"You're not going to cry, are you?"

I'll never be able to fool anyone...

I've started a new serial over at Stardust. Like Blue Moon, I'm going to post short chapters there and then gather up longer ones to post here.

The first premium story I donated to BigCloset, Jacks or Better, will be posted next week as a free story. So...

Her mom has been keeping her awake and keeping her from working, most of this week, and now she's so upset she's ill.

Let's be good to her and not hassle her.

Posting of Green Sun 13 may be delayed because I'll be editing and picking an illustration myself.

-- Donna

I'm still a week or so ahead on planning out episodes but there's plenty of time to influence where this story is headed. I'm trying to use many of the same elements from Blue Moon and a few of the same characters--we will see Richard and Jo again and some of the other band members. But this is a very different story.

Why a sequel to Blue Moon? Why not?

Well, existential questions aside, I couldn't get Richard, Jo, Sophie and the other characters out of my head. They had lots of clever things they wanted to say and stuff they wanted to do. But I didn't have a plot.

Well, Blue Moon is done. My first novel since the obligatory, bad, coming-of-age tripe I wrote in college.

It didn't start out to be a novel; originally I just had a cute idea for a short story based on the calendar and having recently re-read Lainie Lee's incomplete "The Devil in Drag."

A lot of people asked me to continue the story, so I tried. It turned into a serial, then a serialized novel under the continued encouragement of several people.

Thank you all, you know who you are. ::smile::

One of the joys of writing Blue Moon is finding uses for elements I introduced earlier just for color or bits of business. Do people writing novels do this, too, or is the tuxedo cat stealing cream in chapter four never to be seen again?

What if you needed a sudden noise in the middle of the night in chapter thirteen? Wouldn't it make sense for Mr. Underfoot to turn out to be the same cat? And then, near the climax when the villain needs to send a message, poor little kitty gets a curtain call?

Grisly example but does this happen in novel-writing?

Have you noticed what a lively bunch of commenters there are here on BC?

Great job, guys and gals! Hip! Hip! Hooray!

Donna Lamb, Flack

Had a weird dream last night. Somehow I'd landed a job on a new movie starring Jim Carrey as Herman Munster, Meryl Streep as Lillie and Tim Curry as Grandpa with Mike Myers as the slimy villain. Actually sounds good while I'm awake!