Okay, when did that happen?? It’s a new quarter AND a new year, and therefore time for an update. What did I set out to accomplish in the last three months? and what did I actually do?
Broadchurch fic: I had intended to write one more piece as a kind of wrap-up to the collection on AO3 before the new series began this past Monday. It didn’t happen. I took a few stabs at it, wrote a few thousand words or so, but never managed anything I was happy with. Then, deadline passed, I took some time this week to read through the collection. You know what? It’s finished. It doesn’t need another piece.
Now I can forget about it and focus on the new series instead.
‘Counter Clockwise’: I really thought it was finished. Then I read the many-times-rewritten final scene to my writers’ group, and everyone – myself included – was underwhelmed. I realized then that my lead character had gone through the entire piece without experiencing a single emotional reaction to anything. If even the lead character is not engaged, how’s anyone else supposed to manage? Needless to say, heavy rewriting is in progress.
‘No Such Place as Home’: I finished this thing ages ago and have been putting off submitting it. That’s over now: today I sent it to Analog Science Fiction and Fact (ref #244953 for my own info). Last time they took four months to reply. Thus begins the waiting game.
I’m not going to wait to hear back from Analog (and F&SF, where ‘Counter Clockwise’ will go when it’s finished) before making a new book. Relatives are impatient. I will, however, not make the book publicly available, or put the stories on Smashwords, until I know for sure both stories are rejected. And if they are somehow not rejected, everyone will get to buy the magazine instead. 🙂
Last quarter of course contained Nanowrimo. I set out to write three stories, revising my word count expectation from 50 to 25,000 as the month waned. I finished just short of 24,000, with two complete rough drafts and one half done.
So now what?
My primary focus for Q1 of 2015 is to finish ‘Counter Clockwise’ and get that book made. Preferably in time for a significant birthday in early March. When that’s done, other goals for the year include:
- Begin collaboration on a picture-book version of ‘The Dragon of St. Johns’
- Finish the third Dragon story
- Revise all three Dragon stories, and take them to my writers’ group
- Finish revising ‘Ghosts’
- Write something new!
I observe that my word count is low when I’m mid-revision; my attention is on polishing the older work, and nothing new is begun. It’s not that I stop writing: my DW blog is busy, and a dozen tiny things have come and gone without becoming anything. I’d rather not wait for Nano to come around to create something again. But if I don’t make it happen, it doesn’t happen.
I’m going to make it happen.
Walk in Beauty 