Raveled

July 13

I meant to write last night, but I went to sleep instead. Tra la.

Yesterday was good plain work. I did fairly innocuous job stuff and then went home.

I wandered for a while downtown, purchasing Sturgeon's Godbody (his posthumously-published novel). Then I went home and read Wild Seed. Good stuff-- Butler is almost always good stuff.

I wanted to do something with my own writing, but I was feeling a bit Geniused out, and I didn't want to type more corrections. So I did something else.

A few days ago I printed out the first several chapters of my second novel, Raveling.

(Brief aside, explanation: For those who don't know, I've written 4 novels. The first, Shannon's God, I wrote in the summer of 1997. I might look it over and send it out someday; I don't think it's bad, for a first novel. The second, Raveling, I wrote in the summer of 1998. It's big and complex and yummy and flawed, and somewhat daunting in terms of revision, but I'm feeling much more confident about revising since finishing Genius, so it's not as daunting as it once was. The third, Infants and Tyrants, I wrote over Christmas break in 1998-1999. It's set in the same world as my Mr. Li stories, 30 years previous. I've come to believe that book is most valuable as backstory for the Mr. Li tales, I'm afraid... it's fun, and has giant robots and exploding babies, but I doubt seriously if I'll ever try to get it published. And at a paltry 85,000 words, it's the shortest of my novels. The fourth is Genius, written in August of 1999, and y'all have heard enough about that one)

So I went to Pergolesi with the first six chapters of Raveling, intending to read through and make notes for revisions. I expected a painstaking, dreadful process-- and instead, I breezed right through the first four chapters, doing nothing more than minor tweaks for style. Now, I seem to recall that the really messy section is in the middle of the book, but still-- I'm encouraged. I could write a synopsis and send off sample chapters of this book tomorrow, if I wanted, and be proud of what I submitted.

I'm not going to do that, though. I'm going to read the whole manuscript first and make sure it's truly salvageable. I honestly thought it needed at least one more round of biggish revisions before I could think about calling it finished. It's possible I was being too hard on myself... at any rate, I haven't looked at the manuscript in nearly a year, so I can come to it with fresh eyes and greater objectivity.

I might make working on Raveling something of a priority, though... I have to admit, the prospect of having two novels out in the world is an appealing one. I want them to be good novels, though, so I won't jump the gun.

Hmm... but if I send it out, I get to have another nice dinner... hmm...

After Pergolesi, I came home and read slush. I'd planned on making my final decisions within the next couple of weeks, but it occurred to me that I'm going to be occupied with the business of moving, soon, and that it might be wiser to complete my line-up. I received a flood of submissions in the past week, and I had enough good work to fill three issues, easily. I had to reject some poems I really liked. I think my final line-up is a strong and eclectic one-- there's a couple of science fiction pieces, a formally-structured dark fantasy piece, a horror/fairy tale, and a beautiful piece of almost mythic surrealism. Something for everyone...

I hung out with Scott and ate his gardenburgers. It was nice to catch up with him a little. I haven't been seeing enough of him lately.

I called Heather, and we chatted sleepily at one another for a while, and then I went to sleep...