The Wait

Last week I shared the fabulous news that my short story, The Legacy, was accepted for publication by Astraea Press. Since then, I've been busy with the pre-publication stuff the company has sent me. I filled out a cover artist information form (listing details about the story so that the cover artist has an idea about what to put on the cover), an author information form (so I can get paid once the six month charity run is done), and I've re-formatted the entire manuscript according to a style sheet they sent me. That took the longest. It's kinda like being in college and finding out what each professor wants.

Fortunately, computers have wonderful tools to help me with a lot of the editing. I can "turn on paragraph marks" to find out where I've put extra spaces. I can do a "find" search to locate the words I've used too often, like "really" and "very". And when I decided to change a character's name, I just do a "find and replace". It couldn't be easier!

So now that I've submitted the "pre-edit", I wait. Patiently. Sort of. I check my mail at least six times a day looking for something from the publisher - more instructions, a cover for the book, or maybe another request for revisions. I check the publisher's website often, looking for other new books in the Japan Relief series. So far there are three. I wonder how many there will be?

It's always difficult to remain patient. It's not one of my strong suits. Fortunately I have a lot of other things to do - like finishing several other writing projects, craft projects (a friend got married last summer and I still don't have her wedding gift done!) and a house that really, really needs to be cleaned. I'm not sitting here, bored.

I'm really thankful for the words of encouragement, as well as the congrats that have been sent my way (not through this blog, but verbally and on facebook). They give me the ambition to go on and write more. So I'm going to open up one of my partially finished projects, polish it off and send it in. There are three novels, three essays, and a short story waiting to be sent off.

Guess I'd better get to work.