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Everyone likes metrics for the end of the year. Here’s some of what I did in 2014. This is why I like keeping track of everything I do. It makes me realize that I am productive and that I did accomplish a lot. Sometimes, this is a hard thing for an author to understand.
Number of days worked on freelancer stuff: 361 / 365 (284 days, answered pub industry email.) I really need to change this. Take one full day a week off or something. No wonder I had moments of feeling burned out.
New fiction words written: 230,800 (doesn’t count emails, blogs, etc…) In the form of 12 short stories, 1 novella, 1 RPG sourcebook, 2 novels.
Edited: 3 anthologies, 2 novel, 3 novellas.
Conventions attended: 8
Sold in 2014: 5 short stories, 2 novellas, first 3 books of the Melissa Allen series. (3 short stories still waiting on an answer.)
Published in 2014:
6 short stories, 1 novelette
1 RPG supplement
2 novels
4 anthologies
Editing. Writing. Getting end-of-year things done. Here’s some links for you. Hope your December is as awesome and productive as mine is shaping up to be.
Review: GeekDad reviews Chicks Dig Gaming. He gives it a big thumbs up.
Review: GeekMom reviews Chicks Dig Gaming. She also gives it a big thumbs up.
Review: SFRevu Review by Bill Lawhorn of Athena’s Daughters anthology where he gives a great shout out to my story, “Janera.”
Article: How I remain productive while traveling. I wrote this for the SFWA blog while traveling.
Book Release: Jazz Age Cthulhu anthology with my 1920s Lovecraftian novelette set in Assam India, “Dreams of a Thousand Young.”
Book Release: New Valdemar antholog, No True Way, with my dark YA story, “Written in the Wind.”
Heads down on my novel, NEVER LET ME LEAVE. Have some links and podcasts and reviews and books!
Article: Writing Tips by Amanda Pillar. These are worth a read.
Article: Suvudu editor Matt Staggs asked for an article on anthologies. I decided to write about the little-discussed art of putting a Table of Contents together.
Interview: I was interviewed by Kindra Sowder for Horror Geeks magazine: Gamer Nerd and Wordslinger. Horror Geeks magazine is really neat. I like it.
Podcast Interview: Adventures in Sci-Fi Publishing. Talking about Shattered Shields with Bryan Thomas Schmidt. The topics ranged from marketing to diversity to RPG books.
Podcast Review: Game on Girl by Regina and Rhonda reviews Chicks Dig Gaming. My Google alerts gave me this one. It’s really a fun look at the anthology. Especially when they refused to name author names but I recognized who and what they were talking about.
Review: Attack of the Books Reviews Shattered Shields. The reviewer, Daniel Burton, really enjoyed the anthology.
Review: Paul Weimer of SF Signal reviews Chicks Dig Gaming. 4 out of 5 stars. He enjoyed the book and asked some of the questions I asked.
Pre-order: JAZZ AGE CTHULHU with my novelette, “Dreams of a Thousand Young.” Visit Assam, India, where a British dilettante wakes up one morning covered in bruises and welts, with a dead man in her bed and no memory of what happened in the last 24 hours. Her only clue is a trashed invitation to the exclusive Black Ram Club.
Publication: Short run boxed set: Under an Enchanted Skyline. Apocalypse Ink Productions has joined Martain Cantina’s boxed Urban Fantasy set. 8 novels and novellas. $0.99. From now until December 30th. Includes my mosaic novel Caller Unknown and fellow AIP author Peter M. Ball’s Exile.
(7 of these did happen. 3 did not.)
I may or may not have fangirled at Steve Perry over his Matadora series.
I may or may not have managed to write 3000 words on my WIP.
I may or may not have had a panic attack at my Shattered Shields party.
I may or may not have fought with Timothy W. Long over a hanger.
I may or may not owe the success of the Shattered Shields party to the Husband and Katie Cord of Evil Girlfriend Media.
I may or may not have gone to the wrong Powell’s store for Authorfest SF.
I may or may not have lost a bet while at the convention.
I may or may not have threatened Bryan Thomas Schmidt’s life.
I may or may not have agreed to yet another project while at the convention.
I may or may not have made faces at Diana Pharaoh Francis while on a panel with her.
Also, happy book release day to me! CHICKS DIG GAMING is now on the shelves.
My life is boring from the outside. All I can talk about is what I’ve edited or written. I’m in a groove of work and not much more right now. A number of projects are falling in my lap all at once.
I just finished the final edits of my Shadowrun novella, Doc Wagon 19. It’s been officially accepted and all that. I also just turned in Never Let Me Sleep (Permuted Press), the first book of the Melissa Allen series, my YA SF-thriller where I kill a whole state in the first chapter. Today, I’m working on the page proofs of Shattered Shields and I know page proofs for Chicks Dig Gaming are on their way.
Now, I’m shifting to writing-writing-writing. I’m working on Chimera incarnate (Apocalypse Ink Productions), the final book in the Karen Wilson Chronicles. Then I will be all about Never Let Me Leave, which is Melissa Allen #2. I also have 3 short stories due by the end of the year. So, my days will be marked by word counts, revisions, and page proofs. It’s boring from the outside but awesome for me. I’m busy but I’m happy.
