I write way too slowly. When I sit down to work on projects, I very rarely get as much done as I'd like. Stories take me longer than they should to complete. This, in turn, is disheartening, because it makes me feel like I'm not any good at what I do (or try to do).

I also feel guilty that I don't have more to give to my readers. In some recent years, I think I've posted something like two or three short stories in a given twelve-month period. Yes, I'm also working on larger projects during all of this, but I do admittedly feel like a hack, sometimes, being on a writing podcast* and not really getting to demonstrate a lot of my writing to people who listen to me.

Also  kyell tells me I should write more sexy things.

So, in an attempt to kill three birds with one stone, I've decided to do a little something special over the next few months. Shorts for Summer!

Essentially, my goal is to write and post one short story a week, every week, from now until the end of summer ("end of summer" being probably right before Feral 2012 in this case). My two recent short stories "Priorities" and "Within the Lines" are the sort of thing I'm talking about here--quick, experimental (hopefully sexy?) pieces somewhere between 1500 and 3000 words, most likely, easy to read in one sitting, and easy to write in one sitting.

Through this, I hope to 1) get better and sitting my ass down and finishing things, 2) learn how to better make use of time set aside for writing, 3) give my readers more stuff to read, and 4) maybe stretch my limits a bit and experiment with new ideas and techinques without a huge amount of pressure.

Since they were both posted within June, and posted in separate weeks, I'm counting the two aforementioned stories as part of this little project (truthfully, I'd decided on doing it before I even wrote "Priorities," but the idea came to me before I got around to writing this post, so it's a little backwards).

So, yeah, there you have it. Stay tuned, keep your eyes peeled, and get ready for a summer of more otter-stuff. And don't worry--I will still absolutely be working on other things during this time (both as myself and as other-myself). Realistically, cranking out stories like this shouldn't take more than two or three hours at a go, which isn't even as long as most TS sessions I have, so I will definitely have time to work on other things. Hell, half of the point of all this is to get better at using blocks of writing time in general.

I'm looking forward to seeing what I put out! And seeing how people like it!

---

* Yes, the podcast is stll alive, I promise. Details to come. Soon-ish.