January 2019 Progress Overview

Well, January sure blew by fast! And December? Don’t even ask; it was a whirlwind. I think I missed the December progress report, but I won’t bore you with it, now. Now is all about January, and a new year, and new beginnings and all that kind of stuff… unless you calculate your year by the Australian financial year – which would make this the mid-year report, instead of the first annual report.

Let’s not do that, okay?

Tracking Progress & Pulp Speed (PuSp)

Having said that, I track progress by both years, now, so you’ll see those records, below, as well. Another new-ish thing I’m doing this year—since four other new things weren’t enough—is tracking my Pulp Speed—something I decided to do after reading Dean Wesley Smith’s article on it, again, late last year (although, I can’t, for the life of me, find it now…)

Anyway, I like the challenge of increasing my word output, and this was a handy way of measuring it, so I wrote down the numbers, and, each month, I check to see how I’m doing production-wise, against the previous month… The main goal is to hit a million new words for the year, which is Pulp Speed (PuSp) 1, and to stay at that pace. It’s doable in theory, but in practice is harder than it looks.

It’s also about half of what I need to write to catch up a little on the back-log of older projects sometime over the next five years. I’ll be content with a regular PuSp1, even if I try to push for more.

The January Summary

So, January... Well, it was a challenge, but not a complete disaster, although it could have been. I started the year fatigued, and didn’t realise until I’d put in a 14-hour day on the first. (Start the year how you want to continue, right?)

Wrong. Sometimes you need to acknowledge that, damnitall!, you’re human. I ended up spending five days doing nothing related to work… or anything else, and then another week slowly getting my act together. Sleep is, apparently, a good thing, and there is such a thing as pushing too hard.

Found it!

So, ten days into the year, and I’d managed to set up the blog, complete several pieces of flash fiction, write several poems, work on the next Granny book, and finish January’s short story, Miguel Unmade. And then I started to look at what I needed to do next, which is when the edits arrived—which only goes to show that my editor has the world’s most impeccable timing.

It took me a week to edit two novels and start writing February’s short story, Rogue Retrieval. Once the edits were turned in, I set up more of the blog, finished Rogue, and got back to writing the third novel in the series I’d just edited. I also came down with a bit of summer cold or mild flu.

That was okay. A day off, and a few easy days later, and the third novel was finished.

January Announcements:

I’m writing in the Age of Magic universe! The first three novels are done, and February’s task is to write the fourth. Guess what I’m doing once this blog is posted...

Note: The cover you can see is the introductory boxed set of the first novels of all the series currently set in the Age of Magic universe - for less than a dollar! You won't see mine there - because it hasn't been released yet - but you will be able to check out the other authors, and read on without me. There are some fantastic stories in there.

The Short Version:

Now, if you’d like the short version, and numbers, here it is:

Progress: January 2019

• Administrative Hours: 45 hours, 54 minutes
• Acceptances: 0
• Bloggery: 85,810 (many already written, but re-edited)
• New words produced: 54,570
• Outlines and Notes: 6,025
• Words compiled: 14,329 (Jalaya)
• Works completed: 24 (2 short-stories—Miguel Unmade, Rogue Retrieval; 1 novel under contract, 10 pieces of flash, 11 poems)
• Works edited: 4 (Miguel Unmade, 2 novel under contract, Jalaya)
• Covers created: 1 (Miguel Unmade)
• Works formatted: 1 (Miguel Unmade)
• Works published: 1 (Miguel Unmade)
• Works released: 1 (Miguel Unmade)
• Works submitted: 0
• Competitions Entered: 0
• January Hours at Desk: 149 hours, 19 minutes
• 2019 Hours at Desk: 149 hours, 19 minutes
• 2018-2019 Hours at Desk: 1,377 hours, 49 minutes

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07K87T2TZ/

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