It looks like the next chapter is slated to happen before the end of this week, which, ladies and gentlemen, gets me to the 3/4 mark of this novel. It's downhill all the way from there. I'm thinking it's going to clock in at a respectable 90 000 words or so - which, once again, is LONG for a YA, but
rdeck always helps me to eschew excess verbiage on those occasions when I really egregiously commit it, and my Harper editor has proved to be pretty good with whittling words where necessary - between the three of us, myself, hubby and the pro, we managed to scrape just over 10 000 words off the 108 000-word behemoth that was "Spellspam" in first draft. I feel good about this third book - it's been the hardest one to write, what with keeping in mind its identity as book the third and the final in a trilogy and the necessity for it to wrap the storyline up in a neat and satisfying story arc - some day I might blog in more detail about the dramas and joys of trilogies.One other thing - for one brief shining moment, "Gift of the Unmage" actually held a four-figure sales rank at Amazon. Whoever bought the books that helped push it there - blessings on you, my friends. (now do it again.)
