I had what H called an extremely “literal” dream last night, which was that my book had come out, and I was reading a number of reviews in various places. All of the reviews said basically the same thing — Delusions was audacious and ambitious, but ultimately flawed and demonstrated a lack of readiness to be published. I do not need an analyst to tell me what my not-so-secret fears are.

While I’m waiting for my second round of readers to go over the book (one being Miriam, and the other a friend and editor at a publishing house), I’m working on something that feels like a second novel. I decided a few months ago that I wanted the second novel to be about marriage. This, of course, after being married for about 2.5 years — of course, I’m an expert! But I’m enjoying it so far. It’s nice to not be writing in first-person. It’s nice to meet new people, to learn a new place, to get into the rhythm of new words. I like it.

For the last few days, it poured and poured here. Miriam said, after waking up (briefly) at 7 this morning, that it felt like we were about to see a dove arrive with a branch in its beak. Blue skies, sun up. I thought the rain would never end, she said.

Will my book be ready soon? I think it will be. In the meantime, other bits and bobs of good news are on the horizon, waiting to be shared here — though not quite yet. I can hear the ocean. It is a good day.

It is unlike me to write How To posts on The Diarist — in fact, I at times unrelentingly mock blogs that seem to think that the How To list is the be-all and end-all of blogging. But in revising Delusions, I found that making a timeline was something that I really needed to do, and because I would have liked to know how to do it before I started scribbling all over the back of an old painkiller prescription sheet, to no avail, I will share it with you.

When I wrote the first draft of Delusions, I did the timing, seasons, and ages mainly by instinct. I figured that so-and-so was roughly this age in 1956, but, for example, I would have no idea when so-and-so else died. I wrote a lot of snowy scenes because I like to write about snow. When working on the second draft, I realized that it couldn’t possibly be snowing at certain times — for example, in the beginning of the first semester of David’s first year of high school, etcetera.

So I poked around for an app that could help me, and found on my iPad a tool called LifeTrack. It has ads, but is free, so I was willing to deal with that for the sake of being able to figure out when and what was happening in my book, and also how old everyone was at any given time. (You can’t go by years; you have to know if the event is happening before or after someone’s birthday. I hadn’t really thought about that before.)

If you don’t have an iPad, I recommend searching for other timeline applications. LifeTrack really simplified the reworking of the nitty-gritty details of my book. And I threw away the horrible, disorganized paper timeline I’d had before.

We had this fellow come visit us after we lit the fire pit. Unafraid, implacable, he stared at us for a few long moments before munching on plants. I read Blindness (my first Saramago, recommended by H) while I sat by the fire, and a few pages in, Miriam and I heard the trampling of dried grass and sticks as he wandered back into the wilds.

I feel close to the end of the book now; the second draft is finished, for now, and I’ll be spending the second half of CNA fixing technical issues with the book. (I spent a few days struggling with titles. I think I came up with at least twenty titles; it’s called Delusions now.) Yesterday I made a timeline of the book’s major events — over thirty years’ time — with the dates, seasons, and ages of the characters kept under consideration; I didn’t do that before I started putting the book together, which I’m hoping will not lead to dire consequences when I go back over the 400-ish pages. I hope there is not too much moaning and groaning.

But I see the finish line, and I know what people to send the manuscript to when it’s Go Time, and I feel good about 2012. The last few times I’ve read over the book, I’m filled with joy. And pride. Let’s go, let’s go.

Just a little reminder that I’m at Camp No Activities for the next two weeks and will be diligently working on (hopefully) wrapping up this second draft of Lamentations, which means that I will likely be updating with more photographs than words.

Be well, beloveds.