I’ve been away for a while. Because, to paraphrase Hemingway, if you talk about it you can lose it. But I’m not superstitious. That’s what I tell myself anyway. But for the past couple of weeks I’ve been talking to a publisher of a small independent press. He is very optimistic about my novel. His editor said he can work with it, which is a yes from the editor I was told. Now he must meet with his partners on Tuesday. They are doing some research about marketability and on Tuesday they will make a decision. If it’s a yes, I will soon be a published author and that grad school degree won’t go to waste. If it’s a no…to quote another great writer, “it’s the same as it ever was.”