Monday, October 03, 2011

Still writing

I haven't posted about writing since the conference but I am still slowly working away at it.

I set up my netbook in the spare room, and for a few weeks got into a lovely habit of writing every morning, averaging around 500 words / day.  Then something happened.  I can't remember what, but I had a really busy week so the routine was broken.  I tried to start again, then we had a few weeks of really cold weather - and it was really cold in the spare room - so I stopped again.

So at the moment, I'm not writing every day, but instead grab a couple of hours each week to lock myself away and do some writing or editing.

I'm now up to 9,600 words on my women's fiction (working title "Sisters").

At our last face-to-face writer's group meeting, we brainstormed some possible plot paths for Sisters, and some fantastic ideas came out of it.  Now I have all these ideas swirling around in my head, and I'm not sure which way to go.  I've signed up to an online Plotting course for October - hopefully that will help me work out what to do!

I also now have 2 critique partners - one is a friend of mine in our face-to-face writer's group, and the other found me through the critique partner matching scheme run by RWA.  So far so good - even though we all write in different sub-genres, they've both had some valuable input into my wip, and hopefully I've managed to add some useful comments to theirs.

I'm giving Sisters one final edit and then entering it in the RWA STALI (Single Title and Loving It) competition this week.  Hopefully I'll get some valuable feedback - and even more hopefully it will do well in the scoring :)


6 comments:

Suji said...

Wishing you all the best for "Sisters". You can do it!

Butterfly said...

How exciting that Sisters is nearly ready to launch into the big world! All the best with the final polish!!

I'm just getting back into writing after several years break. Trying to set some goals and choose a project. I'm very excited, and feeling vulnerable, but encouraged by my husband's decision to support me ... he's even suggested that I'll soon be able to buy a netbook or laptop, so that I can escape into the bedroom or work at the library. Woohoo!!

P.S. The book I mentioned, full of inspiring tips and quotes, is "Writer's Little Instruction Book: Getting Published" by Paul Raymond Martin. If you can find it at your library (808.02/MAR) it's worth a look.

Kez said...

Hi Vanessa,

Sorry, fingers obviously got ahead of my brain! Sisters is only 10,000 words done - that's what I was polishing to go in the STALI (it's for the 1st 10,000 words). Still another probably 60,000-70,000 to go!

Good luck getting back into writing - a netbook is very useful, I'd take your hubby up on that offer!

Will check the book out, thanks.

jugglingpaynes said...

I wish you lots of good luck on your manuscript! Watching you get serious inspired me to start at least one new story, even if it has taken a back seat during an incredibly busy September. :o)

Good luck getting your work into the world!

Peace and Laughter!

Suzanne Brandyn Author said...

All the best in the STALI Kez. :)

Amy said...

How exciting Kez! Best of luck with it. I'm sure you will get your writing groove back soon.:-)