As you may have noticed, I finished the second draft of WINTER, the fourth and final installation of the Lunar Chronicles, just over a week ago. And whoa boy, am I be happy to be out of that draft! This book, you guys. Here’s hoping I can make it epic and awesome before it kills me.

I am happy with this draft, though. Sort of. I think. We’ll see how I feel after I read through it. BUT – while I still feel that there is lots of room for improvement, there are also a lot of parts that make me giddy when I think about them, and how excited I am for you guys to read them, especially the Big Scenes that have been rolling around in my head since I first started coming up with these books.

I know you’re all still holding your breaths for CRESS, but I thought I’d share a little non-spoilery info about WINTER anyway, while it’s all fresh in my mind.

Title: Winter: Book Four of the Lunar Chronicles

Fairy Tale Inspiration: Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

Word count: Top Secret (but it will be the longest book of the series)

# of characters who get their own POV chapters: 11. Unless I’m forgetting some.

Combined months I’ve been working on this book so far: 10

Semi-randomly selected teaser sentence:

“No. She will never be queen.” She swayed toward him, and he felt like he was being encircled by a python, smothered and choked.

(Dun dun dun . . .)

So, What Now?

Unfortunately, my second drafts are still usually a long ways from being finished, and this book is no different. At this point, I have dozens of notes left for myself throughout the manuscript—word choices I want to clarify, descriptions I want to add, things I need to research. So that’s what I’m working on this week while I’m still in Nano-recovery mode.

Then I’ll start reassessing the bigger picture items and figuring out ways to fix the still lingering issues that I have with plot, characters, and themes.  In particular, there is one subplot that I am really unhappy with at this  point and I know I need to give it some serious consideration before the next round. There were also a few subplots that got pushed aside in this draft that I need to bring back to the forefront and tie in to some of the other major plot arcs.

Once I’m satisfied (more or less) with those big elements, I’ll conduct a read-through to check for general consistency, before sending it off to my editor and beta readers for feedback.

With any luck, this will happen before the Cress tour kicks off in February! *fingers crossed*