My Other Goal Completed

I wrote a post back in March about my goals for the year. My primary goal is to survive the year, and I'm very pleased to be well on track for that one. My secondary goal was to see the second edition of my book, The Writing Revolution: Cuneiform to the Internet, through its final stages in press and onto literal or virtual bookshelves. I am happy to report that it is now out, as pictured below.

Author's copies of my new second edition

My editor at Wiley says I can share the promotional code WRRV2 for 20% off for anyone who wants to order a copy from Wiley's website.

My thanks to the folks at Wiley who helped make this second edition possible!

Thinking back to the first edition, I realize that there is a common thread between the two editions, which is, oddly enough, my mortality. I first had the idea for a book about writing systems as an undergraduate, but I didn't do anything about it for some years. Knowing that the field of linguistics didn't take the study of writing systems seriously, I thought I had better get tenure first and then write the book.

Well, life didn't turn out the way I'd planned, and instead of finding myself in a tenure-track position at a university, I found myself making standardized tests at the Educational Testing Service (ETS). Then I found myself beset with an undiagnosed illness that left me exhausted, bone-deep. I was so drained that for a while I wondered if I was going to die. It occurred to me then that I still had unfinished business: for one thing, I had not yet written that book about writing systems! I couldn't write it then, in that condition; but I eventually regained much of my health, at which point I gathered my courage, quit my job, and sat down to write. 

The question now is,  What will I write or otherwise tackle next, with the measure of health I've regained?