Uncategorized – Page 28 – Caroline M. Yoachim

Productivity Resumes

So I had an idea that was rattling around in my head for a while, and I kept trying to mash it with other things, which wasn’t working very well. So instead of doing that I tried to boil the idea down to its very essence and write it as flash, which seemed to work. Flash is not really one of my strengths, so it will be interesting to see what other people think of it. Anyway, it was nice to get some actual writing done, as lately I’ve been doing photography and outlining, both of which are at least …

Submission #24 and stock photography

Well, after Connie’s workshop, I’d meant to revise a story AND get a new one written by Potlatch (tomorrow). I’m one for two on that. Got the story revised so I can mail it off today (Sub #24, my 8th sub to F&SF). No new writing whatsoever, though I did do some outlining on two separate story ideas. So post-Potlatch, I really need to settle in and get at least one of them written up.

Why so little writing? I’m working on breaking into stock photography. At the moment I’m selling pictures through dreamstime and fotolia. These are …

Workshop Tidbits

Went to a writing workshop with Connie Willis, part of the Hugo House series of one day workshops (http://www.nwmediaarts.com/2007Event-Workshops.html). Connie was wonderful, with lots of insights on plot. She gave TONS of examples from books and movies, which I always find helpful. And, in addition to all the tidbits I picked up from Connie, it was nice to spend the day with a bunch of other writers, talking about writing.

Assorted tidbits from Connie Willis:

Plot reversals change the direction of the story. The questions that the reader is interested in change. A reversal can come about by finding out …

Miscellaneous Stuff

Over the last week or so:
Submission #23 – to Strange Horizons
Rejection #18 – an 8-day “nice writing” but “no grab” from F&SF

After several days of not writing, I outlined a story today. It’s not ready to be written yet, it’s close, but it needs to be mashed with *something.* I’m hoping that it will become clear to me what that something is by Monday, so that I can devote next week to writing the story. On the other hand, it may be that I’ll have a whole bunch of shiny new ideas by then, since …

Rejection #17, return of the ducks

My mechanical ducks are back from Strange Horizons, but with a personal rejection, which was nice. (Well, as nice as a rejection ever is.) Feeling relatively encouraged, I went ahead and turned those ducks right around and sent them to Clarkesworld (submission #22).

No fresh writing today, or even revising. Instead I’ve been working on assorted crits. Tomorrow, though, I’ll get back to my own stuff. Really. After all, I have to have *something* done by the end of the week, be it a new story or a revision. (Or a novel chapter, I suppose, but since I’m not working …

WIP complete

Finished my story-of-the-week this morning. It came in at 5800 words, which for me is on the longish side of things. Sent it to my online crit group almost immediately, so now it’s out of my hands and I’m going to try not to think about it until a few weeks from now when the crits start rolling in.

Indoor Rain

There’s water seeping in through my ceiling. There’s little bulges up there, moist and swollen, one of which burst and dripped water down onto my kitchen counter. Fortunately, it seems to be a very small leakage–at the moment, it isn’t even dripping. Unfortunately, there is water, seeping in through the ceiling. And I’m not even on the top floor of the building. *sigh*

Writing-wise, I got my sub out to F&SF, and am closing in on the end of my WIP. It’s 4,837 words (1372 today) and I think I’ll only have to crank out one more scene. That’ll have …

Submission #21, WIP

Sub #21 – Packaged up a light revision of my backwards fairy tale, and it’ll go off to F&SF with tomorrow’s mail. If (knock on wood) I don’t get a rejection between now and when I mail it out, I’ll be up to 4 stories out in circulation, which is a new high for me.

My current project is up to 3465 words (598 words today). I think I’m about 1.5k out from the end, one or two days more if all goes well. Not sure what I’ll be working on next. I have a couple of things that need …

WIP

2867 words, 1100 today

I think I’ve passed the halfway mark on the story. The scene I’m currently halfway through is not cooperating, so I may be re-writing it tomorrow. It’s interesting and all, but I’ve no idea how it ties into anything else. Somehow it managed to skitter off sideways from the lovely outline that I made. I’m hoping I can rein it back in though, as I like some of the images in it.

I also went back and tinkered with the sections that are already written, tightening the language and trying to sneak in a little more …

WIP

Up to 1767 words on my new story (1197 words today), which brings me to the end of the second scene. Today’s wordchunk leaves me both cognitively and emotionally drained, which is probably a good thing, in terms of the end result. I’m still not quite on track to finish on Friday, because while I got a fair number of words down today, I’m not progressing through my outline as quickly as I expected. I was originally going to give myself until Sunday to have the story done, and I may go back to that. My priority on this one …

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