The past two days have been…interesting, if you couldn’t tell by the fact that my RoW80 update is a day late. Aside from my minor meltdown and applying for a perfect, bigger-than-expected, totally-in-love-with-it, vintage ’20s apartment (which I am waiting to hear back from with bated breath; the guy said he’d get in touch once all the paperwork is done, “probably” yesterday around six, but no call. If I don’t hear from him by five today, I’m pestering him. I want this apartment so bad.), I also went on a spastic rampage and almost changed the entire ending of Soulless. Let me offer a word of advice to my fellow authors: if you start having a grand scheme to change your book dramatically, stop and take a shower first. I was able to work out that what I have going on now makes way more sense, that the new idea was cool on the surface but would never work in the grand scheme of things, and I saved myself a lot of heartbreak by thinking about it first. That was a close one. I’m still probably going to cut one of my favorite parts from the book, but I’ll still be using it, just later in the book.
I was kind of a mess (again!) yesterday waiting for that call, but since it didn’t come in, I had to grapple with disappointment and fear that he didn’t like what he saw on the credit checks and decided already not to rent to us. I reasoned with myself and told myself he was probably waiting on a reference or something like that. Then, someone was talking about meditation on the radio, and I reminded myself that I’m living far too much in the future right now, neglecting the fact that the true path to happiness is to live in the moment. So I’m focusing on that right now, looking at the present, paying attention and enjoying what is going on now, and not worrying about what may be. I can’t control any of that. But I can control how I make today count, no matter what may be ahead of me.
But we’re not here for me to vent out all my nervous excitement and worry and hope about an apartment. We’re here for a RoW80 Update! Here’s my goals and how they’ve been coming along these last few interesting days:
Goal One: Soulless. Did I mention how I almost completely changed the ending? Yeah. That was interesting. It’s so surreal to change so much of a book before it’s published. I feel very good about the changes, but I really feel like I’m flying in blind, and I can’t thank my beta-readers enough for opening my eyes to some real big issues. I’m learning a lot, too. Next time, give yourself more time before the deadline and the beta-reads. You’ll want a second round, more than likely. The entire tone of the book has changed, some of the “bad guys” turned into good guys, and one character even completely changed genders. I’m almost a little glad I gave myself a deadline when I did, because if there were more revisions, I might change even more of it completely.
Also, I’m finding it surprisingly difficult to put together my back cover blurb. When you’re writing pulpy apocalyptic zombie fiction with a side of steampunk, it’s really hard to describe it in one paragraph without sounding super cheesy. Maybe I should just put “Pulpy Apocalyptic Zombie Fiction with a Side of Steampunk.” I’d read that if I saw it on a back cover.
Goal Two: Short Stories. The Torn Pages deadline is coming up fast, so I’m really focusing on finally getting that story out, especially now that I have a new concept that I think is really cool and interesting. Other than than, I’m brushing the dust off my list of contests and submissions to keep an eye out for the next deadline.
Goal Three: Heartless. Heartless is at a little bit of a pause right now There’s a scene in Soulless I’m considering moving out of the first book and into the second, and whether or not I do that changes a lot of what I’m working on right now, so it’ll be a day or two before I decided. Until then, it waits.
Nothing too exciting, as you can see. Most of my energy is going decidedly into Soulless, as it should. It’s almost ready to go into formatting, but not quite yet. So I better get back to work. If you haven’t already, be sure to swing by here and support my fellow RoWers!
Happy writing!
L.S. Engler 
I hope everything works out with your potential new apartment. Vintage ’20s apartment sounds awesome. 😉 I have a tendency to live in the future, too–I have to remind myself to be present in the moment and live for today.
I can’t wait to see how “Soulless” turns out. If you’re anything like me, your brain is swirling with possibilities after getting feedback from beta readers. I always come up with way more ideas than can fit into a single book. But my critique partners always let me know when I’m on the right track or if I still have miles to go. Good luck!
You said vintage and then 20’s and then apartment, and I think I drooled a little. Best of luck on that and on your writing progress, too. 🙂
Vintage ’20’s apartment… man, that’d be something. Hope everything works out for you.
I hope you get news about the apartment soon. There’s nothing more stressful than having to wait for news like that, but I admire your determination to live in the moment.
It sounds like you saved yourself a lot of work on Soulless by having that shower! It’s funny, I’ve just finished reading another blog where the writer was doing the same thing, making changes and trying to work out if they were useful or not. Something that’s worked for me on the couple of occasions I’ve tried it is to imagine my story as a movie and play it through in my mind to see what happens and what’s different from what I have planned. You need to be quite relaxed to do it, and not emotionally invested in what you already have, but be open to whatever shows up.