That may be smarter, but I'm just chafing to have something out there, you know? Finishing Anna is months away, at minimum. And for all I know, I'm being too hard on Lucy. I mean, my third book will probably be better than Anna, and I've certainly seen worse books than Lucy get published.

Upon further reflection, AmyLiz has Lucy now, and expects to have time to read it within the next month or so. Since she knows her stuff and is a fresh set of eyes, I think I'll wait and see what she thinks, and also what kind of feedback I get from the contests I entered it in back in June. That might give me an idea whether or not the glaring flaws I'm seeing are just from having spent so much time on it that I'm nitpicking.

Susan -- Just peeking in because I'm still unpacking and dealing with a looming deadline, but I saw your posts, and wanted to chime in. Everyone (hopefully) gets better as they go along, but by no means does it mean Book #1 sucks. And from what I've seen of Lucy (just that first chapter, so far) it definitely doesn't. Edited to add that that sounded like damning with faint praise, and what I should have said was: What I read of Lucy so far was charming, atmospheric, and very smoothly written. I think most of us also see the glaring flaws in our own work much more easily than others do, because we're always much harder on ourselves. So what you might see as a flaw (because you know you could have/want to have done it better) someone else might not notice at all.

Plus, I'm of the mind that you have this done and ready to go, and while you wait for feedback from whatever source -- which, as you know, can take a while in coming -- you can keep writing Anna. Then if someone's really interested in you as a writer, rather than just in that book (which happens very frequently in romance, because everyone wants to "grow" authors as a brand) you can say, "Hey, I have another book X amount of pages from completion."

Amy--thanks! I'll be interested to see what you think when you've read the whole thing, because most of the flaws I see don't show up until later chapters.

In any case, I've decided to wait a few weeks before submitting it, because I realized I was so antsy because if I shipped Lucy out, I could feel like I was doing something productive even if I wasn't working on Anna or publicizing my freelancing. So, if the feedback I get from you and the contests convince me it's worth going forward, I'm going to send it out as a reward to myself after I've written another 10,000 words of Anna and advertise my freelancing in at least three more places.

Who knows anything about fashion designers?

For example, if a wealthy-but-stylish character had a thing for wearing black dresses with pink trim, who would she be wearing?

Damn, I don't even know enough to know how to ask this question.

All advice appreciated.

Um, Chanel? (I'm kind of a fashion idiot, though. Hippie mamas don't pass on much in the way of couture. If anyone else answers, take theirs.)

Victor, what's the time frame? What's the fabric? What's her personality? And what's her age?

That would vary widely, and there would be years, decades in fact, where black/pink would be unavailable by way of haute couture, in which case she'd probably have them made specifically for her.

Victor, what's the time frame? What's the fabric? What's her personality? And what's her age?

That would vary widely, and there would be years, decades in fact, where black/pink would be unavailable by way of haute couture, in which case she'd probably have them made specifically for her.

OK. This is Karen, in Nihilist Chic. She's 23, and rides the line between being extremely fashionable and complete disregard. She's usually classy, and definitely enjoys standing out in a crowd. The time is right now.

So, tailored, simplistic chic, rather than flashy or too trendy? Stay away from Versace. I'll need to do a bit of googling, but I can see her doing the updated Audrey Hepburn, with dark quirks, in full Givenchy.

If she wants really dark freeform chic, there's always Prada.

Victor. check here:

[link]

and click the various designers to look at a slideshow of the current collections. With Karen, I might be tempted to look at Galliano, or Christian Lacroix.