New Writing Goals

In the spirit of shared insanity, I have decided once again to join a writing challenge. Every year for the past five, I’ve done NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month – write 50k words in the 30 days of November) and met my goal each time save one – and that’s only because I didn’t set my time zone correctly on the website. It makes November crazy, but always productive!

I recently discovered another writing challenge site, called A Round of Words in 80 Days. In this one, you set your own goals to complete within 80 days. Sounds a little less hectic than NaNo! I do well with deadlines, so I figure I’ll give this a try.

Anyone who’s been asking me when my next book will come out has heard me say that it is written, but unedited. Every time I get into editing it, I get frustrated because it’s not going to be so much an edit as a compete rewrite. Especially after my recent trip to New Orleans. There are so many things I want to incorporate from that trip into my next book, that a rewrite really is necessary.

So here’s my goal for the next 80 days: Finish the rewrite of Free Spirit. I’m not going to say it’ll be completely edited by then, but I’d like it to be in pretty decent shape with only some cleaning up and polishing to do before I send it in to the folks at Crescent Moon Press.

I have to make this goal! And here’s why: I have another book that I’m working on that is due to the publisher in less than a year. I’d really like to complete my sequel before I get any farther into that book though. Also, I want to be able to answer people’s questions about a sequel with a date! And the only way to do that is to get it into my editors’ hands.

I’m very excited that my husband, John, already jumped into the challenge with me. We may not have a very clean house for the next 2 and a half months, but I think writing a couple of books is a fair trade!

The 3^rd round of ROW80 just began July 4^th – who wants to join me? Yes, Sam and Amy, I’m talking to you!