Any writing goals, hopes for 2008?

[Naomi Hirahara]

I just posted this on MWA-Breakout yahoo group and thought it might be fun to repeat it here:

Anyone want to share their writing goals and hopes for 2008?

For me, it's to keep any new installments to my series fresh, to challenge my characters and improve plotlines.

To find the pitch-perfect correct voice for my standalone. (Hasn't been quite discovered yet.)

To plunge into the middle-grade and YA market with my new book coming out in August and seeing if I can use new contacts to help widen my mystery audience.

And on a more practical level, to clean and keep clean my home office!

Hope you all have a great New Year! Happy Year of the Rat.

Naomi Hirahara
www.naomihirahara.com

[J.D. Rhoades]

As we've been posting over at Murderati (and we miss you, Naomi!) :

(All together now)

Write MORE. Write FASTER. Write BETTER.

[Naomi Hirahara]

The Write FASTER bit trips me up a bit. I know to sustain our writing careers, we need to produce at least a book a year, but sometimes I think because of creative reasons, personal crises and responsibilities, etc., this pace is sometimes hard to keep up. Of course the bestselling authors seem to be able to do it--which may separate the successful from the unsuccessful.

[I. J. Parker]

It takes me a year, and sometimes longer, per book. Keep in mind that bestselling authors have the money to pay secretaries, readers, publicists, housekeepers, nannies, gardeners and so forth.

Some bestelling authors also keep their own authors.

For me, faster means that I pay less attention to the things that matter to me. I would have to cut corners.

[mike D]

my goals:

1. To get published this coming year. I am not pushing this, as I work well over 60 hours a week..it is just a little dream of mine.

2. To begin the home improvement projects the wife and I keep talking about.

3. To get in shape and stay that way.

[Johnny Ostentatious]

Write an 80,000-word novel (my stories usually stop at around 50,000) and pen an Young Adult novel.

[Christa M. Miller]

I really want to land an agent. And, of course, a book deal.
I want to finish the sequel to the novel I'm shopping.
I want to take on enough to feel productive and make decent money...
... but not so much that I feel overwhelmed and start to neglect my family, or the work.

Those are the big ones. I also want to finish and shop short stories, but those three are the most important of all.

[Bethany K. Warner]

I want to finish the first draft of the novel that I'm currently working on.

Then, I want to sit with it and the previous first draft of a novel I finished last year and decide which one I should really work on to improve.

[Katie]

My goal is simple -- to finish writing a book.