Very nice, Anne.

I've been forced back down to earth. When I asked for more details about which publishers were interested in Napoleonic War stories, she said she couldn't name the publisher, but that it was a case where they'd specifically commissioned one of their existing authors to write such a story.

So I've gone from "Woohoo! The market is finally opening up to the kind of story I care about writing," to "Oh, God--what if her book is too close to mine in premise? She'll beat me to market, because it's just impossible for me to write really fast what with freelancing and Annabel. And I love my book. I want it to have its chance so bad."

Susan, there's a lot of room in there for different styles of stories set in the same period. Personally, I'd rather read something like what you're writing versus a "traditional" regency.

Finally got my thoughts together on all those pictures posted yesterday. Here's one for starters.

Picture #1.

Climb Every Mountain

Years later, after she’d lost the picture, she was reminded of that day by a song. They’d met at a fair outside Garmish-Partenkirchen two years earlier. That day they’d gone up the mountains for a picnic, grateful to escape together for even a couple of hours. It was their last meeting. He was going back to try and bring his family out of Germany. She never saw him, or those hills, again. In the darkened theater, watching a young woman climb her own mountains and sing of being alive, she cried for a home that had never existed for her.

Personally, I'd rather read something like what you're writing versus a "traditional" regency.

Well, yeah, that's the thing. Whoever this other author is, she's been commissioned to write something more like what I'm writing now than a traditional Regency. Cue freaking out over whether it'll be so close that it'll ruin my story's chances.

Of course, as I just posted in Bitches, it's entirely possible my freaking out has more to do with the headache from hell and a baby who refuses to take a nap when it's absolutely critical that she do so RIGHT NOW. I'm not thinking very straight right now. I'm all emotion and headache and hunger pangs (because I also just started back on a diet today).

Whoever this other author is, she's been commissioned to write something more like what I'm writing now than a traditional Regency.

What I see this as is a toe-in-the-pool thing. If this sells, you think every publisher in the business isn't going to go "Napoleonics! We need Napoleonics!"?

What I see this as is a toe-in-the-pool thing. If this sells, you think every publisher in the business isn't going to go "Napoleonics! We need Napoleonics!"?

Susan, connie said what I was trying to say. That it's, for me, a wide open market. That you will find more demand for your writing than you think. One other person with a similar novel out there is not going to glut the market.

OK. Taking deep breaths. Trying to think rationally. Considering cheating on the diet in hopes that not having the hunger shakes will enable me to actually think rationally.

Okay, here's my stab at the drabble.

Number Four

Carrie loved the way the sand would pull away from under her feet as the waves receded. It felt like the sand pulled all the tension out of her body and banished it far into the depths. The water was cool this time of year and the sun teased her with the promise of warmer days, but that didn't matter. The salty smell of the water and the caw of the seagulls always made her feel warm. She came back here when she needed to feel more centered, more herself. The ocean was the calm in the storm of her life.

Oooh, ChiKat, I like that. It's very much how I feel about the ocean.

All three of those were excellent - but Anne's really talked to me. Been there, done that, thrown my hands up in despair: "Tekla! You freak! Are you being less territorial than I am? You're a damned cat!"

Susan, a glimpse of the obvious here, sweetie: the freakout gains you nothing except heartburn. All publishing is a crapshoot. You can't predict a damned thing. If you love the book, then finish the thing and go from there. Why flip out over stuff you can't possibly control or even have an immediate effect on? That''ll just distract you from your writing.

And another one.

Picture #5.

More Than Money

We’d been in that house twenty-five years on our anniversary. Our parents bought it for us as a wedding present. How they did it we didn’t know, but it gave us the freedom to build our lives up without the worry of a mortgage. Calvin earned his accounting degree in night school at that table. Only after twenty-five years, did we realize that the house had come with a mortgage. With every child’s birth, every graduation, every marriage, we were putting more of our hearts into our home. It wasn’t a mortgage paid with money, it was paid with love.