More things in Heaven and Earth

Right. Tired of feeling useless/pointless. I think it's time to start making some tough goals for myself and getting myself somewhere in the writing world. With one professional sale and a diploma from Clarion West I'm sure that I can, I just have to stop being so wishy-washy about it.

So, to that end, I think I'm going to make some goals for myself in hopes that I can really buckle down and get this going:

1) Finish a draft of Raze and Ruin by August 31st. They say if you write 350 words a day, you can finish a novel in a year. If I can write 500 words a day, in half a year I can have 90k. It's a matter of being disciplined and making myself sit down and write every day.

2) Use skills developed at Clarion West to complete or revise a story a week. I have a number of stories, written before, during, and after CW which are almost in submittable form or have issues I can address and resolve to get them into submittable form. Additionally, I have a lot of ideas and half-written stories which are just begging to be fleshed out.

3) Submit or revise at least a story every week or two in submission queue. Obvious overlap with point 2. I'm sitting on several fics I have been shopping out to magazines, and I need to get those either back in the mail or back on the drawing board and then back in the mail. Especially the ones I've received favorable responses on. If I'm completing or revising a story a week this should be perfectly workable, but I'll give myself some wiggle room to allow for magazine response times.

Stating your goals helps. Now that I have those up, I have no excuses. I've got expectations to live up to.

How about you, fellow aspiring writers! Do you have goals for the immediate future?

We decided to re-instate the Weekly Writing Challenge over (UIowa's) Winter Break, which should be a nice exercise--I'm tired of not writing anything! So.

Through December 30, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through August 12, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through August 5, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

And, as a reminder, do submit something by the end of the month if you haven't already!

Through July 29, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through July 22, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through July 15, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through July 8, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through July 1, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

And, as a reminder, do submit something by the end of the month if you haven't already! _coherent, mister_duster, I'm lookin' at you, here.

Through June 24, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through June 17, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

Through June 10, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!

A few of us have decided that we want to become good, productive writers, and to do this, we need to... y'know... write. To facilitate this goal, we're going to try to write a short story (or a chapter of a larger one) every week. You're welcome to join us.

Through June 3, if you finish a short story or a chapter of a longer one, crow about it here! It doesn't matter if it's 600-word flash fiction or a 5,000 word tale, the point is to wrestle out something complete. Completion is the first step in polishing, you know. And give us the name, the wordcount, and (if you feel like it) a tiny little snippet so we can better cheer you on!