So I crashed and burned on the May Novel Writing Month (MayNoWriMo), which comes as no surprise to me, and shouldn’t be to be three or four faithful readers here. Ah well. At least I got a little bit more revised and written on the ol’ baseball book.

I think I just need a break from that book right now. My fear is that I just need to start completely over with that book, and do a “re-draft” from page one. Yikes. It’ll be much better, I know, but I’m just not ready for that yet. As much as it hurts me to admit it, I’m just not ready to write that book yet.

But I may be, in half a year or so. More on that later.

For right now, I’m going to polish up some unfinished stories, maybe write a couple new ones, simply because I have ZERO stories out there circulating on magazine and webzine editors’ desks. I miss having stories out! I revised a story I wrote last year a week ago and sent it out, and while the rejection I got stung, I sent it right back out again. So there.

I’m also hoping to make a little cash if I sell some stories, as I’ll need it in the coming months. But more on that later.

I’m also starting to get the itch to start work on the revamp of my young-adult, contemporary-fantasy novel, A Sudden Outbreak of Magic. I’m planning on making my protagonist Kelley the viewpoint character for the whole book, which to non-writers probably doesn’t seem like a big deal. But logistically, since I’m telling the WHOLE story from her point of view, I have to do some rearranging. Kelley can’t be everywhere, and a lot of crazy stuff happens to her twin brother and their friends. So I have to either put Kelley into those scenes, which might be awkward, or have scenes where other people tell Kelley what happened to them.

It’s an interesting challenge, and one that will pay off in the end — the book will jump around a whole lot less, which makes it easier for younger readers to stay focused. Kelley’s a great character, lots of attitude and determination, and readers will enjoy having her as their tour guide through the mean streets of Dubuque, Iowa, and beyond… 😉

And finally, now that all the various big non-writing chores have been done (mulch, computer fixups to both the laptop and the desktop at home, etc.), I finally have time to focus on reading again. I’m finishing up my buddy Tim Pratt’s Spell Games, which has been a wild romp with tons of amazingly cool ideas all packed up into a con game, with wizards. As soon as I finish that book, hopefully tonight, I get to dive into some more books — assigned reading for a workshop I have coming up.

A workshop, you say? Yes, a workshop. Continuing ed for my fiction-writing skills — the first one I’ll be going to since 2004. Before Drew was born! Yeah, I really need this. I am rusty.

After about six years of wanting to go to one of these workshops, and never feeling like the time was right or the finances were in good enough shapre for me to go, I’m finally heading west to do a Master Class with Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch!

Alas, I don’t have time to talk more about the workshop right now, other than I can’t. Frickin’. Wait!