Hi Friends, family and heroes!
I’ve got a big update for you. First let me thank you for being patient, taking an interest in the updates, and above all else, supporting me! I wouldn’t be here today writing to tell you that my editor has sent me her editorial letter without, well, you!
That’s right. I now have the notes and feedback from my editor and I’m on the road to revision. Let me just say it is both extremely exciting and psychologically taxing. For someone who makes their living coaching, instructing, and providing feedback to help people become better at their craft and passions, you would think I would be better at receiving feedback on my own work, but that has not been the case. It’s taken me almost a week just to read and digest the information. All the notes are excellent and will absolutely make my book better, but it is difficult not to take them personal. Even though it is not personal. It’s constructive. The aim of the notes is to help me. And I know they will help to make this very personal story more accessible, entertaining and hopefully worthwhile. I share all this with you because, well I guess I just want to say that feedback is not always easy, but it’s how we get better and I’m good at saying it, and trying to be better at exuding it.
I’ve started revising my book and putting the notes into practice and I can already feel the difference. I am so fucking excited to finish this draft and get this book on the shelves! I’m also fucking terrified. This must be like what skydiving is like. I will never jump out of a plane, but I will do this.
I plan to have this next draft done in a month. I’m sharing this with you, so if you see me out or talk to me, you can hold me accountable. It’s not your job, but if you feel like sending me to my room without dinner until I’m done, you’d be doing the difficult work we all will benefit from.
And lastly, I’m making some cuts to a rather large section of the book. I wrote 20,000 words on action movies, and it turns out that’s too many. Which is funny because I had thought 20,000 was a nice trim from the original 30,000. But in retrospect, losing another ten Gs on Tombstone and Robin Hood is a very good idea. I really leaned into talking very specifically about very niche action movies, and it sounds like a transcript of audio lifted from an old cult video store in the Kevin Smith universe. That being said, if you are interested in those pieces, I’ll be posting them as deleted scenes, both in an audio format and likely the whole piece in print. So check the link below for the first one. It’s mildly personal, but mostly just a small essay on the brilliance of Desperado.
https://soundcloud.com/jake-jabbour/grow-n-up-movies-desperado-deleted-scene-from-training-to-be-myself
Ok, thanks again for being great people who believe in me! Know that the feeling is mutual and I am excited to be there for you in the future!
