Damned to the dogs of editing....

I spent the past several weeks editing the novella Ganbaatar and Nordic Sun.  Both manuscripts are done.  They need to be critiqued.  That will happen in the coming year.  This has become the season of revision/editing.  I'm currently working on Kepler Falling.  I'm editing that manuscript.  I don't know when I'll take to WUTA for critiques, though.

Kepler Falling should take me through May 2016.  That's a long time to revise/edit.  I'll hate myself by then.  Ugh.

New Years 2016 writing projects...

I've spent the past month writing.  I talked to my brother in Columbia, MO.  He's getting back to work in his sci-fi/noir detective novel.  He's only got it halfway revised.  He needs to write the rest.  I hope it's better than his first revision.  The technical aspects were great.  He's awesome with his descriptions and settings.  But I wanted to kill his characters.  They had little redeeming value.  Hopefully, that changed, lol...

I've been working on the rough draft of a new story.  It's speculative fiction.  Hard speculative fiction.  It's been a challenge to write.  I hope I can get 50,000 words out of it.  Right now, I'm at 30,000 words.  In involves a Scandinavian interstellar expedition to a world some 5,000 light years away.

The second story I outlined is a steampunk story set in South Africa at the time of the second Boer War.  I just wrote the beginning of it.  I'd like to get back to it when I get the speculative fiction novel done sometime this spring.  I also rewrote a satire/horror story piece that had one a prize in an anthology years ago.  Unfortunately, I lost the original work and had to rewrite it...

Blake

End of the year resolutions...

I look back to the end of 2015.  I wonder.  Where did this year go?  However, I did get some writing projects done...

1)  Ganbaatar:  the rough draft of a novella set in 13th century Asia got completed.  The manuscript was started in the fall of 2014.  Many things kept me from completing it.  However, I followed an outline and kept to it.  I wanted a novel.  Instead, I got a novella.  I believe that was due to me sticking to my chapter outline.  However the material was there for a novel.

2)  Half A World Away - A Poetry Chapbook:  I worked on poetry the second half of 2015.  I took my good poetry and bought it to WUTA to be critiqued and reworked.  Half A World Away is the result of that revision.  It's due for Big Books in March 2016.

3)  Poetry:  I worked on random poetry for eventual submission to an academic literary journal in the hopes of getting published again for the first time in twenty old years.

4)  Scars of Victory:  Final short story in the Desmon Singh story cycle.

5)  Kepler Falling:  Manuscript was revised and edited on its third draft earlier in the 2015.

6)  New Sci-Fi Novel:  I started a rough draft of a new speculative fiction novel.  It's about 19,000 words.  I'm aiming for 80,000 words at the end of June 2016.

2016 will see the following:

1)  Completion of rough draft of New Sci-Fi Novel.
2)  Start of third sci-fi novel in August 2016.
3)  Editing/Revising of Half A World Away.
4)  Poetry submissions to literary journals.

Early holiday purchases....

I decided to make my holiday purchases early this year.  After taking my mom book shopping at Barnes and Noble two weeks ago, I purchased books online.  I got the following:

Finland at War:  The Winter War 1939-1940.
The Battles of the Cornells and Falklands, 1914.
Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson.
Green Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson.
Blue Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson.
Hero of the Imperium by Sandy Mitchell.

I reorganized my bookshelves and put everything in order.  I also purchased Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie.  So I have about 13 hard copy books to read this coming year...

Writing second novel...

Work is progressing on my second novel.  I'm about 10,000 words into it.  I'm aiming for 80,000 words.  I hope to have it complete by July 1, 2015.

Great used book hunt...

I found a used book by Philip Jose Farmer yesterday.  I want to broaden my knowledge of commercial speculative fiction.  I'd read Farmer in the past.  But I can't recall what I read.  I also picked up Elizabeth Moon's Victory Conditions, Ben Bova's Orion and King Arthur, John Scalzi's Old Man's War, Gini Koch's Alien vs. Alien, and RM Meluch's Tour of the Merrimack:  The Myriad/Wolf Star.

I'm also looking for Ann Leckie's Ancillary Justice and Stephen Baxter's Ultima.  I also have two WH40K Horus Heresy novels to read at some point, too.  There are other books I want to get.  However, I'll have to see what I can afford electronically.  Most of my new purchases will probably be ebooks.  They're normally cheaper and don't take up any space on my bookshelves.  However, I've been able to get new paperbacks cheaper than the ebooks editions recently.

Rather strange...  

Building literary agent database...

I put together a literary agent database of possible literary agents.  I have about a dozen agents, authors, and books so far.  I'll add more as I go.  I spent the weekend book shopping.  I bought books of different sci-fi/fantasy authors I need to read to know what's out there commercially.

I did start a new project.  It's a speculative fiction novel about interstellar colonization.  I don't want to give much away.  I hope it will be rather original when I get done with the rough draft.  I'm trying to write at least 2000 words/per week.  I should be done with the rough draft by the end of June 2016...