Of Movie Scripts, Manuscript Revisions, and Skype Visits

Crap, I've been busy.

Parenting, writing, and swimming, oh my!

Plus, um, you know, trying to make a living in there. Oddly, my mediation practice has picked up at just the time of year it's usually dead.

At any rate... just handed in my "Frankie" revisions, uh, AGAIN. My editor is good. Damned brilliant. But let me just say I'd be happy to never have to revise that manuscript again.

I think it's there. I hope it's there. And I'd really like a title. I'm reducing its working title down to Frankie in my head, so I can try to let go of "Frankie Sky." I still love that title but my editor feels it doesn't really tell you enough about the story. She's probably right.

Here's what else I am up to, in brief:

Have taken out In Sight of Stars to revise some more (even though I really want to work on the new thing I started this spring). Thinking ISOS will be my first submission to my editor when my option period opens. I need to fall in love with it again, but my agent likes it. I have more possibilities if my editor disagrees. Or if she wants to go with something else first...

In other news, I have the final draft of the The Pull of Gravity movie script in my email, if I could just get to it. Too much else on my plate. Luckily, they don't need me to read it again to start shopping it for budget (or whatever the movie lingo is for doing that). I've had plenty of input between last draft and this one, and I trust the awesome guy who is writing it.

Fyi, this is what the title page of the script looks like, talk about your really cool things:

Yep. Un huh. Really awesome. But, yes, still pie-in-the-sky. A movie takes money, so we'll see where we are six months from now. Cross fingers.

Have had, or am about to have, some awesome Skypes and in-person visits. Highlights:

Last week I Skyped with a group of terrific girls from the Reading for Life Program. Oh my goodness, they were adorable, smart, beautiful, and, loved my book. It was in the company of two giants for their program -- Speak by the incredible Laurie Halse Anderson and Matched by Ally Condie, so, I was worried, but they liked The Pull of Gravity best, so I guess it can hold its own.

Maybe one day, I'll believe it. . .

This week I Skype with one of my all-time favorites: the kids from Silver Creek High School, Room 407 (the classroom of the inimitable Paul Hankins). Been there twice, I think, and never have anything but fun!

And coming up, also a visit to the Kids Read Program of The Center for Fiction in New York City, and my rescheduled reading at the Pen Parentis Literary Salon, where I may, or may not, read from a piece of my ever-unpublished women's fiction.

So, that's it. Doing my thing. Trying to make new things happen. And finding my way to the water most days, to boot.

me, second from the left,
wading in to the 40 degree water like a champ. ;)

xox gae