Yes, I did get home

I actually flew to New York and back on the same day, but realized that my blog post might make it seem like I've been gone ever since.

Life is strange late.  Awesome-great in some ways, and scary-bad in others, but on the balance it's still pretty good.  I don't want to get into personal issues too much on a public blog, so I'll focus on the things I think you all care more about.

I had a great meeting with my publisher.  We're going to try to get me doing events again, especially school-and-library visits.  Those were always my favorites, and I credit them for much of my inspiration to continue publishing, even when other parts of my life sometimes make this work a bit of a struggle.

Among other people, I also met (or re-met for the first time in years) much of my design team.  As I shook hands, the first thing I felt the need to do was apologize, and then say thank you.

Now, I made a comment a while back about editors, and how sometimes I hate my editors, which was interpreted by some as critical - though folks who talk to me regularly know I meant it as anything but.  It is my personal opinion that if you don't get angry with your editor sometimes, she (or he, though all mine have been female to-date) isn't doing her job.  Her job is to tell you what's wrong with your work of love.  To tell you what you should get rid of, what you should do differently.  If you don't have a few moments of outraged fury, and a few "she's totally insane and an idiot!" rants, your editor is obviously being too nice, which means the book won't get as polished as it should if she pushed a little more.

I bring this up because my design team takes a lot of grief from me.  Why? Because it's their job to make a visual, physical symbol of a story that exists in technicolor in my head... without the benefit of being able to see inside my head.  I think they're often forced to work off notes from my editor, based on a story that is still being revised, and then they need to deal with a cranky under-slept author who more often than not downloads art before her first cup of coffee.  So I wanted to add the comment that, just as a good editor will probably make you crazy sometimes, so too can a good design team.  In both cases, the ultimate goal is for everyone to be happy with the resulting synergy.  (Did I use that word right? I'm not sure I've ever said the word "synergy" before.)  In both cases, the middle process involves a lot of back and forth with both sides trying to be polite while they're thinking, "What are you thinking?"

They're a good team.  I really like the recent covers- Poison Tree and Promises to Keep.  No, I can't show you Promises to Keep yet.  Yes, I am absolutely teasing you.

Have a good day!