Catching Idle Butterflies

Hump Day

It's now halfway through my vacation and halfway between Christmas and New Year's. What are your plans for the last major holiday before Easter?

Me, I'm old and love my sleep. I doubt if I will stay up for the year to turn over. I did stay up past 11 last night, though. I'm reading Ŧĥē Beŋ 's book "Invalid Item" . Very good so far! I read the first part in only a couple of hours, so I'm going to tackle Parts II & III later today. After that, I'll tell him what I really think *snicker*. I'm kidding. It's a good story, unique in many ways, and the writing overall is top-notch. So far I came up with only a few minor suggestions. If you like science fiction with a little historical thrown in, give him a shout and I'm sure he'll give you the passkey.

In between I'll be editing my manuscript "Invalid Item" . I received an email a week ago by a prospective literary agent (also my mentor when I took the Apprentice course with the Christian Writer's Guild) giving me some suggestions. He likes the story so far, but Chapter 2 required major rewriting - again.

I discovered when a sentence, paragraph, or whatever keeps needing rewriting or restructuring, and still doesn't work, I'm better off eliminating it. I did so with Chapter 2 yesterday. I didn't delete everything, but shortened it to only several paragraphs. I then moved portions of it to Chapter 1 and the rest to the new Chapter 2 (previously Chapter 3). I think it works much better now, but after I finish Ŧĥē Beŋ 's book, I'll print it out and go through it at least one more time before I email it back.

I'm also in the mood to finish editing the second installment of my trilogy I tentively titled Shalder's Children. "Killer of Minds" is the first book, and the second I titled "Destroyer of Wills." The third I have neither title nor a single word written. Two reasons for this: One, I'm daunted by it. It's about a war, and I've never written about an entire war before. It requires a lot of action as well as military strategy and tactics. I know little of either. I know I can do it, but it still makes me a bit nervous. Also, I don't want to write the entire trilogy, and then have the publisher require significant changes to the first or second book that will change the third. By writing the third one now, I could be wasting my time.

No matter, really. I let the Spirit guide me with the first two. I'll know when I'm ready to start on the third.

Several of you have mentioned New Year's resolutions, and many have said they want to submit and have their work published. It appears I'm doing the same. It's about time, too. I've been sitting on my writing far too long, and doing little to write new stuff.

I'll be participating in a local writer's group, starting up on January 2. I'm hoping by meeting with them once a month, I'll not only receive great feedback on my stuff, but be motivated to write as well as submit. Being accountable to others always helps.

Chewie Kittie also invited me and others to join her new group "Invalid Item" . I haven't joined, yet, but will do so once I'm done here.

To get out of the house, I might traipse over to Barnes and Noble. Twice now I've gone to their cafe to drink coffee, read and write. It seems to get my creative juices flowing, I've written some good stuff while there. Seeing all those books helps motivate me as well, because I imagine my own books being shown off there. I won't even attempt to drag my 10lb, 17" wide-screen monstrosity of a laptop, though. I have a Palm LifeDrive PDA with fold-up keyboard. I could take my Psion, but I like to use a different tool to write once in a while. Plus my Palm has wireless internet capablilities, and Barnes and Noble has a free WiFi hub. But that's only if I get stuck with my writing .