Gud, I haven't been keeping up with the chapters you've been sending me. If you want to send me the same complete first book you sent Liese, I'll go ahead and read it all the way through and try very hard to give you feedback. I can guarantee the reading, I'm not sure I'll have useful critique to offer but I will try.

That would be great! Thanks!

I can send the normal copy, or one optimized for duplex printing.

Normal is fine.

The normal one I have laying around, so to speak, so I can just send it.

Again, Thanks!

Ok, so I thought signing up for Script Frenzy, which is like NaNO for Screenwriters would be an awesome idea, because it would force me to finish my spec by 4/1 and for the challenge and all that happy crap, right? But I forgot how "!!!!" writing hobbyists are.Everything is just always*so* much fun and the best shit evar...I don't remember when I started a writing project and felt like that, but I think my age had "teen" in it. I don't suppose there's a nice way to post back "Please stop gushing...your ceaseless glee is making me sick." And I don't even think I'm even all that tormented...not one of those people that believes every page is childbirth(despite my tripping on what a big job the spec has been....the new version has come more easily But there are definite moments of pleasure in a well-crafted, in character moment...it's just hard to imagine being all "Woo hoo!" about it...at this point that would feel like being excited about...digesting a sandwich.

57 is done with now, and I'm making inroads into 58. After spending forever on chapter 55, I'm feeling good about making progress now.

My new audiobook is Killing Floor, by Lee Child. It was recommended to me, partly to see how he depicts characters. Well, I'm writing fantasy and this is a crime drama, so it doesn't help much. The main character is a detective and portrayed in first person, so while the characters are sharply drawn, its mostly by the main character telling you what they are like from observations. It's totally in character, but it's not an approach that works for me.

As for the book itself, I'm enjoying it when the plot is progressing, but there are spots where I feel like he strolls away from the plot to describe stuff and account for time. So good, but I think the editing could be more ruthless. The paperback has 544 pages so about 180,000 words, seems like some trimming wouldn't be bad.

Do not get me started on his depiction of Georgia or the dramatic scene in the airport that could not possibly have taken place in any incarnation of the Atlanta airport.

I'm not that far into it yet, it's a pretty sizable book. There is a certain stereotype feel to, well, everything, but I like the way the mystery is being set up when he doesn't wander off.

From everything I've read, a first book this long would be impossible to get picked up, but if I had a dime for every "don't do this" thing I see in published work, I'd have a lot of dimes.

Yeah.