Where Personal and Professional Life Collide...

Part I of THE COLD EYE is now marked up with red ink (notes) black ink (rewritten bits), and post-its tacked to relevant passages. 5 more parts to go, and then another pass to put it all together, and then another to polish it, and...

Yeah. And people ask me if I ever read my books once they're done. After an average of 10 passes, including the copy edit, would YOU?

Meanwhile, today there is more revising, and some editing of Other Peoples' Work, and dealing with the ACA for 2016, oh joy...

Tomorrow there will be socializing. And probably some whinging about the ACA paperwork. Because Tis the Season.

After the insanity that was last week's GISHWHES, I'm back on the pony...mostly.


Writing:

The draft of WORK OF HUNTERS is with the editor, and I have the revisions letter for CLAWED (Gin & Tonic #4) on my desk. The revisions letter for SILVER ON THE ROAD is supposed to hit on Friday (more likely next Monday, I suspect). I'm also working on a short story, and fine-tuning the plot for the next SI novella. I think that's enough? Yeah, that's enough. And August was the light work-month.


Editorial:

Finished up one client's manuscript and sent her editorial letter out last night; another client's manuscript lands today, plus two shorts to edit for Buzzy Mag.  I may or may not have slots open in October/November, depending on what the email brings in the next week... (but I do have slots open for December/January right now...)


Conventions & Travel:

Shamrokon in Dublin, August 21-24.  (reminder to self:  sort out the currencies drawer and check the pound vs euros situation!)  Spending my birthday weekend in a foreign city with friends and friends-to-be-made and readers... yeah, that's about as good as it gets.  :-) My schedule's here.

DragonCon: August 29-September 1.  Atlanta in the summer.  If I didn't love DragonCon so much.....  But I do. My schedule's here.

RoberCon (Binghamton, NY), September 27-28th.  New and small, but it's got good bones, so if you're in the area, check it out! There will likely be hijinks...

Reading at WORD (Brooklyn, NY)  October 1  (as L.A. Kornetsky, with Nick Kaufman and Laird Barron)

World Fantasy (Washington DC) November 6-9.  The usual suspects plus new suspects...

And at some point between October and December, I will be in Seattle again.  Alerts will go out when that's finalized....

March did not exactly start off with a bang - Saturday was reasonably busy, but then I got nailed with serious insomnia Sunday morning (not a thing I am normally prone to, thankfully) and the rest of the day my brain felt much like wet taffy. I can no longer function on 4 hours of sleep.  Oh hell, I never could. Six, yes. Four, no.  Managed to get some editing and pre-editorial reading done, but not so much with the writing.

On the other hand, I did manage to clear out and sort my email, so that the Actual In Box (as opposed to the side subject folders) is easily scannable, and nothing will get lost.  For at least a week, anyway.  However, in the process some settings got wonked (I touched nothing, I swear!) and now Thunderbird will only d/l email from the Gmail account, but not SEND anything, and ignores the sff.net account entirely.  I have access to mail, I just have to interact with it via the web portals, which I HATE. Have sent out the usual cries for help to the usual suspects.

This week, I'll be doing the final pass on DOGHOUSE (Gin & Tonic #3) page proofs, working on a client manuscript edit, starting work on the Kickstarter bonus projects, and continuing work on SILVER ON THE ROAD (The Devil's West 1) and TAGGED (Gin & Tonic #4).  Oh, and there's that short story I started, too.  Should go poke at that some more.

Slide a pizza under the door, willya?

Meanwhile, there's a nice review of PACK OF LIES here, from Musings And Ramblings. It's always good to see older books getting discovered/loved. :-D

‹LauraAnne› I just regretted out of an all-day party tomorrow. Because I COULD just go for a few hours, but I know I wouldn't...
‹pooks› And that's what makes you a pro.
‹LauraAnne› a grumpy, grumpy pro.
‹pooks› Is there any other kind?
‹LauraAnne› .....maybe?
‹pooks› A nongrumpy pro just hasn't been a pro very long.
‹LauraAnne› or just got a check.
‹pooks› Oh yes, there is that.

Writing:

"Being in the devil’s debt was a damned uncomfortable thing."

It is entirely possible that I haven't loved a book this much since writing STAYING DEAD.

(my feelings for THE VINEART WAR were more akin to your first Bad News relationship, where you know you gotta even though everyone's shaking their heads sadly at you. Less fun, more obsession. Although there's some of that obsession coming through in this book too. So I may be screwed. In a "regret nothing" sort of way.... ).

And no, this has no pub date, because I'm writing it on spec (as I did with FLESH AND FIRE), and even my agent hasn't seen more than the early proposal/sample pages yet. I want to have at least 30k before I drop it on him....

Editing:

First week on the job for Entangled, and I've already got three manuscripts on my desk (two for evaluation, one for an edit. I am both filled with glee and thinking whatthefuckwereyouthinking? So: pretty much normal and as expected. :-)

Social:

A break in the rain yesterday, and I got to squire some friends visiting from Ireland around the High Line and the West Village. I'd thought about taking them over to the Greenway and the Frying Pan for drinks, after, but decided not wearing them into the ground was a better plan....

and they gave me this!



Tomorrow, I get to hit the local crafts fair, and Mother's Day Brunch (which is also my mom's Birthday Brunch), so I'm hoping there's another break in the rain.  But for now, I should hunker down and get to the writing and the editing (and the cleaning of the bathroom, just so you don't think my life is so terribly glam...)


originally published at Writer. Editor. Tired Person.

