Preparing for Draft 2

On my revision plan and digging out from the snow

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This Saturday, February 7, 2026 from 12-2pm ET, I'm hosting a special live training and hands-on workshop for authors looking to build thier email funnels.

Together we'll map out what you need, choose your reader magnet, demystify the tech, and draft your welcome email.

If you're looking to grow your list, connect with readers, sell more books, and leave with real progress, then join me!

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Mentioned in the podcast:

• Build Your Author Funnel LIVE – Sat. Feb 7, 2026

• The Inevitable Undoing of Zahara Douglass – releases August 11, 2026

• Scene Study: Before & After – “The Eternal Library”

• Aeon Timeline software

• Locally Crafted in Gaithersburg, MD

• HBCU grads, please take my survey: https://tally.so/r/zx7kJg

• Read for Pixels Event

The following is an edited transcript of my podcast episode.

Hello friends. Today is Friday, January 30, 2026, and this is episode 256 of My Imaginary Friends. I’m Leslye. This whole week has felt very weird because I’ve been in the house because of the snowstorm.

Just a reminder: you can sign up for the Footnotes newsletter, which includes show notes for each episode and posts with inspiration, strategies, and ideas to help you grow as a creative, at myimaginaryfriends.net/footnotes. When you sign up, you can choose to become an Imaginary Best Friend for a few dollars a month and get access to premium posts, as well as discounts on my courses and workshops.

Speaking of which, I’m holding a live workshop on Saturday, February 7th at 12 p.m. ET. It’s called Build Your Author Funnel LIVE. It’s a hands-on working session and live training to help you build an email system—an email funnel—so if you’re an author interested in email funnels, that’s for you. You can get more information at https://theauthor.digital/funnel-live/.

I take a lot of workshops. I buy a lot of classes. And then I either don’t take them, don’t finish them, or don’t do the thing. So I want to do the thing. 2026 is about doing the thing.

This week’s best thing: I’m planning on leaving the house today for the first time in seven days. I’m in Maryland, and we got about thirteen and a half inches of snow where I live last week. I couldn’t go to the gym or work out but I got my workout through shoveling thirteen and a half inches of snow off my car and steps.

Other than that, I haven’t left the house. The roads have been wild. Fortunately, my neighborhood has been plowed, but I’ve seen videos where other neighborhoods weren’t plowed at all, which is pretty scary. I’m finally going to go mail some books that people ordered from my store, so I feel confident leaving the house.

I don’t actually mind not leaving the house. I’m an extreme introvert. Staying home for a week, mostly doing work, has been fine. It’s been very busy lately.

Libraryaddict commented, “These are not fun workouts.” That is true. They are not. I was trying to deadlift snow—lift with your legs, not your back—but yeah, I’d rather be doing my normal workouts.

For my writing update, I have a couple of weeks of notes. I was planning the revision for Blitches, my Black witches story, which is the next novel I’m working on. I wrote the first draft as a script, if you’ve seen my previous podcasts about that.

I finally reread the entire script. I’d taken a few weeks off to work on copyedits for the book coming out in August, The Inevitable Undoing of Zahara Douglass. Next week I have to dive back into proofreader notes for that, so it’s still not done. ARCs should be coming next month—fingers crossed.

For Blitches, which still doesn’t have a title, I reread the script and wrote down my notes. It’s actually good and exciting—thrilling, even—until the end. I need to figure out villains, motivations, plots, and plans. Those were my basic notes.

I also did a Substack post this morning showing a first draft versus final draft of the opening scene of a short story I wrote a few years ago, “The Eternal Library”. It’s about three immortal librarians and a monstrous bookworm eating the library.

Thinking through how I get from a first draft to a final draft is always interesting. I love revision—it’s one of my favorite parts of the writing process—but it’s also daunting. I spent several weeks planning the revision without even getting back into writing yet, playing three-dimensional chess in my mind and moving pieces around.

I want this Blitches story to be really twisty. It’s a murder mystery. It takes place at a university, and I’m deciding whether it’s dark academia or just a story set at a university. I’m taking a dark academia class right now, and there are elements I’m interested in and elements I’m not.

My script was about 118 pages—very bare bones. The synopsis I’ll be working from for the next draft is about fourteen pages, roughly 4,400 words. That’s a whole short story as a synopsis, which isn’t unusual for me, especially with multiple POVs and a complex structure.

