Busy, Busy, Busy

So busy, I've fallen behind on goal updates. Since the last time I posted, I signed a contract with Cobblestone for Wickedly Ever After (release date sometime in May, unless something changes), completed the first round of edits on According to Luke, and started the first of several planned shorts for the new Wicked line. It's almost done now:

Wicked 1 (Contemporary)


The goal is to finish that one up today and start on the next one, so that I have two to submit when the line opens to in-house authors on February 7. It may be tight, since I expect the second one to run a little longer.

Wicked 2 (Regency)


And what about my full-length request from the agent? Honestly, I just haven't been able to contemplate tackling it. I may decide it's just not worth the effort, but I'm still thinking about it. We'll see.

A Deadline of Sorts

Okay, so now I have made a commitment and promised to finish this thing by Feb. 1. Backing off so there's time for a beta read/crit, I need to have the first draft done by the 23rd. That works out to a little over a thousand words per day, not counting the weekends (when any writing time I get is strictly a bonus).

Carnally Yours


Must.Do.It!

Slow Going, but...

Well, I only managed a little over 1,000 words on Saturday, but hey, it was something. Wordmeter looks like this:

Carnally Yours


Today is looking more promising than I thought because originally, I was supposed to go into the office to teach, a task that eats up about five hours of the day. Lucky for me (in a way, at any rate), two of my three kids were too snotty with the crud to go to school today, so I had to cancel the class. Of course, I'll be interrupted by them a million times over the course of the day, but at least it's not a work day any longer!

Today Is the Day!

Now that I know I can't submit my Wicked until February and realized I'll probably actually end up with a series of three stories, I'm noodling on that for a while while working on another project.

Since hubby and #1 son are gone camping until tomorrow, this is my day, which means I have to get as much written as I possibly can. In theory, it ought to be possible for me to get 3,000 words. Realistically, I'm aiming for 1,500.

Right now, the wordmeter looks like this:

Carnally Yours


I have to admit, I'm a little daunted by this story. Before I reread it, I was afraid it wasn't any good and might not be worth the effort to finish it. Now, I'm afraid it's so good I won't be able to finish it with any justice. (Does this ever happen to anyone else? God, I'm neurotic!)

Okay, I'm back

After the writing slump I had during December (Jackie, Ericka, don't laugh. Lol) I think I might finally be back. Well, considering I wrote 7,386 new words today, I think I am. Got my novella finished too, which feels great. Yay!

Anyway, just wanted to check in. This is my first 2008 post over here.

Oh yeah, and I've decided to keep tabs of my word count during the year. Here's what it looks like at the moment --

ytd word count: 10,238.

Happy weekend!

New Project

Ah, the excitement! I wrote the opening of the next story in the Gospel series longhand while I was at the Science Center with the kids yesterday. Got it typed up this morning and I really like it so far.

I have to admit, I'm still kind of feeling my way through the plot, so it's hard to guess at the final word count. For now, I'm thinking 25K, but that could shift a few thousand words in either direction before I write THE END.

According to Matthew


Today, I'd like to write at least 1,000 words, although with the kids home and the weather looking icky, it's not looking all that likely.

Good Day at the "Office"

Got more than 2,000 words. Three and a half scenes to go.

According to Luke

Tomorrow, another 2,000. I doubt I'll wrap up in 17,500 now, but if I get 2,000 tomorrow and 2,000 Friday, I should be done.

Rock on!

Done, at last

I have a word meter to share:

Yeah, I finally finished this story today. It took longer than I thought it would. Well, a hell of a lot longer than I wanted it to. But it doesn't matter. It's done! Yay. The first draft is done and I can now put it aside for a bit. Forget about it and then look at it with newfound love. ;)

I honestly thought I was never going to get through it. I had such a shitty week last week, that on Monday I decided to go back and read it from the beginning. This is something I never do, but as I read it, the spark returned.

And that's all I have to say for today. :D

Friday update

I managed to add more to the story yesterday and today. Though I was a little distracted by the TV tonight. :/

Anyway, here's the word meter:

At least I know how it's going to end. I also started the next chapter so I've got a place to go from when I pick this up again on Monday. Maybe during the weekend I can make a small list of the things that need to happen from here until the end. That would be very helpful.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Well, I Didn't Expect THAT!

Today, I was overcome with a new story idea. One so powerful that I decided I'd better write it down before I "lost" it. A couple of hours later, I've written more than 2,000 words, which must be some kind of record for me.

So for today, the word meters look like this:

Carnally Yours--no change


Going Greek--400 words added yesterday


According to Luke--all written today and still going!


Er, wow!

Major "Duh" Moment

So...I'm backing up all of my documents, figuring out which ones to burn to CD and which ones to keep on the hard drive when I see...AH! A Christmas short story I finished and never submitted (well, I entered it in a contest and it didn't win). It has a "needs revision" note on it....

I reread it...it's short (4500 words) and very sweet. Not my typical genre, but the ending brought tears to my eyes and I felt a little like the writer in Romancing the Stone as she bawls over her own manuscript.

Anyway...what to do with the darn thing? Then, I got a wonderful idea, give it to my readers free for a Christmas gift! I e-mailed Deanna, who agreed AND added the simply terrific idea of putting excerpts and teases at the back!

