Ah yes, good ol' Izzy. I remember that.

That's some excellent use of detail in your drabble, Liese.

And that's great about the 3rd in hero creation -- you've really been pleased with your writing of Jack, so that's great to hear back that you really are on the right track with him.

Yep, I'm really happy about it. He breaks the hero mold in a variety of ways, most notably by being non-noble and non-broody (though he does brood a bit in the late going), so I'm glad to know he appeals to someone other than just me.

In a possible fit of over-analysis, I copied the scoresheet from the contest website and made a master sheet with my scores and comments for each question all together, so any areas that all the judges loved or that more than one had a problem with would jump out at me. There was only one question on the scoresheet for which none of them gave me a perfect score: "Has the author effectively created sensual tension?" All of them gave me 4 out of 5. And y'know, I'm not sure there's a fix for that. Anna and Jack meet while helping deliver a baby. It'd be just a little odd if they were openly lusting between contractions or over the afterbirth, methinks. And one of the areas where all three gave me a perfect score was "Does the attraction appear to be emotional as well as physical?" Since I'd rather read about an emotional bond that grows into a physical than vice versa, I think I'm on the right track.

I've reluctantly accepted that I'm going to have to go back and tweak my opening two paragraphs a bit more, however. Two of the three had issues with them, and a few other people who've read it either got confused or thought it went on too long. Which sucks, because I'm particularly fond of those paragraphs and think they're way prettier than most of what I write. So I guess that bit of writing advice that tells you to kill your darlings contains some truth.

Joe's drabble made me laugh and laugh.

I think I'll preen a bit nonetheless

And well you should! Good going!

Little lethal bits of malice

Loved loved loved this line. And you can always drabble whatever you like -- Teppy is most benevolent.

OK, memememe.

I finished the pass-page edits, typed up the two pages of mostly layout fixes, wrote the cover letter to my editor's assistant, and wrapped the entire pile up, ready for mailing back to St. Martin's. They wanted them by 1 June.

Such a nice feeling, being able to sit in front of my computer and take three days to do it instead of having to do it on a frickin' airplane.

That's wonderful, Deb. It must feel great to be done with room to spare.

Susan, it definitely does. And if I was worried about Ruth's edits (and I was, just a skosh, because it's a complex piece of history, that whole lead-up to the Cromwell years), worries are all gone. It's incredibly tight, and the few things that needed to be put back in for proper continuity totalled up to, like, three sentences. I had Ruth's permission to put back whatever I thought was needed, and I did, without even changing the page count.

Now I can buckle down and work on Cruel Sister. Since Ruth told Jenn that she "couldn't imagine not wanting my next book", I'm going to do my best to ignore the fact that I've essentially been holding my damned breath for five plus months, ignore the fact that I'm not likely to hear anything for yet a few more weeks (since BEA is imminent, and it's in NY this year), assume she's going to buy at least this one, and write the damned thing.

Depending on whether she offers on just one or on more than just one, I can also put some mental energy into considering what I want to do next, after this series is done - which I'm envisioning it being after the sixth book, at least right now.

All right, deb! Fantastic. You work so fast.

I've actually been slacking for weeks on this book, Liese. The whole being in limbo thing can lead to inertia.

I'm getting a LTE published in the local alternative weekly. I just wanted to give the writer, Amy Silverman, some feedback on her article on "Why Phoenix Has an Inferiority Complex" because I related to it so much. So now David Simon likes carrots will get a wider audience.

(beaming madly at internet wife)

Feedback may not make me sexy, but it seems to get me read. Although, to writers, sometimes there isn't much difference.