Scary ... in a good way.

There's sometimes a fine line between excited anticipation and fear. 
Think about it - accelerated heart beat, nervous swallowing, shortage of breath ...
A couple of things this week are disturbing my peace - but for good, or bad?
First, I got the email from the lovely Lyn, from Choc-lit, with suggestions for the cover of the next book, Out of Sight, Out of Mind. Waiting for the four sets of artwork to download takes forever - is a minute really that long? Will I like them? Will I hate them? Will I like the one everyone else hates? Will they look anything like my mental picture of the book? What is my mental picture of the book? How on earth do you illustrate a romantic thriller about mind reading anyway? I needn't have worried. Illustrator extraordinaire Berni has produced four designs to fall in love with, each one illustrating something elemental about the book. At the moment, I want them all. Whichever one ends up as the cover, I shall be happy. But having the cover reminds me that the really scary stuff will be coming next. Editing. 

One of the other sort-of-scary things that comes with being an author is talking to people. Lots of people. In groups. Public speaking. I'm off to the Winchester Writers' Festival at the weekend, and as well as listening to other people talk, in a series of lectures and workshops, I'll also be amongst the Winchester 'graduates' who will be mentioned in the Plenary session that kicks off Saturday morning at the conference. I know this, because it's there in black and white in the newsletter that accompanies the programme. My name! I still haven't got used to that yet. There should even be copies of Never Coming Home for sale at the bookstall. I hope I'll have the chance to say a few words at the Plenary. Two of them will be thank you. Winchester is famous for its one-to-one sessions, where quite a number of writers have found agents or publishers. I didn't get my break that way, but success in the many competitions that are part of the conference did huge amounts for my confidence as a writer.


That's another sort-of-scary thing - there will be many people attending that festival who will be scanning the lists of competition finalists when they go up in the foyer of The Stripe at lunch time on Saturday. The feeling, when you see your pen name there, is amazing. Walking-on-air-all-the-afternoon amazing. And then there is the awards ceremony, waiting for the winners to be called - accelerated heart beat, nervous swallowing, shortage of breath ...