It seems to me that summer… is rapidly coming to a close around here. With the girls back in school and the last few months of travel behind me, I’m looking forward to the start of football!
THE FAR EMPTY is still winding its way through the halls of Putnam. We’re picking up the endorsements (aka blurbs) from other authors — and will be until release — and I’ve been blown away by the very generous comments. They’re going to look fantastic on the book’s dust jacket, and I can’t wait to share them.
I have a full draft of TFE’s sequel, HIGH WHITE SUN, done, and have started work on a first revision (I typically do two revision passes after the first draft). It’s a “bigger” book in almost every way, and I’m happy with where it’s at right now. This will occupy me until October or so, when I’ll turn it over to both my agent and editor for a read. While they’re working through it, I hope to have a window to complete a book I was about half-way through when THE FAR EMPTY sold. I don’t even have a working title for it, and it’s not set in Texas, but I hope to find a home for it someday. Then, if I can get to it before the revisions for HIGH WHITE SUN come back, I may turn my attention to the long gestating “domestic horror” I’ve had rattling around. By then, THE FAR EMPTY will also be out, and we’ll have an idea if a third book in that series is a go or not.
It’s weird to know that my writing schedule for the next two years is already lined out, but even weirder to think that two years ago I didn’t even have a need for such a schedule.
And, I have to admit, as each month rolls by, my impatience grows. I can’t wait for THE FAR EMPTY to go out into the world. It’s a book I’ve been living with for a long time, and I’m ready to share it. Good, bad, or indifferent, I’ll be thrilled to see how it stands against all the other great books I’ve read over the past year, and the writers I’ve always admired.
So, just as quickly as summer has felt like it’s come and gone, THE FAR EMPTY’s impending release has felt twice as slow. Everyone tells me it’s the nature of publishing, but that doesn’t make it any easier.
More to come…
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