Good luck Brian!

Writing a novel is a huge undertaking, as I know from first-hand (incomplete) experience.

I once submitted a short story to a competition. The woman running it contacted me before ruling on who won and told me she liked it so much that she'd give me a choice - get the first place and $100 prize, or withdraw it so she'll award first place to the runner up, and she'd give me free developmental editing if I turned it into a novel within the following year.

I chose the second option, of course.

It's been well over 10 years and I'm stuck about halfway through with 45k words or so. :(

I'll finish it one day. I hope. Though I may need to write a simpler novel first and then get back to this one.