My mid-week report to you that covers the three major commitments I’ve made: to write, to edit, and to read.
Writing
Wow. A lot can happen in a week…
I finished editing “Down Among the Dead Men” and got it out to my writer’s group (shout out to my fellow Alpha Mercs!) for critique. Yay me! I’m going to let it marinate a bit, then go back and look over the comments I gather before shipping it off. I started “Third Time Charm” as well, a pirate-ish story that got stuck in my head. That may be suitable for a contest submission down the road.
I also picked up a couple of rejections. Bleah. But wait - there’s more! I also got an acceptance for a microfiction story. Yeah, it’s tiny, but to paraphrase Bob Parr - “Acceptance is acceptance!”
The rejections have also made it easier to line up a bunch of stuff for submission. I may have a partially finished zombie story that might be suitable for Bayonett Books’ Patient Zero anthology. We’ll see.
Commitments for this week:
Keep on plugging on “Third Time Charm”
Kick at least two stories out into the wild
Editing
Remember when I said, “A lot can happen in a week”?
I’ve contracted with an editor to help me with a structural review of Sigils. I’m incredibly nervous about that, but if I’m going to learn, I need to be able to take criticism and figure out how to be better. This is part of that process. This book is going to get published one way or another (trad pub or indie), and I want it to be decent.
To prep for the discussion with the editor, I spent part of this week going back over Sigils. I focused on reorganizing scenes to fit my internal timeline as well as story beats. I also had to figure out where I need to do more writing to include additional scenes. Then I took all that, combined it with existing commitments on my calendar, and came up with an editing schedule.
I’m trying to be realistic. On days that I have major commitments, I’m planning on zero writing or editing. On days that I can work, I’m planning on 1-3 scenes, depending on what I think my commitments will allow. I figure I can get this done by mid-May without too much trouble if I simply keep plugging along.
Of course, no plan survives contact with the enemy (in this case, the entire rest of the world). I’ll keep yinz all appraised as to how it’s going.
Commitments for this week:
Keep to my established editing schedule
Reading
With one thing and another, I have yet to even crack Broken Roads: Returning to my Amish Father. I did find time to do a read-through and critique of a short story someone posted in my writer’s group.
I think that’s one of the things I need to add to my weekly schedule. If I have something to review, do it on $SOME_EVENING. If I don’t have something to do, do my other reading. I’m thinking that Tuesdays or Thursdays might work for that. I often have something going on those evenings, so I’ve blocked it out as a “non-writing” day. Reading’s a different matter, though :) So I’ll add that in and see how it works out.
Commitments for this week:
Start Broken Roads
Figure out where I can commit 2 hours a week to reading & critiqe.
Other
The lady’s tea is rolling right along. I’ve been doing some advisory work for a couple of other non-profits. My youngest finished out her regular basketball season with a win and a wonderful Senior Night recognition.
Oh, and for those of you wondering what I do in my Day Job: I’m a software developer. This explains why last week’s accountability post was labeled “Week 4/52”, and this week’s post is labeled “Week 6/52”. Those pesky off-by-one errors. Or was it a typo that slipped through my editing process? Probably a little bit of both.