August 2015 Motivational Thread

RedMage said:
@Beth Wagner, just the titles of your comics sound interesting! What are they about?
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Isaac & Lee is the fictionalised story of two of best friends, very loosely based on actual events. The sidecar racing is imagined but the burlesque dancers are real.
A Grotto of Poppies is the story of an occult psychiatrist and his resident who help the police solve crimes.
 
Beth Wagner said:
Isaac & Lee is the fictionalised story of two of best friends, very loosely based on actual events. The sidecar racing is imagined but the burlesque dancers are real.
A Grotto of Poppies is the story of an occult psychiatrist and his resident who help the police solve crimes.
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Those both sound interesting. Thanks for sharing, Beth!
 
J.D. Carelli said:
Computers upgraded to Windows 10.
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Upgraded mine,but it was a nerve wracking required expansion of my boot sector's partition prior upgrade that made me want to hate Microsoft. Why they insisted on dumping files in this little known partition is beyond me, and Samsung SSD drives default to a very small partition.
 
Goals for August:

Release Inish Carraig on time for 21st August. This is my first sp novel and I'm nervous about all the uploading etc. But there are loads of people waiting for it, and I have a few early, good, reviews, so I hope it will do well.

Work on Teardrops in the Sky with my writing group.

Find out what panels I will be on at my first convention next month and practise a reading so I don't disgrace myself entirely.

Oh, and blogs. Lots of blogs. Two guest blogs to produce and two for my own blog to keep it trundling.

I was going to put in submit to Hodder's open window, but I've just done that.
 
Well, I'm back from a fun-filled week of gaming, walking, and buying. GenCon was a blast as always. I did a handful of writing seminars, the highlight being a discussion with Scott Lynch on writing cinematic action scenes. The guy is just amazing.

Those seminars, and seeing successful authors up close, always serves as inspiration for the last half of my year, and this time is no different. So my goals for August:

  • 20k words
  • Hammer away at the last episode of Ash & Flame's season one. Get the stupid thing published, finally.
  • Finish the military sci-fi short story and submit
  • Really sit down with the Norse werewolf novel and figure out where it needs to go - start writing with a firmer idea of the plot
  • Finish the last bit of a friend's novel, provide feedback, and then get started on another's
 
SteveW said:
Keeping it simple this month after a very poor showing in July.

1. Write a piece for the micro-fiction contest.
2. Get back to my skeleton draft and my lunch hour routine.
3. Write after the kids go to bed
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You can do it, Steve!
 
I keep just pushing my goals back each month, adding to them. That means one of these months I'll just do double what I intend and catch up, right? Ha ha ha. Ahem.

Goals, then:

1) Write at least 3000 words. At least this I've been able to do consistently.

2) Finish Phacelia's ^%@$%& Birthday. It's already 5k words... SURELY 8k will be a draft.

3) Revise and resubmit my anthology story.

4) Submit some reprints.

I also have a million non-writing responsibilities, though. I have to catch up on reprints for Apex through to early 2016. I have to find judges for the Merril Short Story Contest. I have to nail two Clavis Aurea columns. I have to give my other writing group's anthology a kick in the pants. And the busy season's about to start at work. Ugh.

That's why I'm writing on vacation. :/
 
J.D. Carelli said:
  • Write and submit short stories: I've been fortunate to get a couple of decent stories put together. With those, I'd like to keep putting them out there. In addition to that, I plan to get one or two new stories put together and start workshopping them. I'm confident I can get at least one pro sell this year, so I need to keep working toward that goal.
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One thing I've found helpful in weathering the onslaught of rejection (>75 this year, oof) is distinguishing between goals (which are under my control) and milestones (which are, ultimately, not).

Keep putting your stories out there, getting new stories drafted and workshopped... those are goals because they are completely under your control. The pro sale, though, isn't. Your 2015 can be a complete success if you hit your goals, even if you don't hit the pro sale milestone.

http://www.diabolicalplots.com/applied-game-theory-in-writing-part-1-goals-vs-milestones/
 
Okay - I have re-started my anthology submission twice and plan a third. I'm just not finding the right place to start nor the right tone. Heck, even my characters keep changing on me. I may have to go back to the drawing board on all this, but I will submit something!!
 
N. E. White said:
Okay - I have re-started my anthology submission twice and plan a third. I'm just not finding the right place to start nor the right tone. Heck, even my characters keep changing on me. I may have to go back to the drawing board on all this, but I will submit something!!
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Keep at it, Nila! It will come together just how it's supposed to.
 
N. E. White said:
Okay - I have re-started my anthology submission twice and plan a third. I'm just not finding the right place to start nor the right tone. Heck, even my characters keep changing on me. I may have to go back to the drawing board on all this
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This sort of thing is why I just plow through with a first draft and not worry. You might give it a try (fight the urge to rewrite). Being a first draft, you've all the license you need to end up with a steaming heap. It's what you do with the second draft that makes things cohesive.
 
kmtolan said:
Being a first draft, you've all the license you need to end up with a steaming heap. It's what you do with the second draft that makes things cohesive.
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So true, but it exhausting. I finished editing the first scene of my submission and got rid of 319 crappy words. I still have nearly 13000 to sift through but at this rate I should have it within limit by the deadline. How are you doing Nila?
 
Kick in the pants! I need a kick in the pants over here, STAT!

We're a week into August and I haven't written a thing. I've received 1 critique and I'm waiting (patiently, I assure you) for 2 more of my Halloween story. JD and I are preparing to go back to work on the Pirate book but we have a few days left to go before we really dive in again. It's the weekend, I'm not working the next two days and I would really like to write!

For my wips I have the novella challenge I entered and a cool story for it. Then there is my Jack Frost story. One of those should probably be worked on...
 
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