A Week of Writing: 7/23/18 to 7/29/18
Monday has arrived, and it’s time to share my weekly writerly report card.
Words to Write By
This week’s quote comes from Elmore Leonard, whose “10 Rules of Writing” is one of my favorite pieces of writing advice.
“Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.”
—Elmore Leonard
This quote is the abbreviated version of rule ten in the aforementioned “10 Rules of Writing.” I’m currently trying to figure out which parts of my novel might fall into this category and then remove/rewrite them. A difficult task, and one I’ll ultimately need my critique partners to help me with, but I think I made some headway this week.
The Novel
Last week was very productive. I didn’t finish my initial revisions, but I’m three-quarters of the way done. I removed a problematic plot point, and I’m in the process of reworking the rest of the novel to match. It’s going pretty well, though I definitely have some plot and character motivation holes to shore up.
Short Stories
Finished revising one story and had just enough time to submit it to an anthology that closed to submissions on July 29th. I’m still working on one more revision I need to get out by the 31st.
Another fairly slow week for submissions.
- Submissions Sent: 2
- Rejections: 1
- Acceptances: 0
- Publications: 0
Two submissions this week and only four for the month. Disappointing, but the shorts have to take a backseat to the novel right now. I plan to send out a lot more short stories in August while my critique partners are caving up my manuscript.
The Blog
Two blog posts last week.
7/9/18: A Week of Writing: 7/16/18 to 7/22/18
The usual weekly writing update.
7/12/18: Iron Kingdoms Fiction – Confirmed Kill
A free Iron Kingdoms story published last year in No Quarter magazine. Privateer Press gave me permission to post this one in its entirety (plus a few others).
Goals
One big goal – finish the initial revision of the novel and get it off to my critique partners. Everything else is secondary.
Story Spotlight
The spotlight story is the piece I mentioned above. As some of you know, I’ve been writing for Privateer Press for a long time, and I’ve published two novels and a whole bunch of shorter works in their Iron Kingdoms setting. Anyway, they’ve given me permission to post some of my old stories on the blog, the first of which you can read by clicking the illustration or link below.
“Confirmed Kill”
That was my week. How was yours?
Effectively Wild – A Baseball Horror Story
Night Walk & Other Dark Paths
Acts of War: Flashpoint
Acts of War: Aftershock
Acts of War: Stormbreak
Aeryn Rudel's Rejectomancy 