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What This Week May Hold 01 23 – 01 30, 2017

Published by Jessica on January 23, 2017

Whale Breaching Whale Hello There

So starts a new week.

That’s one of my favorite things about Monday, you know. The fact that it is the beginning of a new week. I suppose I could say that my week actually starts on Sunday. Sundays are one of the busiest days out of the week for me and my family because of church and church activities.  So I prefer to look at Monday as my start with Sunday as something of an in between.

These are some of the things this week will hold.

Announcement of the 2016 TNT Horror Contest Grand Prize Winner

In fairness, this was supposed to be announced on the 18th. But they needed more time to figure this out. So it’s very much a hope that they will make the announcement this week, not a guarantee.

*phew Cue the rattling of xylophonic nerves clanging up and down my back. I’m vacillating between happy thoughts and worst case scenarios.

House in the RainOn the bright side, all nine of my competitors are lovely people. I’m not going to pretend I don’t want to win (I do), but there is comfort in knowing that no matter who wins, the grand prize is going to someone I like. (One of the downsides of competing too much with your enemies is that if you lose, it smarts doubly.)

But hopefully they will release the details and make the formal announcement soon. And hopefully they will let us know.

Either way…it’s going to be all right. More great opportunities to practice patience, trust, and think with joy.

Another Short Story

I hadn’t done it intentionally but I have drafted a short story each week this month. Actually I’m up to five at this point.

For the longest time, writing short stories was almost impossible for me. They kept growing and expanding, and over the past few months, it has suddenly become much easier. It’s always been true that short stories are capsules of a larger tale. They are a window that we use to look in on a small bit of a character’s life. But, perhaps it was greed or ignorance or both, I always struggled to get this into my stories.

I would start off with a short and then, as I reached the main points, it expanded. Sometimes writing is like wrestling an anaconda that’s in the middle of a growth spurt. I have realized that I am dreadful when it comes to accurately estimating how many words are needed in a story.

But I am getting better at cutting a story off and saying, “no, no, it’s enough to look at this point. I don’t have to catch it all. Just this portion.” And when I find myself resisting this, I remind myself that I can always come back and reveal more of the story later. Setting many of these shorts in the same world has also reduced pressure.

Write a short story every week. It's not possible to write 52 bad short stories.Ray Bradbury once said, “It’s not possible to write 52 bad short stories in a row.” I can be a bit of a contrarian. But I’m hoping in this case, he’s correct.

Catch Up With the Paperwork

Maybe I’ll never really be caught up. Each day I try to take five minutes and clear off my work space, file the papers I have, and prep for the next day. The key word here is try.

If you could see my desk right now. I have three mugs, two water bottles, a stack of five notebooks, the checkbook register, and a mass of loose leaf papers. Not to mention a dozen or so pens and pencils clattering around my laptop and probably four or five cat toys I can’t even see.

Paperwork, particularly on the law firm side of things, always backs up. Not that it’s so good on the writing side of things. I have a whole box of notebooks that need to be transcribed. A few of my novels are hand drafted in there, and they have no backups. Prince of the Waters Below, Phoenix Shattered, Why Am I On a Quest with a Minotaur, String of Pearls, and a couple others are hopefully in that bin. I’m not entirely certain.

Anyway I’d like to get the mountains under control. All the loose leaf paper is probably the highest priority, particularly given that my cats like skiing through the mounds of paper.

For Mercy’s Sake, Woman, Promote Something

I abhor promotions, and there’s really no good reason. They don’t have to be intrusive. They aren’t bad. But it’s easier for me to find excuses not to promote one of my stories than it is for me to find excuses not to run.

I am actually taking a couple courses that help with promotions and advertisings. And I just have to get over this hump. It’s utterly psychological, and even though I don’t feel like other authors who do this are horrible, some secret part of me must believe that I will become some greasy haired, mustachio twirling troll (and trust me, I don’t look particularly fetching in a mustache).Octopus Running Nope 2

So I figure I’ll tackle this the same way I tackled running and spiders. One little step at a time. Scream. Flail. One more step. Repeat.

Wrapping Up Projects

I thrive having multiple projects to work on. When I get stuck on one, I slide over to the next one. The one downside to this is that I have many projects open, and I would like to get some of them done.

Sometimes having multiple projects open like this makes me feel overwhelmed when combined with other situations. So…it’d be nice to wrap some of these up more.

Anyway, it’s going to be a great week. I have many more goals, but these are just some of the highlights. What about you? What are you looking forward to in this next week for you?

My Actual Writing Goals for November 2016

Published by Jessica on November 3, 2016

So I have already discussed that my goal during Nanowrimo is to post actual content rather than just writing it. And I won’t be counting my Wattpad chapters as contributing to this total. (It’s rather interesting that posting to Wattpad is not at all difficult for me. I get at least two chapters published there at a minimum each week.) 

