The week that was...

This is a spider free post, I promise...

Funny how you can finish a week and be disappointed with what you've achieved only to look back later and see that you actually did quite a lot. Last week was like that for me. While I didn't tick off every item on my to-do list, I did manage to complete a few that had been languishing there for a while.

On the writing front, I edited two short stories and had a brainwave for another, so wrote and edited that as well. A rush of blood saw me entering all three in the Romance Writers of New Zealand Chapter Short Story contest when I'd planned to enter only one. This is the contest I won last year with Budapest, which went on to be published in Woman's Day as Hungarian Rhapsody. I'm not holding out much hope for this year, though. While I think the stories are reasonably good, I'm not sure they're up to the same standard as Budapest. But you never know. Contests are very strange beasts and there's no point in writing these stories if I'm not going to do anything with them.

Anyway, those stories must have put me on a roll because I had another idea for a non-romantic one. Not wanting to lose it, I spent an hour or so plotting the story and writing a few passages as a reminder of how I wanted the narrator's voice to sound when I came to write it. I now have two non-romance short stories all plotted and waiting to be written. God knows when I'll get around to doing them but I need to make time somewhere. Perhaps when DB and I next head north and I'm faced with two days of non-stop car travel and acute boredom. Always worked in the past.

With the entries sent off I concentrated on a long synopsis for SOG and completed it to a state where I can now rework it into a short synopsis. It's not perfect, of course, but it's a vast improvement on the previous effort. At least this one actually describes what happens in the book. Helpful, to say the least.

On the promo side, I finalised a blog interview with futuristic and fantasy romance author, Golden Heart finalist and all-round good egg Kylie Griffin. The interview will be posted this weekend so if you'd like to know the answers to fascinating questions like what's my greatest vice or the most intriguing place I've visited, trip over to Kylie's blog on the 3rd of April.

Unfortunately, that left my Ritual Passion short story still on my to-do list. It's written but it needs a lot of editing (and a lot of words cut from it) and as today is the first day of Book In 50 Days, a challenge I do with a bunch of other writers, Alamar and Timorelia will have to wait a little longer for my attention. I'm looking forward to BI50Days, though. I don't know why, but for some reason I find having to post my word count to a loop each day very motivational and it's a great opportunity to get Pureheart sorted. The poor thing's been neglected enough.

ODDS AND SODS

Kim McDougall from Blazing Trailers has a fantastic post over at 1st Turning Point called Trailer Gaffes and Greats. In one of the best articles I've seen on the subject, Kim explains the dos and don'ts of making a great trailer. If you've an interest in making book trailers, don't miss this one. It makes me want to do Ritual Passion's all over again.

Fantasy author Jim Hines has posted the results of his first novel survey to his website. Click here to take a look. It makes for some very interesting reading.

SYDNEY SWANS NEWS (because I know you adore them as much as me)

We lost our first game, going down to Saint Kilda by eight points, which puts us in 9th position on the ladder. This Sunday we'll be in Adelaide playing the Crows. While it wasn't the start I was hoping for, 'tis only early days in our campaign for the premiership.