Friday, January 30, 2009

My fear of emailing EK a hot mess

First, I need to round up a few links!

We've got:

A review of Take the Reins from Mara at Whitebrook Farm. Thanks, Mara! :)

An interview up at Harmony Book Reviews. Thanks again, Harmony!!

A guest blog at Presenting Lenore. I did a Letterman-style "Top 10 Things I've Learned About Writing" list. Thanks for letting me stop by, Lenore!

And now, back to my little writing corner. I'm *almost* finished with TRIPLE FAULT.

Probably a week or so until it's done. Then it gets sent off to Editor K. But my OMG-I-so-suck cycle begins just before I email the draft. :) Hitting the send button to email my book off to EK or Agent A is still sooo hard! I pull up Hotmail, attach the file, sit, stare and then close out the window. I open the Word doc, scan a few pages and then convince myself it's really time to let it go. So, Hotmail comes up again and I reattach the file. There's pacing, glossing of lips, eye rolling at myself and then I finally press send.

Then?

Nooooo! Why did I press the button?! It wasn't ready! Take it back!

But, of course, I can't take it back. I force myself to close the laptop and walk away. I remind myself that EK and AA haven't said, "JB, you just emailed us a hot mess. You're fired." before, so the draft might be okay.

Yes, that's my process. :)

9 comments:

Keri Mikulski said...

I feel your pain.. :) But, I think I send things too fast. :) Is there help for this problem?? :)

Jessica Burkhart said...

Hmmm...perhaps we need to start our own support group? LOL

Lenore Appelhans said...

I have to hear that from my husband whenever he sends of his illustrations :) And of course they are awesomely wonderful. As I'm sure your book is.

Nora MacFarlane said...

Libba Bray wrote a fun blog entry July 15th, 2008, called "Writing a Novel, a Love Story," about her writing anxieties. You can find it here:
http://libba-bray.livejournal.com/?skip=20
You'll need to scroll down to find it. It's worth the search!

I'm sure your work is fine!

Jessica Burkhart said...

I'll check out that link, Nora. Thanks! :)

Alea said...

I have that fear when I send projects to print and then I think oh yeah I get a proof back. But then i'm scared to approve the proof. So I look at it like 1,000 times and force everyone else around me to look at it too!

Jessica Burkhart said...

I do that with printing, too, Alea! :)

Alea said...

Right now i'm waiting for something to come back for the printer! I just want it to get here so i can look at it!

Bookworm said...

Ooh I can't wait to read it anyway. I'm sure it's fantastic! (:

Counting down to Saddlehill Academy!

  Hii, friends! I'm so very thrilled to remind everyone that NEXT MONTH (!!!) is the release of my first novel in eight years! Ahhhhh!!...

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