I abandoned my writing for the month of December to enjoy the Christmas season with my family, friends, and community. It was a joyous and busy time. I had altogether too much fun and way too many chocolates.
I'd planned to get back to my writing once the New Year hit and the kids and grandkids went back to their own caves. However, I hadn't counted on having to use the entire first week of January to catch up on things like bill-paying, housecleaning, undecorating, laundry, and grocery shopping.
What I'm saying is: I'm quite far behind in readying the sequel to THE TRAZ for publication. I promised my fans a Spring 2012 release, but winter is just flying by!
For the past week, I've been reading through the manuscript, correcting errors, improving my writing, deleting the extraneous, and other such fun things. I'm also trying to settle on a title, design the cover in my head, and line up authors and reviewers willing to read the novel and write me little promotional blurbs.
Things were going along lickety-split and tickety-boo (despite being hectic) until last night when I came to the part in my novel where a couple excitedly announces they are pregnant. My heart fell to my stomach. My breathing almost stopped--because, although I'd forgotten that announcement scene, I clearly remembered the tragedy that's going to strike eight years from now...in Book 4 of the BackTracker series.
That they were so excited about the baby, so in love with it, so devoted to each other. When I'd written this scene, I, like them, hadn't know that in a few short years....
I became incredibly sad. I wanted to rewrite my story. I wanted to make the future better for them. It was something I could so easily do.
I felt a bit God-like and wondered if God too, felt pain about what was going to happen in our lives. Did He ever want to rewrite our futures before we got there? I wondered what it would be like to be a true fortuneteller. Would I want to be one? Would I want all my todays coloured by what I knew was going to happen tomorrow? I thought about how this works both ways.
I keep going with the BackTracker series because I know things are going to work out well for Katrina...eventually--at least most things will. If I knew in real life that things would all work out okay in the end, would it make my troubles seem more manageable?
Then I thought of what I
do know about my future...I'm going to die...
And then I realized it was 3:00 a.m and I ought to go to sleep because such thoughts become rambling and incoherent when entertained by a sleep-deprived, imaginative, novelistic mind...
p.s. the title for the sequel to The Traz will be "BackTracker"
Eileen Schuh,
Canadian writer
www.eileenschuh.com
