A Week in Writing #123

Happy New Years! A time to look back and a time to look forward.

My hope is to become a published author with the goal of being able to make a living from writing. I know that's what they call in business a "stretch goal", but it is something that I try to work on everyday, though some days are better than others.

I started this year with high hopes and while I haven't reached any of my goals, I am, I think, getting closer. I wanted to work on two things this past year, my detective fiction and the comic book. Sadly, it has become a choice and more often than not, I've had to choose the comic book, PowerSquared (Powers Squared) because it was in the active progress of being drawn.

There always seems to be something that needs to happen with it, just as there is now. We're always nudging an artist to complete the task at hand; necessary, but never fun. It was only days ago that the artist finished the color and we're gearing up for the third issue. I really hope that it won't take as long.

I can't go into things at present, but we (Paul and I) are trying to take steps to ensure that it doesn't. It makes me mad that it's taken so long and I don't want to go another year like this one again. A learning experience, yes, but not always a pleasant one. 2017 will not be like that one. But while I want speed, I have to balance that with the expense. Self-funded means that I can't go as fast as I'd like, at least not with there being no money coming in for it. I hope that changes as well in the new year.

I really want to get back to the detective fiction in the worst way. There are two books that desperately need rewriting and agents to query for rejections. And I have other ideas that I want to put down on "paper", I may have to get better at segregating my time. Since I only have an hour or two each day, I might have to segregate my limited time between projects.

While I really wish I could have written more, the holidays are not necessarily the best time for it. There were other things to do and they all take time away from writing. Still, I managed to write three reviews this past week. One I published on Saturday, a 1200 word review of Good Ol' Freda (2013), a documentary about Brian Epstein's secretary who also ran The Beatles Fan Club from before they were The big "B" Beatles and until after they broke up. And about 900 words about the current film Passengers that was published today. I also wrote 3100 words about Shield For Murder (1954), which will be published later.

One thing about writing reviews is that they're usually easy to do and they don't take much time to do. Everything else takes weeks and months and endless rewrites, so I never get the same feeling of accomplishment as I do with a review.

Here's hoping that 2017 is a better year than 2016. That we all get what we want to accomplish done and new opportunities will open themselves up for continued growth.