Just A Week Away

November is Coming...

NaNoWriMo is almost here! I can't wait to try and finish my project. It's not going to be easy, but I think I will be able to carve enough time out of each day to get things rolling. That, and I'm excited that the title and the cover will finally be revealed to everyone. Watch my NaNo novel page to see when it happens.

I also want to keep everyone updated on how I'm doing, so this year I'm going to try and keep a daily log. I've tried updates in the past like this, so I don't know how it will go, but I'm going to make the daily logs exclusive to Patreon, so there's another awesome thing you have to look forward to if you sign up now.

A Note on Fiverr Freelancing

Even though there is so much to do for November, I still have to also split my time with the day job, though that load has lightened a bit. As of midday yesterday, I'm no longer taking new work on Fiverr. All of my gigs have been paused. It's unfortunate that I have to do this, but I got scammed twice within the span of a couple of hours. By scammed I don't mean anything as serious as stolen personal information, but I was scammed in that I did the work, then the customer turns around and says it wasn't what I portrayed in my gig description (it was VERY clear, by the way, and to the dozens of others who have successfully ordered it). They got out of paying me while probably running around using what I wrote for them. This does nothing to the customer on the Fiverr platform. To me, it dropped some of my stats below the level I need to maintain for Level 1 status, which means on November 14th, I will lose that status. Again. And for the second time, this demotion wasn't something I did--except, you know, trust that a customer was serious about the job. I get it. Fiverr protects buyers over sellers because without any buyers, they make $0. It still sucks.

I know that pushing through it would be the best choice because I've developed quite a few repeat customers who love the work I provide. I am sorry for them, but I know they'll go off and find someone else to fill my place if it's that urgently needed. For my sanity, I have to take a step back. I was already so frustrated with many of the one-time customers I had because they were asking for things I just didn't provide, and it was always a long back and forth that was not worth a whopping three bucks and change. And sometimes if it was small, I gave in, which made me feel worse because I knew that had this been a gig extra, I could have charged $5 extra for every one of those jobs (assuming, of course, that they would have agreed to pay for the extra). I know I shouldn't admit this, but I'm terrible at upselling.

If only Fiverr had a platform where I as the expert in the situation would be able to pick and choose who I work with instead of any old yahoo who pressed the order button, it would be a lot different. I like working for myself, but right now Fiverr is like working for a terrible employer who doesn't even have to bother to pay benefits, yet takes from all its employees. The 20% cut per gig is one thing, but plenty of my customers have given me generous tips, and guess what? Fiverr took 20% of those, too.

There's no set return date for me on that platform. If I truly want to have a good holiday season (minus the income I was bringing in), I don't see myself coming back before January. I probably should rewrite my gig descriptions and be that jerk that I hate to be, but as I've noticed with most of these orders, people read just about as well as they listen, which is not much at all. My gigs weren't saving the world, so I'm sure the world will keep turning without them.

The plus side? I get to work that much more on my poetry project and my NaNo project. That's a big plus for me, so I'm still smiling. See you in November!

Seeing What Develops is Coming -- PreOrder Your Copy!

It's been nearly a year in the making, and the release date for Seeing What Develops is finally here! The book will be released on October 15th. Pre-orders for the Kindle book start TODAY, and the paperback version will be available by the 15th. And don't forget to to add it to your Goodreads shelf!

I wouldn't be here on the brink of the release of my first full-length novel without the place where it all started--National Novel Writing Month. It was November 2014 when I took this short idea I had scribbled on a piece of paper and just ran with it. I didn't stop until I hit 50,000 words. Not only was this a product of NaNoWriMo, it also gave me my first NaNoWriMo win. Seeing it in print only makes it feel like every grasp for a word, every edit of repetitious phrases and every hour spent glaring at a computer screen to get here was worth it.

And this is just the beginning. I have many more writing projects in the pipeline, so I know that I'll be busy throughout the final months of 2015 and into 2016. This year's NaNoWriMo is coming up too and I have a doozy of an idea for it. If all goes according to plan, I'll have the first draft of the next Great American Novel by December 1st. Maybe. ;-) 

I hope you continue to join me on my journey!

Looking Forward in December

I ended up with an official NaNoWriMo word count total of only 20,740. Not even half way. I don't like excuses, but I had a nasty cold throughout the last ten days of November and could hardly do anything, let alone think coherently about a novel. But that's not stopping me. I'll finish the novel by the end of the year, whether it ends up being 50k or just 40k, as long as I have a complete story to work with during the first round of revisions.

My other goal in December is very vague, but I can take tangible steps to get there. Officially, the goal is called "get to where I want to be" but I know what that means (most days). Usually it involves a change of scenery, a new job and some courage that I haven't yet found (I think the lion from The Wizard of Oz took it all). Right now, there's a really positive attitude going on around here, but an abundance of Christmas candy could be a contributing factor to that. So while I'm still walking around with a smile on my face, I'm taking the month of December to set a few more concrete goals (and enjoy the Christmas season) so that I'm not floating in the wind aimlessly in January.

