For the last few days I’ve been enmeshed in a full time writer’s vacation. In an effort to step closer to my goal of being a full time writer, I’ve spent my whole vacation from my true full time job writing/editing at least 8 hours a day, and taking my writing as serious as a full time job. I’ve learned quite a bit from this time. The most important being pacing and other being a new respect for full time writers.

Starting off my fulltime writer’s vacation with a bang, I received my edits for Heart’s Ultimatum. I was thrilled when I saw them in my email as another goal I could get behind me as part of this vacation. I got them on Tuesday (the day before my vacation) and did the easy edits, such as deleting and adding commas, typos and fixing comma splices. On Wednesday, my first day of the full time writer’s vacation, I dug into the edits, but by the end of my eight hours that day I was feeling pretty drained and emotional. It took me a good twelve hours of sleep and a Kathy Griffin stand up special to get back to an even keel.

I learned from that first day the importance of pacing. Don’t do all your edits in one day, because that’s going to make you crazy. Once you get so far into edits you won’t be able to do anything else, you’re brains already drained. Since then I’ve been spending the first four or so hours of the day either writing or revising something new. Writing gives me energy, while revising and editing tend to take it away, so I need to building writing new stuff into the schedule early, to give me energy in the beginning of the day to make it through to the end and then I can end with edits, when I’d be tired any way.

I’ve also been spending an hour or two a day, doing promo. Setting up blog spots, emailing people, even discussing writing on some loops and facebook groups. That’s an important part of writing full time too, making sure people know who you are and where to find you when they want to buy your books.

Once I started to get the pacing down, I’ve been having a much better time on my full time writer’s vacation. I revised and submitted another work and I’m almost done with my edits for Heart’s Ultimatum, I hope to get them sent back within the next day or two, which is still way ahead of the January deadline set by my publisher.

For the remainder of the vacation (which will extend through January 2nd) I have one more short to revise and possibly submit (but it’s not ready I won’t push it, since I plan to submit it to a big publisher) and to write more of Foolish Desire and my superhero novella. I’d also love to make some progress on heart’s trailer, but we’ll see. That’s really at the bottom of the list as far as I’m concerned.

The biggest thing I’ve learned so far this week, is that being a fulltime writer is not as easy as it appears. It’s a lot easier to put in eight hours at my day job than my writing one (though there are definitely a few hard days at the EDJ too). It’s more emotional than I would have though and draining. While I still want to work towards being able to live off my writing, and open up more opportunities for myself for my future, whether it is writing full time, or with a part time EDJ or being a full time mom and part time writer, the future is pretty unclear. But I plan to keep working hard, pushing through and enjoying my writing the best I can.

We’re at the half way point of my December Close Out plan, so I thought I’d let you all in on my progress so far. I finished revising and submitted one of the three shorts I wanted to push out the door this month, Snow Day, and I’ve made great strides towards revising the second one. I completed my character profiles for my superhero novella. And I completed the Midnight Mirage trailer I’ve been working on and off for months.

Here’s my results--

I’m very pleased with the progress. Though now that the month is partially done I realize some of my priorities need to be changed.

I had hoped to do a book trailer for Naughty List. And while I still want to build one someday, I think now that we’re so close to Christmas, my time would be better spent creating a book trailer for Heart’s Ultimatum so I can use it for promo during its release (February 2012).

I also had another great surprise this month. Amy and Will from Foolish Desire started to talk to me, and since I’d really like to get this book released during the spring/summer time (which means subbing it in January/February) I definitely listened to them. Not only have I completed all the character profiles for these two, and have a good handle on their personalities. I’ve even started writing. I have about 3k, and I’m only picking up speed. But this will probably keep me from finishing Hunter and Madison’s story for a little while longer.

Tomorrow my plan kicks into high gear, as my fulltime writer’s vacation starts. I’ll be focusing for at least eight hours a day on my writing for my entire vacation (besides Christmas day). In that time I should be able to revise and submit the other two shorts, as well as work on some of my other projects. I hope to have a very merry Christmas of writing and revising. And take a few steps closer to making my full time writer status not just a vacation, but a lifestyle.

Sorry I didn’t check in last week for WIP Wednesday. I had a bit of a personal emergency. I hit a pot hole on a main highway and ended up bending the front passage rim. Not only did I end up with a flat tire, and thankfully was able to relay on the kindness of a coworker to come help me, but I had the whole upheaval of fixing the rim and trying to find another car to use until that was complete. It wasn’t a life or death situation, but took a lot of time and stress to deal with.

The big news this week, Heart’s Ultimatum is officially submitted. After very thorough read through, I sent it off to the publisher Saturday afternoon. WhooHoo!

But with any submission, this now leaves me with a gaping hole of what to do next. I always have a million ideas running around in my head. I just have to capture one and hold it down long enough to get all the specifics. An idea is far from a story, or even a book. A lot more needs to be determined before that can happen.

Right now the idea most on my mind is a shifter idea I’ve been contemplating that’s a twist on a secret baby storyline. I’ve got my heroine, Madison, fleshed out, and even her daughter Brianna is pretty three dimensional, but I’m having trouble capturing the hero, Hunter. As much as I roll him around in my mind I can’t seem to get a firm grasp on him. I feel more like I’ve grabbed the edge of his jacket, or maybe just an ass cheek :D

Until I have a better idea how he’ll react in the situations my heroine and her secret baby will throw at him, I can’t start writing. It’s an extremely frustrating part of the process for me, feeling the flickers in the back of my mind, but not able to grab onto them. It’s kind of like trying to remember a dream from the night before. I know I need a break to let it settle, once I stop thinking about it, the idea will probably just come to me.

Until everything is cleared up on my shifter story, I’m going to take another pass at Wandering off the Path and see if I can get that submitted to a few more publishers. I really love this story, but after completing and submitting four other works, I’m afraid it might need a lot of work. I was a much less experienced author then, and I’ve learned a lot since those days. But I love this story so much and had many critique partners really enjoy it too.  I think the story deserves another round of edits. If I can’t get it picked up this time, I might have to reevaluate if the work is salvageable.  So my goal for September is to do one more complete revision, taking into account an editors notes, and see if I can get this one set up for the 2012 schedule. While still stewing my shifter idea.

Should be a action packed month :D

I often talk about how important it is to push through the pain, to keep going, to force yourself to work when you’d rather take a nap or watch American Idol. I do believe that’s a gigantic part of being a writer, and especially for being a successful writer, but there also comes a time when you have to quit as well.  There has to be a balance between pushing past the pain and driving yourself so crazy you don’t have time to sleep or think of anything beyond your work.

This week I decided I had to quit a project, not the project entirely, but the original conception of it. I had planned to finish my WIP I’ve been calling Post-Apocalyptic NYC and submitting it by the first for an anthology call. I realized it wasn’t a goal I could complete to the level I wanted to submit. I decided regardless of my goal of submitting something every month, I only want to submit works that are ready for publication, regardless of this resolution. Getting rejections is hard enough, no one wants to set themselves up for it, and submitting something you don’t like or doing think is ready is only asking for such a rebuff.

For right now I’m still able to accomplish my goal. I have a few more works in the shoot ready to be submitted, so I’ll just be calling another one up to action sooner. But it may mean I can’t make my goal later in the year. But I’ll get there when I get there.

As a side note, my work on Post-Apocalyptic NYC will continue, and I hope it will be ready for submission quickly. The work is a dramatic departure from some of the other things I’ve done, but a really interesting and stimulating turn. I’ll keep you all posted on its progress.