Good News, Bad News

I have some good news and I have some bad news. I’m a good news first kind of gal, so here goes:

Dream of a Vast Blue Cavern is getting a makeover! While I love the current cover, it doesn’t quite have the sparkle I want it to have, and I want to make a few changes to the back cover copy and layout. When I put it together a year ago, I was in the mode of trying to get the book out as quickly as possible. This cover has served the book well but now, I want that sparkly cover.

This is good news for you dear reader, because before I can advertise the book under a new cover, I need to sell off my backstock with the current cover. For a limited time only, I am offering these great deals to anyone who purchases a signed paperback of Dream of a Vast Blue Cavern using the paypal link to the right:

• Free shipping!

• $12.99 down from $14.99!

• Sales tax included–you pay $12.99. Period.

• Free gift wrapping if you indicate it when you order!

• Your name entered in a giveaway for one of three free copies of Book II: Dream of a City of Ruin!

Please don’t miss this opportunity. Not only will you (or a friend, this would make a great Christmas gift!) have a limited edition copy of DVBC with the original artwork by the author, you’ll be supporting the production of the sparkly new cover!  When I’m a bestseller, that original will be worth $$$$!

So now we come to the bad news. I’ll put it bluntly: Dream of a City of Ruin is behind schedule. However, this bad news has a silver lining related to another writing process catharsis, which I’ll explain in a minute.

First, let’s review my old writing process from my post about summarizing, available to read here:

1. Get an idea for a story

2. Start drafting from idea

3. Run out of ideas, attempt to outline the rest of the story

4. Draft a novel which in no way resembles said outline

5. Stare in horror at 150K word mess on paper.

6. Spend five to ten years sorting out this mess.

Now, here’s my current writing process:

1. Get an idea for a story

2. Write a summary of the story

3. Expand and revise the summary as many times as needed until the idea is fleshed out

4. Share summary with first readers and gather feedback

5. Revise again with feedback (about four months have passed at this point)

6. Draft the book, following the summary closely but allowing for necessary changes (This took another four months)

7. Read through draft 1 once quickly, noting first impressions and getting a bird’s eye view of the book. (Two weeks)

8. Read through draft 1 slowly, making more critical notes and jotting down possible solutions to problems with the draft. (About another month)

At the end of last week, this is where I had landed. While this baby is well overdue, nine & a half months is a lot better than five years. If I hurried the revision, I could probably get a final draft by the end of the year. I was all set to start making changes to the file. But I had a nagging doubt that was holding me back, so I waited. And sure enough, as these things usually do, the reason revealed itself to me.

Years ago I was taking a class from my friend and writing mentor, Laurel Leigh. I told her I had finished drafting a book and she said, “now you need to go back and write an outline of what you have on the page.”

Ulp. I tried really hard to do it. It made sense as a thing to do. Write an outline, and then when you’re revising you’ll have a map of the book to refer to. But I simply couldn’t write that outline. I started and stopped for years. At the time, I didn’t realize it wasn’t the concept that was the problem, it was the fact that I simply couldn’t think in terms of outlines.

So the other day, Laurel’s words from that class crept back into my head and suddenly it was clear. I needed to go back and write a summary of what I have on the page.

At first, it was like pulling teeth. The lazy creature in me, the procrastinator, the excuse factory balked. My desk got cleaner than it has ever been before. In fact, I got a new desk. My filing got done! I discovered the magic of decoupage.

But last Sunday, which for most people is a day of rest but for me is Monday, I kept the date with the Muse, sat my butt in the chair, and started flipping through Draft 1 once again, this time typing notes in summary form as I went.

By the time I got to the second scene in the prologue, something magical happened. I was struggling over my revision notes in the margins. Do I summarize strictly what is here on the page? I wondered. Or do I summarize the stuff that I’m going to write when I revise it? For example, if I’m planning to add a scene, do I summarize that scene?

The answer, brought to us by the magic of italics, was both. I summarized the book on the page with regular text, and then inserted notes in italics where I planned to add or significantly change material. Parts that I planned to cut, I simply didn’t summarize. No sense in backpedaling.

So now I have a document of about 5000 words that clearly shows the shape of the story of Book II: Dream of a City of Ruin, with a clear map for revision laid out in italics. Laurel, you were so right.

And yeah . . . there are a lot of italics. I feel confident about turning those italics into regular font, but it is going to take time.

All of which is a very long way of explaining why Book II will take more time than I thought. If I had two weeks of uninterrupted work, I could probably get my next revision done in that time. Unfortunately, I don’t have that luxury this time of year.

I happen to work in retail, and the month of December is basically a black hole for my personal life. When I am not selling toys and running around the store like a chicken with my head cut off, I will be hiding at home, preferably in a hot bath, in a catatonic state. Most of January will be spent recovering from December.

While I intend to keep making headway during this period, I will not be writing, or even revising, 50K words in one week like back in September. So stay tuned. Dream of a City of Ruin will be a spring baby.

Meanwhile, now would be a good time to read or listen to the short stories here, or re-read them if you already have. Not only are they fun to read, but a few of those characters (no, I won’t say who) will be making an appearance in Book II.

And if you haven’t yet, read Dream of a Vast Blue Cavern! If for no other reason than this: you’ll need to in order to understand the next book, and trust me–you’re going to want to read Dream of a City of Ruin.