Joyously Prolific

The days keep kind of slipping past me. In a good sort of way, actually. I've been getting some serious work done. I finished a short story (The Magic Place, now called Uncertain Waters), and I finally made a decision on a book submission. This was a very difficult choice because it didn't matter which one I did, it would have to have a rewrite. I was going to go with Glory. I think Glory is a great book... but it's not even done yet, and I need to let it sit for a while before I do a rewrite. So I started looking at some of the books that I've been hording for a while. Three of them leapt up and started screaming 'me, me, me.'

I think I've settled on Badlands. I started reworking the first chapter last night. The opening pages have so many infodumps that my eyes starting glazing over, and I barely got 1000 words done... but the new ones are much better.

This isn't an edit. It's a complete retype everything from scratch version. The story is the same. The prose is entirely different. I have not worked on this novel since about 1997. It is amazing how much I've learned in that time.

And I've enjoyed those first 1000 words. So now I have two projects -- a thousand words on Glory and a thousand words on Badlands. Glory will be done soon, at least in this draft. Badlands is over 100,000 words long. I expect to be working on it for some time... but it's a good thing to do.

See, I tend to write things... and then go for the easy stuff to submit. Badlands has not been out since about 1998. It made it through Ace's slush pile and a rewrite before being turned down because they wanted a story that had more of a space opera feel -- wider scope than just one world.

I put Badlands away after that and haven't seriously looked at it in years. When I pulled it out this time... It felt right.

I'm starting to feel like a more serious writer again. How odd.

So, off I go to work on Glory and Badlands, and maybe a few other things just for fun.