I know, I know...

The good news is that I've settled on a cover design for Little Birdies!. The bad news is that I'm still fine-tuning the manuscript, which I thought I already had locked up.

On top of that, the Quark file that I was tinkering with froze up on me yesterday, so I lost two days (15 chapters) worth of updates. It's not the end of the world ... I should be able to recreate the adjustments today, but it wasn't helpful. I was really hoping to have been done with this by now, but every time I go in for "one last pass," I find something else that I'm not happy with. I know that there are people out there waiting for this book (I can tell by my website statistics), but I really want to present the cleanest possible product. One, maybe two more passes and it will be on its way to the publisher.

The Aqua Vitae manuscript is still hovering around 48,000 words. I was never completely convinced about the plot line I'd been following, and think I've come up with a more productive path. I'm going to start from the beginning, new title and all, as soon as I can get Birdies out of here. I should be able to salvage at least half, maybe two-thirds, of what I've already written, so that's not so bad.

And I haven't forgotten about The Cup of My Blood. It's next in line to be readied for publication. If I can get my ass in gear, I should be able to get Cup out there by the end of the summer, and maybe catch a break and get on board the next "DaVinci Code" whirlwind -- Dan Brown's next movie, "Angels and Demons," is due out this summer, as is his next novel. They're very different books, of course, but are similar enough in theme that I might be able to scoop up a few of Dan Brown's crumbs if I can get out there in time. Fingers crossed...