Going through the second draft of Jack Shilkaitis' sequel to Apostasy, Atonement.After the first draft got Jack nearly 200 comments and corrections in the manuscript and some fairly aggressive general remarks from me ("nothing happens!", "completely pointless") he has taken several months to make a fairly substantial rewrite.
There was an awful lot that was good in that first draft, but this second draft is for me exactly why I do this job. Jack has gone away and worked hard, been very creative and thoughtful, and shown exactly what he is capable of. The new draft has momentum. You will be swept up by a chaotic helter-skelter of events with barely time to think. There are some "big reveals" on some of the mysteries of Apostasy but most of them serve only to deepen the mystery - while at the same time hinting at an underlying coherence. That second part is what the big popular TV dramas of recent years completely failed at (yes, Lost and Heroes, I'm looking at you.)
With Apostasy, Jack convinced me that he can write a solid, convincing, thoughtful and inventive story. With Atonement, he has convinced me that he can deliver excitement, and that he can put real conviction behind his ideas.
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Currently editing: The Downtown Deal by the consistently awesome Mike Dennis.
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P.S. yes I am intending to gush more about my authors.
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