Dashed hopes

Whenever I get a new project, I get this little rush of excitement. Maybe this will be a good one! Maybe this time I won't get mad and scream at the computer monitor for two weeks straight! Then when I read the client questionnaire and it's written in complete sentences and includes legitimate questions and concerns about the book, I get even more excited.

And then I open the file and briefly scroll to a couple of different pages throughout the book, just to get an idea of what I'm looking at.

That, my friends, is when my hopes are dashed on the rocks like a thing that is dashed on a different, harder thing.

A very basic first glance of this one includes one of the characters being referred to as:

the tall woman
the brunette
the CEO
the six-foot-tall woman
the brave woman

Yes, I now know that my main character is female, brunette, six feet tall, and the CEO of some company.

I also know I'm going to hate this book, as it's likely written by someone who thinks she can write because she owns every Dan Brown book.

The editor's excitement had faded like color fading from an old photograph that once had color in it.