Coming to the End of Another Project & School Year

Posted on June 20, 2015 by Charles Yallowitz

Tomorrow is Father’s Day, so I’ve no idea what’s going on.  Happy Fathers’ Day to everyone.  For me it’s the beginning of a ‘busy’ week.

I’m 2.3 chapters away from putting Book 11 to bed as far as first drafts go.  It’s had a scene that I’ve been planning for a while and I’m slowly piecing more stuff together.  My hope is to finish it either Monday or Tuesday morning.  Even if I go over, I’ll be getting my celebratory pizza on Tuesday. After that, I’ll be fiddling with the new idea that I wasn’t comfortable enough to mention last Thursday.  I might try again this coming week, but it depends on timing.  I also want to go over and ‘repair’ the Book 12 outline, but that might be easy.  Unlike 9-11, the next one isn’t as heavily affected by the events.  It brings a few plotlines to an end and reveals some things that I’ve hinted at, but I’ve been altering the previous volumes to work with the current plan.

I’m looking at 2 weeks of planning stuff before I dive into editing Books 9-11 and possibly Raven’s Hold.  A few wrinkles will appear within this plan. One is that I’m still scared to touch the psychological thriller again. Not even sure what I’m going to do with the damn thing.  I keep pondering handing it to a few beta readers, but for some reason I don’t feel ready for that. Another stumble is that July/August will have a few birthday parties that I’m working with.  One is my son’s 6th and the other is a combo for my parents’ 70th bday (one this May and the other next May) and 40th anniversary.  That will take time and I’m still trying to get everyone to respond to the eVite.  Finally, I’m apparently getting kicked out of the house from August 13th to the 18th.  My wife’s present to me is nearly a week alone in a nearby hotel to write.  Means I need to have a project ready for that and Book 12 won’t cut it.  Though I might have The Merchant of Nevra Coil to market around that time if everything goes well.  I also have to figure out what to do about food since the room only has a fridge.  Maybe a lot of yogurt.

All of this chaos kicks off when my son starts school half-days on Wednesday and then his brief summer break starts Friday.  My time will be commandeered by my shadow unless the weather is terrible like last break.  We’re going to have a long trip for the July 4th weekend too, which means I’ll be a rarity from the 3rd to the 6th.  Then he goes to summer sessions and I leap into editing.  Seems like September is when everything will settle down around here.  Just in time for the Book 12 tackling, which is really nothing more than proof that I can’t stop.  Only the plus side, I don’t plan on writing Books 13-15 until next year, so a break will appear.  I’m just rattling on about my long term plans here, which I’m sure has lost a few people.  A reason I don’t have much to report or short term plan is because I’ve really just been writing and getting things situated.  I want to spend time with the munchkin while he’s home and that’s easier to do with only outlining to do.

One thing I have been wondering about is what I can do to market my books.  I’m in a spot where the series is too far in for me to quit and potential readers might see it as too daunting to start.  I’ve also used so many promo sites multiple times that I think I’m part of the background.  Guest posts seem to get my blog followers, tweets get me Twitter followers, and FB posts get me . . . well I never had any luck there.  Don’t get me wrong.  I really enjoy swapping guest posts and wandering around the blogosphere.  But I’m wondering what I can do that’s different even with my issue of limited time.  Might need a bunch of time to figure this out.

So what are the goals for the week?

  1. Finish first draft of Book 11.
  2. Outline story that I don’t have a title for.  Not 100% certain of genre.  Thursday post might help a bit.
  3. Outline a future story.
  4. Fiddle with Book 12 outline.  (I sense a theme.)
  5. Celebratory pizza on Tuesday.
  6. Plan stuff for munchkin when he finishes school year.
  7. Possibly watch a DVD if I finish some stuff early.
  8. Swear I’ll get back to biking this time.

About Charles Yallowitz

Charles E. Yallowitz was born, raised, and educated in New York. Then he spent a few years in Florida, realized his fear of alligators, and moved back to the Empire State. When he isn't working hard on his epic fantasy stories, Charles can be found cooking or going on whatever adventure his son has planned for the day. 'Legends of Windemere' is his first series, but it certainly won't be his last.
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19 Responses to Coming to the End of Another Project & School Year

  1. coldhandboyack says:
    June 20, 2015 at 6:13 pm

    I like reading planning posts. I still think for a series you could do a limited time free bundle. Books one through three are bundled at a discount or free for three months, something like that to draw people in. You might take advantage of free days and give each one a successive day for X number of books. I did that over Christmas, and gave away a mountain of books. I didn’t see any spike in sales afterward though. Promotion is the bane of self publishing.

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  2. John W. Howell says:
    June 20, 2015 at 7:22 pm

    Happy Father’s day. Hope you enjoy.

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