Last week kept me busy in my personal life—my in-laws came to visit, so I didn’t have a lot of time to spend on editing. No worries, though. My editor has made some deep cuts to preserve a whole story that fits better as a standalone. That means I have to write a whole new chapter to the book.

I believe you will find it to your liking, dear reader.

For now, here’s a little except complete with word count. I’m up to 72698 (and hopefully that number will increase as more of the story unfolds.

Yes, Doctor Kathryn Cross has made her return, and she’s not terribly pleased with me about it, either. But she knows I have to torture her and she endures it like a champ.

As brutal as the editing process can be, I have to say it’s fun for me, and therapeutic. I enjoy taking a raw story to the editor and having him tear it apart. He is seeing the draft after my first and second edits of it, so it’s not 100% rough, but he catches things that I miss. He makes it better.

The story is coming along. It will still be in composite novel format, but I believe readers will find this version more linear than the last.

When will it come out? It depends on how much editing I can get done in the next couple of months, but I am hoping to have it in your hot little hands by the end of this year, if not sooner.

I’m off to keep editing and writing. In the meantime, if you haven’t read the first of the series, now’s the time to catch up.