addisonbrae

Do over. New beginning. Reboot. We’ve all had at least one fresh start. Some people run away from something horrible and have to start over. Many have no choice because they’ve lost a job. Others, like my friend who was a big inspiration for Becker Circle, run to their new beginning. This week, she’s leaving Dallas, her home of about ten years, for Nashville to fulfill a dream she’s had since she was a teenager.

Then there are those who run both away and toward like Gillian, the main character in Becker Circle. She escaped an abusive boyfriend to seek her dream of being strong and independent for her fresh start. Gillian schemed and worked her butt off to graduate Harvard a semester early and slip out of Boston while her boyfriend was away for the holidays. She wasn’t choosey about her destination as long as it was far away from him, came with a great job offer, and gave her room to breathe. That’s how she ended up in the trendy urban area of Dallas called Becker Circle.

Like Gillian, and all of us, fresh starts come with experimentation. Downright screw-ups. Mistakes are how we know we really are starting over. When Gillian moved into Becker Circle, she made many bad choices—some even put her life in danger. She owned up to them, learned from each one, and tried to not repeat the same mistakes. She always knew they were her choices and no one else’s.

Live your fresh start!

After an author writes a manuscript, they revise it, revise it again times 10, and hopefully a publisher acquires the manuscript. Then the real editing begins. This edit phase is a critical behind-the-curtain process to get a manuscript ready for readers’ eyes many people don’t know happens.

An editor who works with the publishing house uses a critical eye to check for plot, character, scene, pacing, too many dialogue tags, and other content issues that might distract readers. Then they look for all of the grammar, sentence structure and punctuation you may or may not remember from your English classes in school. Editors follow the CHICAGO MANUAL OF STYLE and have an eagle eye for passive voice, overused words, run-on and fragment sentences, gerunds (the ing words), and adverbs (the ly words). A professional proofreader does the real crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s final edit before the book is formatted for e-readers and print. After a thorough 49 ¼-hour edit over 8 days, the BECKER CIRCLE manuscript draft was ready for handing over to the professionals with:

• 360 fewer instances passive-voice word culprits was, were, is and are
• 69 less uses of vague words including tried to, about to and nearly
• 832 fewer weak words that, of and it
• 319 less overused verbs like feel, know, guess, think, watch, and see

These are edits readers may never notice. To me, this tidying up is like coming home to a clean house. It just feels good.

Happy reading!

 

Whether you go solo, with friends, or are with your true love, everyone should enjoy a special Valentine’s Day-themed cocktail. Here are recipes for five red cocktails Gillian and her fellow bartenders served during a busy Valentine’s Saturday night at the George & Dragon Public House in Becker Circle.

RED NAIL
1 oz. your favorite vodka
1 oz. Campari
Mix in cocktail glass, add four ice cubes, and let the drink sit for a few minutes before serving.

LADY KILLER
1 oz. gin
½ oz. orange liqueur
½ oz. apricot brandy
2 oz. passion-fruit juice
2 oz. pineapple juice
This one’s more pink then red. Shake ingredients with ice in a shaker, strain into a champagne flute or highball glass over ice and garnish it with mint and a cherry.

LOVE BITE
1 oz. cherry liqueur
1 oz. orange liqueur (clear works best)
1 oz. cream
Pour the cherry liqueur into a cocktail glass. Layer the orange liqueur on top by pouring over the back of a tea spoon. Top with cream. Add an orange wedge garnish to dress it up.

SCARLETT O’HARA
2 oz. Southern Comfort
Splash of lime juice
6 oz. cranberry juice
This recipe varies with some suggesting whiskey or amaretto. Any good southerner will only use Southern Comfort. Pour Southern Comfort and lime juice into a highball glass filled with ice. Fill with cranberry juice. Garnish with a lime wedge.

RED HOT SHOT
¼ oz. silver tequila
¾ oz. cinnamon schnapps (Aftershock Hot & Cool is red)
There are many varieties of this recipe, but this is my favorite. Stir the ingredients in a mixing glass with ice and strain into a shot glass. If you want to get really fancy, pulse about 8 cinnamon hard candies in a food processor until ground into a powder. Add about 2 teaspoons salt. Run a lemon wedge around the shot glasses and dip them into the cinnamon-salt mix. Instead, you can tiny red and white baking sprinkles.

Please don’t drink and drive or drink and dial.