May 2010 Goals

My agent liked my memoir as a novel, and so did a ton of AWers, so that's my goal--To rewrite the memoir my agent has out on sub.

Editors keep saying they like the writing and tha story, but don't like the competition as a memoir.

I can do this, I know it.

I've had a really slow few months, through my own fault, I admit. I've spent a lot of time editing and not much time writing new material. Nor have I implemented my grand plan for a set writing schedule.

With that in mind, in May I aim to:

1. This damn vampvella. Curse it! It's gotta go. And by that I mean 'go on sub'.
2. I have one novel to edit and another to revise/resubmit. I doubt I'll get both of these seen to this month, but I'll get the 'edit' novel seen to, and make headway on the novel which needs a revision at least.

I don't think I've been overambitious in recent months, making lists with countless 'to do' items. I've been lazy. My work ethic/time management could use a lot of work and discipline.

1. Finish Burning Eden. I'm not more than 15,000 words (god, I'd better not be) from done, so this is a finish-by-halfway-through-the-month-tops goal
2. Edit the first part of Burning Eden, cutting it by at least half and restructuring the bits that make more sense restructured
3. Write a new version of the query letter for Burning Eden.
4. Continue blogging thrice-weekly, even if it's only to keep in the habit of doing stuff.

Wayne K said:

My agent liked my memoir as a novel, and so did a ton of AWers, so that's my goal--To rewrite the memoir my agent has out on sub.

Editors keep saying they like the writing and tha story, but don't like the competition as a memoir.

I can do this, I know it.

Click to expand...

Good luck, Wayne, but now I'm a bit scared...

I've been told by several agents (3), who requested fulls of my novel, that it had some challenges as a novel (basically because I threw a murder into the story of a chapter of my life to make it a murder mystery) but would be very interested in it as a memoir. So, my goal this month is one:

5,000 words on memoir!

Gulp.

1) Finish my "Glee" essay for BenBella.
2) Finish my "Vampire Diaries" essay for BenBella.
3) Finish my short story for the anthology.
4) Keep on blogging.
5) Finish at least one more chapter of FATEFUL.

This month is gonna be TOUGH.

Finish editing and start to find a agent..

From my goals post on my blog

May Goals

Looking at my calendar for May, there is a lot on during the weekends which might hamper making any ambitious goals but I’m aware that I don’t want to take too long working on Sanity Juxtaposed and The Red Pen. Also, my writing slot in Chinese Whisperings is coming up.

A large part of the last half of May will also be spent immersed in the Emerging Writers’ Festival.

1. Finish draft of An Abused Mind
   
   Following the research on homophobia I did last month, I’ve begun the first draft of a rewrite of an old short story An Abused Mind. The plot has changed but the characters are very much the same.
2. Finish a version of From Persecution to Persecution (working title) and submit to The Red Pen list for work-shopping. I have an idea for a short story around the issue of refugees seeking asylum in Australia that I want to submit for the zine. There’s already an early version posted as ‘Chasing Cages’ on this blog for #FridayFlash a couple of weeks ago.
   
   I want to finish an expanded version worth submitting to the list to get some feedback on.
3. Finish copy editing ‘Early works’ section of Sanity Juxtaposed and have the ‘Flash Fiction’ and ‘Blog posts’ sections ready for copy editing. Dividing the collection into sections has made it easier to organise and prioritise the copy editing work. The ‘Early Works’ section is probably the most work so getting that out of the way would be progress.
4. Catch up on reading the current version of the short stories before me in The Yang Book of Chinese Whisperings. I’m the last writer in the collaborative anthology for Chinese Whisperings, The Yang Book and as my writing slot is coming up in June, I need to have read the stories before mine before it’s my turn.
5. Read 3 short stories (Cultural Goal) Even though I have a lot of reading to do in the form of the Chinese Whisperings stories, I’m going to try and keep reading published shorts too.
6. Collect articles on anti-Muslim racism, particularly around airport and border security (Political Research Goal) Both my short stories for the zine and for Chinese Whisperings will be around themes of racism, particularly toward Arabs and Muslims and to do with border security and airports. I already know a bit about this area but given how useful the research on homophobia was for contextualising the issue, I think finding case studies on anti-Muslim racism would be useful also.
7. Post two ‘link collection posts’ (Blogging Goal) Along with comments, links between bloggers is another one of the currencies of the web. Lisa Dempster’s post is good at highlighting this and her ‘Linktown’ posts as well as the link collections at The Daily (Maybe) are quite good at spreading the love. I’m going to give that a go this month.

I feel like I’ve raised the bar a bit this month and there is a bit of reading involved too so spreading the goals across the whole month will be essential, which will hopefully be helped by the weekly word count goals.

The same as April goal, which went pretty well:

Two chapters a week on the WIP.

So far so good. I'm managing to stay motivated. I almost have the edits done on my novella

Hmmm, I never am good at these things.

1. Get a third and (hopefully) final draft of one of my short stories.
2. Finish up a short story I've been working on for a couple of months now.
3. Get past the prologue of my WIP novel. lol

I think those are very, very modest goals I'm setting for myself there...

My goal:
-I've got a lot of short stories in the works, so to have three solid pieces out on submission at a time by the end of the month would be pretty doable.
-I'm also on the reading board for a lit mag this month, so my goal is to read two pieces a day on days I have work, three pieces on days I don't. So far, it's been going well.
-Other misc non-writing goals: have school stuff at least close to figured out. Find potential apartments. Clean room. Fix misaligned tires

Wayne K said:

My agent liked my memoir as a novel, and so did a ton of AWers, so that's my goal--To rewrite the memoir my agent has out on sub.

Editors keep saying they like the writing and tha story, but don't like the competition as a memoir.

I can do this, I know it.

Click to expand...

Nope. Didn't do any of that..

I have 5 chapters of a new book though. I win the innernets. I like this one.

I'm working every day, so I'm gonna shoot for 10 chapters by June 1

Well let's just say - I'm slipping. Some of April has become May's goals.

- Finish the first draft of my WIP by the end of the month
- Finish editing Bandits wich is due to go to the editor at the end of the month
- Finish Beta reading the two manuscripts I have
- Write blog post for virtual tour
- Prepare materials for Balticon - book signing and children's program
- Help my son get his short story in shape to submit to another contest
- Help my daughter to submiter her short story to a school contest

Take a mini-vacation

MagicPen said:

Hmmm, I never am good at these things.

1. Get a third and (hopefully) final draft of one of my short stories.
2. Finish up a short story I've been working on for a couple of months now.
3. Get past the prologue of my WIP novel. lol

I think those are very, very modest goals I'm setting for myself there...

Click to expand...

Well I've done number 2. I just sat down and the words came out. It definitely helps to have all the ideas accumulate in your head so solidly; that's what really helped me.

The edits have been completed and it's off to the beta who said it only needed some minor work after the initial read through

Goal 1
- I must start on a book!

Goal 2
- Get my laptop repaired, or get a new laptop.

1. Start a blog.
2. Finish part 2 of a 2500 words story for class.
3. Edit my book.