Monday October 19th 10:30 am Jennifer Uphoff Gray – Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Forward Theater
 
Monday November 2nd 10:30 am Michael Herold – Co-Founder of Forward Theater and professional actor.  Performed in virtual production of Lifespan of a Fact
 
Monday November 16th 10:30 am Sandy Kintner – Member Sun Prairie Civic Theater Board of Directors, actor and director.
 
Monday December 7th. 10:30 am Dr. Iva Ugrcic, Co-Founder of LunArt Festival, professional musician, teacher. 
 
Live stream www.sunprairiemediacenter.com or tune in to 103.5 FM
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I begin with a caveat.  These comments are based on only my experience.  I don’t believe I have a bias and I freely admit my own short comings.
 
I like to developmental audit.  I hate to edit for grammar, style, readability and other technical edits.  I decided I needed to take on the task of the technical edits myself rather than turning it over to someone else and paying for the service.  I’m aware of a number of software packages designed to be author friendly and guide a person through these unpleasant tasks.

I spent weeks researching various programs, reading reviews and independent appraisals.  I decided to purchase prowritingaid.com.  They offered a basic package for $79 for a year access to the app.  I thought that was a reasonable investment in myself.
After opening the app I learned it was designed to edit only 30 pages.  My draft novel is about 260 pages.  If the advertising included this fact, I missed it.  I thought I could maybe review 30 pages at a time and work my way through the draft.  Nope.  Didn’t work.  The limit was cast in stone like Excalibur.    Prowritingaid.com offers a lifetime license with unlimited pages for review.  I swallowed my pride and spent another $239.00 for the lifetime license.

 I ran the summary report which was useful and pointed me in the direction of specific improvements.  I thought I could whip through the grammar report in short order.  I had over 500 grammar mistakes.  When I reviewed the list of mistakes I learned the program somehow converted the first letter of many words to a ‘dash’ and I had to remove each dash.  Rubbish.

Next I ran the ‘sticky sentences’ report.  I had over 400 sticky sentences.  A sticky sentence is one with too many “connecting” words that don’t serve a purpose.  I found this report useful but tedious.  Because I reviewed the entire document rather than just 30 pages when I made a correction the program would freeze.  It took me about 30 hours to make corrections.
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My writing was improved by correcting sticky sentences but the process was like pulling teeth without novocaine. My conclusion is the software was designed to work on small pieces – 30 pages or less – not an 80,000 word manuscript.
Have you tried editing software to improve your draft?  If yes, please let me know.