Accomplishments Make Me Happy

Well, I did it...I got the next set of work out to my crit partners! This section is pretty rough so hopefully they don't think I'm a crap writer, but we shall see.

I had a great weekend! It's very sad, but I don't think that I'm going to have time to put up the Christmas tree this year. I don't know...maybe week after next I might have a window of time. It just doesn't feel like the Christmas season without it to come home to. On top of that, our demon kitty, Skittles would love to climb in it. I'm glad that we have cheap ornaments.

I am not going to be doing much writing this week as I have finals in both my classes and projects due in both my jobs. I'm very much looking forward to the winter break from my classes. The hubby and I are behind on date nights :)

There is an element to my novel that is slightly "steampunk". Does anyone out there in blog-land have any good reqs for a steampunk novel?

I Love the Holidays!--and looking for another CP

So people who are very busy are usually busy because they enjoy it. I'm busy and I enjoy it. This weekend is going to be so much fun. I get to spend time with a bunch of different friends...including attending a bachelorette party, ornament exchange party, cookie exchange party and my husband's work holiday party. I love the holidays.

Also, I'm on track with my writing goals so that's good.

I'm so excited for an excuse to bake Christmas cookies!

By the way, I'm looking for one more crit partner if any of you out there are interested (a normal reviewer is good to, but I'd rather have a partner so I feel like I'm giving back).

Prophecy's Promise is a fantasy novel written in first person.

Hailey, wildly hailed as the smartest mind of her time prepares to take her Scholar Exam and pass into the ranks of the Learned--the youngest to attempt this one-time make-or-break Rite in recorded history. A week before the Exam she has a prophetic dream. Now she must give up everything that she knows in order to help save all humanity from being consumed by their dying world. Problem is that she's spent her life training how to record history, not how to make it.

One thing Hailey will learn is that everyone--uncle, father, lover and friend-- is just out for themselves, even when it comes to the end of the world.


Let me know if this project sounds interesting to you and if you want to help me!

Sharing my goals

I had a writing vacation and now I am back! I don't feel any less blocked so no more breaks. They don't work for me. Everyone works differently-- I am very goal-oriented and I need small milestones to keep me motivated and productive.

I believe that goals are easier to keep if you announce them. I am giving up TV until I have completed though to the end of the third draft. If I ever feel like watching TV I will either read a book or will go write :)

I have mini-chapters. They run between 800 and 1600 words. The chapter numbers aren't as much my goal as the word count. This is pretty mutable, but here is the basic idea.

Does anyone else out there have any specific goals? How do you motivate yourself to work on your book?


My plan:
Draft 0: Outline (Done)
Draft 1: Plot and basic description
Draft 2: Make it good enough to share
[Send to CPs in batches]
Draft 3: Take input and fix issues
[Send whole thing to CPs and Beta Readers]
Draft 3.5: While CPs and Beta Readers are doing their thing work on technique, description and setting
Draft 4: Final Draft
[Send queries to agents]

Total means total word count to the end of the section--lower drafts that are downstream from the section don't count into the totals.


Done: Chapters 1-22 (Draft 1) Total: 20k
Done: Chapters 1-5 8k (Draft 2) Total: 8k
Sunday Dec 7: Chapters 6-15 (Draft 2) total: 20k (5k in this section)
Sunday Dec 21: Chapters 11-15 (Draft 2) total: 20k (7K in this section)
Sunday Dec 28: Chapters 16-21 (Draft 2) total: 28k (8k in this section)
Sunday Jan 4: Chapters 22-25 (Draft 1) total: 33k (5k in this section)
Sunday Jan 11: Chapters 26-30 (Draft 1) total: 38k (5k in this section)
Sunday Jan 25: Chapters 31-35 (Draft 1) total: 44k (6k in this section)
Sunday Feb 1: Chapters 22-25 (Draft 2) total: 36k (8k in this section)
Sunday Feb 8: Chapters 26-35 (Draft 2) total: 50k (14k in this section)
*Sunday Feb 22: Chapters 1-21 Draft 3 (need draft 2 reviews for these chapters on or before Feb 1)*
Sunday Mar 1: Chapters 36-41 (Draft 1) total: 56k (6k in this section)
Sunday Mar 8: Chapters 42-49 (Draft 1) total: 63k (7k in this section)
Sunday Mar 15: Chapters 50-56 (Draft 1) total: 70k (7k in this section)
Sunday Mar 22: Chapters 57-61 (Draft 1) total: 75k (5k in this section)
Sunday Apr 5: Chapters 62-65 (Draft 1) total: 80k (5k in this section)
*Sunday Apr 19: Chapters 22-35 (Draft 3) (need draft 2 reviews for these chapters on or before Mar 22)*
Sunday Apr 26: Chapters 36-50 (Draft 2) total: 60k (10k in this section)
Sunday May 3: Chapters 51-56 (Draft 2) total: 70k (10k in this section)
Sunday May 17: Chapters 57-61 (Draft 1) total: 78k (8k in this section)
Sunday May 24: Chapters 62-65 (Draft 1) total: 86k (8k in this section)
Sunday May 31: Chapters 66-72 (Draft 1) total: 93k (7k in this section)
Sunday Jun 7: Chapters 73-end (Draft 1) total: 100k
Sunday Jun 14: Chapters 57-65 (Draft 2) total: 90k (20k in this section)
Sunday Jun 21: Chapters 66-end (Draft 2) total: 105k (15k in this section)
*Sunday July 5: Chapters 36-56 (Draft 3) (need draft 2 reviews for these chapters on or before Jun 14)*
*Sunday July 12: Chapters 57-end (Draft 3) (need draft 2 reviews for these chapters on or before July 5)*
Sunday July 2: Deliver full draft 3 to beta readers (and CPs, if they want)

Send out to Beta Readers and focus on technique over next month. (work on draft 3.5)

August 1st: Start querying agents

{{Note, this was updated Dec 9th, 2008}}

Starting to Feel Less Overwhelmed

I hope that all of you in blog-land had a great Thanksgiving!

