Category: Year In Review

How to summarize last year? Major items would include spraining my ankle beyond belief. Finalizing my divorce. Changing my last name to something entirely new. Unpacking all my boxes and setting up my apartment, only to buy a new condo and move AGAIN. Grieving the death of my cat Octavia, aka Tiny Dragon, who passed away from cancer. And learning to live by myself. I did manage to write, but I came nowhere close to finishing the novel.

So what about 2024?

Usually, I try to set a few specific goals for the year. Over time those goals have become smaller in number and less grandiose in scope, but I told myself that a couple should be easy enough, right?

Yeah right. So far, this has not worked, not last year, not ever.

So. I am taking a step back from…a lot of things. I’ve removed the “bookstore” from my website, and I won’t be sending out newsletters. I’ve also admitted to myself that I don’t want to be in any kind of a romantic relationship. I like living alone with my beloved elderly cat. I like being accountable to myself and myself alone. If I want to take a nap at three in the afternoon, then watch five episodes of Death in Paradise, I can and will do that.

As for writing, I’ve decided not to worry about word count. Last year, I spent a lot of time pulling my hair and gnashing my teeth mostly because I was clinging too hard to the original plot for Mansfield Park, and because I didn’t have a clear vision of the magic system and how it connected to my characters. I took a step back–actually several steps–and reworked the plot and world building. But this novel has turned out to need a marathon, not a race. I need to take it day by day, paragraph by paragraph.

And in between, I just breathe.

Octavia, 2009-2023

Since my last post, I’ve been hard at work rebuilding my life. Fig-Cat and I have moved into our new apartment. I’m gradually furnishing the space and making it mine. Figgy immediately bonded with her new cat cave and overall has adjusted well. My emotional state goes up and down, but overall I’m adjusting too. I’ve not been able to write yet, but I did have a glorious New Year’s holiday in the Canary Islands.

Normally, when I write these posts, I summarize the year just past. To be honest, I can’t. I just cannot. Let’s just say that I wrote, albeit slowly, and I’m happy with what I wrote.

But for this brave new year, this 2023, I will dare to set a (very) few goals:

• I will finish NotMansfieldPark. And by finish, I mean an end-to-end draft that I have edited and polished until it gleams brighter than the sun. I started this nameless novel back in 2014, only to get tackled by Janet Watson and her story. This proved to be a good thing, because when I returned to the manuscript, I was a better writer. Now I can do justice to the story.
• I will make this apartment my own. That is, all boxes unpacked, all pictures framed and hung on the walls, all the small details carried out in a way that pleases me.
• I will go on another adventure somewhere in the world.

And that’s it. Let’s see how it goes.

What a year, oh what a year.

And that was just January.

Usually, with these year in review posts, I write about the highs and lows in my personal life and my writing. Between COVID and the alt-right, the world has changed in terrible ways, and I don’t have the spoons to summarize the year in any detail. Y’all lived through it, too, after all. Suffice to say that I’m still here, and I’m glad you are too.

For all that, I did manage to release new editions for both The Time Roads and my River of Souls books. And while I didn’t actually finish a first draft of NotMansfieldPark, I did reach the 30K mark and I’ve ironed out a huge number of important plot points and character arcs for the rest of the book. (Yes, it’s expanded from novella to novel. Are we surprised?) And in the waning hours of December 31st, I had some important epiphanies about myself.

So. About this new year. Here are the gentle goals I’ve set for myself:

• Finish NotMansfieldPark. Really. For sure. And by finish, I mean write the complete draft and make at least one editing pass.
• Be kinder to myself.

To all of you, I wish you joy and love in the New Year, and may 2022 bring us all what we need.

Every year, I come up with tentative goals. And over the years, I’ve learned to pare down and simplify because…Life Happens, you know?

The 2020 we all experienced went so far beyond “Life Happens” it leaped past the next zipcode and landed on Jupiter. A global pandemic. An election year that still isn’t over. The monstrosity that is the Trump administration, dialed up even higher.

As for me, personally… It’s been a mix. My trip to Alaska last January remains the brightest spot of the year. I am also delighted that The Hound of Justice was named a finalist for the 2020 Lambda Literary Awards. COVID hit shortly after that, and the world changed.

I came down with COVID in late March—a relatively mild case, but one that lingered for months. In the middle of all that, my publisher canceled the second book in my Mage and Empire series. (Publishing took a huge hit from the pandemic, obviously.) Frankly, I could barely focus on reading, much less writing and editing, so that was likely just as well.

However! I did write three chapters for my NotMansfieldPark project, plus detailed plot notes for what is now looking more novel-ish than novella. (We shall see what happens.) I also wrote a new short story about Janet Watson when she was twelve. And I finally started work on re-releasing my River of Souls trilogy with new covers, something that excites me beyond words.

