Book Update: In The Home Stretch

Whew... holidays were rough this year, thanks mainly to me coming down with a mild case of pneumonia. So I spent most of those days lying in bed.

I'm doing better now, though, and now comes the part in which I prepare to polish up the draft of my first novel (and this process started back in April 2015 and has gone through six drafts) and start going to the next step (yes, this year is the year I plan to not talk so much about the novel and start getting it on the path toward publication).

My book writing experience, though, has led me to a lot of changes and new experiences. I picked up a bunch of books to read, I started attending meetings of the Kansas Writers Association, I joined up with another writer's group and I've gotten feedback from multiple people about my draft. Plus I've had the chance to find out what a few other authors are thinking about through Twitter.

It's been a good experience, as it's allowed me to broaden my writing and got me generating a bunch of ideas not just for this series I'm planning, but for some other book ideas as well. Once I get this draft polished and sent off for consideration among agents, or perhaps smaller publishers if an opportunity comes along, I can start writing the first draft of my second planned book.

In the meantime, I have some other plans in the works, but won't start talking them up until I actually do those things. But I do promise that I should be a little more active here at the blog (as I have mentioned, the plan is to update every Sunday) and hopefully I'll get the chance to explore more writing of other authors out there (and there are a lot -- there are more than 300 authors who I follow on Twitter and I'm sure that's just the start of the list of authors out there).

Yeah, a lot of things I hope to do -- it's just a matter of following up on them, particularly on this first book I've written. With any luck, I'll get to the point that I'm not just talking about my writing and that I'm talking more about that there will be published material you'll get a chance to read.

Next week: I'll sit down and talk about the new Star Wars movie. By then, everyone who wants to see hopefully has done so and there's no worries about discussing spoliers!