Little break

Since I'm so close to finishing my first draft I've decided to take a teeny tiny break from blogging.  I hope to be back by the beginning of March. 

If my time away is as productive as I think it will be then my return post will hopefully be to announce the completion of my first draft. 

Happy writing and blogging, oh and Valentine's Day too!

50,000!

It happened!  Finally!  Yesterday I cracked the 50,000 word count on my WIP.  It's been a long time coming (almost 5 months) and I'm so glad I'm finally there.  I also plotted out the last part of the book and I (think I) only have five chapters left to write before I'm done with the first draft.

Alright, my little online celebration is done and that's actually all I have time for today.  Let me know what you're celebrating this week!

This Girl!

I watched Angie Ziederman's audition on American Idol during the past week and couldn't help but relate it to writing (shocker I know.)   First watch the audition, the whole thing.  Then come back and we'll chat.

Can you spot her huge mistake?  Her first query song was a mess.  Definitely rejection material and definitely not the way to get out of the slushpile to Hollywood. Then with her second song it turned out she could actually write sing quite well.  She got lucky because for some unfathomable reason Jennifer Lopez saw something in the hot mess that was her first song.  We as writers probably won't be quite so lucky.  That's why we have to put our absolute best out there with every query, every pitch, every conference because chances are none of us will have Jennifer Lopez tagging along with us begging the other agents to give us another chance (and if you do why are you bothering with queries, just have her publish it for you).

A Quick and Likely Discombobulated Post

Here in the Paxton household my children are on their seventh (not exaggerating, seventh!) cold since Halloween.  My little man spent almost all night last night awake and alternately crying and coughing.  Thankfully, little blond person is old enough to take OTC medication so she slept like a lamb.  I, however, did not and now I'm exhausted and not sure the connections between my brain and the parts of my body that actually do things are functioning properly, so please excuse me if I ramble.

I just wanted to do a quick announcement.  The folks over at Throwing Up Words are having a contest called Project Writeway (with a title like that I bet you can't guess what reality TV show it's spoofing). I would have put up a link for you guys to enter were you so inclined, but I only found out about it just in time to squeak in under the deadline.  Anywho, it looks like it's going to be a fun little contest and since the outcome is 50% judges and 50% popular vote I thought I'd tell you all to get on over there, read the entries and pick your top six favorites.  Voting opens up tomorrow and continues through Friday.

Hope you all had a great weekend! 

Spring cleaning (on the blog)

Well, that blogcation was a bit longer than expected. This weekend I cleaned up a little around here. I added blogs I've recently started following to my sidebar.  I deleted some blogs that haven't been updated in over a year. However, I spent most of my time going through the blogs I link to on my sidebar and moving those who've been published in the past year from the 'aspiring authors' category to the 'author' category.  I went from having five or so blogs under the 'author' heading to over twenty.  There were also a few who signed with agents and I'm sure they'll be making the move from 'aspiring' to 'author'very soon as well.  It was amazing and inspiring to see how many of my blogger friends have made such huge progress in their writing journey over the past twelve months.

As I went through all the blogs I follow, I saw a lot of other happy news besides agent signings or publication deals.  It was great to read all of that as well.  I also came across quite a few blogs that have gone dark. Some gave reasons for ending their blogs.  Some just stopped posting.  Some gave up on their dream.  It was these that stayed with me.  I just kept thinking about them, so much that I actually got depressed.  I think I understand why they did.  Heaven knows I've been close to taking the same step myself especially over the last couple months. It was tough for me to see people who actually did.  I hope that at some point down the road, they'll rediscover their dream and decide this time to really go for it.  And I hope when I feel like giving up, remembering them will give me the oomph to keep going.

How about you guys?  What are your tricks to keep pushing through when it all seems hopeless?

Gratitude, an epiphany and a publishing opportunity

First of all, I want to say thank you to everyone who commented on my last post.  Your comments were helpful and encouraging and just what I needed.  Thank you so much.  I took a week off and while I'm still having a rough time getting momentum on my WIP I think I figured out why.  If it hadn't been for your comments I wouldn't have given myself a break and perhaps wouldn't have figured out the reason for my funk.

So here's my epiphany.  All the work I've been doing on my WIP has somewhere inside made me feel like I'd given up on SEEDS.  And somewhere inside I wasn't prepared to do that.  I still believe in SEEDS.  I still think it's a good well-written story that deserves to be published.  I've got to somehow strike a balance where I put time into finding a home for SEEDS while still doing work on my WIP.  That's going to be tough.  Finding time to blog and work on the WIP while taking care of two young kiddos with all that entails is tough enough.  I'm not sure where I'm going to find the extra minutes and hours it takes to ferret out possible agents/publishing options for SEEDS, but it seems I'm going to have to try unless I want my writing to be on permanent hiatus (shudder).

On a semi-related note Dragon Moon Press is open for submissions for the month of December.  They are only looking for novel length (85,000 to 110,000 words) fantasy, but if you have a manuscript that fits those specifications this is a great opportunity.  Their submission guidelines are very specific, so if you're interested go here and read them carefully before submitting.  It was this tidbit of news and my subsequent submission of SEEDS that led to my little epiphany about the reasons for my funk.  I hope you find it similarly helpful in your pursuit of your writing dreams.  Good luck!

In a funk.

Do you ever find yourself going through your daily routine and thinking 'what's the point of this again?'  Yeah.  Today is one of those days for me. But I haven't been questioning everything today, just those things that relate to my writing life.

I logged on to blogger at few times today to do a post and that's the question that kept running through my mind.  Don't get me wrong.  I've met some great people and made some good friends through my blog and I love it for that reason, but I started my blog because of my writing.  And as I said, I've really been questioning the reason I'm putting all the time and effort I do into my writing.  That encompasses the blog as well.

I don't know, I guess it's just one of those days when I'm doubting my ability to get published, heck, even my ability to write anything worth giving to my critique group.  I'm sure it will pass, but for today I'm in a funk and I think instead of working on my WIP tonight I'm going to take a long hot bath and get a good night's sleep.  Hopefully that will be all I need to recharge.

How about you guys?  Anything you've found particularly helpful in banishing self doubt or getting out of a funk?  I'd love any suggestions.