I just finished reading Kristan Higgins' latest, My One and Only. If you are a fan of her work, you're bound to like this one, too! It's a great read for summer, whether you can curl up on a porch, lay out on a beach, or put your feet up on your deck, it's a great way to lose yourself for a few hours. And what better way to usher in the summer?!
Revisions, revisions. I am almost sick of them but am perversely driven to keep trying to improve what I've got. These past few weeks have had more packed into them than I have been able to juggle . . . or at least juggle well, so I haven't gotten the writing done as quickly or in the fashion that I'd like. I am looking forward to some time off, so I want to get this work done before then. I am pushing, pushing, pushing to make progress on what remains of my revisions. Sliding deadlines are helpful but they are deadly, too. 
Last week I mentioned that I'd be attending a writing conference over the weekend, which I did and had a blast. It was great to catch up with writer friends that I hadn't seen in a while, meet new ones, and get some great ideas about my current and future books. 
I am going to hold off on this week's Friday check-in until after the weekend because on Friday I will be at a conference and I am hoping for a fun and productive day. Please keep your fingers crossed!
One of the books I have been most eager to read this year is a work of nonfiction entitled, Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian by Avi Steinberg. I had seen a review of it in late 2010 and was interested, but I knew I was hooked when I found it at my local Borders and started reading the first page: "Pimps make the best librarians. Psycho killers, the worst. Ditto con men. Gangsters, gunrunners, bank robbers - adept at crowd control, at collaborating with a small staff, at planning with deliberation and executing with contained fury - all possess the librarian's basic skill set. Scalpers and loan sharks certainly have a role to play. But even they lack that something, the je ne sais quoi, the elusive it. What would a pimp call it? Yes: the love."
Revisions continue. I did not get my submission in the mail this week -- I had forgotten about the synopsis, which also needed work. I spent some time whittling my eight-page synopsis down to five pages, and now I am back to weaving more passages into the book to help elevate the conflict and the subplot.
As writers, there are tons of things we can learn from sports. I think there is a mental toughness, stamina, and commitment that athletes and writers share, plus we both learn lessons when we don't achieve the outcomes we have worked so hard to create. Run to the Roar: Coaching to Overcome Fear is a book that uses the ups and downs of different aspects of sport to teach life lessons . . . to learn how to lose, to rebound, and to run toward those things we would prefer to shy away from. Written by Trinity College's Men's Squash Coach, the book has a solid foundation. Paul Assaiante has 244 consecutive wins and 13 straight national squash championships. It is the longest streak of any sports team in the country. Ever.