Writer Recharge Update 2

Here we are at the end of week two of the Writer Recharge challenge, a co-hosted event for the month of February intended to help us writers keep our eyes on the prize of making progress in our work. Thanks to Sara Biren, and her fellow challengers (Katy Upperman, Alison Miller, Liz Parker, and Elodie Nowodazkij) for setting this up. Visit their blogs for more details, and the linky list of other writers to visit.

I only have two goals to achieve. Here’s how I’m doing with them:

• Get the novel ready for Beta Readers: I’ve revised the first four chapters, concentrating particularly on chapter one. This was one of the critiques from my First Readers: the information in the opening chapters was important, but not particularly… um… exciting. Kind of like reading the instruction manual before putting the IKEA bookcase together. Necessary, but not exactly page-turning. Hopefully that’s better now. There are other changes I need to make, and I probably could have got further except… well… I started reading the novel and got sucked in. This week, I need to concentrate on sharpening some plot points and finishing up the changes that need to be made before sending this out to Beta Readers (email me if you want to be a Beta Reader!).
• Finish at least one short story: I hoped to have the first draft of the short story done by this time, but I haven’t. Thanks largely to some great YA Buccaneers Word Sprints, I made good progress, but it’s not finished yet. Maybe by next week, but I’m giving priority to the novel. If I can at least make more progress–say, at least another 1,000 words, that’ll be good.

That’s my update for week two. BTW, I’m serious about Beta Readers for my novel. If you’d like to volunteer, send me an email telling me so. What’s the novel about? If you don’t already know, here’s my query:

Pearl, a sixteen-year-old girl from the planet Maralan, is an Earthophile: she loves all things to do with the tech-savvy occupants of planet Earth. So when she gets the opportunity to visit anywhere, any time, she decides on London in 1978, a year when fashions were wild, and her favorite Earth band, ABBA, were still making music.

But a miscalculation ends up transporting her to London in the year 1879. She needs electricity to recharge her travel device, but Edison’s only just invented the light bulb. Stumbling into the home of the 14th Earl of Chiswick, a man of means and connections, seems like a step in the right direction. However, keeping her alien identity a secret from his inquisitive household, and his sharp-tongued, sharp-eyed 16-year-old daughter, while finding a way back to Maralan, might prove harder than she thought.

A TEENAGE ALIEN IN VICTORIAN LONDON is a 78,000 word YA Sci-Fi/Historical novel. Douglas Adams meets the big-house atmosphere of “Downton Abbey.”

Thanks, and have a wonderful Writer Recharge week! 🙂