Report On Quarter the Third

I began writing fiction seriously on April 9th, 2001, a little over 9 months ago. This is the third Quarterly Report I have done since then. It is complete happenstance that my quarters fall so near traditional business accounting-type quarters, although I do have to admit finding the convergence funny.

A) convergence may not be the right word, and b) I have a very strange sense of humor sometimes. Also, c) regarding the previous sentence--I am quite confused as to whether I should capitalize all three letters ( a, b, and c), since they are items in a series; only a, because it is at the beginning of the sentence; and/or whether the word convergence should also be capitalized.

I am amused by this confusion, as well.

Moving on.

I have only completed a handful of short stories since the last quarterly report. I was fairly lazy wordcount-wise in the month leading up to NaNoWriMo, as well as in the month after it. That said, I do feel like my most recent stories are some of my best, and the quality does somewhat make up for the lack of quantity. My total stories written tally stands at 34, not including my first novel.

This quarter I entered and won NaNoWriMo. It was my first year of participation (since I wasn't even writing when it was held previously.) I quite enjoyed the experience, although it was fairly brutal. It took me almost the whole month of December to write the last 6 to 8k of my novel, but I did it. It still needs editing to even be considered a first draft, but I am quite proud of myself nonetheless.

The 70k I wrote for the Zero Draft of my novel, plus the other dribs and drabs I wrote this quarter, mean than I wrote approximately twice as much this quarter as in the first two combined.

***A quick note about wordcounts--I am obsessed with them because they are the only reliable metric I have for tracking my progress as a writer. I can see progress in my writing, of course. But how to measure it? Later on, sales and income might help me to understand where I am at in my career, but I don't really have either of those yet. I write at different speeds on different days, so time spent with butt-in-chair is not exact. A Million Words Of Crap requires just that--a million words. The best way I know of to measure those million words is word-by-word.***

I already have on story published that will count towards the current quarter, "Out, De'Moan!", but I didn't manage to publish anything last quarter, despite the promising start I got off to with Tes-Nin's Elbows. I did do a ton of submitting to paying markets, and got a ton of rejections, including a number of personalized rejections. I've also come very close to selling a couple of stories (and those stories still have a decent chance of selling to the markets that are interested.)

I've also vastly improved my typing skills, as well as my ability to use a voice recorder to get more writing done when I am out and about. I started and have maintained a Daily Log, which has already shown it's value as  a personal metrics tool (yes, I just made that up. No I don't know what it means either, exactly. Except that a Daily Log comes in handy.) My punctuation and grammar have improved somewhat as well.

All in all, I've accomplished a lot this quarter. Not as much as I could have, but more than enough to satisfy me. The most important--finishing a novel (draft)--counts as not only an accomplishment in and of itself, but as proof-of-concept that I can write and finish long form fiction. I also verified the truth (for me) of what I have often heard: It is easier (at least in a wordcount outputted vs skullsweat inputted sense) to write long fiction than short.

Looking ahead: If I keep up the pace, I will likely end up with 250k or thereabouts written during my first year. More if I hit the goals I set for myself this year. I also hope to finish this first year with at least eleven titles published, a Zero Draft of a new novel, and a bunch more shorts. With some luck, I might start to make a little money off my self-epubbed stuff, and/or a few short story sales.

I've got plenty of content, now it's time to make getting it out there as much of a priority as generating new stuff.

Overall verdict: I kicked tail this quarter.

Weekly report:

I am still losing weight reliably. Nothing drastic or infomercial worthy, but I am down at least three pounds since New Year's, if not four or five. I am having no problems maintaining an improved attitude and outlook (40% improved, to be precise.) My wordcount was better this week (over 8k) but still not up to par. I do feel like I am gaining some momentum in that area, though. And I did do more (over 2k's worth) background material/Idea Bank writing.

I haven't done a self-epub for the week yet, but I am hoping to today or tomorrow. So there's a good chance I will get three out of four again this week. Things are looking good so far for the first month of this year's challenges.

Also, I am planning on doing FebuWriMo next month. If I do as good a job on wordcounts as I did during my last noveling stretch, I may have an easy March ahead of me. We'll see.

Media Breakdown:

It turns out both Superhero Squad and Transformers Prime are right up my son's alley. I like them okay as well. Not awesome, but not any better or worse (when considered objectively) than the cartoons I grew up watching (and loving.)

