I want to write...something

There's a strange kind of itch you get in your brain when you want to write something (why am I saying "you" when I know I mean "me"?). The thing I need to work on (besides the middle grade that I'm waiting to hear back on from my agent) is the other middle grade fantasy where I need to finish re-working the middle bit. Then it will be ready for subbing as well. And it's got a cleaner hook so may be an easier sell.

Yes, that's what I *should* be doing.

But I've been feeling so frustrated that I've only been working on that sporadically. And, to be fair, it's a little difficult to switch between two different manuscripts that have some similarities (both being middle grade fantasy). It's easier when it's two entirely different things so your (my) brain can reset a little easier. Otherwise, I feel like I'm mixing them together too much and I don't want to muddle them up.

So I'd kind of been wanting to work on the YA romance that's partly done. Except that I know when I get back to that for real I am going to need to really sit down and focus on it and I *know* that I'm kind of hanging from a hook until the publisher either goes forward with this middle grade book we've been going back and forth on or doesn't (in which case, time to regroup with the agent and talk next steps--it hasn't been subbed in the US yet, for instance and there's still some UK pubs it hasn't been sent to either). So I don't really feel like I'm in a place to work on it.

Which leaves me at very loose ends wondering what I should work on. I have a number of other very amorphous ideas floating around including a three page synopsis of something I found today that I'd completely forgotten even writing down. It's an adult romance chick-lit type of idea but it has potential. Okay, it's a little cliche, but it could work. And I imagine I could twist it so that it isn't too cliche. Maybe. Eh...maybe not. If I'm honest with myself, if I saw the synopsis on a book I'd be annoyed at it. Twins changing places. Hijinks ensue. It's been done a billion times. But...could probably be a pretty quick story. It's the only kind of thing I would ever think of self publishing (not under my own name). I've got some friends who do that. Though self pubbing...kind of makes me cringe. I really don't think it is for me.

Or the beginning of a thing I jotted down years ago with the girl who's kind of like that Amy Schumer character in Trainwreck. Though my idea came way before that. But now, meh, it might be too similar. It's really only a bare kernel of an idea. Really just a character. She doesn't have a story. I could play with that and see if she goes anywhere. Right now she's just stuck drinking alone in a bar.

Or there's Sylvie.

Sylvie has been sitting in a drawer for ten years. Maybe it's time to let her out. I don't know what her story is, really. But she's always been in the back of my head, with her wild cloud of red hair billowing around her. Except I feel a bit romance-y but I don't know if Sylvie has that in her. She's different. But maybe that's the point. She's different but she's not? We all want love? Acceptance? I'm not sure I could pull it off. I feel like I want to add a bit of fantasy in there but Sylvie is grounded in the real world.

And that other book...the first one I ever started...it has some good bits. But it's epic fantasy and if ever there was something you can't just dabble in, it's epic fantasy.

Gah. I don't know. Too many ideas. Too many variables. And there's logic vs. want/need. I want to write something. And that isn't always the thing I should be doing. I almost want to pitch a bunch of these ideas to someone and see if any of them make that person go, hey, yes, I want more of this!

My brain needs to shut up.