"The notion that such persons are gay of heart and carefree is curiously untrue. They lead, as a matter of fact, an existence of jumpiness and apprehension. They sit on the edge of the chair of Literature. In the house of Life they have the feeling that they have never taken off their overcoats."
- James Thurber, My Life and Hard Times

Saturday, June 6, 2015

Sometimes you go with your gut

For all my readers who are clamoring for the next Peri book, it's on its way. I'm about 20,000 words from the end of the story. I know where the story is going and how to finish it. For the past few weeks, I've been writing feverishly, madly, quickly, just to get to "The End."

And then my intuition started to nag at me, telling me more than a few things.

1. This book needs more care, more thought than a race to the finish line, even in draft form.

2. This book will never been published this year. It needs time.

3. I need to have a book out this year.

In the old days, I never listened to my gut. That's how I married the wrong man and got bucked off my horse. Now that I'm older and wiser, I pay more attention.

One of the neat things about 2015 is that it's the 10th anniversary of my column in the Placentia News-Times. I have two books of columns out, but haven't put a new one out in four years. I've been puzzling as to what to do to celebrate ten years of telling tales about my family, my community, and myself.

Then it occurred to me, why not a book for my P-Town friends? As a matter of fact, why not two? Or three?

What I'm doing is a little unconventional. When I go to the Placentia Heritage Day festivities this year, I'll have three brand-new paperbacks. One will be columns about my family, one will be columns about Placentia, and one will be columns about the holidays. They won't be available before then. They won't be available in ebook. Not until my P-Town readers have the opportunity to have the books first -- and of course, at deep discounts. 

It should only take a couple of weeks to get the books ready to go. After that, I'll return to Peri's story and wait until October to release the anniversary books.

Be patient. I promise you good stories!

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