A writing update

Hey, everyone, sorry it's been so long since I last did an update on where I'm at with my writing. I could roll out my usual excuses, but I won't. Suffice it to say, I've been busy as hell. But, today is a calm morning, so let me take advantage of it by bring you up to speed…

First up, HAYWIRE! The editor of Gryphonwood Press sent me an edited version of my manuscript a little over a month ago with notes on further edits he'd like to see me make. When I got them I thought, "Oh, I'll be able to knock this out in a week, if it takes that long." Man was I wrong. What I'd failed to realize was that HAYWIRE is a novel I'd finished a couple of years ago, and since then I've evolved as a writer, and if I wanted to make the book as good as it could be, I'd have to make a ton of little changes all through it to bring it up to the level I'm at now. Then, to make things even more difficult, the changes I was asked to make were more far-reaching than I'd initially thought, causing extensive rewrites and wholesale slaughter of previous chapters. It was an alphabetical massacre. Now, a little over a month later, I'm done. I've corrected and changed it as much as I'm able. Yesterday I sent it back to the publisher, and now I wait to hear back. Once I know more, I'll let you know.

A MINOR MAGIC, which is being published by Crescent Moon Press, has emailed me about edits to that manuscript. They want to wait a little while between the publishing of that novel and HAYWIRE, which I totally agree with. When I know the date HAYWIRE comes out, I'll let CMP know so we can schedule the editing of A MINOR MAGIC.

I was nearly finished with the first draft of STILL WATER when the edits for HAYWIRE came in. Now that HAYWIRE is off my plate, I'll be getting back to STILL WATER. I'd like it if I could finish the first draft, and then let it cool while I edited A MINOR MAGIC. That way, when I got back to it, STILL WATER would be out of my head and I could come to it fresh. After I do an editing pass on it, I'll send it to some beta readers to get their take on it.

And as for my short stories, I've actually just had two of them published. My sci-fi noir story THE DAME WORE WHITE has been published by Flagship Magazine, and my horror story IN THE DEEP DARK has come out from Abbatoir. I'm extremely proud of both stories, and I like that they represent me as a full-spectrum writer. I love science fiction, I love fantasy, and I love horror, so it's only natural that I write the same way. Hopefully I've got something for you no matter your tastes. Please click on one of those links to support not only me, but also the wonderful people who think enough of my work to publish it.

And… that's it for now. As always, I'll try to post more quickly next time. Have a good one!