To get from the script to the synopsis, I had to write everything out to understand the story. I even kept a written diary of my thoughts so I could remember why I was making certain decisions.

I decided to add another character... and another murder. I had good reasons for this. Originally, I thought about changing the original murder victim, but instead I kept them and added a second one. It helped with tension and allowed for more twists, more suspects.

I had a brainstorm while getting my hair twisted. Getting my hair done takes about two to two and a half hours, and because of wrist and elbow issues, I can’t really hold my Kindle for that long and read while it’s happening. So I just sit with my thoughts, and it actually helps me work through story problems.

There are layers of villainy in this story, fake-outs, and reveals. Adding another murder had ripple effects. It reminded me of programming—when you change one thing, it ripples through the whole system. Writing and revision work the same way.

Princess asks how I create the synopsis after the first draft. Good question.

My process is usually to read through the first draft and evaluate what I like and don’t like. I often go scene by scene and create a map or spreadsheet—sometimes by hand, sometimes digitally. I list what each scene is doing and whether it’s working.

Then I tell myself the story again from beginning to end and ask: how did the first draft not meet my expectations? What’s missing? I write a new synopsis that reflects how the next draft should work.

It’s a lot of iteration. I had a clean version about a week and a half ago, but it wasn’t quite right, so I stepped away and came back to it.

This time, I also created a detailed timeline. I used Aeon Timeline initially, then built a spreadsheet with days as columns and characters as rows, tracking what each character is doing and who sees what. For a twisty story, I needed a map.

POVs were a challenge. I wanted a structure like the movie Weapons, where each POV rewinds the timeline and shows what that character was doing. I wasn’t sure I could pull it off, so the timeline helped me figure out who had secrets, who saw what, and when.

It’s not exactly what I envisioned at the beginning, but it’s still cool and still twisty. That may change again once I start writing, but the plan is detailed enough that I feel good about it.

If you’re not on my reader newsletter, I’m doing a survey for people who attended HBCUs for research purposes. I went to Howard in the late ’90s, so I know those experiences, but I’d love to hear from anyone who attended an HBCU.

Next week I’ll be responding to proofreader queries for Zahara and then starting draft two of Blitches. I’m excited, a little scared, and a little daunted, as usual, but I feel good about the synopsis.

In other news, I went to a bedazzling workshop. My friend Ines Johnson introduced me to it. It’s in Gaithersburg, Maryland, which is where I grew up. We bedazzled books. I bedazzled The Obsidian Curse, The Cupid Guild, and The Monsters We Defy. Clara’s hat ribbon is sparkly, and the title words are in white rhinestones.

I’ve been looking for an off-screen hobby that doesn’t aggravate my wrists or elbows. Coloring helps, but even that can be irritating. Bedazzling isn’t, though it’s rough on my neck because I’m hunched over placing tiny rhinestones. Still, it’s relaxing, and I can listen to audiobooks while I do it.

I might use these for giveaways or put them in my store. They’ll be around eventually if you’re interested in a book bedazzled by the author.

The Obsidian Curse had been stuck as unavailable on Barnes & Noble for months, but that’s finally fixed. If you were trying to buy it there before, it’s available again.

I also want to say this: I’ve seen people low-key shaming authors for not focusing exclusively on the terrible things happening in Minneapolis and all over this country and world. I don’t like that. For my mental health, sometimes I step away from the news. Creating a space that isn’t about politics doesn’t mean someone doesn’t care.

We’re not all obligated to use our platforms the same way. You don’t know what people are doing behind the scenes. Social media can be very performative and not indicative of real actions.

Libraryaddict says in the chat, “we need joy to sustain us.” If you read my books, my positions on many issues are clear in my writing.

Princess asks whether ARCs for Zahara will be on NetGalley. Usually my publisher does put them there, so that’s a cautious yes. I’ll know more next month.

I’ve gotten some custom art for Zahara and Annica, the twins in the new book, and I’ll be revealing that soon. I’ve also already started ordering swag for the preorder campaign. I’m trying to do things early and pace myself.

Next week’s goals are proofreading Zahara and starting draft two of Blitches.

Thank you for being here. You can subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen and watch video episodes on YouTube. You can email me at podcast@lpenelope.com and leave a rating or review to support the show.

Thanks, y’all. Stay warm and safe.