April 7, 2014

Nose to the Grindstone: ROW80 Round 2 Goals

It's time to get real. Lots to do this round. My focus is to keep my nose to the grindstone.

*** Word nerd alert ***

Before I continue, I had to look up the meaning behind the grindstone saying. The best explanation I found:

Knife sharpeners were known to have to stay at the work stations. The work stations were at grindstones for sharpening the knives. The phrase, "keep your nose to the grindstone," implies having to do work. Knife sharpeners were known to have to do hard labor and were sometimes punished.

While it is not certain that they literally had their noses put to the grindstone, the phrase may have originated from that type of punishment. (source

*** back to post ***

Goals for A Round of Words in 80 Days (ROW80) Round 2

Just in case you haven't seen it. *Squeal*
My last Chasing Shadows edit will go to Jo--Editor Extraordinaire--by Wednesday. Then, we will gear up for a late April release. To that end, I need to:

- Write my Acknowledgements section ** See question below
- Get the eARC copies to the amazing people who offered to read and review
- Plan a GoodReads Giveaway
- Put Chasing Memories on free promotion to celebrate the release of book two
- Organize Release Day posts
- Organize (all by myself *eep!*) a Book Review tour

Plus, I am going to finish Chasing Forgiveness (novella) this month.

My original goal was to have Chasing Destiny (book three) out by UtopYA, but I'm just not sure. I've never been one to rush my writing, and I don't want to put too much pressure on myself. Then again, pressure can be a good thing (I wrote books one and two during NaNo). 

There's a lot to do to prepare for UtopYA, too. I need to decide on my swag and get it ordered plus order books to take. 

** I find this a hard task. There are so many people to thank, but I always hate it to get too long. I hate even more to forget someone. Any advice?

Wishing everyone a great Round 2!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

The best thing I could suggest is to go to your nearest bookshelves and pull about 5-7 books. Look at their acknowledgement pages and see how long they did theirs AND who they called out. I think you'll find it's limited to a few people and then a general "thanks to all those not mentioned who helped". That way you get everyone without naming everyone. You know? Best of luck :)

krystal jane said...

Everything time I see or hear the word grindstone I think about A Christmas Carol. ^_^

Ryan gave you great advice. It's the only way I would be able to think of on how to do it. I think it's tempting to try and name everyone, but then it gets kind long and intimidating.

Good luck with your to do list! UTOPYA will be here before we know it!

Anonymous said...

I agree with Ryan about the acknowledgments. Nerd alert: there is a medieval trope where the author thanks everyone (generally, not by name) who helped improve the work, and that mistakes and clumsy prose are all the author's fault.

That's what I plan to do with my acknowledgment page.

Have a great Round Two!
Elizabeth Anne Mitchell

Tia Bach said...

Ryan - Love the advice, Ryan. Although I sometimes get intimidated by how witty some people's Acknowledgments are. Off to research…

Krystal - Love the Christmas Carol reference!

Elizabeth - I like the mention of any mistake being on me and not all those who were so kind as to help me. :-)

Jo Michaels said...

Get on the writing! LOL! We're knee-deep in the editing, so you have very little left to do here, lady!

:)

I don't do acknowledgements. Perhaps I should :P

WRITE ON!