Tag Archives: Second Hand Daughter

Looking Back to Look Forward

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Last year I set some fairly high goals for myself. And now I’ll go over what they were and how I did.

  • Write Dragon Story – This I managed to do early on in the year. I plan on making this a series, however this was a neverending story, so I need to reassess this story and find a cut off point and decide what I want to keep and what can go into the next book.
  • Write Faith’s Story – This I achieved as well, in early October.
  • Write another story – in November I wrote and completed Hope’s story in the Racing Harts series, so really pleased with this.
  • Edit Second-Hand Daughter – not only did I edit this, but I published it as well in May 2024
  • Edit Compromising Positions – edits were completed and was published November 2024
  • First draft edit of Finding Sam Healey – These I started, but I haven’t completed them yet. I have a date with the editor for March 2025, so it will be published next year.
  • First draft edits of Carol’s Christmas – this hasn’t happened, but I’m not too upset about that.

    Overall, that isn’t a bad year considering I was working fulltime for most of it. The results are pretty epic. At this stage, I have yet to find another job, so I now have to have a real think about what I want to achieve heading forward. I would love to be able to quit work and write fulltime, however I have some limitations as far as that is concerned (will talk about in a future blog post), and to start making money from my writing, I might have to write to market, which isn’t where my heart is. I want to write what I want to write, and that means that I need to find readers who want to read my work, and that proved elusive this year. I guess I could focus on writing in the first quarter of next year and really push my publishing timetable, but I also don’t want to burn out.

    It’s a fine line between doing something you love for money and doing something you love for the enjoyment of writing. I guess it is something I really need to work out over the next couple of weeks as we start the full on countdown to Christmas.

    Planning and Plotting

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    It’s been a week. Work, Monday to Thursday. Friday was Matariki, which is Maori New Year, an opportunity to remember those who have left us, plan ahead for the future, and celebrate those who are around us. My Partner, Mr H and I took his daughter back to Christchurch. He brought her up two weeks ago. She was supposed to drive herself, but she broke her collarbone, and so Mr H went down and picked her up.

    It was a lovely drive, and a great opportunity to get some photographs for inspiration around the Murchison / Maruia area. I won’t share them here, but I did share a photo of the Maruia falls on my instagram page.

    Lunar, being…Lunar
    Maruia Falls
    Kaikoura ranges from Canterbury Plains

    So, writing / planning / editing wise – I am slowly working through a second edit of Second Hand Daughter. I’m taking my time on this, which I probably shouldn’t be but I’m enjoying reading this again, plus I didn’t really plan to edit this month, it was a planning month.

    And planning I have been. I have planned out most of Carol’s Christmas, and have 4 main characters, Carol Sawyer the main character, Emma Thornton, her daughter, Noah Thornton, her ex husband and Iona who is her best friend and business manager. I like the story plan I have in place for this, and will start writing next month.

    I’m also still ticking along on my Dragon series. I have a couple of ideas that I can work with. The original plan is to write 5 stories relating to the series, however with a major idea I’ve had, this could expand. I can’t wait to introduce you to some of the characters in this series. Keep an eye out on my facebook page for some introductions.

    I’ll keep working on the dragon series for now, and see what else develops. I started writing one of the stories a couple of years ago, so I will have a read through and work out what I want to keep and what I don’t, and I hope to use November to write this novel – or at least complete it.

    Anyhoo – I hope you’ve had a good week, and I’ll catch up with you next week.

    Kia kaha peeps