My Writing Goals for 2024

New Year is a terrible time for resolutions. We make them because we feel under pressure to do so, not because we really want to. We “ought” to go on that diet or join the gym, and the commitment quickly runs out because it comes from outside. Far better to make the resolution at whatever time we feel ready be committed — not just because it’s the first day on the calendar.

On the other hand, New Year is a good time to take stock of last year and set realistic goals for the year ahead. We’ve probably had some downtime over the holiday, and it makes a good point for a break.

Accordingly (and a little late), I’ve reviewed my writing achievements in 2023 and set goals for 2024.

What Happened in 2023?

I’d finished 2022 on a high note, having finally, after far too many years, completed the first draft of the novel that currently goes under the working title of The Empire of Nandesh. It wasn’t even remotely finished, of course. The second draft will be a substantial rewrite, addressing its many fundamental issues, while it’ll then need at least one polishing pass. But, for the time being, it was complete.

I didn’t want to launch straight into that revision, for two reasons. Firstly, because I prefer to get some distance before approaching revision. Secondly, because I had a very long list of ideas and fragmentary beginnings for short stories, and the goal I set myself was to write ten of these.

I started well, with a story I’d just begun at the end of December for a dragon-themed anthology. The deadline was mid-February, and I duly got it written, revised and submitted on time, with the title Fear of Flight — and I’m still waiting to hear about it. These things happen.

The next was a story about the Traveller, which currently has the title The Tower of Zeka-Zomi. Although not a monstrous story, it took me about four months to complete, and it still requires revision (and probably substantial expansion).

Then the proverbial really hit the fan. I started working on a story currently called Shadows in the City. One of my “modern” secondary-world stories, I’d written a number of excerpts from it, and I was expecting it to be long — perhaps 15,000 words. Well, it’s currently over 26,000 and still not finished, although I’m now closing in on its climax.

At the end of the year, I set Shadows in the City aside to write another dragon story for another anthology call. This story, called Scorch Marks, was finished and submitted two days before the deadline, on 30th December. I also wrote four new very short pieces (flash and drabbles).

I had a goal of submitting at least one story a week, and I actually managed 44 submissions, of which three were accepted, with two already published. I pretty much met my goal of promoting one of my books every week, and of critiquing someone’s story on Fantasy-Writers.org each week. However, I didn’t make the goal of getting a book published — although I do have a book waiting in a long queue to be published.

Goals for 2024

One of the things I’ve struggled with for a while is actually writing on a regular basis. This is partly because my “day job” involves writing for clients, and I don’t necessarily feel like embarking on more writing last thing. This has often meant very little getting written in the week — hence the slow pace referred to above.

At the beginning of December, however, one of the members of Fantasy-Writers.org recommended Neil Gaiman’s solution to a similar problem: just to set myself the goal of writing 50 words a day. It’s proved a lot easier to open the file when I’m only committed to writing for a few minutes, and in fact I’ve normally ended up writing at least a couple of hundred words. The result has been a much faster pace over the past month and a half, and I’m setting that as a goal throughout 2024 — allowing myself up to two “fails” a week, but aiming for every day.

So what will I be writing for those 50 words (or more) a day? Well, the first order of business is to get the draft of Shadows in the City done — I’m aiming to have that finished in February.

Once that’s done, I’ll target getting at least five short stories written. I know better than to second-guess how long they’re likely to be, so I’ll just say they’ll be longer than flash but shorter than novellas. The first will be a story about my recurring characters Kari and Fai, which I already have excerpts of totalling around 2000 words. Other priorities include another story about Loshi (the first, The Guild’s Share, was published last year by Swords & Sorcery Magazine) and a story about another possible recurring character I’m referring to as the Maimed Warrior. But there’s a very long list.

In addition, I’ll be aiming to write and submit flash fiction and drabbles as and when inspiration strikes, as well as revising the stories I already have (at least The Tower of Zeka-Zomi and Shadows in the City). And there’ll hopefully be time towards the end of the year to do at least some planning for the second draft of The Empire of Nandesh.

And what else? I’ll be targeting at least 52 submissions and 52 critiques of other peoples’ stories, along with 52 promotions and 12 blogs. Not to mention aiming (again) to get at least one book published.

So, will I achieve all these goals? Most likely not; but, if I get anywhere close, I’ll consider 2024 to have been a successful year.