How do you slap the tantrum out of a character you’re writing?

Cataclysm’s been out for a few days, and both Heisenberg’s Point of Observation and Entanglement are available for pre-order. I’ll either beg for cover art or see if the cover for the Kindle version of the novel in one piece will do for a front cover for a paperback and a hardback edition…but that’s not a worry at the moment, since it’ll be August before that’s ready to come out.

No, the worry right now was Meg. The third of the Liquid Diet Chronicles was…blocked. Because Meg was throwing a screaming, flailing tantrum. Not because the book’s going in the wrong direction–she’d assured me it’s on the right track–but because the scene was emotionally difficult for her, and she don’t wanna. She really, really, really hated it.

I finally got it knocked loose, but…

It’s a hell of a thing.

For the last several years, I’ve had a recliner. An electric one. Over the past two years or so, it’s gotten less reliable in the motor, and less comfortable as the padding wore thin. It’s what I generally write in, with the laptop set on a TV tray, and a keyboard in my lap.

We replaced it today, with a new Lazyboy. It’s a rocker recliner scaled to me. Which…honestly, looks pretty funny in the living room next to the recliner scaled to Andrew (who is a solid sixteen plus inches taller). I can put my feet on the floor and be comfortable in my recliner. The front of the seat on Andrew’s recliner hits me about halfway down my calves. So…no way can I touch the floor in that one.

We got the old chair out, and the new chair in place, and I got set up and started writing. Put the footrest down and started rocking.

…and the block came loose.

Like a tired, upset toddler.

My kids are past doing that. I thought I was done with the whiny toddler stage.

Guess not.

It’s alive!

Alive, I tell you!

(What I can’t tell you is how relieved I am!)

Alas, Amazon

I have been publishing with Amazon for almost twelve years, now. I have never had file review take more than about twelve hours. Usually, it doesn’t take longer than six hours.

I am sitting at seven days and counting. I wanted The Schrodinger Paradox: Cataclysm (the first part of the novel) to pop live today, and it hasn’t. I have no idea when–or if–it will. I poked them Friday, and they said to give it until today.

I was busy today–we ran out of a few things without me noticing we were almost out, and I had bloodwork to get done, and the pixie had some dental work to get done. I’ll poke them tomorrow, if it hasn’t gone live by then.

I blame Bezos’s replacements. There’s a lot that went sharply downhill when he stepped back. I really wish it hadn’t, because there’s not a lot of options out there for independents. I really wish he either hadn’t stepped down, or had picked someone for competence rather than for affirmative action checkboxes and ideological purity.