While enduring my first real stretch of unemployment, I’ve been attempting to put in full time hours on my writing. It’s not an easy habit to build, especially with the distractions of the Internet (Internet…forever!), but I’m getting there.

Since I find it near-impossible to write for 8 hours a day (I can do it, but then I burn out for the next few days, so it’s a wash), I spend the rest of the time reading agent blogs. It’s been enlightening, to say the least! I’ve used the ideas found on those blogs to craft a query I really like for the novel I’m writing, begin to draft one for the novel that I’ll be revising, and start to think about verbal pitches for both.

It’s also led to some frustration. For instance, after reading several agents’ negative feelings about prologues, I began to wonder what I should do with the brief prologue in Beltrunners. It’s an exciting scene (the second word is “explosion”), but it doesn’t involve my main characters at all. Suddenly, it hit me: instead of describing an explosion in space that none of my characters see, why not have it happen at the spaceport where they’re all preparing to go on their trip? It will be a more integral part of the story, not to mention adding immediacy and drama to the first chapter.

But it’s going to be a pain to rewrite. I suspect there will be some headdesking involved.