Longhand? What the Heck?!

I am revising. I LOVE revising!Revising means the long slog of writing that dreaded first draft is over. This time my initial draft took almost seven months, small potatoes compared to my first book’s 21 months. However, this time around I wrote over half the...

Poisoning a Monk

I felt like poisoning a monk. -Umberto Eco on why he wrote the novel The Name of the RoseI wrote Hatshepsut because the poor woman was going to drive me insane if I didn’t get her voice out of my head (and because I’ve always wanted to time travel to...

Finito!

Pop the champagne and throw a shrimp on the barbie! I just finished the first draft of my WIP! Wait, I don’t eat shrimp and I’d rather have a glass of wine. Whatever–all I know is that it’s DONE!*breaks into an Egyptian Byzantine happy...

Yeah, Yeah, I’ve Been MIA, But…

*gasps for breath*Must make it to the finish line. Side cramps are killing me. Feet are burning. Brain is about to explode. So close… and yet, so far!I have three scenes left to write. Three! Work is bedlam as we finish the last two weeks of school, but I can...

U: Undertaking

My current WIP feels like a whirlwind compared to my first finished novel. This has been a huge undertaking, basically because I knew next to nothing about the Byzantine Empire when I started. Yeah, okay, I’ve taught about it, but my school’s 700+ page...