Poised at season's edge....

                                       Dawn, Eastern Uplands- Painting by Kevin Macneil Brown,
                                             watercolor on paper, 2016


It may have been the winter that never was here in Vermont, but I suspect there will be a bit more winter mixed with the spring that arrives this week.  With most of my work time devoted to the third draft of a book  right now, I'm taking a moment, on this quiet Sunday morning, to share a look back and a look ahead.
Letting winter go, I share this short video combining most of this year's winter watercolors with new music for lap steel and laptop:

and winter light spilled slowly... from Kevin Macneil Brown on Vimeo.

On my sonic easel is a work in progress. This section was made with steel guitar and kalimba. The idea is of a journey in an ancient time.

Thoughts on the Third Draft

Third drafts, I find, can be somewhat geological. With the story and characters --mostly-- what they will be, I now come across veins, lodes, and layers of theme and mood, character and development.  Through rewrite and revision I can polish and clarify, connecting and revealing these things. It’s like discovering secrets within my own book. The third draft is also a good time for digging deeper into historical research and map work—fine-tuning details of background and location.

 After this, in the drafts that follow, a painterly metaphor might better describe the process— working with subtle tints and brushstrokes that will bring out detail, shadow, and highlights.

  -KMB