It's frustrating when characters scream in your ear ...

And so I have FINALLY (after about a bazillion years) finished the next Booktown Mystery (just working on the recipes before I hand it in) and I need to start writing either a Jeff Resnick or Lotus Bay book ... but my Tales of Telenia characters are SCREAMING at me to work on their story.  I've been putting it off for over two years, and they've just about had enough.

I lost a lot of sleep during the last months of my mother's life and would lie in bed during the wee hours distracting myself from thoughts of death by plotting the story.  Yesterday I wrote most of the first chapter longhand (while engaged in another pursuit), Of course, then I remembered that I'd already WRITTEN part of the first chapter back in August.  So now I've got to merge the two because they're both pretty good.

I love these characters.  I love the stories and yet THEY DO NOT SELL, and I have not been able to convince my cozy readers to give them a try.

It's not smart to write something that doesn't bring in income, because let's face it:  writing is my job. I couldn't afford to take time away from a day job to do something like this.  So I guess I'll have to make it a hobby piece that can only be worked on AFTER I write something that brings in grocery money. (Did I mention I had to have my brakes replaced last week???)

It's okay, Mandy ... I haven't abandoned you (and Dohmas). It's just going to take a while longer until I can tell the rest of your story, even if only I and a handful of your followers ever read it..