So this is what happened: on Thursday November 4 I flew home from World Fantasy sure that I was due for a nice relaxed return to Perth; on Friday I received a phone call from Jason Williams, a good friend of mine and one of my publishers, who made it clear that the revised deadline for my best of the year anthology, December 12, really was not going to work out.
Jason pointed out that prior to 2009 the deadline had been November 5, with me typically delivering in late October so I could go to World Fantasy without work hanging over my head. The date had changed to December 5 in 2009, and was drifting a little again for 2010. Jason made it clear that I had to make the December 5 deadline, and if I could get the book in earlier then that would make things much easier.
I stopped, I looked and I panicked. I’d read a lot, I had lists and notes and stuff, but I didn’t have a table of contents, and I didn’t have much else either. I had, in short, quietly let myself become complacent because I had, oh, six weeks to get things done in. I revised my target delivery date. It seemed to me if I could get the book done by Monday November 15 I’d only be ten days past the old deadline, and would beat the new one by more than four weeks.
To meet this I would need to finalise the table of contents, get writers to agree to their stories being reprinted, get permissions sorted, write an introduction and story notes, and prepare the manuscript for the publisher.
I panicked.
I calmed down.
As I write it is nearly 4pm on the afternoon of Wednesday, November 10. I have selected the final table of contents (well, I’m quibbling over one story), notified all of the authors and received emailed confirmations from all but two of them, arranged for contracts for 23 of the 29 stories to go out, and assembled 22 of the 29 story manuscripts. I have also engaged Marianne to standardise / cleanup the story files and assemble the story notes that I already have written for previous books.
From here, to meet my own self-imposed deadline, I need to write a 1,500 wd introduction on Saturday (while also podcasting with Gary and having family movie night with the kids), and write/review 29 story notes on Sunday. If, by 5pm Sunday I have that done then all I have to do is suck the whole lot into Scrivener, work out the running order (I’m thinking on that now), add the introductory materials and recommended reading, and then spit out a manuscript. Once that’s done, a quick spell check and it heads out the door to the publisher.
Can I make it? I think I can. If I don’t, I can take the following weekend to get things finalised, but I’m hoping the Nov 15/Nov 16 will be it. Wish me luck.