I signed up for Write 1 Sub 1 for the full year of 2011, intending to do the monthly version on a double. If it had gone according to plan, I’d have written and submitted 24 stories. Which compared with my 2010 count, was way out of my league. Still, I had to try.
Prior to Write 1 Sub 1
2010 – drafted 8, revised 24, submitted 6 new, 36 resubs
Prior years averaged 3 – 10 new stories, though the revisions and submissions were lacking.
1st attempt at Write 1 Sub 1
2011 – drafted 18, revised 18 (with 2 in process currently), submitted 7 new, 65 resubs [Consider, my last two months of 2011 were derailed by a broken hand. The writing was ok – I wrote three new stories (and novel chapters) by hand, but avoied the revisions because it’s really hard to hunt+peck the keyboard while ensuring your prose is correct. Plus it’s dizzying.]
Interestingly, the 24 revisions in 2010 were for 10 different stories) whereas the 2011 count of 18 was for 12 different stories. I’m also spending more time on each revision, and getting stories out earlier (versions 3 or 4 instead of 7 or 8). My revisions are definitely stronger.
As I like to compete with myself, I need to kick this up a notch for 2012. How shall I do this?
Write 1 Sub 1 again, first of all. I’m going to do the monthly version. I can write more than the single story a month, but need to work harder on getting new stories into submissions. I’m scheduling myself to write the new story right away in a new month (nothing like a challenge to write the story within 24 -48 hours). After that, the first story revision happens, and it goes up on OWW while I work on the 2nd story revision, which goes up on OWW as well. By the end of the 3rd week, I’ll have two short stories with feedback ready for a final revision. I can choose between them.
I’m hoping some months I can have more than one ready to go, but I’ll also be working on a novel while all this is going on, so I will have to choose carefully. I also need to allow time for the stories that sneak up on me and write them quickly.
The good news is that I should be back to my normal typing speed by the second week in January. I’ve also taken to writing stories by hand, then dictating them to text-to-speech software for faster transcription. It’s an interesting process which takes about the same time as typing up a first draft and a first revision. The quality is about the same, since as I dictate, I’m correcting story and grammar issues.
Write 1 Sub 1 has influenced how I handle my revisions and submissions, two of the most important aspects of getting published. I’m going to stick with it, and hopefully at the end of 2012 will be able to report some new writing/submission/publication records.
Happy Writing!
~ Dawn
Absolute Write / Write 1 Sub 1 Blog Chain
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DAWN BONANNO 
A broken hand? Yow! I’m glad you’ve managed to keep producing amidst that.
Maybe one day I’ll feel as productive as you sound. Sounds like you’re doing great. Good luck with your new goals!
I’m lucky it wasn’t my dominant hand. I’ve been doing a lot with pen and paper.
As far as the productivity goes, it started small. I just stretch a little farther each year. You’ll get there too, but I’ll tell you a secret. My least productive years coincided with pregnancies and children under the age of 1. 😉 I did some writing those times, but didn’t push myself on it.
That’s some good output for the year, Dawn! Judging by how you’re trending over the last few years, i reckon 2012 is gonna be a huge year for you 🙂
That whole speech-to-text software sounds very interesting. Do you find the software translates your words accurately?
Thanks Sam, I sure hope so.
The software requires a training period to increase accuracy, so it also needs patience. it took me a good two weeks to get Dragon running properly at work. The funniest part, is you can do training exercises to increase the accuracy. I was sitting at my desk one morning, reading Alice In Wonderland to my computer. 🙂
That’s a lot of stories for 2011! Good luck next year.
Thanks! Lots of stories = lots of subs = sales!
Very interesting. Thanks for sharing your numbers. It is interesting (and inspiring) to see how the w1/s1 challenge has improved your stats.
I’m sorry to hear about your broken hand. I’ve been struggling with severe tendonitis, so I can imagine the pain. I’ve wondered about speech-to-text when I’ve been unable to put hand to keyboard – perhaps I should check it out.
Good luck in 2012!
Thanks Jennifer. You should check it out. It gets a little hairy with fantasy names sometimes, but that’s been the biggest challenge. Dragon is definately better than the base version that comes with windows. I was training them both up at the same time, Dragon at work and the windows version at home. I still like to try and type, I don’t want to lose the skill, but it’s really nice to choose speech when the discomfort would impact the writing.