New Year's Resolutions

I'd like to take a break from my regularly scheduled post (how to make your writing show not tell) to talk about New Year Resolutions. What are mine? How can I work a shameless plug into this post?

First, I resolve to finish rewriting Love Transcends, a collection of new and previously published short stories by yours truly. This has been a difficult book for me. One of the stories, "Mining Chernobyl," was my first professional payment on a publication. Unfortunately, the company has not been able to push the anthology out. Since I do not have rights to republish until at least 90 days after publication, we've had to wait. Not to mention rewriting several stories, removing one and making it into a novel itself, and finally adding a new story to fill the hole this left. Best of all is that the cover art is done by my wife, Trisha Hammerquist.


Second, I resolve to finish Bitter Truth. Since I'm on chapter 53 and 70,000+ words in, that shouldn't be too hard. I'm releasing the concept paper to the public. This is not a piece of writing, but the outline and exposition for this work. It is something I always do when I write. Why? Because I have a tendency to let my characters balloon to unmanageable numbers. Already, we have dozens of characters, facts that form a detailed background, and much more.

Third, I resolve to finish my master's degree. I'm four classes away, so that should be easy. As a part of this degree, I must write a thesis. This thesis must be "a significant work of fiction." I have already started planning this work, and it will be titled A Year and a Day. Before the days of medical miracles, you could not be charged with murder unless your victim died within a year and a day of the assault. That is no longer the case (we can keep people alive in some form on machines almost indefinitely now), but the title is too good. A man puts a young man in a coma, and is released to the custody of the comatose teen's mother. He turns is life around, but what of greater consequences?

Fourth, I resolve to finish Orion's Forge. This is the prequel novel to "Mining Chernobyl." Most of my characters (at about 1/4 complete) have taken their places, but as you will know when you read the final story, I have a long way to go to destroy the Earth.

This promises to be an exciting year for my fans. Maybe *knock on wood* even a year where I make a profit writing. Keep tuned, and click follow.

Happy New Year