The following is the first in a series by Wren Doloro entitled On Making Goals for Writing and Life. A later post in this series is: 7 ways to Write Everyday

How do you make Alphabet Soup into Success?

Despite all this, I am rather organized. Every major thing in my life I’ve wanted to get done, I got done. And reasonably fast, too. For what I lack in a linear process, I gain in enthusiasm and passion. This drive gets me to ‘Z.’

To travel you need destinations before deciding a route

 Something very important to me in my process is to write the goals down. Let me say this again: Write the goals down.

To write goals down, fuzzy ideas have to become concrete. Once the goals are concrete, todo lists and plans can fall into line. How can anyone hit the bullseye without the bullseye?

If you don’t have a clear idea of what you want to do on a trip with another person, this happens all the time. I know, I’m a travel brat.

Guess what? Real life is full of other people! If they have a clearer goal than you, they’re more likely to get it.

Incorporating your Passion into your goals gives you super powers!

 Ok so you say you know everything you want to do. Do you have it on your wall so you see it when you wake up? By where you brush your teeth? In your kitchen? Even in a notebook you use for your project? On your corkboard? No? No motivational collage? No related background for your computer or cellphone? None of the above? Really?

Well then sure, you know, but then you might

•   go a bunch of days without thinking about it

OR worse

•  stress yourself out because you have to constantly remind yourself of your goals to get them done.

OR even worse

• You don’t actually care about your goals. They have not been articulated well enough for you to stay excited.

You should want your top goals. You should crave them. A burning urge to cover ground on your goals fills you every time you see that motivational picture, or that goal written out.

Write goals in the present. Examples are:

• I am driving a teal convertible to my mansion on a hill.
• I am calling a crowd of 500 people to save the whales
• I am finished my first draft by September 2012.

When in doubt, read!

 

What is Wattpad? It’s a site with a mobile app where you can find free books that other readers have voted up to recommend. In minutes you can fill your phone up with a stack of books to read, follow authors as fans and comment on stories.

The site Wattpad is made for readers to give feedback to new authors and give their work a try. This is a great tool for authors to get their works out to the public, build excitement and get great reviews. Some books have been downloaded by millions!

In addition, Margaret Atwood is also assisting the fundraising for Fanado.

“Fanado: (n) fan.ad.o /fe’nado/:a person who is totally into and wildly knowledgeable about great artists of any and all kinds.

She wrote an eight week comic about these new technologies for readers. Anyone can subscribe to the eight week comic by donating one dollar to Fanado.

 

Description:

Secrets…we all have them.

The majority of the stories left me wanting more–more about the characters and more from the authors. Luckily if that is the case, a lot of these stories are spin off scenes from full length books. Stories that especially stood out for me are:

The opening story by Carolyn McCray, “An Engagement to Remember,” reminds me greatly of James Bond: fancy restaurant, satin dress and champagne turns into mayhem. Computer wizard Rebecca is a great female lead while Brandt takes the firearms. Both feature in Carolyn McCray‘s other works, 30 Pieces of Silver and Havoc. 

“Uh Oh, It’s Magic” by Amber Scott dives into action headlong. Callie has just received a blow to the head. She better figure out what to do fast! As the title hints, this one is urban fantasy. Amber Scott also writes paranormal romance.

“What a Tiny World” by Jeremy Rodden is a seriously freaky theme park investigation. He is author of the Toonopolis series.

One of my ultimate favorites of this anthology is the short and funny, “It Keeps Getting Shitakier,” by Patricia Mason, author of In Deep Shitake (A Humorous Romantic Suspense)

“Partners” by Mimi Barbour kindof disappointed me because you get a chunk of story without a real climax. Because it is split into chapters it seems longer than the other stories, while being less satisfying. To me this story was the Achille’s heel of the anthology.

The anthology takes a strong finish with “Dark Lullaby” by Cristyn West. The supersnarky profiler Kent works alongside the more diplomatic detective Nicole to solve a case. Serial Killers are what the author Cristyn does best.

 In Donora, Pennsylvania the mills are churning ugly smoke in the fall of 1948. Community nurse Rose Pavlesic is a tough cookie– wrangling her patients, family and life into shape with sheer will. Suddenly the time comes when everything is called into question. Her community nurse program lacks funding, her children’s lives are spiraling out of her control, and her husband…she can’t even think about everything wrong with their relationship as she juggles the well-being of the entire town. Her one hope for funding circles around the Superintendent’s family. The secrets of her past come to haunt her and blacken her vision like the fog coating the town.

Rose is an amazing character. Any modern woman would admire the way she uses every moment in the day. From making breakfast, picking up the chores her family neglects to do, watching her nephew, visiting four families before lunch, saving money bill by bill, straight to coming home to dust a second time, and putting dinner on the table. How does she do it? Why by being really friggin stressed and a bit bitter than no one else ever gives her a hand.

Things come to a head quickly in this book as everything starts to crumble on Rose. She’s tough, but there are things that can make anyone curl up into a little ball. After the Fog has great pacing, bit by bit the characters reveal shameful acts and sordid pasts.  Kathleen Shoop sure packs a lot of action into a week’s time. A few typographical errors, an unexplained shift in perspective and a couple of spots I couldn’t help but skim are what kept this book from rating higher. Overall I couldn’t stop reading, and found some serious tears in my eyes. Read this book!

After the Fog on Amazon
Kathleen Shoop’s Website 

a Rafflecopter giveawayCheck out the following excerpt and enter the book giveaway!! Shadow Sight, the first novel in the Ivy Granger urban fantasy series, goes on sale in trade paperback and ebook editions July 24, 2012. Read on for the review by Wren Doloro.

     I sniffed the air and smelled a whiff of sulfur.  Oh, Mab’s bloody bones!  My hand snagged a crucifix off the desk and I started muttering the Lord’s Prayer.  I may not follow any particular faith, but Kaye had taught me a trick or two.  Ten to one odds my client wasn’t bothered by today’s intense heat.
     Color me pixed—the guy sitting on the other side of my desk was a demon.  My hand, the one holding the crucifix in a white-knuckled grip, was starting to shake.
     “You seem to have some inkling as to my lineage, however I am not here for myself,” he said.  “Hell has no interest in you…yet.  I represent a client, someone very powerful who requires your special services.”
     “You’re telling me that you’re some other dude’s lackey?” I asked.  My hand steadied as I held the crucifix out before me.
     “Attorney,” he said, shooting me a narrow eyed glare.
     “Lower than a lackey then,” I said.
     I was playing with fire, or brimstone.  I should order the demon to leave, but there was something intriguing about his story.  I couldn’t help becoming curious.  Someone had made a deal with a devil, literally, to gain my services.  I wasn’t sure if I should be flattered or die of fright.
     At least I knew my instincts were good—this was definitely going to be a long day and this really was a client from Hell.

E.J. Stevens writes on her Unusual Creatures in this guestpost: