Jennifer Crusie's Blog, page 72

State of the Collaboration, July 29, 2022

We were just getting started on One in Vermillion when Bob knocked something liquid into his computer, so he’s out today, buying a new one. Which is good; I think he was getting stir crazy.

Enough about us. Here’s your free play post, do with the comments what you will.
(You do realize that all posts here are free play posts, right?)

This is a Good Book Thursday, July 28, 2022

I read nothing but the books I’m working on and some newspapers. I know, I’m ashamed of myself.

What did you read this week?

Working Wednesday, July 27, 2022

Yesterday, we started One in Vermillion. And once we get done with that, we’ll start rewrites from the beginning with Lavender, but still, I will remember this as the summer I did nothing but make stuff up and type with a guy I haven’t seen for fifteen years. We’re taking tomorrow off because Bob wants to go biking which I completely understand, and I need to . . . do so many things I can’t even list them. But we have the start of a plot, which is good, and we’ll find out what this book is about as we write it, which is normal. I don’t think we could ever do this again, but I’m so happy we’re going this fast this summer.

So what did you do this week?

We Have a Truck Draft

And the first draft of Rest in Pink is done.

I know, we’re amazed, too. It still needs work, but we have a truck draft (a draft that’s complete and good enough to publish if we get by a truck). Bob wants to rewrite a scene and write a new one for the end, but he nailed the action ending, something I am not good at so he is a GAM as far as I’m concerned.

And I’ve finished two books so far this summer. I know, WE’ve finished two books, Bob and I, but it’s been so long since I got to the end of a book, let alone thought, “YES! That’s how this should end,” that I am positively giddy. There was a whole list of niggles to take care of, but I knocked a lot of them out last night:

Pearls

Bartlett

Chris Blake

Five Button Jeans

Imani

Jason

Sex scene (for the three beat)

Running up that hill: Umbrella for Anemone

Anemone puts the money in her account.

And now we move on to One in Vermillion, which I still want to call Yellow Brick Roadkill, but Bob does not. Sigh. This is collaboration.

Happiness is Air Conditioning

I know we’re not nearly as bad as Europe–so sorry about that!–but it’s in the nineties here and I’m broiling. I like working outside, but ten minutes in that heat and I come back in and bask in the cool air roaring through the window AC. I need to put a second one it, too. It’s July. I cannot imagine what August is going to bring.

Air conditioning. I appreciate Shane even more now.

What made you happy this week?

Quick Question: Do You Know How to Pronounce Anemone?

Bob and I are having a discussion.

At the moment, we have solved it with this:

“I’m a ghostwriter. I go where my clients are.”

“And your current client is here?”

“Anemone? No, she’s in Chicago, which is why I must go there as soon as possible.”

“Who again?” he said.

“Anemone Patterson.” There was no recognition on his face, so I went on. “Anemone. Ah nem oh knee. Very famous woman.”

“Weird name.”

“It’s a very beautiful flower,” I said in her defense. “And also a predatory sea creature. She’s very aptly named.”

He let that one go. “So what are you doing back here?”

I thought it wasn’t necessary to put the pronunciation in there, but he had no idea how to say it. And it does matter that readers know how to pronounce it in their minds.

So do we need that in there?

Working Wednesday, July 20, 2022

I am writing. Also taking out the trash, making freezer meals, scrubbing floors, and trying to install an air conditioner.

Collaboration update:

What did you do this week?

This is a Good Book Thursday, July 21, 2022

I was really pleased to find a book I could recommend this week, light and fun, until I got three quarters of the way through and saw a Big Misunderstanding looming. So I skipped ahead to the last chapter and yet, there was our heroine alone and devastated but wait! here comes a public declaration of love from her one-and-only.

No.

Did you read anything good this week that did not have a Big Misunderstanding, let alone a Public Declaration of Love? Or anything good period? Please tell us. Please.

Collaboration Update, Essay on Revision

We are now at 85,000 words on Rest in Pink, looking at being done with the first draft by the end of July. Yes, we’re stunned by the speed of that, too. Also I browbeat convinced Bob into picking a name for the last book which is now One in Vermillion.

In other news, the NYT did an essay on revising books that have already been published, and while I drifted during some of it, it made some really good points. For the record, I updated a couple of my novels and ended up regretting it. But that’s just me.

So that’s:
Lavender’s Blue
Rest in Pink
One in Vermillion

It’s a plan.

Happiness is Sleeping Whenever You Want

I’m so far into the Book Zone now, I’m not really present for reality (until I go out for food, then it gets real). Bob signs off every night before eight and does human things (I assume), but I’m in this weird “work for awhile, sleep for awhile” cycle. The best thing about it is, when I get tired, I go to sleep. As somebody who had to be at work at 7:30AM for fifteen years, this is ecstasy. I wake up when I wake up, I write when I have ideas to write, I sleep when I sleep. This, Argh People, is bliss.

How did you find bliss this week?