Summer Daze

First, for the summer part...

Ah, bliss. Here in the Midwest, summer has finally arrived. And it's about time. I mean, really, we had to wait until mid-August to hit the 90s? Now I'll be the first to admit that a whole summer of 90s would be a lot. But for now, I'm not complaining.

My hubby and I were headed out yesterday and he put the air conditioning on in the car. (In our old car the air hadn't worked for years, so this is a treat for us.) Problem is, we drive a convertible. The perfect summer car. We made it less than a mile down the road before I said, "You know, we really should put the top down." He agreed. So we pulled into the next parking lot, cranked that top down, and hit the open road: the sun pouring down, the wind blowing, the stereo cranking (our favorite Kenny Chesney CD)....again, bliss. Now that's the way to do summer.

Now, for the daze part...

My mind is spinning. Have I told you before how much I love my publisher, The Wild Rose Press? Well I do. A lot. The people there are fabulous. I escpecially love my editor. (Hi Kat!) Here's what happened on Thursday this week.

I finally finished my WIP, "This Can't be Love". (It's a spin-off of my first book, for those of you familiar, and features Zach as the hero.) I've been working on it for a while. One of my goals was to finish it this summer. I've worked on it here and there, but it never really seemed to go anywhere. Then, last week I got inspired. My fingers were literally flying over the keys. And I got it done! Talk about being thrilled.

As soon as I finished, I sent off my query and synopsis to my editor, figuring I'd get the ball rolling in that direction. This was around 12:30 in the afternoon. I fiddled around after that, tweaking some spots of the story, realigning chapters, etc. Later I went back inside (I'd been working on the patio table under the umbrella all day.) and checked e-mail to see if there was anything new in the world.

Imagine my surprise when I saw a reply from Kat already. With a flutter in my stomach, this part always makes me nervous, I clicked open her e-mail, which had been sent at 4:00. She asked for the full! Talk about your fast turn-around.

Talk about having a spinning head. I really was in a daze. In the space of a couple hours, I'd completed a manuscript, queried my editor, and was asked to submit. What a crazy business this publishing world is. I can barely keep up.

And, not only was my editor quick, she was kind enough to let me know that she'd be on vacation for a while and asked if I could send the mss in a couple of weeks so that it would be on the top of her e-mail pile instead of burried amongst a ton of vacation e-mail. (So now I have more time to tweak and polish before sending it off.)

It doesn't get any better than that. Really, this is a crazy business. But I love it!

Until next time,

Happy Reading!

Debra
www.debrastjohnromance.com