So what about 2021?

The world is more fractured and tumultuous than before, but I still want and need to set goals for myself. Gentle ones. Achievable ones.

• Re-release my River of Souls books with their new covers, both in print and as e-books
• Re-release my alternate history novel, The Time Roads (also as print and e-book)
• Finish writing NotMansfieldPark and send that to my agent

And as with every year, there’s so much more I’d like to accomplish–and maybe I will! But it’s one small step at a time.

So. This has been a rather chaotic year for me, both personally and professionally.

Personally? I found a new therapist and life coach, who is helping me make the transition from full-time software developer PLUS author to…full time author. I’ve learned techniques to overcome anxiety, and I’m working on making my living and work spaces at home into ones that bring me joy. This is all very good.

Professionally? I had not one, but TWO novels released this year. The Hound of Justice is the second installment The Janet Watson Chronicles and came out from Harper Voyager in July. An SF/Political thriller with Watson and Holmes, re-imagined as two black queer women, in a US divided by a second Civil War. A Jewel Bright Sea, which came out in September from Rebel Base Books, is a completely different kind of book. Epic fantasy with a strong romantic element, set in the same world as my River of Souls trilogy, 500 years earlier.

But! But! That’s not all!! I won an award!!!!! A Study in Honor (book #1 in The Janet Watson Chronicles) won the Lambda Literary Award for Best Lesbian Mystery. I still can’t quite express how amazing that felt, when the announcers read out my name at the awards ceremony.

Which brings us to next year. I’ve learned over time not to make overly detailed plans because something always, always upends those plans. I do need to finish the sequel to A Jewel Bright Sea. I also want to get this proposal for my NotMansfieldPark novella off to my agent within the next few weeks. Beyond that, everything is possible.

Last year was filled with amazing. A Study in Honor got all kinds of buzz. I signed with a new agent, who went out and sold my pirate novel plus a sequel. I finished the sequel to ASiH, now titled The Hound of Justice, which I might love even more than the first book. And by finished, I mean written, edited, copyedited, and proofread. Lots of work, but oh so satisfying.

2018 was also the year my husband and I to Japan for vacation. Japan…So many kind people, so much good food, so much history. We loved it so much, we’re going back this year. This was also the year I went on a solo vacation to Heidelberg, where I’d been an exchange student many decades ago. This was a low-key visit—I wandered about the Altstadt, checking out what had changed and what had not, eating all my favorite German food, sitting in the sun at the Marktplatz, drinking good coffee and watching kids play.

So what about my goals for 2019? I have two Must Dos and one Want To Do:

• Finish edits for A Jewel Bright Sea (pirate#1)
• Write a complete draft for The Empire’s Edge (pirate#2)
• Write a synopsis and sample chapters for a possible third book in The Janet Watson Chronicles

And in between, there will be the usual copyedits, and the usual promo for all three books. Because, yes, that’s right, I will have three new books out this year!

Last year…last year was challenging. Nearly every day I woke up dreading what stupid, cruel, destructive act Trump had committed overnight. I did what I could, with monthly contributions to good organizations such as Black Lives Matter and Planned Parenthood. I voted in local elections, because those are the building blocks for state and national politics. And I wrote. I wrote because I needed to. I wrote, because my fiction is part of speaking out against the horror show that is the alt-right.

And with writing, came a number of wonderful things in 2017. Not!Sherlock sold to Harper Voyager. I cannot express how much joy this gives me—that Janet Watson and Sara Holmes will see the world. That my editor gave me feedback to make the book better, stronger, and more true to itself. That my publisher came up with the perfect cover art for both my characters and their story.

So what did I accomplish last year? None of my modest goals, as it turns out. A Study in Honor and one sequel sold in January, with the editorial letter following soon after that. I spent several months carefully reworking the plot and prose to address my editor’s concerns. By June, the manuscript was formally accepted. Around the same time, I started work on a detailed synopsis and sample chapters for the sequel. Once my editor approved those, I dove into the rest of the new book. This past month, I broke through the 50K mark, with around another 30K to go.

And let’s not forget the dayjob. In March, I hired an awesome developer, who has the skills and experience we so desperately needed for that position. He’s also a nice guy, and we get along very well. At the same time, work has not slowed one bit. The finance director has dozens of ideas for more reports, more applications, more processes he’d like to see automated.

What about this new year? This year, let’s try just two goals:

• Finish Not!Sherlock#2 by the contract date
• Write a synopsis and sample chapters for a possible third book in the series

And that’s it. Oh, sure, I’ll be doing the usual promotion work associated with a book release. And sure, I hope to get more writing accomplished, but I can’t tell yet, what that “more” should be.