Wednesday, February 1, 2012

I Love the Smell of a New Month in the Morning

So today begins a new month in what I'm affectionately calling "The Year of Get Off Your Butt and Do More Than Talk About Writing" (or TYOGOYBADMTTAW, for short). With this new month begins a new project, a new goal, and a new deadline. February's goals are as follows:

  • Write 1000 words per day, Monday through Friday. This adds up to a monthly goal of 21,000 words.
  • Begin Defenders. This is my paranormal YA project, the first book in a five-book series. It centers on a city called Rafcate, which was attacked and nearly destroyed 150 years ago. To make sure that never happens again, every citizen is drafted into military service at the age of sixteen. The main character is a 16-year-old girl named Laurie, who is looking forward to serving, until the body of a teenage girl shows up on her doorstep with a message about treason and revolution.
  • Finishing editing Rosetta. I'm about 70 pages into my edits, and I'm rewriting significant portions of the first draft, but my hope is that I can finish the first round of edits by the end of the month, after which I'll finally be able to allow other people to read it and offer critiques.
  • Submit short stories. I'm also looking to write and submit some short stories to magazines and contests. I'm on Duotrope, but if anyone knows of any other websites like it, please let me know.

My writing goals for the year are fairly ambitious, but I'm slowly starting to learn that big goals and hard deadlines will keep me writing and moving forward better than anything else. How do you keep yourself motivated to write and edit?

4 comments:

  1. Some awesome goals here. I'm trying to get my butt back in writing gear as well. 1000 words a day ain't a bad goal, and not too difficult to achieve either. I think I may have to steal that from you :)

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    1. Go for it! I find that as soon as I have fewer than 800 words left, it somehow feels like I'm practically done (even though I've barely started).

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  2. 1000 words a day is quite the goal. I can do that on days off from work. But four pages a work day is daunting! I wish you great success in reaching your goal. You have a new follower : me. My guest on my post today is the ghost of William Faulkner. He's talking to new writers. You might enjoy it, Roland

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    1. Ooh, that sounds really interesting. I'll definitely go check it out. Thanks for following me!

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