Debut authors sometimes wonder when the whole “published author” thing starts to feel real. I’m not speaking for others, but when an uber-author like Laurie Halse Anderson takes a photo of your ARC and posts it on her blog, it feels real, boy.

Really, really real.

In all there were 25 excellent entries. The Teen Judges Three had a difficult task choosing just one heart to receive the prizes. Past members of award committees would admire the very serious way they went about the task of vetting the choices and then going behind closed doors to come to consensus about one heart.

Here are their comments about the winning entry:
“Congrats! I think your candy heart is amusing and creative. It took awhile to decide on the winning candy heart though. I enjoyed many of them.”
–Judge D.

“Congratulations!!!!! I loved your candy heart. I thought it was clever and amusing. I really enjoyed reading all of them, even the ones that didn’t win. It took awhile of debating back and forth and rereading to decide on the winner.
–Judge C. #1

“Ohmigosh, I love your candy heart. It was very creative and hilarious. I cracked up the first time I read it. I debated another heart but yours caught my attention. We decided on the Best!!”
–Judge C. #2

The envelope please.
Riiip.

The winning heart is:

Submitted by

afraclose at http://afraclose.livejournal.com/76994.html

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Audio Rights: David Macinnis Gill’s SOUL ENCHILADA to Tim Ditlow at Brilliance Audio, at auction by Rosemary Stimola at Stimola Literary Studio.

After I sold SOUL ENCHILADA, the one thing I hoped for, thought would be totally, completely, awesomely awesome would be to hear the voice of my characters coming through the earbuds of my iPod.

And now…

This is a die cast 1:18 scale model of the 1958 Cadillac Biarritz with maroon exterior and cream-colored interior. It’s loaded with chrome, sports fancy white walls (which make enticing targets for rogue coyotes), and had a grill that would intimidate Beelzebub himself.

That means the person that the judges think has the best candy heart will receive both the signed ARC of Soul Enchilada and the model of the Cadillac Biarritz.

Reminder: The contest is open until July 31^st so there’s plenty of time to enter.

I got the idea for the first contest from something one of the characters in Soul Enchilada (SoulEnchilada.com) reads off of a warped fortune cookie: “If you love something, set it free before you have to pay child support.”

Here’s the candy heart I created with the phrase:

Now, let’s see what you can create!

To enter:

1. Create your own candy heart at http://www.cryptogram.com/hearts/ . Your heart can say anything you’d like. You are not limited to phrases from the ARC (since you haven’t read it).

2. Copy and paste this entire post–as well as the image of your candy heart–on your blog, Facebook, MySpace, website, etc.

3. Once you’ve completed #3, email me at davidmacinnisgill AT gmail.com with the link to your post. Voila! You’re entered in the giveaway.

4. The contest will be judged by three teen readers based on the criteria of originality, design, and message. The contest closes July 31st.

5. The prize is a personalized, signed ARC and a special gift, TDB by the judges. The winner will be contacted via email. Her/his name and winning entry candy heart will be posted on my lj blog, as well as my home site DavidMacinnisGill.com.

Good Luck!

I enjoyed working on the manuscript too much, and if I gave it up, I’d be expected to start a new book. And we all known that I am a fraud who somehow convinced a group of very smart, able people that I can write a novel.

At 6:20 PM, after letting the manuscript ferment for all of 14 minutes, I opened the envelope then started sorting.Edited pages to the left, unmarked pages to the discard pile. Over 80% of the pages required some sort of edit.I’ll pause here to add that only once in the process of revisions did I stet one of AEV’s suggestions. It was a one-liner that was mildly humorous by itself, but I had referencedit at least twice more in the novel and used it to set up a reveal later (a free Tupperware bowl to the first astute reader who can guess the stet’ed line).

Generally, I used he same process before—cull, reword, and then rewrite. The last three chapters required some cutting, which is easier than writing new pieces. I was satisfied that the last chapter had the new touches AEV asked for (better opening line, more humor, less sap), I let Microsoft Sam read key sequences and the final chapters to me.I found at least six typos in the last chapter, even after proofing it three times. Best of all, I didn’t fall asleep once, and I made my deadline to the minute.

I said in the last post that this was the most difficult revision. So what made it so hard? Not the actual line edits, because although they were numerous, they were minor. Not the cutting because it made the story tighter and saved me time having to recast a few clunky passages. No, it was the finality of it. I knew that when the manuscript went to copyediting, it would no longer be the story that AEV and I had made. It would become a book that was shared with others, and despite the fact that I’ll have to respond to copyedits, my writing would be done: the story that revision 3 created would be the novel Soul Enchilada.