When asked, "What's next? What will your next manuscript be?"
"I'll find a home for Selkie Song." I started that YA novel a number of years ago. It has undergone many perumutations, including a shift from one protagonist to another, point of view change, and in fact was originally an adult novel, not a young adult story at all. (Or so I thought.)
"Yes, but that's not the same as writing. What will you do once Selkie's off into the world?"
This time I gave my friend's question such a long stretch of thought, he asked if I was still there. "Oh, I"m here. I'm just turning over possibilities. There's the Fairy Gate (another YA I started before Judith grabbed me and would not let go) . . . but it's tempting to go back and really revise one of the children's stories I wrote when I was in my thirties."
The Forest Witch actually came to me in a series of dreams. I've always loved Kierka, the witch who lives in a tree. And the main character in another tale, Maura, discovers a young dragon lost in the woods behind her house . . .
Yes, it's good to start turning over which characters, what conflict I'll focus on, live and dream in once Judith is complete. Once Selkie is on her way through the publishing pipeline, and Love is the Thread launched and out in the world. In some ways writing and gardening share this key similarity. Before the writer or the gardener begins, we need to turn over the ground.
But what's next for right now, for today, is Judith. My heroine waits for me right now, with a whole day to survive at the center of an Assyrian military camp.