back in business

Turning 31 wasn't nearly as bad as 30, but aging still sucks in my book. So I took this week to re-group and re-energize; get myself prepped and ready to head back out into the world and "git r done."

I took a free online workshop entitled "How to Write 50 Books in a Year." I know it sounds absolutely insane and a little unbelievable, but its not really the number that's important here, it's how you go about it. What these two sisters, Elle James and Delilah Devlin, (both romance novelists), teach is mostly organization, time management, and motivation. And really, everyone needs some of that, while I need a lot of it. And not just once. I need to kick myself into gear at least four times a year, with mini-kicks in between. One of the big lessons taught was to make clear and detailed goals for yourself, starting huge and funneling down into specifics. That's what I did.

My main goal is to have 10 books written by the end of 2009, five single-title novels of roughly 100,000 words each, and five category romance novels of roughly 50,000 words each. I'm sure it sounds like a massive goal, but it's doable. I planned it all out, even giving myself some leeway in between. And the trick is, even if I only get 9 books by the end of 2009. That's still 9 more than I have now!

For my current novel, I'm back to the 1000 words a day goal until I reach 100,000 words. And I began the planning stages for my first category romance as well. I've already began fleshing out the characters with Holly Lisle's Create a Character Clinic. She's absolutely amazing. Check her out through the link on my Favorite Shops link on the right. I bought her Clinic bundle which includes, Create a Language, Create a Character, Create a Culture, and Create a Plot. They really are detailed and inexpensive for all you get.

Do you remember I mentioned that when I went home last weekend, I had an idea for a new novel? Well, I decided to formulate this idea as a category romance that I'd like to push toward the Harlequin Blaze line (though I've heard rumors that Blaze may be on the chopping block soon). Blaze is basically contemporary with more steamy love scenes than a typical category.

The gist of my CR (category romance) pertains to a woman who has it all; a successful career in finance; a wealthy and respected fiance; a beautiful home; and a busy social calendar. That is until she turns down a scandalous proposition from a sought after investor, and is promptly fired. Her fiance is mortified by the news of her unemployment and dumps her, leaving her without a place to live, or any real friends. Blacklisted by her former company, she has no choice but to go back to her home town and stay with her parents until she can figure out what she wants to do. But going home means she's thrust back into the neighborhood where everyone knows your name...and your business. And then there's the boy next door, who's all grown up and more man than she ever hoped to handle. Soon, she begins to wonder why she ever left at all.

Whatcha think? The picture is the best I could find of a sexy mechanic, which is the profession of my hero, but he doesn't really resemble the dude in the picture at all. If any of my readers can find a nice hot mechanic pic, I'd be grateful.

Have a wonderful weekend and catch you next time.

grand total: 56029

Quote of the Day: The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it. ~Jules Renard, "Diary," February 1895

i'm back

I have a habit of doing this. Creating a blog and then letting it go until I forgot where the blog was, what it was about and how to retrieve it.

Not this time. I wrote it down. On something permanent. Yep. I'm learning.

I had to post today, because I'm moving forward and I feel good about it. And well, I read that one of my gurus, Holly Lisle, says that creating a blog formalizes your goals and makes you more responsible for getting the things you want done. I'm hoping she's right.

I've got goals, but nothing specific as of yet. That will come as I see how this new system I'm implementing works. Today, it worked. And quite well, may I add.

Holly practices Ten Minute Magic. Which means she does almost everything in ten minute increments. What this does is break down big things into manageable and focused periods of time to move yourself forward on a project, or anything you'd like to complete.

Today I wanted to try this out. I had laundry to do, scheduling to input and writing to complete. So I set my nifty little computer timer to ten minutes and did the laundry until the timer went off, which was plenty of time actually to get the load folded and the next batch loaded into the washer. I set it again and did my scheduling. The timer went off and I was done with that. Then I gathered all my story notes, read through them and set up my computer to begin where I was next in the story. I set the timer. In ten minutes I had two paragraphs. Ok so it doesn't sound like a lot of words, but it's two paragraphs more than I had written in a month. Put that in your perspective and smoke it! I ended up setting the timer roughly 10 more times and got a couple loads of laundry finished and guess what?? 876 words written! If I can do this daily, I can get 22,776 words written by May 17, which is the next Cactus Rose meeting (my local chapter of the Romance Writers of America). I put a dollar into their goal journal, saying I would get 20,000 words written on my manuscript by the next meeting. More importantly this is another couple of steps to getting my novel finished. Hooray!

What I'm hoping will happen is that I'll get faster in my ten minutes and more prolific, getting more quantity as well as quality done. I won't get my hopes up. But I am a dreamer.

Anyway, I had to tell someone. And you're it.

Also, if you had a moment, check out Holly's site. She's got lots of cool things there in regards to writing...free plotting courses, helpful writing tips, great character, plotting, world building, etc. courses for a fantastic price and a newsletter that comes out every week detailing what she's working on and a section where she answers questions from people like me. I like her because she's a real person, making a decent living as a writer. www.hollylisle.com

Until next time...