Momentary Change of Pace

I'm about halfway through the outline for an animated screenplay that I hope to start writing by next week. Set in my favorite world of medieval fantasy, it's got knights, imps, fairies, and an ogre as the hero (the real kind that eats babies, not a gassy one with a cheeky urban sidekick). I'm writing it for a number of reasons. First, I think it's a great story with some fun characters. Second, one of my day jobs is being an animation writer so I need to keep those muscles in shape. Third, I want to keep my writing agents supplied with current material that they can use to get me work. An important side benefit is that a 100 page movie script can serve as a very detailed outline for a novel -- with many of the kinks already worked out. I'm really jonesing to get back to writing novels, but I'm treating this is as a fun and necessary side project.

Hot Links Are Hot Again

A large percentage of my links were not working due to me not paying attention and accidentally adding some extra junk in the URLs. Yes, I'm a dope. An often well-meaning dope, but still a dope. They're functioning now and I recommend that you check them out -- especially if you're interested in improving your writing skills or learning about the business of writing. Special thanks to Mike T. for pointing out the errors.

A Dream for Some...

Well, I did it. "What?" you ask. Allow me to elucidate. I...

• finished several passes that incorporated J.Z.'s high quality notes
• did a polish pass (where I still discovered scads of typos and formatting errors!)
• hunted down any editing debris (highlighted text, bits of cut text I didn't know if I wanted to get rid of yet)
• ran a spell check (hmm, you mean "smellingly" is not a real word?)
• wrote a query
• sent the query to Liz, my excellent picture book editor (yes, I'm extremely fortunate to have a leg up on the slush pile)
• was greatly relieved when she quickly responded that she'd love to read the manuscript
• sent off the manuscript

What a terrifyingly exciting moment it was to press that send button.

My goal from the beginning has been to write something I was proud of -- which for me meant a manuscript that was a fun read and was good enough to send to a publisher. I feel I've achieved that goal. What's next? I'll continue to post here on any relevant news but I won't be sitting on my hands, waiting. I plan on taking a week or so off to clear my head. Then I'm going to start work on a screenplay (animated). That should take about a month and then I'm jumping right back into the novel game -- outlining one of the many "middle grade" ideas I have with the idea of completing another novel by the end of the year.

Word count a/o today's submission: 76696