I’m working my way through Ready, Set Write! this summer 🙂    

This update is coming to you from my office at work.  Summer is gone gone gone.  

Week 12 Update:

1.  How I did on last week’s goals:  Well, that was a bust.  I wrote exactly one rec letter, so not the 5 I wanted.  I’m at 11 total, 25 or so to go before they need to start being mailed out, but it’s very manageable now that I’m back at school.

I DID begin to revise my manuscript, wrote some new backstory on the hook I decided to go with, and revised 3 chapters with the hook added in.  I think it’s going to be more work than I originally anticipated but I believe it’s the right thing to do.

2.  My goal(s) for this week:  5 letters done.  Shouldn’t be hard, now that my butt is back in my desk chair.

Revise more of WIP.  Spoke with my agent this week about next steps and we’re not going to sub it, but I’m going to ready it for contests.  There’s one with a deadline of less than 2 weeks from now, so that’ll be my goal.

Marinate on the next book.  Agent and I agreed on the next 3 (!!!!) books to move forward with and while I’ve got the hooks, I don’t have the characters or much of the plots, so I’ve got to think on those.  Once I figure out the first book’s details, I’ll write a synopsis and hopefully work on it for NaNoWriMo.

3.  A favorite line from my story OR one word/phrase that sums up what I wrote/revised.

New words!  This is my female MC, in a flashback, meeting with a fortune teller.

Freya smiled with one eyebrow up and put her other hand over top of mine. “I will tell you everything I see for you, okay?” I smiled nervously at her and nodded. There was something kind in her pale blue eyes and in the sum total of thirty seconds she’d been holding my hand, I felt like I could trust her. “There is a theme to your life, Phoebe.” I shivered when she said my name, even though it was sweltering hot outside. “You are meant to make others happy. You like to put pieces together and make something that is bigger than the pieces.” Freya eyed me and cocked her head to the side. “You’re close with your family, yes?”

“Yes,” I squeaked out.

“You are also like them, in mind and heart. That won’t change.” I smile. I couldn’t imagine being unlike my family.

4.  The biggest challenge I faced this week (ex. finding time to write):  Psyching myself up for going back to work put a damper on productivity.  I’m finding that giving myself small deadlines–the end of the week, a couple of days, etc.–is helpful.  I work better under pressure.

5.  Something I love about my WiP:   I love my new hook.  I think it really grounds my female MC and gives her a purpose she didn’t have before.

How did YOU do?