A Round of Words in 80 Days

I wish I could say I had a busy life with screaming kids and a husband to cook for. But I don't have kids and my husband usually fends for himself. I do however have a full-time job and a part-time job teaching community college Monday nights and Saturday mornings. The rest of my time is either spent writing or thinking about writing. You'd think by now I'd have a better handle on how to better manage my time, but no...I tend to procrastinate and actually do more thinking about my WIP than actually writing it.

Yesterday, I stumbled upon A Round of Words in 80 Days and even though this writing challenge began on January 3rd, I decided it's never to late to set realistic writing goals. The organizer, Kait Nolan, was encouraging and said to jump on in and so here I am.

The idea behind #ROW80 is to set your own realistic writing goals as long as they're measurable. That's pretty much all there is to it, with bi-weekly check-in's on Wednesdays and Sundays.

I think I can manage that!

So here are my goals for the next 80 53 days:

1. Write everyday - I don't have many distractions other than work obligations, so I have to condition myself to put in writing time in the morning and at night. I get easily distracted by the t.v....

2. On weekends, spend at least 3 hours writing a day - my weekends, other than Saturday mornings, are are almost always free.

What I hope to accomplish with the first two goals will ultimately lead to my third and final goal.

3. Have the first draft of my WIP completed.

So there you have it. Every Wed an Sun you'll be seeing my progress posted on my blog and I hope that by participating in this challenge I will stop procrastinating and get it done!

** I didn't devote 3 hours writing time yesterday, but I did manage to get in @ 1,500 words. If I stick to these goals (starting today), think of how much I can accomplish!

I'm a Writer, but a Reader First

I just want to make it clear that this is not a book review site. However, occasionally I like to post about books that I've read and enjoyed...especially indie authors. Why? Because we are a special community of writers that rely on the support from writers and their peers. It's no different than what we see in the world of academia when we hear the term "peer reviewed" in relation to a published article. It simply implies that the work had been accepted and vetted by members within their academic community.

But aside from being a writer and a peer, I am also a reader!  If you're going to write, you have to read (and because Stephen King says so).

Now that I've said what I have to say, here are two books I had the good fortune of reading this week from indie author Stacey Wallace Benefiel. 

I loved the story so much, that I ended up reading both books back to back (Stacey, please hurry up with Glow)! Stacey offers an original take on psychic abilities and I was completely sucked into the story and its characters. While the books are YA, it was still a captivating read to this 30-some year old. My only complaint was that both books were just a tad too short...I didn't want it to end. Oh, and her sister did the cover art. How cool is that?

Glimpse (Zellie Wells Book 1)

Glimmer (Volume 2)

So you see, this isn't really a review, but rather an attempt to say, "Hey! Read this book. It's great."

New Blog Design!

For those of you who actually read my blog, you'll notice a definite change. I decided to take advantage of  last night's winter storm (okay, I could have gone to work today, but I decided to stay home and clear up all the widow makers that fell in our front and back yards) and play around with my site.

Since a lot of my current projects include horror, paranormal and fantasy elements, I went with fun. Plus, I really like skeletons and skulls - I even have skull artwork around the house (but no skeletons in the closets!)

I am still working on revising some of my pages, so keep checking back!

Don't Forget to Add These Books...

Ever since I decided to take the leap from published short story writer to penning full length books, I've been greeted with open arms by both authors and readers. All I can say is that I've had the pleasure of making the acquaintance of some great indie authors, readers, and reviewers in the last couple months. Without your words of encouragement and support, I'd have given up long ago.

But support goes both ways, so here I am, excited for my dear friend Abe Dawson who has just published his first book, Acedia. If you are familiar with the some of the works from last year's Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Awards, you'll know that Acedia (under the working title, The Earls of Fairlington) made it all the way to the Semi-Finals. Publishers Weekly called his debut book, "...a highly original, sometimes farcical and reliably intelligent work..."

Now, even though Abe already gave my husband and I a signed ARC of Acedia as an early wedding gift awhile back, you can bet I'm looking forward to downloading Acedia on my Kindle!

*****

And speaking of signed copies...Guess who won a signed copy of J.L. Bryan's The Haunted E-Book this past weekend? Me! As I've mentioned before, J.L. Bryan is currently blog-hopping on his Haunted E-Book Tour (Is it possible to be a groupie for a blog tour??) and it's not too late to win some great giveaways, including a Kindle!