This year, and what I did in it

First of all, just a reminder that today's the last day to enter my giveaway of Jenna Black's fabulous YA book GLIMMERGLASS. Giveaway closes midnight Thursday, California time.

Meanwhile, over at the Deadline Dames, the fabulous Rachel Vincent is blogging about what she's achieved this year, and I thought that was quite cool. So I decided to try it myself. Just to make me feel good, and prove that I do actually do something apart from eat chocolate and hang out on the internet.

Here's a little list of what I've done for the mighty cause of words-on-the-page this year:

- Wrote BLOOD CURSED, my August 2011 release. 106K. Remember yesterday's post, on keeping the conflicts simple? That's exactly what I didn't do when I started BC, and it took a really, really long time.

- In the meantime, I did edits for POISON KISSED (one word: ugh) and suffered through release day/week/fortnight/month for SHADOWGLASS. It may look like fun. Let me tell you, it's fun from the outside. On the inside, it involves madly writing a pile of guest posts where you're trying desperately not to say the same shit over and over, a few moments of OMG, this is the best job EVA!!! and then a month of sheer panic. Highly recommended, but not for the squeamish or thin-skinned.

- Then, I made a proposal for a sci-fi series, and outlined and wrote the first book. 85K. Actually, this was already a novella before I started, so it really only counts as 50K.

- Spent what seemed like the whole of July and August doing conferences. Disneyworld Orlando, Bondi Beach, Melbourne. Breathe.

- Did another pile of guest posts and an absentee release day/week/etc. for POISON KISSED, while I was on holidays in Europe for a month. See above. Good holiday. Bad idea. Note to Self: Self, next time, stay in your own time zone for release day.

- Outlined and wrote HUNTER'S BLOOD, a short vampire romance. 15K.

- Outlined and wrote CHERRY KISSES, a Shadowfae short. 11K.

- Outlined a new paranormal romance series (yay!) and started the first book. 40K.

I think I did okay! I've made... let's see... 220K plus, not counting outlines. It's never enough. But you can only stay awake for so many hours per day :)