God Knows

My novel went to the publisher yesterday! I feel as if I have given birth. But I am not sure whether the offspring is viable, or whether I want it to be. It is an unholy mess. Like my mind. I have been working on it (this is my third novel; the fist two remain in hibernation on my hard drive) for over three years. (Three years ago I published a collection of my Zone Notes, short mostly non-fiction pieces, that felt less risky somehow.) The novel made one abortive journey to the publisher several weeks ago - I freaked out and called it back to do more revision. I sent write-only discs to my sisters, both talented editors, hoping, since they could not alter the discs, they might pronounce it wonderful and I could send it back in. But they printed out hard copies from the disc, nearly 200 pages long, did meticulous edits and sent the edited copies to me by expensive snail mail.

So I did two more edits myself and sent it off. I know, had I not done that yesterday, I would have gone to my grave thinking I could have made it just a little better. Which I could have.

The title: God Knows; It Isn't About Us - and the wordy subtitle - If You Want More/You Better Die/This Is All There Is/Here.

Lots of people have said they would like to host events across the country where I would go and talk and hawk the book. I hope I don't lose my courage between now and the time the book comes out, probably in 4 to 6 months.

So we're about to do our semi-annual migration east to Vermont. And the book will be rolling around at the publisher.