There it is! I'm almost 2/3 finished with the book. I'm at 60%, and by this time tomorrow probably, I'll pass the threshold for the 2/3 mark, and be somewhere past the point of no return. Who am I kidding? I am so past that point now. This is a ride, and I love it.
The Murder Book has a mind of its own really. I'll sit myself down, and bullet point what it is that I'm going to say in the book's next chapter, and before I know it, I'm not even looking at my notes. My hands are flying, my fingers hitting the keys and making so many bad mistakes! Oh my gosh, when I type quickly there are big fat boo-boos!! I use the wrong words, I drop words that need to be there; words like "not" and "now". Believe me, they do matter. I have to go back after I've written each chapter, before I save the document, to both correct my spelling and go over each sentence to see if I had written it as a quote when I should have, or if I had used quotes at all? I find it frustrating, to say the least, but it's OK, it's all part of the process. It is. I promise.
I have written two chapters today, one yesterday, and I'm right at 45,000 words now. With my last book as a gauge of sorts, I've decided that 80,000-90,000 words will be about the right size. If I can say the things I want to say, get the full story told in a bit less, I'll do it, but not less than 75,000. No way. I'm going to have this book measured at 7x4 rather than 6x9, and if they'll let me, I'll go back and change "Of Kilted Pleasure" to be a 7x4 book as well. I just don't like the bigger book. I don't really like any book size for myself really, I read everything on my Kindle, but that's another story. I will have both books in E-book form soon. I just have to get them uploaded correctly. You can't just upload it, you have to have a PDF turned into an E-Pub format, and I'm not up on that tech yet. I will be, again, I promise.
So, the hero is making his way through Edinburgh, a place he hadn't been to in over 10 years. He's finding much has remained the same, a few things have changed as well. He's not as apt to try new things as he was as a younger man, and he's also finding out that murder is a bad business; no matter what side of the pond one is on. Eoghan, or the new guy, is stretching his wings and becoming a faithful and good friend to Posh. Theirs will be a long-lasting bond; perhaps deeper and more meaningful than the war buddy Posh fondly refers to; Ferguson, or Fergy.
It's toning up and taking shape. I have to get around to talking about Nick's father's murder soon; it will be discussed in this book, and pursued in another. I am purposely creating threads that will weave in and out of the various books in the series. The purpose of the series is not to tell one story in one book, then go to the next, but to keep the thing rolling. It will make sense when you dig into it. I don't want to say "I promise" again, but I do.
Writing the way I'm writing, I'll probably finish the book in a couple of weeks, and then start the tweaking, fluffing, and stuffing. By that time, I'm hoping to be either employed or closer to it. I'm on stand-by now, we're all just sort of waiting for the hurricanes to hit so we can be deployed from our desks at home. It sounds funny when you say that, but it's called a deployment because you're working for one company under a contract for an indefinite period of time, and they provide the software and equipment you use. You are in a sense, their employee even if you're (me) a 1099 with an EIN. You work for them while you're deployed. They take out your taxes. If you get the experience and go out on your own, you use the EIN and take out your own taxes. You can more or less dictate your income at that point; I am not at that point.
OK, well, gotta run. I'll keep you posted as I go, and at the end, I'll tell you I'm there, and we can start the fluff and stuff and get a full count of words. I'll certainly go through it 12x at least, looking for mistakes, grammar issues, and more. I wrote to Tony Broonford today, shooting him a copy of Chapter 22 to see if I had made any big blunders in the theatre scenes. He said I was good to go!! Woot!! I'll take his expert word for it, and keep moving. The building of the King's Theatre plays a significant role in the book - - I wanted to make sure I got it right!
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