ROW80

It's the Round of Words in 80 Days Writing Challenge! For ROW80, you set your own goals depending on where you are in your works in progress and what your life allows.

To see a list of fabulous authors signed up for ROW80 or to join, click HERE! For my latest update, scroll down to the bold type.

Round 4 Goals
1. Blog twice weekly.
2. Edit middle-grade novel, The Year of Firsts, through twice (once for plot, once for proofreading) and send to beta readers.
3. Make minor edits to adult mystery novel, Grace & Fire (reworking climax).
4. Comment on at least five ROW80ers' blogs each week.
5. Encourage at least five ROW80ers through Twitter each week.
6. Prepare and send queries to ten agents for The Year of Firsts.
7. Outline plot for next novel idea.
8. Restart exercise program . . . and stick with it. (30 minutes a day/5 days a week)
9. Eat more fruits and vegetables. (3-4 servings per day)
10. Take a true Sabbath on Sunday - not writing, turning off social media, and spending time on my own, with my family, and with my God to refresh. REVISED: Taking 5:00-9:00 p.m. each evening, and Sunday mornings 8:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.

November 13 - Press the Reset Button, Please

Two of my ROW80 goals involved editing WIPs. As I am learn more and focus on improving my fiction, I realize that I am not satisfied with minor tweaks. I can make my novels even better by rewriting to develop character arcs more fully, raise stakes, and put more punch into the plot. At the same time, I am facing the fact that my original exercise plan is not working. Moreover, I have once again had problems with Blogger and want to change blog hosts.

So it's time to PRESS THE RESET BUTTON. Tomorrow I will be devoting myself to getting my Wordpress site in line. I may not like the look of it as much as this one, but navigability and reliability are far more important than a cute header or font options. This week, I am also going to replot my mystery novel to make sure I'm giving it everything I can. I will be revamping my ROW80 goals as well and looking for a better exercise option.

As to progress, I did keep up with blogging and even got ahead by drafting a couple of posts for the future as ideas came to me. I am reading How to Write a Damn Good Mystery by James Frey. I managed to plot quite a bit of a new young adult novel.

Kait Nolan said today on the ROW80 site that this is the midpoint - a time when writers might need to shift their goals to a more workable plan. That's me! I'm feeling okay about it, though. Without ROW80 and constantly looking at my goals, tracking progress, and getting support from other writers, I would likely flounder for a while before reconsidering my plan. I don't feel off track, so much as I'm deciding to get on another track which will lead me where I want to be.

How are y'all doing? Anyone else thinking of pressing the reset button?

November 9 - Editing & Affirmation
This week has been about editing. Now editing is not for the faint-of-heart . . . or those within easy reach of a firearm. So this is what my "just needs tweaking" manuscript now looks like (a bit hard to see, I know):

My husband asked whether a rewrite of the novel would be faster. He has a point.

Thankfully, I had the encouraging words of a friend yesterday as we sat at our respective laptops in a coffee shop. Then, Tawna Fenske posted just what I needed this morning with Like notches on a bedpost. And if I ever really need it, there's always Stuart Smalley:

The silver lining is that I am better writer now than when I started. I am no longer satisfied with okay. I know I can write something great. And if it takes a few daily affirmations, lots of red pen marks, and a rewrite, so be it. However, at this point, I am thinking hard about shelving that manuscript and starting another plot idea to flex my writing muscle - that one that's gotten much stronger since I've been regularly exercising it.

Thankfully, ROW80 allows me to do just that - change my goals if I need to change direction. What do y'all think? How's it going for you? Do you need an affirmation about now?

November 2 - Slow Cooker Meals and Writing
It's NaNoWriMo month, when writers set their timers for 30 days and zap out 50,000+ words of a novel. I cheer them on! Meanwhile, I'm living out the slow cooker plan. Slow and steady, degree by degree, I'm getting things done.

For my mystery novel, I made it through checking my dialogue tags and started slashing unnecessary adverbs ("Die, 'actually', Die!"). More editing to come!

