Midweek Notes from a Practicing Writer

Three quick updates from my desk, drafted and scheduled for publication while I, like everyone else in this country, awaited election results.

1. November may be NaNoWriMo for some of you who are reading this. For me, it’s shaping up to be NaKidlitWriMo. My children’s picture-book biography critique group met on Sunday; I’m slated for one conference later this week and another one on November 15; a revision of my own picture-book ms is due to my critique group the Sunday after Thanksgiving. I spent quite a bit of time this past week beginning those revisions. Let’s just say that the work is…challenging.

2. I’m also hoping that November may bring better news for the freelance piece that I last referenced a few weeks ago. Things didn’t quite work out at its anticipated home. I was lucky to find (quickly!) another editor who was interested in reading it, and for the past week or so, I’ve been refreshing my email again and again (and again) hoping for some good news from him.

3. I’m so susceptible to peer pressure! A few days ago I succumbed to the entreaties of a few librarian- and writer-friends and signed up for a four-week class on Jewish short stories. Have I read most of the stories on our syllabus already? Yes. Have I even taught some of them myself? Yes. But so have the aforementioned friends. We live all over the country, and thanks to the Zoomification of our lives and this particular opportunity, we’ll have this chance to focus on these works together. I can’t wait for us to be classmates—the first session happens tonight.

an open spiral notebook with a pen resting on a blank page, plus a text label that reads, "Midweek Notes."