06 January 2013

#JanPlan: Getting It Done

On New Year's Day, someone retweeted something into my stream that caught my eye. Something called a JanPlan. What the heck is a JanPlan, I wondered? I clicked through to this post from Christa Desir to find out. The basic idea is to take some project you've been wanting to finish, and finish it!



I liked the idea of setting some kind of goal for myself for this month, and there are a lot of things I want to get going, so I decided to jump on board.

I've already had this feeling that 2013 is going to be my year. I don't know in what way, exactly, but I see success in my future. With any luck (and a lot of hard work) this will be the year I quit retail and make my living doing something writing-related that I enjoy. Therefore, my JanPlan will help me tidy up a few things that need to be done to start me on that path. This month I plan to:
  • Launch my transcription website and start seeking out clients
  • Follow up on some freelance opportunities I've come across
  • Continue work on one of my fiction manuscripts that I had set aside. A stretch goal would be to finish the draft of that manuscript, but that would be a pretty big stretch. :-)
Do you have something you want to finish this month? Join us on Twitter and share your #JanPlan efforts.

01 January 2013

Consent is Sexy--Dialogue, Not So Much

Every year on my Facebook page, I post an erotic short story. Just for fun. This year it took me a little longer than I would've liked to get the story written and posted. As in, I only managed to finish writing and do a quick copy/paste so that it was up at 11:59pm on New Year's Eve.

I always forget how much longer it tends to take me to write erotic scenes than I think it should. But this year there was also something else dragging it out, and I think it was the dialogue in the story. I've written previously about how much I obsess over dialogue. I pare it down as much as possible and can't stand to have more than a couple lines of it without some sort of supporting action.

This year's story was heavier on the dialogue than I like to be, generally. But I couldn't help it. The nature of the story demanded it. The story, appropriate titled Consenting Adults, focuses on explicit consent in sexual encounters. The idea struck me, but I didn't want to make it overtly political or preachy. In order to show consent as sexy, it required a lot of dialogue.

A lot of repetitious dialogue.

Lots of yes and can I and would it be okay if...

I think it took me so long to get the story written because I was just trying to avoid writing all the dialogue!

Anyway, I finally finished it an hour ago and hastily posted it to my FB page. Didn't even spell check it. Eep! I know some writers are appalled at the idea of letting anyone read the rough or first draft of anything. Obviously, I'm not one of those writers. If you'd like to read the story, you can find it here. I would love to hear from you about whether you think I made consent sexy, or anything else you'd like to comment on. I wouldn't mind a little 'like' on my page while you're there, too.

Do you ever have a "message" in your writing that you try not to make too preachy? Any tips?

And at what point do you feel okay letting people read your writing? If not the first draft, which one?