My Epic Writing and Personal Goals for 2019

January 7, 2019February 24, 2019 Diane Tibert Challenges and Goals author, books, challenges, goals, publishing, weight loss, writing

As an epic fantasy writer, I suppose it is only fitting for me to make epic writing goals. Normally, I don’t, but 2019 will be different. I’ve been feeling it in my bones since September that this year was going to be my year.

For the past five or six years, I’ve been all over the place with my writing and editing. I’ve not made a lot of headway with my books; it’s disappointing. I’ve done a lot of work with little to show for it. Last summer, I realised why.

I spent autumn figuring out the best course of action and putting a few things in place. Now that the prep work is complete, it’s time to launch the new goals, ones that will get me closer to what I desire.

Changes

Obviously, there will be changes. To make time in my life to meet my 2019 challenges, I had to reduce time spent on other projects and other types of work. This means, once I finish the two editing/formatting projects scheduled for 2019, I won’t accept others.

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What I learned about writing two novels at the same time.

December 10, 2018 Diane Tibert Challenges and Goals, Lessons in Writing, NOVELmber author, books, epic fantasy, home, NaNoWriMo, publishing, self-publishing, stories, true love, writing, writing goals

For NaNoWriMo 2018, I wrote two novels at the same time: Revelation Stones and Beyond the Myst. I didn’t plan it that way. My goal was to complete the first novel. The second one started as a homework assignment from my writers’ group.

I focussed on the book I wanted to complete first, writing a minimum of 2,000 words a day for it. I wrote 1,500 words a day for Beyond the Myst.

To keep the stories separated in my mind, I wrote Beyond the Myst in the morning between 5:30 am and 7:20 am. If I didn’t reach my goal, I spent a few minutes after the morning chores to complete it. I wrote Revelation Stones from 5:00 pm to 9:00 pm. Often I finished early, so I was in bed by nine o’clock. I get up at 4:35 am, so I need to go to bed early.

Before each writing session, I’d envision the scene I was about to write. This put me in the mood to write and provided details I might not have considered. I run scenes in my head like movies, so I get a clear idea of what I want. The scene is basically written before I sit down to the computer. I just record what happened.

I’ve never tried to write two full novels at once. I have written a short story while writing a novel, but usually I’d write the short story in a few days, then return to the novel writing. This whole experience of writing two in one day was completely new to me. Here’s what I have learned listed under the benefits and the drawbacks.

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Filter Words – Who Knew? Not Me

October 15, 2018 Diane Tibert Editing, Lessons in Writing books, characters, editing, filter words, paragraphs, publishing, stories, story telling, words, writing

A week ago, I stumbled onto a YouTube video discussing filter words. Never hearing this term before, I watched, listened and learned…and discovered I was guilty of using filter words.

What are Filter Words

Although I’m relatively new to the idea, my understanding is: words that create distance between the reader and the detail the character is seeing, hearing, tasting or feeling.

In other words, we are not using one of our senses to digest the story, rather instead, we are being told through one of the character’s senses.

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Catherine MacKenzie interviews Diane Lynn McGyver at the Writing Wicket

October 3, 2018 Diane Tibert Author Interview, News Flash author, author interview, Catherine MacKenzie, Diane Lynn McGyver, interviews, publishing, Writers Wicket, writing

Today I’m at the Writing Wicket as Diane Lynn McGyver, my alternate ego who writes fantasy novels. Catherine MacKenzie interviews writers every Wednesday on her blog, so if you’re interested, drop her a line.

You can check out my interview here: Writer Wednesdays – Diane Lynn McGyver.

Also, since it’s my birthday, I made all my Castle Keepers Tale short stories free for the day. These short stories tie in with my fantasy novels, Shadows in the Stone and Scattered Stones.

Don’t Muddy Your Brand

October 1, 2018 Diane Tibert marketing, Thought for the Day, Writing Business #amwriting, algorithms, Amazon, authors, books, brand, branding, David Gaughran, Kindle, marketing, publishing, truck pulls, writing

My teen-aged son loves to attend truck pulls at exhibitions. He only has his beginners, but he’s itching to get behind the wheel and has created elaborate schemes that would see him get there before he has his full driver’s license. He has yet to successfully carry out a scheme, but his mind is always working on it.

The videos he captures at these truck pulls are mashed together and posted to his YouTube channel. After a big pull at the end of August, I told him I’d share his link on my Twitter feed, thinking I’d be helping him spread the word so he’d have more subscribers and more views.

“You can’t do that,” he said. “You’d muddy my brand.”

For a guy who has no problem getting muddy on his four-wheeler, he had a real problem with mud on ‘his brand’. He knows little about marketing – or does he?

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Two Vital Questions to Ask Yourself About Writing

September 24, 2018 Diane Tibert Challenges and Goals, Thought for the Day #amwriting, books, goals, planning, publishing, reading, stories, success, writing, writing business

We are all looking for our path to success, but our paths are drastically different. We all don’t get to success the same way, and we don’t all identify success in the same manner.

In my years of reading about marketing and writing, the same questions pop up, and by answering these two questions, it makes us better able to plan our writing careers. In fact, the answers to these two questions are vital in making important decisions in our publishing journeys.

Last week, I posed these two questions to members in my writers’ group. They have a month to think over the answers, but I’ve been thinking about my answers for much longer.

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A Hard Lesson Learned

September 10, 2018September 10, 2018 Diane Tibert Challenges and Goals, Lessons in Writing, My Indie Publishing Experience, Scattered Stones, Shadows in the Stone, Writing Business #amwriting, authors, books, ebooks, genres, hard lessons learned, indie publishing, learning, lessons, publishing, self-publishing, writers

Although it’s tough to admit it, six years ago, I made a horrible mistake in my publishing journey. After publishing the first book in my Castle Keepers fantasy series, Shadows in the Stone, I should have buckled down and completed the draft to the second book in the series, Scattered Stones.

However, feeling the pressure to get more books on my publishing shelf, I wrote a few short stories that were not in the fantasy genre. They were quick writes, quickly edited by my editor and quickly published. I soon had four books on my shelf. It looked impressive.

I was following the advice of those who believed the more books on a shelf, the more a writer gets noticed because they have a larger footprint.

However, those giving advice didn’t stress the vital fact that the books written should all be in one genre. Readers sometimes stick to one genre, so those who loved my fantasy novel might not like my contemporary stories about death, domestic abuse or a cranky neighbour.

Sigh.

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Catriona Wheatcroft

Bronwyn Darrow

Alaura of Niamh (pronounced ‘Neev’)