You may have remembered, on Friday, that I set up a list of Things to Do.

I did not get to all of them. But I nailed the important/deadline-insistent things, so that's okay.

Monday: spent the morning doing the last pass on the copyedit, then headed out to have late lunch with a friend who was in town for the day. Came home, did some editorial and admin work in the evening while watching Castle (pretty decent for a clip show), but was pretty wiped out, mentally, from a 5 day push on the copyedits (plus everything else).

(you can read about said copyedits here, for those who're looking for actual writing-related content)

Tuesday was All Client Work All the Time. Plus a haircut. Plus setting up software for a new gig I'll be talking about soon. Again, by the time 6pm rolled around, I was exhausted. All this braining is tiring.

So tonight, I have a DVD, and a nice healthy dinner, to be followed by some dark chocolate with sea salt, and while I might get some writing done, I also might not.  The plan is (relatively) early to bed (if not sleep) in a freshly remade bed, and not getting out of said bed a minute before 7am.

The rest of the week can worry about itself, then.

I've decided to pass on the Giants victory celebration parade today in order to try to keep on top of deadlines (I did say try).

So. Deadlines and Needtos for this week:

- finish tax prep (stop procrastinating, Gilman!)
- DRAGON JUSTICE once-over
- send out first few chapters of Portals #1 to betareaders
- polish Jerzy's story and send to betareader #2
- finish writing chapter 9 of Portals #1
- dentist (ugh)
- chase down missing freelancer payment (now AWOL 2 months + counting)
- finish up pending freelance
- write up proposal for G&T#2 (ok, cheating on this one. I have all but a plot twist done)
- talk to madame agent about follow-up to Portals

EtA: call back dr who left urgent "call me back about your bloodwork" message yesterday, only to be told that she's not in today so I have to call her tomorrow. Assume I'm not going to die terribly in 24 hours while I wait... [if I am, above list becomes meaningless]


There. That's not too bad, right?

Editing a short story this morning (wearing my freelancer hat), and I am reminded that there is a distinct difference between "not well-written" and "not how I would have written this story." The reader may have an opinion, the writer will certainly judge against their own inclinations, but the editor - even as a reader and a writer - must understand where you have no say on the story's choices, must think not subjectively about the work, but objectively.

It is not your work. You must accept the choices made by the author, even as you nudge them into ways to clarify or strengthen those choices.

This is an interesting balancing act, and one that creates an ongoing dialogue in my head between editor & writer, even as I'm working on the project....



[this is one of the things that makes editing - or deep beta-ing - so useful to the writer. When you can slip into an editorial mindset like that, it allows you to see your own weaknesses and work on them as well. And, likewise, when you see something positive, you can bring it into your own toolbox, suitably McGyvered for your own style and needs. Ideally, anyway. In theory. ;-)]

Book View Café author Sarah Zettel has been nominated for the 2009 Sidewise Award for her novella, "The Persistence of Souls," from the collection THE SHADOW CONSPIRACY, Tales of the Steam Age, Vol. I, edited by Phyllis Irene Radford and Laura Anne Gilman.


THE SHADOW CONSPIRACY is an anthology of new fiction released in 2009 from Book View Press, the publishing arm of Book View Café, which is the Internet's largest professional authors' cooperative. All the stories are set in a steampunk universe where the inventions of Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage changed the world and Mary Shelley's tales of creating life were far more than a ghost story. Available exclusively as an ebook from Book View Press, the collection is part of the ongoing drive of Book View Café's professional authors to bring their work directly to the rapidly growing numbers of online and on-screen readers.

Following on the heels of the success of the first volume, Book View Café will be releasing a second volume later this year: THE SHADOW CONSPIRACY VOL. II.


THE SHADOW CONSPIRACY can be purchased from the Book View Café bookstore.



For more information on the Sidewise Awards, visit the Sidewise website.

Came home from a lovely dinner last night to discover the solicitation covers for the mass market edition of FLESH AND FIRE. With the starburst "Nebula nominee" on them. And embossed lettering. *quiet satisfaction*

Woke up at the not-ungodly hour of 6am and made it to the gym for my first decent workout in weeks (after a leg injury sidelined me for too long). Got the new cat perch up, and Pandora claimed it as her own (best case scenario), then got a lot of small work-details sorted, wrote 1,100 new words, had lunch at the local Dominican place that makes awesome sandwiches, walked a mile without my leg hurting, discovered a deadline I thought I'd blown had some leeway built in and made it under the wire, rejiggered copy for WEIGHT OF STONE and dealt with some more small details [including getting a story to an editor], wrote another 1,000 words {2,100 total, not including copy or story notes] and did Mean Things to Characters.

Dude. I have rocked today.

Now... I have to put on the editor's hat and read submissions. And, um, try and figure out what I'm packing to take to the Nebs. Which are, um, this weekend? Really? Howthehelldidthathappen?

So, what do you think, oh LJ-mind? Should I go with Basic Black for the awards, and show off my not-a-tan? Or try and flow with a more tropical theme, since I will be in Florida, land of Too Damn Much Sun? Or drag out the classic Cocktail Chic? And do I bring the Bitchin' Boots of Doom, or the Cuban heels? okay, the boots might be a Bit Much for Florida in May, I agree...