On Fridays when I don’t post new fiction, I’ll be catching everyone up on how the novel and other projects are coming along.

I’m under a bit of a deadline because I promised my editor I’d have it to her by the end of January. I’ve been making a lot of progress this week, but still have a bit to do. A problem that slowed me down was I decided to take two long chapters and rearrange them into four short chapters. This seemed easier in my head than it was on the computer. I’m still not 100% certain I got everything in the right place, but I wanted to finish this draft before I read the whole thing again.  I know it will take a full read-through to make sure it’s all sorted. Another issue is that thanks to the advice of one of my beta-readers, I’ve decided I want to rewrite the last two chapters. I feel like the current ending is too easy and a bit too sappy. It needs more punch to it. I know how I want it to read now, but I haven’t actually written it yet. Maybe that will happen today, but it will definitely happen by Sunday. I need Monday and Tuesday for one last read through before handing it off.

In other news, I’ve been working through a four-part short story contest, and I got the feedback on Part 3 last night. The judges comments were very positive, the most positive they’ve been so far. I felt really good about what they’ve been saying, and I’ve been trying to incorporate their notes into each piece. It seems to be working. The final part of that series is due on February 5th, so I’ll have to dive right into that once the novel is safely in the editor’s hands. I will post that series starting next Friday, so you can follow that story soon too.

SD