I'm not dead yet!

I was going to link to the original Monty Python movie clip ("I'm not dead yet, I feel fine!") but then discovered that SPAMALOT had an entire "not dead yet" musical number. Enjoy!

I would like to apologize to my readers for simply disappearing for over a month. But sometimes the in-real-life issues just have to take priority.

Here's what's going on:

I've closed my Twitter account for now. Maybe I'll come back, but it was a time suck I just couldn't handle. Twitter's like a cocktail party -- if something funny happens, you really have to have been there at that moment because everything moves so fast that there's no real way to explain it or participate in the joke after the fact. Which means I felt a need to be online at all times so I wouldn't miss those awesome moments. Also, if you're feeling down, and you go to a cocktail party looking for your friends, and they're not there or they're all talking with other people, that's super-depressing, right? The same thing can happen on Twitter. Sometimes it's a delightfully social experience, and sometimes it's oddly isolating. I need to free myself from all of that right now.

At the end of last year I did another round of edits on my first novel. I'm never sure how much of this kind of thing I should put online in the public eye, but let's just say that these edits were guided by the advice of an industry professional and her assistant. These women are super awesome and even if this doesn't end up leading to representation, I'm incredibly grateful for the time and energy they have given me. LADIES, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. YOU ROCK AND I HAVEN'T FORGOTTEN YOU.

I'm submitting my short stories to various literary magazines. No new publication credits yet, but I got a personal rejection with a request to submit again from a very prestigious magazine that's basically my "dream market." Squee! Now I just have to write another piece that suits their submission guidelines. Dang.

I'm still doing the show notes for Mur Lafferty's I Should Be Writing podcast. I even called in to the show with a question of my own (see Feedback Episode #180).

Special thanks to my internet friends who've checked in on me during my mysterious internet absence: Patty Blount, Harley May, The Rejectionist, and Maine Character.

I hope to once again start blogging on a semi-regular basis, but my family life and fiction writing have to come first. I'm still trying to figure out the right balance. Once again, I hope you'll hang in there with me.