About the Novel

As the title implies, this sequel details the further adventures of Mildred Susanne Parker. She thought surely she’d seen it all, but gets a big surprise all the same. And it launches her on a new path of discovery.

Plus we catch up with what is happening in the lives of some of the other characters. And it’s quite a lot. They are on their own amazing paths of discovery.

This book also has wry humor and a bit of suspense. It will have all the things that make the first book great. I’m having a ball writing it and I’m anxious to see how it all turns out. Will Millie prevail this time? I sure hope so.

Posted July 28, 2022

I finally finished the proofreading. My husband finished his proof copy. We combined the two into one and I made the corrections and edits. Boy was that a tedious job.

Even with the both of us doing our best to find errors, two slipped by that were found by the spellcheck function during preparing the manuscript for the Kindle version.

So I made the corrections and re-uploaded it to the eBook. But I had to wait for the paperback to go live before I could edit the content. When it’s in review, you can’t do anything with it.

So it went live early this morning and I uploaded the manuscript. Should go live again sometime tomorrow morning.

Woo hoo!

Five books under my belt and another already in the works.

Life is good.

Posted May 9, 2022

A couple of weeks ago, I finished writing “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time,” which is the sequel to “Millie’s Adventures in time.” I know, not very original with the title.

I’ve spent the time in between then and now proof reading and editing my digital manuscript. It’s tedious and sometimes boring, but I found some mistakes and made some edits which I hope will have improved the novel.

When I thought I had that all worked out, I uploaded it to Kindle Direct Publishing. I had already set up the cover and the details of how the interior of the book should look. Once they processed the upload, then I was able to preview the novel.

It was a mess.

So I went over the formatting. Moved a bunch of stuff around and had another look.

Still not good. But better.

I have no idea how many times I went over the manuscript checking this and that, changing this and that, but it was a lot.

Finally, today, I gave up trying to perfect it (there is a blank page in the preview mode that is not there in my digital manuscript and I can’t seem to get rid of it in the preview mode no matter what I try) and ordered the proof copies.

In some ways, it is very exciting to be at this point in the publishing of my latest novel. In others, it is fairly anticlimactic. For the most part, the hardest part (the writing) is over (the exciting part), and yet there is still so much more left to do (the anticlimactic part).

I can certainly see the allure of having an agent and a publisher so that, as an author, all you would have to worry about is the writing. But I tried for a year after I finished writing “Millie’s Adventures in time” to get an agent and failed. That was the time I allotted myself at the end of which I would self-publish. Between that first novel and this sequel, I self-published three other novels.

Yes, I would still prefer to have an agent and publisher to take care of getting the book to look exactly as I would like it, promote it, and all the rest. But since that wasn’t to be, I am content to at least publish the little beasties.

So, with any luck, it should only be another month or so and then “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time” will be available for purchase.

Will there be a third “Millie” novel? Maybe. I’m knocking around some ideas about that. So, you never know …

Posted April 26, 2022

Surprise, surprise! I finished the first draft. Now comes the hard part. Reading the digital manuscript and fixing errors and making edits.

Hopefully, that will not take too long and then I can order proof copies. Then I get to do it all over again … but with the help of my husband, and possibly my sister this time.

Couple months and it should be ready for publication.

How exciting!

Posted April 19, 2022

Well, hey! I’m back to writing again. Work on this sequel took a backseat to my illness for quite a while. But I’m improving now and can sit at the computer for more than a couple of minutes before the pain sets in.

Plus, I’m feeling inspired. We recently purchased the complete television series of “Castle.” Watching an episode the other night, I was mesmerized as Rick Castle wove a tale for Detective Beckett and her crew. The story was compelling and encompassed all the things I love most about writing.

It reminded me that I’m a story teller and not just a writer of words. I create characters and situations. I flesh them out and give them life.

And that’s what I love about writing and why I am happy to be at it once again.

Posted October 14, 2021

I recently finished writing “Daria’s Tale” and have ordered two proof copies. One for me and one for Bernd. He says he is anxious to read it. He’s read some of the first chapters and really liked it.

So anyway, while I am waiting for those to arrive, I’ve started to re-familiarize myself with “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time.”

On thing that stands out to me is how different my style of writing is between the two novels. It’s as if Millie is the big driving force in her novel, and her way of looking at things and her sensibilities are what forms the basis for the whole thing.

Both novels are written from the standpoint of an omniscient narrator. But “Daria” was written in the past tense. “Millie” is written as if everything is happening everywhere right now. In some ways the latter is more difficult to manage. But I am not going back through all 78,000 words that I have already written and changing the tense. I think that might just make me a bit crazier than I already am.

