CAROL BURNSIDE / ANNIE RAYBURN

>Fly-by posting. Must keep writing.

Sorry!

>Yesterday, I only managed another couple pages. Even so, I’m feeling good about the outlook.

In amongst all this push for pages I’ve been preparing for a garage sale, (which the entire subdivision takes part in) keeping up with the laundry, and trying to keep the house from becoming buried in dust-bunnies and pet hair. I don’t see how young mothers who write factor in the needs of their children and/or a job while trying to do all this. Sheesh! Maybe it has something to do with being a couple decades younger than me, hmm?

This month’s activity has me thinking about other goals I’ve set. Do you set goals? I made quite a few at the beginning of the year. Starting next month, I think I’ll take a look at them and see what I’ve accomplished, adjust some, and possibly set short term goals to aid in reaching the more lofty ones.

>Recently, I sat down and wrote up all the book ideas I had jotted in notebooks, in small Word files and such. I ended up with 30 possibilities for books. Granted, some are more developed than others. Some are mere ideas, but hey, I need to ramp up productivity in order to see them all become actual books before the decade is over.

Yesterday, I talked about the April Writing Challenge I’ve been working toward. Because I’ve been attempting the First Draft in 30 Days (FDi30D) method of writing Taming The Tycoon, the bulk of my writing has been in outlining the book, brainstorming scenes, then analyzing what I’ve got for continuity, and story elements. (I did manage to write some articles and a short story in there, too.) I must say, though, the FDi30D process has given me a better appreciation of how the story elements come into play, how the tension needs to continually ramp up, ease off, then ramp up higher in building to the climax so that the HEA will be that much more satisfying for the reader.

So, in challenging myself to the 120 pages this month, I knew most of them would come in the last 10 days. I’ve got a 15-pg. outline, consisting of some 30 scenes that I’m revising. I’m hoping to at least double the outline pages with more detail. Then the real writing will start, using the outline as a guide. For a mostly-panster like me, this will be interesting and (I’m hoping) will get me past those ohmigod-where-am-I-going-with-this spots because I’ll know how the book unfolds.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to take a break during the day and keep up with my blogging, too. I’ll keep you posted here on my progress. As of yesterday, I’ve managed 3 pages/day and need to make up 19 in 11 days. So from now through the end of the month, I need to churn out approximately 6 pages a day to finish strong. Stay tuned…