Lilly Avalon's Blog, page 4

Writing and Publishing Goals for 2021

Hello lovelies!
Today I'm going to be talking to you about what you can expect from me this year. There are all sorts of fabulous stories that I planned to write and publish in 2021, but I have changed these plans at least a dozen times. There are a million reasons why this occurred—two of the biggest are that I don't write as quickly as I'd like to and it took me forever to even settle on what to write. There are definitely other factors (mostly to do with IRL setbacks and obstacles), but those two are the main issues.
After I finished writing and editing The Risqué Series , I had every intention of writing something new right away. Instead, I spent months starting and stopping several stories after writing one, two, or three chapters. To say it was frustrating is an understatement.
When I finally found something, I was ecstatic. Yay for words flowing again! I had some off days and moments when I strayed from the outline, but it's okay. That can be fixed during revisions, right? No biggie.
Here's the deal, though. This new story needs to be handled with care. The title is My Roommate's Ex , so there's the element of a forbidden romance and keeping secrets. I don't want my readers to hate the protagonist or her love interest, but I have a feeling some of them will. Plus, the protagonist has a co-worker who is going to get her own book. I'd hate to publish my current WIP and not have the next book in the series available until a year later (slow writer, y'all). This makes me wonder if maybe I should finish my WIP, then set it aside to publish next year to give myself enough time to fix any issues as well as write the second book. So, I'm currently considering this as a possibility.
Also, I have two other projects that I would like to publish this year. The one is a boxset of The Risqué Series , which I would like to write bonus scenes for, and the other one is a secret. I don't like being vague, but I don't want to announce anything on this one until I have it written in full. I will say that it is a novella, but that's all I can divulge at this time.
Last year, I wanted nothing more than to get back on a regular publishing schedule. Of course, life gets in the way, along with other things. Fortunately, as an indie author, I'm able to change deadlines and potential release dates around before announcing them publicly. And hopefully I'll have more details regarding my next release very soon.

Thank you for reading and listening to me ramble a bit about what's to come!

Camp NaNoWriMo: April 2021

 

Hello lovelies!

It's time for a wrap-up of how Camp NaNoWriMo went for me in April! I really enjoy participating in Camp NaNo in the spring because I can set my own goal. NaNoWriMo in November has the automatic goal of 50,000 words and that's a tough goal for me to reach in a month. I would love to get to the point where I'm able to write 1667 words consistently every day, but it will take some time. In the meantime, Camp NaNo is where it's at for me!
My goal for April was 10,000 words. That comes out to 334 words per day. On a good writing sprint (10-15 minutes), I'm able to write between 250-350 words. I figured that as long as I can get one writing sprint in per day (or double up when I miss a day), I can reach this goal.

Take a look at my daily word counts for all of April to see how I did!


GOAL = 10,000 words
April 1st = 400April 2nd = 556April 3rd = 0April 4th = 178April 5th = 457April 6th = 251April 7th = 215April 8th = 156April 9th = 467April 10th = 505April 11th = 494April 12th = 319April 13th = 229April 14th = 499April 15th = 366April 16th = 540April 17th = 648April 18th = 877April 19th = 306April 20th = 100April 21st = 369April 22nd = 735April 23rd = 418April 24th = 555April 25th = 92April 26th = 326April 27th = 0April 28th = 0April 29th = 0April 30th = 0
TOTAL = 10,058 words

As you can see, I had a spectacular month of writing. I managed to finish early, which is why the last 4 days have 0 for the word count (I took a break). All of the words written in April got added to the grand total in my work in progress, bringing it to 20,932 words!
I'm about halfway through the story and I'm hoping to be able to have it finished sometime this summer. My original goal was to have this book available this summer/fall, but I'm unsure what my plans will be at the moment. I'll post an update this month regarding my potential writing and publishing plans for the rest of 2021. In the meantime...

Thanks for reading and have a wonderful week!

Lilly Avalon Monthly Writing Update #12 for April 2021

Every month I share an update about what I'm writing in my Monthly Writing Update!Here's the latest for the month of March.
If you look at my March update, my main goal was to participate in Camp NaNoWriMo with the word count goal of 10,000 words.


