Insecure Writer's Support Group: Reaping the Rewards. Or Lack Thereof.

Insecure Writer's Support Group is a blog hop hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh where totally insecure writers can get together and share the things that are making us go argh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IWSG Day Question: How do you celebrate when you achiever a writing goal / finish a story?

I think the sad answer to this question is that I don’t celebrate. I always mean to, and often use rewards as motivation when I’m trying to complete a writing challenge like NaNoWriMo, but when the month is over I tend not to follow through. Nowadays, I don't even give myself time off to relax. It's just straight on to the next project. 

            I guess I’m one of those people who is really good at delayed gratification. That or I am one of those insane people who lives for the chase rather than the kill (Sorry. Bad imagery. Have been writing too much shifter romance). 

             I know it isn't sustainable though. This kind of pace with no reward or down time will likely end in a breakdown. Maybe this is a timely reminder to be kinder to myself.

 

Insecure Writer's Support Group: Genre Love

Insecure Writer's Support Group is a blog hop hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh where totally insecure writers can get together and share the things that are making us go argh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IWSG Question: What do you love about the genre you write in most often?

If someone had asked me this question a few years ago I would have gone into a lengthy tirade about how great sci-fi/dystopia is. But as I sit here trying to formulate a plan for my publishing career this year, I realise that my growing WIP list now includes quite a lot of urban fantasy, contemporary YA romance and most recently some adult paranormal romance. Usually when I’m done writing a novel in one series I’ll jump straight into editing or writing the next book in another series. So right now it’s hard for me to pin down what genre I write in most often.

What my novels have in common across all these genres is strong female characters, lots of action and some sort of fantastical element. Even in my contemporary romances some far out things tend to happen (kidnappings, stolen identities, hacker culture etc).  This isn’t a huge surprise because these are the kinds of books I like to read. I can read any genre as long as it doesn’t have a shrinking violet heroine and a really slow plot.

Insecure Writer's Support Group: Resolutions Anyone?

Insecure Writer's Support Group is a blog hop hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh where totally insecure writers can get together and share the things that are making us go argh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IWSG Day Question: What steps have you taken to put a schedule in place for your writing and publishing?  

Can I just state first of all that  I am loving these monthly questions? It really takes the hassle out of figuring out what I'm going to write about each month. And they always seems to be especially relevant to me. But I digress...

I've spent the past few days trying to decide what will be happening with this writing and publishing thing that I appear to have decided to do. I've mentioned previously that I published my first and only novel in September 2015. Since then I've allowed myself to go off on a tangent and write all kinds of other novels in other series. As an indie, I can tell you now, this is not good practice. Any traction that I had with my first novel is now gone. The few people on my mailing list probably don't even remember who I am anymore and the face of indie publishing has changed so much in the past 2 years that when I do publish again I'll have to essentially relearn everything from scratch. 

I guess what I'm saying is that I went into this whole publishing thing with my eyes tightly shut, hoping to just wing it on luck. I'd been writing the same novel for over 4 years and was thoroughly sick to death of it and just wanted it out so I could work on other things. Which was all well and good except that I had nothing to follow it up with. There's a saying that the best way to promote your novel is to write the next one. Well I broke that rule right off the bat. 

The other night someone on one of my FB groups shared this blog post about sustainability as an indie author. It's all about treating your writing as a business and setting long term goals so that you don't burn out. There's advice in there about how to sustain the business now that the indie market has matured and it got me thinking about where I eventually want to go with my writing career. How much I can write a year, every year, to sustain my love of writing. I haven't quite figured it out yet but what I do know is that I can't be one of those writers who chases trends and writes what the market demands. It's just not who I am. 

I guess I'm lucky in some ways because when I do write (Mostly during NaNoWriMo months), my word counts can be staggering. I could probably comfortably write 4-6 novels a year if I really needed to. I've realised too that the drafts I write are pretty clean so editing, though mentally tedious, isn't as awful as it once was. I think it's the marketing and self-doubt side of things that makes me pause and want to stick my head in the sand. That's the part that I need to focus on this year. I have about 9 novels in various stages of readiness to publish. If I don't do them soon, it's never going to happen. So I guess that's my rough plan for this year. Publish as many novels as I have ready and figure out what a sustainable number of novels I can write in year will be.