Nothing like finding a pattern in something and then have it go completely sideways on you.
My productive half of the month flip-flopped on me, so I wrote almost my entire word count goal's worth of words by the 19th. So yeah. I guess the pattern to recognize isn't that certain halves of the month are more productive, or that the moon has anything to do with it, but rather that I will sometimes hit a groove during the month and sometimes I will hit a slump. Who knows when those will come, but I'm still writing consistently each month, so that's the biggest thing to keep in mind.
I easily wrote 15k words. I even ended up at about 17k words, after throwing some words at a Cafe story and participating in ConQuesT's Story-in-a-Bag contest.
I still haven't edited Druid Wars. I edited some SP shorts instead. Those are at a point where I think they just need one more line edit each, and then proofread by someone not me. And I've actually found someone to proofread for me. So that's coming along. Now I just need to write a bunch more, and I can maybe actually start monetizing them. Probably will still be a couple years yet, but that's solidifying nicely. I'm happy with things so far. I had a friend read the first couple, and she says they are a lot of fun. That's all they're really meant to be, so she's given me the confidence to go ahead with my publishing plan for them.
I'm still writing words on book three, and I'm at a point where I know all the rest of the scenes and am excited to write it. I'm aiming to write another 15-20k in June. If all goes well, I'll be able to wrap it up before July so I can spend July doing another SP Camp NaNo.
I still haven't gotten any bites as far as short story submission. I think I have one more market in mind for my time travel flash, and then I'm relegating it to the Cafe. The others I have out I am not optimistic for. I may throw one more story out there when a specific market opens up in August, but for now, I'm done with all that. It was a distraction. It's taking energy I don't really have. It was fun at first, but the rejections are starting to bother me. I know I could always try unpaid markets, but half the reason I decided to do it was to make a few bucks. I'm at a point where I don't want to write for free anymore. So I need to let the short story thing go. I'm not a short story writer. I write them for fun. I can't expect to make money on them. If I do, great. But if not, ah well.
One thing I did do last month that I hadn't planned for was submit book one to one last publisher. Maybe they'll take a chance on me. It would be so, so nice not to have to do everything myself. So fingers crossed for that. I should hear back in a couple months.
So yeah. That's where I'm at right now. Almost done writing book three. Ready to write SP 2.2 next month. Hoping against hope I might get book one picked up. And very behind on editing Druid Wars.
For June, as I mentioned, I'd like to throw enough words at book three to finish it up. And I'd like to get Druid Wars fixed up by the time #SFFpit happens on the 28th. Same old stuff. But. I'm trudging right along. Maybe I'll have more exciting things to say for next month's update!
Friday, June 1, 2018
Tuesday, May 1, 2018
May Update: Patterns and Progress
I'm only four months into this year at this point, but I'm keeping up a pretty good routine. My overall goal for this year has been to try to write around 15k words a month and spend at least a little bit of time editing each month. I spent most of January editing, but the last three months, I've been trying to find a balance. With varying degrees of success.
I've noticed some patterns the last few months of tracking my word count and progress. The first half of the months, even if I write every day, I don't seem to make much progress. The writing comes slowly and laboriously. I don't get lost in the world as much. But by the second half of the month, I seem to hit my stride. In April, I had more than one day where I wrote 2k words or more. Six days like that, to be exact. And while the previous two months there wasn't a substantial difference in word count from first half to second half of the month, in April, I wrote 3k words total in the first two weeks, and 16k in the second two weeks.
I don't have a good explanation for this. It could be coincidence. It could be that I expect myself to change gears right at the change of month, and it takes a week or two for my inspiration to catch up. It could be a deadline thing, where I procrastinate the first half of the month, then work to catch up the second half. Which would make sense if the level of energy for writing wasn't so drastically different. Maybe it's a new moon verses full moon thing. The day after the new moon last month, my progress skyrocketed. That's my best explanation so far, since going back and tracking progress over the last year, it seems to correspond with the moon phases. Saying that out loud sounds a bit crazy, so maybe that is all in my head. Who knows.
Regardless, it's nice to see patterns in the month. It's comforting to know that my slumps won't last forever, and that I go through them every month.
At any rate, my goals last month were to finish up SP 2.1 and edit Druid Wars to incorporate beta reader feedback.
The start to the month, like the month before, was slow. Despite sitting down to write every day that first week, I made minimal progress. But the second half of the month, things kicked into gear, and I not only managed to surpass my word count goal for the month, I actually even did manage to finish the adventure, which, until the last couple of days, I wasn't sure I could pull off. I even threw some words on the next adventure, which was fun and ridiculous, but I'm so glad I did it. It'll make Camp in July easier to get into, since I have a start. And easier to finish, since my average word count goal is 15k, and I already have 1.5k words written.
I still haven't worked on Druid Wars, though. I spent about two hours poking at it one day, and I talked to one of my writing friends about some of the edits I had concerns about, but I've not done anything substantial.
I can't put it off any longer, though. The Twitter pitch contest SFFpit takes place on June 28. I want to have this thing ready by then, so that means dev edits this month and line edits next month. My goal is to do dev edits pretty early this month and get them done, so I have at least a couple of weeks between one pass and the next. The only downside of that is I have to shift gears to go right into edits this month. I'm still bathing in the glow of the recently full moon, so it may be hard to choke off the desire to write and shift into the more analytical editing mode. Although I do need to write a scene or two, so perhaps I can focus on that.
The trouble is, I'm still not all that interested in the Druid Wars world. Last month, I attributed my hesitance to fear of having another book ready to query. After a good hard look at the book and the edits I need to make, I realized that a lot of my problem is excitement. I just don't have any for that world right now. So I'll have to make a choice. Continue with my timeline, which means I'm going to have to suck it up and do it anyway, or fall back on my new emerging idea of working on what I want to work on now while I can, since I don't have contractual obligations at this time.
Still, the editing portion of the month wasn't a total loss. I spent a day working on finishing edits to another SP adventure in the first season, so that's something. I just spent so much time working and reworking the outline for the adventure I was doing for Camp that that part of my brain was fried. Plus the aforementioned trouble with interest in what I was supposed to be editing.
The biggest thing I did last month that I didn't really plan for was short story submission. It started as kind of a procrastination technique, but it was also a nice changing of gears. Plus, I've dealt with so much rejection in the last year, I was hoping to get a short story accepted so I would have some success to speak of. Sadly, at this point, that's all been rejections, as well. Although one rejection was kind enough to invite me to submit something else during their submission period because they liked my writing, just not the story I submitted. That was very validating. I even poked at another short story to submit to them for a few days. Although the progress on that was so negligible, I didn't even record the word count on my spreadsheet. I'm sad to have missed that opportunity, but I decided, in the long run, my energies were better spent elsewhere. I just didn't have anything else for them.
Overall, I wrote 19k words in April and spent six hours editing various things. Mostly SP stories.
In May, I really have to do dev edits for Druid Wars. I'll give it a few days to see if I can get myself interested, maybe poke at other projects, but then I'll have to buckle down and force myself to do it. That's my main goal this month.
My other goal is to get back to work on MystWatch book three. Which is good. I'm feeling the pull of that story, the stirrings of inspiration to work on it. If I can throw another 15k words at it this month, I should be able to wrap it up with another 15k next month. If all goes well. If it doesn't, I can finish it up in July. But come August, I have got to put this world behind me and move on to the next big thing.
I've been feeling a bit unsettled the last month, since the two main projects I've actually worked on are projects that I will have to self-publish if I want to see them in print. Which isn't to say it's not good practice writing and editing or that someday I won't be glad to have these things. But I'm getting more and more impatient with myself. I turn 40 in less than three years, now. I can't help but feel like I'm running out of time.
Which is silly. It's not like I'm going to stop trying when I hit 40. I have an impressive body of work. I'm not limited to mainstream publishing, and everything is fodder down the line. I know I just have to keep at it. And I will. I just have to be okay with adjusting my expectations from time to time. That's why this blog is so necessary. I have to check in with myself every month, see how I'm doing and incorporate new information to my ever-evolving goals.
I'm right where I should be, doing the things I should be doing. It's all going to work out.
I've noticed some patterns the last few months of tracking my word count and progress. The first half of the months, even if I write every day, I don't seem to make much progress. The writing comes slowly and laboriously. I don't get lost in the world as much. But by the second half of the month, I seem to hit my stride. In April, I had more than one day where I wrote 2k words or more. Six days like that, to be exact. And while the previous two months there wasn't a substantial difference in word count from first half to second half of the month, in April, I wrote 3k words total in the first two weeks, and 16k in the second two weeks.
I don't have a good explanation for this. It could be coincidence. It could be that I expect myself to change gears right at the change of month, and it takes a week or two for my inspiration to catch up. It could be a deadline thing, where I procrastinate the first half of the month, then work to catch up the second half. Which would make sense if the level of energy for writing wasn't so drastically different. Maybe it's a new moon verses full moon thing. The day after the new moon last month, my progress skyrocketed. That's my best explanation so far, since going back and tracking progress over the last year, it seems to correspond with the moon phases. Saying that out loud sounds a bit crazy, so maybe that is all in my head. Who knows.
Regardless, it's nice to see patterns in the month. It's comforting to know that my slumps won't last forever, and that I go through them every month.
At any rate, my goals last month were to finish up SP 2.1 and edit Druid Wars to incorporate beta reader feedback.
The start to the month, like the month before, was slow. Despite sitting down to write every day that first week, I made minimal progress. But the second half of the month, things kicked into gear, and I not only managed to surpass my word count goal for the month, I actually even did manage to finish the adventure, which, until the last couple of days, I wasn't sure I could pull off. I even threw some words on the next adventure, which was fun and ridiculous, but I'm so glad I did it. It'll make Camp in July easier to get into, since I have a start. And easier to finish, since my average word count goal is 15k, and I already have 1.5k words written.
I still haven't worked on Druid Wars, though. I spent about two hours poking at it one day, and I talked to one of my writing friends about some of the edits I had concerns about, but I've not done anything substantial.
I can't put it off any longer, though. The Twitter pitch contest SFFpit takes place on June 28. I want to have this thing ready by then, so that means dev edits this month and line edits next month. My goal is to do dev edits pretty early this month and get them done, so I have at least a couple of weeks between one pass and the next. The only downside of that is I have to shift gears to go right into edits this month. I'm still bathing in the glow of the recently full moon, so it may be hard to choke off the desire to write and shift into the more analytical editing mode. Although I do need to write a scene or two, so perhaps I can focus on that.
The trouble is, I'm still not all that interested in the Druid Wars world. Last month, I attributed my hesitance to fear of having another book ready to query. After a good hard look at the book and the edits I need to make, I realized that a lot of my problem is excitement. I just don't have any for that world right now. So I'll have to make a choice. Continue with my timeline, which means I'm going to have to suck it up and do it anyway, or fall back on my new emerging idea of working on what I want to work on now while I can, since I don't have contractual obligations at this time.
Still, the editing portion of the month wasn't a total loss. I spent a day working on finishing edits to another SP adventure in the first season, so that's something. I just spent so much time working and reworking the outline for the adventure I was doing for Camp that that part of my brain was fried. Plus the aforementioned trouble with interest in what I was supposed to be editing.
The biggest thing I did last month that I didn't really plan for was short story submission. It started as kind of a procrastination technique, but it was also a nice changing of gears. Plus, I've dealt with so much rejection in the last year, I was hoping to get a short story accepted so I would have some success to speak of. Sadly, at this point, that's all been rejections, as well. Although one rejection was kind enough to invite me to submit something else during their submission period because they liked my writing, just not the story I submitted. That was very validating. I even poked at another short story to submit to them for a few days. Although the progress on that was so negligible, I didn't even record the word count on my spreadsheet. I'm sad to have missed that opportunity, but I decided, in the long run, my energies were better spent elsewhere. I just didn't have anything else for them.
Overall, I wrote 19k words in April and spent six hours editing various things. Mostly SP stories.
In May, I really have to do dev edits for Druid Wars. I'll give it a few days to see if I can get myself interested, maybe poke at other projects, but then I'll have to buckle down and force myself to do it. That's my main goal this month.
My other goal is to get back to work on MystWatch book three. Which is good. I'm feeling the pull of that story, the stirrings of inspiration to work on it. If I can throw another 15k words at it this month, I should be able to wrap it up with another 15k next month. If all goes well. If it doesn't, I can finish it up in July. But come August, I have got to put this world behind me and move on to the next big thing.
I've been feeling a bit unsettled the last month, since the two main projects I've actually worked on are projects that I will have to self-publish if I want to see them in print. Which isn't to say it's not good practice writing and editing or that someday I won't be glad to have these things. But I'm getting more and more impatient with myself. I turn 40 in less than three years, now. I can't help but feel like I'm running out of time.
Which is silly. It's not like I'm going to stop trying when I hit 40. I have an impressive body of work. I'm not limited to mainstream publishing, and everything is fodder down the line. I know I just have to keep at it. And I will. I just have to be okay with adjusting my expectations from time to time. That's why this blog is so necessary. I have to check in with myself every month, see how I'm doing and incorporate new information to my ever-evolving goals.
I'm right where I should be, doing the things I should be doing. It's all going to work out.
Monday, April 2, 2018
April Update: Taking My Own Advice
March started off slow, which I suppose is to be expected, since I pushed really hard at the end of February to meet my February writing goal.
But once I got going, things went pretty well. And they went really well once I read back over last month's post and reminded myself of the two valuable lessons.
Changing projects was vital to my success last month. Working on something else, even if it doesn't seem conducive to my timeline, is still progress. Following what I'm passionate about at whatever point in the month keeps me fresh and keeps me moving forward, even if it means tweaking my timeline. The timeline is fluid, designed to keep me on track and moving but with the freedom to shift things.
Also vital was to remind myself that I'm not a writer that writes every day. I do start to feel antsy if I haven't written in a few days, but it feels great once I get back to it. If I push really hard a few days, I have to take a mental break. And that's okay. As long as I keep my word count goal realistic, I can still meet it even if only write half the days in the month. And right now, I'm intentionally keeping my word counts low so I keep making that slow progress without getting burned out. Slow and steady still gets books written.
I really ought to read those lessons every time I start to get down on my progress. Which happens at least once every month.
My goals for March were to write another 15k on book three and incorporate beta reader feedback on Druid Wars, with secondary goals, if I was feeling up for it, to poke at the zombie CYOA and maybe work on a Cafe story.
I did, in fact, write 15k on book three, which brought me up to 80k on the book. That feels really good. I'm not sure I'm completely happy with the last 30k words I've written, but at least I'm feeling my way through the story so I know what happens, even if it's not written all that well yet. It's a first draft. As people have said, the first draft is just putting sand in the sandbox. Editing is where I'll shape it into an amazing castle. I will admit that I wish I could write cleaner first drafts so I didn't have to work so hard editing. But. These days, I'm better at editing than actually writing (and seem to enjoy it more), so I let myself write sloppy prose and waste a lot of words figuring out what happens. I've stumbled on some good stuff that way, so it works, and I have faith in my abilities to fix it up in editing.
My second main goal was Druid Wars, and if I'm totally honest, I let that one completely fall of the radar. I didn't even open any documents, although I did spend some time thinking about some scenes. I pushed my beta readers so hard to get it read, then didn't even do anything with it. I do feel kinda bad about that, in some respects. But I'm not ready to do it yet. Which does put me behind on my project timeline a bit. By a month or two. I just couldn't face it. This is the next one I want to query. I am still feeling kind of kicked and sore from querying my last book. I am not quite ready to dive into that madness again, especially as I watch Dianne going through it now, too. That's a lot of it. The rest is fear. Of failure, yeah, of course, although I have my backup plans for failure. What I don't have is a plan for if I succeed. I'm almost more afraid that this book will get picked up. What then? Then I'm not a hobbyist anymore. Then come commitments. Contracts. An editor. Potentially readers. I probably won't get to choose what projects I work on at any given time. I might not have the freedom to change projects if I get frustrated or stuck. It's terrifying to think of the expectation that comes with being a published writer. So...maybe I'm not in as much of a hurry to do that as I thought I was. Which isn't to say I won't edit and query this book this year. It's stupid to stop because of fear. But it turns out I'm okay with taking an extra month or two before I start editing and querying.
