Happy Belated Blogaversary!!!

Woa... I just realized that my 1rst  year blogaversary was April 1rst.  And it's already April 6th.  Yep.  I'm out of it. O_o 

But hey; happy blogaversary to the Pen and Parchment, I guess.  :D  It's neat to think that it's already been a year.  Where on earth did a whole year disappear to?  It snuck away when I wasn't looking and I'll never be able to get it back... how tragic.  Or exciting.  Depends on how you look at it. ;)

And looking back, I'm happy to announce that I met some of the goals I laid down in my full profile. Even took a step beyond them.  One of my goals was to get my manuscript, Song of the Daystar, on an editor's desk before Christmas.

Well, that happened.

And not only did it happen, but now I've decided to announce the other exciting news that I've been holding off on since the beginning of March: the publisher contacted me again with a revision request and an invitation to resubmit. 

I said before that I wouldn't name the publisher until I heard back from him: well, now that I've heard back from him, I will tell you the company's name. 

Flaming Pen Press.

Yep!  Me excited!

Now, nothing is certain yet.  I started rewriting the manuscript before I'd heard back from Mr. Appleton.  However, when I explained this to him, he kindly invited me to send him the first 20 pages of the rewrite.  A few days later he contacted me through email saying that he really liked the direction the new version was going, and told me to go ahead and finish the rewrite, then resubmit the manuscript when I'm finished.  (If you head on over to the "Read an Excerpt" page, you can read the new blurb and the new first chapter of the rewrite.)

I refuse to count my chickens before they hatch... but it's hard not to feel a little giddy. :)  I really don't want to assume too much, or get my hopes too high before I know anything for certain; it all feels a bit sureal and I've got a long way to go before I know for sure if Mr. Appleton's company will actually decide to publish SOTD.  I guess I will leave it up to God; He's knows what He's doing.  I just need to sit back and enjoy the ride... and continue writing. :D

Speaking of which, this blog post was originally going to be called "In the Slum" which is where I've been for the past couple of weeks.  The Writer's Slum, that is.  It's not a very fun place to be.  But I just wanted to send a shout out to Mr. Wayne Thomas Batson and thank him for his awesome books: I'm almost half way through reading Sword in the Stars, Mr. Batson's latest epic achievement, and I find it very inspiring.  The world in SITS is slightly reminiscent of J.R.R. Tolkien's world, Middle Earth - complete with histories, languages, different races, etc... - and yet it is completely different.  Reading through the book, it keeps reviving old ideas I had thought near death, and suddenly I understood how I could continue my story!

So thank you, Mr. Batson.

I think I shall go write now.  :D