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What do I want from my writing career? I linked to Aprilynne Pike’s October article Firsts in my last entry.

I feel differently about setting my writing goals than she does. Now, I’ll admit that I entered my pursuit of writing fairly naive. I didn’t know about differentiation. I figured that agents were created equal, and now I know better. I figured that any exposure was good exposure, and now I know better. I also hear the echoes of many writers telling me to control the only thing I can control–to write the best story that I can, which I think is sound advice.

But what do I want from my writing career in the long run? What are my goals?

My goals are very simple, when I get down to it.

1. I want to write the stories I have inside of me to the best of my ability. I will try to publish them wisely. (Yes, I know I’ll have to unpack that.)

2. I want to supplement my retirement income with advances and royalties.

That’s it. Let’s take a deeper look at those two things.

Continue reading “Basic Goal Setting and the Philosphies Therein”

Some links that have crossed my path during Internet travels today.

Do I Really Want to Get Published? by Editorial Ass (for all of you on the Submission Train with me).

Firsts by Aprilynne Pike. (This one is about thinking through and setting your writing goals, which is worth doing. I’d best do this sometime.)

Some objects appear closer by fellow VP’er Brent Bowen, talking about the first steps being the ones you actually take.

Right. Back to the writing.

Catherine

Several interesting items before we begin a gray, murky, misty Iowa writing day.

1. Story Acceptance: I’m pleased to announce that my ambiguous horror story Crystal Vision will be appearing in Swill issue 5, most likely this summer. One of the things I like to do as a writer is stretch, and this one is a bit of a stretch for me. I get to climb into the head of an alcoholic grandmother. Swill is a non-paying venue, but fills another part of my writer agenda, working with people I know. It sort of dovetails into the third part–placing yourself in areas where you think there will be buzz. Because the Swill guys really have a quasi-literary project.

I want to thank all of my great readers who made me work harder to shape the story. You guys really know how to make a woman revise!

Viable Paradise peeps might also like to know that this was one of the evil overlord vignettes I wrote.

More? Let’s cut this thing a bit, so you don’t have to read the whole list if you don’t care to.

Continue reading “Publishing Announcement; List o’ Stuff”

My friend Yvonne from the Netherlands took a series of trips to Norway. I’m linking her travelogues here for my own use.

and what will this be?
norway 2
norway-wednesday
norway?

***

Jim Hines publishes the first of his Novel Survey Results.

And now, I’ve got to do some appointments and run some errands. Writing coming up! Loving the full time writing life for this week.

Catherine

Julie Rose sends along a link to another gorgeous candidate for frost elf chases: the Myrdal Plateau. Of course, there is a gallery of gorgeous pictures from the trip as well. Thanks to both Julie and Craig for letting me link. Some of these pictures are breathtaking.

Some more Norway pictures can be found at Tifosi, the soccer blog my friend Prairie writes. There’s a lot of soccer in here, but also some country capturing pictures.

I’d really like to see this stuff for real. Probably not in time to do any good for this manuscript, but maybe I can rig something for the sequel.

Catherine

The first two new scenes feature a horse chase across a winter landscape. Alfheim is patterned on Scandinavia, and I am looking for places to have such a chase. Which is why you get this exciting entry on Hardangervidda.

Ready? Here we go.

What I needed was a flat feature of lands embedded in mountains. A cave in the ice is a feature I intend to add in myself. What looks promising?

Hardangerjokulen. If the glacier is good enough for George Lucas in The Empire Strikes Back, it’s good enough for me. This travelogue shows some beautiful pictures of the area.

The glacier itself is situated in Hardangervidda, a peneplain. Peneplains are one of geography’s little controversies. The theory is that erosion causes these sorts of plains to build up near sea level. The lack of formations of peneplains in this time, though, casts some doubt upon that theory. Most peneplains are old, and they have been uplifted through orogenic (mountain forming) activity.

In 1981, Norway created this area into a national park. Apparently, there are loads of activities to do all year around. In winter, snow activities are king. In summer, the hikers and fish enthusiasts come out.

If you’re interested in getting there, Hardangervidda is between Bergen and Oslo, sort of on the way. I think, geographically, this will do quite nicely.

And it should also do quite nicely for tomorrow’s writing session(s).

Catherine

From over at Matt Cardin’s journal, Getting to Know Your Creative Demon, Part 3, part of the ongoing exploratory series.

I’m off to research cold land masses. That is all.

Catherine

Spring break=me pretending to be a full time writer. I’ve put in a lot of writing time today. While I don’t have an excerpt for you after all, here’s where I’ve been and what I’ve done today.

Chapters 1 and 2: Complete
Chapters 3 and 4: 3 scenes in need of deep revision

Issues: Think about how to handle POV. This book may need to have more of a sense of narrator, given you have a lot of POV going on.

Well, I’m going to send out some short story feedback, and then I’m going to knock off a while.

Hope your day is going well.

Catherine

It’s not going to quite happen, that handout I need for the academic conference I’m going to right after break, so I’ll be taking that home with me.

That’s the only work thing I have to take home. Oh yeah.

The writing all break plan should begin on Monday. I’m excited. Did I mention I’m excited? Because I am excited.

First, though, have a weekend of hanging out with friends. I’ve got to get a role playing game around for them (the geeky horror! the geeky horror!). There’s a Tupperware party tonight too (the Midwest horror! the Midwest horror!)

I’m going to try to post interesting snippets all next week, so I don’t just keep coming here and saying exciting things like I’m writing and I have nothing to say.

Catherine

As of today, I’m driving this book. I just spent the last hour plotting the book, and I know everything that happens. Who’s doing what, where the emotional stuff fits in, all of it.

Although the alternate title could now be Teen Elf, I’m still pretty pleased. It’s definitely a YA book. The end of the book is the culmination of romance that develops over the series of the adventure. Sure, there’s heartache and there’s a tone of bittersweet for some of the characters as well.

And interestingly, it sets itself up for a Decorah sequel.

At any rate, now the plan is to write all this into reality. I have an entire week off next week, and I will spend it working on this book.

It feels so good to have a map, finally.

Off to read some other people’s work. I have a full manuscript (about halfway through that one) and a couple of short stories in the hopper, so I’m excited to do it.

Catherine