I've been listening to the album "All Eternal's Deck" by The Mountain Goats a lot. Not a lot of rock-n-roll, but really good, thoughtful, and emotional lyrics. Lots of bittersweet, lots of indie-acoustic vibe, a high degree of thoughtfulness and literacy. I highly recommend it.

And that's it for this week. See you all next time.

Quarterly report Numero Two

Quick update on how the writing "plan" is going.

Completed novels - None. Still not getting traction on long form fiction. I did make it into novella territory with one novel. I am going to do NaNoWriMo next month, with a goal of 2k a day. So maybe I will be close to finishing a novel for real in December.

Completed short stories - Basically about 24. A few of those are still in editing, but they are basically done. That is twice what I had finished last quarter, so I am doing a good job there, staying on track. I credit the day off story challenge for really helping with momentum. I have a number of partials as well, and a ton of idea bank treatments.

Other stuff - I have been voice recording less, mainly because I have been writing less overall. Yep, stopping the blog to have more time to write did nothing to help my production. Several days spent futzing with typewriters haven't helped. Also, I seem to be writing slower since Dillocon. More thought going into what I'm writing means a longer time to finish. I'm hoping I pick back up as I internalize all the stuff I've been learning. Nearly everything I'm writing is shorter now, too. Funny, that.

Sales - None. I just put a new cover on Tes-Nin to see if that helps get any sales, as well as bumping the price on Smashwords up to .99 cents. I have just shy of 100 free downloads in two months, so I am not really worried that I will be losing exposure. Whether I sell some now or not, the real deal is that I need to get more stuff up. But...

Submissions - I have sixteen stories in submissions now. Nearly everything I have that is finished and edited. Some of those stories are coming up on five or six rejections, so I am contemplating putting them up myself. If I can keep writing new stuff to sub, I will have to put the old stuff up, since I will already have something in with every market already.

Questions - I am not sure I'm not completely wasting my time subbing to paying markets instead of just putting my stories up myself. If I had a longer backlist or more time writing I wouldn't have to make that choice. I really need to get a better business plan going this quarter, x-mas is going to be huge for new ereader sales. Also, was I doing better just writing and pushing ahead? I've been doing a lot of revision lately, time which might be better spent on new stuff. Hopefully I will have more progress to report on at the end of next quarter.

A Quarterly Report - Lessons

Things I've learned in the last four months -

1) A daily wordcount is crucial to production. 250 words or 2,500 words, whatever. Set a limit as high as you can consistently make it, and stick with it. Producing new words of fiction on a regular basis is the essence of being a fiction writer, and producing a volume of new words on a regular basis is the essence of being prolific. Unless you're one of those binge writers, which I'm not, mostly. Although I am considering doubling my wordcount and only writing every other day.

2) Have a one sentence idea written out for every story. This simplifies the hell out of actually writing the story, and keeps me from writing something that I'm not sure how to finish. In other words, it's much harder to get stuck if I have path to follow, even if I don't know the features of the path (story or plot) beforehand.

3) Keep an idea bank. This keeps the ideas flowing, keeps my imagination in shape, and ensures that I never have to sit around wondering what to write about. For a guy that had no concept of how to plot a story four months ago, this has been crucial in developing my storytelling basic skill set.

4) Power days. This is the opposite of the steady wordcount theory above, or the next level of it, if you add in the concept of blurting. Basically, once a week I set aside a day to write my ass off. This is also known as the Day Off Story Challenge, and has been another really useful way to expand my storytelling skills. The next level of this is taking every writing day and turning it into a power day. I'm not there quite yet, but hopefully soon.

5) Miscellaneous smaller lessons - The seven point story structure is another, useful way to look at novels. Heroes and happy endings are worth writing, too. Plot is what happens when characters interact. The math of writing as a career heavily favors the prolific. Voice recorders are really useful. Touch typing, on a keyboard, is way faster than pecking, and way way faster than typing on a touchscreen. Android tablets are great for tweeting, but suck for writing blogs. Tweeting and posting on other people's blogs about your own work (especially "buy me, buy me" is mostly just irritating and counter-productive. Podcasting takes work, and possibly money.

6) Final lesson - I can do this, at least for four months. And next quarter makes half a year, and that twice is a full year. More math, and it says that all this adds up, eventually.