Update on books!

THE HIDEAWAY
I received my editorial letter in mid-June with a deadline of July 29–two days from now. But I returned it to my editor Karli about a week ago! Her letter was lovely, truly. It was four pages of comments, kind praise, suggestions, and questions. I was incredibly relieved because I’ve heard of huge editorial letters with pages of changes to be made, including big things like plot points, characters, whole POVs, etc. In contrast, Karli’s edits were light. AND YET, the changes/additions she suggested were so sharp and insightful. As I read her letter, I kept nodding, thinking, “Well, of course, this is a great suggestion. Why didn’t I think of this?!” In the end, THE HIDEAWAY is even stronger than it was before and I couldn’t be happier. I’m SO excited about getting this story out into the world!

Next, Karli will read through the manuscript with my changes, then hand it off to the line editor. If Karli has more suggestions for me, she’ll lump them in with the line edits, and I’ll get those all back somewhere around the end of August, I think. 

My sweet friend Sara Beth Cobb of Nimblee Design (designer of this website!) creative a super sharp little brandmark for me to use on bookmarks, notecards, whatever needs my “stamp” on it. I’m excited about being able to use it, and the logo (my name) along with it. The thought of self-promotion feels weird and foreign to me, but I know it’s part of the job. And Sara Beth has provided me a really classy way to do it 😉

BOOK 2 (tentatively titled HURRICANE SEASON)
I am about 72K words into the manuscript, which is actually pretty far. By comparison, THE HIDEAWAY is about 88K words completed. So, by that word count, you’d think I’m pretty close to being finished. And I am pretty close to being finished…with 2/3 of the story. But that last third has been royally kicking my butt. The story has 3 POVs, and I essentially got really stuck in the weeds with one of the POVs, so I put it on hold while I wrote the other two. I am really liking the rest of the story, but that one character’s POV has been beating me in the head these last few months. Thankfully, I’m back with my wonderful writing workshop group and they are helping me untangle the knots in my head and sort this character out. And I think it’s working.

My goal is to finish the book by the end of the year. Then I’ll have basically 3 months for more revisions. But because of this awesome group of writers I hang out with on Tuesday nights, when I get to the end of the book (before Christmas, please Lord), it won’t be a huge mess–it’ll actually be in pretty decent shape. 

Other things going on:
School starts, unbelievably, in two weeks. I’m excited about first grade for Kate and 4K for Sela. I think this time next year will find me a little teary, with my baby going on to kindergarten. Time marches on and that’s a good thing, but it doesn’t mean I don’t want to hold onto the reins a little tighter. 

I’m split on how I feel about school starting back up. On one hand, I’m ready to have some of my time back–time to myself after having the kids with me basically all day, every day, and time to write for longer stretches of time. But I’m also really not looking forward to the early morning time crunch: “Hurry, hurry, hurry! Eat breakfast, brush teeth, get dressed, where’s your bag” etc etc. And just the chaos of the school year. Summer is a nice break from all that. But there’s something to be said for routine and structure–for all of us.