Here it is, October 4, and I haven’t blogged since early September. Alas! Alack! Aghast! Etc.! I should really blog more often. I mean, I don’t have much to say, I suppose, but sometimes just because you don’t have much to say doesn’t mean you don’t have to say it. Or something.

Since last month, I finally finished the second first draft of And the Devil Will Drag You Under. I say “second first” draft because after feedback on the earlier version I decided to start over from the ground up, and I’m much happier with this version. I printed out the whole thing, grabbed pens of multiple colors, and a spiral notebook for writing down issues; you can see it all in the picture above. I’m all ready to go! My new deadline for completing these revisions is November 10. I should be able to complete that.

In September I submitted eight manuscripts and received four rejections. No acceptances; all those leftover submissions are still waiting for responses. My submission stats for the year so far:

SUBMISSIONS: 80

REJECTIONS: 67

ACCEPTANCES: 2

I’m planning on submitting another twenty manuscripts before the year is out for a total of 100. Just like last year. I had better get cracking on getting some new short stories written!

I didn’t do much editing in September, though I did some minor revisions on “Meep” before submitting it (no response yet), and completely revised “Gorgo’s Redemption Arc” (now entitled “An Ending Worthy of the Bards”) and submitted that as well (no response yet). I haven’t worked on my android rights story because I realized the premise itself could be deeply problematic and needs fixing. I’ll fix it.

And, of course, November is National Novel Writing Month! This year I’ll be writing the first draft of The X of Doom, the first in a planned trilogy of pirate novels tentatively entitled Oceanbound. I know the titles of the next two novels; I also know how the second novel ends. Beyond that, not much.

I have friends who are planning on blogging daily throughout October. I am not one of those souls. I do plan on blogging weekly from here on out. Let’s see if that happens.

Happy October, my friends! Excelsior!