Editing is DONE!
Hang on a minute -- I've got to catch my breath.
This last month has been INTENSE! I recruited the aid of a professional editor, Lauree White, in January, and received her suggestions for "Choose To Believe" in early February. Needless to say, she found a LOT more opportunities for improvement than my friend, Toni, had.
Around the same time, my wife, Linda, read through the book and noted down areas where she felt the material could be improved. Between the two sets of suggestions, I had a BIG job to do. As chance would have it, as I worked through the manuscript making needed corrections, I found other issues that could be improved as well.
The result is that now I feel my new book is TWICE as strong as it was before. Two chapters were combined, a section was thrown out, a few pages were completely rewritten, and countless minor edits improved the flow of ideas.
Beyond the editing, I've now added the Resource section and Bibliography I had planned, as well as much of the front matter -- About the Author, Acknowledgements, Copyright info, etc.
Today, I uploaded the files and ordered 10 copies (through LuLu.com) to send out to the major media for advance review. These are the publications that review books for bookstores and those in the industry. Because I won't get those until next week, and it will take nearly another week for them to arrive at their destinations, the 'official' publication date had to be pushed back to July instead of June.
I've set the 'official' publication date to be July 5th, 2008. I realize that this is close to several major holidays around the world, including Independence Day here in the US. Considering how well last year's special for the KTP Mastery System went (which happened around the same time period), I don't have any worries about the timing.
Besides, from what I've seen, the 'official' publication date of a book has little to do with the ultimate success of a book. It's far more important to get noticed by those who are influential within a community. Because of this, I'll be sending out LOTS of review copies to those who have large audiences, and this will include popular bloggers as well as those in traditional media.
But before I can do all that, I want to set up a website for the new book. I've already registered a domain name and loaded the content software. Content pages will come later, perhaps next week or the week after. I'll announce the new site when it's ready.
For right now, I need to take a day off and recover my energy. I feel as if I've just given birth.