writer at play
Posted in challenges, goals, reading on Jan 6th, 2010
At the beginning of 2009, I committed to reading 52 books in 52 weeks. By the end of the year I had read 64. However, that number does not accurately represent all the reading I did last year. It doesn’t take into account blog posts, magazine articles, anthologies, all the books I only partially read [...]
Posted in challenges, kids at play on Mar 10th, 2009
The trade of wordsmithing, that is. Sir I. likes to narrate stories to me, usually beginning with “Once upon a time, we all got up” and involving the eating of pancakes and playing out in the snow. This one was inspired by our country study of China (we had a Chinese New Year’s Parade which [...]
Posted in challenges, reading on Jan 23rd, 2009
I’m a planner. I love lists, schedules, menus. I love having goals to tick off and challenges to complete.
In fact, the more, the better!
Since this is a new year and all, I signed up for a reading challenge: 52 books in 52 weeks. I started strong with a theology book (Tim Keller’s The Reason for [...]
Posted in challenges, creativity, writing process on Jan 21st, 2009
A week ago, I wrote about all the time I’ve spent not writing. Today I want to talk about another limited resource: the mental space in which my stories dwell, quietly gestating, until they’re ready to be written. I call this (quite cleverly) headspace.
All my stories need simmering, but there are only so many mental [...]
Posted in challenges, short stories on Dec 28th, 2008
2,177 words on the last story. Another 1K or so to go (I think. I’m horrible at guesstimating how long my stories are going to end up being). I’m going to push to finish it in tomorrow night’s writing session. Woo!
Posted in challenges, money, motivation, news, self-promotion, short stories on Dec 27th, 2008
I know that writing fiction does not generate much income. I know that most novelists do not support themselves on their royalties and advances. Then I read articles like this one and I really know it.
It’s not the lack of money more than it is the lack of readership that bothers me. My husband says [...]
Posted in challenges, short stories on Dec 23rd, 2008
An update to say not much has been happening on the writing front. Instead, I’ve been holding the baby, gearing up for Christmas, beating my husband at Settlers of Cataan (okay, he won once, when I wasn’t paying attention), and oh yeah, holding the baby.
I still need to write story #4, but that will have [...]
Posted in challenges, numbers, short stories on Dec 14th, 2008
Broken, another Elinor story, is complete at 6242 words.
Two down, two more to go. One will be short and brutal (to write), the other will be just weird.
Then, then, then it’ll be time to start another novel!
Posted in challenges, short stories on Dec 6th, 2008
Got 2253 words on the new Elinor story (working title Broken), most of them today. *pant pant*
I decided to forego waiting around for motivation to come calling and Just Do It. It’s been a long time since I got almost 2K words in a day and it feels good.
Amusing typos: Therefore, it didn’t take long [...]
Posted in challenges, short stories on Dec 1st, 2008
It seems so long since I actually accomplished a writing goal that I deem it worthy for a blog mention.
The Xenobiologist story is first-draft complete at 4,410 words. And it was like pulling fingernails to write it, too. The plan is to not look at it until next year.
I was toying with the idea of [...]