Every three months or so, I take a look at the progress I’ve made on the goals I set for myself at the start of the year.
Publish my novel, The Lone Wolf.- Average a short story acceptance each month, with the majority of them in paying markets.
Put out a short story collection.- Get another novel ready to query – either 2012’s NaNoWriMo novel, or the one I’ve been working on for a couple years, A Handful of Wishes.
- Read 100 books this year.
- Kayak the entire length of the Hennepin Canal.
So, how am I doing?
- Yes! Evolved Publishing picked it up, and release date is just two months away, on December 2nd.
- I’ve pretty much sucked at this. Grad school is taking up a lot of my time (“ambitious” is how one of my thesis committee profs described my academic aspirations), and between reading, class papers, and thesis research, I haven’t been writing as much as I’d like, and I don’t even currently have any submissions out.
- Us, Together: A Short Story Collection came out in June. I’m really hoping to have another one, The Futility of Loving a Soldier, out by the end of October, and definitely by the time The Lone Wolf launches.
- The first chapter of A Handful of Wishes will be included in the back of The Lone Wolf, so I guess I have to keep moving with it. The semester ends at Thanksgiving, so I’ll have a month to really focus on it, then 3-4 months for edits, before the April deadline for a Christmas 2014 release.
- I’m at 57 books this year – 16 books behind. Again, I’m hoping to knock a bunch out when the semester ends. I currently have hundreds on my Kindle to choose from, so this shouldn’t be difficult.
- Yeah, not happening. No fulltime permanent job = no new vehicle to transport a kayak = no kayak. Grr.
If you’ve set goals for yourself, how’re they going so far this year?
Your goals are really good but maybe, like your academic aspirations, they are very ambitious. I’ve found the most important thing with setting goals is to set yourself up for success, not failure. So, for instance, with how many books you’ll read, I’d suggest you say: there are 52 weeks in a year, a couple of weeks might be overly busy so, say 50 weeks that I’ll definitely read in. One book a week is a good target. My goal will be 50 books. If I do that I’ve hit my goal. If I read more, I’ve exceeded expectations.
Good luck with them anyway.