Yeah, yeah, I know, it’s not quite Friday yet. But it is for me. I have a four day weekend coming up for no other reason than I can. At old job, I went for two years without a real vacation. I mean, I accrued vacation days, and I took days off, but never without being on call. And during the last year I was there, I also worked six day work weeks. The upside to this? When I left I had a month’s worth of vacation banked that they paid out on.

And now with new job I’ve finally reached the point where I have days off. And by Loki I’m taking them. But don’t wory. I’ll still be around tomorrow for…#RANDOMfest. If you haven’t signed up yet, you can sign up today and all of tomorrow. Details are behind the link and it’s going to be a ton of fun.

And I have my steamy kiss scenes for two separate blogfests set to auto post on Monday morning (when I’ll be sleeping in because I can and I love sleeping in on Mondays).

One of them is from the piece I’m just getting into revising, Serious Game 2.0. The other is from Uriel’s Fall. Which is the reason I’m sleepy this morning. The reason I woke up at 2:30 and couldn’t fall back asleep until after 4. It’s because…

I’m DONE!. You might think on January 24 when I submitted the manuscript to ABNA that it was done. I knew it wasn’t, but at the time I also didn’t know what else I needed to do with it. It was as done as I could make it. I also (cue self-doubt) don’t plan on making it very far regardless of how polished the story is. I’ve seen the stories that win/place in the general fiction category. This is not one of them. So why did I enter if I don’t suspect I’ll win? Awesome opportunities 1 – for feedback and 2 – to see how each section of my submission holds up.

Anyway…I’ve been getting feedback from a couple of readers. There are still three more outstanding, and now one of them (the only actual ‘reader’ in the group as opposed to a writer who’s reading for me), has the newest version. The feedback I’ve gotten so far had me stumped at first. Not because I disagreed, but because I didn’t know how to implement it.

A week or so ago an idea started to form. I didn’t implement it right away because it wasn’t enough. The Dark and Stormy Night blogfest rolled around and I realized it was now or never. I started implementation by writing a new first sentence to the novel. Which became a prologue (yes, I like prologues when they’re done right. Flog me if you must. I also like dream sequences, flashbacks, and changing narrators from scene to scene).

But it needed more than the prologue. So while I pondered how to fix the second issue I worked on polishing my query. Which wasn’t bad, but it also wasn’t great. It lacked voice. Suddenly I know how to fix it. I rewrote some sentences, made sure Ronnie’s naive brand of snark showed through, and grinned.

And then I suddenly knew how to fix the entire rest of the story. All because of the hook I’d created. I hate the hook/pitch concept in general. A single sentence that conveys the meaning and tone of your story and still makes it sound unique? ICKY! But I think I’m close now, and it told me how to fix the other issue with the book.

The pitch
She’s a little naïve and sure, she’s new to existence in general, but even so Uriel knows hearing voices probably means she’s nuts.

And it terrifies me to put that up there because now everyone has the opportunity to come in and tell me that it’s not as grand as I think it is, and poke holes in it, and tell me I suck.

But for now I’m in love with it. I feel like the story is at that ‘done and ready for submission’ point. And I’ve never felt that about a novel before. Not without going “You really should fix …. before you submit this.”

Have you had that ‘DONE’ feeling before? If so, what did you do to celebrate? (I’m thinking ice cream). If not, what are your plans to get there? (You know you can do it.)