End of the year leap of faith
After fifty rejections, I almost put Residuum to rest. I laid it aside for a few months before picking it back up, determined to get my character’s story told. I did rewrites in almost every chapter, and I had a professional editor help me out.
I gained confidence again after my editor loved it and was eagerly asking for a sequel! It was the first time that someone who reads books for a living loved my work. After taking her notes and suggestions, I felt like Residuum was as polished as it was ever going to get.
So a year later, I’m putting it out for queries again. It’s like throwing my child into highly competitive beauty pageants, I don’t know if I’m ready to have professionals judge something so personal to me.
My editor has faith in it, so I might as well have faith in it! 
In the meantime, I put together an aesthetic board for Residuum here: