January Update: Accomplishments and Goals

I had a total slacker December, managing only to get my Cafe story written. I did write a narrative for work but didn't end up submitting it. It's been a slow start as far as January, as well. I have my annual New Years cold, so most of my energy has been focused on feeling better and recovering from all the holiday travel.

I'm finally ready to face this year's goals. But first, a recap of my 2018. Here were my goals for 2018, and a note in parenthesis as to whether they were completed or not:

• Finish writing Scions of Mythos (DONE)
  
• Send Druid Wars to beta readers, incorporate feedback, and hopefully start querying (received beta reader feedback, made editing notes, then stalled out)
• Edit Online Dating for Demons (pushed back to 2019)
  
• Write at least four stories for the Confabulator Cafe, and keep it running (DONE)
• Start a brand new project for Nanowrimo (DONE)
• Finish the first adventure in season two and start the second adventure for Sally Prescott (DONE)
• Volunteer at ConQuest (decided just to drink and enjoy the con)
• Write at least one blog post a month here. (DONE)

I made really good writing progress. Steady progress. In 2018, I:

• Finally finished writing the third book in the MystWatch series.
• Beta read two novels for writing group friends.
• Wrote a short story for the 24-hour short story contest.
• Wrote a short story for ConQuesT's story-in-a-bag.
• Wrote four short stories for the Confabulator Cafe.
• Had a short story published (and was paid for it).
• Sent queries out to publishers for MystWatch book one.
• Wrote one (and a half) Sally Prescott adventures. Put together a query for Carina.
• Poked at Suddenly, Zombies! and Once We Were Witches. 
• Brainstormed two new book ideas (one I wrote for NaNo), and a few short story ideas.
• Finished the line edit on a BCP book.
• Overall, wrote 196,400 words and spent 161 hours editing.

I learned that I can consistently write 15,000 words a month, at least on average. I had some months where I didn't write much at all but compensated by writing more than that other months. And while I didn't get all of my original goals accomplished, I'm really pleased with what I did get done. Especially winning NaNo. I wasn't sure I'd ever be about to hit 50k in a month again. I also managed to gracefully shift all of the things I didn't accomplish forward on my project timeline. So!

My goals for 2019 are to:

• Edit MystWatch book three for beta readers, incorporate their feedback, and send to my brother and sister by Christmas.
• Incorporate beta reader feedback for Druid Wars book one and begin querying.
• Start edit for Pandemonium book one.
• Write at least two Sally Prescott adventures.
• Write for the Confabulator Cafe as needed. No minimum.
• Participate in NaNoWriMo (for the 15th year, holy cow).
• Write an average of 10,000 words each month.
• Write at least one writing blog post a month.

Those are my main goals. I lowered my word count goal since I'll be working on edits for three different books this year rather than writing. That being said, though, I also want to throw in work on some other projects. I may try to work on Once We Were Witches (probably in the fall, since so much of that book is fall nostalgia), and Chain Letter Choice. I can probably finish Chain Letter in about 30-40k words, so it's worth it to at least consider throwing some words at it. And I always poke at Zombies! when nothing else strikes my fancy.

All that might be too ambitious, but right now, I'm following where my motivation leads me. So I want to leave myself open to working on other projects even as I'm wrapping up some projects that have been on my plate for awhile.

No goals as far as self-publishing for now. I may get a quote from an editor, maybe a cover artist, but as much as I'd dreamed of self-publishing MystWatch in 2020, I don't really have the funds for it, so I may have to put it off another year. Besides. I'm still holding out for DAW.

My biggest worry is that my burnout from doing a 50k NaNo will continue through this month. But at the very least, I need to get a beta read back to Amanda. I think, though, that once I dive into MystWatch book three, I'll be into it. I was daydreaming about the world today as I was trying to take a nap. So yeah. It's there, at the edges of my consciousness. I'll go back there soon.

December Update: Epicness

November was an epic month for me.

I finished the first-pass editing treatment of book three, to get a lay of the land. A few scenes need major revision and I need to write one more scene, but overall, the edits aren't as bad as I feared. Well, to get ready for beta, anyway. They'll give me a whole other set of things to fix, I'm sure.

I finished that on top of participating in NaNo. I counted my book three outlining words toward my NaNo goal, as well as some brainstorming and a short story, but that allowed me to hit 50k. I truly did not think I would be able to, but I did. And I ended up with about 40k on a new novel.

A short story I sold to a magazine went live on November 9. I subscribed to the magazine when they accepted me, and it was surreal to see my name in the subject line of their newsletter! They're a great magazine. I will definitely submit to them again. Also submitted two short stories, although one has already gotten me a rejection.

Still waiting to hear back from DAW.

I've written a few Cafe stories the last few months. Working on one for December. It's interesting how writing always turns into me working through my life stuff. The story I want to write for December turns out to be an allegory for my recent crisis of faith. My NaNo was working through grief of Kevin's passing. All of MystWatch was me working through grief over losing Mom. I asked my friends if I could ever just write something for fun, but apparently that's not how being a writer works. Oh well. What was it Greta said on that last day of NaNo? Things don't have to be real to be true. They say write what you know, and I know feelings. That's mostly what I write about.

Anyway. I'm still trying to figure out my December plans. The last couple of days I've done nothing, and it's been glorious. Although I'm deep in the post-NaNo blues where I feel like something is missing in my life, so I'd like to get back into writing again soon. I'd originally thought I might spend two weeks on Druid Wars so I could keep my promise to my brother and sister and give them something to read for Christmas. But I still don't know if I'm up for diving back into that world. I might poke at it a bit and see, but if it doesn't captivate me, then I'll push it back to next year as I'd planned last month, as I was sketching out my project timeline for next year.

I also thought about spending two weeks on SP, since December is always for "wrapping up" projects, and that is the other big unfinished one. I'm skeptical that will happen, because as I learned last year, getting anything done in December is a crapshoot. I think my one big goal is to be sure to get my Cafe story written. And if SP and Druid Wars don't catch my attention, I may poke at my NaNo novel. I also need to beta read for Amanda. I do have two weeks off at the end of the month, although there will be lots of travel during that time, so I hate to expect too much from myself. We'll see.

Anyway. I think that's it for this month, and this year! I will plan on doing the year recap and upcoming year goals in the January post. Although I did want to note real quick that I am up to almost 200k words written this year, thanks to my push for NaNo. And, stunningly, 91,500 words of that were on book three alone. That feels pretty awesome.

Anyway. Happy holidays! See you next year!

November Update: Grief and NaNo

I finally took my break after finishing writing book three. And of course by "break" I mean I didn't get my 15k words written.

I did stay busy, though.

I beta read a book for Ashley. I finished up edits for Kevin's book. I did a lot of brainstorming for my National Novel Writing Month story. And, I actually started edits on book three.

It's a very perfunctory edit. I'm tweaking minor things, but mostly I'm writing chapter outlines and adding editing notes for when I have the time and energy to dive deeply into it. Which, considering I can't stop thinking about it, will probably happen sooner rather than later. I'm really excited about it, still. I've figured out a few things I wasn't happy with. I've only made it about two-thirds of the way through at this point, but I will probably still try to juggle it with NaNo.

I've decided to follow my creative energies and have ultimately put off editing Druid Wars for sometime next year.

But, my creative energies come and go unexpectedly lately. My dear friend and colleague Kevin died a week ago. And the aftershocks of that keep hitting me. Mostly I'm devastated that I took so long to edit his book. He never got to finish it. Maybe if I'd turned it around in the two weeks I normally did, he would have.

Despite everyone assuring me to the contrary, I still can't help but have a lot of guilt about that.

And guilt is not great for writing.

Except when it is.

My NaNo project so far has been a lot of me dealing with my grief. Which, if you'll remember, was what the whole MystWatch trilogy was. And I was finally at a point in my journey, losing Mom, where I'd developed a healthy grieving process and moved on, in a way.

And now I'm starting all over.

But I think it'll go better this time. I'm balancing writing it with editing book three, so I have Diana telling me how to grieve properly. It's almost like she's speaking to my new MC through me. We're both going to be okay. It's just kinda funny to me that Diana of all characters is the one helping us through it.

Anyway. Yeah. It's NaNo. I'm writing and participating in events and active on the discussion board. But. I'm behind. Sorta. If I only count the words written toward my new novel, anyway. If I count work I've done on book three, I'm not. What I've realized is my relationship with NaNo has changed. I'm taking full advantage of the energy and other people writing and the events and all that. But at some point, maybe on day two or three, I realized I'm not actually expecting or even really aiming to hit 50k.

I have hit a point in my writing process where I write around 15k every month. I've already written 145k words this year. Back when I used to do the full NaNo experience, that 50k was about the only words I wrote a year. In the fourteen years I've been doing NaNo, I've developed a writing practice. And that's in large part thanks to NaNo, which is why I will always participate and always donate and always support people who want to throw their whole selves into it.

But the likelihood of me ever being a "winner" again is slim. I only need 25k this month to keep my monthly average at 15k for the year. More if I don't write in December, but I have no idea what I'll be up for in December yet, so I'm not making any plans. December is always my planned break month, so typically anything I get done in December is bonus.

So yeah. That's where I'm at this November. I hope I can get around 20k written on this new novel. Maybe more. More would be great. But I also want to get through my first editing pass of book three, and I need to write a Cafe story. That's enough stuff that even if I wrote 50k words this month, they won't all be on this new project.

And I've decided that's okay. NaNo is still a tool that I use. But I have learned, especially over this last year, that I need to follow where my inspiration is right now. I have the freedom to do that. Someday I will get published and have to force myself to work on X project by X deadline. But right now, I can work on what I am most passionate about.

And that varies throughout the month. I'm happier when I have more than one project to juggle each month. Also, writing 15k new words a month, whether in brainstorming, outlining, or actual stories, is extremely do-able for me. It's high enough that I have to push myself through the I-dun-wanna's but also low enough that if I have just a really crummy month, my really good months make up for it. It's also low enough that I can fit in editing and beta reading.

Some of this info would be better suited for the end-of-the-year post, but I wanted to bring it up now, so I don't forget.

That's about all I've got right now, though. Which is more than enough, honestly. I'm mostly just heartbroken about my loss of a friend. The world is worse off without him in it. He was truly one of the good ones.