Laurel Snyder

So I just, just, just…. finished the new book, Any Which Wall!

 It is only a draft, what I have. And I’m sure my very wonderful editor will pull it into a trillion gazillion pieces and help me make it better. I harbor no illusions that it’s really done.  That I’m truly finished.

Far from it. This thing is a MESS!

But when you have a deadline, and you only have about 8 hours a week without people pulling on you (quite literally), the pressure, the fear that you will find yourself on deadline day about 60 pages shy of a book… it’s a BIG fear.  And the sense of helplessness that goes with it. The idea that the only way to carve out more time is to rob your sleep.

When you are averaging 5 hours a night, broken into 1.5 hour segments!

I remember being lazy. I remember what that felt like, that sense of guilt that it was *my* fault I wasn’t finished with something. Late nights in college, writing 20 pages in 12 hours, researching in the wee small hours because I’d watched too much Rikki Lake every day for a week.

Sigh.

Sometimes I wish for that time back. I imagine what I could do now if I could jsut rescue an hour of time for every 10 hours I wasted in grad school or college.  Store those hours up in a box. Pull them out when I need them.

But then… I wouldn’t be me.

And maybe I needed all that down time, that “wasted” time. To become this person. The person…

Who just FINISHED HER BOOK!

Yip!

Now I just have to  hope it doesn’t suck…  I have to hope pirates aren’t totally overdone…  I have to worry…

Oy.

(In other news, we are looking at ideas for illustrators. And boy howdy, is that FUN!)

I got word that I’ll be doing a “speed dating event” at BEA in Los Angeles in May!  For Inside the Slidy Diner!!!

 Not quite sure how that works exactly, but I’m incredibly excited about it!!!

 In other Slidy News, we just got the final art in and it’s absolutely incredible.  Now the artist (Jaime Zollars) and I are getting together on some super fun swag ideas.

I, of course, want to make temporary tattoos for everything in the universe. I’d make temporary tattoos of my grocery list if I thought people would wear them…

xoL

I’m on a deadline, trying to finish the new book, Any Which Wall, by March 3rd…  so that my wonderful editor does not lose all faith in me and throw me to the seagulls. 

 Not that… ummm… they do that. I mean… ummm… you didn’t hear it from me.

 In other news, life continues to be pretty great. The kids grow like weeds.

That is to say– they thrive on dirt.

 Love, Laurel