I haven’t gotten a lot done with my writing this past month. What with holiday shopping, travel prep and the obligatory winter cold/flu (not covid, thankfully) I haven’t done a lot of writing or marketing. Things right now are somewhat at a standstill.
But both short stories are ready for editing – my editor has cleared some time for them at the end of December, so I should be ready to publish early in January. Then after Christmas I have quite a few Marketing webinars to review and some new things to try to advertise my stories. I just discovered Book Brush, which seems to have some excellent tools to build ads and marketing videos, and I am looking forward to checking them out.
I also got a little written on the novel before I got sick and before travel. I was going to kill off a character, but realized she had a part to play in the ending of the book, so decided to let her live. She was going to die from natural causes, but instead she has had a miraculous recovery, and I wrote that scene. But, of course, that delays their progress on the journey, just by a day or so, but they have no time to spare. It adds a little bit of ticking clock suspense.
After the holidays and my travel adventures are finished, I plan on knuckling down and getting the writing done. My original goal in January 2024 was to have this book published by the end of December 2024. That didn’t happen, necessitating some new goals. My updated goal for 2025 is to get this book finished by the end of March, then have it edited – I might have to find an editor and pay them as my regular editor is way too busy to edit a whole book, I’m sure – and then get it published. Also, during this final writing period I will start some preliminary advertising, to get the book out there visible to readers and develop some interest in the book. I might investigate getting copies out to some Advanced Readers to get some reviews for when it’s published. And I might do pre-orders which also helps get some reviews up before the actual publication date. Lots to plan and organize on top of actually writing the book!
I predict a busy few months ahead of me.
Whatever holiday you celebrate in December, I wish you Happy Holidays!
I’ll post again in January 2025. 😉
