Welcome Our New Contributors

We have four new members to our blogging team for this challenge. Thought it was time to bring in some new blood. It is always good to get new views and as these women are all new to the National Novel Writing Month, it will be interesting to get their point of view over the month.


Our new contributors are Anita Mack, Kiki Opdenberg, Monique Wood and Natalie Hatch. I hope you all will welcome these delightful ladies to the crew. See what happens when RC goes on holidays, Diane and I run wild, who knows what we will come up with next. LOL.


Chat to you all soon.

Sandie.

The countdown is on...

It's only 4 weeks to the Nanowrimo kick-off on November 1st and I am excited at the thought of writing fast and furious again.



I've started a Nano roll call on the group so we can find out who is participating and update this blog with a shiny new Nano word counter for each participant.

So if you're in, please visit the RWA Nano group and leave your details.

2008 RWA Conference Spellbound on Southbank

Diane

I have just returned from the 2008 Romance Writers of Australia Conference in Melbourne and had an absolute blast.

One of the things that made the conference so special for me (aside from my bat wings) was being able to meet in person the fellow writers who had taken on the 50ks challenge in June. It was so good to be able to put faces to names, to have shared the challenge together and to find out where we were all going next in our writing. I was proud to be wearing my 50ks badge and I hope that everyone (and more) return to the challenge next year. (Don't forget Nanowrimo is only 2 months away).

Nikki

Lisa and Michelle

Of course it was sad not to meet Rhian, Sandie, and Nat but I did drop into the Clayton's Conference a couple of times over the weekend and caught up with the mischief that was happening there. Who needs a real conference to have a ball, hey gals?



And I'm looking forward to catching up with Elaine's Mechanics of Sex Writing Workshop when I have some time to spare.

Nicki & Shona

Meryl

So fellow 50ks, I hope you all had a fantastic conference. I know I've come away with my head buzzing with information and also know that many of us came away with requests for partials or fulls. Please leave a comment and tell us about your conference experience.

From Start To Finish Challenge

NEW CHALLENGE! Who is game to play? The rules are simple just write, edit and submit your novel in twelve months. That’s right, you have one year to reach your goal. This is open to everyone, whether you’re a published author, who would like that extra push to meet your dead line or get that new novel going. If you are unpublished and want that extra something to keep you on track, this maybe just what you are looking for.

Challenge starts 1st November 2008 and runs through to 31st October 2009. The word count is up to you, how many novels you write is up to you. The main thing is to have your butt in front of your computer ready to write on November 1st, to help you achieve that goal at least, we are going to have two months of plot, plan and research. Through September and October we’ll do whatever is needed to have you ready to start your challenge in November. You can sign up for the ‘National Novel Writing Month’, which runs during November, 50ks in the month.

We’ll be on the RWA NaNo loop, to encourage, cheer and hug you no matter what you decide to do. If you’re interested in taking part just head over to the loop page http://groups.google.com.au/group/rwanano/web/from-start-to-published?hl=en for the challenge and tell us, your name, word count goal, genre, and title of your novel/s (if you have one). Hope to see your name on the list.

Hugs
Sandie

Queen of The Bionic Fingers, Mistress of Editing

We have known her as Rachel Charlton, Rhain Cahill and RC. Now let me introduce you to our Queen of The Bionic Fingers, Mistress of Editing. It seems that no matter what this power house of a writer does she excels beyond the normal limits of we poor mortals.

As you know RC doubled the word count for the June challenge, 100,015 words in just 30 days, over 42,000 of those words in just four days. We had Pin-up girls through out the challenge, I felt it only right that we should acknowledge the fantastic effort put in by the talented Ms Rhain Cahill.

RC was a constant source of entertainment to us all with her quirky one liners, of course some of these one liners were aimed at her partners in crime and co-members of 'The Topless Table Dancing Tarts', Diane Curran and myself, but we love her. There is one thing about our RC and that is life is never dull when she is around.

Ladies, please select your glass.

Let us raise our glasses to this years Queen of the challenge, Rhain Cahill.

Of course now our lovely Ms Cahill has to try to keep that title, we have the

National Novel Writing Month, coming up in November, who is going to be the

person to topple our raining Queen?

The challenge is there now ladies, get ready November will be here sooner than you thing.

Badge of Honour

Well the graduation ceremony has gone off, the winners' certificates have been emailed and the badges have arrived!

Here I am wearing fifty 50ks badges, and it feels like chain mail. Not sure I'll be doing this look at the RWA conference - maybe 10 badges at the most so my fellow 50'kers can recognise me and come and get their badge.

Remember you don't have to made the 50ks to wear your badge with honour!

Now it's back to the editing, Sandie is cracking the whip.

A Page A Day Challenge

50 ks In 30 Days may have come to an end but that does not mean we can sit back and take things easy. So you've had a week off to get over such a big month, now it's time to get back into writing. Set a routine, have a new goal, reach for that gold ring. Whether it be writing or editing set your goal. So I have a new challenge for you all, write or edit 1 page a day. Now this is not a big ask 250 words, that is all I'm asking of you or edit 1 page of your manuscript. Don't go letting all that hard work you did last month go to waste.

My husband tells me this is what my office looks like. Hehehe.

Here's the link to the groups 'A Page A Day Challenge'

http://groups.google.com/group/rwanano/web/a-page-a-day-challenge

add your goal and each day come back and add your daily total. How easy is that?

Come on ladies fingers back on the key board, let's write.

Each week we will come up with a different challenge, anything that will keep you writing. Get those words down on paper. Anything that will get you to your goal of being a published author.

Happy writing.

Hugs

Sandie