Did you know that when a baby eagle gets close to ready to fly, his mother will throw it out of the nest to see if he will flap his wings. The first handful of times, or maybe more, she will fly down, catching the baby before he crashes on the forest floor or against the rocks, and swoop up to the nest and do it again. Eventually, the baby learns to flap with enough strength that the mother no longer has to throw him out of the nest. I have tons of things in the works, as if I’m building up core muscles, and simultaneously growing wings. And I have faith that I’m not going to crash against the rocks below.

This morning, I signed the final contract for my short story, Time to Play, in the anthology “Grifty Shades of Fey”, a PG-13 anthology that reminds us that the fair folk weren’t always so fair. Once upon a time, they stole our babies. You can check that out here.

I also took a fabulous writing workshop on Saturday by David Farland and Forrest Wolverton called Writers Peak, which aimed at helping writers get deep into the point of view of their characters, and breakthrough writers block with a number of visualization techniques. It was wonderfully powerful.

I’m still waiting on the bulk of my edits to come back for my novel, but I did get the first 20 pages and have been working on some of those edits. Before those arrived in my inbox, I was also working on a new short story with the working title of Freaks and Family.

So I am building muscle in all parts of my little eagle body. My editor is tossing me out of the nest and grabbing me and tossing me again. Sometimes, I’m just jumping out on my own and hoping I will be caught. Soon enough, my wings will be full grown, and I’ll be flying on my own.