This is the Year!

I’m calling it now – this IS the year I’ll get published. IF I can’t find a publisher I’ll self publish again, but I’m determined to work hard to make my writing good enough for a publisher to pick up. I reread Carly and Jim after a long hiatus and thought, this is actually pretty good. However, the opening needed work so I’ve spent a few days playing with it and today finished putting the right words in the right order. I’ve played with the structure one last time (this is the book one of my best friends and I printed out and physically moved around a room in chapters to find the right way to tell the story) and I am finally happy, it is finally ready, I think I’ve finally found the right publisher. Now I’ve got one of those bitter sweet periods of waiting time where you’ve got hope hanging in the air.

I’m not one for new year’s resolutions but I am determined to write something every day this year. A woman I met at a Scottish Book trust event is doing a daily random word challenge and I asked if I could join her. Basic idea is find a random word generator online and write about a different word every day, in whatever way you choose.

I’ve been away from short stories for a while to concentrate on AOTH, but I’d got a bit lost with the ending and needed to leave that for a while so am looking at competitions, my favourite destination for stories. There seem to be more than ever at the moment and Writing Magazine produces a complete competition list (more than you could possibly enter, complete in that way) every Jan for the coming year which is a fab resource. I did notice no less than four typos in last year’s winning grand prize story which I found a bit sad. I find typos in just about every book I read – my husband says I’d be a great proof reader but I know I’d no longer write my own stuff if I did that. But honestly – if a magazine dedicated to writing that is full of advice about proof reading everything, can publish a story so full of mistakes, maybe the rest of us should stop stressing when we send something off having proof read it 50 times only to find a typo the very next time we read it. I’ve found typos in my published work too, in anthologies, and I think this reflects badly on me when it’s not been me at all.

Back to this year’s ambition. It feels as if the stars have aligned. I’m ready to write full time. I feel I’ve improved enough as a writer to be confident when I send work away and my self-belief has got healthier. If you’re ever in doubt about following your dreams, watch Nyad, as I did last week. Extremely inspiring.

For now may you have a better 2024 than 2023, which for many was a pretty rough year. May your dreams become reality.

This year.

Yep.