Updates and Changes

It's been a few weeks since I've posted. I worked last Sat. and Sun. so my mind was totally focused elsewhere. The week before, I think I just simply blew it. I've been working so hard to finish a couple of books I'm writing that I've had a bit of the tunnel vision.

Yesterday, I finished the rough draft for one of the books that is a requested full. So, yay!!! I'll let it sit for a week and then go back and start the edits. I've already made extensive notes for that, so I'm comfortable that those will go relatively smoothly.

The other requested full I need to finish the rough for is within days of finishing. Maybe by the end of next week. There is a lot of technical things I need to bring out - it's a bit of sci-fi so there are some world-building threads that need resolved for this book in the series arch, as well as the final declaration of feelings from the heroine. (The hero is already toast as far as his feelings are concerned.) Then that one should be ready to sit until I do the edits. Oh, and since I put some markers in for some love scenes, I'll be writing a few two or three days of nothing but sex. Hehehehee....

Yes, all right sometimes I avoid writing it in the rough if I'm not in the mood and just want to get the damn plot down first. However, my love scenes tend to releave something else about the characters that push the book forward, so even if I haven't yet written the scene I have to at least know what revelations will come at the end of the love making that impacts the rest of the book. So, while I might not actually put down the choreography of the moment, I have extensive notes on the emotional song and dance the characters perform.

A novella I need to get to my editor is also close to completion. I'm hoping to get these all out the door by the first of April at least. Hopefully end of March for the novels. But we'll see.

Next projects on deck? Finishing the sequel to the book I have at LSB and hopefully finishing the novel sequel to The Host. It's close. I can feel it.

There is a part of me that is floored by the fact we are in mid-March already. The Ides are just around the corner. How can the years go by so fast now? What kind of super sonic time warp have we ventured into as a world? I don't know, but it needs to slow down a bit.

I've been off for the last few days - this is five of six off. Friday, I tackled the book situation in my bedroom. The damn books had taken over. I could no longer see my bedside table it was stacked so high. There were books in there I had read years ago, and some I never intend to read. I pulled and purged and changed around. I made a bag of books for giveaways. I filled to boxes to send to my mother. (It will probably be sub-divided since it's going to cost a fortune to ship. And I think there are too many for the flat rate boxes. I'll have to try and see.)

I've also gone back to reading some fantasy and sci-fi I haven't read in a while. Out of the romance aisle and into the other side of my public library. A few years ago I kept a journal of the books and authors I read. Just as a reminder, since I was reading out of my norm. It proved very helpful. I even coded each entry with symbols indicating if I'd read the author again or if I felt the book was good enough to recommend to others. Well, I've started that again since I've read some really great books lately and thought it worth bringing back that particular practice.

So, what's new with you all. Are you being productive? Or have you decided to take some time off and regroup? Either way, now that Daylight Savings Time is here, I'm feeling more like myself again. This is the most wonderful time of the year.

-Kate