Have I accomplished this?
YES! I am so pleased to say that I managed to meet my goal of 10,000 words this month. On April 26th, I hit 10,058 words, which brings the grand total of my WIP to 20,932 words. I had a really good first two days, then I missed a day and had some low word counts for a few days. I got caught up and managed to remain consistent and ahead which allowed me to finish early.
While I could have continued and gotten another 500-1000 words, I decided to give this WIP a short break for a few days. I love this story, but there is so much that I need to fix to prevent any continuity errors as well as adding in the correct details. I had written an outline up to a certain point, yet I've deviated from that outline so much along the way that I feel I may have some potential issues. Those will hopefully all be corrected during revisions.


Goals for May
I would love to get as many words written as I possibly can in May. As far as a word count goal goes, I'm kind of leaving it up in the air for now. Aiming for 10k would be optimal, but I don't want to force it, even though 323 words a day is reachable. My husband and I are going to be visiting family one weekend, so I don't want to aim too high when I won't be able to write for a few days. But I promise I will keep writing as much as I can!
If you want to keep up with my progress, I'll be posting occasionally on my social media about it, so be sure to follow me.

Love you all lots! Take care, everybody!

Lilly Avalon Monthly Writing Update #11 for March 2021

Every month I share an update about what I'm writing in my Monthly Writing Update!Here's the latest for the month of March.
If you look at my February update, my main goal was to write 7500-10,000 words in my WIP.


Have I accomplished this?
Unfortunately, I didn't, but I did manage to get just 6,103 words (as of last night), so that still feels great! There were, of course, several ups and downs as well as days I simply didn't want to write, but I still managed to get a decent number of words written. This story has had some slight changes along the way, so the original outline has been adapted a bit here and there. The main story still remains the same, but there are new scenes being added as I go.
My total for this book is currently sitting at 10,874, which means I've broken the 10k barrier for revealing the title to my Facebook group! If you want to see what it is, join my group.

Goals for April
April is Camp NaNoWriMo! I'll be participating again this year. Last year I had the goal of writing 12,000 words to finish writing Seducing the Star and I managed to finish writing it in fewer words. While I didn't hit the goal for Camp NaNo last year, it was still an accomplishment.
My goal for the month is 10,000 words. I've decided to aim low, but still higher than I did in March. At 10k, I need to do 334 words a day, which I feel is manageable for me. I can knock out that in one sprint on a good day, plus easily make up for lost days by doing two or three sprints! If you're participating in Camp NaNoWriMo next month, let's become buddies on the website!
If I can get 10k next month, that will mean I'll be about halfway through writing this book. I haven't decided what my goals for May are just yet, but there's a good chance I'll aim to finish the book if I feel confident enough.
If you want to keep up with my progress, I'll be posting occasionally on my social media about it, so be sure to follow me.

Love you all lots! Take care, everybody!

Lilly Avalon Monthly Writing Update #10 for February 2021

Every month I share an update about what I'm writing in my Monthly Writing Update!Here's the latest for the month of February.
If you look at my January update, my main goal was to write 7500-10,000 words in my WIP.


Have I accomplished this?
Not quite. I had a rough start of it at the beginning of the month. It took me forever to complete the first chapter, and once I did write it, I still wasn't 100% sure it was exactly what I wanted. Even though it wasn't perfect, it was still a good start. That good start can be fixed during revisions later. I made myself some notes of things to adjust in it and I know that once I'm in revision mode, I'll be able to see more clearly the direction I want it to go in.
The grand total as of yesterday is 4429 (mostly from only TWO chapters), which is still a mighty fine number if I do say so myself.

Goals for March
To keep on writing as much as I can! I would like to aim for 7500-10,000 again and see if I can do it this time around. April is Camp NaNoWriMo, so if I can get myself on track with my daily word counts, I should be able to participate and possibly finish writing the first draft of this book (or at the very least come very close!).
If you want to keep up with my progress, I'll be posting occasionally on my social media about it, so be sure to follow me.

Love you all lots! Take care, everybody!

Lilly Avalon Monthly Writing Update #9 for January 2021

Every month I share an update about what I'm writing in my Monthly Writing Update!Here's the latest for the month of January.
If you look at my December update, my main goal was to finish outlining my latest WIP and start writing it.


