Back in the Blog Saddle

The past two weeks have just been nuts, and it wasn't until I got back from a recent business trip that the 'I'm away from my Blog' post I thought I had left was apparently eaten by Scribefire, along with one for the WRB.

Anyhoo - a quick rundown:

I finished the Sweat with Sven challenge. It was the third round, though the first time for me. I think I could have gotten more out of it if I hadn't had so much on my plate otherwise. I went into it with big plans to be the ultimate cheerleader and fell woefully short of that goal. BUT I did at least complete the challenge - rather early too. From that aspect, it was a good motivator.

My first draft of Cloak of Deceit, is finished and being edited and slowly re-worked and re-written with the assistance of The ABC. I've sent off a submission package to a contest and am planning to possibly enter a few others this summer.

I'm still chugging along (albeit slowly) on my mentorship with the fabulously inspiring Debbie Mumford, whom I'm sure will be a very successful YA author soon, and on my Fiction Writing Workshop with A. Catherine Noon on the Writer's Retreat Forum. I'm not giving either of these as much attention as I would like, but c'est la vie - for now.

My next goal is to tackle a Nocturne Bite submission. I have plans to write and submit at least three possibilities for this. I'm 3K words into the first one and finding it challenging, but am very excited about the premise for the story. It's set in my Zyne Legacy universe - the one from my second novel project, Witch Hunt.

Two more weeks left of school and I can safely say I am completely crazy for thinking I could do all of this at once. I should manage to pull okay grades, but just by the skin of my teeth. I'm looking forward to having the summer off in order to focus on writing and maybe enjoy a bit of leisure time.

I have a stack of book reviews to do, and some already written. I'll be posting them over the next month rather frequently. Kresley Cole's Immortals After Dark series is one of my new favorites. I breezed through three of them on my trip and liked each one better than the last.

We've hosted a shrunken down version of the Flash Fiction Carnival on the Writer's Retreat Blog. I'm not sure if it is my fault because I didn't actively recruit enough, or if it is a mix-up because of the admin change - but in any event - major kudos to those who submitted - Catherine, Susan and Unhinged. I will have the posts up with a link hopefully tonight.

That is May in a nutshell so far. What have you been up to?