So, as if over twenty-four hours of Christmas music was not enough for Christmas listening enjoyment, XM now has all of their Christmas stations going in full effect. They have all the sub-genres covered from your traditional carols to the novelty to the normal everyday Christmas music from artists like Mannheim Steamroller, Kenny G, and Mariah Carey. It’s nice to have choices, choices are good, it’s like an auditory 31 Flavors.

The Book will be finished this week, we are so close. The excitement is building, we’re trying to figure out how to celebrate. To me a celebration seems premature, even if it is well deserved, it’s still premature. Technically, I don’t have a book yet, I have a manuscript that really, really hopes to grow up and become a book. I’m guessing that the road to bookdom, yes I just made that word up, may be arduous. But it does speak to some accomplishment and for that I should be happy. So maybe we’ll go grab a slice at The Costco, celebrate small, because even the small accomplishments deserve to be celebrated.

So the hope of finishing Part Three and subsequently the whole book by the weeks end has been met with delays due to Leslie battling a cold this week. We’ve made progress, just not quite what we thought. But the week is not over yet, not technically until Saturday night. So there is hope. We keep plugging along.

The Book is coming along. Over the weekend we finished Part Two’s edits and revisions. We’re hoping, crossing fingers, to be able to get Part Three finished by weeks end. We’re really getting excited.

I’ve been doing my research concerning agencies and queries, learning the format, and crafting the perfect query. It’s a whole process, I tell you. It’s like preparing a resume for a new job.

This whole adventure is not for the faint of heart or the easily tired. I’d have to say, this is harder than high school and college. That might sound strange I realize, especially considering for many high school was a traumatic experience of acne and awkwardness. I didn’t find high school or college all that difficult, just take away the acne and awkwardness and it was great.

To get through school it took perseverance and a lot of self-discipline. The difference is that you have to go to high school and you have to finish not really any other option. College, well once you’re in, you just have to finish as well. So really, there’s not much of a choice, you just have to endure the papers and professors. Writing a novel though, you can start, but you don’t have to finish it. They always say starting is easy, finishing is hard, and it’s true, even if you are passionate about it.

Writing a novel in your free time is challenging to say the least. You have to remember your characters, what’s going on, what’s going to happen, how you got to where you are and how you’re going to get yourself out of where you are. Characters are people. If you want to understand and know someone you have to spend time with them, talk to them, listen to them. In the same way, if you want to finish a novel, and I’m certainly not speaking from a lot of experience here, you have to spend time with your characters. If you’re balancing life at the same time, well sometimes the characters and their lives go by the wayside.

It’s really something you have to want, like a garden, or so I hear—I don’t garden, I water. A story is something that you have to throw yourself into, you have to be able to find the characters and understand what they would say in the given situation, not what you or the reader would want them to say. I find that it’s an interesting mixture of right and left brain, creativity and organization—a lot of organization, outlines and refinements, and edits, and tweaks and…you get the idea, I’m sure.

I’m just thankful that my characters are almost complete and ready to be launched out into the world. And in case you wonder, I know you do, the answer is: yes, I do have other novels in the works, three actually. I of course need to get the first one published and out there, but I’m pursuing this wholeheartedly.

As complex as the process is, I adore it—yes, I used adore, a word you don’t hear too often. The process is challenging, yet amazing. There is a feeling of accomplishment when you finish, be it a page, or a chapter or a section or the whole thing. But even during the process, the excitement of exploring a new world, new characters, listening to what the characters would say and how they speak, it’s truly a unique experience that I do adore.

So now, off to Part Three, updates to follow.