Susan McEachern

I wrote about my favorite dystopia series Sunset Rising in this post here, but there's more to the story. I am especially fond of this series, not just because it's fantastic writing, but because I ended up befriending the author, S.M. McEachern, a year ago.

To be honest, I download a lot of free ebooks for my Kindle but rarely read any of them. I have hundreds of unread books in my elibrary. ^^; I may use a recipe from a cookbook, skim a romance novel, or try out a scifi/fantasy/supernatural/adventure series but usually only for a couple of chapters.

In the current cultural zeitgeist of YA dystopia series written from the 1st-person POV of a "regular but special" teenage girl, Sunset Rising was that rare find that grabbed my interest from the 1st page and kept it until the last. (Plus, no vapid heroine, repetitive words, or lame love triangle.) I got totally engrossed in the story and world, read it twice in a row, and then, because I'm OCD, sent grammar/typo corrections to the author's website comments.

When the 2nd book came out, I actually purchased it. It's the only time I felt compelled to buy a sequel, and I think it was the 1st ebook I actually paid money for. XD Halfway through Worlds Collide, I tweeted McEachern about mistakes I'd found, and she gave me her email to send a list. Turns out that she had sent her manuscript to a professional editing company and 2 proofreaders, but they had all missed like 95% of the errors I caught. She thanked me and decided to wait for me to finish the book and send any other errors before she resubmitted a corrected version to Amazon.

So yeah, I accidentally became an editor on a book. Susan (as she asked me to call her) thanked me and even gifted me with a signed copy of the Sunset Rising paperback! That's how we became internet friends. :D

Later, I was on her list of beta readers who receive Advanced Reader Copies to give feedback to the author before final revision. She sent me the ARC for the 3rd book New World Order, I sent a bunch of corrections/suggestions, and again Susan thanked me for my "eagle eyes" catching things before publication. She even said I should work in editing, and I kind of do some freelance proofreading/editing now. ^^;

Susan is a wonderful writer and person. I'm really looking forward to her next work. =)