Mine was relaxing in comparison to my normal schedule. We went down to Indianapolis. It was nice to visit with the family and play with my nieces and nephew. I made a cream-of-butternut-squash-and-apple soup, shortbread pear tarts and pumpkin whoopie pies. Well, the whoopie pies were the day after with my sister's kids. It's our thing. I bring over an interesting recipe and we bake together. I do miss Indiana... Who knows, maybe I'll move back one day.

I seriously haven't worked on my novel in over a month, but classes are starting to wrap up and my Associate Year for the Junior League is done, which is pretty exciting and will free up the schedule a bit. I think I get voted in sometime this week. I'm not sure...us associates aren't invited. Tonight I shall write. Assuming I get to leave work at a reasonable hour. For someone who has a writing blog detailing my path to publication, I'm not doing enough writing :-P

Usually people's schedules get busier around the holidays, but mine (at least during the week) is calming down--the weekends are about the same :)

Long Time No Blog

Sorry that I've disappeared into the blog-o-sphere. The bit about me being really busy has been a bit of a problem lately and it's been giving me some issues with writer's block. So I decided to write a non-fiction article related to my work. It turned out pretty nicely. I didn't write it with the intention of getting published, but I think that I'm going to go for it.

I'm so looking forward to the four day weekend. I'm not going to take it off. I'm going to use it as an opportunity to get caught up. On my running, on my writing, on my knitting, on my school work, on my main job and on my side job. I'm also looking forward to getting caught up on all the blogs that I love to read, but haven't had time to recently and visiting with family and friends. Going to be awesome!

Avalon Universe

http://www.avalonuniverse.com/

I am in a web-isode. Web-isodes are short online tv shows. You can go see it at the link above. My character isn't in that scene, but it's her twitter and Facebook. No, I'm not wriring the Twitter and Facebook, the writers of the show are (some people were confused by that).

Anyhoo, I know that I'm biased, but I think that it's worth a watch! :)

Have a great weekend!

Why Am I So Busy?

So on my last post I talked about being so busy. I decided to write a little about what makes me so busy.

I have two primary focuses. Everything I do is to go towards these two goals:
1) Publish a Novel
2) Get in to Grad School (MBA at Northwestern or Chicago)

Part One is what this whole blog is about. Most of you reading my blog are going through the same Write, Revise, Repeat Cycle and know all about it. (If you don't keep reading my blog and you'll soon find out :-P).

For Part Two, the two MBA programs that I want to get into are two of the top five. Only around 15-20% of applicants get in. I hadn't finished my undergrad and the classes I did take had a bad GPA so to get into a good program I have to do a little bit extra to hopefully make up for the GPA issues:
* Finish school (which will take until this time next year since I only have a couple classes) and get As on classes I accomplish (which will be hard since I'm finishing up a Math degree and those classes are just evil.)
* Excel at work (partially okay since I'm a Dir of IT, but I'm trying to do some entrepreneurial work on the side to help--I'm doing the programming for a small company for equity and I'm starting a small promotional company on the side which I hope to flip in a year and a half to help pay for grad school)
* Be active in the community through philanthropic organizations (I joined the Junior League of Chicago, I'm looking at joining the Catholic Charities Jr Board and might join the Associate Board at the Stepehenwolf Theater)
* Take the GMAT, planning on doing it in the summer.


So, the only things that I do lead to helping me accomplish my two goals. Problem is that my first goal usually gets pushed aside. But not now that I have my sacred writing time. Talking about writing, I think that I am going to do that right now :)

Busy Week--and the Creation of a Special Writing Time

I hope that everyone is doing well out there in Blog Land!

I'm not completely unstuck on that scene, but everyone's ideas are super big helps. I got something written down. It's enough to feel okay about moving on to the next bit. I'm starting to feel pretty good about my book :) It's such a great feeling. I still have a very long way to go though. Between working full time, doing a part time job, participating in a couple philanthropic groups, trying to start a company (for another blog post) and taking a couple of classes, I feel like writing is getting pushed under the table. I think that I am going to start waking up an hour earlier and writing. Doing after work just isn't panning out as well as I would like. I did an hour this morning and it was great. Such a wonderful to start off the day :)

Does anyone out there have a "Special Writing Time"?

Writer's Block

Once I hit 20k words I started a revision on the completed work by adding description and filling in story holes. Some story holes are accidental and others were purposefully left for me to fill in later. Now it's later and I'm stuck on a couple of scenes.

My usual solution is to move forward and worry about it later, but this is just a part that I won't like writing ever so I need to do it now. Any suggestions out there in blog-land?

Welcome Baby Jack-Jack!

Baby Jackson Duane Melchiorre was born at 8:21 this morning to Pete's sister. It's the first baby on that side of the family. Very exciting.

I need to work on my own baby (My Book in the Oven). Flipping between calling it Prophecy's Promise or Prophecy's Tool. Any preferences?