An Unwanted Guest

I spent some time babysitting about two weeks ago. Now I'm paying the price. I have a cough/cold thingy and it's been draining a lot of my energy. I'm working at about 20% of my normal capacity, but the upside is that I'm still working. Although, NaNoWriMo has been severely neglected. I may use it as an excuse to avoid family togetherness at the end of this week. ;)

The poetry chapbook manuscript I've been chattering about on Twitter and other social media sites is going out today. The only thing I have left to finish is a little formatting and the table of contents, then it's off.

So with my tea and my tissues by my side, I'm ready to conquer the week. What are you writing this week?

Persistence in November

I planned on starting this post to rejoice in the fact that I'm doing well in my NaNoWriMo adventure. But ten minutes ago I just cut ties with my major source of employment. I no longer felt I was being treated fairly (happens often in freelancing) so I'm not doing work through them anymore. And these are the kinds of things that tend to happen in the month of November to pull me away from any of my goals. But why stop now? I certainly have more time in my day to work on it.

Negativity is very bad for my creativity, so I'm trying to stay out of that space. It's so hard though. If there's no Point B to navigate to, I'm lost in every way. This is why I should have never listened to everyone who told me the safe route was the best route. If I had taken a chance when I had the means, I would be in a completely different place right now. I may have still been poor, but at least I wouldn't be held down by all of the anxiety and fear I've developed by hiding for so long.

Anyway, spent an hour feeling sorry for myself and now I'm back to work on the novel. At least it keeps me busy... we'll see how far I get by next week. 

Why I Will Not Let NaNoWriMo Kick My Butt This Year

When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. When life gives you a ridiculous deadline to write a novel, you take on that challenge with a smile on your face and very big cup of coffee.

According to my history on nanowrimo.org, this is my ninth year doing the event. Every year, I fail to reach the 50,000 word mark that tells you that you are a champion, at least in your own eyes and that of your writer friends. Usually it's around day fifteen when I haven't worked on the novel in a week that I tend to give up. Although the novel ideas usually still have plenty of plot twists available, I stop seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

But not this year. I can't quit. I need a win.

The need isn't purely about writing a novel. It's more like a need a win in any part of my life right now. Working outside of my cramped little home office didn't work out. Finding writing jobs that pay a decent amount of money is hard; finding that same work between November and mid-January is nearly impossible. Life outside of work isn't much better. Certain family members will be holiday zombies for the next eight weeks with marathon sessions of watching sappy Hallmark Channel Christmas movies. And to top off this lovely day, I found out someone ate all of my mozzarella cheese (okay... that one could have been me). That is why I'm not giving up this year.

Life can throw a lot at you all at once. When that happens, any glimmer of hope is better than nothing. That's why I'm throwing all my effort into winning. On December 1st I will look at my 50,000+ words and pat myself on the back. Then, reality will set in, and the fear of revision will start creeping up. The fact that I haven't been searching for enough work for the past 30 days will also rear its ugly head. But I'll have a full first draft of a novel. And everything else will work itself out.

Nanowrimo: Week 1 Update

Nanowrimo got off to a great start last Thursday... then, it fizzled out. Weekends are usually the time when Nanowrimo participants catch up on all the words they couldn't get down during the week. As a writer, weekends are my Achilles heel. I spent Saturday Christmas shopping. One day and done. So that should never be a distraction for me again. However, I'm also having to ramp up the freelance projects. I got a bum car and who knows how much that will cost to fix.

But back to the story. It seems to be going well so far, even though I had absolutely no direction other than the opening scene. I'm trying not to plan this one ahead of time in any way and it seems to be working better as a strategy. Usually with an outline I try to skip ahead the boring parts to get to the good parts. Without an outline, I have to just see where the next sentence takes me.

Although I'm currently 2 days behind (or more... I'm not quite sure), I will be catching up today. After coffee. And breakfast. And work. And... nah, I'm just kidding. I'm getting on it right now.

NANOWRIMO 2012 Prep Has Begun

It's that time of the year again--National Novel Writing Month (Nanowrimo) is fast approaching. I love this time of the year because I get a ton of clear daily and weekly goals to meet, I get to push the limits of my writing techniques and of course I get to add and check off a bunch of stuff on my to-do list.

Everyone has a different approach to preparing for Nanowrimo. Some people choose to fully outline their plot, write character bios and do all the normal things you would if you were planning to site down and write a novel without a crazy time limit of 30 days. Others choose to prep by not prepping at all. At most, these people make sure that they know where the charger to their laptop is.

Me? I'm right in between. My method of preparation of Nanowrimo is to pull a slip of paper out of my famous Ideas Box. This box is still full of phrases, ideas and nearly complete story outlines that fit on the width of a sticky note. Here is the one I pulled out for this year's event:

It says: "opens on a crowd watching a building burn." Okay, so it's not a full outline of a story, but at least it isn't just a single word. I'll have to think about this one over the next couple of days to see where it will take me on November 1.