Focus

So, my last blog post was about balancing my passions in life, and how over the last year I've reconnected with my passion for horses and have been training my horse Max. Last year my life went through a big transition period, and I haven't written as much as in previous years. Part of that was the big upheaval of my personal life (divorce and move) and part of it was finding balance with other aspects of my life (more time with my horse and doing yoga and other healthy things). And a big part of it that I didn't talk about was that I've had a hard time finding a focus because I wasn't sure what direction my writing was headed. I joined my first critique group and started querying my latest book, and didn't know whether to start a new project, or work on the second book of the series I'm querying, or edit one of my older books.


The optimist in me thought, if I get an agent and pub deal, I'll need to focus on the various rounds of edits that they'll want, and not be distracted by another project. So I waited, and I couldn't decide. And that was fine - I needed the time to mull things over and find my direction. Pretty much the day after I wrote that last post, I made a decision: I will self-publish my second book, Martinis with the Devil, by the end of the year. Even if I get an agent for my latest book, I think this will be a good move. Martinis is urban fantasy, and most publishers aren't touching that genre right now because it's fairly saturated. But people still love reading it (including myself!), and it's such a fun book. When people say to write the book you want to read, Martinis is pretty much the epitome of that for me. It's just fun, sassy urban fantasy with a kickass cast of characters. Nothing dark and serious like a lot of the urban fantasy out there. So, unless I get an agent and they don't want me to self-pub, that's the plan.


With that decision made, I've had a blast the last week or so outlining the sequel to Martinis. The second book is set in Dublin, so I'm tentatively thinking of a title like Whiskey and Angelfire. Whatcha think? And have you made any big decisions lately?


TTFN!

Ink, Paper and 75,625 of My Words

Man, it has been one roller coaster of a week. Some ups - all the awesome critiques on my query over at the Quintessentially Questionable Query Experiment. Some downs - crazy shit happening at work. But, I am excited for the weekend because I'm finally ready to print out Noir for my first full read-through!

I finished the first draft of Noir on December 4th, and have been letting it have "marinating" time, so my eyes are fresh when I start making editing notes. I did a little work on it over the Christmas break, not editing but researching various things. I never do that during the first draft, but put an @ sign wherever I need to look something up so I can easily search later. And over the last couple weeks I've gone through and replaced all the @ signs with the appropriate stuff, including changing the end slightly because I'd written something inaccurate about Mt. Rainier that was fairly vital.

So, now I'm done, and that baby's ready to see it's first printing! Tomorrow I'm headed to Office Depot and then on Saturday night I'm going to try to read it straight through. I'll only look at big picture issues on this first round (plot, flow, character consistency, areas that need cutting/plumping). I'm super excited!

What are your plans, my friends? Writing or otherwise... I'd love to hear from you!