I FINISHED EDITING BOOK ONE OF FLETCHER&COOPER! Admittedly 17 days past my (self-given) deadline, but WHATEVS, it’s 2020, at least I am Doing the Thing. Toronto’s currently in the midst of its second wave of The Rona, and we’re being urged to stay inside except for groceries and exercise, so you’d think that leaves me lots of time to edit. That would be wrong; I still hate editing as much as I did in the Before Times and still seek out every reason I can to avoid it. (God do I miss co-working spaces and their ability to remove me from my apartment and force me to focus.) So while I have started editing Book Two of F&C, who knows how long it will take. There are so many lovely things to do instead.

Yes! My procrastination is your gain, for instead of editing I am reading slush for Grace&Victory’s second Low-Fi anthology (go on, send us something, don’t self-reject!). This is turning out to be a larger job than our previous anthology, as we are now listed in Duotrope and this is persuading many, many people to not read our guidelines and send us inappropriate submissions. Please, I beg of you, on behalf of myself and the Pillbug, READ ALL SUBMISSION GUIDELINES. Even if you think the story fits based on the first sentence. All the guidelines are important. We will forgive you if you start the email with “Hi There!” or even “Dear Ms. Grace & Victory”, but not if you send us extracts from a WW2 memoir. (Yes that happened. Yes I read it through the end waiting for a) something speculative to happen and b) for there to be a cosy ending. I was disappointed on both counts.)

In better procrastination news, I have been pouring lots of love and attention into my shiny new Patreon. I dithered for so long about setting it up, which is a shame because I’m really enjoying coming up with content for it. I’ve been posting prompts for NaNo and excerpts from F&C that make me laugh, and once December rolls around I’m going to be doing Submission Challenges again and making worksheets & posters for 2021’s 100 Submission Challenge. It’s lots of fun.

I’ve also been avoiding thinking about editing (I can’t help it, my brain rebels) by percolating on a new novel idea. I am firmly against starting it until I finish editing Book Two, but it’s there, in the background, lurking, and my hope is that by the time I am free to start a new novel it will leap fully formed onto the page.

Or we’ll be into the third wave of The Rona by then and I’ll sewing Cutie clothes out of flour sacks and making us vodka out of potato peels. Who can say? If anyone ever tells you that nothing was gained by hating a task or by being overly anxious, tell them they’re wrong. I’ll show them all the sewing I’ve been doing. You’ve never seen such dedicated hand-stitched eyelets. Certainly not on clothing made out of old sheets.

It’s also not a coincidence that after several months I am blogging again. See you next week, and the week after, until Book Two is done!

Now, what else can I do with my morning…?