Have I accomplished this?
Yes! I managed to finish outlining this new story, as well as writing up character profiles to reference. The character profiles took some time to finish but weren't as difficult as I thought they would be. I haven't gotten too far into actually writing the story, however I'm still proud of being able to finally get it started after all this time of not really writing. It's a good feeling to be writing again.
I'm not very far into the story yet (only on the first couple of chapters), and the word count isn't very high (less than 3000), but it's still more progress than I could have done a month or two ago.

Goals for February
To continue the story! I would like to aim for 7,500-10,000 words this month. That way I have a low goal and a stretch goal if I'm doing well. I mean, I'd love to do much more than that, but it is a 28 day month and I'm still kind of a slow writer. However, it's my hope that my outline and character profiles will assist in getting the story written a little quicker than before. Once I reach the 10,000-word mark, I will be announcing the title of the book! I changed the title twice already, so let's hope the one I have now sticks.
If you want to keep up with my progress, I'll be posting occasionally on my social media about it, so be sure to follow me.

Love you all lots! Take care, everybody!

Happy New Year and Hello 2021!

Happy New Year, lovelies! It's 2021!
With how chaotic and terrible 2020 was, I'm glad to have that year behind me. While I know 2021 isn't going to be perfect given everything currently happening, I still have the hope that things will get better. We'll make progress toward eradicating coronavirus and we'll heal as a society.
This year, I want to take steps toward more of my personal and professional goals. I tend to reach too high and become upset when I can't achieve what I planned on doing every year. This time I'm going to be reasonable with myself. My surgery may be over and I may be recovering on schedule, but I still have to pace myself.
Near the beginning of December, one of my recent story ideas popped back into my mind and I decided that maybe I should go with it. The story doesn't need a whole lot of research, planning, storyboarding, or mapping. It's a simple steamy forbidden romance standalone novel. I came up with character names and outlined (most of) it, so I'm hoping to make that my first book of 2021.
Other than that book, I have a few other ideas in the works. I don't want to go into too many details as these books are in the very beginning stages and may not be ready to write this year, but I will hopefully have more information to share about these upcoming projects soon.
Ultimately, I just want to take my time and write what I can when I can with no pressure to meet any major deadlines. My goal is to publish at least 3 books, but maybe more depending on how things go. Wish me luck!
I promise to keep you all updated with the latest news whenever it's available! Take care!

2020 Recap for Lilly Avalon

This year has been a year full of ups and downs. The pandemic put us all through a range of emotions and fears. Life was different and we all had to make adjustments. We've had blessings and losses. My husband's job has had down days and weeks, which meant going through the ridiculously long and painful trouble of filing for temporary unemployment to make ends meet. I had an emergency visit to the hospital where it was discovered that I had an ovarian cyst that I had to get removed just this month. On the other hand, my husband and I found success in our eBay business, which meant we were able to stay afloat and start paying down some debts.
Despite it being such a rollercoaster, I was still able to do a lot more than I thought was possible, especially when it came to making progress with regard to writing and publishing.
After nearly a year hiatus, I began writing a new series in November of 2019. I finished writing the first drafts of the novellas in early 2020, then began working on revisions right away. The first book, Desiring the Dancer , released on August 31st 2020. It had been a year and a half since I published a new book, so it was such a good feeling. Enticing the Escort and Seducing the Star shortly followed (on September 14th and 28th respectively).

Writing these books has been such a boost when it comes to believing in myself and my writing. For a long time, I doubted my ability to write a decent story. There were a number of starts and stops along the way, not to mention really (and I mean REALLY) crappy first chapters of stories I never ended up finishing. On my bad days, I told myself I should probably quit and focus on something I'm actually good at. Then on my good days, I reminded myself that I needed time to find my voice again.
The good days were what allowed me to achieve what I did this year.
Even though I haven't been able to start a new story since publishing the novella series, I haven't given up on myself. There have been some speedbumps and some learning about what sort of stories I have the most passion for, but I'm continuing to make progress. It may be slower than I wanted it to be, but that's okay. Good things take time. Good stories sometimes need time to become what they need to be and I'm happy to wait a little bit longer to find out what it is.
Thank you for joining me on this journey and for reading my words. You have no idea how much it means to me that my stories have brought smiles to the faces of my readers and fans. You're amazing and I hope that 2021 will bring you the blessings you deserve.

Lilly Avalon Monthly Writing Update #8 for December 2020

Every month I share an update about what I'm writing in my Monthly Writing Update!Here's the latest for the month of December.
If you look at my November update, my main goal for the month was to recover from my surgery and outline some books.


Have I accomplished this?
My surgery happened on December 15th, went very well, and I've been recovering nicely. The first few days were difficult because it was hard to lift myself up from lying down. My husband had to assist me a couple times. Naps have been my best friend. I've slowly been doing a little more every day, but making sure to pace myself so that I don't overdo anything and cause myself any pain.
When it comes to outlining, I did do a little bit of outlining for a new project. Not a lot, mind you, given the fact that I had a lot to do before surgery and then not being able to do much post-surgery. However, I still feel like I've been making some progress despite having all these roadblocks and obstacles in the way.


Am I on track?
I still have plenty more to outline in this new story, but given the circumstances, I feel like I've been doing fairly well. Could I have outlined more? Of course. Does it bother me that I didn't? Not really. It was a rough month of various challenges and I feel like I did what I could and I don't want to give myself any grief for not doing more. Progress is progress, and I'm happy with where I'm currently at.


Goals for January
In the midst of surgery recovery, I was thinking about the goals I want to set for the new year. I began writing up an extensive list of things to accomplish. This was a larger than life and basically impossible type of list, lol, but I mostly wanted to get all the potential plans written down, even if I wouldn't be remotely able to handle all of them. Sometimes it's good to just brain dump everything you're thinking about.
As far as what I'd like to do specifically for January, I want to finish outlining my next book and begin writing it. I'm still recovering from the surgery, so I'm unsure how things will be next month just yet. Tomorrow marks two weeks since the surgery and I have a follow-up appointment next week with my surgeon. Who knows? Maybe I'll be feeling extremely well by January and able to do ten times as much as I can do right now. Let's hope that my recovery continues to improve every day so I can reach that point again.

Love you all lots and I wish you a happy and safe new year!

Lilly Avalon Monthly Writing Update #7 for November 2020

Every month I share an update about what I'm writing in my Monthly Writing Update!Here's the latest for the month of November.
If you look at my October update, my main goal for the month was to participate in a half-NaNoWriMo by aiming for 25,000 words.


Have I accomplished this?
Unfortunately, no. And surprisingly it wasn't me sabotaging myself or losing motivation or inspiration.
On November 3rd, I found myself throwing up and feeling a sharp pain in my lower abdomen. My husband took me to the hospital and I found out that I had an inflamed bowel and an ovarian cyst. The former was treatable with antibiotics, and the latter will require surgery. For about a week after returning home from the hospital, I wasn't able to do much without aggravating the pain in my abdomen from the cyst. Even though I can do more now (most days), I'm still trying to pace myself so that I don't overdo it in any way and cause myself to go back to the hospital.
As of right now, I should be hearing from the surgery scheduler this week. My doctor told me that I should get the cyst removed by the end of the year, so I'm hoping I'll be able to get an appointment soon. My husband will have to take time off work to take me there and take care of me after. I've heard varying stories on recovery times, from a few days to a few weeks. I'm hoping I can be back on my feet as quickly as possible.
Am I on track?
I did manage to get 1453 words in before everything happened. After I was home and attempting to do work on the computer, I realized that I needed to take a step back from writing until I was more able to focus on it. Instead, I've been working ahead on my online businesses so that I can have as much done as possible before I get the surgery. I've also been getting all my Christmas shopping done early so that everything is ready to mail or drop off at houses.
Goals for December
My surgery is likely to be in December and that means most of the month is shot as far as writing goes. However, I did take a moment recently to plan out what I'd like to publish in 2021. It's a makeshift schedule, which I'll likely have to change around depending on how things go in the near future, but it felt good to make plans.
I would like to, at the very least, spend some time in early December writing outlines for 2021 books. I've changed my mind (yet again) about which book is next. But that's okay! I have ideas upon ideas, and sometimes certain ones take longer to fully form into complete stories.
If you could keep me in your thoughts and your prayers, I would greatly appreciate it. This has been a bit of a wrench in our life, but my husband and I are hanging in there and staying positive.


In the meantime, please stay safe out there! Take care and I love you all!