Thursday, October 01, 2009

A Writer's Week

This repeat post, from November, 2008, describes some of the many things a writer does for her career other than writing. I can say I'm just as busy with non-writing activities now as I was then! This will be my last repeat blog post while on my South Africa vacation, and after I recover from jet-lag, I hope to post some trip reports and photos.


Little did I know when I embarked on this new career as a writer how much of my time would be spent on tasks OTHER than writing. This past week I did the following:

- Contacted a bookstore to determine the status of my payment for consignment books, then deposited the check when it arrived,
- Mailed a copy of A Real Basket Case to a Japanese publisher interested evaluating it for publication in Japan,
- Participated in a 20-author library signing event,
- Attended a meeting of the local MWA chapter,
- Wrote the minutes for the local Sisters in Crime board meeting, mailed them out, and sent out an invitation to the members for our December tea,
- Went to my own book club meeting and discussed The Yiddish Policeman's Union,
- Had coffee with a new writer starting on his first novel-length manuscript to offer advice and encouragement and gave advice to another writer on novella markets,
- Made plans to host a fellow author on my blog next month and to host a discussion in a Facebook group next week,
- Started a list of revisions to my author website for my hubby to implement next week,
- Reviewed a second edit of my science fiction novella, The Epsilon Eridani Alternative, and returned my comments and revisions to the editor at Virtual Tales,
- Kept up with my email loops, social networks, and this, my blog, and
- Prepared a talk I will give tomorrow to the local chapter of Pen Women about "Networking Your Way to Success in the Creative Arts."

The only new fiction I wrote this week was one paragraph of new text for the novella. Gotta do better next week!

4 comments:

The BEDBUG Blog said...

There is so much more to writing than most people realize.

Writers have to be multi-taskers with such a range of skills.

I'm glad I came across this blog. It looks interesting. I've always loved suspence.

antgirl said...

I've been getting a taste of that lately. I certainly enjoyed your visit in Bend. :) Hope you're having a fabulous trip.

Anonymous said...

There are so many things involved with the freelance creative's life that don't involve creativity! It's frustrating. Some days I'll only get maybe a couple of hours in actually painting/drawing/whatever, the rest is promotion, administrative stuff, etc.

Sheila Deeth said...

Ah, jet-lag. Wishing you well, and I enjoyed the post. Dreaming...