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Greetings, all! How did everyone do this week?
I was relatively sucessful at meeting my goals. I've been revising eight and nine a little bit, and I've just started on ten. Alas, there is still more planning to be done before I can start to write full speed. I did get my WOTF story to first-draft stage, so there's an accomplishment.
My goals for this week are to accomplish at least two of the following: -finish my story from Talespinner's trigger challenge -write my story for IB's trigger challenge -fix chapter 2 so I can send it out for editing (after the changes i made to the second half, there's a few things I need to add in) -finish Chapter 10 -start Chapter 11
Right now I'm wrapped in a quilt on my couch, planning on reading IB's novel before I get to my Writing Hours.
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Yes, I've written. No, I haven't achieved my goals.
I was editing my way through Book Two, The Ignored Prophecy, making a few, fine-tuning edits to Book One, The Shaman's Curse, and working on the outline for Book Three, still untitled. Then some new stuff occured to me. Stuff I want to add to the first book.
So, I'm only half-way through the second book, I have some new ideas for the third book, and I'm back editing the first book so those ideas will not just drop out of the sky. Meanwhile, I'm adding a few things along the way, too.
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If you don't focus too much on quantity, then we can celebrate that I've hit all my goals from last week. Plus, there was the added bonus of having submitted my short story "Trophic Decrescendo" to a mag I just recently discovered...with "Exhaust" slated to go out sometime next week.
New Goals * Continue with my "Metzgerhund Empire" chapter exchange / crit work.
* Continue with my physics research for my SF novel.
* Submit "Exhaust"
* Continue my world-building / order-of-events work on my new mainstream-ish novel.
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I have been trying to twist my plot into contortions--bending it and tugging at it to make it fit into my preconceived notions of what the storyline should be. After months of this, late on Thursday night I had this a-ha moment that makes changes the timeline of one event and everything else falls neatly into place. It's incredible that I have overlooked such an obvious solution for so many weeks, but I'm very happy. I've been culling through the first couple of chapters, trying to make the switch, so I didn't accomplish my goal, but I couldn't be happier about it.
My incredibly lofty goal for this week--take the three storylines that make up my novel and put them in order in one great big word perfect document. Change all the chapter numbers so they fit and really get to work editing for content. I'm really excited about it. If anyone has a few extra hours in their week that they would be willing to sell to me, I'm paying premium prices right now. Melanie
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Well, I realized I have lost momentum and interest in, "The Nimble hand and the Snake". That is not to say that I haven't been productive or written. I finished several short stories, dusted their bones and let their skeletons out of the closet. I also picked up on resubmitting old stuff that I lost track of when I was so sick the last few months, and I have found a spark inanother old project.
"Heavens Net and the Peircing Ray of Sun" was my last WOTF (Q3) and was an HM. The main reason for this was that the story was too large for its novella form in which I submitted it to the contest. It longs to be a novel and I have outlined and rekindled my desire to write it. It would be grand to get it finished, find it a agent, and win this quarter of the WOTF.
My, do I have grand ambitions. I should re read "Great Expectations" this week
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Well, I have yet to reach the page count I want, but I have written steadily for the last week-and-some, and I generally get at least two pages a day. I have also begun an outline collaboration with another Hatracker co-author. I got a second partial critique from Conn Iggulden, and I am grateful for his time, and am expecting to hear from two other writers I greatly respect.
I'm a bit over halfway done with Deb's cover (expecting to fiinish up--or very nearly--tonight). I had an interruption when I had to go to the emergency room earlier today. And, pretty soon, I'll have to do the illustrations for Jake.
Did I meet my goals? No. Am I disappointed because of it? No.
Goals for this week: Finish Chapter One of POTD. Finish cover painting for Deb. Get rough outline for next collaboration done. Get started on FFO art.
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I was doing good. During the weekend I was on a role, excited about writing and didn't want to stop. I think I got over a thousand words one day. Then I let myself get distracted, but I forgot what it was that distracted me. Then the flu hit our house and I was either too sick to care or too busy washing sheets with throw up on them to write, only my four year old daughter came through this without getting sick. Lets hope it doesn't hit her this week. You know it's bad when getting thrown up doesn't bother you at all.
My goals - I have a lot of crits I need to get to so I'd like to get through most of those. Then finish the short story for the IB fiction contest. Then work on new material for my novel.
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Wow, I see everyone's been pretty busy. I'm just finishing up the first complete draft of the prologue for my new fantasy novel. It's a WIP currently titled "Tears of Heaven". Ok, "just finishing up" is a lie, but I'm only a page away at most.
My goal is to finish the prologue and the final "working" draft of it and send it out for critiques. Then I want to start outlining the rest of the story. I want to do it in one book, but I may have to stretch it into two or three to tell the whole story.
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I didn't do so good, again, this week. I wrote a weird short for IB's contest. Way weird, kind of weirded myself out for a bit on it. I wrote about three pages in my novel, not really good pages, but at least the story is going down. I can always rewrite them later on. But I'm plugging away here. Keep on plugging, that's my goal.
Weak week goal, but until inspiration hits, that's all I really got.
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I'm excited. I've finished the the prologue! YES! 3,452 words. Not much I know(some of you guys are over 50k words), but it's a HUGE deal, but it's big to me. For anyone interested in taking a look, the 1st 13 are posted in the "Feedback for Novels" section. And I am looking for readers (hint, hint)
My bad, for rambling but I'm really excited/proud. I'm also a bit loopy because I staid up all night to finish. Going to work soon...the workplace is about to get really interesting.
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Thanks BoredCrow! I've literally been up since 7am yesterday (it's 5:30pm) my time with no sleep and the only thing keeping me up is the fact that I'm so excited! Ok, I'll stop now. I sound like an idiot.
[This message has been edited by Christian (edited February 11, 2009).]
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Well, I've been doing revisions and mulling how to punch up the conflict in Book Two. This morning my subconcious delivered! It's not ALL there, yet. But I've got a really good idea, now. It involves a new character (not entirely new, he was in the background) and it's going to give me some suspense as well as a chance to get in some of the backstory on a couple of other characters. I like it.
WooHoo! Book Two may actually get back on track after all.
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"Congrats Meredith. Are you shopping Book One around?"
Not yet. I'm getting some good feedback from other Hatrackers and making what will hopefully be final revisions. I want to have at least a draft of all three before I start putting Book One out there.
I've been a little stuck lately. Waffling back and forth on how to handle Book Two. But I think I've finally got a handle on it. Feels good.
[This message has been edited by Meredith (edited February 11, 2009).]
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Well Congratulations. I am in awe of the fact that you've finished three. I'm sure you'll keep us posted when you do sell, so that we can get a copy (and tell our friends to buy a copy).
I actually just bought a copy of Jamie Ford's book (hatracker) yesterday (Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet) and I'm definitely excited to start reading it.