This post's purpose is to collect my common tags in one place, so readers (and I!) can easily access entries on several subjects.

My publisher, Harlequin, now has its own YouTube Channel. So they want book trailers. *whimper*

Anybody have experience with those? Making them? Viewing them? Know someone who makes them? I know there are a few Really Expensive firms who do them, but I would prefer to avoid paying a large chunk of my advance for a single publicity item.

So if anyone makes trailers and is possibly interested in doing one for Moonlight Mistress, please let me know; I'd love to see your website, some examples of your work, whatever you have.

Here are a couple of LJ posts by people who've made trailers themselves.

I am DONE with Moonlight Mistress. I'll email the typed line edits/corrections to my editor on Monday.

Now I have to write a partial and edit a synopsis for a proposal, and work more on the pirate novel, and make notes for Worldcon. Oh, and pack. I'm leaving for Montreal August 3.

I'm down to the last hundred pages or so of Moonlight Mistress.

I've concluded it's an odd book. Probably because I never did a chapter-by-chapter outline, the story seems to flow in strange ways; or maybe it's just that I have too many characters. I seem to have skimped on transitions and setups, to some extent, dropping in on one group, then another. Not sure how this will work out for readers. It's too late to change it, now.

Re-reading, I'm reminded of writing music without bar lines.

I am not much of interest right now because I am obsessed with paragraphing in Moonlight Mistress. That seems to be the thing that stops me short most often in my reading. Should I have broken that paragraph earlier? Do those sentences really belong together? Is it too long? If I added a break, would it be too short?

Mostly, I've decided that if I ponder it too long, I have to leave it as is. The typesetter people will be grateful, I hope.

I'm making a lot fewer changes than I did on my Author Alterations for The Duchess etc. A couple of times I've changed words so I wouldn't use the same distinctive word in too close proximity (well, a few pages proximity).  Otherwise...only four small errors so far that I've seen, one of those a capitalization thing that would have been okay even if I hadn't noticed it.  I'm into the second hundred pages now, of 381.

An excerpt from Moonlight Mistress is up over at my pro blog, as part of "Snippet Saturday." Links at the bottom are to other participants in this Saturday's theme, which is "first kiss."

Behold the cover flat for Moonlight Mistress.

It will look like this when it's an actual book.

I worked on revisions last night, solving a couple of problems by simply excising confusing bits, or bits that were no longer relevant because of other changes. I think I've now addressed each query on the revision letter, some of them more briefly than others. It might be time to print and read over. It seems a daunting project, but otherwise I won't see the whole picture.

If I burn out before I'm done with reading it over again, at least I'll have another chance at the manuscript after copy edits and such. However, that chance will be handwritten...so if I want to add those couple new scenes, I should do it now. They're not scenes that are desperately needed, just scenes I want to put in for the sake of characterization. And for fun.

Revised plan for revision: spend this weekend reading it on screen, as much as I can take, and add those couple of lagniappe scenes. Hopefully, also find if I missed anything big. Next week, print and read until I've read the whole thing or until my brain fizzles out. If I could ship it on February 2, that would be ideal.

After that, I've had a request for a couple of chapters on the pirate project, so I'll do that next, along with a shorter, more focused synopsis. Since February includes the Death March to Brahms rehearsals, I'm not sure if I'll finish that in the same month, but I sure plan to try.

Revisions continue, and I continue to check things off on my revision letter for The Moonlight Mistress.

I have rediscovered something else: available time to write does not directly translate into wordcount.

If I'm writing dialogue or description, but most especially dialogue, the words pile up faster. Word acquisition slows when I'm making subtle changes, or changes in many places.

I think there are a couple of reasons for subtle changes being slower. One is that I spend time scrolling or searching around in the document for the things I need to change. The other is that each change requires time to think, and if the changes aren't related to one another, each one requires a little thinking time of its own.

If I'm just adding in a scene, I can start at the beginning and proceed to the end, or an end; also, I've usually thought about what I'm going to do in that scene before I sit down, so it's just drafting, or if I'm really lucky, transcribing.

Why do I ponder these questions? Well, I feel better about my writing if I feel in control of it. It's not something one can control in every aspect, but knowing how I work, and that my methods have been successful in the past, is reassuring. Understanding my process makes me feel more in control of my process.

I've started tracking total wordcount on The Moonlight Mistress at the end of each revision session. (Tracking how many words I subtracted, and how many I added? There lies madness.)

So far, no matter how long I work, I seem to average about 500 words per session. Is that how many changes I can make before my brain gives out? Because rather than count, as I do when drafting, I'm just working until I run out of writing-brain functionality. (By which I mean, I can poke and poke at the sentences, and suddenly nothing is happening, it's like pushing paperclips back and forth across a desk.) (Which I just realized still doesn't explain what I mean. Oh, well.)

I am curious to see if this 500-words-per-session thing holds true on the weekend, as well. I am betting not. On the weekends, I start writing first thing in the morning, when I am perky and excited to get to work. When drafting, I get more wordcount, more easily, on the weekend. During the week, I write after a full day at the dayjob, so I'm already a bit tired. I wonder if I've just trained myself to 500 words? Because that used to be my minimum per weeknight before I could stop, at least until I sold The Duchess and had to bump up to 1000 per weeknight so I could make the deadline.

*ponders*

I did more revising last night. I spent a week or so after receiving the revision letter just thinking, more in the back of my mind than in the front. I made some notes on my ideas, scribbled a little on a printout of the novel, and thought more. I finally opened up the file on Saturday, and worked on it again last night.

