Schooling, sickness, and family life have kept blog updates to a minimum over the past few months, but the low-key investigation and not so low-key editing has continued.

Since I last wrote, this first novel in the hoped for Seekers series has undergone some stringent editing!  It started with friends and family who kindly pointed out typos, grammar errors and other inconsistences and has continued with some intensive editing from other friends who carry some heavier credentials.  All in all, I think we’ve undergone at least 10 edits.  The refining process has been incredibly fascinating, time consuming and humbling.   It really is true what they say – the hardest work is after the book is written.  But it’s so worth it. 

While the story has been polished up, I’ve been talking to publishers, emailing contacts and chatting through options, reading stacks about the publishing world, discussing it with interested parties, listening to a seminar and praying. 

As the big picture brings more clarity, I have come to the conclusion that the best option for my family is to self-publish.  While there is great security and prestige in having a traditional publisher back a writer, there are also expectations and deadlines that I may not be able to commit to.  Writing these stories is not my primary role and I am not making a living from them.  <—- that there?  I need to tell myself that over and over.   Because, the pleasure I get from writing the stories, my desire to see them touch the hearts of readers, my excitement about future projects can so easily overtake my primary role in this season of my life: being a homeschooling mom and wife to my husband.

That’s the short version of a long process that is still happening.  But, from the conversations I’ve had with people in the know, it’s the best route to go.  The bonus is that I keep full control over the rights.  As I write, the cover is in the beginning stages of planning, and the holiday months of December and January promise some hard work towards publishing.   If all goes well, I pray that this book will come to you in early 2013.