Posted September 9, 2021

I really wish I could say that I’ve finally finished this sequel, but I haven’t. I haven’t even worked on it in over nine months.

In February of this year, I thought for sure I would be writing again. But the house we bought and moved into in December of 2020 needed so much more work than we had thought it would that we’ve only just gotten to a place where I feel I can step down from that a bit and get back to writing.

Thing is, I’m not working on the sequel. My husband suggested I work on one of my other projects and his reasons for the suggestion were compelling. So I’m working on that instead.

Have no fear, though, I will eventually finish the sequel and you will be able to find out what happens to Millie and all her friends, two-legged and otherwise.

Posted February 11, 2021

I finally finished working on “The Many Misadventures of Tall Guy and Short Gal” and have published it. So now I can begin thinking about finishing “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time.”

I say begin thinking about finishing it because there are so many other things on my mind right now. This old house we bought has needed a lot of work and seems to need more at every turn. I won’t call it a money pit, but it is definitely occupying a lot of our time.

But now that I have another novel behind me, I can definitely get cracking on the sequel to “Millie’s Adventures in Time.” Fortunately, I do have about two-thirds of the book already written. Unfortunately, I will have to read all of that again to get a sense of where it was headed when I so rudely abandoned it.

Posted November 5, 2020

We are moving. We are uprooting our lives and transplanting them to Wyoming.

There is so much to pack and plan. There’s the selling of our current house and the buying of another one. I had no idea we had so much stuff.

So all my literary projects have been put on a temporary hold. That includes this one. I’ll get back to Millie and her stories one day soon. Just probably not this year, which is quickly drawing to a close.

Posted August 11, 2020

Our cat, Bonfire, is not doing too well right now. We are not sure if he will recover. For the last few weeks, we’ve been caring for him as best we can. It’s tiring.

It also makes it very difficult for me to create whole new content for “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time.”

For that reason I have been focusing my attention on compiling two novels from content I have previously written. It’s much easier to edit/proofread/rewrite for me at this time, so that is what I have been doing.

I am pleased with what I have accomplished. But at the same time I feel that I have abandoned the sequel. And I can’t really say when I might get back to working on it.

So that’s all I have for now.

Posted February 5, 2020

The sequel is still sitting fallow. I got so caught up with “The Alien Visitation Chronicle” that I just sort of let the sequel lie.

Letting something sit around for a while like that hasn’t hurt it in the past. In fact, it helps me with the proof reading. Having not looked at it in a while makes it more likely I’ll actually read the words instead of skimming over them.

I anticipate finishing Chronicle by the end of this month. Then I will have to get serious about working on the sequel to Millie.

Posted January 2, 2020

I feel that I am just about ready to begin re-rereading what I’ve written so far. It’s a lot of pages and I hate the editing and proofing, but it has to be done. I’m still not certain I will see what Bernd saw that needed fixing, but I’m going to give it my best shot. That’s all I ever do. It’s all I can do.

Posted December 18, 2019

Sometimes I feel as if I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole. Nothing seems to make sense and I’ve no idea where I am, where I’m going or even where I’ve been. Doesn’t take much to push me over the edge either. Apparently.

I have not worked significantly on the sequel since Bernd made those first few comments about it (see the previous post, it follows this one). I got a bit angry, I’ll admit it, and slammed out a few changes that I hoped would fix things up. Then I started re-rereading the dang thing and found I had no real desire to do that at this time.

So I have been working on “The Alien Visitation Chronicle” (TAVC) instead. Bernd has read that also and pronounced it a lot of fun and too short. So I’ve divided it into Part One and I am working on the Part Two.

What I have discovered is that I am taking the whole thing about the sequel to “Millie’s Adventures in Time” way to seriously. I have it in my head that it has to be this masterpiece of literary fiction. It has to dazzle and amaze and all that crap. Whereas, with TAVC, it was never meant to be serious. It was meant to be silly and cliche and over-the-top. So I’m having a ball writing the stories for Part Two.

Maybe it’s a good thing. Maybe after a bit of this, I’ll be ready to look at “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time” again. Maybe I’ll have a better attitude about it. Maybe I’ll have a fresher eye. Maybe I’ll see what Bernd saw and it will all be clear what I have to do in order to make it work. Maybe.

Posted December 9, 2019

My husband, Bernd, recently started reading the sequel to “Millie’s Adventures in Time.” At least what I have written of it so far, which is actually quite a bit; something close to 80,000 words. Bernd is a good person to read the sequel because his memory for what he has read is not really all that great. So he’d forgotten … well I won’t say much, but he’d forgotten quite a bit about the first novel. In his defense, he remembers what he hears with an uncanny precision. He can quote dialogue from DVDs like you wouldn’t believe.

