So, here we are, 2023. I feel like the last few times I’ve tried getting goals scribbled down I end up loosing track of where I am on them. This time I’m hoping to be able to stick to them much better. I feel more focused, more capable at the moment and like I can actually follow through with these plans.
1 – Publish my zombie novella
2 – Publish one vampire era story to my ko-fi a month (this covers me till august)
3 – Continue writing War Child (2022’s NaNoWriMo project)
4 – Find publishers to submit Penal Earth to
5 – Complete Black Blood (just need to do the final edit)
6 – Continue planning for Penal Earth 2
7 – Spend no less than half an hour a day, for at least twenty-five days of the month working on writing projects
8 – Blog on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays
9 – Continue serial killer story
10 – Find anthologies to submit to
This feels like a big list, like there’s a lot I’ve lined up for myself. I do feel like I can do it though, I don’t feel like I’m fooling myself with what I want to achieve in this calendar year. A lot does rest on me continuing working on my life in general. I’m going to try and map out some personal growth goals as well, but I’m not sure where I want to start with that one.
This year has been a ‘Get Shit Done Year’. Writing wise I didn’t have a lot of focus in the early part of the year as that attention was on personal matters. Those were happily resolved and I could put a little more attention into writing.
I did set out goals, but they ended up getting lost in the churn a little. The core focus was on getting the Zombie book done. That, was essential for this last year. It’s going to be three years past when I had first wanted to get it published, but better late than never. It is done. All that needs to be done is have the artwork for the cover finished (the artist has been super patient and trust me, the cover is awesome!), and the formatting needs to be done. Once they’re done, it’ll be published. Hopefully the early part of next year, but definitely next year at some time.
Another project that had a lot of attention this year was Penal Earth. This story has been on the go since 2015 but I’ve really honed into a story, the setting, and the feel of the world in the last couple of years. This year I’ve got it to the point where I can’t take it any further, I think it’s as good as I can make it and I’m really proud with it. The next stage with this one is to have it edited and or submit to publishers. I do want to test the waters with it as I think it’s my best written tale and I think it does have appeal to it. If it doesn’t get snapped up, I’ll self-pub it.
Next up is The Vampire Era. This has a similar history to Penal Earth, in that it’s been on the go for a long time. This one even longer than Penal Earth, bit again. It’s had a lot of work on it this year, and has come as far as I can take it. Also like Penal Earth I’m very proud of it, and hope it finds a following. The main difference with this ones future is that I’m going to publish it on here. It’ll be released on Welcome To My Nightmare tier and the first post is live. It’s a nine episode first season, and will run until August if I remember right. After it’s come to the end of it’s run I’ll put it in the list to be professionally edited and then I’ll self-pub it. I won’t do that for at least twelve months after the final post has gone live.
Speaking of Ko-Fi, I don’t get a lot of income from the site, those who do support my work on here are all awesome people and I can’t tell you how much it means to me for you to give me your hard earned money. I’m barely a newborn when it comes to writing careers, and I don’t expect anything but what I do get I’m incredibly grateful for.
Although I don’t write for the money it’s nice when I am paid for my work. The way I look at it at the moment is, if it pays for my fees for my web domain each year, then I’m happy. And thankfully for the last few years it has done.
Back to the fiction, and we come to Black Blood. This story is not at the stage that say Penal Earth and The Vampire Era are. It want’s one more deep edit and then it’s going to be ready for an editor. At the moment I’m feeling like self-pub is the route for this one, but I’ll leave it open for the moment. This has been another long term project that has come a long way during 2022 and I’m very glad it’s moved in the direction it has. It’s not far off done, but isn’t quite there yet.
A project I got quite deep into this last year has been a series of serial killer stories that are like The Vampire Era in that they are set up like a TV series and will all build to a conclusion. This one isn’t anywhere near done yet though. It is a huge mess, but I’m not worried about it. It’s one where I need to focus on getting the individual stories tidy and then I can add in the little knots to tie them together. Some with be big, heavy duty knots. While others will be smaller ones. It’s a long way off, and one that isn’t a priority for this year, but I think I’ll be working on it here and there.
I was looking at starting Penal Earth 2 in the early part of 2023 but I’ve got a few hard decisions to make about plot lines and where I want to take it, so I’m not quite ready to get it off the ground just yet.
The first part of next year will be getting a first draft of the NaNoWriMo ’22 project completed. I’ve been editing it this month, well editing is a strong word. I’ve been going through tidying it up and making a sort of bible for it as I go. Again, this one is a long way off but will be a priority for the next twelve months.
Black Blood will also be a major project in the first part of the year as well.
2023 isn’t going to be a make or break year for my writing career. It’s going to be a series of steps forward.
Howdy, folks! How are we all doing? Are people having a good festive period? Mine has been pretty darn good, but it’s back to work tomorrow. Which I am looking forward to, I enjoy my day job a lot and I like the routine (if shift-work has such a thing), and as most of my shifts are early’s I tend to have the rest of the day to get stuck into what I need to.
