Posts Tagged ‘Check-in’

March 17, 2010

Meg & Matt, Stories

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In the home stretch

Getting in the habit of writing is really helping.

I got another 1,000 words written today, bringing my total on Meg & Matt’s story to 44,090 — many of them written since Jan. 17.

That leaves a minimum of 11,000 words — max 16,000 — to finish this story. It’s definitely a category romance.

It means I’m in the home stretch with this one. Wonder if I’ll have the first draft finished by this time next month. If I can write even 500 words a day, it’d take about 20 days to get to 55K.

Perhaps I should make that a goal. Of course, if I final in the Golden Heart, I’ll lose a few days to chaos — at least that’s what I hear. I’d love a chance to experience it for myself!

March 16, 2010

Contests

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Getting ready

The dialogue presentation I’m giving to NARWA on Saturday is almost ready. I’ve practiced it more than once (once in front of a human audience and twice for my cats, who didn’t seem impressed) and keep finding things to change with each telling.

I’ve also been plugging away on my WIP — Meg and Matt are a bit above the 40K-word mark now, so I only have between 15,000 and 20,000 to go. It might be time for them to stop with the deliriously happy lovemaking and get back to being in conflict. (… If only I were better at conflict — but that’s another post.)

The one thing I haven’t been getting ready for? The possibility of getting THE CALL that I’m a GH finalist. A part of me thinks I have a very good chance; another little voice says “not a snowball’s chance.” All the see-sawing is starting to make me a nervous wreck — and there are still several days to go before the calls go out.

For those of you not plugged into the whole Golden Heart experience, March 25 is the big day. (But I have to ask, are you living under a rock?)

Last year’s finalists are having a big countdown on their blog, the Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood. I’ve been checking back there more often than usual because their excitement is infectious. (In fact, until they started their countdown, I’d managed to not think too much about the fact that March 25 was inching ever closer.)

After reading Monday’s entry on things you should do to get ready for THE CALL, I Googled myself (no, it didn’t hurt a bit!) to make sure people — important publishing-type people — could find me. I also checked the RWA Web site to make sure they had the correct contact info. (I’d hate to miss THE CALL because they had my now-defunct home phone. We switched from a land line to just our cells quite some time ago.)

Guess that means I’m as ready as I can be. Less than 10 days to go!

March 10, 2010

Progress, Query Letters

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Thought of a great post

… But somewhere between sitting in traffic for an hour and driving up I-17 at 20 mph, I forgot what I wanted to say. Maybe it’ll come back to me for a future post.

I didn’t get a lot of writing done these last couple of days. I did, however, manage to do a little. Better than nothing, I guess.

There was another rejection in my e-mail inbox a couple of days ago. Three down; two more to go. By the time I hear back from them, I’ll probably know the GH results, too. Maybe then I’ll know if Brad and Erin’s story is even worth sending out.

I think I just remembered what I wanted to say. But I’m going to save it for another day. Maybe tomorrow, so I can appease those regular readers of mine. 😀

March 5, 2010

Blind Date Bride, Meg & Matt, Progress, Query Letters, Stories

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Plugging away

First off, I want to thank my regular readers. Apparently there are two of you out there. My blog had two hits for each of the last two days, even though I didn’t post a thing.

Maybe I’m wrong, but it makes me think there are some people out there who actually look forward to what I have to say. I’ll try not to disappoint.

On Monday, I started taking a synopsis-writing class via RWA Online. On Wednesday, I completed my first class assignment: Writing a query letter. I wrote one for “Blind Date Bride” and am reasonably happy with it. I haven’t turned in my homework to get any other comments yet, though. Guess I need to get on the ball, since we just got assignment No. 2.

Of course, the time I spent on my query took time away from the WIP. I’ve only written a couple thousand words on Meg & Matt’s story in the last few days.

I guess it’s still 2,300 words more than I had a couple of days ago. I had some fun today, writing a scene where the ballplayer confronts his woman’s ex (the baby’s daddy). I enjoyed making the ex a real creep. Here’s the part where Matt sees him for the first time.

The guy was wearing an oversized cowboy hat and shiny red shirt. His lip was curled into a sneer. Matt hated him on sight. What the hell could Meg have seen in a guy like this?

His mother’s soft voice popped into his head, admonishing him not to judge the book by its cover.

Matt sighed. His mom was right. This ex of Meg’s could have a scintillating personality. He’d reserve judgment until he’d actually talked to the bozo.

Of course, talking to him doesn’t change Matt’s opinion. But it was a fun scene to write.

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