Just Offstage

After revisions, Grace & Chocolate is out to readers. Again. I've completed the author forms required for submission to my publisher. So, after feedback and the necessary improvements (one hopes they are improvements), I will submit G&C to my editor and then . . . wait. Again.
It is strange to have two books waiting in the wings, approved, anticipating makeup and costume. They know their lines and have the potential to deliver their parts with emotion, timing, and humor.
But it's not their turn yet, and here I send another player in for auditions before the others have been proven. They keep glancing back at me as they watch the performance of other stories, and I have to put my hands up and settle them. Just wait, I whisper. Just wait.

Something's Burning

You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what's burning inside you.  And we edit to let the fire show through the smoke.  ~Arthur Polotnik

 I'm almost done reading through my REMNANT ms after being away from it for many months. As I edit, I am keeping my readers in mind, wondering what they might think of this next idea, curious as to what suggestions they will make, what they loved and hated. My stomach tightens at the thought, as always.

As soon as I'm done with that, I'll be going over The Orchard, due for release in Spring/2011, again for the first time in months. I'm anxious to look at it, see what I've learned since it was last submitted, go over it with a fine-toothed comb before my editor sinks her teeth into it. (Am I mixing my metaphors? Combs have teeth, right?) I have until the end of August. Then things may get moving, for reals. Maybe. I hope!

A lot of my friends ask about this publishing time line, expressing shock at how long it takes to put a book on a shelf (or, as I prefer, in my hot little hands), but at this point in the process, while I am anxious for all of it, I just want the fire to show through the smoke. My fire. The one fueling my hot little hands as they run over my keyboard. The one fueling these stories in my head.

I hope my readers feel the burn.

Is your fire showing?

Thursday Authorial: To Everything There is a Season

As a woman who's book has been written, critiqued, edited, looked at, critiqued, re-edited, re-read, tweaked, re-submitted, and finally, FINALLY HALLELUJAH, accepted, I now have the strange and wonderful opportunity to... WAIT. SOME MORE.
And I'm okay with that. Annette Lyon gave me some insight on Twitter yesterday. Those of you who follow us may already have read, or Twead, our little conversation, but it bears repeating.
I told Annette I feel like a wallflower. I've been invited to the ball, but I just don't get to dance yet.
Her brilliant and somehow reassuring, and yet all the more tantalizing summation of getting published?
"The industry really is, 'Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. CRAP! DEADLINE! NOW HURRY UP!'"

I can't wait to yell, "CRAP!"

In honor of all of you author's waiting on that first book, I recognize you with this beautiful symbol of patience and long-suffering for your art.

So, for M. Gray, Andrea Pearson, Tamara Hart Heiner, L.T. Eliot, Ali Cross, Elana Johnson, and all of you working, waiting, and wondering... there will be a time to dance.


And to yell, "CRAP!"

Tuesday Testimonial: Patience

“Faith is not simply a patience that passively suffers until the storm is past. Rather, it is a spirit that bears things - with resignations, yes, but above all, with blazing, serene hope.” -Corazon Aquino

 In lieu of Tuesday Edit Crunch (because until I hear back about my second book I am stumped about what to cover next), I will be sharing Tuesday Testimonial! And, as I have already hinted, this first testimonial will address a subject I have recently declared the possible crown of all submitting authors:

PATIENCE

If you look at it long enough it starts to look foreign, doesn't it? Like some french word for an amazingly rich pastry in a paper doily. Mmm... pastry.

Chocolate sauce, anyone?

Am I right, though? It is not enough to "open a vein" and pour ourselves out onto paper (or screen), then take a deep breath and push a creation out for others, and not just any others, but those whose job it is to judge it, and then... wait. And wonder, and clean our desk and go through the motions and make wrong turns and space out during conversations and start to say things like, "Oh, that is Dierdre's favorite song," or, "Galahad went through a very similar experience," and you're referring to your main characters so people look at you funny. Waiting. Cuckoo.
No, it's not enough. My favorite part of the above quote are the words, with resignations. It's the phrase that makes the rest of it, the blazing, serene hope, human. I can do that. I have resignations. But I think my hope is pretty blazing, if not entirely serene (eye twitch).

The manifestation of my blazing, serene hope, is that I am still writing. I am still going back and editing my brains out for stories I have yet to submit and have no idea how they will be received. I am on the lookout for the next story. It is in how I allow a moment to envision my book in my hands, the weight of it, what the cover might look like, how I might avoid the reviews, and how I might not, how the story might touch others. And the next story. And the next.
I told my writing group, "Anyone who wants to learn patience, write a book, and submit it." I'll add to it. 
Anyone who wants to learn of faith, keep writing.


Are you up for the lesson?