Here’s approximately how our first conversation about it went. And he hadn’t even read more than about 25 pages.

Bernd, with a questioning note in his voice: “Sweetie, did you mean this to be a stand-alone or part of a real series?”

Me, a little tightly:  “I meant it to be a sequel but also able to stand alone.”

Bernd:  “Hmph.”

Me, a little more tightly:  “What’s that mean?”

Bernd, with some uncertainty in his voice:  “Well, there are parts that might need more explaining.”

Me, finally walked into the living room and looked directly at him:  “Yeah. Like what?” I wasn’t being adversarial. Really. Okay, maybe a little.

He went on to explain. He had some good points. But I can’t say that I wasn’t a bit disappointed and frustrated. I thought I had done a good job of getting enough from the first book into the second for it to make sense. Hopefully without it being pedantically boring to anyone who had read the first novel. And as I said, he’d only read about 25 pages. If there were that many problems so early on, well, I was looking at a major rewrite. As we went further along in our discussion, he also mentioned a couple of places where Millie said something he thought was out of character. Hoo boy.

I’ve read from some authors that they think your first draft should just get it down. If it’s a dirty, muddled mess then you will fix it in the second draft. By the fifth draft, you have a finished and finely polished piece of prose.

I don’t work that way. I don’t really expect to get it “right” the first time around. But I also don’t expect to have to do any kind of major rewrite. Usually, my final draft isn’t that far off from the first. Maybe that’s a total error on my part. I guess I will know more once I get some feedback from the couple people I know who have purchased the first novel.

In any case, over the next few days I will re-reread the sequel and see what I might change to make it less confusing. I guess it can never hurt to have a good look at it often. Maybe I’ll find typos I missed the first time around. That’s about as positive as I can feel about it right now.

Posted December 7, 2019

I had suspended working on the sequel to “Millie’s Adventures in Time” while I was getting said title published. It took longer than I thought to accomplish that once I decided to go forward with it and drop the search for an agent. So recently, I reread everything that I had written so far on “Millie’s Further Adventures in Time.” I was somewhat amazed at how much I had already written and I made a discovery.

I had completely forgotten that I was trying out a different way of writing the sequel from how I had written the first novel. The first one was written rather doggedly, one chapter after the other. I had to frequently go back and reread previous chapters to remind myself what a certain character had done or said on a particular topic, or just what had transpired before I could move on.

For the sequel, I was trying a different tactic. I set up a number of plot lines, gave them titles to help with saving them and retrieving them and then started writing. I’d write several chapters about certain characters and certain elements of the plot until I came to a point of no more inspiration at that time. Then I would move onto a different plot line. It helped to keep it fresh for me.

I think it must have been working well because once I finished rereading what I had put into the manuscript, I had this niggling little memory of there being more and I looked through the file and found about 30 pages worth that still needed to be fit into the manuscript.

I thought “wow” this is really great. I have all this “new” material to add to the manuscript. The only problem was, in what order should I add those chapters. Should it be two from this plot line and then one from that? I realized that this part was going to be harder than I remembered.

I reread all those “bonus” chapters and started making notes about how the chapters should be ordered. It required a couple days of fairly intensive work, but I got it done and it looks pretty good.

I haven’t quite decided if I should continue in this manner. The basic pros and cons are about even in my mind. I’d have to assign weights to each one in order to figure it out from a statistical standpoint. I’m not sure I have that much patience.

My gut tells me to continue in the same manner. After all, the sequel is already more than half as long as the first novel. Of course, I have no way of knowing how long this one will actually be. But I tend to have a lot to say most of the time (the length of this post should be an indication), so I have every reason to expect it to be at least as long as the first one. Since it has gone well so far, why not. Right?

I guess only time will tell on this one. I’ll just take it as it goes and see what transpires. Chances are good that I will be letting you all know how it is going. 🙂

Posted November 18, 2019

While I was doing my best to get an agent for my first novel, I started writing the sequel to it. To be honest, I thought I would be done after the first novel. It took so long to write it that I thought that would be enough. But I found that there was more to Millie’s story and so the sequel sort of started writing itself.

I have no idea how long it will take me to finish the sequel. But I’ve learned so much about formatting and the mechanical aspects of writing a novel with the first one, that I anticipate it will not require nearly as much time to bring it to fruition. That’s my hope anyway.

So stay tuned for more news about Millie’s Further Adventures in Time.