Life is returning to normal. Okay, who am I kidding? I've never been normal.
Despite that, I am here to report a bit of progress. I have just completed the last of the action, and the manuscript lacks only the denoument. That's right, just wrapping it all up in a neat, tidy, little tangle--err... bow. I know what it is, but I also know that I need to stand up before the bloodfow never returns to my rump. But in only a day or so, it will be time to get this horrid mess off to the editor.
By horrid mess, I mean a script full of typo's and weird word selection. But it's normal for this stage. I have powered trhough this without editing what I have written. I have to. If I ever wanted to write half a story that never got finished, I would go back and re-work passages before it is complete. This would pretty much guarantee that I stagnate. Years from now, I would have a really good two or three chapters... and nothing else.
So, I have a tangle of tortured english. But burried in that morass is a story. One with a beginning, and middle, and--most importantly--an end. My editor will now take my mess and show me every place where a bit of work will bring the story out into the light. After many hundreds (twenty or thirty hundreds) of edits and rewordings, the story will be laying atop the rubble. Then, another editor will help me recognize where I can sweep the rubble away.
Once my thoughts are clean and fully exposed, a third editor will show me where to scrub and polish. By the end, a bright shiny tale of adventure will be ready to be double-checked for those last pesky misspellings and typo's that seem to breed every time I look away.
Fear not, intrepid reader, for this is not as time-consuming as it sounds. Sure, it's a lot of work, but I find it exciting. Each iteration brings the pictures in my head closer to life, and the end result is always something that I am amazed I had a hand in producing.
So don't give up on me yet. There is another tale coming, and I am looking forwad to sharing it with you--soon. Until then,
Keep Dreaming