It’s 11 a.m. on the East Coast as I write this blog — I’m late. (It’s 8 a.m. in California, where I live, but here at MSW we endeavor to schedule our blog to post between midnight and 6 a.m. ET, so I’m late.)
Being late is the story of my life. My kids lament that I’m late to everything. Usually it’s only a couple minutes. Last year, when I was responsible for driving the kids to school, they were late 2 out of 5 days in the week. The tardies were so bad, I had to have a meeting with the principal. (I was contrite.) Now that my husband or daughter are responsible for getting the non-driving kids to school, they’ve only been tardy ONE DAY in the first half of the year.
For the last two days, I’ve been fighting a cold. Nothing serious, just a running nose/headache. Drugs and homeopathic remedies (essentially Sudafed for the nose so it’s not leaking 24/7 and Emergen-C + zinc to help the cold go away faster) have worked to keep it from getting worse, but it’s just lingering there so … I went to bed early last night. And totally forgot about the blog, which I usually write the night before. SO I wake up at 7:45 and my first thought? “Oh, shit, it’s Thursday!”
It’s been a busy couple weeks in the Brennan house. We’ve had a Christmas Choir performance, my youngest’s Christmas play, Christmas shopping, mid-terms (which also means mid-term projects), and parent-teacher conferences. I’m very proud of my two teen-agers who have worked hard this semester, both landing a 3.3 this semester. My youngest doesn’t get letter grades, but my other two have straight-As. (Well, my brilliant 5th grader had a B+ in language arts, but swore he to secrecy so don’t tell anyone.)
And then there was my book.
SILENCED is the fourth Lucy Kincaid book, and the first for a new publisher. I’m working on a blog about the psychological challenges I faced writing this book, but that’s something I don’t want to rush. I’m elated that it’s DONE. Writing, revising, and copyedits. I went through the copyedits TWICE — something I never do — because the story needed tweaking. I made all the copyedited changes in my electronic version and sent that to my editor to be distributed (it’s this stage that the proofs for review and in-house reading are made–I wanted the manuscript in the best possible shape.) I’m happier with it now, but won’t really know if it works until I get the proofs and sit down to read it in one long sitting. I read proofs first for story, quickly flagging pages for errors, then again to fix the mistakes.
Because my revisions were late (I rewrote the entire second half of the books) I only had a few days for the copyedits, but those were on time. Whew. Sometimes, it’s not good being late. But they’re done and that’s a huge weight off my shoulders. I can enjoy Christmas, write a short story, and await the page proofs while researching the next Lucy Kincaid book, STALKED.
If you haven’t checked out my new website, please do. My web guy has updated the site to be more user-friendly–and mobile friendly. It works on tablets and phones. I think it looks great. But the content, which is my responsibility, is lacking.
What information would you like to see on my website? Do you find it easy to navigate and find the information you want? Let me know! There’s a box of books in it for one of you — YA and thrillers. My daughter cleaned out her bedroom, which is good for everyone.
Have a very Merry Christmas and Holiday Season, and a safe New Year.