Making Progress

Well, at last I finished the time travel rewrite I referred to in this previous post.  My character made her decision, and it was actually not the one I expected her to make (funny how they do that sometimes.)  I also managed to get it from 11,400 words to just under 10,000!  10,000 was the threshold I was aiming for, as longer stories are harder to get published.  Not that 10,000 isn't still long, but it's a line that some markets draw.  (For anyone interested, the commonly-accepted definitions are:  Flash Fiction, up to 1,000 words; Short Story, up to 7,500 words; Novelette, 7,500 to 15,000 words; Novella, 15,000 to 40,000 words; Novel, 40,000 and above.)

I'll be adding it to the Critters' queue pretty soon here, although I can't have another one in the queue until my previous one gets critiqued, so it probably won't go out to readers until early June.  There is one way around the wait:  I could work to get Most Productive Critter status, which allows me to bump myself to the top of the queue.  To do that, I have to critique ten (or more) stories in one week.  I'm not sure whether I could commit the time for that; I suppose I'll see how many of my stories start to get backlogged, and perhaps devote a day (or three) to critting if I feel it's necessary.

The story still lacks a title, although I have one idea that could work:  Pandora's Time.  I'm not thrilled with it, although it seems like it could work to hook people's interest.  Any opinions?

Now on to something new.  For my next piece, I think I'll be doing something unusual:  starting with a title.  Typically, I figure out the title somewhere through the process of writing a piece, but I came up with this title a while ago and it's starting to grow on me.  I have a basic idea for a plot for it now, and I've been feeling really enthused about this idea lately, so I figure it's time to see where it takes me.  I've learned from experience that I'm most likely to write a story if I get to work on it shortly after getting the idea, because that's when I feel most inspired.

The title:  Smooches By Proxy

I'll let you know whether this reverse process of writing works when I find out!