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We are now almost half way through 2012. Are you where you want to be in writing for this year? Are you where you wanted to be, or are you going to give yourself a bit harder of a nudge?

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Not quite where I wanted to be -- I wanted at least one more book up for sale at this point, and I wanted a lot more writing this month. On the other hand, I'm doing better than I was last year, and I think I'm on the right track.

-- Erin

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You sound like you're in a solid place. Keep up the good work.

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Funny, I'm not as far as I'd hoped, but it's still a good year. Productive doesn't neccessarily mean numbers; it means results. And the results are I'm writing a good novel that got me into an awesome workshop; it means I wrote some pretty solid outlines to get some shrot stories going.

The rest will come.

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I love your attitude

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I am no where near where I would like to be. I have only worked on my next project a little bit and have avoided editing and finishing the end of a young adult novel in process. I could def use some nudges from others to kick me into gear.

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*nudge nudge*

Good luck getting in gear. It can be so hard to get going, or to keep going once you get started.

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Thanks for the nudge! It has been a tough week with the holiday and my anniversary but I am back at the computer and my writing group meets this weekend!

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Consider yourself nudged! A little bit a day will get it done.

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thank you. I am aiming for an hour a day and then am surprised when more time flies!

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I'm pretty much exactly where I hoped I'd be. Since January I've:

completed the R&R rewrite on Golden Triangle, resubmitted it, had Carina Press accept it for Book 2 in my UF series with them, signed the contact for publication in February 2013 and completed the developmental edits;

wrote the novella Damage Control, planned the rest of its 4-book space opera series, and employed a cover artist in preparation for self-pubbing it in a few months;

participated in an intense 3-month one-to-one mentor program in which I helped my apprentice take her big SF novel from 1st draft to submission standard then walked her through the submission process;

sold the audio rights for Beauty and the Bastard to AudioLark and signed a contract for them to produce it as an audio book for publication in 2013; and

written a polished 25k of my (probably 90k) post-apocalyptic steampunk novel A Flight of Thieves, aimed at submission in mid-August.

I would have been further along with Flight if it weren't for the relapse that effectively wiped out my May, but I'd factored in the possibility of that happening somewhere along the line so I'm still on track, if a little more pushed than I'd like to be.

Wow, you're having a truly excellent year. I'm sorry you had a relapse, but you're making great progress despite that.

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Thanks, Bonnie.

Wow, you've been able to get a lot done! Congrats! I hope you are feeling better now.

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Thanks!

I'm nowhere near what I had initially planned before all the stuff with the house and spouse's job and all the rest. But I have managed to keep writing, and I'm still making good progress.

The mechanics of writing through the chaos have turned out to be a bigger problem than the motivation. Because we have to make the house spotless on very short notice, I can't just leave my writing out where I can reach it. I have a big binder with several current stories that I can take out to work on, but somehow the one I need is never there :p The past few weeks, I've been working on the bad fairies, though, so that's been easier.

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Well done for keeping going despite the upheaval.

My writing area is spread out so I can relate to the problem. Good luck on continuing progress.

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After this Tuesday, my big deal family distractions should be settled, leaving only my job hunt breaking my creative concentration. I'm nowhere near where I want to be, and have to start almost from scratch to build habits again, but I'll get there.

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Good luck getting back on track. Do you think your new habits will be the same as the old one, or have things changed?

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Good question. I'll tell you when I succeed in something. Right now I'm scrambling on deadlines and redesigning my study thanks to an extra room now that my oldest moved out lock stock and barrel.

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No, I'm not where I thought I would be. My original goal was to have my novel done by June and readying it for publication. Then I got into a critique group, and it needed a lot more world building. Since then, it's been a struggle to do the revision -- I feel like I'm eeking out the revisions.

But I also went to ConTemporal, a Steampunk science fiction convention, this weekend and attended a workshop on Finances for Writers. Years back, I stopped doing short stories and articles because they were cutting into novel writing time (at one point, they were a form of procrastination when I got stuck on the novel). But the workshop made me realize that because of that decision, I've gotten little out there in years. So I'm looking at short stories and articles again while I work on the novel. This time, I'm not writing a story, then scrolling through magazines hoping to find a place where they fit -- I'm looking for upcoming deadlines and writing stories for those. I'm working on one due by June 30, and then a non-fiction piece to break it up.

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That sounds like a good strategy, Linda.

My last couple of projects have been novellas. I find them a satisfying compromise between the rich world of novelling and the completion satisfaction of short stories.

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I think I'm doing pretty well. I've gotten the novel I'm self-publishing in August done on time and all I need to do now is the final edits/formatting stuff with Createspace. (And Kindle, can't forget that!).

I've also started the sequel, something I've been wanting to do for the past few months.

I've done 4 more lessons in HTRYN which has been languishing.

And I have a new trilogy idea I want to explore soon.

So yeah, not a bad 6 months at all.


CA

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Sounds like an excellent first half

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Pretty good this first half of the year, considering how much moving I've been doing.

Released 3 novels and 4 novelettes and short stories. 5 books are now in POD releases. Plus, I attended two fantastic workshops with Dean Wesley Smith while we were on the Oregon Coast.

As for raw writing, I am ahead on my wordcount, but behind on the drafts I wanted finished. I call it good. I'm getting in the words!

I'm hoping the last 6 months of the year will see the continuation of progress along all aspects of writing and publishing.

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You are such an inspiration. May nose is to the grindstone now! Good luck for the rest of the year

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Hehe, thanks. I'm having a lot of fun writing, and that's the important part.

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If I break it down into three catagories, I can state it thusly:

- New writing: I'm ahead of my predicted curve. I think I'm almost 11K words ahead.

- Completed works: I'm behind the eight ball. I wanted to have at least 6 completions by this time of year. I have 2.

- Submissions: Again, behind where I'd like to be. Not as bad as my completions, but still behind. I wanted to be shoving things out the door regularly. At least once a month. I've got a total of 4 submissions all year.

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This is why a 6-month look at the goals is a good thing. It means we still have the rest of the year to get back on track. Good luck with it!

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Wow, I hadn't realized until just now how far off I am. Not so much in a bad way. In January I knew that I would move this summer, have a "real job", but still be working on my writing. Now..in July...I have moved, gotten the "real job", and have decided to apply for an MFA program. My how things have changed. I'm already ready to go back to school...and it's only been two months since I graduated.

Good luck with getting into the program. Sometimes you have to adjust, and that's all to the good.

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Thanks!

I have a first draft of "Thomas Twine's Terrific Time travelling Toilet", and my next non-fiction book is underway. That's about where I wanted to be.

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That's great! Congrats!

I just want to say that I LOVE that title.

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This itself reminds us the need to understand and realize where we stand vis a vis our objectives. In deed, such thinking propels us more forward among a community of Forward Writers. Thanks

mpv.muthu

Good luck with the second half of the year.

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