Well, I have to say that vacation has been going quite well. My wife is settling in to her new job, but it was great to have her back for this weekend as we celebrate my son’s high school graduation.
This week has been good as far as getting out and about, meeting with other writers. Today, I plan to be out at a local writer’s retreat discussing how I’ve used my writing journal as a way of helping to stimulate my writing.
Last Friday, I saw a presentation at the Musser Public Library by Dennis Maulsby, an Ames writer who shared some of his poetry, short stories, and novels. Once I actually get some spare change, I want to try and get some of his work. His website is here if you’d like to check it out. As I plan to move next year to south central Iowa, I’m making more of an effort to connect with Des Moines-area writers and writing groups.
And, I’ve been writing more than a little bit. Here are the numbers – some of the best that I’ve had in a while.
+14,935 words written.
Days writing: 6 of 7.
Days planning/revising: 0 of 7 for 0 total minutes.
Daily Writing Goals Met (500+ words or 30 minutes of planning/revisions): 6 of 7 days.
Compared to the previous month’s doldrums, I will take these numbers any week, any time. Much of the writing has involved blogs or this weird Game Of Thrones epilogue that I’ve been obsessed with over the past couple of weeks. (For lack of a better term, I’m going to call that Project S for Stark.)
As some of you who have been following me know, however, I’ve got a few things on tap that I want to get done as far as writing projects go. Even though I’ve finally gotten published this year, I don’t want to stop this whole process. Getting published causes you to want to get more stuff published. I think I might update this list that I put out a couple of years ago regarding my projects – actually, I think I’ll just put out a new blog post on it mid-week.
But for now, I’ll update you on my progress regarding those projects.
- Project A: I want to finish one last revision and get it proofread as I begin doing queries for this. If there is one project I would love to get done through a traditional publisher, this would be it, especially since I can see it as the start of at least a trilogy of books. I checked out some recent Writer’s Markets to start collecting candidates for queries, but I think I will get a subscription once my next payday comes in, which will be later this month.
- Project B: I need to get back on this to finish the first revision/second rough draft. Then, I’ll take a breath, revise again, and get it to some beta readers. Again, given the relatively short length of the book, the local setting, and some other factors, I think this book is a candidate for getting something out quickly and efficiently, maybe through self-publishing.
- Project C: The presentation Dennis gave on Friday gave me a new perspective on this project. I had been looking to put this out as a whole collection, but he mentioned how he was able to generate more interest in a poetry collection by getting his individual works accepted by various publications. I’m going to take a close look at some markets (especially those for regional writers, as much of my work has an Iowa or at least Mississippi River theme) to see if I can have some luck there.
- Untitled Fantasy Project (We’ll call this Project F for Fantasy): Mostly just musings and initial plans at this point. Given the genre, I would have to this this would be a long-term project by its very definition. I would be interested with bouncing ideas off other fantasy writers to see if what I have in mind makes sense.
- Project S: See above.
- The projected deadlines for those projects:
- Project A, begin querying agents and publishers: Sometime in early-mid summer 2019.
- Project B, finish major redrafting of the rough draft (more of a second rough draft rather than a more focused revision): End of summer 2019.
- Project C, finishing creating rough draft poems: End of 2019.
- Project F: None
- Project S: Maybe posted by the end of the month (tentative)
Didn’t think that I’d have too much to write about this week, but it turned out not to be the case. I’ll see all of you later.
Liegois Media 