A Secret Vacation from Social Media

June 26, 2013February 18, 20141 Comment

I’m baaack…

If you’re wondering what I’m talking about, that’s a good thing. Because I worked hard to make it seem like I was here even though I wasn’t.

I’ve taken time off the blog before—a week every now and again for vacation, the holidays, or whenever real life gets too crazy.

But when I found out I’d be joining my husband for a three-week trip to Germany and Spain, I was left with a tough choice. Either let the blog go dark for an obscenely long time or work harder than I’d like to keep the blog up-to-date.

I chose the later option while I spent the majority of this past month in Europe. And here’s how.

Get Organized

I was lucky in that I had advance notice of our travel dates. So I created a list of priorities that I wanted to accomplish before leaving town. Everything from reaching certain milestones on my various projects, ensuring all my critiquing obligations were met, and preparing blog posts in advance.

Knowing what I needed to run when was hugely beneficial. In my early blogging days, I always had a blog post or two ready to go in case I needed it. However, that fell off as my writing obligations increased. But it was good to remember just how smoothly things could go with the right preparations in place.

Get Tech

The post scheduling feature on Blogger (also available on WordPress) also helped tremendously. Although we were told we’d have internet access at the hotels we were staying at over the course of our trip, who knew how that would work out in actuality (Spain had the worst internet b-t-dubs). That combined with the time difference and the fact that I would be more focused on having a fantastic time in Europe instead of micromanaging my social media, it made sense to have my posts ready to go in advance.

The other tool in my arsenal? Tweet Deck. Some of you are already familiar with it, I’m sure, but I just started using it this Spring, and it’s “schedule tweets” feature was hugely helpful in creating the illusion I was still around in the digital ether. Took the spontaneity out of my tweet stream, yes, but it was a big help keeping my Twitter profile active.

Get Help

But in the end, I didn’t do it alone. When I found out I’d be gone, I solicited help from a few of my writerly friends. I staggered their interviews between regular posts, which lessened the burden on me to create new content.

In case you missed them, be sure you check out the interviews with some great fellow writers I have the utmost respect for:

May 22^nd – Catherine Schaff-Stump

June 5^th – Lori M. Lee

June 19^th – Fran Wilde

I was happy I could keep the social media machine rolling while I was away, even though it required a lot of work. What techniques or shortcuts do you rely on to stay on top of your social media obligations?
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Best Laid Plans

June 12, 2013February 18, 20143 Comments

Writing is a slow process. From idea to draft, from early drafts to later drafts, from query to agent, from contract to publication. That doesn’t mean things can’t move faster, just that they so often don’t.

Patience is a quality you need to cultivate if you are going to survive this field. I understand all this—even if I don’t like it. One thing I like to do is make plans to distract myself from the futility of waiting (I’m type A all the way).

Regardless of whether you’re a plotter or a pantster, I think being able to plan is a crucial act of writing, even if it’s the just-in-time variety pantsters employ. We have to be able to hold large amounts of information in our heads and then turn that information into something that’s not only literate but adheres to a recognizable structure. This ability is explored in part by Maps of the Imagination: The Writer as Cartographerby Peter Turch—a book that’s geared more to thinking about writing than actual writing, if you know what I mean, though in this case that’s not a dig.

Planning, making mental maps, using words to formalize what has only been nebulous or intangible thought… these kinds of activities take a lot of time, and can be the very means to work through the periods of waiting that always seem to crop up.

These activities for me often include:

–Planning out my next project

–Determining what I need to do on the blog

–Prioritizing story drafts across projects, critiquing for my writing groups and CPs, and research time

I also create contingency plans in my head.

Sometimes I create contingencies when I’m plotting out a novel and need my research to corroborate the action. I want X to happen in my story, but if the research doesn’t support X, I’ll need to go with Y. Or Z. Or maybe X will work but another set of conditions need to be considered. By planning out what needs to happen, and what alternatives could also work, I’m able to work through tricky plot issues and stay on target with my story.

Or in the case of submitting, say I have a handful of short stories under consideration at markets. However, most markets have no simultaneous or multiple submissions policies in place. Because of this, I have to consider what is the best order to submit them. Usually factoring in some combination of

1. Impact (higher tier/exposure over lesser markets)

2. Response time (quicker over slower)

3. Fit (always hard to judge)

4. Deadlines

For example, let’s say the average response time at a market is a week. And there’s a deadline for stories with a theme similar to my story coming up in two weeks. I would probably submit my story to the market with the 1-week deadline, under the assumption that if it gets selected (great), but more realistically I might get some feedback that would help me to submit to the themed market in time.

I’ve also created contingency plans in my head for what happens if something big and exciting happens. What then? I don’t recommend this last one. For starters, I can make a gazillion plans and all that mental effort goes out the door with one rejection. Sure, a contingency plan will kick in then, and I’ll remain optimistic for another few weeks and then… Well, you can see how this cycle could last forever.

So planning can range from the highly useful (as in the case of story plotting and time management) to busy work (micromanaging story submission orders) to entirely unnecessary (winning the publishing lottery).

But writers write. And in the case of this writer, I plan as well.

Happy writing (and planning)!

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How is it May Already?

May 1, 2013February 18, 20141 Comment

Seems like I was just getting used to typing “2013” and now I have to mentally remind myself it is already May. As in four months have expired since the start of the year, and I’m in a constant state of playing catch-up.

