So looking back, I see I didn’t post any goals for either August or September. It’s been so long since a goals blog went live, that the last time I posted, Too Far Gone didn’t even have its final name yet. I couldn’t even remember what I’d said my July goals were. Turns out, they’re much the same as my October Goals.

• Work on Thunder Road Book 3.

As with July, I find the following statements are still true: I’m satisfied, if not overjoyed, with my progress. I will be overjoyed when it is done.

**There can be no joy until it is done.**

As such, I am modifying that goal.

• Finish current draft of Too Far Gone.

There, I said it. Now I have to do it. I want this draft done so that I can get it off to my first readers with lots of time to spare to revise it before it goes to my publisher. One of my yearly goals was to participate in NaNoWrimo again, and I definitely have a book that I want to write, but if Too Far Gone isn’t done, that’s not going to happen. Even if that third book is out of my hands, I might spend November polishing and drafting a few short stories I’ve been meaning to get to. After all, that was another goal. As was polishing up another old manuscript.

October has a lot going on. I attended VCon for the Prix Aurora Awards (thank you everyone who nominated Tombstone Blues, and ChiSeries Winnipeg!). I have a wedding to attend in Ontario and C4 Comic Con starts on Halloween Friday (right now I am torn between dressing up like Robocop and Inspector Spacetime). Fortunately, I’ve also got a write-in weekend scheduled with some friends, and I always get a lot of work done at those.

In non-writing goals, I finally own a copy of Roger Zelazny’s A Night in the Lonesome October (one of my favourites by him).

Each chapter is a single day in the month of October, and so I will be rereading one chapter of A Night in the Lonesome October a day through the month. I’ve been tweeting impressions with the #ANightInTheLonesomeOctober hashtag, if anyone is interested in following along. Hat tip to my Fungi editor, Orrin Grey, for giving me the idea for this reread a while back.

Write on!