I’ve found that sometimes hope comes at the strangest times. It’s unexpected, but usually exactly what we need at that moment.

I’ve been working hard on revising ‘Scales & Stingers: A Heroes of Avoch Novel’ for several weeks now. Last night, as I was wrapping up the read-through (verbal), a publisher contacted me on Twitter and asked that I be sure to have my agent submit the book to them when it was done.

Does that guarantee I have a contract? Absolutely not. But that invitation alone gives me hope.

If you’ve read the caption on the photo, you’ll notice I borrowed the name of that village as the name of the world I set up in the book. Honestly, that town was beautiful. I didn’t meet many people there, just those who work the dolphin tour boat I was on. But it still gives me a feeling of peace, of calm.

A feeling that hope is never dead.

The last week has been a trial for me, emotionally. Not because of the revisions, mind you. Those were necessary, and the book is much better for them. I had to take some steps I didn’t want to do, but were as necessary as the changes to the story.

Sometimes we have to surgically remove ourselves from a toxic relative, environment, or friendship. Those changes, while necessary, are painful in so many ways. What’s done is done, however, and it’s what I needed to do.

Tonight, I get back to ‘Shield & Scepter’. I wait for my agent to hear back from publishers about the first book. And I continue to hope that the future is brighter than the past several days.

BB/Chan Eil Eagal Orm