One reason I’m anxiously awaiting next week!

Almost three years ago I decided to leave my job at io9 and be a full-time novelist. One of the main reasons was that The City in the Middle of the Night was a massive challenge that needed my undivided attention. On Tuesday, I finally start finding out if this was a good choice.

When I left io9, The City in the Middle of the Night was kind of a sprawling mess, living in a ton of handwritten journals and a bunch of disconnected Word docs. The worldbuilding was huge but the characters and their journey weren’t coming together the way I wanted.

And even though I had written a few other novels while working at io9, including All the Birds in the Sky, I was finding this book too heavy a lift while also holding down a day job. After I quit io9 on May 1, I worked like a maniac and had a halfway decent draft by late July.

I feel sure this book never would have come together the way it did if I hadn’t taken that plunge. (Not to mention the YA trilogy I was able to pitch.) But this is one reason I’m nervous for next week: I’ll finally see if this book was worth giving up health insurance/salary for.

All of which is to say: please come to my book events if you can (https://www.tor.com/2018/12/10/charlie-jane-anders-city-in-the-middle-of-the-night-book-tour-dates/), and please preorder the book (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780765379962) or pick it up next week, if you can afford to. It will mean more to me than I can possibly say!