I'm in that first stage of writing a new book when all things are still possible.

A friend asked me if writing a book was like giving birth. The comparison is apt. There is the conception - that first spark of an idea that hits in the middle of the night or in the shower or when I'm out running, followed by a period of gestation as the project grows and develops. And then, eventually, there is the labor of birth and euphoria,followed by - at least for me and for a number of my colleagues - post-partum depression.

"So where are you in the process?" my friend asked. "Have you conceived?"

I told her I was still dating. Right now I'm in the back seat of the Chevy making out and steaming up the windows. The hard work lies ahead.

In an exchange with one of my students from last year's Maui Writers Conference, I mentioned that non-writers
couldn't possible know how difficult writing a novel is. "Yeah," Alan e-mailed back, "but they don't know how exciting and gratifying it can be either."

Or how alive you feel when passionately in love with a story and the characters who people it. I'll let you know when I crawl out of that back seat and start driving the Chevy down the road.