Happy 2022 everyone!

Sorry I’ve been so quiet, but I’ve been on two book deadlines. One was early in December for the League of Women Voters book and the other was yesterday for the Sex and the City (SATC) book. I stayed awake for 36 straight hours finishing it, but I finally got it turned in at 10:30 last night. (I didn’t get to edit as much of it as I wanted to, so here’s hoping it makes sense!)

I also wanted to share that a few of my books made the top year-end rankings over at Coverfly again!

Having slept late today, talked to a few friends, and had an unexpected visit from another, I’m just now getting to my planning for 2022, including picking my word of the year (blog post to come on that as soon as I figure it out), but I thought before I focus on that, it might be helpful to go back and review 2021 and the goals I had set.

By the numbers:

• Books written: 2.5
• Words written: More than 200,000 on books alone. Doesn’t include articles, blog posts, presentations, etc.
• Hours spent researching/writing editing: 1140 – that’s 142.5 8-hour days.
• Books read: 63 according to Goodreads. Doesn’t include research or re-reads of The All Souls Trilogy and some of my own books. Nowhere near my goal of 100, but I’ve been a bit busy. Favorite book: tie between A Season of Lights by Gregory Phillips and The Women of Chateau Lafayette by Stephanie Dray.

Highlights of 2021:

• All the book contracts! (League of Women Voters, SATC, Fierce Females and the Minor bio)
• I wrote 2.5 books (and that’s with having a FT job) – League book, SATC, and half of Irena Sendler’s histfic. I don’t recommend that schedule to anyone!
• HNS virtual conference
• Live Like an Editor Workshop and joining the School of Self Image
• Reconnecting with dear writer friends (you know who you are)
• I totally forgot I published Consequences!
• Started writing poetry again

Goals and how I did on each one:

Writing Goals:

• Get a contract for Minor bio.  – DONE!
• Finish Colonial/Revolutionary War histfic by end of July. – Started it. Didn’t get too far before other projects took over and I got stuck anyway.
• Finish WWII histfic by end of July. – 70K words in!
• Write female inventor histfic by end of 2021. – Didn’t have time for this. Its rolling over into 2022.
• Start on modern retelling of a classic – Thought about it and wrote down some ideas.
• Write poetry again. DONE!
• Attend the Biographer’s International and Historical Novel Society virtual conferences. DONE! And they were great!
• Hopefully the Ethics in Arthurian Legend book a I wrote a chapter for will be published. Edits are DONE! Forgot about that one. They have the book with the publisher now.
• Do what I can to get Madame Presidentess and Daughter of Destiny optioned. Out of my hands, but we’re working on it.

Personal Goals:

• Lose 40-50 lbs by June 1. – No, but I have lost 15!
• Pay off debt. Doing well on this one!
• Continue working with the League of Women voters to fund a permanent suffrage memorial of some kind in St. Louis. In process.
• Learn to read French. Nope
• Teach myself to sew. Nope
• There’s another one that I’m not ready to talk about yet, but I will if it ends up working out. – I pursued this one and end up opting out of it because it wasn’t right for me.

Overall 2021 was a great year for me. I hope it was for all of you, as well. Bring on 2022!