After too many nights of "There is nothing in this house to eat!" and rushed trips to drive-through windows, I took today to find recipes, make a shopping list, procure ingredients at the grocery store, and cook for several hours to have plenty of meals ready to go. By 5:30-ish, I had tonight's dinner and eleven meals in bags and dishes in my freezer. Almost all of them will simply require dumping the contents of the bag into a slow cooker in the morning and ringing the dinner bell that night. At most, I will need to add a side dish or two.

Here's one recipe I made today that my family loves:

Easy Slow Cooker Meatballs
Source: AllRecipes.com
1 lb ground beef
1/2 c bread crumbs
2 Tbsp parsley
1 tsp minced garlic
1 egg


Mix all ingredients in a bowl. Shape the mixture into meatballs. Bake for 10-12 minutes at 350 degrees. Then freeze the meatballs.


Combine meatballs and 1 jar of spaghetti sauce in a small Crockpot and cook on low for 6-7 hours. Serve on top of 1/2 pkg of cooked spaghetti. (Note: Meatballs and sauce are also good on sub rolls with a slice of provolone.)


How's it going with you? Are you in microwave or slow cooker mode?

October 30 - Too Tired
I'm so tired, despite a nap today, from my sons' weekend schedule. So I'll make this quick and to the point.

Blogging - check.
Commenting - check.
Editing - progressing well.
Reading craft book (Writing the Breakout Novel by Donald Maass) - 1/3 done.
Exercise - don't ask.
R&R - check.
Outlining novel idea - worked more on this. Excited to work on a new idea!

I leave you with a picture of what I would like to be doing right now, but this one is author Piper Bayard.

Be sure to check out this post:
Planking-It's Not Just for Pirates Anymore
It was one of my favorites from Piper!

October 26 - The 20th Draft
Blogging - I'm keeping up on this one. I enjoy blogging and have plenty of ideas for a while, so this isn't too tough for me to check off each week.

Editing - I returned to my mystery novel, Grace & Fire, to make minor tweaks to the climax. But as I read more about writing craft, I want to strengthen other areas. At this point, I have been through this novel so many times, it's a wonder I don't have chapters memorized. The great news is that as many times as I have read it, I still get excited about the characters and the story. The bad news is that I still have weaknesses in my manuscript, even though I'm somewhere around Draft #19.

Reading - I am reading Donald Maass's Writing the Breakout Novel. It's strange how I have read several publishing experts explaining how difficult and crazy this book business is, and I so want to do it anyway.

Outlining - I had a spark of an idea pop into my head one evening last week, and it was full-blown in my brain in minutes. I sat down yesterday and started outlining scene ideas on notecards to see if the idea has legs. Fun.

Health - Exercise Schmexercise -- don't ask. Eating better this week, and taking time off in the evenings. I know that some wonderful authors are on social media only in the evenings, so I'm missing them. However, I must take breaks and handle the home front. My kids won't be young forever, and I don't want to look back and not have spent quality time with them.

October 23 - Going Down to the Bone
I have about five pages left to finish Plot and Structure by James Scott Bell. I highly recommend this writing craft book. It covered a lot of ground and was easy to read.

This week, I made real progress on my mystery novel - substantially reworking the climax. In my ROW80 goals, I said that I needed to make "minor edits" to the book. However, the more I consider my plot, the more I want to get down to the bone in several areas and change up some scenes - upping the  stakes for the characters and moving the novel along. I will be revising more this upcoming week. In addition, I started outlining the sequel to Grace & Fire.

I completely missed my check-in on Wednesday and failed to encourage as much as I would like. Instead, I had my focus on tearing apart that climax in my WIP. (Reason? Excuse? Both, I think.)

I need to find a new exercise program - one that doesn't feel like working out. I plan to check out a local Zumba class.


Goal #10 has changed. The hubby and I decided that my off time needs to happen on weeknights more than Sunday afternoons and evenings. It's the same result whenever I take that time, so I'm changing up the hours of my Sabbath. Not actually being Jewish (well, only 1/32 Jewish), I think I can do that.


My comments section has not been working on Blogger. So I apologize if you have tried to say something here. I'm planning to move my blog soon.

Finally, in honor of my going down to the bone in my WIP and my recently post on Silly But We-Love-Em Songs, here's a funny, favorite video from the 1980s:

October 16 - Cheese Graters and Cheerleaders
I had a realization this week. I recently met with some well-meaning criticism that felt more like a gut-punch. Sometimes we need to hear exactly what others (aka potential readers) think about our ideas, but I felt like a block of cheese being grated on the edges: It wasn't terrible and I was still intact, but a little of my confidence was missing.