Unfortunately, to do this...there's been a few "but firsts" to get done with it. I sent it out for critique and got those changes back but haven't input them yet.

Then I realized I'd have to do my own cover for it (thank you hubby and his spare copy of Adobe Photoshop from the old computer we just got rid of) -- but thanks to that, I've wasted sooooo much time surfing pictures and putting together covers, I can see how it gets addicting!

Next, get it all pretty and go see if I can round up a free PDF converter to make it into an e-book.

I want it all done by 1 Dec...and Mojave Moon is going to be longer than I expected (possibly 25-30K!), so it doesn't look like I'll finish it much before the new year. So I won't be submitting to EC this year unless a miracle occurs. Oh well....

I am an official winner! ;)

Yeah, check this out:

I scrambled my manuscript, uploaded it and got this funky graphic. Oh, and a certificate too.

So, this is officially my second NaNoWriMo win. Yay.

I actually re-read the last few chapters this afternoon and the final first draft word count is 55,450. Not bad. Gives me some room to move during revision. The novel's also been printed out, and I will put it aside for a month.

Now all I gotta do is take some notes for the sequel! :/

Done

So I got my Untitled story finished. It finished at 19,365.

I'm checking in.

My last check in was Wednesday, November 14th @ 12:24am, so I'm checking in a little less than 48 hours later.

I started with 13,389 and have 19,365 so that gives me a total of 5976 an average of 2988 per day. And a total of 13,181. WOOT! An average of 2197 per day.

Untitled - COMPLETE


Untitled - EDITS


And my SVEN up to date as of today


I'm thinking of today and tomorrow off and hoping back on the horse tomorrow. *shrugs* We'll see.

All by myself today, so...

Here's where I'm at right now:

Not sure how many words I added today, but man... I'm totally into this tale.

And I really, really need to thank this wonderful, most awesome band.

You see, right now I'm in the thick of things. A sequence of bad things are going to get this novel to the end. And although I knew what had to happen, the order in which it should go was starting to feel a little murky. So, this morning after I dropped my daughter off at school, I stuck the headphones into my ears and played their album A Beautiful Lie.

During three of their songs -- From Yesterday, The Story and R-Evolve -- it all just came to me. Honestly, I kid you not.

Their music is my muse for today. And for that, I thank them.

xxx

Checking in a little earlier today

Not sure what happened, but I've met my target by 11:30am. The words were just zooming out of me today.

So, here's what it looks like now:



Crossed the 40k mark. Yay.

Now I've got this afternoon to work on the second edits of Valentine's Beast.

Write on! :D

Doing what I gotta do...

Last check in was November 8th at 11:30pm.
11/09 (24)
11/10 (24)

48 hours have passed since my last check in. I had a tiny melt down but I put on my big girl panties and did what I had to do. I've been telling myself it comes how bad I want it. Well I want it more than a chubby kid at a fat camp wants a Snickers. (Mmmm...Snickers)

Anywho lets get to it. The New Life project hasnt moved as much as the Untitled project but here are the numbers.

Started off with New Life at 1849 and I'm now at 2032 for a total of 183.
New Life


Started off the Untitled project at 756 and I'm now at 4012 for a total of 3256.
Untitled


3256 + 183 = 3439

An average of 1720 per day. Whew! I'm gonna sleep a little while and get back to it in a couple of hours.

Ooh you may have seen the word count has changed for the Untitled project, right now I don't know that word count is going to be so it may change from time to time. I need to get the story done by the 14th no later than 15th so I could get it polished and submitted by the 17th.

Chugging Along

Two-thirds of the way feels like a milestone. It's all downhill from here, right?

I was going to give myself a goal of 1,000 words today, but I have three parent-teacher conferences this afternoon. And stuff to go into the office and do (which I blew off yesterday). Gah!

Ah well, I writes what I can write!

It's like crack...

So I have NEVER started a story right after finishing one. But not only did I start another story, I've started two. That's right folks, writing has become my crack.

New Life



I started off with New Life at 1106 so I wrote a total of 743.
I started at 9 with the new untitled project so I wrote a total of 756.

Total = 1499

Thank GOD it's done...

At 25,115 words ROP is DONE! Sweet Jebus typing the end was better than an O. Okay, so it wasn't better than an O but it was a pretty close four hundredth.

This story pushed every boundary I had and features my very first semi what what scene.

So let's do a count, from the last time I checked in on the Tuesday the 6th at 2:49 am I have done a total of 2921 words. *faints*

So from October 31st, I've written a total of 10,336 an average of 1477 per day.

Whew. Go me! So I get 24 hours from the time this is posted to rest and recuperate before I hit the next story! Hope everyone else is out there rocking!

The Meter Moved

I have to go into the office again today, so I'm not expecting big things today, but I do think I can finish off the scene I stopped in the middle of last night and get to the nasty before I knock off for the night. At least another 500 words, that's my goal.

The only thing that's worrying me now is that at this rate, I won't finish until the middle of next week. I might have to start replotting/reworking Unbridled before I'm done. Which would suck.

/Sigh