Update

My third book is done! I have come up for air.
Playing With Matches is currently scheduled by Random House to appear next summer, 2011. It's a story of chicken circuses and burning beds on the False River, a century-old Mississippi prison farm, and a five-year-old who won't talk. Playing With Matches tells us this: sometimes it's enough to say "I'm sorry."
A million thank yous to all the readers who claim they are waiting, trembling in anticipation, and holding their breathe. All 353 pages have been printed and are going out to my last reader, then, with any last changes, it goes in the mail to my precious agent in New York.
I'd like to think I'm taking a break, but I turn ugly when I don't write. My hair frizzes, nails break, and I chew holes in the people around me.
I'd like to revamp The Coffin Maker, see what it's future might be. And I have IDEAS for the next book -- a couple dozen sticky notes on and around my computer, new characters vying for space in my head. Yum.