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Floodtide

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I finally have the projected publication date for Floodtide (by virtue of simply asking about it). It's on the Bella Books schedule for October 2019. My mind immediately goes to thinking about where that falls with respect to conventions and whatnot. It won't be out for Worldcon (which in some ways is easier, because I can talk it up without the anxiety of having actual books in hand), but it should be out in time for Sirens (which I hope it's a good fit for in terms of readers, though not an event where I'd feel comfortable holding a launch party).

I’ve gotten in the habit of doing a year-end summary of my creative output, if only to convince myself that I really have accomplished something after all. It’s funny: people have a tendency to react as if I’m boasting, or making the lists to try to make other people feel bad. But for me it’s an emotional survival tool. What have I done? What do I have to show for all the time, energy (and money) I’ve poured into the projects of my heart? Am I putting those resources into things that bring return? The intangible returns are the connections and friendships I make.

My friend Karen periodically holds a "backyard writing retreat" for a small circle of friends. The idea is to set aside the day for actual writing, not chit-chat (though we do some of that) or web surfing (though that happens too) or getting caught up on ancillary tasks (yup, check). So for this past Sunday's writing retreat, I committed to actually starting the revisions on Floodtide, which has been "fermenting" in messy first draft since...oh my goodness, since before last year's Worldcon? I'd have to check.

Yeah, it's been a while since I've done a writing progress update, isn't it? I confess I've gotten a little knocked off the tracks with respect to blogging in the past month and I keep reminding myself that one of my New Year's Irresolutions was not to beat myself up about that. (Poor Abiel LaForge is sitting there on the front lines waiting for the war to end.) So where are we...?

One of the protections that my Alpennian ladies have for their personal lives is the willingness of Rotenek society to look the other way. To enter enthusiastically into the belief that “nice women don’t do that sort of thing” and therefore that two women who are well-born and respectable could be the closest of romantic friends without ever stepping across the line into forbidden desires.

Have I done a writing blog lately? I've gotten so random with everything except the LHMP and the LaForge diaries that I'd have to look in the blog roll to see.

My day-to-day writing project is still Floodtide. I'm continuing with the tradition that every book has a slightly different writing process. This one feels a bit like I've circled around back to my process for Daughter of Mystery in that I'm just sort of spilling story onto the page as it comes to me with only a bare outline to guide me.

I'm not forgetting my promise to talk more about the geography of Alpennia, but in order to come up with even the sketchiest of maps, I need to organize and review the data. In the mean time, I thought I'd tell you how Floodtide is coming along.

I confess that I get a thrill out of planting bits of information in a current novel that also serve the purpose of setting up events for a future story. It's one of the reasons I've made my peace with having things plotted out in advance in a fair amount of detail. If I don't know the general who, what, where, when for the overall series arc, how can I know what seeds I need to be planting now? When I knew I wanted to write Floodtide, and realized that it would weave into the events of Mother of Souls, I had some careful planning to do.

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