The Home Stretch

I spent the last couple of days re-reading the whole book, (mostly) resisting the urge to tinker (other than fixing obvious typos and repeated words), and it's actually working far better than I realized. I've only spotted a couple of scenes that I think may need to be adjusted to fit what I've realized about the villain, and one of those I may "Bill and Ted" after the book is done. The other is a couple of scenes before I left off, so I can start there and gain momentum moving forward. I'm sure everything will be tweaked in revisions, but that's what revisions are for. Last night, I wrote a quick summary of events from the villain's point of view to figure out what was going on with her, why she was doing the things she was doing, what she felt about the way things were going, and what her next plans were. I think that will help me plot going forward.

I'm so close to the end I can feel it. This is when I get eager to work on a book. Plus, I have more books that I want to get to, and I need to finish this one first.

I suppose this is where our crazy weather is going to work in my favor. In case you haven't seen it on the news, Texas is flooding right now. I'm okay in my immediate area, just a little soggy, but all bodies of water are out of their banks. They've cancelled the Friday fireworks at the lake for the next couple of weeks because the spot where they can safely fire the fireworks is under water, and the roads to most of the lakeside parks are under water. And there's lots more rain in the forecast for the weekend. Sounds like a good time to stay inside and write.

Back in the very early days of my writing career, when I had a full-time job, most of my writing came on Friday nights. I'd come home, have dinner, maybe watch a little TV, then I'd make a pot of tea and sit down to write until I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer. Those marathon sessions were when I'd tackle the big parts of the book, and they had a lot of momentum and energy. I don't do that as often anymore, now that I have all day to write, but I think it might be fun to try it again. I'm a lot older now, so I may fall asleep a lot sooner (I'm not as much a night owl as I used to be), but a rainy night might be just what the doctor ordered.

And then I can dive into PR, marketing, and research for the next project.