Hello 2016

My calendar tells me that we just entered a new year. I wasn't done with the last one yet. Give it back!!!!

This last year has been a mixed bag. On one hand, I did publish My Kingdom for a Quest and Water Princess, Fire Prince, which have been my best books thus far, but on the other hand, I didn't accomplish that much else.

I'm going to first link up with the Beautiful People link up that Cait and Skye have issued, themed on my writing goals for 2016.


What were your writing achievements last year?

I published two books! I believe I mentioned that before. I didn't get a whole lot of writing done, apart from parts 1-3 of Lady Dragon, Tela Du, but I'm mostly satisfied with that. I also had a job. Jobs steal your time.

Tell us about your top priority writing project for this year?

Finishing Lady Dragon, Tela Du and getting it published sometime in October. This means that I need to finish writing it by my birthday next month. Can I do this? If I focus. I'm also going to try to have the Beta Reader call up by that point, and part 1 mostly edited. 

List 5 areas you’d like to work the hardest to improve this year.

1. Focusing - Dug from Up is my spirit animal. I am SO easily distracted. This year, I'm going to to work on staying on task.

2. Multitasking smarter - As extension of being easily distracted, I love piling projects on top of myself and subsequently drowning. I'm going to try to smarter about this in 2016 so that I don't drown.

3. Meeting Goals - I'm a published author with a fanbase clamoring for sequels. This means I need to get them their sequels in a timely fashion. 

4. Staying accountable - I don't like admitting the real truth about why I don't meet my goals. "I'm sorry this post didn't go up ... work ... brain broke ..." while in honesty, it didn't get done because I was goofing off playing a computer game. I played a really fun Hidden Object Adventure based on Snow White the other week. That was fun.

5. Promotion. I doubled - nearly tripled my fanbase last year, but if I'm going to become independent off of my writing, I need a larger fanbase. So this year, I'm going to get serious and actually shell out money to promote myself. I'm also going to get serious contacting reviewers to see if they want to read Water Princess, Fire Prince.

Are you participating in any writing challenges?

NaNo for certain - I've already nearly settled on Sing, Aling for this year, my Sci-fi retelling of Peter Pan. I'm not sure whether or not I'm going to do Camp NaNo. If I do, it will be with either book 3 or The New Division.

Five Something Something. I didn't get Poison Kiss done in time this year, so I'm going to try again this year. If they do Little Mermaid (which is my #1 guess ... either that or Rapunzel), I have something picked out. Otherwise, we'll see what I come up with when I see the cover. 

What's your critique partner/beta reader situation like and do you have plans to expand this year?

I have a few girls who are reading LDTD by the part as I write it, but I'll be issuing a call for betas sometime next month, hopefully. Beta readers of book 1 will be contacted directly. It'll be a bit more tricky for newcomers, but not impossible.

Do you have plans to read any writer-related books this year? Or are there specific books you want to read for research?

Not really. Well, I have a small slew of writing/publishing/promotion how-to books on my kindle. Maybe I should read them.

Pick one character you want to get to know better, and how are you going to achieve this?

Aling of Sing, Aling. She's the Tinkerbell character, and is half-elf and half-fairy, and loves tinkering. I'm going to write her book. It will be awesome.

Do you plan to edit or query, and what’s your plan of attack?

I'm going to edit. You'd better bet I'm going to edit. Querying isn't in my plans, though, not until I have a book ready that I'd be willing to let a publishing company control.

Plan of attack ... uh ... same as I always edit. Without mercy.

Toni Morrison once said, “If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.” What are the books that you want to see more of, and what “holes” do you think need filling in the literary world?

There is a severe shortage of books by Kendra E. Ardnek. Only SEVEN!! I need to rectify that.

What do you hope to have achieved by the end of 2016?

LDTD published, Poison Kiss published. New Division written and ready for revision and publication 2017, Sing, Aling written, and put together a series of children's books about essential oils. This is a new project that I was discussing with my aunt the other week, but basically ... I'm going to personify the various oils, and write stories that will help kids learn about their various uses.

I would also like to get the Bookania collection finished ... but I'm not sure that's going to happen. Maybe next year. I don't want to abandon Bookania, but right now, Rizkaland and its surrounding novels have me captured, heart and soul. It might not be until I have RL Book 3 out before I can focus on the Bookanian characters again. I need to prioritize, after all.

Also, I'm coming up on Sew's fifth birthday this summer, as well as my 7th blogoversary. There will be a party. It's too soon for me to know the details, but it will be awesome. I do know that this is when I plan to publish Poison Kiss.