My friend Aprilynne Pike recently posted her list of author resolutions on her blog, citing several new-author mistakes she wanted to avoid during the publication process (for those who don't know, she sold a four book deal to HarperCollins not long ago. I'm very happy for her, but I am still waiting for my $20.00,...hehe).
In keeping with this theme, I have a list of my own. My list is different from hers, however, in that hers are mostly geared toward her goals as a soon-to-be-published author, while mine are goals for an unpublished author. Still, I thought I would share them with y'all just in case you're curious, and in so doing actually set them down in writing and in front of witnesses. See, now you guys can see this list and you can bug me if you haven't heard from me in a while. Just refer back to this list and say "Gee, Dave, I thought you were going to (insert appropriate comment here) this year. What happened to that? Eh?"
And I'll have to look all sheepish and admit what a slacker I am.
Still, I AM a slacker, so you might be wasting your breath, but hey, I gotta try, right? :)
Okay, here's the list:
1) I WILL write. Every day. I will not find excuses not to write. I will not play video games or watch TV. I will park my ever-expanding hindquarters in my computer chair and pound out two hours of writing per day, five days per week.
2) I will NOT give up. Just because my great, wonderful, fantastic and very original novel has not sold (yet), I will not use that as an excuse to no longer try. I will spend NO time convincing myself that my best is simply not good enough, and will instead work to improve on my writing.
3) I will NOT be afraid to try new things. I have been writing predominantly horror and dark fantasy, but I want to try my hand at something else. I've had a MG book kicking a rock inside my skull for several months, and I'm going to take a crack at it.
4) I WILL communicate more with the writing friends I have made over the last year. I've been slacking on that (y'all know who ya are). Some of them have had incredible years and I am very happy for them, even if I don't write much.
5) I WILL give my agent a reason to keep me as a client even though my first book hasn't sold (yet). By "a reason..." I mean I will give her a wonderful new book to pitch, and I will do so before June of this year.
6) I WILL update my blog at least once per week. Even if I have very little to say, there will be SOMEthing new on this site EVERY week.
7) I WILL finish the novels I start. So far I have written two complete novels. This means I AM capable of finishing a novel. Therefore, there is no excuse for the three unfinished novels I have on my hard drive.
Ok, that is all I can think of for now. If I come up with any more I'll post them here. how about y'all? Any New Year's resolutions ya wanna share? Eh?
See Y'all!
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9 comments:
i have one goal, and that really is to just finish this damn first novel. getting into an mfa program would be nice too, though that's out of my control.
well, i haven't sat down thoroughly to think about this yet though... perhaps i will. when i'm not jetlagged.
as an aside -- are you ready for sunday? i'm heading to a bar that will surely be filled with giants fans, sporting a romo jersey that will certainly get me stoned. as long as they win though, it's all worth it. :)
Angelle - Oh, yeah! The only teams standing between Dallas and the Super Bowl are teams the 'Boys have already beaten. That's not a guarantee, by any means, but if anything it should give Romo and Co. confidence going into the game. I just hope T.O. is ready to play. It would be great if T.O. and Terry Glenn were both able to take the field. The Giants might be able to cover one of them effectively, but not both. :)
Still, Big Blue has been playing very, very well the last few games. If their defense holds up, it could be a hard game for Dallas, even with T.O.
i'd definitely rest easier if TO was up to speed. i'm getting VERY nervous for the weekend, probably more so than others, living in blue territory. let's just hope we get the worse of eli's split personality.
and i do wish they'd stop posting pictures of romo and jessica simpson hanging out in cabo. if the boys lose this weekend, simpson's will be the face of blame because ppl are ridiculous. although... i think i liked carrie underwood better... ha.
No kidding. Seems Romo can't do anything these days without a heaping helping of criticism. Granted, he's getting paid a lot of money, so he should be able to take it in stride (which he does, btw), but it's annoying to more rational people (like me, for instance...HA!) that he has to defend his personal life to people who really have no business prying into it.
Sheesh. Jessica, Carrie...let the guy have a main squeeze, fer cryin' out loud. It's not like he hasn't already led the Cowboys to a 13-3 season and their first division title since 1998. That ain't enough for some folks, though, no. Some folks will ONLY be happy with a Super Bowl win, which just doesn't happen every year (although...we are due...).
All I can say is...GO COWBOYS! WOOOO!
My resolution for 2008 is to polish my current novel with this 4th rewrite, get an agent, and get a book deal. And complete the 2nd book in the series.
David, David, David, I seem to recall that someone got paid in chocolate last month.;)
I like the idea of starting a MG novel. After all, I certainly didn't start out writing YA.
And BTW, I really want to see 33 AD when you finish revising it.:)
You got it, Aprilynne.
I haven't been doing too much revising on it (although I need to), in favor of working on the new book. But thanks for the reminder, I need to get that done. :)
P.S. The chocolate was gooooo-ooood, even if it didn't last very long ;)
Those are fantastic goals, and they sound very realistic. As for not finishing novels that you start, the moment I heard that 90% of all novels are never finished I knew that I had to defy those odds. Whenever I want to quit, I think of those. (And I'm several novels in, too.)
Caryn,
That's a great way to look at it.
You know, I wonder what the ratio of finished novels to unfinished novels is for established authors.
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