Love of a Wild Thing, book 2 in the In Between series, is on indefinite hiatus.
I will do my best to explain.
The book was very nearly finished. It was so very very close. But I had decided to include current world events (not virus related) into this story. Specifically, the space race shenanigans between Musk, Bezos, and Branson. At first it was just going to be fun stuff, background action. But as is the curse of being a Pantser, the story began to write itself. And those background fun things turned into the plot.
Which, okay, not that big of a deal. That's happened before and it's always been exciting. I'm good at making things up. I fictionalized everything. I changed numerous characteristics and exaggerated several of my scenarios.
But it wasn't enough.
Maybe it's because I had chosen current events that were happening in real time. Everything is still in motion. I had thought that I'd sensationalized some things to the point of ridiculousness. I cackled numerous times during certain scenes as I embellished certain character actions, thinking my readers would make fun of me for being so wildly outrageous. I made things up based on what I had seen.
This summer I was busier than expected and I didn't get the book finished in the time I wanted. If I had, it's possibly this would be a very different kind of a blog. Because about two weeks ago, Bezos began doing things that I had written about. Word. For. Frickin. Word.
I sat in horror at my desk as I read article after article about him filing lawsuits against NASA.
Unknowingly, I had successfully predicted the future.
Which is not as cool as it sounds.
And then here today came another report of Bezos interfering with the FCC and SpaceX. It's again, already in my book.
Head meet Desk.
I am distraught.
Never in my life has this happened.
I will have to either throw out the entire book and start over, or wait for these space boys to finish their bullshit before I rewrite certain events.
I'm thinking it would be safer to just throw it out and start over.
Which makes me mad and sad and frustrated all at the same time.
If I would have published this in July like I had originally planned would this still be an issue? I have no idea. I'd be able to prove that I have written about it before it happened and you'd think that would save me from any lawsuits. But again, someone doesn't seem to need a very big reason to file a lawsuit.
Y'all I am not a rich person. I cannot afford to be sued for something like this. I just wanted to tell a story that might make people think about plants and space and how we sabotage ourselves without realizing it. You know, my usual.
Am I proud of myself for accurately reading someone's character and predicting actions based on that assessment? I little. But it's also scary and annoying.
Maybe I need to just go back to writing about rock stars and beach bums for a while. That seems to be my sweet spot.
Anyway, I am sorry for those of you who were excited about this book. I was excited too. I have hope that I'll be able to give you something even better. Whenever I've been met with barriers in my creative life and been forced to pivot, I always, always, always, make something better. So as frustrating as this is, ultimately it will be for the good of the story.
I just don't know when that will be.