Monday, January 19, 2009

coming up for air

Current work: Just finished Penhally revisions, second round
Listening to: Corelli
Reading: Sarah Morgan, The Prince’s Waitress Wife (lovely fast-paced read – a real whirlwind of a romance, with a gorgeous hero and the most lovely heroine – recommended)

Been busy with second round of revisions. It’s been a while since I’ve had to do revisions on revisions, so as I’m a paranoid (read: typical) author, I had a slight attack of the crows over it. My ed was away, so one of her colleagues briefed me, and was utterly lovely about the way she explained what they wanted. The way my head works means that I needed a day or so to let it brew in my head, before getting down to actually writing it yesterday. (In the meantime, while that was brewing, worked on my nonfic. Which also has a tight deadline.)

Finished it at lunchtime, and my ed is back - as she said, it was a matter of making the most of the opportunities I'd put into the book, not that I'm rubbish and have completely lost it :o) (And I imagine other authors out there are nodding sagely. You KNOW that feeling. It's illogical, but it feels all too real.)

Today is wet and miserable (it's meant to be Blue Monday, where everyone's got a cold, is broke and feels miserable - hmm, why am I hearing New Order? Oh, yeah. I grew up in the eighties), but yesterday afternoon was glorious. I needed a shot of the Broads, so I begged for a quick trip out to Ranworth. The ducks and geese were out in force. As were the swans. As soon as I neared the water’s edge, up they all came. And when they realised that I didn’t have any goodies for them… Let’s just say swans are big birds, and when they hiss they're a little intimidating. So I took my pictures and vamoosed.

The winner from the draw for a signed copy for Sold to the Highest Bidder is Carol. (Please let me know your snailmail addy, Carol – kate dot hardy @ btinternet dot com – sorry for the longwinded way of putting it, but it does help to avoid spam!)

And I have three bits of nice news. Number one is the one I was really hoping for: my stepmum was under threat of redundancy, but she's just texted to say her job is safe. Good. Number two, the utility room should be fixed this week. (Yes. My house completely back to normal. At last.) And number three, I had a lovely review of The Greek Doctor's New Year Baby - but I'll share that tomorrow as my deadline is nagging.

7 comments:

Unknown said...

Lovely bits of news.

Too many people are worrying about their jobs right now - all very depressing. So glad your stepmum's had good news.

Enjoy your house being back to normal. Bliss, isn't it? :o)

Diane said...

Ah. Blue Monday. That explains everything. And yes, I have the same song on my MJB now, thanks. :o)

Anonymous said...

Great news about the job and the floor.
Stability. Don't you love it?
As for the revisions? I thought that was just me, working on my second book.
I hope you do not mind me saying that it is actually reassuring to a newbie like myself, that an award winning talented writer like yourself with over 25 books in print, still receives more than one revision letter from her editor.
Someone clever said that 'Writing is Rewriting.' Hard to do though.
Dratted crows.
Hope for me yet. :-)

Kate Hardy said...

Shirley = I was so relieved.

And a normal house. Hooray.

Kate Hardy said...

Diane - sorry ;o) I didn't like the song when it was out the first time. (I live with someone who did buy the single. It might be on blue vinyl - there had to be a reason why he bought it, because it certainly wasn't the music.)

Kate Hardy said...

Ray-Anne - stability is just lovely.

Hugs on the revisions and the crows. (As you know, I recommend a combination of chocolate and Pandora beads...) Focus on the positive bits of the ed's letter, look for the important points, re-read your MS and apply said points to it. And then take a deep breath, plunge in, and give yourself breaks for treats (whether it's a cup of tea or nipping out to the shops to buy yourself some daffodils).

Kate Hardy said...

PS - Ray-Anne, thanks for the compliment :o) Sorry, speed-read and missed what you said, first time round!