How'd I Do On Those April Goals?

It's the end of April. Time to reasess my April goals.

Well, I only had two for this month. Let's see how I did.

1) Complete world-building for my futurisitc romance series.
Well, I fell down a bit on this one. I did read the book on world religions, but haven't yet completed the Native American book. But I did take a workshop on building the beginning of a novel, and wrote a blurb for the first book, that you can check out on the Current Projects page of my website, www.susanmacatee.com. I also developed the two main characters, as well as two supporting characters who will be the main characters in the second book, and I wrote the opening of the first book as an exercise for the workshop.

2) Start the first draft of my Civil War romance Katie Rose. I wanted to get at least 60 pages written.
I'm happy to say, I've surpassed this goal. I have the first 154 pages written and with the help of my critique group, have polished up the first two chapters.

All in all it wasn't such a disappointing month.

Trying To Keep Up My Momentum

I'm writing the first draft of my Civil War romance, Katie Rose and feel like I'm on a roll.

I did get stuck at one point, but fixed the problem by working in a few extra scenes and viewpoint characters.

Now, life intervenes to halt my momentum. I've been idle in my day job, typing manuscripts and other documents for writers. My regular clients send me things in spurts and I haven't had any regular work for awhile. More time to work on my own projects.

But now, the work is coming in and, frankly, I need some extra cash. I don't want to lose momentum on this new book, though.

So, what do I do?

I split my time between working on their projects and mine.

So far, it's working out, although I have fallen down on my blogging.

Oh well, something's got to give. Hopefully, things will get back to their regular pace soon, and I'll have some extra cash to spend on writing expenses.

Writing Another Love Scene -- Oh My!

I've gotten to the point in my new Civil War romance, Katie Rose, where I have to write the love scene.

I always feel nervous writing such scenes and have a hard time getting the mechanics and emotions in place, so that they blend together in a beautiful, romantic scene.

The love scene I wrote for Erin's Rebel needed help. My critique partners insisted it wasn't as bad as I thought, just needed more emotion. Their suggestions greatly improved that scene.

Now, I have to do it again. I won't even look at the Erin's Rebel scene until after I've written this new one. I'm afraid of repeating myself and don't want to do that. These new characters have different personalities and I want the love scene to evolve from their unique backgrounds.

The good thing is, before I'm ready to submit this new book to a publisher, I'll have ample time to have my critique partners look at it.

For now, I'll just do the best I can. After all, it's only the first draft.

Stuck In the Mucky Middle

I was moving along great on my Civil War romance, Katie Rose, until I came to what I call the mucky middle.

All of a sudden I felt like I was moving too fast toward the first big love scene. Something just didn't feel right and I had to stop.

I reread the manuscript from the beginning and realized what was wrong. I didn't include enough essential scenes to build up to that point. Part of the story was missing.

So, I went back to the drawing board, my outline, to see where I needed to insert scenes as well as different points of view.

After doing that, I went through the manuscript and wrote the scenes. Now, I just have to type them into the file.

Now, hopefully, I should have no more trouble writing the rest of the story.

Working On Katie's Story

Now that I've got my first romance, Erin's Rebel, in an editor's hands, I'm trying to get as far ahead on my new story as I can while I wait to hear back from Medallion Press.

Katie's story that I'm calling Katie Rose is my woman soldier romance tale. So far, I've got about one quarter of the book written, and I've sent the first chapter to my critique group.

I got a little stuck on Friday, but realized that I'd forgotten to insert a few vital scenes, so I did that today, and now I'm unstuck and moving ahead.

I've been wanting to start on this story for awhile, but had to get Erin's Rebel edited and proofread for Medallion. Now, it feels good to get this far ahead on my new story.

April Goals

As promised, here are my writing goals for the month of April.

1) Complete world-building for my futuristic romance series.
As part of this goal, I plan to read two books; one on world religions, the other on Native Americans.

2) Start the first draft of my Civil War romance Katie Rose.
I want to get at least the first 60 pages written.

Since both of these are big projects, that's all I have on tap this month. I'll let you know by May 1st how I did.