Writing goals - the latest

So, how are my writing goals going.

If I remember last time, I said that I wasn't going to write pocket novels anymore, and that is still the case. I am sticking to writing magical realism for adults, and my children's books as well as short stories for women's magazines (womags).

I have finished the third book in the new children's series of books called 'The Rainbow School'. The first one, Billy, is still with my illustrator to do the cover and internal chapter headings. I hope to publish it this month so I can order copies in time for its book launch on 1 October.

Later this week I shall start planning and writing the final story in my adult magical realism series 'Geraldine's Gems'. I've already visualised some scenes so have an idea what happens in it and how it will end. I hope to get that all done and published by end of November, esp for Xmas.

Short stories - they are still a work in progress. My latest efforts need more thought and effort put into them, esp how the characters move from scene to scene or stage directions as they have been called. I have put them aside for now and have been working on another story intended for Woman's Weekly. It is the story I wrote the start and end to at the last workshop with WW I went to about writing stories with a twist so this is a warm twist in the tale.

Once I have finished that one, I am going to rewrite a story that WW rejected last year, turning it into a twist story, then will be a story for Take a Break's Fiction Feast. After that we shall see. I won't be having 5 published this year, which was my goal, realistically I will now aim for just one. I have one story still with TaBFF, so we shall see.

So, they are my goals for now. Hope yours are going as well as mine.

My writing goals - an update

So, how are you getting on with your writing goals? I think I am coming along well with mine. Here is my progress so far:

Have almost finished the last mermaid story. Have printed it out and reading it out loud to find any errors. Have found a few already. Once I have done that, I shall email it to my editor.

Have finished the pocket novel and my editor is hopefully editing it for me now. Once I get that back, shall read any comments and suggestions for the first 3 chapters, do those and then email it off with a synopsis to the editor of My Weekly Pocket Novels.

Have begun reading and editing the first two books in the Asperkids series called 'The Rainbow School'. Am sticking with that title because someone suggested it corresponds with the autism spectrum, and a week later I saw a rainbow showing as the spectrum in a magazine. Have edited the first one which is about Billy, and have sent off the first two chapters of it for an author to comment on at the retreat. Started editing the second one about Charlie fainting, today. Have plotted out the third one about Susie and her heart problem, to work on at the retreat. All these books are loosely based on my primary school memories as a child with Asperger's and other health problems.

Still writing short stories for womags. Have two still with Take a Break's Fiction Feast, and one with Woman's Weekly which was rejected by TaBFF. Have been rewriting another for WW, from comments I got on the story blog, which were v helpful and it now reads like a story not a set of thoughts.

My client's picture book is finished and with the illustrator to work on again. Should hopefully be ready to publish for end of May. He is excited and so am I.

So, that is how I am getting on. Am v excited about publishing my Asperkids series as they are close to my heart.

Next post will be about having Asperger's, a way to promote my new series before I have published them.

My Writing Diary - so far

So what have I been writing and how far have I got? Here is my writing news:

I have now emailed the pocket novel to my editor to edit for me. The plan is that when I get it back, if there are changes to make in the first three chapters, I will do those first then email those with the synopsis to the My Weekly Pocket Novel editor. Then I will start on the rest of the ms.

The quirky short story went out to Take a Break's Fiction Feast. Meanwhile, I got a rejection for the story I sent them in December. This has now gone to another magazine.

I have finished the ghost story for the Writing Magazine short story competition. Seems I might have sent it to them for another competition a few years ago, but I am still going to send it and see what happens. It is all printed out, ready to fill in the form and cheque to put with it.

I have finally got round to writing the story I started at the Women's Weekly workshop last month. It is now over 600 words, so getting near to the count of 1000, which is what I want it to be.

I have finished the current draft of the mermaid story and am now highlighting verbs. Lots of smiling going on. Lol. I shall go through those and either change or cut them out. Then I shall highlight all repeated words such as 'and'. Then the final edit will be to read through it.

I have also emailed the first 2 chapters and synopsis to the organiser of the SCBWI retreat, for the one to one with Melvin Burgess. Yes, he of 'Junk' fame. Can't wait for that, as those books are close to my heart.

In my author client world, I met my client yesterday and he has given me a few changes, inc the title of the book to do, which I will work on tomorrow. I shall then post them to him to check, he will do that and post back to me, so I can email them to the illustrator.

So, that is what has been happening in my writing world. I mainly have 2 of my own projects on the go, and my author client's.

My Writing Diary - update

So, here is where I am with my writing to date:

My writing came to a halt last weekend when my mum was admitted to hospital after a heart scare. She is back home now and getting better each day. She even went local shopping with me this morning.

