Success in Strange Ways
But they are my ways!
Yesterday I managed, very late at night and long past my bedtime, to finish the short story I was trying to write for Taco Tuesday. I let my challenger know I was done, but, sorry, wasn’t likely to get it all the way to published until today. Then, I took my laptop to bed with me, and got it all of the way done. That was the challenge. A short story, written, editing pass, cover made, blurb written and categories, keywords… all that, in a week.
It’s a fantastic writing exercise. I will get better as I go on, I hope, because the stories keep wanting to go long on me, and part of this is training my brain to write to deadline, to wordcount, and to topic. Refining the process doesn’t mean I’m unhappy, however. I consider this a successful week. Even a week where I really don’t make it on time, and I carry the tale into the next week (and longer, to the delight of my readers) will be successful if I learn and improve based on it.
Which might well happen this coming week, as the other thing I started on Monday was an intensive class on wasp identification and it’s more in-depth than I thought it would be. I am delighted, but also sobered knowing I am stacking two weeks of that, MWF, on my day job which is immovable and immutable, and it means something will have to give. Firstly, my poor dear husband will have a feral housewife for a couple of weeks as I’m buried under work and chaining myself to the desk. Secondly, the writing may have to be somewhat neglected… although after managing 6,000ish words in four hours on Tuesday I may just have to expect more from myself. I’ve already worked ahead on graphic design where I could, and warned clients that January is not a good month. However, I do expect that I can’t keep up this level of production forever. So next week… I will see what I can do.
CV Walter tried to apologize to me for the short she wrote this week, and I wouldn’t let her. She’d spent the weekend at MarsCon working hard, came home hours into Tuesday morning after a flight-cancellation nightmare, and still managed to write! That’s a success in anyone’s book, and there are no wordcount limits on this challenge. Full story, that’s all, and posted or published. You should go read it, and subscribe to her substack as well, to follow the other half of this challenge.
And if you liked Djinn, the first story to come from this challenge, you’re going to want to read Dust Storm, and find out what happened next. There will be, next week if I can maintain my successful writing streak, the third and final story set on Sumire, the desert planet with secrets. I know who the characters will be, and some of what will happen, but I haven’t started to write it just yet.
Onward!
