I love this picture of a bookstore/cafe in the historic center of Mexico City. I imagine, but I’m not certain, that the cafe is on the second floor, and that (if I were there) I could buy a book, climb the stairs, order an espresso and read a novel well above the hustle and bustle of the narrow streets.
But I’m not there. I’m sitting at my desk slooooowly proofreading my book. I remember a well- known mystery writer telling me he always held carrots in front of his nose at this point in the novel writing process. “Eight pages and I can get up and play with the cat. Eight more pages and I can make some tea. Eight more pages after that and I can check the mail.”
In order to speed things up, I’m forgoing blogging about life on the ranch this week so that I can put up another chapter. Since each one takes me about three hours to proof and post, and since life on the ranch doesn’t come to a dead stop just because I need time to do this, I’m going at a snail’s pace. But, I really want to get this book up on Amazon sooner rather than later, and in order to do that, I have to apply seat of pants to seat of chair and not drift off into some dreamy state. In my case, it’s eight more pages and I can go fill the cattle trough!
Writing is fun, but copy editing . . . uh, not so much. That’s why there were some glitches in Chapter Eight. I wandered off. The glitches have now been corrected. If you haven’t gotten that far, then just ignore this message. If you have, well I’m sorry for the pronoun confusion — there’s a reason that happened. However, now you can go back and take a look.
Rest assured that after I’ve gone through all this, a professional copy-editor will have a go at it. Then it’s off to the e-book formatter and up on Amazon. com.’s Kindle store.
I suppose this is always the kind of thing you see if you lift the hood up and take a look at the engine of any creative endeavor. All that sort of messy stuff. Still, the engine is not what I want my readers to see. Kind of breaks up the narrative dream. While that’s all very post-modern and stuff, it’s not my style. I’m a traditional women’s fiction writer through and through.
But, back to the chapters at hand . . .
If you’ve been to Mexico City, you’ll know the Plaza Tolsa where Lili is having lunch. If you haven’t been, well, here’s a photo on the right.
You’ll get the feeling.
And just to nudge your imagination a bit more, here’s the restaurant Los Girasoles on the left where she’s dining.
BTW—Fabulous food. Great margaritas.
Before I sign off here, I’ve got a little announcement. Any of you within range of KVRP Public Radio (FM 89) can listen to me read El Tropical, an excerpt from my novel Bird of Paradise. It airs February 8 at 7 pm. Hope you’ll tune in.