Joely Sue Burkhart

February in Review

It wasn’t the greatest month but not bad.  I wrote 16,500 words, about 10K new words to expand Letters to an English Professor.  (About half of what I planned.)  I don’t know that I’m going to get the 30K I needed or not.  I wasn’t able to finish the revisions by 2/29 like I hoped, but that’s okay.

The Evil Day Job was crazy and demanding, so that took a toll on my desire to get up D&E to write.  I did make it several times, but I wasn’t as productive as usual.  I was simply too tired.  This month will hopefully be better, although I have several big things due by 4/1.

This month will be huge for a lot of reasons.  My first novel will be released 3/9, the dreaded book of my heart.  The first book I wrote and completed, the book that haunted me until I got it right.  To say I love the book is an understatement, and I’m so thrilled to see it coming out shortly!  Of course, that means I’ll be busy getting promo items lined up, requesting reviews, etc.  If you have a blog and are interested in reviewing either The Rose of Shanhasson or The Fire Within, please let me know.  (Ann, I already sent the ARCs to you, my dear.  Hopefully you got them.)

This month, I’m not sure exactly how the writing will all play out.  I’ll be straddling two projects:  the Letters revision and The Road to Shanhasson, book 2, otherwise known as Gregar’s book.  I don’t have an outline prepared for the second so it might be touch and go.  In this case, knowing exactly how the book ends doesn’t guarantee writing the middle will be a piece of cake.  Let alone the beginning, in this case.  But I did start wading through notes and old files this morning and made a little headway.  I’ll continue muddling my way through a plan the rest of this week.

Sven:  2501 words

I have a dilemma.  Round 3 of 70 Days of Sweat has started, and I’m already behind.  I’m torn.  I don’t know what to do, which has allowed me to dither.

I’d hoped to have Letters revised by 3/1 so I could move perfectly into Gregar’s book for Sven.  However, that hasn’t happened.  I might not even be halfway through the revisions.  The Evil Day Job took a toll on me in Feb and my D&E sessions just weren’t as productive as I’d hoped, and definitely fewer and farther between than I planned.

After sleeping in yesterday (no basketball!) and today (oops, overslept and missed church), I’m ready to begin a month of hard writing.  Yet I still can’t get my mind in gear.  I’ve done NO OUTLINING whatsoever for Gregar’s story.  I know it inside and out… yet there are several sticky points.  One just happens to be the beginning.  To claim on the page or not…  (Inside joke — read Rose to find out what the big deal is about a claiming.)

Letters isn’t in an any better place right now.  It’s hard to change scenes around to another POV.  I’ve added some nice layers and texture, definitely, but I’m in a Dark Valley where I’m really wondering whether I’m doing the right thing, if I should have just left it alone. 

Well, enough whining.  I’m going to make a decision tonight and get up D&E tomorrow ready to work.  I’m just not sure on which project yet.

[Comment this week to be entered in the Drollerie Press $25 Giveaway!] 

Did you hear the wild cheering this morning?

For the first time in weeks, I dragged my fanny out of bed dark and early this morning to work on NSR.  Why?  Because I could smell the end.  Sure enough, I finished the NaNoWriMo novel this morning!

Roughly 63,667 words, and I do mean rough.  Very rough.  I’m sure most of the ending will change when I come through for revisions, but still, what a great way to end the year!!!  I’m very pleased.

1430 words this morning, bringing my Sven total to 84,870 words since 10/15.  My daily word count average in Dec. has only been 787 words, but it was regular and consistent enough to finish.  That’s what counts in the end.

I also finished the second pass of editor revisions on The Fire Within last night, so that novella should be closer to release.  I can’t wait to see the cover Deena concocts!

My plans for the rest of year?  No, I’m not turning into a slug.  I’m reading several books for research and pleasure already (that’s part of why my word count average has been lower this month).  If I feel up to it in a few days, I’ll pull out ANTs and see if I can finish it by the end of the year.  I’ve only got 5K or so left on it.  I also need a synopsis for Letters and I need to decide whether to turn it into a full length novel or not.  With half the Brava finalists announced already, I’m not getting a good vibe that Letters will place.    The stress is killing me, so I decided to just assume the worst and be done.  I could easily double Letters’ length by adding Conn’s POV.  I just need to decide if that’s the route I want to go or not, because obviously that’s a chunk of work.  The story isn’t about HIS growth and change right now, but Rae’s. 

Otherwise, I’m shifting my focus to RHP and will develop a revision plan for the second draft.  That’ll be my #1 goal in January!

