Summer's Literary Malaise

Or make that my-laze... I've just not been able to get into anything since my Harry Potter rampage. (Next scheduled HP rampage: July 10th.) I've delved into "The Kalevala", the Finnish folk epic, and Barbara Kingsolver's new book, "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle", but I'm more in the mood for fiction. There's something about the summer heat that makes me crave a good, strong plotline.

Did a little more work on my children's mystery tonight. It's been a few months since I last worked on it. I keep thinking each chapter will be the last, or I was anyway; I'm now thinking it'll be another two chapters. It's a little darker and scarier than I'd originally intended, but I like it. We'll see what happens on the edit.

I had an interesting conversation the other day with an acquaintance who has the happy job of editing books. She said it's good to get some articles published, just by way of establishing some publication credits in a somewhat wider market than, say, poetry, lit or children's books. Good tip. Time to get back into creative nonfiction mode...