If you can believe it, the year is over the hill. We’ve got less than six months to go; we’re halfway there! Cue terrible singing.
All right, enough of that.
The year is going by entirely too fast, that’s for sure. I’m not really sure what all there else is to say about it. So, I suppose I’ll just share some stats with y’all.
Yearly Goals Completed
- Submit 2 short stories
- Both Lifelike and The Cost of Rain have been out for submission since March. Neither have found a home yet, but both are consistently reaching high levels of consideration.
- Publish 52 blog posts
- This is the 59th post of the year, so I am blogging way more than I expected to! Hurray! This consistency is paying off, because the blog is having its best year by far, stats-wise.
2018 Word Count (so far): 80,367
Speaking of stats, how is the blog doing? Well, I’m glad you asked! The blog is killing it this year, with almost 500 followers! There’s been more audience interaction than ever before, with an average of one comment per post, and views are up. Each month of 2018 has out performed the views of any other year so far, and the total views for the year so far are just shy from outpacing the total views for 2017! I’ve also put in a staggering 45k+ words on the blog so far this year.
That feels good, let me tell you. Now, I feel I should mention that this blog is a small and mighty thing. I started it back in September of 2011 as a way to warm up my writing muscle in the morning and to hold myself accountable to my own goals. It had also been suggested by a guest speaker in a Novel Writing class that discussing works in progress on a website was a good way to prevent plagiarism. You know, timestamps and yadda yadda. I didn’t, and still don’t, care so much about this. I doubt anyone is stealing my work right now. Especially since no one else ever sees it!
But, the accountability thing? Blogging has definitely helped. It’s not fool-proof, of course. I am stubbornly my own worst enemy sometimes and no amount of blogging will keep me from sabotaging myself. But, this year is proof that it can work and does mitigate some of my most self-destructive (work) behaviors.
So, you might think 500 followers is no big deal. That outdoing previous years’ views isn’t that big a deal, but I’m celebrating all my wins, no matter how small. And for this blog, these are very exciting jumps in activity.
Another positive for the year so far is my reading goal! I’ve read 37 books so far this year, according to Goodreads, which puts me four books ahead of schedule. As usual, my reading has slowed down in the summer months, but my reading sprint earlier in the year always buoys me through.
I’m still (slowly) chipping away at The Steel Armada rewrite. This project looks much different now than I originally planned, and defining it as ‘done’ is something of a moving target. I’ll discuss that more when I write my Editing Check-In post next week.
Santa Sarita is on its last installment. I shared the first chapter the other night, and got a bit of a response. The readership is still there, so that’s a relief. Now if I can just post chapters on a steady schedule, I’ll be able to finally mark this monstrous project as ‘complete’. 17,000 words in, who knows how many to go? Certainly not me.
My yearly goals seemed to have been a bit small, now that I’m looking at them. I did much better the first half of this year than I anticipated. So, what do I do with the rest of 2018?
Honestly, there are a lot of options. I want to work on something new for NaNoWriMo this year, preferably not fanfiction. I might try out my newest story idea, an Urban Fantasy set in Arizona, featuring angels, demons, a badass bisexual, and lots of cats. It’s something I came up with earlier in the year, and it just will not give up. This story wants to be written.
Once The Steel Armada is ‘done’, whatever that means, I want to start editing Cards. It’s a project that I really love, but it will need lots of work. There’s also the rough draft of From the Quorum that needs finishing. I might do that for NaNo, but it depends on what project is more motivating when the time comes.
I also have a couple short stories milling around in my head. One is half written from earlier this year, the other is just an idea, a little scribble on a p-slip from the library. I want to work on them both, but don’t think I should until I really hammer out The Steel Armada. The ideas will keep, they always do. Plus, I want to keep my short story energy focused on finding homes for Lifelike and The Cost of Rain.
What else? Obviously there will be a giant gap in productivity in September, while we’re on vacation in Germany! I will plan for that accordingly.
2018 – Remaining Priorities
- Finish The Steel Armada
- Finish Santa Sarita
- Sell Lifelike and The Cost of Rain
- Decide on NaNo project
- Keep reading!
So, yeah. That’s where I’m at. That’s the year so far. I’m feeling a touch lost at the moment, mainly because I’m wading back into my workload after a month of shutting down. But, when I look back at what I’ve accomplished so far, I don’t feel so daunted by the months to come.
I guess that’s really the point of all these goals posts and check-ins. Goals are easier to digest if they’re broken down in to manageable portions, after all. Thanks again for following along this far. I appreciate you. I sincerely hope 2018 isn’t treating you like crap.
Talk soon, Bloggos,
BZ
To Write These Words Down... 