New Year's resolutions: seven months on

At the beginning of the year I posted my New Year’s writing resolutions in order to pressure myself to keep on track. Let's see how I did in July.

Write 7,000 words per week minimum, 10,000 preferred.
I've been keeping up the word count this month, helped by my job at Gadling. Having to write a minimum of five posts a week keeps me busy, plus I'm in crunch time with my next book for Osprey. I want to get the rough draft done before heading to Missouri in mid-September.


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 sent out a couple of magazine pitches this month, and got one no and one yes.

Search for another paid blogging job.

This is no longer a goal now that I'm blogging for Gadling.

Finish a how-to book on writing that a publisher is interested in.
This project has been put on the back burner while I get up to speed with Gadling and take advantage of the research opportunities while I'm here in Oxford.


Try to get an agent for my fiction and nonfiction.
Working on it. Still no luck.


Do another round of edits on all three of my novels.
I've already done this, and while I want to do another pass of my latest novel before year's end, I'm working more on my next one.


Write my next novel, set in London and Oxford.
I did a fair amount of writing this month, although not as much as I like. It's in a different genre and a very different voice, so I've been struggling.


Finish two short stories and two novellas I've been fiddling with.
I haven't done anything with these.


Write and send out "Willoughby: England's First Great Explorer", a book proposal I was supposed to write last year (whoops!).
Still haven't done anything with this proposal.


Increase my online presence.
I've been slacking off on my personal and writing blogs, in case anyone noticed, but my work with Gadling is gaining ground. Several of my posts have made it to the front page of AOL, which gets me lots of hits. I quit writing for Charge of the Write Brigade, however, because I need to focus on my paid blogging.


In general, it's been an OK month dominated by my current nonfiction work. I'd love to get more fiction done, but that will have to wait until crunch time is over.