Writing a Novel: How I’m Doing on Born in a Treacherous Time I

I thought I’d give monthly updates on my progress with my next novel, Born in a Treacherous Time:

A band of early humans struggle to survive a world where violence and chaos rule.  Think Man vs Wild rather than National Geographic.

With a planned publication date of May-June, here’s how I’m doing.

• I’ve completed substantive changes like checking timelines, plot points, and character development.
• I’m self-editing using Grammarly and Autocrit, in preparation for submittal to my editor. This includes spelling, grammar, word use, adverbs, dialogue tags, and more.
• I haven’t even considered a cover yet. I have no idea what it would be and I need to provide some sort of idea to the talented folks at Paper and Sage.
• I’m considering calling this a spin-off of To Hunt a Sub which has a secondary plot about a paleolithic female (named Lucy) who the main character (Kali) turns to for mentoring and support as she struggles with her modern-day problems. Born in a Treacherous Time is Lucy’s story, how she copes with the same problems we all do though with very different tools at her disposal. But, most of the reviews on To Hunt a Sub don’t mention Lucy so I wonder if she’s relevant enough to be considered a spin-off. Any thoughts?
• I have a few writers I’d like to contact for recommendations who wrote wonderful books in this genre–paleohistoric fiction. If you have ideas for me on that sort of writer, let me know!

This is a start. I’ll let you know how it goes next month!

More on Born in a Treacherous Time:

My Research at the Library of Congress 

My First Piece of Writing

Book Review: Lucy

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Jacqui Murray is the author of the popular Building a Midshipman, the story of her daughter’s journey from high school to United States Naval Academy, and the thrillers, To Hunt a Sub and  Twenty-four Days. She is also the author/editor of over a hundred books on integrating tech into education, adjunct professor of technology in education, webmaster for four blogs, an Amazon Vine Voice book reviewer,  a columnist for TeachHUB, monthly contributor to Today’s Author and a freelance journalist on tech ed topics. You can find her books at her publisher’s website, Structured Learning.

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