This has been a crazy couple of months. When last I blogged, my youngest daughter had just had an MRI to pinpoint where a muscle biopsy should be done and to see if there was any indication of inflammation (which would have lead to a firm diagnosis as dermatomyocitis of polymyocitis). The day that I was supposed to call the doctor to schedule a follow up, the paternal grandmother of my husband died.
So in 24 hours, I packed up the 5 of us to make a 4000 mile road trip to New Mexico and back. We took 3 weeks, visited a lot of family, drove like maniacs, had our little dog get mauled by a 60 lb chow-mix, and got home in one piece though considerably poorer in wallet and ruffled in spirit. Three days later, dear husband's other grand mother passed. We didn't go to this funeral though.
The next couple weeks were concerned with getting school finished for the year and bidding adieu to my spouse who deployed with the Navy for a couple months. With all the stress, my middle and littlest began wetting their pants like 4 and 5 times a day. Being away for three weeks pretty much trashed my oldest daughter's report card, but she finished out the year. My middlest, the drama empress, graduated from pre-K with flying colors and an award for "Most Creative." My littlest... well, it was just weird to notice how strong she was, how she could climb, and didn't waddle when she ran, how she didnt fall so much. I went to pick her up from daycare one day in May and she just stood up off the floor without using her hands. I nearly cried.
So then in June, we go away to my mother's shore house where I normally work my ass off and get very little in the way of appreciation. This year was not much different, except that I could tell mom was at least trying to be appreciative. I wallpapered the bedroom, made new curtains for the living room, a new bedspread, and pillow covers for the day bed, fixed a miriad of small things etc and so on.
We get back and FINALLY I take my littlest to the neurologist to follow up her MRI. She shows almost no sign of ever having a muscular disorder. I can still tell she's a little weak, but she runs without a waddle, and you can lift her without her slipping. She has reflexes. She climbs stairs. She pops off the floor without a hint of Gower's Maneuver. And the neuro's eyes just keep getting bigger and bigger and he keeps smiling wider and wider. The poor man doesn't know what to think. "She's better!" he tells me. Well, I can see this already.
The neuro says there's no hint of inflammation on the MRI, so that rules out the 2 -myocitises. And seeing as she is doing so well, he doesn't want to do a muscle biopsy either. As far as he says, there really aren't any forms of muscular dystrophy that have points where a child will improve this much over this long a period of time.
So, the bad news is, we still don't know what it was that made her sick. It could have been a virus of some sort--one that had a LOOOOOOONNNNNGGGG recovery arc. There is an unknowable possibility that the weakness might return. I try not to think about this. The good news is that she is very nearly well, and is catching up with her age peers as far as physical ability. For now, the neuro says watch and wait. If she stays well or improves, he wants to see her in October. If she gets worse, back she goes.
Let's hope this is the first rays of the dawning and not just a bright flash before the storm.
So, last entry, a tech book contract just fell into my lap. This entry, that too is on thin ice. The co-author completely dropped out, even of just doing 20% of the book. He did this right before the holiday weekend, so I am not sure what kind of effect it's going to have on the project. On the one hand, it's a book deal. On the other hand, I've seen better money... only $3200 advance and 9.5% royalty. I still have to give up 15% to the agent, which pays me a bit over $2700 to write a 250 page book... like $12/page. Now, I'm not greed—ok, I am—but that seems like a lot of work for not much moula. Did I also mention I'm kind of lazy? I'm also not the subject expert for this book. That was the other guy.
If the book retails for $25 (not unusual for a tech book), then they'd have to sell like 1350 to earn out the advance and make me any royalties. A best-selling tech book might sell 10K copies, a moderate seller might sell 2K-5K. So at best, I don't expect there to be a lot more money coming in from this. It's the advance or naught.
Now, for what my editor at NewsForge told me. His name's Robin (he's a guy Robin not a girl Robin) and he's a real mercenary sort of fellow, having come to journalism from a background in... limosine driving. He says, "you don't write books for the money, you write them for your career." So I am left pondering. There really isn't a lot of money in this. There might not even be enough to make up for the income i'm going to lose working on it. But I wonder, is it time to do something "for my career?"
This year, I've been able to put two things on my resume I didn't have before "contributing editor" and "senior writer." It seems that those things get a little bit of attention. My buddy and former colleague at About This Particular Macintosh writes for MacWorld (the #1), while I write for MacAddict (the #2). I've watched him publish 3 books in the eighteen months since I wimped out of my first book deal.
Truth was, I was spooked... scared. I didn't pursue the books deals because I was afraid that I couldn't write a whole book--despite having written 4 novels and a 240 chapter serial. It was too big, too intimidating. When publisher #1 strung me along for 6 months and then dumped the book with a lame excuse, I didn't pursue the second publisher.
So maybe it's time. Is it time?
Oh, and incidentally, I finished Fall from Grace, book 5 of the On the Edge series. I finally found an ending, or really, the ending found me. That does seem to be how the muse works. She comes in her own time and pours magic into my hands.
Anyway, while I was in RI, I tried to figure out which of my works-in-progress was going to get the nod. As usual, after poring over the saleable, the light, the amusing and the profitable, I chose the one that will be hardest to sell and won't make me a dime if I do. There were a few I was scared of, a couple that didn't really interest me, one I still don't feel equal to, and then this one, which makes my muse sing.
The working title is The Barunian Incident and it's a socio-political space opera sci-fi—okay, "speculative fiction" if we MUST. As per my usual, there is a triangle of doomed lovers and lots of angst. As per not my usual, there is also political intrigue, social upheaval, sword fighting and explosions. I get to create whole civilizations... it's kind of fun. I'm enjoying it, except that since I came back from RI and got buried under work and other administrivia of being a mom and a jouralist, I haven't had a single fictional thought at all. Too much stress makes me very dull and DULL is what I am right now.
So we'll see. It took 3 years to write Unison and Counterpoint. It took 16 months, on and off, to write Fall from Grace. With OTE essentially dead in the water, I promised myself that I would write something different when I finished FFG. So now I am. If I got any more different, I'd be writing horror.Tune in next week for the upshot of my discussion with my agent about the future—or lack of the same—of the OTE series.
1 comment:
So glad to hear that she's doing so well!
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