Most important things.

My WIP is a worthy story deserving of love, honor, and the work of editing, revising and possibly rewriting that will make it great.

It’s also nowhere near done.

I started writing Twenty-first Century Airship Princess back in December. The goal was to enter it in the Zebulon (local PPW annual contest) as a story that is marketable with an appeal to a wide body of readers, as opposed to many of my other stories that are very niche-market oriented. I had eleven months to write, beta-test, revise, and compose a query letter for it.

It’s not going to happen in time for the November 1 deadline.

I’m not going into the reasons or making excuses. The realities of daily life often make demands that keep us away from the plans we make.

It is a relief, admitting that this is not the right time for the story. Yet I am horribly aware that stories (and other projects) often lie unfinished indefinitely. I have a genetic disposition (let’s just pretend that’s a thing) towards abandoning projects without finishing them. I’ve fought against it most of my life, and I have numerous accomplishments to prove that I can finish something.

I can also identify with all the Mensa-qualifying folks who have crappy, low-paying jobs.

In November, I will be switching my writing-energy to NaNoWriMo. I’m returning to my Kingdom Come SciFi-Rom world because I’ve written several novels in that universe and the stories come easily to me. But they’re quirky and very niche, so not as marketable. I’m doing this to keep my brain in writing-mode while also letting it rest from the more difficult projects. I want to FINISH something and Coward of the County is a story I can finish. It’s also part of The Fall of the Adelaide Faire, which is my hubby’s favorite part of the Kingdom Come stories. Maybe…just maybe… I can rewrite The Scar and finish the other stories in the set and eventually query them…

Finishing stuff is a goal and a struggle. There are so many reasons for putting a story on the shelf. Sometimes it belongs there. Sometimes it deserves to be reworked and refinished. Sometimes it needs to be cannibalized into another story.

The idea is to finish something.

The ultimate goal is to not only finish, but publish and sell enough to make it worth writing the next one.