(writing/personal) The first blog post of the new year

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Happy New Year, everyone!  Sorry I disappeared after the end of Advent – the holidays overwhelmed me, and I just couldn’t bring myself to write, never mind blog.  But I hope everyone enjoyed this year’s Advent, and I promise, it’s not the last.

 

For those who may not know (I know I have some new readers here), I have an incurable disease – Crohn’s Disease.  It’s stress-aggravated, among other things, and I go once every 8 weeks for an IV treatment to keep it in check.  When I’m on schedule, it’s usually pretty good.  However, this holiday season, my 8 weeks was up on Christmas Eve, when the infusion suite wasn’t open.  So basically, I’m now 2 weeks late for my treatment.  To add to it, I ran out of one of my other meds, and had to go a week before the refill prescription was sent to my pharmacy.  It was NOT a good thing.

 

So I retreated for a bit, surrounding myself with family and close friends, and didn’t look at my computer very much (except to play Dragon Age Origins once, and getting stuck), and to be honest, it was good.  I did THINK about writing, and how I was going to approach this year, and what I wanted to do with the next 12 months.

 

This year is going to be a year of writing and publishing.  I have some concrete goals, and a plan of how to accomplish it.  My work schedule has settled into a 4×10 week (Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, I work 10 hour days), and a lot of it is writing.  That, combined with an hour driving commute each way, means I don’t really want to look at my computer when I get home.  So I’m not going to.  I’m going to be writing on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, and setting myself a goal of at least 1k each day.  That’s a minimum of 3k a week, which is fine.  I’m also going to be posting more here, but only on those days.  The other 4, I’m not worrying about writing.  If I do write, that’s awesome.  If not, that’s okay too.

 

It wouldn’t be a New Year’s post without goals, so here’s what I plan on accomplishing this year, writing-wise:

1. Two Advent stories.  Yes, two.  If you read this year’s Advent, you know that Molly and Drew have finally set a date – July 18, to be exact.  And well, they can’t get married without a story, can they?  So yes, readers, there will be an abbreviated Advent in July (6 days) for the wedding, plus another full Advent in December.  And I plan on having the first Advent story (now tentatively titled Winter’s Secrets) available in e-book and print in July.

2. Five more Pendragon novellas.  The response to Into Thin Air was awesome – I’m glad you guys liked it!  There was a short story in the Tales of the Tesla Ranger anthology as well, and I’m moving forward with the rest of the season.  Once all the novellas have been released as e-books, I’ll do a print omnibus edition as well.

3. A separate novel project.  Even though I’m enjoying working on self-publishing both Advent and Pendragon, I would like to sell a novel to an agent and get a big publishing house deal.  Because I would.  So I’m working on an urban fantasy take on World War 3, sort of.  Involving the United Nations, the Bright and Dark Courts, goblins, and the half-elven daughter of William Shakespeare, who’s currently working as a bartender in Manchester, NH.  As one does.  This rough draft will be done by the end of the year.

 

So yes, it’s going to be a busy year.  But a good year.  I’m excited.  And I’m dedicating this writing year, and all those to come, to those we lost this last year, especially PG and Nicole, because I’m going to do what I can to live not only for myself, but for them.  Life is too short, and too fragile.

 

Now, it’s Saturday, and I’ve got a word count to get.

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