Off to Balticon

Geeks all across Maryland, DC, Virginia will pack their geeky bags for Balticon 42, including yours truly. I always get the feeling that I am not geeky enough to belong, despite my geek cred in the real world among the non-geeks. You could say I'm a geek and a geek fanboy, in that I think geeks are cool and don't feel worthy. No physical science degree, no comics pedigree, no l33t hacker skillz, no RPG XP, no publications. But somehow the tribe doesn't kick me out.

Every year, Balticon is like a checkpoint on the writing career such as it is. So here's a progress report:

Short fiction sold: 0.
Short stories drafted: 1.
Short stories reviewed by outside readers: 1.
Novels being drafted: 1.
Novel drafts completed: 1.
Novel drafts reviewed by outside readers: 1.
Novel drafts in rewrite: 1.
Query letters sent: 0.

Not very impressive, and a few years ago, I might have become mightily discouraged at the glacial pace of things. But some experience in crafting quality things suggests that time to get things right is time well spent, especially when building expertise and new skills. It's supposed to take ten years to become an expert in something. The Crashpoint Cascade has been in production seriously since about 2003, so I'm halfway there, right?

1 comment:

shoffy22 said...

ahh yeah i like that new trackball image on the page! indeed it is much more ominous! oh yeah good to keep the progress chugging along with the writing - indeed the 10yr path is most excellent! hope balticon is rock'n and all the trackballs have a great time!