Finished going through the copyedited ms. of ABSENT FRIENDS this morning. A very trying process, I must say. Because it was also the line-edit, I was trying to deal with my editor's big changes ("delete the following six pages: you don't need them"), medium changes ("end this chapter on an emotion, not an oblique craving for cigarettes"), and small changes ("not 'gentle' again -- look for a different adjective") at the same time as I was dealing with problems in the chronology pointed out by the copyeditor, and her desire to make my newspaper stories, written for the old NY World Telegram and Sun (which I'm sure she's to young to remember) sound as though they were written for the NY Times. Not to mention the serial commas and a VAST number of other changes, suggested changes, queries, and remarks.

But it's going to Bantam tomorrow, a day ahead of schedule (I always try to be a day ahead of schedule, so any last-minute disaster has a day to get resolved).

Then I'll tell you about the author photo session.