Spring Break

I finally feel like I’m making some good progress on my writing.  We’ve had some time off this week and did a little traveling – to Sienna, which was gorgeous, then to San Gimignano, which was even more so.  Now I’m doing some crunching away at the story, trying to whip it into shape.  Have to go back to work on Monday, so I’m trying to get as much as possible done over the weekend.  We’re still hoping to head out to the Dolomites before we leave here.

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Idea for Spring Break?

It’s hard to believe we’ve been in Italy for seven weeks now!  I have been so busy with teaching that I haven’t been doing a whole lot of writing, but I think I’m starting to turn a corner.  I’ve been carving out some time during the work week to finesse American Caliphate, my most significant current project.  I have to have it in ship shape to turn into my publisher by the end of May.  And that’s a little scary!  Not that it’s in bad shape, but because it’s epic and long, and at just over 100,000 words, it’s 15,000 words longer than the publisher wants.  So I’ve been doing a lot of soul searching as to what back stories can go, and what characters can become less vivid.  And I was nervous about doing this, but the strange thing is that every cut I make is a cut I want to make.  I feel like I’m honing this into something finer.  I have to admit that this is a bit scary, because where does it end?  If I keep going, I’ll either have a hell of a short story, or a truly wonderful sentence!