Still Here

I'm still getting going after the enforced break. I finally polished and printed the assignment I finished, and today sent it off in the mail. I'm still trying to give birth to the other assignment. I have a few ideas floating around in my head but nothing is bubbling to the surface. I think I'll just need to sit down and bang out a few ideas.

Congratulations to Amy on another sale. I'll provide a link to it when it becomes available.

What else have I been doing - nothing - well, I've played a lot of Tiger Woods '09 golf game on the Wii...it was a Father's Day present and I'm enjoying the hell out of it. At least it's some exercise...

Okay, I know I've been procrastinating a bit lately for all sorts of reasons. I've pretty much written this week off and will start again in earnest soon.

Black magazine issue 2 should be hitting your newsagent shelves any day now so keep an eye out. I received my contributors copy and it's excellent, well worth the small sum at your local outlet.

No comments on yesterday's question is disappointing. Honestly, new writers want to know how much everyone else writes. How much do you produce, on average, per month or over a yearly period? Seriously.

Too Late the Rain took me 12 months to get it to it's current state and that's just a short story. It took me six months to write the first draft of Tiger's Eye. It would take me another six months to get it to a reasonable level of readability - it really was the horrible first effort most writers won't admit to.

I wrote 14 stories in 3 months last year (2007). I'm still working on getting them to a marketable level while writing new stuff. Idolatry, Dark Rose, Grimoire, Winged Shepherd, Mobile, and Wamphyri have all been written (or completed) this year. 6 stories in 9 months. Plus I've written the first draft of the first 5 chapters of Newland (all equivalent to the length of short stories). On top of that, I've done 13 assignments, 4 articles, and 20+ reviews.

So 48 items in less than 40 weeks (I think), and in my opinion, that's pushing it way too hard. I've enjoyed not worrying about things this week if I'm really honest. So I'm not going to push it so hard from now on. If sales come, then they come. Wamphyri is just about done so I can concentrate more on Newland and on my assignments. I think I'll be looking at doing only three or four nights a week at the computer. I'll read as much as I have been because that's simply good, I get paid for some of my reviews, and it helps improve my own writing.

But I'll still be blogging and I'll still be trying to help out at AHWA where I can. I'll also be there for my writer friends whenever they need me to read something of theirs.

It's been a long and physically/mentally tiring, but it's also allowed me to realise that killing myself isn't going to get my writing to the top any quicker. Hard work and perseverance is the requirement to gain any measure of success in this industry and I'll still be doing that, but I'll be trying to do it without neglecting anything else. Writers need to live--where else do we get the inspiration for our art...

So, how much do you write?

And good luck with your submissions.

BT