Writing goals for 2009

Camy here, talking about Writing Goals for 2009!

Pam Hillman recently shared her writing goals with us, and I was totally impressed how she broke things down into quarters.

What that mostly did was to help her target herself in terms of writing efficiency. She challenged herself to write a certain amount—or at a certain speed—by a certain date.

I thought this was brilliant. It was good for me because it inspired me to figure out my own writing goals, challenging myself to a certain amount of writing by a certain date.

I thought it would also be good for any writers who really don’t know how fast or how much they can write within a certain time period. If you are one of them, why not challenge yourself to a few quarterly writing goals?

Here’s an example of my writing goals for 2009:

1st Quarter: (January 1st to March 31st)
1. Finish line edits for Deadly Intent, due January 7th
2. Write proposal for next romantic suspense novel by January 31st.
3. Complete Marketing Info Sheet for The Year of the Dog by March 1st.
4. Coordinate the American Christian Fiction Writers 2009 Genesis contest for unpublished writers.
5. Prepare for my HeadStart mentoring group for Mount Hermon Christian Writers Conference. (If you’re a beginning writer, and if you can swing the cost of the conference, the HeadStart program is a great way for new writers to get all the information they need to jump start their writing career. Learn from my mistakes!)

2nd Quarter: (April 1st to June 30th)
1. Finish writing The Year of the Dog by May 1st.
2. Write my next romantic suspense novel (assuming the proposal is contracted—crossing my fingers).
3. Work on “The Lone Rice Ball,” the fourth book (novella) in my Sushi series (it’ll be available as a free ebook download to members of my newsletter YahooGroup).

As you can see, I have a few non-writing goals like coordinating the Genesis contest and preparing for Mount Hermon writers conference, but aside from those, my writing targets are clear. I’m trying to finish a proposal within a month, and then finish the Marketing Info Sheet (like an Art Fact Sheet used by Harlequin authors) the next month. Then I need to finish writing my manuscript by May 1st (that’s a publisher-set deadline rather than my own, but it’s still a deadline).

Your writing goals don’t have to be as harsh as mine (since I write full-time, I have more time to devote to these things). But you should try to set some goals for yourself that will prod you to write faster or more consistently.

Remember, writing is a business—otherwise, why would you be entering all those contests?—and so treat it like one. Motivate yourself to work harder at your chosen profession, and don’t give in to self-doubt. You can do it!

Camy Tang writes romance with a kick of wasabi. Her novel Single Sashimi is out now, and she runs the Story Sensei critique service. In her spare time, she is a staff worker for her church youth group, and she leads one of the worship teams for Sunday service. On her blog, she gives away Christian novels every Monday and Thursday, and she ponders frivolous things. Sign up for her newsletter YahooGroup for monthly giveaways!