Closing In On The End.

Here we are, closing in on the end of 2023. Halloween is tomorrow, and then we get into November and the slow slide toward a new year. Yesterday, I hit the halfway point on Balance of Power, which means I’m well on my way to finishing the book by December, just in time for Cookiepocalypse. Planning for 2024 has started (slowly, but it has started), and I’m looking forward to closing the book on 2023.

It’s been a good year. A weird year, but a good one. I’ve learned a lot, and I’ve come to a lot of realizations that will change how I work going forward. What, you ask? Well, working multiple projects at a time isn’t something sustainable for me anymore, to start with. I have to focus on one thing at a time in each category — planning, researching, writing and editing. If I try to do more than one in each category, then none of the others get done. Time to adjust so I can accomplish more by doing less.

I forget if I let you all know that Written in Water didn’t make the finals for SPFBO. It had a fabulous review, though. You can see the finalists here, and there’s still one more to come (by tomorrow, I think!)

So what’s in the cards for 2024? Keeping in mind that things are still in the squidgy, warm Jello stages of planning, 2024 holds at least one convention (possibly three — I applied to present at ICFA, and I’m in the waiting list for a convention that I’ve never done before), more events with the Cavalcade, at least one but possibly two books from Riverdale Avenue Books (Morrigan’s Heir is still on the roster for this year, but they have Bonds of Blood and Steel, and I will be sending them Morrigan’s Wrath once I finish the Heir edits.) There will be at least one self-published book — that would be Balance of Power, and getting research done for Imaginative Anthropology and for the worldbuilding for Iron and Silk.

So, if I keep with the categories, here’s my 2024 starting lineup.

• Planning:
  • ???? (at the moment, I have a pile of story outlines ready to go. So this with either stay empty for a bit, or just be business planning.)
• Research
  • Imaginative Anthropology
    • Iron and Silk research when done
• Writing
  • The Sea Prince
    • ???? when done (Either Tales from the Arena: Dead Man’s Hand or Tower of Light.)
• Editing
  • Balance of Power
    • Either The Sea Prince or whatever comes back first from RAB.

I’m looking at perhaps a March or April publishing date for Balance of Power, but that will depend on several factors (how long edits take, how long cover creation takes, and what other books I have releasing and when.)

On a personal level, someone who lives in my house and is taller than I am now graduates in the spring of 2024, and starts college in the fall. All the applications are in, applications for scholarships have started, and we do the financial aid paperwork in December. Then we wait…

Oh, and there’s a two-years-postponed vacation in there somewhere. I really can’t wait for that!

Works in Progress

Balance of Power
Heir to the Firstborn, Book 7

The Sea Prince
The Coral Throne, Book 1

Promotions!

First in Series Friday is Coming! Friday, November 24th (Black Friday in the US), the first books in Heir to the Firstborn, Rebel Mage, and Swords of Charlemagne will be on sale everywhere for 99 cents.