I’ve gotten a couple of inquiries—well, more than a couple!—about what sort of progress I’m making with the sequel to The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic. It has been more than a year since I posted here to let you know that I was about three-quarters of the way through a first draft. Time for an update.

I spent most of the past year finishing the first draft of the sequel. As usual, it took longer than expected because characters often insist on having their own way, and magic is complicated. No major spoilers here—but it took me a while to understand exactly how timestones work, for example. The Kavareen turned out to have more interesting depths than I first thought. And Nora’s magical education took some unpredictable detours.

Now I’m at the stage where I’m getting feedback on Book 2 and revising. The first readers of the manuscript appear to have survived their ordeal intact; some even say they enjoyed it. They’ve also given me some really terrific suggestions—which in turn has sparked some new ideas on my part. “Wait, I never knew THAT about Aruendiel!”

You can tell where this is going, right? I wish I had a definite, set-in-stone publication date to give you. But I don’t, and it will be a while before I do. Writing takes time, and then editing takes more time. The first draft of The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic took three years, I spent a year revising it before I even tried to find a publisher, and then it was three more years of editing and rewriting—not to mention all the myriad things that publishers do to create an actual, physical book and get it into bookstores—before the novel saw print.

So. I’m working now, and it’s going well. That does mean that I'm sometimes too busy writing to respond to your wonderful messages and comments. I wish I could get back to everyone who has taken the time to write to me to ask me how the sequel is going, but then—well, you see my dilemma.

Still, I have to be honest. When I sit down to write, I have a couple of habits. First, I make a pot of tea. And then—usually without even thinking about it—I take off my watch. Because where I’m headed, I can’t think too much about time.