But I am, of course, also working on various projects this month. And, as usual, I have one main one and several that I want to complete. (Some of these titles contain links to where the stories are posted.)

where-gryphons-mournWhere Gryphons Mourn — this is another dream story that I have been meaning to get out there for quite some time. So I am finally getting it done. In fact, my darling and wonderful friend, Stef, created a cover for me, so it looks like I will be writing it and posting it on Wattpad. Isn’t she massively talented? (Seriously, this woman is amazing! Check her out on her website, at Deviant Art, and Wattpad.)

Through the Paintings Dimly — this one is actually almost entirely done so I won’t be increasing my word count much through this, but there is probably about another 3 – 5k that needs to be added in addition to the overall editing. But it will be done and off by the end of the week.

The Insurgent Queen — another book in the Tue-Rah Chronicles, and so, of course, it will get a substantial portion of the word count. I write about 5 – 10k on the main series once a week. In a sense, this is my easiest and most difficult project, but it is the one I adore the most. My soul is always in this series no matter what else I am working on. I really hope that Amelia gets her voice back before the end of this month’s writing. It’s been a good long time, and the poor girl needs to start talking again. (Note: if you haven’t started this series and would like to, you should probably start with Identity Revealed.) 

In Darkness, Cower — now, once again, this story is mostly completed. In fact, it appeared in the Tenebris Somnia anthology on Wattpad. I plan to enter it into the TNT competition, but I want to expand it a little more to reach the 10k word limit. I had to trim it a bit to make it meet the anthology’s criteria. So that will be about 4k. It’s due by the end of the month.

thecelebrityThe Celebrity — this story is mostly completed, but I want to enter it into a competition on November 15 (can’t remember the name of the competition right now). It’s just about 8 k too short though and then it will be up to the required standards.

Untitled Story — I have been tossing around some titles for this story, but I haven’t settled on one. Cruel Frost, Frost Wolf, and Frost Strain are possibilities, but none of them really hit the horror genre nail on the head. The proper title will come eventually. This story is going to be approximately 8k. Another dream/nightmare story that I just want to have done. I may submit it to the TNT competition as well. It may also expand beyond the anticipated 8k.

Just a Kiss — a sweet romance for an anthology. It’s probably going to be about 5k, and it is due by the end of the month. I just have the ideas down for this one, and, in fairness, if another sweet romance story presents itself that fits in with the Christmas season, I will likely go with that. I’ll consider this goal satisfied so long as I have a sweet romance story down.

The Nameless One’s Plea —  This is another story for an anthology, and it’s great because this is part of the Ragnarok Undone novel or perhaps Ragnarok Untold, depending on where the end of the novel comes. It’ll be about 8 k. It’s going to contain some spoilers for the story but nothing too major, and hopefully it will help to draw additional readers to the Ragnarok series.

The Nightwalker Before Christmas —  a dark holiday/horror story that will hopefully stay short and sweet. (I’m really hoping that with this short story focus this month I will be able to do a much better job of keeping stories short and tight.) Hopefully about 3k. The title is a little off for me, but I’ll find a better one later.

Serpent’s Kiss — a fantasy adventure for another anthology that will be approximately 5k. It has to be done before the end of the month, but I have a fairly solid idea of where I want to take it. And if that idea doesn’t work, I’ve got another one that can work for the same title, which is good because I like having a good title.

Aquanos Feratu — a tight short story in the horror genre utilizing the breath vampire concept among other aquatic horrors. Probably about 10 k. If I have to prioritize and run out of time to finish projects, then this is going to be set aside until next month. (If I’m not careful with this one, it’s going to get a lot bigger a lot faster.)

Escaping Nowhere — I started this novel last year for Nanowrimo, got to the required word count, and it was all quite great. But I didn’t finish it. I’d like to wrap it up, which will probably take about another 20 k. On the high end. It’s fairly easy to write though, and I have good notes to pull me the rest of the way along.

Parnimo’s Prize — oh yes, please, please, let me finally find the right ending for this novella. I have written the ending so many times, but it never quite seems right. I think I’m going to be done with this one within about five chapters at the most.

Now if I get to have my druthers this month, I would also add these. I’d love to also complete 5k SoulMates Pendanteach on The Red Dragon, Cursed, and Ragnarok Undone. 10k on Of Cruelty, Elves, and Sorcery would be fantastic along with completion of Of Course Not, Silas, I Know Best.

I’m also planning to send off my application for the SFWA, query letters for Lunar Realms, and send off a couple other short stories to some other professional markets.

These aren’t all my goals for the month, and I doubt that I’ll make them all. I make my goals difficult to reach and usually almost impossible, so don’t worry. We’ll just see how far I get on this.

In terms of my actual Nanowrimo writing, I’m doing all right. It has been a bit slow because I’ve had to do more editing and legal work than usual, so as of yesterday, I only wrote about 14k. I’m getting ready to settle in for a batch of fiction writing here after dinner. Hopefully that goes way.