In the week before Christmas I had very little time to focus on writing, but I did manage to squeeze writing time in. This years NaNo project is still in process and I didn’t want to go too many days without working on it. I’ve had seven days this month where I haven’t done any writing at all, and likely a few days where I haven’t worked on NaNo ’22, but I’ve not let too many days in a row where I’ve not worked on it. Something I’ve talked about a lot on here is momentum, and I think it’s something that’s very important. I’ve lost momentum before and it’s very hard to get it back. I’m worried it’s going to happen again, so I’m hoping I’ve done enough so far with this story to stop me from hitting a roadblock that stops me dead like has happened in the past.
I don’t want this year to end with a bang, and I definitely don’t want it to end with a whimper. I want it to end with a nice steady pace, similar to where I am at the moment which rolls right into 2023 and continues.
I haven’t spoken much about my mental health publicly of late, that’s simply because I’m feeling better than I have done in a long time. Okay, then I’ve ever felt. Yes, there’s a long way to go. There are still things which really eat away at me, and as I kinda tick one thing off another three crop up. But I’m working on it all. I have less bad days now then I used to and the good ones are more frequent. I don’t believe it’s one or the other. I think some days are a mix of both, while others are neither. Those are the days I have most of, but even those days tend to be more towards the positive side of life.
The biggest lesson I feel I’ve learnt of late is to get a decent amount of sleep. Life is a lot more settled when I’m more rested.
We all have that one co-worker that don’t do much 😉🤣
Good evening folks, just a quick post tonight. I’ve managed about 10k words of editing in the last couple of days. I feel like this story (NaNo ‘22) has a lot of potential, I just need to wrangle it a little.
I’ve been looking back at the last twelve months of writing, and I’m pretty pleased with it. They’ll be a more focused list on that soon, that post will also look at 2023 a little.
Right I’m off to bed, retail at Christmas is a workout and a half. So a good nights sleep is a great place to start.
I have edited 6000 words on this years NaNoWriMo story. I’m getting stuck into the story, mostly tidying it up but also trying to get a decent picture of how the story is going to play out.
I’ve started on a couple of short stories, one feels like it’s fizzled out while the other might end up being a novelette, but we’ll see.
We’re nearing the end of the year and I’m thinking hard about my goals for next year. This past year has felt like it’s been a preparation year, with the aim of getting a few pieces lined up for either publishing or submitting in the next two years. The zombie book will be published next year. Penal Earth will be pitched to publishers or submitted in open calls. Black Blood needs one more pass I think, and then it’ll be ready to go. The vampire book will be released in a serialised form on my Ko-Fi page, with the first story being released early on Christmas day. What is being posted on Ko-Fi is likely not the final draft, I’ll have it edited and then self-publish it in maybe 2024. I’m not sure yet.
I do have my goals for next year written out, but I’m not sure if I want to share them here just yet.
Right, that’s all for the night. Have an awesome time, folks!
I wrote 50082 words for this years NaNoWriMo, hitting the target at about 9:40 last night.
This years NaNoWriMo got off to a slow start for me, I didn’t get caught up until the 23rd of the month, then I had a couple of days ahead of the goal, then a couple of days behind and then I brought it home on the last day.
It was a month where I was feeling like I was chasing the goal each day. My lowest word daily count was 247, while my highest was 4026.
The month started off with a busy schedule at the day job which didn’t leave me much time for wrangling the words. I’d write before work, then during my breaks and then get stuck in after I got home. Most of the time when I was writing at work I’d not really be able to get really in-depth with the work, but I did manage to get some words down. These feel more like I was thrashing out a synopsis of the scene/chapter I was working on. I’ve now got a lot of little synopsis to build from.
Other scenes I’ve managed to build a pretty solid part of the story which won’t need much tidying up when the time comes.
Where I’m at now is I’ve got a lot scenes scattered throughout the document and I’ve got to start figuring out how to connect them all. I don’t think it’s as bad as I might be fearing, but there is a bigger problem I’ve come up against. Originally I saw this as a three book arc, but was worried I wouldn’t have enough to fill three books. Now that I’ve started it, I think I’ve potentially got a lot more than three books worth of story to tell. I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me with this one.
This story, working title ‘War Child’ has been one I’ve been wanting to tell for quite some time, but have been intimidated by it. I feared I wasn’t capable yet to do it justice. But after some encouragement from friends and peers I decided to dive in head first. I’m so glad I did. This is going to be one where I think I am going to be pushed as a writer. I’ve spent so much of the last year trying to get stories finished and ready to either self-publish or submit I’ve forgotten what it’s like to begin crafting a new world.
