Midlist Writer: Writing Goals for 2009

Thursday, 1 January 2009

Writing Goals for 2009

It's a new year, and time to get planning what to write next! Here is a list of my writing goals for 2009.

1. Write 7,000 words per week minimum, 10,000 preferred. Quality is more important than quantity, but you do have to hit a certain level of productivity to keep the money coming in.

2. Get through that huge list of magazine article ideas I'm going to pitch. As I send them out, the list will be added to, so this is a perpetual goal. Same goes for several book proposals I have. I'll be pitching a lot to Osprey, because they are a great publisher to work with.

3. Search for another paid blogging job.

4. Finish a how-to book on writing that a publisher is interested in. Details to follow!

5. Continue to try to sell my three novels to agents. Getting an agent, both for my fiction and nonfiction, is a major goal for me this year. I need someone else in my corner other than my wife, who is wonderfully supportive and helpful but has no power in the publishing industry.

6. Do another round of edits on all my novels, especially my Civil War horror novel, which I believe is the most marketable. Every work is a work-in-progress until it's published, so it's always good to do more editing.

7. Write my next novel, set in London and Oxford. I'm going to outline it in the first few months of the year and really start writing when I go there in April.

8. Finish two short stories and two novellas I've been fiddling with.

9. Write and send out Willoughby: England's First Great Explorer, a book proposal I was supposed to write last year (whoops!).

10. I also have some work already lined up for this year, including a book for Osprey, editing the page proofs for a book for Globe-Pequot, a few magazine assignments, and updates to a Madrid guidebook.

11. Increase my online presence. I'll be getting Authorsden and Myspace accounts, and working on and promoting my blogs a bit more.

Ugh, lots of work. Better get busy. I'll post regular updates on my progress as an incentive to keep myself working.

Have you posted your writing goals on your blog? If so, drop me a line at seansontheweb (at) yahoo (dot) come and I'll post a link to them here. Check out my earlier post about other ways to get your blog mentioned on this site.

1 comment:

M. A. Leal said...: These are great goals. Keep up the good work!; 5 January 2009 at 11:15

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