Ice Cubes for Fingers

Brrr...my writing room is tres froid this morning. My fingers feel like stubby little ice cubes, which makes for some interesting typing. I may have developed an entirely new language. Now if I could only decipher it, I'd be all set.

Yesterday I took the day off, my replacement vacation day and sadly my last one for the year (deep, heavy sigh inserted here, along with a little wallowing in the pity pool). But it was a productive day. I started typing in my edits and revisions and sent my first ten chapters off to my critique partner. I'm sending it to her in 5 chapter chunks. Chunks...you know that's kind of a fun word to say. Chunk. Say it with me, people. Chunk. Crap, that's going to be stuck in my head all day now.

Anyhoo...where was I? Chapters, right. So I sent the first 10 off yesterday, did another two this morning and will hopefully have another 5 to send tomorrow. I figure at this rate, I should have everything to her by Saturday. Which if that happens, I'll then spend Sunday doing the accursed synopsis (picturing me sneering like Clint Eastwood right before he says 'so tell me punk, are ya feelin' lucky?'...or perhaps more like Billy Idol before he lets out the rebel yell--you're choice.)

Needless to day, after yesterday's progress, I feel much better about getting things done on time. Pam has already returned my first 5 chapters with some wonderful comments which have her sitting on top of my favorite peoples list and also pointed out some typos - HELLO? How do I miss those no matter how many times I read the darn thing??

So next week will be spent on clean up and finalizing said accursed synopsis which I'm allowing 5 pages for and no more, and then that's it. Off it goes to the GH and to HQN. Which can mean only one thing - well two if you factor in that I've apparently lost my mind, but since that's not necessarily a recent development, we'll keep the count to one - I can start new stuff!!

Woo hoo!! Happy Dance ensues! Yes, that's right boys and girls, after two years of slagging away on The Outlaw Bride (and loving about 75% of that time), I am now ready to move on to a new book (Desire & Brimstone), a new country (England), a new era (early Victorian) and yes - yes! - fresh new characters (Devlin and Isabel, not to mention the notoriously drunk Quinn who will have his own book to follow).

Ah yes - it's like Christmas came early.