Away from the writing part of NaNo I didn’t get much chance to host or even attend write-ins. Between the manic work schedule at the start of the month and a slow cash flow it just wasn’t on the cards. The one I did manage to host turned into a solo session. Which was okay, I got words down. It’d have been nice to get a few faces there though, hopefully next year I’ll be in a better position to be the ML I really want to be. I don’t feel like I’ve had the chance to step up how I want to. Between Covid and non-writing matters that have cropped up I’ve not really been able to dedicate the required time and effort to it that I’d have liked.
What’s next? I’m going to continue with War Child, but I also need to get The vampire book ready as I’ll be releasing that via the Welcome To My Nightmare tier on Ko-Fi. So I need to pull my finger out and get that final pass of edits done!
1- finish this pass of Black Blood. This one feels more daunting then it is. I just need to sit my butt in the chair and work!
2- Make the final tweaks to Vamp book. This one shouldn’t be too bad either. It’s just a case of going through and making some corrections to spelling and the odd small continuity fix.
3- Finish the short story I’ve just started. Um, yeah this one could be challenging.
4- Type up the short story I’ve just finished. This should be fairly straight forward.
I’ve eased off writing a little the last few days due to family and work taking priority. But today I’ve got stuck into editing some short stories for Ko-Fi, which means I’ve got stories scheduled for the Welcome To My Nightmare tier through the end of the year. Then next year, I’ll have something that I’ve been working on for a long time kicking off…….
In total I’ve edited 13751 words on four different stories today.
I’ve also stepped back a bit from Black Blood. I realised I wasn’t doing the deep edit it needed and was just going through the motions a bit. This tells me I’m burnt out on this story and I’m going to put it to one side for a while. I’ve got notes keep popping up in my head for it so I’ll note those down and when I get to editing it I’ll put those where they need to be.
In the meantime I’ll be working on Vampire Era as that’s the next on the schedule. I do need to make one minor addition to Penal Earth that I think will explain something a little better. It’s not a change, it’s just a small detail that I need to do a little research on, but it’ll likely be less than a sentence when I do add it.
Speaking of Penal Earth, I am in the very early stages of planning book two.
The last few weeks I have felt off pace, so I’m going to try and step it back up to the level I know gives me a decent level of productivity.
How are we all doing today? I wrote about 600 words during the write in this morning. And I’ve also had a bit of a sort out of my desk this afternoon. I feel a little more organised now.
The gears are really beginning to turn at the moment and I’m getting really eager to wrap up Zombie, Penal Earth, and Black Blood. Other stories are really shouting at me and it is very much time I put these three longer term project to bed.
Right, have an awesome afternoon and evening folks. I’ve got a long day at work tomorrow so likely won’t be posting then but will be writing at some point.
I have been really struggling to get anything writing related done the last few days. Like all of us, I have a lot going on and am feeling for those in Ukraine at the moment. But I’ve got to push on and get cracking. There’s no excuses. I can take a day, but thats it. It’s not hard for me to work on writing for half an hour five days a week. This coming weekend is going to be very busy so I doubt I’m going to get that half an hour. Because, it’s not just half an hour. I’ll have a timer going to half an hour, but I’ll be getting settled beforehand. Things like getting some music going, making sure I have a drink. I might need to see to some writing housekeeping. Then there can be a little time afterwards where I’ll do what I’m doing now and writing a blog post, or making some notes for tomorrows work.
So although I set a timer for half an hour it rarely is. That’s why when it comes to days when I’m doing a nine or ten hour shift I’m not noting down on my week planner that I’ll be word wrangling that day. Or if I’ve got work and other plans I won’t be setting a writing goal for that day. That doesn’t mean I won’t be writing. I’m going to try and make more effort to write in small gaps of time that I’ve got during the day. I’ve been doing that but some of it is writing for myself. I’ve got my struggles with mental health. I’ve talked about it here before, and I’m trying to write out the things I’m trying to figure out. I’m writing it like it’s for this blog, and some of it I will be publishing here. What I’m working on at the moment I’m not going to, but some I will.
I’ve had a little therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy and those have given me some very helpful tools in how to start looking into the whys of my struggles. It’s something I’m finding hard but also quite freeing. I’m also at the start of this journey and it’s a journey that doesn’t have a destination. And I’m really cool with that. I want to keep growing as a person for as long as I am able to.
Tonight I have a writing group to go to, it feels good saying that. Covid is still there, but I think we’re getting to the point where we’re learning to live with it.
I’m going to end this post by saying that I’ve had three people who I greatly respect telling me I’ve got the ability to be in essence a working writer. This is something I need to attach to more. I let the self-doubt dominate and cripple me at times. This last week has been a good example of that. I say I haven’t written for non-writing reasons, but nine times out of ten, no matter what is happening around me stops me writing. I’ve got past that, and I know how much being productive helps me as an individual maintaining a strong level of mental health. The more I create, the stronger and more capable I am. It’s not a false sense of ability, it’s knowing I have the ability to create and make this writing game work.
Peter Germany's World 