Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Binge reading ... and what's next

I'm at the stage between books. All the things I've been neglecting while trying to perfect my latest love child are staring me in the face. "Spring cleaning" the house, catching up on my favorite authors, visiting friends and venturing into the outside world.

I dusted my house. Top to bottom. Cupboard fronts, door panels, everything. It's a start.

I'm reading +Jill Shalvis, adding the rest of the series that I haven't read to my wish list so I make sure to read them all. Was reading one last night and had a laugh out loud moment, which prompted the Big Guy to look up from his Kindle Fire to ask what I was laughing about. The book.

Had lunch with one of my dearest friends.

And in a couple of weeks, I'll be meeting and greeting at the Elgin Literary Festival.

But an author's work is never done. While I'm fine tuning, waiting on my critique group to catch up, and preparing Gathering Mist for the editor, I'm thinking ahead to "what's next."

A few years back, I wrote a book that I shelved. Epitaph. It's a ghost story, and a love story. But it was deeply flawed in several places. At the time, I wasn't sure how to fix it, so I set it aside and moved on. The story still haunts me (hah! a ghost story haunting me!), and I'd like to fix those flaws. I keep telling myself it will be next up when I find myself short of story ideas.  WHOOPS! No shortage of story ideas? So now I'm doing a balancing act again.

Remember when I mentioned, before I started writing Return to Hoffman Grove, that I couldn't decide between Cinda's story and Kundigerin 2? And then Cinda tapped me on the shoulder, demanding page time. Decision made. And now? I'm trying to decide between THREE stories. Kundigerin 3 - Max's story, fixing Epitaph, and the idea that keeps nagging me about Tromp L'Oeil. The first two are no brainers, I know the stories, just have to put them down, so it makes sense to tackle them -- plus people reading the Kundigerin series who are enjoying it might be anxious to see that resolved. But it's the tromp l'oeil story that has been occupying my mind.

Friends, fans, readers, anyone care to push me in one direction or the other?

1. Kundigerin 3 - Max's story. Finish the Kundigerin trilogy. Marissa and Wolf have two new friends, (you'll meet them in Kundigerin 2) and the four of them need to stop an evil genius. The plan right now is that it will be told from Max's point of view (Marissa's little brother) - he is the new secret keeper and has to chronicle the family legacy, along with the confrontation that is to come.

2.  Epitaph - a haunted house ghost story about a willowy young woman and a newspaper feature writer, haunted by the newspaper guy's dead sister and chased by her killer.

3.  Murals - a mural artist paints to escape a troubled past. This romance will not be a paranormal.

Anyone care to weigh in?

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