DoT

Time for a long-overdue writing update!  This is going to make for some boring reading, but it helps to keep me motivated when I stop to talk about the process once in awhile. 

So here is the current word count for my Daughter of Time manuscript.  You know, I don't think I've ever revealed that title on my blog before.  I should mention that Daughter of Time isn't the name of the actual book; it's the name of the four-book series...in my fantasy world where Book 1 actually gets published.  I do have a name for Book 1; I'm just not ready to announce it.  It's not anything special, it just feels like I'm jinxing things by saying it outloud (so to speak).  Stupid, I know.

I just realized that "D.O.T." is the acronym for Daughter of Time!  Or I could do it WoW-style and write it like this:  DoT.  Ooooh, I like that.  I'm totally going to use that.

Okay, so I spent hours yesterday adding a new chapter and smoothing out some of the stuff from previous chapters.  As of today, I have completed all of chapters 1 and 2, a small section of 3, and all of chapters 4, 5, and 6 (although 6 still needs some serious grooming over, and it's a little too long).  A typical young adult book is a minimum of 50,000 words, and I'm about half-way to that minimum.  At this point, it's looking less like scraps and pieces of a novel and starting to take on a real shape.  Yesterday I was so excited by my progress that I actually felt giddy.  And then I started thinking about that day in the future when my manuscript is finished, and realized I'm really freaked out about that.  At least while I'm writing it, my ultimate goal is simply this: Write a book.  I don't have to think any further than that.  And I can have all the hope I want about it, and there's nothing that can contradict that hope.  But once it's finished, I have to create a new goal:  Get it published.  That's the scary one that requires me to delve into completely foreign territory.  I did get a magazine article published before, but that was so much smaller of a feat, and that was a combination of good timing and sheer luck.  But I have NO idea how to get a novel published.  As an unknown writer, how do you possibly convince someone to read your work?  How do you get your manuscript to stand out when it's buried in a slush pile with hundreds--possibly thousands--of submissions from other hopeful writers? 

The worst is I have to face the possibility of failure.    

I guess if I was willing to self-publish, none of this would be an issue.  But I won't do self-publishing.  I want the thrill of holding that letter in my hand that offers me yay-amount of money for all rights to my story.  That's the fantasy.  And I want to see my book on a shelf--a real shelf--in a Barnes and Nobles somewhere.  Is that too much to ask?  I honestly don't care how much or how little money I make.  That's not the dream.  Seeing something I wrote sitting on a shelf is the dream.  I'd be willing to live in a hole if I could just see that dream come to fruition.   

Oh well, it's going to be a long time before I have to worry about any of this.  Right now my focus is simply to finish writing the book.  And with everything else on my plate, it could take another couple of years to get this baby banged out.

Nice, huh?  My DoT manuscript has it's own special flash drive--the drive slides out from the crystal heart.  Yeah, it's a little on the pretty side for a flash drive, but as far as I'm concerned, any object that happens to be carrying your hopes and dreams ought to be pretty.  The name of the drive is "Pixie Dust," because that's what it's going to take to get this damn thing published.  If my house was on fire, this would be one of the items I would grab before running out the door.

Oh come ON, the kids and pets were implied.