Despite yesterdays's freezing rain/ice/snow/rain storm and the unseemly accumulation of snow this morning, I'm feeling pretty darn good. The tasks were piling up, but I'm on the road to unpiling them.
This week, I finally updated my author grid, which is Dundurn's publicity chart. They use it to send out ARCs (advance reading copies) to reviewers and to organize signings etc. I was also tasked with writing up a few character sketches and a series arc for Cold Mourning and managed to get that completed and accepted. I went on to tackle the paperwork for my taxes and am almost done. I'll have my package in to the accountant on Monday. Finally, I've written the first draft of the climax for the Cold Mourning sequel and and rounding into the home stretch.
I've been in touch with Dundurn and will be visiting with my newly assigned editor, Jennifer McKnight, and publicist, Karen McMullin, as well as senior editor Allister Thompson next Friday in Toronto. Jennifer has let me know that she'll start editing Cold Mourning on May 6 and I'll be reviewing her edits in June. The final proofs will come to me for one last look in early July. So the final tweaking and prettifying is soon underway.
After visiting Dundurn, Ted and I will be hiking it up to the old Maple Leaf Gardens to watch Lisa curl in the Players Championship, which features 15 of the top ladies' teams in the world and 15 of the top men's teams in the final slam event of the season. Should be a good, good day.
Speaking of publicity, two-time Arthur Ellis nominee C.B. Forrest kindly agreed to read a draft of Cold Mourning with a view to giving a cover quote if he liked the story. He's given me a glowing blurb, part of which is now on Amazon etc. I thought you might like to read the review in its entirety:
“Deeply atmospheric and tightly plotted,
Cold Mourning is Chapman’s sharpest mystery yet. In Kala Stonechild we meet a
damaged, complex and courageous heroine determined to leave her complicated past
behind. But she finds the Nation’s Capital offers both beauty and danger as she
gets tangled up in a high-profile murder investigation with enough twists and
turns to keep the reader guessing. Chapman masterfully renders the streets and
neighbourhoods of Ottawa – all the dark corners the tourists never see. Spare,
haunting and unflinching – Cold Mourning will make you shiver long after you’ve
put it down. A gripping read from the first line of the first page …
”
Yay!
Writing is an odd pursuit. It can be exhilerating but also frustrating. I'm at that point in the manuscript that I'm working on (78,000 words) when I think the story is boring and predictable. After all, I've been working on this one for over a year. The self-doubt happens with every manuscript at around this same point, so I'm going to take a leap of faith and work through, just as I have faith the snow will melt before June and I'm going to land this sucker (to quote Tim Wynn-Jones) within the next few weeks.
La la la la la!!!!!
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