The last page of 2012 has been logged into the history books.  Reviewing my writing performance for the year, I see a strong start to 2o12 that ran into some bumps later in the year.  I met some goals; I failed to meet others, but overall I was pretty happy with the year.

Last January I set five writing goals:

1. Write and/or edit at least 700 words per day.  I made my daily writing goal.  I wrote or edited 304,252 words, which works out to 753 words per day (excluding November).  More importantly I wrote on 333 of 366 days (91%).  I started the year strong, and faded a little through the second half, but I consistently made my minimum daily targets.  My writing was split among short stories (41%), my novel (17%), web posts (13%), story critiques (26%), and other writing-related things like interviews (3%).
2. Complete NaNoWriMo (50,000 words in November).  In November, I completed NaNoWriMo.  I wrote over 52,000 words, mostly in a new novel set in the same world as my story “Dreams in Dust.”  While I didn’t finish the first draft, I continue to make progress on it, and I’m nearing the 2/3 mark of the book.  I hope to finish the first draft this spring.
3. Finish at least twelve short stories.  I completed only eight new short stories this year, and I left about a half-dozen more on the table.  I’m disappointed I didn’t hit my target on this one, because completing stories is the key to success.  I’ll work harder on this in 2013.
4. Make at least 60 story submissions or five sales.  I made 59 story submissions this year, but more importantly I made 11 sales, including two sales to pro-rate magazines (“My Mask, Humanity” to Daily Science Fiction and “Dreams in Dust” to Lightspeed Magazine).  As the year went along, I found that many of my submissions were making it past the first readers; thus they were sitting for a long time in editorial review.  This reduced the number of times I could submit a rejected work.  While my submission rate slowed in the later half of the year, it wasn’t because I was allowing stories to languish.  I am very happy with my accomplishments on this important goal.
5. Revise and submit my draft novel.  Finally, I did not edit and submit the draft novel I finish in December 2011.  I made some progress, but I didn’t get very far.  I will need carry this goal over to 2013 and try to put more focus on it. 

Overall, 2012 built on a strong 2011, and turned out to be a fairly good writing year, even though there were several area where I could improve.  I continued to sell to pro-rate venues, and increased my total sales.   I failed to finish many short stories, leaving too many drafts sitting around unfinished.  I’m looking forward to building on my successes and improving on weaknesses in 2013.