I feel a little sheepish about this. However, I'm sharing anyway!
I had thought, when I was writing, that I needed to write about the entire decade post-transplant. Everything that happened....every trip, every show, every everything. And I kept hitting blocks in my writing.
While I was trying to write what I kept calling "the last part", I had a brainstorm. What if....I didn't write everything? I mean, who says I need to write everything? This isn't War and Peace! You don't need to know all this stuff I'm writing!
It was ridiculously freeing. So I opened my scrap document (this is an idea I got from Elizabeth Gilbert--a Word/Pages doc that holds the big parts I cut from the manuscript, so I can use them later, if I need them), cut out about 5,000 words, and put them in there.
I feel so much better! And the manuscript is now a decent length! I've decided that it needs a new prologue and a new epilogue, but that's it.
So I'll be moving things around/fixing things for the next week or two, and when I get back from Charleston, I'll start sending out book queries.
Scary, scary thought. It sort of terrifies me to send out book queries. But hey, it has to be done. Seize the day, screw your courage to the sticking place, and all that.