#41 new year rock
Greetings, lovely humans! It has been a million years or at least too many months of that endless last year, 2018, since I wrote to you. You'll be happy (I hope!) to know that one of my goals is to get back on a monthly schedule for these letters and to update my blog at least once a week. This is part of a quality-not-quantity retake-my-attention-and-focus-online larger goal.
A very short form reflection on 2018 career-wise -- I'm very proud of my releases from last year, which I've talked about here already, both collaborative projects: Dead Air and The Supernormal Sleuthing Service #2: The Sphinx's Secret. Thank you if you bought (or buy them now or in the future) or listened to the free Dead Air podcast (which was chosen by TuneIn as one of the top five binge-worthy podcasts of the year, yay!). I'm also still stoked about being one-half of the Cult Faves podcast, and we're now back and biweekly and so check us out wherever you get your podcasts. This week's episode is a look back at our favorite cult stories of 2018 and setting goals, so it's a great place to jump on board.
But it's the new year now and time to look ahead. I, of course, took a big chunk of last year's creative energy to write Stranger Things: Suspicious Minds, which comes out in just a month (eep! so exciting). Please consider preordering or buying release week, if you'd be so kind. Or requesting from your library, etc! I'm asked a lot where people should buy books for maximum impact, but, honestly, it's more about when--the closer to release day, the better (although don't let that stop you from buying books at ANY TIME). Books-a-Million has some autographed copies, and you'll be able to order personalized and signed copies from Joseph-Beth Booksellers here where I'm doing my launch on release day. The B&N edition will have a sweet extra in it, but I can't tell you what yet. So basically anywhere is great, wherever you get books -- if you have a great indie, shopping there is always encouraged.
Sales pitch /over.
Like many people, in January I think ahead to what I want out of my year. I'm always surprised anyway, and I don't believe in resolutions so much as I believe in goals. My current goal is to finish the YA novel I've taken way too long to finish, hopefully by the end of the month. I made a pretty index card wall and have it all mapped out and have finally gotten back into a creative groove on it. It's a really fun one, which hasn't made it easier at all because of course fun books can be among the hardest to write. Especially funny weird, fun books.
My other goal/challenge for myself is one I decided to do a couple of months back, which is perform in an aerial silks knot routine for the studio show Anastasia in early March. I've been doing silks and other apparatuses on and off for awhile now, but not really focused much on improving. And I knew it would be hard to take this on (and it has). Wednesday I had a private lesson and even though I already backed out of one of my favorite festivals because it conflicted with the performance dates, I felt so behind and discouraged with my lack of progress that I began to give myself permission to just not do it. To quit. Which I should've done weeks ago, because as always, giving myself that permission NOT to do something hard almost always ends up being a crucial step toward doing it. I find this is true in my creative work too. "I could just not write this book" and then, boom, I'm writing the book.
Brains are tricky, and half the battle is figuring out all our little quirks so we can hack them and make them behave. So anyway, of course I went to rehearsal today, knowing that if I didn't at least get these two tricky moves I've been struggling with, I might have to just admit I can't do the routine in time. But I did them! So while I still have a lot of practice to do in the next two months, I feel like yes, now I'm doing this.
So my main goals going into the year:
- Finish novel.
- Perform in Anastasia.
- Start and hopefully finish the other novel.
- Revisit my old screenplays and maybe get a Hollywood rep if I can whip any into good enough shape.
And some surprises, because what's a year without cool opportunities coming your way unexpectedly.
Laura Lippman does this post every year where she chooses her word for the year and invites others to do theirs. Mine this year is HOPE. This will be my fourth year as a full-time freelancer, which has been a financial roller coaster but also really great. But it's been really easy the past two years to get bogged down in the sense of despair and frustration most of us have felt. To give into inertia. So I'm reframing things. When I feel the doubts or like it just doesn't matter, I'm stopping and allowing myself to hope. To remember that I and many many other people are out there working for change, and trying to make the world better. That everything we do contributes to that. So, hope.
Here's one of my favorite pics from 2018, of me in the Peabody Library in Baltimore at World Fantasy, which we visited with friends. This is the best encapsulation of the mood I'm shooting for in 2019.
More soon! xo
Gwenda