And the hell of it is, there are things coming up in my life that will make that even more difficult for me.

Make no mistake, I want to be that person who is always unruffled by change with a plan for every contingency. But the last year or so, I’ve found it harder to keep my writing life from affecting (or is it infecting) the rest of my life.

I used to aim to do something writing-related every day, whether that was actually writing or engaging in pre-writing activities like reading and researching, or more platform-building stuff like this blog post. And that was great.

But now the workload feels heavier. I’ve talked before about my critique responsibilities increasing (becoming a slush reader, joining a new writing group), and I’m still convinced critiquing is one of the best ways to improve your craft. However, I’d say my writing output has also increased, which puts even more demands on my time.

Last month I finished up a novel draft. I realized I had written it over the course of six months. That’s a huge productivity jump for me. It’s not fully polished since I’m currently scrambling to get it in shape for my trusted readers, but still, that’s a lot of words for me, on top of revisions, short story drafts, and all the other writing “stuff” that creeps up on you.

And I know this is only a fraction of what more successful writers face. It can only get busier for me. I’m not sure how I feel about that. But if we could go back to January again, I’d be all over that.

How are things going for you? Have you been surviving 2013?

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Shifting Priorities

March 20, 2013February 18, 20143 Comments

How is it March already?

What started out as a one-week break from the blog turned into two. And the only reason I’ve been remiss is because I’ve been slammed lately.

My critiquing responsibilities skyrocketed since the fall when I joined a new writing group. We meet monthly, and the week before, each member submits anywhere between 30 to 100 pages of their WIPs. Then those pages need to be read and responded to in time for the meeting. Needless to say, when that week rolls around each month, critiquing has to be the first priority.

My own writing often has to be put on hold, and that means my blog as well. I’m also a member of another writing group that meets weekly, so I sometimes have to be creative with how I divvy up my time.

This month another variable was added to the equation—my editorial pass on the collaborative project I wrote about a few weeks ago. 70k that needed extensive line and developmental edits. Hence the radio silence on the blog.

Now, I wouldn’t trade joining the new writing group or working on the project for anything. But sometimes something has to give, and more often than not, that’s this blog.

I’ve been blogging now for three years. When I started, conventional wisdom was that you needed to do social media all the time. Now, slowly but surely, people are starting to back away from that.

In fact, in a post earlier this week, Jane Friedman ofWriter Unboxed said:

If you’re a totally new, unpublished writer who is focused on fiction, memoir, poetry, or any type of narrative-driven work, forget you ever heard the word platform. I think it’s causing more damage than good. It’s causing writers to do things that they dislike (even hate), and that are unnatural for them at an early stage of their careers. They’re confused, for good reason, and platform building grows into a raging distraction from the work at hand—the writing.

Do I regret blogging? Absolutely not. I enjoy it and I’ve enjoyed the connections I’ve made because of blogging. But that doesn’t mean I always enjoy the time and energy it takes to maintain one.

Especially when it comes up against my own writing time and professional responsibilities.

So that’s where I’m at. If I’m not here, I’m writing. Which is how it should be.
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Nano Fail

November 8, 2012February 18, 20143 Comments

So I’m not doing NaNoWriMo this year. I can hear your collective gasps.

I am very aware of all the benefits to participating in National Novel Writing Month: the motivation to get words down, the camaraderie of knowing you and all your best writing buds are typing away, the assurance that it’s ok if your draft sucks since that’s what first drafts are for.

But the guilt of not making daily quotas and the inevitable burnout that always results from going full tilt don’t appeal to me, especially given the timing for me this year.

Word Count Guilt

For the past two years, I’ve participated in Nano. I’ve never “won,” but logged 20k the first year, closer to 30 the second. And I considered those victories. But the 1,700 words a day wasn’t sustainable. At least for me.

On a good day 2k is about my limit. On a really good day, 3.5k is possible. But that usually means I’m way over-caffeinated, my hand aches from writing so much, and my legs have fallen asleep from sitting so long. Not exactly the balance I seek in my writing life.

After a big writing day, I usually take a break. But during Nano, the pressure to “catch up” takes over. And while it might be good to understand just how far you can push yourself, to motivate you in the future, you eventually have to worry about…

Burnout

We’ve all heard the horror stories, related to Nano and other publishing deadlines. Burnout’s no fun. It can leave your brain a pile of goo and have you questioning your resolve. And as far as I’m concerned, anything that makes you doubt your decision to write is not a good thing.

Plus, with the projects I’m working on, the goals I want to reach with them, I really can’t afford the time off to manage burnout symptoms. Besides, I believe you should be focused on writing everyday, not just once a year, as outlined in the NaNoWriMo No post from Writer Unboxed. Slow and steady, wins the race… (at least I hope!)

Timing

Despite my (lack of) progress in Nano’s past, I have used November as a good time to jumpstart a new project or restructure an old one. But this fall, I started another project, wrote a skeletal draft, and am now fine-tuning things. The WIP is not in typical Nano shape, and I’m in too deep to consider starting one that is. So the timing just didn’t work out this year. For me.

That doesn’t mean NaNoWriMo isn’t a worthy goal for those of you forging on. But I’m sitting this one out, and hopefully I’ll be able to join in next year!