It's December? Ack! Bumping Up My Book Release Will Cost Me Christmas.

Hee hee, ha ha, ho ho! That's not Santa Claus. That's my delirious laughter. The manic sound of having too many things to do and not enough time in the day to do them. I'm so busy I have to remind myself it's December and that Christmas is only 21 days away. I might have time to celebrate the holidays...in February or maybe March of next year, right after the Super Bowl, but right now? Not gonna happen.

My next book is due out in January, and I'm on a tight deadline to get the last edit —which was a proof until I decided to deepen my POV, based on what I learned and posted about in my last blog post—finished. Now I'm trying to cram in a final edit AND a proofread in only a couple of weeks so I can have the manuscript formatted and ready to publish by December 31. Talk about pushing my luck.

I had initially announced that Rebel Obsession (my next book) would be out on January 15, but due to a miscommunication between my assistant and I, my blog tour got scheduled for the first half of January instead of the second half, so now I'm trying to get the book ready two weeks early so the release can coincide with the tour. It would be kind of a waste to miss out on all the excitement the blog tour will generate by not having the book available for purchase, so now my holidays will be spent putting in double-time to finalize the manuscript.

Consequently, my blog series on Showing vs. Telling is being temporarily set aside along with everything else in my life until I get my manuscript ready. Sleep? Who needs sleep? And my husband is probably going to slit his wrists by the time this book is released, because he's having to do most everything around the house right now while I lock myself in my office and hunker down on corrections, swag orders, and promotion...and did I mention corrections?

This is the longest book I've written to date at 111,000 words, and as I trudge my way through the manuscript, which I've read in its entirety at least five times now, it's not something that can be done in one night. Not even two. Not even five if I want to make sure I'm being thorough. Proofing is not about "reading." It's about looking at each individual word and punctuation mark, and it takes a great deal of brain power to proof properly, which means once the eyes and mind grow tired, you can't plow ahead. You have to stop so you can bring a fresh mind and a fresh set of eyes back later. Ugh. I don't have time for my eyes and brain to grow tired, know what I mean?

Stress? Yes, I'm there. But in January, it will have all been worth it.

Hope everyone else is having a less stressful and mroe enjoyable December than I am. :) Happy Holidays and roasting chestnust and all that jazz!

Oh, and as always, happy reading and writing!
-D