Had an hour-long chat with Muse Margaret. First off, she loves the book - it's really the first book in a long time where she's had no comments at all in terms of things she didn't think were working - two tiny little things is all and those were easy.
BUT: She's very protective of me and she's feeling somewhat uneasy about a certain aspect of the book, one that she understands can't be changed and besides she really likes the plot and the characters and wouldn't want me to. She wants me to give some time to this one - not to rewrite or anything like that. Because, being an author, one does use stuff one sees in life and I've done that in this book. I felt it was a good cautionary tale about young people run amok on places like Instagram. But because I used stuff that I'm familiar with she's concerned that some people who know me will think I had other motives for doing this story, which I didn't, and she understands that and understands that the details are all fiction, but she's concerned and I have to think about that concern. She was this way on Album Produced By when I'd editorialize about things that had happened - she wouldn't let me do it because she felt that it would have the opposite effect of what I wanted, i.e. I'd come off poorly rather than the person who I was writing about.
So, I'm going to reread it soon, make my changes and see how I feel. The bottom line is I may wait until a little later in the year to put it out. Which is fine - all my books used to come out in September anyway and I'm not in any kind of hurry. She just feels a little more distance might be good. Again, it's not the book itself or the way it works - that she's very happy with. And if I hadn't told her certain things in advance of her reading it, she would not be feeling this way at all. So, pondering is what I'll be doing.
