Hello to all you faithful followers. It's been a while since I've written anything on this here blog. There's a couple reasons for that. Actually, there are a great many reasons for that, but I can sum it up in a few simple words right from the get go: I've been really fucking busy. What have I been busy with? Read on, True Believer, and you shall have the answers you seek!
Before I get into the whys and wherefores of my absence, let me give you some good news. My work in progress, the novel I've been going on and on and on about over the past year or so, IS NEARLY COMPLETE! Yep, you read that correctly. Still, I'll say it again to bring home the point. FUNERAL WITH A VIEW IS NEARLY READY FOR PUBLISHING. Has a nice ring to it, don't you think? I sure think so. All the comments I'd gotten from the betas who'd read the first draft were taken to heart, and I busted my ass to incorporate them and make the book much better than it was. Once that was completed, I sent it out to betas once again and waited on pins and needles for further comments. Many cigarettes were smoked and much beer was consumed as I waited on the final judgement. Turns out that any worries I had were unfounded. Every one of the six ARC/beta readers loved the final product. Sure, there are a couple 'niggling bugaboos' (Patent Pending) left to be ironed out, but they're minor; change a line or two here, condense a couple chapters into one there ... you get the idea. The point is, all the work I put into the book has paid off major. For those of you who know me, you know I don't publish something just for shits and giggles. If I don't feel it's publishable, I ain't gonna publish it. Funeral With a View is publishable and then some. I'm extremely proud of how it turned out, and I have a good feeling that readers are going to dig this one. The Fake It Till Ya Make it contingent is strong in Indieland, but I don't adhere to that philosophy, so if I say I love the book, you know I mean it. And trust me, I DO love the book.
Now to the topic of why it's not only taken so long, but why I haven't been around much lately.
The working manuscript of what is now Funeral With a View was written in five weeks back in early 2012, and I didn't get back to the book until after I'd written and released Ghosts of Demons Past in June of 2013. Why did five weeks of writing turn into over a year of editing and rewrites? There were problems with that first version, but there were many outside influences. Here's a laundry list of some of the personal crap that I've experienced during that time:
- Hand surgery in late June, 2013 rendered it nearly impossible to type (although I did manage to turn in Chapter 7 for The Carnival 13 anthology during that time and ON TIME, something I'm still pretty proud about)
- My son, Babyface Vinster, aka 'Boog Boog' Vinnie, was born in January of 2013, slaughtering all spare time and eliminating sleep for weeks.
- I was involved in not one, but TWO car accidents
- One of our pets died (RIP Charlie)
- I had pipes in the house burst not one, not two, but THREE times, the most recent of which was last week, and the one prior to that jacked up half my basement, not to mention these two incidents happened no more than a month apart
- My wife underwent not one, but TWO major surgeries in the past couple months
While most of the above has been somewhat spread out over the last year and a half or so, it's easy to say that the past eight or twelve weeks have sucked in epic fashion. As the song goes, it's a cruel, cruel, cruel summer, and I'm happy it's getting smaller in my rear view mirror. Tying this all into Funeral With a View, compartmentalizing has never been my strong suit, therefor there were periods when I couldn't pull my mind out of the quagmire of personal issues to work on the book. Remember, folks, I also have a nine to five that I go to Monday through Friday, and my moonlighting has to play second fiddle to begin with. It amazes me that I finished the book in the first place, and it's damn near miraculous that it turned out this well. As i said before, I love the damn thing and I ain't ashamed to say it either!
So, that's all I have for now. A few things are left to be done, but they're small. I'll be finishing ironing out those 'niggling bugaboos' (Patent Pending), doing a final read, then it's on to the front and back matter, and finally, formatting for kindle. Woot! Oh, before I forget. The book has a page on Goodreads! Click on the groovy cover below and add it to your To Be Read list! And there's also a couple of ARC reader reviews. Check them out! Yes, I know, I don't have a blurb yet. I'll be working on that in the next couple days, too. Silly me thought it would be a good idea to finish the book first before I beat my head against the wall trying to summarize about 100k words into a hundred ;)
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Take care and see ya 'round teh intarwebz!
M.
