80 pages to go. Inside a line edit, on Facebook

 Frieda with one of Maria’s potholders. Frieda is a working dog and loves to help Maria sell her potholders. And they are selling, for sure.

 I am down to the last 80 or so pages on the (hopefully) final edit to “Rose In A Storm.” The process ought not be hurried, and I will go back and read it over, but I’ve been posting an editing coundtown on  FB, a first for me, and somehow encouraging and helpful as my fingers ache and my vision blurs.
  This is a challenging book, my first novel in some time, and one told from the point of view of an animal that doesn’t talk or have language. My editor has sent the book back four or five times, and the annoying part is that her suggestions and criticism are valid.  That’s also the creative part.
 So we are making a book together, and it is as exciting as it is exhausting.
 This should be the final edit before it goes into some form of production for publication next year, and I am eager to start the next novel, tentatively titled “Rose Running.”  I can’t really stop at this pointing, and reading over the novel is very good for me, gives me a real sense of pace and voice.
 I will break in an hour or so to try and get some foliage shots in nearby Vermont. I never did this in school, which is why I was such a crummy student and got kicked out of two colleges.