Still, the editing portion of the month wasn't a total loss. I followed my own advice and let myself work on a different project. After a delightful afternoon spent with the folks of Bottle Cap Publishing, I got excited about Sally Prescott again. Rachel wants to read the first season. Yipes! So, I spent a few days polishing the first adventure within an inch of its life and sent it her way. Then I edited the second one. Then I poked at the third, fourth, and fifth ones. The last three need some work more, but there's a ton of good stuff there.
So after all that, I was fully immersed in the Sally Prescott world, so I changed my Camp Nano project for April from finishing up book three to finishing the first adventure of the second season.
So much for the poetry of finishing up book three during Camp, eh?
But that's okay. Looking back at the last few months, I realized that expecting myself to write 30k in a month is too daunting. It's setting myself up for failure. I can take two months instead of one to finish up book three. I'm already taking extra time for Druid Wars, so it doesn't really set me back that far, anyway. And will allow me to immerse myself in Pandemonium edits for two consecutive months rather than trying to work on it several months apart later this year.
I also need a break from book three. It's eaten my soul for two months, and I am banging my head against walls. I am excited about SP, so it makes sense to do the next adventure for her now. I have to do two of those a year at least if I ever want to put those out, and Camp are the perfect months to commit to that. That guarantees I'm working on them at least twice a year, and should, in theory, be able to finish them in the months I work on them (although theory and practice often drastically differ).
So, to sum up, my achievements last month were to write 15k on book three and spend 20 hours editing the first two SP adventures. I also wrote 6k words on a brainstorm for a young adult high school romance story, which may never go anywhere but it was fun to lose myself in that world for a few days. I had a really good month. In March. Which is typically pretty grim. I'm very pleased with my progress, and I hope I've found a good balance between writing, editing, brainstorming, and relaxing that I can keep this up each month going forward.
My goals for April are to write 15k on the next SP adventure, hopefully finishing it off, and then actually do the Druid Wars edits. That way, I can take May to put some space between those edits and the line edit, which I will try to do in June so I can start querying in July. May and June will also be finishing up book three, and July will be another SP adventure.
And then I will transition into Pandemonium in August! And I can work on that and maybe some Cafe stories (and a Writers Weekly contest) until NaNo hits.
I know that's looking pretty far ahead, but I'm excited. I'm getting all this stuff figured out. I truly believe I can do this.
But once I got going, things went pretty well. And they went really well once I read back over last month's post and reminded myself of the two valuable lessons.
Changing projects was vital to my success last month. Working on something else, even if it doesn't seem conducive to my timeline, is still progress. Following what I'm passionate about at whatever point in the month keeps me fresh and keeps me moving forward, even if it means tweaking my timeline. The timeline is fluid, designed to keep me on track and moving but with the freedom to shift things.
Also vital was to remind myself that I'm not a writer that writes every day. I do start to feel antsy if I haven't written in a few days, but it feels great once I get back to it. If I push really hard a few days, I have to take a mental break. And that's okay. As long as I keep my word count goal realistic, I can still meet it even if only write half the days in the month. And right now, I'm intentionally keeping my word counts low so I keep making that slow progress without getting burned out. Slow and steady still gets books written.
I really ought to read those lessons every time I start to get down on my progress. Which happens at least once every month.
My goals for March were to write another 15k on book three and incorporate beta reader feedback on Druid Wars, with secondary goals, if I was feeling up for it, to poke at the zombie CYOA and maybe work on a Cafe story.