I thought about how important it is for writers pursuing a career to have more cheerleaders than cheese graters. In addition to holding me accountable, my fellow ROWers give me a much needed boost. They are among my cheerleaders! I'm getting out my pom-poms for the rest of you too, doing a big cheer, and maybe even attempting the splits because there are some amazing authors out there who can make it if they will persevere. GO TEAM!

Buffalo Bills Cheerleaders

As for my progress: I moved more of my mystery novel into Scrivener (dang, that's going slow). I'm STILL reading Plot and Structure by Bell. I got Maass's Writing the Breakout Novel and James N. Frey's How to Write a Damn Good Mystery in my TBR pile.

I am considering a webinar offered by Chuck Sambuchino of Writers Digest about getting an agent/querying. If anyone has information about whether it's worth doing, let me know!

I exercised 4 out of 5 days, and I hope I will stop feeling super-sore soon. (Those splits didn't help.)

Y'all?

October 12 - Jello, Bagpipes, and Progress
Writing goals: I got through my first round of rewriting/editing my middle-grade novel. Now I'm sticking it in a drawer, so to speak, for 30 days with hopes to pull it out later with fresh eyes. Today I worked more on moving my mystery novel into Scrivener so that I can review the novel's structure, make minor edits, and have it ready to query soon. I'm outlining the next novel as I read through Plot and Structure by James Scott Bell. I think I should also add Donald Maass's Breakout Novel to my writing craft books list.

Non-writing goals: Two days into my exercise program and OUCH! Since I was informed by fellow authors on Twitter than wine counts as a fruit serving (grapes), things are looking up! Actually, I'm adding juice or a fruit smoothie as snacks to cover my bases. As for my Sabbath plan, IT'S SO HARD to turn things off. What if y'all tweet something clever and I miss it? What if I have a brilliant idea and feel an urgent need to blog about it? What if aliens invade the planet using Omaha, Nebraska as their portal, but I don't know anything about it because I've turned off all media sources?! Still, I need one day to take it easy.

Since my update is pretty boring, here's something that's not (from comedian Robert G. Lee):

October 9
I blogged twice, edited another section of my middle-grade novel, and moved the first few chapters of my mystery, Grace & Fire, into Scrivener for edits. I also commented on ROWers' blogs and tweeted with them; we have a good-sized group this time around, it seems!

Though not on my goal list, I started reading Plot and Structure by James Scott Bell. Last round, I read three writing craft books, and I want to continue finding good resources to improve my writing.

Tomorrow I will reboot my exercise program, which is Thrive 90 from Fit Marriage. I managed to eat healthy foods today with a fruit smoothie added in as a snack, but I drank too many Coca-Colas. (I just know there will be a lake of Coca-Cola in heaven for me to swim in!) I'm considering my "Sabbath" to run from Saturday evening to Sunday evening, so I can still check in for the ROW80 round. How's everyone else doing at the get-go?

October 5: Today we are ROCKING THE ROW! That's right. It's time to celebrate our Round 3 successes and the kick-off for Round 4.  As I explained in my last post, I did not achieve all of my goals in the last round, but I definitely made progress and connected with some great writers. So here's my personal celebration for the party!

The wardrobe: I had to go back a bit to find a pic with me in a rockin' outfit. So circa 1982-3, here it is:

Can you believe that's me!
Was I cheesy or what?

The music: Since I'm dressed for an 80's Party, I figured the music should be from that era also. So here's a rock song from the 1980s I liked that never got much play - Kim Mitchell with Go for a Soda:

If you want to know why the video is so bad, remember that MTV debuted only 3 years before this song came out.


As for how I'm doing so far, I'm sort of cleaning up goals from the last round. I rebooted my blog with a twice weekly goal now. I finished The Novel Writer's Toolkit by Bob Mayer. I'm also encouraging other ROW80ers. I'm about halfway through the first edit/rewrite of my middle-grade novel, The Year of Firsts. How's it going for y'all? What are you doing to Rock the ROW?