Yes, an actual NUF! Huzzah!

I read through the draft of The Shadows One Walks, page 1 to page 103, took a few notes, got really excited, opened the folder to write and...and...and I WROTE!!!  Real words! My own words.
It was only a few pages, but it felt soooooooooooooooooooooooooo good.

Then--even MORE exciting--I got the last of my feedback for Beyond the Gate from amazing author and sister in Hadley Rille Books, Karin Gastreich. She pointed out several things that also concerned Kim (Vandervort, my official editor,) gave me some suggestions, and now, armed with notes from my editor and from my "definitely NOT an editor" (Karin's words, not mine!) I am ready and totally stoked to start in on my final (I hope) edits of BTG.

It means setting TSOW aside again, but that's ok. I got a little taste of creating story again--the sip that sustains! My goal is to have this edit done by the end of January and back to my editor for another read-through. The cover artist contacted me the other day (because I emailed him first and said, "Yo, dude! I'm still waiting here!" I can do that because he's a friend of my son-in-law's and I've known him since he was a kid I fed chicken cutlets and cookies to) and he said he'd have another set of sketches for me after New Year's. This process never gets old for me. I love every moment.

AND! I'm just reading the last chunk of the last edit on Mark Nelson's release for May--King's Gambit. I told him just this morning, I LOVE getting revisions from him, because they are always just right. He knows exactly what I mean by the copious notes I leave him, and adjusts perfectly. Ah, beautiful music of a different kind. I'm lucky to be his editor.

Artist Tom Vandenberg has also been sending us some amazing artwork for the cover--as long as he takes the dead horse out of the pic, we're almost ready to go! :)