Some updates.

What’s up, people? Am I going to have to reduce the Most Recent posts list on the Modern Evil homepage to 20 now, or are posts going to pick up again? There are so many people out there with access to post who simply aren’t using it… It’s sortof sad, really.

I know, I know, I haven’t been posting much myself lately. I blame … umm… President Bush. He kept calling me up and asking for my advice. And then doing precisely the opposite. Of course then the people who really wanted control over the President arranged to have my phone made useless so he couldn’t call me anymore. I guess we’ll just have to see what he does without my advice. Maybe he’ll call you next.

Hey! How about that war? I heard that as soon as it was over, people would start spending money again! Except … less people are coming up to Pine, less of those are coming into the store, and still fewer of those are spending any money. And when they do spend money it is in smaller amounts. Less and fewer and smaller, not just than last year, but than winter (considered a time of year not really worth bothering to open to many locals) this year, and than during the war. Sure, closing the forest might have something to do with it, but considering it was 113 degrees in Phoenix today, there should at least have been more traffic in town today than we saw. Yeah, well, I heard Bush was working up to a new war, with Iran this time. Which is specifically what I’ve been advising him not to do, right up until he stopped calling me. Because maybe if there’s a war on, people will come spend their money. Maybe if we go to war with North Korea (I’ve been telling him not to battle them since he first called) there can be a thermonuclear exchange and people will really start to open up their pocketbooks, maybe even buy some ‘fine art’. Just like the 34th Rule of Acquisition says, “War is good for business.”

Did I mention I finally got properly spurred to actually begin the work of re-writing my novel? Yeah. Nothing to do with Bush. See, like I said a couple of weeks ago, I was invited into Cafepress’ Print-On-Demand Book Beta. That is, I submitted to them an electronic copy of Forlon, plus a front and back cover, and they sent me a free copy in exchange for my feedback about the product. Fantastic. Partially because it means they’ll have the finished service available soon and I can start using it in a variety of ways. Plus, when I finally got my ‘professionally printed’ copy of Forlorn in my hot little hands, it became a real thing for me that I hadn’t got it re-written yet. Did I mention that Cafepress if ‘featuring’ me at their booth at the Comicon this year? They’re thinking about having several copies of my novel available for purchase at the con. Which scares the bejezzus out of me. (Not that bad, really. Have you ever had a bejezzus take up lodging in your abdomen? They’re pretty annoying.) This isn’t a finished novel, ready for mass consumption. I put it online to try to get myself to edit it sooner, not because I thought it was wonderful. Except then everyone who read it told me they thought it was wonderful, and everyone who didn’t read it said they didn’t like it because nothing bad ever happened to anyone in it. The worst of it was in the first chapter, and even that began after the bad things had happened. Which was fine when I was trying to get a novel written in a week, but … even I knew right away that it wasn’t a very satisfying read. I’ve been working on ideas for the re-write since the moment I stopped writing, November 30th, but I didn’t get started on the rewrite until several weeks ago, when I finally figured out what I wanted to do, made up index cards for blocking out the major story arcs and how they fit together, and managed to get eleven pages re-written to fit the new structure. And then I stopped again. Things just kept getting in the way. Until I had Forlorn in my hands and realised that if I don’t have it totally re-written in time for them to produce it for the con, this feeble first draft may end up in unwitting consumers’ hands. So a couple of days ago I got all my resources together and started re-writing. I’m just over ten thousand words into a novel that should prove to be between 120,000 and 165,000 words long based on the story I’ve developed. Yes, it will not be less than twice as long as Forlorn. Here’s a problem though: unless something strange happens around here in the next week or two I simply will not have enough hours to type it in before the con. Either way, I’m working on it.

I finished reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix this afternoon. I checked it out from the library and took it in slowly, only reading a couple hundred pages a day. Actually, a big reason for this is because of the time I’ve been putting into my novel. I’ve been reading Harry Potter while I wait for people to show up in the store. I can’t really work on my novel in that environment, though. So at night, when it IS possible to work on the novel, I’ve chosen to do that. Anyway, Zoe and I should be having a MEVBC about it soon, probably laden with all sorts of spoilers. If you’ve already read it or are about to be done reading it, let me know right away so we can try to include you in what may be the last MEVBC meeting ever. Briefly: It was a good book, and much like Harry, I don’t believe that that character is dead for good. I also want to say that if I had access to the classes and teachers and materials that Harry and his schoolmates have, there’s no way I would slack, fall behind, or have trouble paying attention. Oh my gosh. I would probably get all O’s, and take double classes like Hermione. What an opportunity! That is all.

Also, just added to the list of things I don’t like anymore, but used to: jonathan rosenberg. He’s welcome to refer himself to the name of this blog.

Okay, I’ve blathered here long enough. I’m going to go back to work on my novel now. I’ll let you know when I get to 25,000 words. Probably Tuesday night. We’ll see. Depends on whether Bush figures out how to email me, I guess.