IWSG May 2026: Editing, Editing, and More Editing...

Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting! Let’s rock the neurotic writing world! Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.

The awesome co-hosts for the May 6 posting of the IWSG are Jenni Enzor, Jemima Pett, Jamie of Uniquely Maladjusted but Fun, and Kim Lajevardi!

The following link will allow you to peruse everyone in the Blog Hop.

Link | IWSG Blog Hop Participants 

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May 6 question - What was the most inspiring feedback you received from readers, including agents, editors, and beta readers?

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Hello, friends!

Getting this posted a bit late today.

April was quite the month. I hit the ground running and didn't stop until May 1st, when I crashed out after work this past weekend and played a video game all weekend and just didn't care if anything got done.

It was a very good month, but it's the busiest I've been in a very long time. Some of it came back to me not really being sure how to stagger my editing clients and some of my editing projects ended up overlapping more than intended. I had three projects that I touched in April. A 95k contemporary workplace romance I finished up right at the end of March but had to do some follow up with in April, a 70k paranormal wolf shifter romance, and a 140k fae epic fantasy sequel. On top of that, I think I mentioned in the last post that my copy edits for THE TINSEL TWIST dropped two weeks early, right at the end of March.

Of course, I had to shift around my schedule to focus on my copy edits. I got those finished and sent them back mid-month. Which was great because it means my book production is still two weeks ahead of schedule. I was supposed to get my pass pages around May 18th, and we got the formatting ironed out and my pass pages hit my inbox yesterday!

It's so wild to think that I'm already to that point that I'm looking at a formatted version of my book and that my ARCs are about to be made. Hopefully when I do my June post, I'll be able to share a picture of me holding a print copy of my book! I am officially less than six months to release!

On top of all of those things going on, we went to JordanCon in Atlanta at the middle of the month. JordanCon has been on my radar for a decade at least, but this was our first time going. We decided to go this year because Brandon Sanderson was going to be there. JordanCon is a con that is based around Wheel of Time/Robert Jordan, but Sanderson hadn't been there in quite a number of years. While I've not read much of the WoT series, the con still has a wide variety of panels and guests to offer that aren't WoT specific.

We were able to get into the Sanderson reading/Q&A and it was so cool. Apparently, he's giving a lecture later this month at Oxford about Tolkien's influence on fantasy, and he read the lecture to us as a test run. Essentially, we got to be "beta listeners" and it was really freaking cool to hear him talk about Tolkien and the origins of fantasy.

We did one of the lightning signings, so I wasn't able to get a pic with him, but we did get a couple of books signed. I was so bummed that I couldn't find my original MISTBORN from the early 2010s. I don't have a clue what happened to it, so I had to run to the store and grab a new one before the con. I'm sure it'll turn up one day in some random place. That or my ex kept it for some reason. Who knows. Regardless, I was able to get a copy signed, even if it wasn't my original first Sanderson book I ever owned.

I had a really great time at JordanCon aside from meeting Sanderson. There was a nerdy performance by the Peachtree Symphonic Winds playing things like the Star Trek theme and the Star Wars theme and Carmina Burana. There were great writing track panels and fantasy panels. And a lot of my friends were there, so it was great to get to see them before Dragon Con in September. I think we'll try to go back to JordanCon next year, but it's always going to have to be a choice between going to it or one of the summer cons like ConCarolinas, which is coming up at the end of this month. I've also applied to a few romance specific events next year, and one is in February, so if I get in as a guest at that, then I'll have to consider if I can do anything else in the first half of next year, because Dragon Con and Multiverse in the fall are non-negotiable because I volunteer for both.

At the end of the month, I had my author photoshoot scheduled, so during all my other running around, I was trying to get my makeup and dress and hair and everything figured out for my photos. Then, the weather was being finnicky and we had to play it by ear because my shoot was outside. That whole ordeal made me a nervous wreck, not to mention I had a lot of anxiety around it in general because I've never liked a single professional photo I've had done, and while I generally like only a small percentage of these proofs, I do have some that I really love. I just got back my proofs today, so I'll soon have some official professional author photos!

So yeah, April was a whirlwind. It kind of started the last week of March and kept going and then I have mostly crashed out. I've been reading a lot the last few days and doing some outreach to try to get authors willing to blurb my debut now that I'm almost to ARCs. I can't believe people are actually going to be reading my book soon. (And passing judgment. Yikes!) And I've been spending some time trying to catch up on marketing stuff. I hardly did any social media stuff last month. But, I joined a fun collab today where we matched our book covers up with outfits from the Met Gala, and my cover basically looks like it stole the color palette from this archival Versace dress from 2006 that Blake Lively wore.

I also decided to set up an Instagram and a Facebook page for my editing services, to help differentiate them from my author page. I didn't want to start another social media handle to keep up with, but I do think it was for the best. Plus, the Facebook page gives clients a place to leave reviews.

Feel free to check them out or give me a follow!

Link || R&Q Author Services on Instagram

Link || R&Q Author Services on Facebook

May Question

Today's question asks: What was the most inspiring feedback you received from readers, including agents, editors, and beta readers?

You know, it's really hard to pinpoint just one piece of feedback. In this process this last year or two of querying and going on submission and now going through edits with my publisher, I've really received a lot of lovely feedback (and of course, some not so lovely feedback).

But this is an industry that really tries to cut you down, especially once reader reviews start rolling in, and there's nothing you can do about those, so I think it's important to try to take inspiration from every piece of positive feedback you get. Otherwise, it would be too easy to give up.

I will say, my latest copy editor said some things that really helped me believe my book is landing the way I intend it too. She was very excited for two of the side characters and hoping I had plans to write books for both of them (I do, if my publisher wants them). And she also commented on how my mid-30s characters handle things like mid-30s characters with maturity instead of like 20-year-olds that I just labeled as mid-30s. Those kinds of things help me to know that I did accomplish writing what I set out to write.

I used to have a few slides of unhinged beta reader feedback on my page for The Tinsel Twist, but that was when I was trying to attract an agent or editor, to show that readers were enjoying the book. I took it down because I hope to replace it soon with blurbs from authors or snippets of reviews from readers or even trade reviews. I do have a lot of anxiety about what total strangers are going to think of my book, very few have read it. I got great feedback from both my line editor and copy editor, but they're professionals, and while I know their feedback was sincere, they were still paid to help me make my work better, and as editors it's nice to deliver constructive feedback alongside something that makes the author feel good. I know readers often say whatever they think, and I know my book isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea, so I am very antsy about my ARCs going out soon and then my book being out in the wild.

Honestly, lately I've had a few authors I've looked up to for years tell me they're proud of me, no matter how they feel about my book or that it's not in a genre they read, they're proud of me and what I've accomplished, and that maybe inspires me more than any comments I could get on my writing.

I should probably stop yapping now. I'm curious though, how do you deal with feedback that isn't always great? Or is even meant to be mean and tear your down (because let's face it, it happens from keyboard warriors). I'd love to hear how you deal with not so great feedback in the comments!

Anyway, thanks for stopping by!

Looking forward to traversing the blog hop and reading about other people's experiences with their old writing.

For now,

Rosie J.

The Tinsel Twist in which a recipe for love requires a dash of danger releases November 3rd from Turner Publishing.

Add on Goodreads or preorder wherever books are sold (including internationally).

Link | Linktree

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