September 2016 Motivational Thread

Facing

Facing

Working on it
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Sep 2, 2014
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It's a new month. Summer is over and the kids are heading back to school. For some, this will mean a return to routine, for others it could mean embarking on a new one. Either way, it's time to set some goals.
 
I am going to take the entire month and spend it reworking my story for the anthology, and I am going to learn a whole lot about line level editing while I do it. @Facing was kind enough to share a Macros she uses for editing and pointed me towards a book called: Editor-Proof Your Writing: 21 Steps to the Clear Prose Publishers and Agents Crave.

So no pressure to write new words... just clean up existing ones and see if I can salvage this story in time for the Sept 30 deadline.
 
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My goals for September depend on when the next round of revision notes come back from my editor. So:

1- Come up with a proposal and first installment of a serial short story for an online magazine and send (deadline September 30th).
2- Start working again on my paused sci-fantasy YA.
3- Drop number 2 if/when edits get back and get to work on those.

(These motivation threads are fabulous for keeping my mind focussed! So glad I found them. :) )
 
I feel I have done well on my goals this summer, even though I haven't actually fully achieved any of them. I think I could have done better in August despite my vacation and work trip the last two days. My problem was I lost focus and decided I what I had done was sufficient.

It also just hit me this week that I have been bouncing from project to project all year and last finished something last winter. 6 months is long enough and I really want to finish something again this year. So I need to get my butt in gear! Therefore, my goals this month are:
  • Write 4 chapters in Red King book 2
 
Specific objectives for me in September:
  1. Visit @CharlotteAshley's bookstore in Toronto (I'll be in Buffalo, NY this weekend - you won't be that far!)
  2. Finish outline on SMTTC! (our collaborative work), maybe even start writing bits and pieces for it
  3. Write a book review
  4. Participate in the flash fiction contest for September
  5. Write at least 20k on some long-term project (either my new thing or one of my old things)
I think that's it.
 
In the full swing of teaching with September here. I should have some time to tackle other things, though.
  • go through the novella again for a third revision pass (I printed it out this time, which often lets me catch things I miss on the screen)
  • revise a handful of microfiction and poems that need one more polish before I look into submitting them
  • I also have a short middle grade novel I wrote two years ago, revised pretty significantly, but then haven't looked at it again since. So I want to polish that off and see if it's something I want to try to submit somewhere
  • and then there's a new project I'm contemplating, which ties in with my teaching. This month that will probably just mean some brainstorming and reading widely what others have done
 
Nila, if you are ever in the St. Louis area, let me know. I'd love to meet up and have a drink or something. Same goes for any of you, really.

I had rough August as far as writing is concerned, and a rough spring-summer if I'm honest. I've written in spurts, but I think I only wrote a couple thousand words last month, far short of @PeteMC's 40k. :)

First and foremost, I need to take a hard look at what I'm doing, and why. I lost my focus for the first time in 4-5 years. My goals (which are going to be printed out and in my face when I hop on the home computer):
  • 15,000 words on military sci-fi novel
  • Update the website (finally)
  • Schedule 2-3 blog posts
  • As a longer-term project, and something I've been meaning to do, research successful Patreon campaigns
Also, as an additional note, I realize that Ash & Flame came out a year ago. At some point I need to start looking hard at a Season Two.
 
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This month I'm still between jobs so I have plenty of time to work on the important stuff, but I'm away for FantasyCon the last week of September which means this is realistically only a three week month for me, productivity wise.

So, goals are:

1) Turn around the copy-edits on Burned Man 3 (which apparently I shouldn't have been talking about, but meh... :)
2) Write another 20k on the Grimdark WIP - in other words, get it over 60k drafted which is hopefully about half way through my outline.
3) um.... I suppose I should probably try to get a job?

.
 
Next year...August doesn't count. So many writing related things happened, but no actual writing.
September started as I mean it to continue, so onward with a short first draft and I am not budging out the seat till there's 1000 words down. I want it done by mid Sept. Apparently I'm chairing a panel at Fantasycon, so like @PeteMC I've allocated a week off around that ;)
 
Breakthrough! You can hammer only so long on a piece of stone before finally catching a clear glimpse of the sculpture within. This just happened to me with my current WIP which was in danger of wandering, thus slowing my writing pace as I fumbled around for how the story should end. These things are important when you're running a character-driven show as I do. I saw the real ending of "Storm Child" and how to get there. It's far more poignant than what I first envisioned, thanks (oddly enough) to getting into the head of my antagonist as I'd mentioned in an earlier thread. All that was left was reconciling what needed to happen with my main character. Yeah, yeah, all just dry words on a forum entry, but trust me. This is going to end well.

Now I have a reachable goal for September - hammer out a scene that features the most tragic circus train wreck in history. It happened outside of Hammond, Indiana. I also have Wizard World convention here in Austin where I'll introduce "Siren's Song"'s to its first comic-con debut. Have a neat little crystal that will be glowing all kinds of colors as a prop. Oh, and speaking of which, the novel got it's third five-star review this weekend. Motivation? In SPADES!
 
Okay.

I'd like to be done with the current edit of the military sci-fi. I'm halfway through, that shouldn't be impossible.
I'd like to edit the first chapter of my fantasy murder mystery and nail down the last world building elements. Once the foundations are in place, I'll go to town on that sucker.
I'd like to do eight more blog articles this month
I'd like to try and submit three bits to magazines
I'd like to submit to a music reviewing magazine and get back into that game too

And I'd like a job.

No pressure on myself here. Lets get to town mofos, there's work to be done and sure if you want it done, give it to someone busy.
 
kmtolan said:
Now I have a reachable goal for September - hammer out a scene that features the most tragic circus train wreck in history. It happened outside of Hammond, Indiana.
Click to expand...
First off, congrats on the breakthrough. I did want to comment on the above, though, as I find those real historic footnotes to be so fun to explore.

I have a project that focuses on a story I had in the UF Manifesto anthology a couple years ago, about a demon who possesses humans and keeps an uneasy peace in the name of holding up the bargain between Heaven and Hell. I enjoyed it so much that I decided to write a couple more stories with that character and eventually release them all in one self-contained volume.

One of the stories is based in St. Louis, so I decided to use some real-world settings, especially since I live here at the moment. An old Lutheran church, which had been abandoned since 1995, collapsed a couple years ago. I decided that would be a fantastic site for one of my climactic fights. Lot of fun to find nuggets like that!
 
Wilson Geiger said:
An old Lutheran church, which had been abandoned since 1995, collapsed a couple years ago. I decided that would be a fantastic site for one of my climactic fights. Lot of fun to find nuggets like that!
Click to expand...

That is so much part of the fun - letting history sort of egg you on to greater imaginings. Have a good time with that scene.
 
Half a chapter done last night in the edit. Ideally need to pick up the pace but not a bad start.

Need to refind my copies of Metal Hammer and recheck house style so I can edit and submit there.

Beginning to brainstorm a sword & sorcery setting. I have the urge.
 
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