I’ve been quiet for a while as far as blogging or any type of writing goes. While I have been dedicating some of my time to genealogy and home improvement projects, as well as life in general, there have been serious moments of reflection about my writing.

Rebecca, the protagonist from my first two short stories, “That’s Just the Way It Is” and “Return to Texas” has become very vocal (to me, at least) about the fact that her story is not complete and asked me to please allow her to finish it. All too ready to put aside the novel I’ve been working on for a few years, probably because I know it needs the dreaded major revision, I have agreed.

The new short story will be called, “Last Breath.” Parts of it are written, and I am in the process of doing the cover. Although I dislike boxing myself in, I will say that it should be available by May. While writing this story, I am doing more historical research about the time period of this piece (1884-1891 in Texas) and the impact it has on the storyline.

In addition, I have decided to do a novelette where I will be expanding these three stories, and including some historical influences especially the Civil War. Much more will be revealed about Rebecca’s early life in Philadelphia before she and her parents moved to Texas right before the War. At this point, I haven’t decided whether this additional project will be completed before or after my novel.

While it’s nice to see your words in print, it must be even nicer to hold them in your hands, which aside from the noise from Becky, is motivating me to put these stories into a “real” book.  Perhaps I could even stretch it out to a novella. I’ll probably let her decide.

I welcome any comments or ideas, especially from those of you who have read my first two stories. For my fellow writers, how’s your writing life going? What’s new? What’s flowing, or not? It’s time to make a little noise on this blog!

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