2024 Goals

Well, it's time to grab the goals list I put together/posted back in January, to see how I went.

This year turned out to be a very strange one. Lots of cool stuff happened, and some not-very cool stuff happened as well. Some shitty people revealed themselves and some disappointing crap went down, but I'm not going to concentrate on that mess because as a result, my first self-published book is now available and I'm SO PROUD of it. Yay! 🥳

Anyway, here's how this year turned out:

• Go for long daily walks: THIS IS SOMETHING I CONTINUED TO DO ALL YEAR. (FROM MONDAY TO FRIDAY, I WALK FOR ALMOST TWO HOURS. ON WEEKENDS WE GO FOR LONG SUBURBAN WALKS.)

• Really get back into yoga and schedule maybe two workouts a week: THIS WAS A TOTAL FAIL. WE SQUEEZED IN SEVERAL YOGA WORKOUTS, BUT THEY WERE SPORADIC. 😬

• Brainstorming a bunch of ideas: YES! I BRAINSTORMED 4 NEW IDEAS & I CAN'T WAIT TO WRITE THEM. (WELL, I ACTUALLY ALREADY WROTE ONE.)

• Celebrate the book/s coming out this year: I CELEBRATED THE RELEASE OF THREE NOVELS (ONLY DARKNESS, NUMB, THROUGH THE BLUR) + HAD A TWO-SENTENCE SHORTIE INCLUDED IN THE VERY COOL SHORT SCARES ANTHOLOGY.

• Write between 100-200k words: I WROTE 196,816 WORDS. 

• Read 52 books: I READ 59 (DNFd 4).

• Revise/finalise the first draft (unhinged women/girls novel) I wrote during November: I REVISED & FINALISED THIS BOOK BACK IN JANUARY.

• Work on edits as they hit my Inbox: I DID THIS AS WELL.

• Write a novel or two: BECAUSE I SPENT SO MUCH OF THIS YEAR EDITING & REVISING, I DIDN'T ACTUALLY WRITE ANYTHING NEW UNTIL NOVEMBER. THEN STARTED WRITING ANOTHER NOVEL THIS MONTH! 😳 YEP. (AND I WON'T BE FINISHING THIS ONE BY THE END OF THE YEAR.)

• Write a novella or two: I DIDN'T WRITE ANY NOVELLAS THIS YEAR.

• Write some new short stories: WHILE I DID START WRITING A FEW SHORT STORIES, I DIDN'T ACTUALLY FINISH ANY OF THEM. 😖

• Finally put together/finalise my first short story collection & find a place to sub it to: I DEFINITELY DID THIS! ACTUALLY, I COLLATED SO MANY STORIES THAT I PUT TOGETHER TWO SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS! I REWROTE/REVISED EVERY SINGLE STORY. THAT'S 34 SHORT STORIES! THE GOOD NEWS IS THAT MY DEBUT COLLECTION, MELANCHOLY DELUSIONS, WILL BE RELEASED BY CEMETERY GATES MEDIA ON JANUARY 28!

• Continue to submit stories: I DID THIS TOO! AND ASIDES FROM THE ABOVE ACCEPTANCE, I ALSO HAD TWO NOVEL ACCEPTANCES: THESE STAINED WALLS (Horrorsmith Publishing) + FALLEN DESTINY (Brigids Gate Press).

• Keep playing Animal Crossing and get into some other cozy, cute puzzle games (ie. Fae Farm): STILL PLAYING ANIMAL CROSSING: NEW HORIZONS. OF COURSE I AM. 😁 BUT I DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH TIME TO START ANY NEW GAMES. 🫤

As I mentioned above, I had three novels published this year and one shortie included in an anthology:

ONLY DARKNESS is my first self-published book. NUMB and THROUGH THE BLUR were published by Anuci Press.

Another thing that I did this year was deactivate my Twitter account. Yep. After 15 years, I had no choice but to leave. I had enough of the right-wing bullshit, the pathetic non-stop ads, the AI crap, and the disgusting owner. And I haven't looked back.

Instead, you can find me on Bluesky. 😁

Oh, and another thing I've managed to do is to keep posting on my blog. Yes, right here!

That's it for now. Guess I should put together a 2025 list soon...