An important tip James Dashner gave at “Life, the Universe & Everything” is that goals are important when writing. Now that does kind of go without saying, but it stands for repeating half a week later.

As far as my writing goals go, I have generally had to keep the goals in my head rather than writing them down. Every time I’ve written a writing goal down, I’ve fallen behind at least a few months on accomplishing it. But if I share the goal with someone else, I’d say it’s about a 50/50 chance that I’ll achieve it. I figure the reasoning is similar to Stephen King’s idea about writing – if it’s a good idea, the author will remember it after a long time. On the same note, if my goal is good for me, writing it down will kind of distance it from the front of my mind. Not that I’ve explained the concept very well…

But anyway, my point in bringing up goals is that I’m currently in the process of rewriting my first novel. I’ve written a whole bunch before but have never set about to rewrite a novel. After two great days of rewriting, I’ve decided definitively (how’s that for –ly words?) that I will have the draft of my novel rewritten. Yes, it will only be the first rewrite, of course, but that’s further than I’ve ever taken such a long piece. And as I’m rewriting the entire story and not just revising it, that will require a lot of work and effort. But I believe it’s feasible and realistic (but we’ll see now that I’ve both written it down and made it public).

So on writing, I’ve been rereading Stephen King’s book “On Writing.” While it’s a great read, I’m discovering (along with Robert Jordan’s “The Great Hunt” that I’m also rereading in preparation for the rest of the series) that the second time through of a book affects the appeal. That’s not to say that Stephen King’s book is bad writing or that his writing advice is no good; merely to say that the reader seems to get a whole lot more out of it the first time around.

Well as I’m focused on rewriting a novel these days, I’d better get to that. So sianara!