I haven’t started the new story yet, or for that matter, done any writing at all since sending the latest one off on Monday.  There have been lots of distractions:  Zach has an ear infection (his first).  We have contractors at the house repairing a closet that was damaged by a leaky shower.  It’s been non-stop hectic.  But the other problem I’ve had–the one that is stymied me–is that I lost the voice for the character.  I had the voice running through my head a few weeks ago, and then it was gone.  I couldn’t seem to get it back.  It was really disappointing because I liked the voice.

Last night, however, while in the shower, the voice came back.  The entire opening of the story was rendered clearly in my head in the voice I was looking for, and if I’d had a keyboard in the shower with me, I could have typed it out as dictation directly from my brain.  I made sure to lock it in so as not to loose it again.  And sure enough, when I woke up this morning, the voice was still there, strong as ever.

I hope to get started on the new story this evening.  I’m trying to write a series of shorter stories over the next month or two.  My goal is to keep them all at 4,000 words or less (my stories typically run 7-10K words; “In the Cloud” was 7,500 words).  We’ll see how it goes.