Weeks are made of days

I’ve been “days” away from being caught up on all my writing projects for the past two weeks…but weeks are made up of days, so this still counts, right? 🙂

My last remaining tasks are for the Beneath the Waves bundle, which launches on June 15th. This is the fifth bundle I’ve cureated, and I learn new things each time.

My biggest lesson with The Faerie Summer was that I need to write down – and follow! – a launch checklist, instead of assuming I’ll remember everything. I do actually remember everything, but a list would help me think of things earlier, so I could get ahead of the game. With Beneath the Waves, I learned that it’s totally fine to launch two bundles a month and a half apart, but that it’s way less stressful if you’re ahead on all of the bundle-related tasks.

One slight complication time-wise was that I decided to completely redo the cover for “To Be a Monster” last week. This was the right decision – the original cover fit the theme of the story, but wasn’t super compelling. The new version looks much better, but I spent forever tweaking colors and trying different fonts – including yet more time today.

After the past few months, I’m full of motivation to get ahead on my deadlines. I’ve committed to delivering six short stories between August and December, and I’d like to get them all done as soon as possible. Not only will that give me more breathing room, it also means I’ll have time to run them past my editor, and I’ll have more time to work on cover designs (since all six will need covers). I’m launching two more bundles this year, have six in the works for next year (that will likely jump to at least ten), and I have plenty of non-bundled stories to work on. So I have to be careful not to let my guard down. 🙂

Uncovering covers

I’ve spent the last three hours or so completely redesigning my cover for “To Be a Monster,” which will be in the Beneath the Waves bundle. My story is told from the viewpoint of Scylla, one of the many innocents who were unjustly turned into monsters in Greek mythology. My original cover idea used a photo of an ancient mosaic depicting a sea monster grabbing a man, which fit the story perfectly, but it was just okay as a cover. Yesterday I decided to scrap what I’d done and start fresh.

Coming up with the new design took a little time, but it was nothing compared to the hours I then spent adjusting the colors and fiddling with the font to get it to display better in a thumbnail on Facebook. It looks fine in the same size in Photoshop, so I can only assume Facebook does something to the image on upload. I do think the color and font changes I made improved the cover, but at this point I’m ready to call it good and just assume that most people won’t be looking at it in a thumbnail size on Facebook. 🙂 I’ll take another look in a few days, but wow, did that take forever!

My last cover, which took significantly less time to design, is for “The Switch,” a short story that will appear in a bundle that launches near the end of June. Edith, the protagonist in “The Switch,” is a seventy-some-year-old woman who is about to commit her first crime ever.

Speaking of crime, I’m starting a class on writing mysteries next week. I’ve been working on improving both my time management and scheduling time to relax (the latter seems crazy, but I’m trying to fit it in nonetheless), so I’m not sure how wise it is to start a 6-week class… But I’m doing it anyway!

In other news, I’ve decided to turn The Faerie Summer into the first volume in a faery-themed series. Issue #2 will be released in December; the theme is faeries and midwinter (also known as the winter solstice, at least in the Northern Hemisphere). Issue #3 is scheduled for April 2018; its theme is faery paths and passageways. The plan is to release three volumes each year.

And because that wasn’t enough, I’m organizing a bundle series of fairy tales! Some will be retellings; some will be new stories with a fairy tale feel. Right now the plan is for three volumes, but if there’s enough interest this could be extended.

It can be a little confusing to talk about both faery stories and fairy tales (which is part of why I’m using the different spellings). I’m working on naming each series, so things should be a little easier once that’s done. I hope. 🙂

Writing through the mud

The last remnants from our latest snowfall (yes, I know it’s May…) have melted, and the resulting mud is drying up. But the dogs go hiking every day no matter how muddy it is. 🙂 Walking along a stretch of muddy trail with an inch of mud stuck to the bottom your shoes is kind of how I’ve felt lately. I’ve been so close to finishing up my last few projects, but being close to finishing for two weeks starts to make you wonder if you’ll ever actually finish at all, even if you can see progress every day.

In spite of the slow pace that I’ve been at lately (which does not equate to time spent – sometimes writing just goes more slowly), I really, truly am almost caught up on everything!!! Just a few more days…

My next goal is to get ahead on stories that have planned deadlines. Things always come up, of course, but right now there are seven stories that I’ve committed to delivering over the next year, so once I wrap up my current projects I’m going to write those stories and not wait to start until closer to when they’re due.

In retrospect, while I could have been more on top of my own time management over the past year, it’s also interesting to look at why I got behind in the first place. Participating in story bundles on a regular basis has meant regular writing deadlines, which is something I’d never before experienced. It’s one thing to finish a story, then look for a magazine or anthology to submit it to. Writing a story that has a hard and fast deadline is something else entirely. I’ve learned a lot about myself and my writing because of all of this.

One of my most important lessons is one I just figured out a week or so ago. I like to be super busy, so if I’m not at my day job I’m writing, doing chores, playing with my dogs, or organizing something-or-other. Occasionally I’ll procrastinate and do something else, but when I do stuff like that I know I’m squandering time when I should be productive. What I’ve recently realized is that I need to start scheduling downtime. Just the thought of spending time doing something fun but not productive seems weird, even though it used to feel normal. 🙂 But without giving myself time in which I’m explicitly not supposed to accomplish things, I end up either always busy, or feeling irresponsible when I’m goofing off. We’ll see how this goes…

Jasper and Rosie, only slightly muddy.