Where are you? (in your novel)

Doing another draft before putting it on the end of a line to try and reel in an agent. If that doesn't work it'll have to be dynamite in the water... or self-publish

Rearranging scenes unsuccessfully.

Gwen just arrived at the bookstore where she works. The store is on fire. She meets with the store's owner and a regular client. The store is on fire because Gwen's husband wants her to stop working and just take care of him and the house. It wouldn't do for a bank manager to have a wife who works outside.

Waiting on feedback from my editor, hoping I don't have another large structural edit in my future. Writing shorts in the meantime, so I don't forget how to, but without diving too deeply into another story.

sorta four-eighty... writing new at one end, chopping off in the middle and rewriting at the other end. i'm sure it's gonna be an-almost piece of art when it's done

Re-plotting Seer for draft #2. I'm going to play around with making this draft a more direct Cassandra Myth adaptation, but I'm a little concerned about POV in this draft. I might have to do multiple POVs this time. Not sure yet.

Plotting Love Spares in preparation for Camp NaNo in April. I'm completely in love with this story. Here's hoping the love lasts.

I'm making moves toward finishing The Forgotten Life of Desiree King and The Hotel Kincaid. It's been over a year. I'm so ready to be done, but I still love the stories. Dez is debating giving up her middle-age memories to be with SPT as a young woman. Sahar is debating giving up 2014 to live in the 1940s with her best friends. I'm beginning to sense a theme here.

Currently attempting to rework the novel-- basically trying to work on the second draft but it is going slowly. It's hard to stick to a schedule but I am trying.

Pushing through the climax and figuring out how to end my novel in less than fifteen chapters (27 so far)

About a quarter of the way through and someone's been stabbed. The attacker's still on the loose and everyone's stuck on an underground farm.

Obsessing about my opening. Again. I hate the first page with a passion. Can't seem to get exactly what I want out of it and it drives me crazy from time to time. I'll be happily writing along chapter to chapter and then I'll reread the opening. Bleh. Don't like it. When I get obsessive like this I have to stop everything else and work on that wretched opening. I know I'll get it right eventually, but in the meantime.....

In the only WIP that I'm working on that I can definitively refer to as a novel (others are in uncertain territory due to being unsure of their length or being an anthology that forms the function of a novel but without the structure), I am about 25,000 words into what I expect to come to about 70,000 words first draft and will probably pare down from there. I was working on it for NaNo in 2013, worked myself into a frenzy trying to make word count with numerous other projects and responsibilities, and burned myself out on the story by mid-December. I've worked myself back up to working on big projects and want to finish the fan-fiction I'm working on now, and intend to pick up where I left off once I'm done.

Halfway through part five of seven. Vacillating between a state of insisting that I "don't know" what the big crisis will be, when in fact I do but I'm afraid to write it because of the second state: suspicion that it will have to be much longer than I intended, and will lend it self to sequels (please NO!)

Hit the approximate halfway point this weekend - protagonists survived the initial onslaught and are starting to understand the nature of the big bad, although they haven't figured out yet what to do about it and time is running out.

On page 410, whereon Nadeer, after having torched his neighborhood and stabbed his best friend, is sold off to a pervert by his uncle in order to keep certain things under wraps and preserve family honor. Poor guy, should've killed him off 20 pages earlier when he asked me to.

The sequel to the novel that's being shopped right now is at a delicate place. I'm writing the scene that I think is the catalyst that gets the main plot rolling (about 15% of the way in), and my mind is balking at how their monarch is going to rationalize splitting them up so two go on a diplomatic mission as bodyguards and keepers for her snot-faced son and the other is sent to a neighboring kingdom to try and heal their ailing Patriarch (who must survive for a while longer, since his country is embroiled in a civil war that could spill over and cause all kinds of trouble if his government falls).

Two different countries here, two different diplomats, and I just don't have any idea how to get it so things happen in one scene. Doesn't help that I know almost nothing about diplomatic functions or the behind doors happenings in closed council meetings with foreign emissaries.

Bouncing between too many projects. Refocusing on my unfinished SF.

Punk* just gave Mozart* a couple of coins outside the subway where he's busking. Somehow, this leads to them having coffee and becoming friends.

*names withheld to protect the innocent

Switching events around and not liking the result.

1,600 words in and (39 year old)girl has met (20year old)boy. Fun stuff ahead!

Chapter eight is done. Chapter nine, you're up next.

5 chapters from the end. Still. Every chapter I write, I still seem to be 5 chapters from the end....

Auditioning characters by writing shorts.

Malcolm is less of a butthead, but he still isn't giving Perry what she wants. Come onnnnn part 6, these two need to get it on again!

Hankering for a middle. Dynamite opening, touching closure, but dammit. What to do with 300 pages! It feels like it needs to be episodic but I don’t think I work that way. I have three characters, a theme, a nippy premise and a scene without the Beatles.

Back to the rear burner with ya.

Currently editing a chapter where one of the bad guys explodes.