'The Fracking War' gets ready for first round of editing

WATKINS GLEN, New York, USA - After a full month of not looking at the completed draft of The Fracking War, I printed out all five sections in the last two days, burning through a whole printer cartridge in the process.

Five sections, 100,000 words

But now it's printed out and the work - my work - begins with a full, red-pencil-in-hand read through. I will do that on the hard copy, making editorial comments along the way, just like I did for more years than I would like to count on student work.

When that process is done, I will boot up the draft of the book on this computer, making changes as needed, and possibly add  (or delete) sections. Whole chapters might get dumped, too, or expanded and other chapters added. I tried not to read as I printed it out, though peeking was too tempting at times.

But the month-long break from looking at it means I should be able to read the draft almost like a fresh piece of literature. At least I hope it's fresh and doesn't read (or smell) like a month-old tuna.

Once my editing/rewriting/rejiggering is done in the next few weeks, off the draft will go to three beta readers for their take on The Fracking War.

A number of people have asked me, "How many pages is it?" The answer? I have no idea. The total word count for the five sections is close to 100,000 words. That makes it longer than most books you would pick up in the airport to read on a flight, but way, way short of a Stephen King blockbuster. 

The other question is, "What's your next book about?"

Kee-rist, I'm just hoping to survive the publishing of The Fracking War. But I suppose as a follow up I could team up with Adm. Fox and we could write something a little lighter, maybe The Art of Sofa Surfing. 

Or we could write a non-fiction book about our adventures in Mexico.

No, not ready to tackle that.