I need to add some scenes, particularly with the villain and relating to his evil plots, but before that I'm making the more subtle changes, the ones that alter the way characters and their relationships are. So, in the original version, two characters had been childhood friends and, in their teenage years, lovers. In order to point up that one character worries about his sexuality (he's bi), I decided that his friend had been much less emotionally involved in their teenage affair than he had been, and that they both knew it, but didn't ever talk about it. At the same time, the friend is charismatic and physically demonstrative, so that's now an added small pain, a constant reminder that his physicality is often casual.

Also, I'm trimming down the numbers of the background soldier characters and giving them a tad more personality, not so much that the reader really has to keep track of them, but enough so she can if she wants to. And I'm giving them a bit more toughness overall, more trash talk, more reason for the characters with alternate sexualities to feel nervous.

I still have to decide some details about the evil scientist plot, but that's coming together, as well.

I have a revision letter for the werewolf book! And I have until the beginning of March to work on it! Though I plan to be done before that. Hopefully in February.

Mostly, it's additional material I need to write, and additional information I need to impart, which is usual for me.

( And most astonishing of all! )

[whine] Writing is hard! [/whine]

I opened up my laptop last night, for my first fiction writing session in over a month. I didn't get far. I read over the story-in-progress and made some minor changes, then got to the end and just stared at it, and stared, and stared some more. After sleeping on it, I think I'm going to hack back the last thousand words or so and go in a different direction, since the current direction is not singing to me. I thought I had a handle on what I wanted, but I don't. So I'll try something new, because I do still want to write a story about these two characters.

I poked at a synopsis for a werewolf novel, and found I didn't have as much thought out as I'd thought I did. I'm still debating if I want to combine current pair of characters with new werewolf characters (for example, a Russian guy), so I need to make that decision before I can write a synopsis. This morning, I considered using the Russian character in a standalone story instead. Still thinking on it.

Also, having troubles with the page number field in my word processing program, and the sound card is completely dead now. Perhaps I should invest in a new laptop? This one is several years old, and was not top of the line when I bought it. I'm pretty conservative on technology, usually.

Poll #1294795 Hottest Russian Names
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 48

I think this/these Russian names would be hot for a male character in an erotic novel.

Good is good, but done is better.

Must print. Courier envelope is ready.

cookie_chef asked for some examples of the edits I've been making. This is what they look like.

Original:
Men stood and read the papers under streetlights and in the street itself, blocking wagons whose drivers cursed. Some men cheered, and some shouted angrily. Singing and pipe smoke billowed from the open door of a beer garden; rats skittered in the garbage in the alley next door.

Edited:
Men stood and read the papers under streetlights and in the street itself, arguing vociferously, blocking wagons whose drivers cursed. Singing and pipe smoke, drunken cheers and angry shouts billowed from the open door of a beer garden.
[Rats seemed out of place; she wouldn't be peering that closely into the alley, given how she feels. Folded a boring sentence into other sentences, created some parallel structure.]

Original:
"Run!" he said, so she grabbed her bag and did so, hearing the sounds of a scuffle behind her through the pounding in her ears.

Edited:
"Run!" he said, so she grabbed her bag and did so, hearing a scuffle behind her through her heart's pounding.
[Cut dependent clauses; still a bit confusing, but better]

Should probably be: ...grabbed her bag, her heart pounding, hearing the scuffling behind her.

Original:
"There aren't so many places that will hire a woman as a chemist," Lucilla said, sharply. "Perhaps you haven't noticed."

Edited:
"There aren't so many places that will hire a woman chemist," Lucilla said, sharply. "Perhaps you haven't noticed, France being full of them. Or no, I'm sorry--those women are cooks, aren't they?"
[added more anger, to more realistically provoke other person to shut up]

Winner of the title contest is trifles with The Moonlight Mistress.

I think it will grow on me. I like the feminine power aspect of it (i.e., no possessive, like "The Scotsman's Big C*ck Mistress"). feklar noted it's a bit generic, but the cover will help with that.

*whew* One less worry.

A thousand words last night, and I am done with the draft. Well, until the mad frenzy of editing starts tomorrow. My goal is to send off the manuscript on next Friday.

I decided I could be done when I realized there were a lot of things I didn't really need to show. I can change my mind later, but I don't think so, not so much. Pacing adjustments maybe, and very likely more scenes in the earlier portions of the book. My backbrain will work on it.

I'm taking tonight off. I can finally do a load of laundry!!!

1000 words last night, mostly getting people from one place to another, as well as a few minor edits I'd thought of and couldn't get out of my head.

Like how I broke glass in one scene and forgot to mention it in another, or didn't say use the word revetment when it would have been cool, niggling details that niggled so much I couldn't start a new scene until they were fixed. You know, in case I got hit by a bus before I could fix them.

Neither Other Skins nor Second Skin made the cut for title of my World War One werewolf book. Current direction is something like Untamed [eep! I'd rather have Sweet Savage Werewolves!] or By Moonlight.

Anybody have suggestions along those lines?

The book itself is erotic, of course, but the plot is more like a pulp novel of the 1930s in many aspects. I gather the publisher wants it to be enticing and also reference the werewolves, not necessarily directly. I had a lot of thoughts that involved mentions of war, and I have the feeling they want to avoid that.

Anybody who comes up with a title that ends up being used wins a Prize. Not sure what the Prize would be yet. Cover flat? Few pages of manuscript for free preview? Music mix to your specifications?

*bats eyes*