I’m shooting to have RHP ready for submission by April and NSR ready for submission by July. 

How about you?  Are you thinking about 2008 goals yet?  It’s only a few weeks away…

Well, my production has certainly gone down this month.  On the bright side, though, I’ve touched NSR every single day this month.  I keep hoping even a few hundred words will eventually see me out of this hell.  (haha, that’s a joke, since the heroine is now lost in Xibalba)  I need to do some brainstorming again, just pen and paper, no idea too bizarre, until I figure out what comes next.  It’s easy to say “defeat the demons.”  It’s hard to figure out what that means!!!

6,500 words in Dec. so far.  My Sven total is up to 77,993 words.  Still grinding away.

How about you?  Is your production taking a hit with the holiday season just around the corner?

 

 Okay, this is a really, really dumb story about a little mishap this morning.  Remember that I write in sections daily.  So I wrote my little over 1K this morning, and with great joy and anticipation, prepared my “first draft” document to feed into the word counter.  All those little sections…    

And I was several thousand short.

You guys know I have a Masters degree in Mathematics, right?  Yet evidently, I’d somehow screwed up the communicative property of addition, because my carefully tallied spreadsheet of daily sections was lying to me.

Then I realized that I’d written two sections “out of order”, calling them Xibalba_001 and Xibalba_002 because I wasn’t sure where they’d end up fitting in the numerical sequence.  DOH.

So after a heartattack, I made it.  Of course, I can’t tally exactly to NaNo’s “official” count of 50,242.  My first draft compiled copy (with scene breaks and [notes]) is 50,340.  The spreadsheet total is 50,097.  They must be counting em-dashes differently or something.  Anyway, by three different counts, I made it!

Today:  1200

Sven:  71,300

A rather grumpy day yesterday leading today.  Contributing factors:  several disappointments and my internet was out from around 2:00 p.m. yesterday until I got up D&E this morning.  I woke myself up at 3:00 a.m. coughing.  So I’m feeling rather raggedy today and the mood is not improved. 

I will get more words tonight.  I’m so close… I’ve just got to dig a little deeper and push through.

Today:  1,023 1,734

NANO: 48,186 48,897

SVEN:  69,389 70,100

Plus, I received edits on the novella, The Fire Within.  With the internet down all night, I worked several hours on revisions and have less than 20 pages to wrap up. 

It’s amazing how much I can accomplish when I get angry.  I saw something yesterday that really ticked me off, turned my eyes green with envy, and made me want to throw in the towel utterly for this story.  My great high concept idea?  Someone has a trilogy coming out with the same general concept.  *(#&@*#&!!

So first starts all the bemoaning.  “If only I’d finished this story two years ago when I first had the idea…”  “Why even bother?  Someone else beat me to it.”  “My unique wonderful idea isn’t so unique, so there’s no need to finish it.”

Ah, the evil voices.  The Valley of the Shadow of Death.

I got mad at myself this morning.  I know I can’t be the only person writing this kind of story, not with the “prediction” of the end of the world just around the corner in 2012.  I still have unique twists to how I’m using Maya mythology.  Nobody is ever going to view a story idea exactly the same.  It’s all in the execution.  Besides, I hope this other trilogy does well.  That will stir up the lust for more books similar to it, and mine WILL be finished and polished soon, ready to go.

Today:  2,366

NANO:  47,163

SVEN:  68,366

Ugh.  This morning was a slow torturous grind.  I found myself doing ANYTHING except write the scene… which just happened to be the first sex scene.  I guess I should have skipped it, but that would have required that I actually know what happens next, and I don’t! 

Today:  1,013 1,328

NANO:  44,482 44,797

SVEN:  65,685 66,000

Since everyone is sniffly, we slept in this morning and stayed home from church.  We had a lovely afternoon of football–except for the Chiefs losing.  Boo.  But yay for Kolby Smith!  Struggled to get my words today, but I finally made my minimal goal of 1K.

Today:  1,246

NANO:  43,469

SVEN:  64,672

What a great game the Mizzou/Kansas border war ended up being!  Of course being a MO girl and growing up at another black-and-gold school, we cheered for the Tigers.  Next week’s game against OU will be exciting to say the least, with the possibility of a national title looming…

And yay, Bill Callahan was fired by the University of Nebraska, one of my old schools.  In forty years, the Cornhuskers never had a losing season until he came along.  Appropriately, the Chiefs are playing HIS old team tomorrow in the same stadium that Mizzou won in tonight.  Hopefully the Chiefs will play as great.

Today:  1,862

NANO:  42,223

SVEN:  63,426