For the first time in several weeks, I did NOT wake up in the middle of the night coughing! I actually slept through the entire night! YAY!

This morning I’m surprisingly tired. I figure that’s because we got up early (even set an alarm) so we could go out for breakfast then come back and write.

A couple days ago I posted about stopping work on the novel so that I could pivot and go and write a short story. Yesterday, I was able to successfully pick up the novel again. I do not think I could have done that without knowing exactly where the novel was going. I already had the scene in my head, as well as the next scene.

I’m almost 30K into this novel. I cannot tell you how long it will be. Maybe 60K? Maybe 90K? It keeps feeling like the latter, not the former. We’ll see when I get there.

Today, I get to write from a new POV. I don’t know exactly what she’s going to do. I have a vague notion about the *function* of her choices in this chapter.

She was one of the characters who came up with a proposal for the current problem that really surprised me but at the same time, was totally in character for both her people as well as herself.

Now, I’m going to write more about that proposal. I don’t know the details of what she’s going to do. Don’t care. Writer brain will give me all of that once I start.

Structurally, however, what I currently feel, is that her choices, and what she does this chapter, will have FAR reaching consequences. That what she chooses to do right now will inform much of the second and third novels.

I don’t know this for certain. I won’t know this for certain until I write the second and third novels. But I’ve been at this long enough that I believe I can accurately interpret the shadows on the cave wall.

This is going to be my 37th novel. Back when I was writing my earlier novels, I would often get the feeling that I was placing “hooks”. I didn’t know why writer brain insisted on this detail or that. I just knew that the detail had to be there and that I would use it later.

I’m more unconscious than that, now. I will frequently write a “hook” and not realize it, not even remember it until I get to the other side, the other hook that needs to reach back and connect to the first one. It’s only larger, structural pieces that I’m vaguely aware of now, not details.

So that’s today’s report from the writer who goes totally into the darkness and not really into dimly lit hallways.