A Purple River In The Graveyard

My house is a mess, the cupboards are down to Ramen and some canned goods nobody wants, there are piles of laundry in baskets, and I really need to pay some bills! And I am ridiculously and embarrassingly late replying to e-mails. Tomorrow, I keep telling myself. Tomorrow. So much for my list-making—there are just not enough hours in a day! Not when you’re nearing the end of a Sammy Keyes book. Sheez! I get obsessed. It’s ridiculous. My poor family. I did follow through on my commitment to run a half-marathon today, though. The route took us past the graveyard and that pyramid tomb I wrote about last week so I was able to point out the pyramid to my husband (who ran with me). As you (probably) know, I’ve been graveyard snooping to research Sammy Keyes and the Night of Skulls, and now I’m all excited because I had the bright idea that climbing the pyramid tomb on Halloween would be a blast. I’ve heard you can see the drive-in theater screen from the top, and now I want to take my kids and their friends and check it out. Wanna come? Anyway, a little random trivia that won’t matter to anyone anywhere but me, but here you go: I’ve discovered purple is the color to edit a manuscript with. I like pencil, but in the late hours (of which I’ve seen plenty of late) it’s easy to miss when entering the changes into the computer. Blue doesn’t show well enough, and I used to use red, but it always reminded me of my teacher days, correcting papers. And I don’t want to feel like I’m a teacher correcting papers. Especially since it makes me feel like an English teacher, and as you (probably) know, English teachers scare me. Bottom line: when I’m correcting my own paper with a red pen and it’s an “English” project, that’s just too much internal conflict for me to handle. Enter the purple Bic ballpoint pen. I love it! Instead of thinking teaching or blood, it reminds me of my purple electric guitar. It’s also bright enough to pop off the page at me as I enter the changes on the computer. I’ve used a river of purple ink this week. It spilled all over the graveyard chapters—which is a lot of the book. The rewrite process can be brutal, and it felt HUGE this time, but things are starting to shape up nicely, so that’s a big relief. And in two days Sammy Keyes and the Wedding Crasher will be out! FINALLY! I know some of you won galleys earlier in the year have already read it (and I must say, you’ve been amazingly good about not giving things away in the comments—thank you!). But for those of you who have been waiting, thank you so very much for anticipating the day for the past, what? Almost year? I hope you like the "special thanks." See you next week!