It sounds like a medical condition, doesn’t it?
Each year, we take the last 2 or 3 weeks off to analyze the past year, plan the coming year, and celebrate our wedding anniversary.
See you in January.
Tag: schedule
Proofreading Done on “Love Runs Out”
Yesterday the proofed version of Love Runs Out plopped into my inbox.
I impressed me, I did.
In a 44,000-word novel, there were about 30 typos, and 2 issues with wording, both effectively typos.
That’s a 7/100s of 1% error rate.
James does excellent work. He catches errors even after I’ve gone through a dozen times. His attention to detail is flawless. He also does a certain level of editing, questioning unusual wording, and he loves fact-checking. He really loves fact-checking.
I’ll have the manuscript finalized by end of week, meaning all I have left now is to settle, for sure, finally, absolutely, on the font for the cover.
A New Jake Calcutta Story in March
The second Jake Calcutta story is getting a final proofread this week and will be ready for newsletter readers in my March 1st newsletter, he said with an unusual confidence in his communication schedule.
The second Jake Calcutta story, The Illuminating Adventure of Jake Calcutta and the Second Bite, is less adventure, more backstory. It’s the story of his grandmother, Rachel Kolkata, inventing time travel and taking Jake under her wing in the process. You’ll see Jake meeting the triplets in the lab, and the illustrious and ethereal Felicity Bruttenholm. (You are pronouncing that correctly, aren’t you?)
This one will be for newsletter subscribers only. Won’t be selling it at Amazon, at least not this year, and won’t be giving it away anywhere else.
Progress on Love Runs Out
I’m halfway through rewrites. Plan to finish in early March, then have it edited by end of March, proofread and published by end of April, he said once again obliviously confident in his scheduling prowess.
It needs a new cover, though. The story isn’t red-and-black dark, it’s blue-sky green-forest with dark undertones.
The Best Beloved Seal of Approval
When Sue read the near-final draft of Rafe Keyn and the Temporal Lisle I only wanted one piece of feedback: does it work?
No writerly feedback. No plot ideas. No character suggestions. None of the stuff people always want to say to writers.
Did it suck you in and keep you in?
This late in the game, that’s all I need to know.
And her answer was “Yes.”
Ⓢ
It’s being proofread right now, and I have one or two sentences that need polishing after my current read-through. The cover is done. (See? Right there above.)
I can see the checkered flag. I’ll keep you posted.
What Jake is Doing for His Summer Vacation
Reviewed the notes with Best Beloved and it appears that all is well and I can dive into writing Jake’s story.
Monday. Diving happens Monday.
Let’s get this book done, eh?
Off to See the Editor: A Still, Small Voice (Phil Brennan #2)
Yesterday the final manuscript of the second Phil Brennan mystery, A Still, Small Voice, was trundled off to my marvelous editor Tom Bentley to face the Pain of the Red Pen.
My goal is to have it in your hot little hands by December 1st.
And Still, the Delays . . .
Waited an extra few days for a cover blurb well worth waiting for.
Then, and only then, discovered (via Smashwords’ Premium catalog feedback) that there were some formatting issues no one caught.
Formatter was on vacation.
All fixed now. Cover updated. Proof ordered.
It was supposed to arrive tomorrow.
UPS just updated the delivery date to Friday.
When I’ll have left for a long weekend.
And when it’s supposed to be a rainy, blustery day, a bit like last night when the top 20′ feet of the pine tree near the house dropped into the field.
So, I’ll come home late Monday and hopefully find an undamaged proof of A Long, Hard Look which I’ll inspect and approve.
And then, finally, we’ll ship those preorders.
Which means you can still preorder an autographed copy, if you like.
Progress Report on ‘A Long, Hard Look’
It’s edited and proofread, and almost ready to be formatted.
James, the world’s greatest proofreader, found some logical inconsistencies in the story.
Tom, the editor, agrees with me that, in his words, “It isn’t an equation, its an ebb and tide of hypotheses.”
So, today I check the proofreading notes, make my final font choices, and send it off to Leigh Anne Aston to be formatted.
She’ll have it back by Monday(ish) and then we upload it to CreateSpace, order and check the printed proof, and then you all order a handful of copies each for your reading groups, friends, family, and others.
Yeah. That’s the plan.
Finishing
Chapter 1 went live on January 31st (because that’s when I wrote it.)
I’d had the first sentence rattling around in my head for decades. I typed it, for something to do, and the rest of the first chapter came out as if I’d already written it.
The way it ended, I knew I had to keep going.
“Going” is right. In 58 days I wrote 56 chapters. During that time we also moved everything we owned into storage in order to move out of the house we rented before we left for a month-long business trip, which we also had to pack and prepare for, while maintaining some semblance of our normal life.
When people tell me they don’t have time to write, I marvel. Continue reading “Finishing”
Rigidity and Balance and Forward Momentum
The first year my blog over at Someday Box was live, I posted whenever I felt like it, when something special was going on. When I realized the work I do with Someday Box was our future, I started posting daily.
Except last week.
I’ve been kicking myself for only posting 4 times in 9 or 10 days. Kicking oneself is counter-productive. I cannot move forward while looking backward.
Continue reading “Rigidity and Balance and Forward Momentum”