Susan Forest

I wasn’t going to post until the novella was done. I cut 10% and have it down to 27000 words. Still not enough! But — if I haven’t cut it so much it makes no sense — I think it is improved for the cutting. I am going to try for 25000 words.

Got the edits made, and then discovered that it isn’t due for a month. Still, nice to be done. Then i did some revisions to my novella, and hope to be done that this week.

I hope it’s a short story. I have an 8000 word limit, so cutting may be required. Oh, well. Write first, then cut.

Wrote several scenes – short ones. Maybe half a chapter. I like the way the novel is going. May not get too much done in June – amazing number of commitments already – but I have holidays in July and so should really be able to gear down.

One scene — but still plugging. I know the next few week will be a challenge to get writing time because I’m retiring from my job and so have a lot of things to wind up. However, next weekend, the long weekend, I am going to Keycon in Winnipeg to see the Auroras, and I know one of my friends will win because all 5 nominees for Best Work Long Form – English are friends of mine! However, I am also treating it as a writers’ retreat and plan to write at least as much as I attend programming. Too many ideas, too little time!

So, between Rob’s book launch Friday (awesome!!) and spending Friday night in emergency until 7:00 AM (Don’t worry, Holly’s fine!), getting my eyes measured for contact lenses, a great rehearsal for the Monster Mash (come see us at Conversion in October) and babysitting my grandson overnight, I am finally getting down to my writing today. Yay! May not get much done, but I’m moving forward a bit at a time!

Sorry – didn’t post last week, but did get writing done, both last weekend and this. Tendonitis is getting better, but I’m still using the Dragonspeak, so as not to bring the tendonitis back. Got a good start on Chapter 5 today of “Magiers.”

Okay, so last weekend I went skiing — no writing. But today I presented at the Young Writers’ Conference. This is always a highlight of the year. I get to do 2, 75-minute sessions with 30, 10 – 15 year-olds who really want to write (they give up a Saturday AND) pay $35 to be there) and see a lot of authors that I only see once a year. I sold 19 of the 20 books I took down and got a nice little honorarium. The keynote speaker was awesome — all in all, a great day!

Revised my novella and put it up for crit, as well as my last short story. Yay!

AND — congratulations to Rob, nominated for the Hugo for “Wake.” “Watch” comes out next month (I have his May launch on my calendar) and it was a thrill to work side-by-side with him at our semi-annual write-off as he did the finishing touches on “Wonder.” Great weekend! Next week – back to the novel — I can hardly wait!

So, I didn’t write fiction this week, but I DID filk my song for the musical AND download the karaoke version of Herod’s Song from JC Superstar AND transfer it to garage band AND record myself with the new lyrics AND burn a disc including the filked song, the blank karaoke, my lines with cues and the cues without my lines. Now I should be able to learn everything by CD!