Update: SO BUSY, but making progress on everything

All right, so, this past week involved:

A) Proofreading the Tuyo World Companion

B) Listening to the audiobook of TANO and making many, many corrections. Well, probably not that many REALLY, compared to making corrections when actually proofreading, but it probably seemed like a lot to the narrator, alas! He should be loading the corrected files to ACX soon, maybe today, and then I will listen to the full thing again. Which I will enjoy very much. I got a remarkable amount of dusting done while listening to it the first time, a win all the way around.

Comments about the audiobook: To me, this voice sounds right for Tano himself. As has happened with Patrick McCaffery’s Ryo, Aras, Geras, and others, I’m hearing Tano with this voice now. Even more important — and I’m not sure why this strikes me as so utterly crucial — but this narrator (Timothy Little, so if I say “Timothy,” you’ll know who I’m talking about) — anyway, Timothy gets Raga’s cheerful tone exactly right. That seemed to be a serious challenge, as almost no one who auditioned got Raga anywhere close to right, and I guess his voice is so clear to me I couldn’t stand it. He’s cheerful! He’s light-hearted! If he’s got depths (and he does) they’re hidden most of the time!

Timothy also made all four young men sound different from each other, SUCH a challenge, and to my great delight, Sinowa and Marag both sound a LOT like they do in the audiobooks of TUYO and TARASHANA. Ryo sounds a bit different, but fine. Aras sounds different, but acceptable. Did I mention Raga sounds great? Raga sounds great. Getting Tano and Raga both right means that when I pick up these young men again and write the next book from Tano’s pov, I’ll probably be asking Timothy to do that one as well. Timothy does pronounce “inTasiyo” differently than I do, and seemed really stuck on his pronunciation there, and I finally said fine, let it go, and let myself get used to it. I guess I hereby declare that the people that far to the west pronounce some words differently than the people closer to the inGara tribe.

So that will be out soon, and btw the audiobook for SUELEN should be right behind this one; SUELEN’s narrator told me he is also closing in on that one.

C) Lots of progress on this semi-final revision of INVICTUS, and I am now officially tired of this story. I got pretty far with revisions before that happened. I think the problem is not just that I’m impatient to move on to other projects, but that I have been practically experiencing whiplash going back and forth between the world of Tuyo and this world.

However, I’ve made enough progress that the thought of the fast-approaching upload deadline is not quite as terrifying as it was this time last week. I’m still making minor tweaks to CAPTIVE, but I should have that one fully tweaked way before the mid-September deadline, and I got surprisingly close to all the way through CRISIS this weekend considering this is a fairly extensive, thoroughly annoying revision.

Among other things, Mike S pointed out a serious worldbuilding problem — a “why didn’t they?” question involving absolutely crucial backstory — and I will just say, this is the kind of thing I REALLY NEED early readers to spot, so that readers who pick up the final version don’t ask, “But why didn’t they?” about that element. In my experience, practically anything can be made to look sensible and plausible, but only if you realize there’s a plausibility problem before it’s too late. In this case, since I was stuck for a good answer to this question, I called my brother and said, “Craig! Why didn’t they?” and we kicked ideas back and forth and boom, ten minutes later I had two different good answers to this backstory question.

Next step, tweaking CAPTIVE to integrate the answer to the “why didn’t they” question plus resolve other issues early readers have tripped over. Also finishing this round of revision with CRISIS and sending the revised version to early readers. Will I have this done before August? Ha ha ha, sob, not a chance. Will I have it done before August 15th? Wow, I sure hope so. Will I have it done before the deadline? YES.

Take home message: it is IMPOSSIBLE to give yourself too much lead time for revision, especially if you’re not keen on stress.

D) Kittens! Alas, I still have all four.

^{Can you spot all three kittens?}

I’ll be making a real effort to find a place for at least two of them in the next week or so. I don’t want to wait till school starts. That’s a good time, of course, but they’ll be practically teenagers by the end of August, less cute, more difficult to place. If I have to, I’ll take them to a rescue or shelter, if there’s anything in St L or some other decent-sized nearby town that has a place open. But I really, really do not want to drop a tabby kitten into a shelter. I fear he would languish, ignored for any kitten that is not tabby.

The kittens have hit an exploratory period as distinctive and obvious as when puppies hit it. I didn’t know kittens did that! But between one day and the next, they’re exploring downstairs. Guess what’s downstairs? That’s right, the bedroom. The orange tabby spent the night curled right next to my pillow. As far as I can tell, he purred all night. I bet you can surmise which kitten I would most be okay with keeping. I could see myself keeping the orange kitten and a gray tabby brother. None of the boys are as venturesome as the Tortie, or as the female kitten last year. I don’t know whether that’s coincidence or if female kittens are more venturesome in general, which seems weird, but I don’t know. I sort of hope these male kittens might stay in the yard rather than trying to get over the (high) fence. The little Tortie, not a chance. She’d definitely go through or over any possible barrier.

UPDATE: almost as soon as I posted this, I got a response for the two kittens I would most like to place — hopefully by tonight, the Tortie and a gray tabby brother will be settling into a new home!