I did, in fact, write 15k on book three, which brought me up to 80k on the book. That feels really good. I'm not sure I'm completely happy with the last 30k words I've written, but at least I'm feeling my way through the story so I know what happens, even if it's not written all that well yet. It's a first draft. As people have said, the first draft is just putting sand in the sandbox. Editing is where I'll shape it into an amazing castle. I will admit that I wish I could write cleaner first drafts so I didn't have to work so hard editing. But. These days, I'm better at editing than actually writing (and seem to enjoy it more), so I let myself write sloppy prose and waste a lot of words figuring out what happens. I've stumbled on some good stuff that way, so it works, and I have faith in my abilities to fix it up in editing.
My second main goal was Druid Wars, and if I'm totally honest, I let that one completely fall of the radar. I didn't even open any documents, although I did spend some time thinking about some scenes. I pushed my beta readers so hard to get it read, then didn't even do anything with it. I do feel kinda bad about that, in some respects. But I'm not ready to do it yet. Which does put me behind on my project timeline a bit. By a month or two. I just couldn't face it. This is the next one I want to query. I am still feeling kind of kicked and sore from querying my last book. I am not quite ready to dive into that madness again, especially as I watch Dianne going through it now, too. That's a lot of it. The rest is fear. Of failure, yeah, of course, although I have my backup plans for failure. What I don't have is a plan for if I succeed. I'm almost more afraid that this book will get picked up. What then? Then I'm not a hobbyist anymore. Then come commitments. Contracts. An editor. Potentially readers. I probably won't get to choose what projects I work on at any given time. I might not have the freedom to change projects if I get frustrated or stuck. It's terrifying to think of the expectation that comes with being a published writer. So...maybe I'm not in as much of a hurry to do that as I thought I was. Which isn't to say I won't edit and query this book this year. It's stupid to stop because of fear. But it turns out I'm okay with taking an extra month or two before I start editing and querying.
Still, the editing portion of the month wasn't a total loss. I followed my own advice and let myself work on a different project. After a delightful afternoon spent with the folks of Bottle Cap Publishing, I got excited about Sally Prescott again. Rachel wants to read the first season. Yipes! So, I spent a few days polishing the first adventure within an inch of its life and sent it her way. Then I edited the second one. Then I poked at the third, fourth, and fifth ones. The last three need some work more, but there's a ton of good stuff there.
So after all that, I was fully immersed in the Sally Prescott world, so I changed my Camp Nano project for April from finishing up book three to finishing the first adventure of the second season.
So much for the poetry of finishing up book three during Camp, eh?
But that's okay. Looking back at the last few months, I realized that expecting myself to write 30k in a month is too daunting. It's setting myself up for failure. I can take two months instead of one to finish up book three. I'm already taking extra time for Druid Wars, so it doesn't really set me back that far, anyway. And will allow me to immerse myself in Pandemonium edits for two consecutive months rather than trying to work on it several months apart later this year.
I also need a break from book three. It's eaten my soul for two months, and I am banging my head against walls. I am excited about SP, so it makes sense to do the next adventure for her now. I have to do two of those a year at least if I ever want to put those out, and Camp are the perfect months to commit to that. That guarantees I'm working on them at least twice a year, and should, in theory, be able to finish them in the months I work on them (although theory and practice often drastically differ).
So, to sum up, my achievements last month were to write 15k on book three and spend 20 hours editing the first two SP adventures. I also wrote 6k words on a brainstorm for a young adult high school romance story, which may never go anywhere but it was fun to lose myself in that world for a few days. I had a really good month. In March. Which is typically pretty grim. I'm very pleased with my progress, and I hope I've found a good balance between writing, editing, brainstorming, and relaxing that I can keep this up each month going forward.
My goals for April are to write 15k on the next SP adventure, hopefully finishing it off, and then actually do the Druid Wars edits. That way, I can take May to put some space between those edits and the line edit, which I will try to do in June so I can start querying in July. May and June will also be finishing up book three, and July will be another SP adventure.
And then I will transition into Pandemonium in August! And I can work on that and maybe some Cafe stories (and a Writers Weekly contest) until NaNo hits.
I know that's looking pretty far ahead, but I'm excited. I'm getting all this stuff figured out. I truly believe I can do this.
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