Olivia, editor-in-chief of Tuxedo Cat Press, feels it is her duty to oversee my work

Turns out that when it comes to keeping my hands off the manuscript, I kinda suck at it.

It probably didn’t help that last week, three major projects that were on my schedule all went away. (None were my fault—cases settled or were withdrawn by a party.) Then, when I opened my emails Monday morning, I discovered that the only remaining project on my desk was on hold, which meant I had literally no billable work.

Which, in turn, meant I had two choices. 1. Panic. 2. Take advantage of this unexpected free time to work on something else.

I decided to work on something else.

First, I wrote a blog post about how I was going to have to keep my hands off the book. Then I checked the ads that are running on State v. Claus and My Brother, Romeo. (Pause for a shameless plug: the ebook versions of both books are on sale 50% off on Smashwords, and State v. Claus is part of a buy-one-get-one-free sale on Kobo. Just follow the links on the home page of Tuxedo Cat Press.)

After that, the only thing I had to work on was the book.

I’d already identified a few issues I’d need to address in the next draft. It seemed silly to send it out to my readers when I knew it had problems. Better to fix the problems I knew about so they could identify new and different problems that I haven’t yet found.

And that’s what I’ve been doing.

Not that I haven’t had other things to work on. A few small billable projects have come in. I wrote a biography for a gorgeous polydactyl ginger cat—an incredibly sweet boy whom I fully expect will be adopted tomorrow. I’ve reviewed a proof of the book’s cover (spoiler: it’s fabulous!). But I’ve spent as much time as I can spare on the book, tightening language, cleaning up chronology, and fixing the problems I’d identified. Barring the unforeseen, it should be ready to go out to my readers by the end of the weekend.

And once it goes out, I really will keep my hands off it until they’ve had a chance to read it.

Or at least, I’ll try.