Tell us about your ultimate writing goal...

O'Dandelo said:

What is your ultimate goal in writing fiction? I don't mean as in "famous novelist." That's sort of a given.

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Not really. I have no intention of writing a novel.

I'd like to make enough pro sales to qualifying markets to be eligible to join SFWA.

That would be rather nice.

Wait--West Pigeon is a reputable market? *waits for email*

I'd like to make a SFWA sale, and maybe hopefully gain SFWA membership.

Well, I want my novel finished, polished and sitting in the slushpile at DAW by the end of the year. That's one of my big, short-term goals.

The other one is to get some of the novellas published before I'm old and grey.

And, of course, to get a story into Lightspeed/Asimov's/Strange Horizons/Apex by the end of the year. Preferably all four, but that might be pushing it.

My short term (2012) goals are:

* Upgrade my SFWA membership from Associate to Active (which means just one more qualifying sale to add to the 2 I had in 2011)

* Attend at least one SF book convention (never been to one)

* Continue meeting my W1S1 goals and producing lots of new short fiction

* Continue improving until I feel I'm good enough to begin writing a novel that could actually sell.

* Begin writing (or at least do a lot of work plotting out) the first novel.

Getting an agent and selling a novel are my more immediate short term goals (I have queries and a partial out, so I've started towards it... the rest is out of my hands). But in terms of shorts, it'd be nice to crack a few more of the pro markets.

I want to attend either a Sci-Fi or Horror convention. I am going to Dragon Con this year so that's a start.

I want my horror novel on an editor's desk!

I want to finish my two short story horror collections and start subbing some of them.

Writing goal four years ago: to write enough, for enough people, to make a full-time living as a writer.

Accomplished starting three years ago.

Writing goal now: transitioning what I write from pro blogging and business documents to fiction and travel writing projects.

Fortune, fame and groupies. Is that too generic of a long-term goal?

Three year goals:
1. Be able to live comfortably off my writing income.
2. RWA-PAN & Active HWA memberships.
3. 50+ career sales.

I have not been writing for very long. First goal: learn to write a decent story.

Short term goal: get one short story published in a reputable, paying SF/Fan magazine.

Medium term goal: get several stories published, so I know its not a fluke. And get to know other writers/people generally in the SF/Fan writing community as I go.

Long term: Improve my ability to write, and my understanding of storytelling, to the point where I feel ready to embark on a novel. And I expect I'd continue to write shorts as well.

After that: Write a novel good enough to get published... but that's a long way down the track from here.

Progress to date: I am finishing stories, and submitting them. I'm getting rejections, including some higher tier forms and some personals. I'm regularly making it out of slush to the next level or the final one, but have not yet received a final acceptance. I hope to keep going, and not give up before I do!

EDIT: I went to a one day course not long ago, given by a SF author who has published more than 180 short stories. He said that he still finds short stories just as difficult to write as when he first started. But, his stories are now a lot more ambitious.

My current goals are an active SFWA membership (one story left), and to finish my novel series so I can start in on something new. I should be able to achieve the second goal by the end of 2012, barring disasters.

I'd like to take writing classes to help me with my pacing and descriptions, and I'd like to get another draft finished (which isn't another rushed s***storm like my NaNo draft from last year).

My ultimate goal? To get published at all. More short term goals include finishing the plotting for my fantasy novel in the next couple of weeks, then the novel itself while on deployment. Everything else is far enough in the future I'm not currently worried about it.

Polenth said:

Getting an agent and selling a novel are my more immediate short term goals (I have queries... out, so I've started towards it... the rest is out of my hands).

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^ That, basically.

My small goal is to prove to nepotistic Polish reviewers that I'm a better writer than their pals and torment those pals with envy by publishing in USA.
...What? Revenge is a great motivator.

My bigger goal, a dream rather, is to be able to sustain my family by writing something outside of promotional copies.

I have written a series of fantasy novels and one historical romance, some of which are in the rough-first-draft stage and others of which went through multiple re-writes. They are unpublished and I'm not sending them out this year.

In the past three years, I've written dozens of newspaper articles for a local paper. Those, I got paid for, which was nice, but creatively it's not where I want to be.

My goal for this year is to explore some new genres. I'm working on a screenplay now, plan to start a blog later this spring, hope to write a cookbook over the summer (first draft, at least), and, if I get a chance, try my hand at speech writing. I also have a short story I want to write and one long short/novella which needs work. By a year and a half from now, when my younger kid starts preschool, I hope to have a realistic but interesting strategy for making a living as a writer.

Being me and being absolutely insane, I have a lot of goals, but these are my most important short-term ones:

>Be able to support myself off writing/editing by the time I graduate high school (2 years from now and I've recently accumulated my first three paid gigs/articles/posts)

>Write and submit more short fiction(hence why I'm here)

and

>Finish the next draft of my damn novel of a thousand drafts, send it to recently acquired beta readers and somehow beat it into submittable shape so I can start submitting it before the year is up.

Those are my goals. I love some of yours, especially getting into the SFWA. I happen to be Canadian, but I know when I manage to join the Canadian equivalent I'll feel like I've accomplished something.

my goal? Well, to be the next JK Rowling. Really, I don't have to pay tax for dreaming, then why I have to limit myself?

this year goal: sell 10,000 copies first

My immediate goal is just to get paid for a story. That hasn't happened yet. After that, I'd like to sell to SFWA-qualifying markets and become eligible for membership.

More long-term, I'd like to write and sell a novel and make a living as a writer. Certainly doesn't have to be an extravagant living, but I'd love to be able to quit my night job (and hopefully, down the road, allow my gf to quit the job she hates as well).

To have stories I've written, the ones that deserve it, at any length, accepted and published in respectable venues.

caw