Wendy Ogilvie NEW YEAR RESOLUTIONS
I don’t do new years resolutions anymore because let’s face it at 49 years old, I have made a lot of resolutions to improve myself – anymore improvement would mean I was getting perilously close to being perfect and nobody wants that!
Perfection would mean no flaws that translate to no character – bad for any writer.
I have given myself a writing goal this year and that is to earn £3,000 for articles, stories and the sales of my book. Of course I need to actually get all those things out there first. There is my problem. I love to write but I am pants at getting my stuff out to the right people. So this is what I need to concentrate on.
- My first stage is to go through the first three months of competitions – provided in a supplement with Writing Magazine. Any more than three months is too much to focus on so I will check out April to June competitions at the end of February. I have checked out the rules and made notes on what I need to do and put the closing date on my computer calendar with a reminder for a week before.
- My next step is to look out at least five publishers who may be interested in my novel. I have sent it to two so far but as it is chick lit, it has been hard to find a publisher that may be interested. If I haven’t made any progress by July, I think I will publish it myself. I have a sequel which I started during NaNoWriMo so I will give myself a goal to finish the first draft by August.
I read an article recently which advised that to give your stories or articles the best chance of getting selected for publication; you need to research the magazine thoroughly. I was taught how to do this on my Writers’ Bureau course but it will take up a good part of a day to read through and analyse each magazine – preferably at least three copies of each, but it will be worth it.
Check out if they accept freelance writer articles, what type of articles/features they include. Do they like lots of photographs? Who is the magazine aimed at? How long is each article? What length are the paragraphs? All these things will help you to get an acceptance for your proposal. - The last thing I want to do is focus on one project at a time. Presently, I have stories to edit, my thriller to finish, a play to rewrite and my last assignment for Writers Bureau – 3,000 words of my latest novel, edited of course. And that is just this month! Wish me luck 🙂
Oh by the way, HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL!!
Wendy Ogilvie 
Happy New Year to you too. See you next week…
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Yes see you then. Not sure what I am going to read out yet. Not even looked at any prompts. 🙂
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I’ve bern scribbling away over Christmas but haven’t done the prompt. I was hoping it was WIP week! Oh well, i’ll hide behind you
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