Still to be released in 2014
I have a novelette in this first one, Jazz Age Cthulhu, called “Dreams of a Thousand Young.” Pre-orders will start in September and it will be released in October.
I have a new short story in this one, No True Way: All-New Tales of Valdemar, called “Written in the Wind.” This is my second Valdemar story. Pre-orders are available now and it will be released in December.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Chicks Dig Gaming:
A Celebration of All Things Gaming by the Women Who Love It
essay collection slated for November 11th release
Mad Norwegian Press is proud to announce the forthcoming publication of Chicks Dig Gaming — an essay collection and sister publication to the Hugo Award-winning Chicks Dig Time Lords, the Hugo-nominated Chicks Dig Comics, and more.
The book is edited by Jennifer Brozek (Apocalypse Ink Productions), Robert Smith? (Who’s 50: The 50 Doctor Who Stories to Watch Before You Die) and Lars Pearson (editor-in-chief, the Chicks Dig series), and features essays by nearly three dozen female writers.
Contributors include Catherynne M. Valente (The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland…, Indistinguishable from Magic), Seanan McGuire (the October Daye series); G. Willow Wilson (Alif the Unseen), Rosemary Jones (Forgotten Realms), Emily Care Boss (Gaming as Women), Mary Anne Mohanraj (Bodies in Motion), Jody Lynn Nye (the MythAdventures series), E. Lily Yu (“The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees”) and more.
Also included: exclusive interviews with Paizo CEO Lisa Stevens and Dragonlance author Margaret Weis.
Chicks Dig Gaming will be published on November 11, 2014, and retail (print version) for $14.95. The book will also be available as an ebook on Kindle, Nook and iBooks on the day of release.
To request a review copy of Chicks Dig Gaming, or to schedule an interview with one of the editors or contributors, please email: MadNorwegian@gmail.com
A web-quality version of the Chicks Dig Gaming cover is attached; please email: MadNorwegian@gmail.com if you require a print-quality version.
I’m super proud of this collection. I had an idea of what I wanted to do with it. Lars and Mad Norwegian Press took it in ways I didn’t expect. This is a fabulous set of essays. Really. I don’t think I could be more proud than I am right now about this book.
Just a quick reminder, my latest anthology from Evil Girlfriend Media, BLESS YOUR MECHANICAL HEART, is out in the wild now and is getting awesome reviews. Cover art by Larry Dixon. There are some really awesome stories in this one.
I just love this cover.
Book release day is always fun. KEYSTONES, Karen Wilson Chronicles #3, is out. Buy it at Apocalypse Ink, Amazon, or Barnes and Noble.
“The Keystone. It must be destroyed.”
Defeated.
By the Children of Anu.
But the Children aren’t done with Karen or the city of Kendrick yet. The supernatural societies of Kendrick are being attacked, one by one. As each falls, the Avatar of Anu grows stronger, and Karen is left to defend the city with fewer and fewer allies… while also being hindered by a new leader of Kendrick’s Special Unit Police Force.
Karen knows that she and her allies must stop the Children before everything important is destroyed. Only by working together, and sacrificing what some hold most dear, will they prevail. It’s time for the denizens of Kendrick to determine what they’re willing to give up in order to stop the evil running rampant.
Some will sacrifice everything they have—and everything they are—to protect the ones they love.
REVIEW: My anthology, Coins of Chaos, was reviewed by The Nameless Zine. They liked it.
INTERVIEW: Sarna.net interviewed me about The Nellus Academy Incident.
ARTICLE: FlickFilosopher wrote an article about the TARDIS Little Free Library I have in front of my house.
COVER REVEAL #1: The Future Embodied anthology has revealed its final cover by the amazing Galen Dara. This has my story, “The Bathory Clinic Deal,” in it.
COVER REVEAL #2: Evil Girlfriend Media reveals the cover for my anthology, Bless Your Mechanical Heart. The cover art is by the wonderful Larry Dixon!
COVER REVEAL #3: Baen Books has revealed the cover of my anthology, Shattered Shields, co-edited with Bryan Thomas Schmidt, by the talented Todd Lockwood.
I absolutely win the cover art game this week. I am happy dancing all over the place.
Jennifer Brozek is a multi-talented, award-winning author, editor, and media tie-in writer. She is the author of Never Let Me Sleep and The Last Days of Salton Academy, both of which were nominated for the Bram Stoker Award. Her YA tie-in novels, BattleTech: The Nellus Academy Incident and Shadowrun: Auditions, have both won Scribe Awards. Her editing work has earned her nominations for the British Fantasy Award, the Bram Stoker Award, and multiple Hugo Awards. She won the Australian Shadows Award for the Grants Pass anthology, co-edited with Amanda Pillar. Jennifer’s short form work has appeared in Apex Publications, Uncanny Magazine, Daily Science Fiction, and in anthologies set in the worlds of Valdemar, Shadowrun, V-Wars, Masters of Orion, Well World, and Predator.
Jennifer has been a full-time freelance author and editor for over seventeen years, and she has never been happier. She keeps a tight schedule on her writing and editing projects and somehow manages to find time to teach writing classes and volunteer for several professional writing organizations such as SFWA, HWA, and IAMTW. She shares her husband, Jeff, with several cats and often uses him as a sounding board for her story ideas. Visit Jennifer’s worlds at jenniferbrozek.com or her social media accounts on LinkTree.
