Yep. I'm stuck in a rut. It's almost winter, it's very cold, and I'm stuck. That's all!

The infestation started a month prior. It began with one lurking in the dark. One quickly became two, and soon, there was a pack. It took a couple of days to notice what was happening. Television channels dropped off one by one starting with local access until C.N.N. was the last. Dave had seen this before, of course. The flesh-eating vermin had been following him as long as he could recall. They were fearsome with their pallor, their stench, their shuffling gait. Their lack of coordination, their looks of confusion, their fear of fire made them humorous, but it took Dave a while to see that side of them. Once, in Poughkeepsie, he shouted “what do you want?” to a couple that had shadowed him for the better half of a day. The taller one had responded by taking a bite out of his companion’s shoulder. Dave drove out of town that night with his dog and guitar and didn’t stop until he reached Shawnee. From Shawnee, he went to El Segundo; El Segundo to Conyers. Conyers to Missoula, where he

I finished my latest round of revisions for FALLING TO NORMAL just now. One thing that strikes me as funny is that I did this while a family poker game is going on in the background. With my husband, father, aunt, and two uncles. One of the uncles is wearing a cheeseburger hat complete with wig. I don't know why, but he is. He and my father just went to the grocery store. My uncle is still wearing the hat. This is funny because my family unbeknownst to them have given me some of the best material for this book. I love how they are here for the latest revision. Even if they are wearing cheeseburger hats. I just went through my drafts to see what I've done since I've taken this up full time in 2004. Here's a brief snapshot. First draft completed June 2006. It had 319 pages and 82,000 words. It also had a prologue and was missing a lot of important information. So I needed to go to my second draft. The second draft was completed two years later, this past June. I took so l

45%

My friend Danielle and I were discussing this last night: can a novelist jump the shark? I think they can. Take Anne Rice and the Vampire Chronicles, for example. I think she did this exact thing towards the end of the series two different ways. The first was by integrating the Mayfair witches with the vampires. The second was by giving Lestat a Christ complex. What do you think? Can novelists pull a Fonzie? Who has?

... More to go! I sent out my first official query today to Serendipity Literary Agency. Go me!It wasn't a standard query, as I met with the agent at Grub Street's Muse & The Marketplace writer's conference this past year. Grub Street does a manuscript portion for an extra fee, which I gladly paid. It was a good experience and stroked my ego a bit. So, I emailed her a quasi-query reminding her that she wanted to see my manuscript when I was done. Now, I wait. I agree with Tom Petty. Waiting is the hardest part.

I previously stated how my cats are the best form of distraction ever. I still hold to that, but would like to add a disclaimer: DISTRACTIONS ARE BAD WHEN THEY HIT BEFORE DAYLIGHT. In case you've never seen the cats, look here: Cute, huh? They are the devil incarnate. Cheyenne (the stripey one) is viciously clever and somewhat of a trouble maker. She has a tendency to open doors and tear open bags of treats. Lucky (the white one) is rather dumb and quite possibly can be considered the Tommy Lee of the feline world. He also likes to destroy things - vases get smashed, video cards cracked, keyboard keys pulled off... you get the idea. He's also some kind of Oriental cat so he talks. Frequently. We've gotten used to these kitty quirks. They're cats, this is what they do. It's summer, so they like the windows to be open. We have a small one that stays open in our bedroom during the summer that overlooks our driveway and the side street. Since they're indoor cats, th

I can tell it's Monday because I can't put my fingers on the correct keys on this here laptop. The home keys don't exist for my fingers. I was back at the florist I PT at for the first time in a week and my boss decided that I was going to work on some pricey arrangement. Amazingly, I did well. But Monday struck there too. It took me way too long to design a $35 basket and I left my scene notebook for my next novel on the workbench. It's bad because I need to finish that scene soon. Like, tonight soon. I hope I can relock the shop door with no problem. It's an older door and wicked problematic. So, without the all important scene notebook and my newly acquired free time, I decided to begin agent searching. Then, I realized - I have no clue how to organize myself for this. If this was Tuesday, I'm sure I'd have a better grasp.

I went to Shana's graduation party today and saw her first the first time and a year and a half. Just wanted to do a public congrats on her completing her PhD. It's a mammoth accomplishment. Congrats Dr. Shana!

With the exception of a few bathroom runs, I have been sitting working on line edits for six hours. I never knew how exhausting it is to sit down and not move. But it wasn't in vain since I achieved so much today. All the line edits and feedback I had received and reviewed this week has been incorporated into the manuscript. Hell, I even changed the book title with a little help from hubby. I was quite fond of Trials and Tribulations, but I was told it wouldn't resonate with the YA crowd and she was right. It's taken me four months to find a title that sat well with me. FALLING TO NORMAL is the new shiny title. The new title solved a lot of problems. Since I was pulling a lot of things out of my youth, including the town, things were getting tricky. We changed the town, gave it a nickname, and a lot of character names were no longer questionable or identifiable. Victory is mine. *insert evil laugh here* I finally gotten around to opening the Twin Peaks complete series DVD t

I've spent the past three days going over revisions of my completed manuscript. In the past three months the "phone book" has gone through about ten rounds of revisions. I'm more than ready to shuffle this thing off. I understand that revision is part of all processes: writing, business, cows (not really, I just needed a third thing), but it sucks. Royally. Really. I'm not kidding. During the final stage of working on this book, I've learned the following things: I hate hard-core editing. I have a fear of completion. I work best when someone's cracking a whip in my general direction. My cats are the best form of distraction ever.