Pocket Novel is now complete, but I have yet to start reading through it to check it is OK. Will get to this once I have a day free with 3 time slots available.

Quirky short story is complete and I put it on the story blog for comments today. I hope to get it out to Take a Break's Fiction Feast by the end of this week.

Meantime, I have printed out a ghost story that I wrote a few years ago for an anthology, but was rejected. I have started editing it to revise for a paranormal short story competition by Writing Magazine. The deadline is mid-May so I have plenty of time.

I have also started writing the third and final Mermaid ebook for 9-12s. I am enjoying this one because I have been adding talking sea creatures.

I have also now got a cover for the POD version of The Railway Angel and hope to publish that at the weekend.

Writing short stories for womags - My journey so far

As well as wanting to be known as an indie children's author, I want to become a short story womag (women's magazine) writer. It is not as easy as some might think. For the last year I have bought the magazines and read the stories, but have only slightly taken in what they are really about and what the magazines like to publish. I continued this way until a couple of months ago when I posted one of my stories on the Strictly blog for comments. Boy, did I get comments or what. A couple of the writers, who have been successful at womag writing, said that I should take the time out to study the stories properly. So, that is what I started doing, one magazine at a time. I have started with Take a Break's Fiction Feast as that is the magazine that most of my stories I have been writing seem to go to eg quirky or spooky, stories that TaBFF publish a lot of. The only magazine that publish those sort of stories. I have been writing the studies in a nice pink book. I will study more later today. I have already sent 2 stories to this magazine; one in December and one last week.

Other things I have found out about writing short stories for womags, the main character has to relate to the reader, and the story has to flow. More linear. I tried one with flashbacks, but now thinking about it, it did take the reader away from the story a bit. It is now more linear, going from day to day.

The next magazine I will study I think will be Yours. They have one story in the magazine every issue, which is fortnightly. I do know they are stories that have families in, esp grandparents and nostalgia. I usually study stories written by regulars (writers who have had more than 1 published) first then the rest of the stories.

Will be back in a couple of weeks to let you know how I am getting on.

Writing diary - Week 2

Starting Saturday

Saturday - This is a business day when I work on content. So I typed up and wrote more exercises for the writing exercise book I have been working on.

I blogged on my biz blog about view points.

I also worked on the pocket novel. Word count now 44,124

Sunday - Finished writing the Xmas story.

I typed up more of 'Checkmate' the pocket novel. Word count now 44,891.

Typed up rest of Xmas story. Word count is 2220.

Monday - Only worked in the morning because I had a hospital appointment in the afternoon.

Wrote more of the Pocket Novel.

Added scene to Xmas story. Also wrote out a character description sheet for it, which helped me realise something about the story.

Tuesday - Wrote some more of the pocket novel. Getting near the end.

Edited Xmas story. It's now 1982 words.

Wednesday - Not a lot of work done today as I had a dental appointment which took all morning. Had a large filling done. Tired me out. Only managed to analyse a story from Take a Break's Fiction Feast mag. Have been doing this all week to work out what they like publishing, the format, sentence length etc.

Thursday - Typed up more of Checkmate. Word count going down as I have been deleting scenes as well as adding. Today it finally reached over 45K; it's now 45,267.

Edited story. Now 1985 words. Now that I have worked out what makes a womag short story, I feel I am more confident in writing them. I write and type them up, then I write out a character description sheet and change and add things to make it good.

Friday (today) - Typed up another chapter of Checkmate. Word count gone down to 45,187.
Just edited and added lots to another womag story I wrote during November's NaNoWriMo. But also deleted the ending, so it's now fewer words than it started out as at 783. I wrote out a character description sheet first, which helped me find out what I needed to add, and still do.

That's my writing life for this week.

My NaNoWriMo plan

Are you doing NaNoWriMo this year? It stands for 'National Novel Write a Month'. You have to write/draft 50K of a novel or just 50K words without editing it. I did my own version last year, writing as many short stories as I could, which weren't many at all. I plan to do the same this year. The best way forward for this is to plan what you want to write. Here is my plan: I am going to write a short story for the 5 women's magazines markets I know about ie Woman's Weekly, Take a Break's Fiction Feast, The People's Friend and The Weekly News and Yours. I have jotted down which story I want to write for them except for WW, as I haven't worked that one out yet, but I will in time. It won't reach 50K as most of them will be under 2000 words. I might also plot out chapter summaries for my next adult romance ebook, and I will be working on my Pocket Novel. Lots to write, so thank goodness I have only one appointment in November, as yet.

So, are you doing NaNoWriMo? Let me know if you are and what you plan to write.

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