Writing Goals for 2015

[benedictjjones]

Here it is! The annual thread where we can put stuff down we might actually get done in the coming year!

For me;

-Second Charlie Bars novel
-Finish polishing the weird western collection and get it picked up
-Get to work on joint weird western novella with Anthony
-clear out the shorts I've been promising to re-write and sub...

What are yours?

[Ross Warren]

Write...something...anything!

[karswell]

Immediate writing goal is to finish the aforementioned western novella. Be good if the first one gets picked up given this is a sequel of sorts... I have two more story ideas for the same characters so will move onto them at some point. (I'm doing the edits today Ben!)

Have set a goal to get a minimum of four shorts published this year. I have a growing pile of rejections so there's plenty to choose from.

Toying with another novel and have the prologue written in my head so will get that on paper at some point. (If not the whole novel...)

Was utterly flabbergasted this morning to receive an invite to write a novella for a six author collection. Took me about a nanosecond to accept. Even more unbelievable is that the subject is war and the supernatural. I'm sure I can come up with something...

[benedictjjones]

great news on the novella mate! sounds right up your street

[Ross Warren]

I hate you both ;-)

[benedictjjones]

^hahaha! ;-)

[Jason Whittle]

Number one priority is the rewrite of The Dead Shall Feed for Horrific Tales Publishing. I am fully aware that this was also my priority for last year, and it's killing me. This is my first substantial rewrite - all others have just been plugging the obvious plot holes, and weeding out the cliches and adverbs - and I'm finding making so many fundamental changes to an existing text way more difficult than writing from scratch.

That said, I was offered a serious cash advance by a publisher with a track record of getting its authors to #1 in the Kindle Horror chart, and if you're serious about making a living as a writer you don't dither over a chance like that. So I'm pretty cross with myself and wouldn't blame Graeme Reynolds if his interest has cooled.

That aside, I have a Creative Writing MA to be getting on with. It includes non-fiction, and if they'll let me, I'll write about football for my dissertation. The plan is to do an FA Cup odyssey, going to a game in every round from the extra preliminary to the final, from thirty people leaning on a picket fence to a sold out Wembley. I'll visit a stadium I've never previously been to for every round up to the semis, and write about the whole experience of the journey, the town, the ground and its surroundings and the match itself, amounting to about 2000 words for each match. I'll try and get it published after it's marked, or self-publish.

My self-publishing debut will come in April; a novella about a man who reacts to his 40th birthday by having an affair with a younger woman, only to find it doesn't actually improve his life. The timing of the release, two weeks after my own 40th birthday, is purely coincidental.

I have three other completed novellas being considered at the moment, and would like to see them published in 2015. My old policy of submitting to one publisher at a time, and then waiting as long as it takes, was fine for a happy go lucky amateur, but will have to be replaced by something a little more aggressive once I give up the day job.

Finally, I have more WIPs on the go than I can finish this year, but if I can get some submission-ready, and finish first drafts of others, I'll be well pleased.

Now I have to stop planning this stuff, and actually get it done.

[benedictjjones]

^That's great stuff Jason - glad you've got so much on and hope you get through it all!

[slagfest2015]

Jan 26, 2015 13:39:42 GMT 1 Ross Warren said:

I hate you both ;-)

I hate all of you.

[benedictjjones]

^but we still love you ;-)