Last night I finished the editorial rewrite for INTO THE FIRE (I know, you’re saying FINALLY! in the same tone I did) and as always the book is better after a reworking.\u00a0\u00a0 It’s a little shorter, it’s got more stuff IN it, and my brain is certifiably toasted to a crisp, very brown around the edges.\u00a0 This is the most difficult rewrite I’ve ever had, with multiple factors involved in making it difficult. But…it’s done, all but the icing decorations on the cake (putting the datelines back in because Editor wants them) .\u00a0 There’s a chance Editor won’t like the rewrite as much as I do, because some comments on the ms. suggest that Editor and I had very different ideas what the book was about–what its real “heart” was.\u00a0 Partly, I think, because Editor did not have time to read the first five Vatta books.\u00a0\u00a0 But for the moment…I can quit working until after midnight every night, quit having to eat just to stay awake and write, and focus instead on other things.<\/p>\n
There may be a significant delay between INTO THE FIRE and whatever comes next, because INTO THE FIRE is the last book on the contract, and that always means a longer break.\u00a0 Not always for me–I may be writing away on a book I hope the publisher will agree to take–but in this instance I’m not doing that.\u00a0 Recovery is my main goal now, and I have only the production work on this book and DragonCon between me and complete concentration on recovery.\u00a0\u00a0 I want the story-well and the energy-well full before I start another big project.\u00a0 (Yes, INTO THE FIRE may be shorter, but it’s still about 144, 450 words.\u00a0 Not a short book.)<\/p>\n
I will be working on putting together one or more short-fiction collections.\u00a0 I will be reading (not just re-reading, which is all I can do in a crunch)\u00a0 other books.\u00a0 I will be gardening near the house, and going out on the land and clearing some trails and things as well as documenting what’s there.\u00a0 (Husband found two grasses new to the place this past week, both non-natives and one determinedly invasive.\u00a0 We’re going to try to hack it back to the fenceline from which it invaded and keep it out, since it’s on the edge of encroaching into an area where we’ve brought back a variety of natives.\u00a0 We’ve eliminated *almost* all the Johnson grass, and we don’t want Vasey grass.\u00a0 The green bristlegrass, however (Setaria viridis<\/em>) is an annual and not particularly invasive.\u00a0\u00a0 I’ll be doing more cooking again (which means eating better),\u00a0 and finally doing some sorting-and-cleaning that’s been on hold while all my energy had to go into the writing.\u00a0 When I can, I’ll get back to singing in the choir, probably after DragonCon.\u00a0\u00a0 Riding the bike, hiking around the land opening up the trails again (Richard just rides through on the lawn tractor, hauling the trailer with *his* tools behind him.\u00a0 He’s still building fence–it’s slow with just one person–and I’m the trail trimmer who does not like to push through branches.<\/p>\n Will there be more books eventually?\u00a0\u00a0 Yes, God willin’ and the crick don’t rise.\u00a0\u00a0 I have stories I want to write.\u00a0\u00a0 Blog posts, including finishing up that bit about the Vatta twins in an Interlude (but not quite yet.)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Short fiction.\u00a0\u00a0 Nonfiction (about small-acreage land management, for instance.)\u00a0\u00a0 And I have non-writing things that have been put off a long time that I also want to do.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I thank you all for your encouragement, which has been great, and for your enthusiasm for the books (YAY!)\u00a0 and now I”m going to go ride my bike a mile or several before it gets too hot today.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Last night I finished the editorial rewrite for INTO THE FIRE (I know, you’re saying FINALLY! in the same tone I did) and as always the book is better after a reworking.\u00a0\u00a0 It’s a little shorter, it’s got more stuff IN it, and my brain is certifiably toasted to a crisp, very brown around the Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,16,10],"tags":[39,17,7],"class_list":["post-376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-into-the-fire","category-life-beyond-writing","category-the-writing-life","tag-into-the-fire","tag-life-beyond-writing","tag-the-writing-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=376"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":377,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376\/revisions\/377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}