Waiting is the hardest thing, as the old song goes. To be honest, I haven’t looked at the manuscript of my new book for over eight months now! It’s an incredibly long time, though I knew it would be. I knew it was in a queue along with the other manuscripts being considered, and so I knew it would take time for my publisher to get around to reading it. Then once it was accepted (hurray!), it would take time for the editing process to begin. That’s where I am now. Waiting to do the final edits. But what to do while you’re waiting?

Many of the things which you need to do while you’re waiting I already covered in my first post in this series, here. But, as the inevitable time for final edits draws near, I have had to admit to myself that I am not quite as steeped in the new book as I had been several months before. I don’t want to go so far as to say I’ve forgotten bits of it…oh no…but it has all receded a bit while I’ve been involved in other writing projects. And, of course, that is the most important thing of all to do while you’re waiting –namely, write something else. Some people can move directly onto a new novel, but I can’t. Although I have definitely started to think about, research, organise what will be the third novel in my Cambodian trilogy, I don’t dare start writing it until Out of the Ruins is fully edited and on it’s way to the printer. I just don’t think I could carry the events of two novels in my head at once. But I have been writing poetry. I have worked on a couple of short stories. I’ve started a new short poetry play, and there is a secret project which is very exciting but which needs to remain secret for a while longer.

But, as I said, the time for final edits is getting closer, and so I now need to start immersing/reminding myself of the world of the new book. This might be a good time to sit down and reread it. But I’ve decided not to do that yet. I want to save that for when the comments from my editor have landed into my inbox. Then I can reread it with those comments in mind, which will give me further distance from how it felt when I was writing it in the first place. And I think that’s key to the waiting game, and why the wait is so important. The wait takes time, of course, but it also gives you distance. That distance gives you perspective, and that allows you to see the work for what it really is, for all its brilliance and for all its weaknesses. For those math/science geeks out there, you could say:

                                 time + distance = perspective = clarity

(That was fun). I know I will need as much clarity as I can muster in order to do justice to the final edits, but then what can I do to start getting myself back in touch with the world of Out of the Ruins? For me, the answer is do something visual. I may not want to get back into the world of words quite yet, but reminding myself visually of that world is very helpful. So, I’ve gone back into my files and found some photographs:

Dining outside at one of the better known expat hotels in Siem Reap

Life on Tonle Sap Lake by Reaksmey

A sculpture at a monastery where one scene is set

playing at Tonle Sap Lake photo by 1 of my students, Daney

At the Temples by my student, Sophal

The more I look at these, and others in my files, the more excited I get about reworking the manuscript. And that, I suppose, is the most important point of the wait — getting excited all over again, and remembering how it felt to want to write the book in the first place.