July: I Disbelieve

July? Really? I disbelieve.

Okay, so if it IS July, then that means the year is half over. I’m not a big fan of setting out year-long goals because 365 days is just too many chances to mess up. I’ve been known to set monthly goals and, on occasion, quarterly goals, but longer than that, and something pretty and sparkly comes up to distract me.

Still, despite my aversion to yearly goals, I couldn’t help but look back on the past six months to see how I’ve done. I’ll admit, I’m not impressed, but hopefully that’ll inspire me to get my butt in gear for the second half of the year. (Or, at least the third quarter.)

In the first half of the year, I started the sequel to Man Whore. I managed about 24k words before I set it aside in what I now admit might’ve been in a fit of petulance over a couple of reader reviews complaining about the character's sluttiness in Man Whore. I thought I’d left plenty of warning about his demeanor in the title, and the blurb…

No, I won’t go into that publicly. No further anyway.

I’ve recently reread that partial manuscript, so I expect I’ll be able to sink back into Adam and Morgan’s world soon. I hope to have the next story finished by the end of the year, and it will take Adam’s secret to the next level as he learns more about why the demons were after him in Man Whore.

What else? Well, I’ve seen two stories through edits and publication – one a short story, Bound By Love, and the other Man Whore. I’ve started the prequel to Bound, and I’m toying with the three follow up stories to cover the three years Bel owes to his demon father, but those are not officially on this year’s schedule. If I’m lucky, the first year of demon debt will be around Valentine’s Day, just as the first story was, but I make no promises.

Speaking of editing, I’ve learned the rumors about Loose Id “editing the crap” out of their stories is true. I think I’ve put as much time into editing Make You Sweat (formerly known as Summer Lust) as I did writing and revising it before the contract. (Okay, okay, slight exaggeration, but I definitely put a lot of time into this project.) The line editor has it now, so I expect an official release date soon and, more importantly, a release from deadlines for it, so I can obsess about something else.

Finally, new Works-in-Progress have been slow in this first half of the year. I wrote a cowboy novella, and still need to finish writing the final consummation scene. It’ll need some minor fleshing out later, but it will likely be one of my 2011 revision projects for the second half of the year. The other one to be revised is a story about a punk rocker and an introvert. I set that one aside to promote Man Whore’s release, and haven’t had the time to start the editing process since. Or, as is more likely, I haven’t made the time.

Lastly, in this quarter/year, I hope to finish a manuscript on a transgender character. I’ve found a few already written, but there aren’t nearly enough trans stories out there. Sure, plenty of memoirs and non-fiction type reads, but for romance, I’d like to see more. I have two trans stories started, and am undecided on which to write first. One is a pre-op FtM, and the other is an MtF on hormones, but not yet entertaining the thought of full reassignment. Both pose interesting character dynamics and a significant amount of research to distract me from actually writing down words. Still, I’m looking forward to learning more about both characters as I write them.

Will any of it get done in the second half of the year? Yes, some, but I won’t torture myself with promises. If I forced a schedule in the first six months, I wouldn’t have written a ghost story currently out for query in a Halloween anthology. It was a fun story to write, the ghost leading the way to new discoveries and changing little things until, by the end, I had to go back and rewrite the first three chapters to fit the ghost’s desired resolution. I’d like to see the Man Whore sequel done, and the Bound prequel, plus one of the revisions and one of the trans characters, but don’t quote me on that, because I’ll deny it come January first.

What have you accomplished so far this year? What would you like to do in the second half, dear Readers?

Ciao,
Pia Veleno