Here’s the numbers. We all love numbers so much.
Thoughts about the numbers:
I don’t really have a lot to say about the metrics for this year. I’m fine with them. They’re respectable for a full time publishing professional. With the Shadowrun magazine coming out next year and being an editor-at-large for CGL, my editing numbers will not be going down. That does cut into the writing schedule. But I’ve got my plans for next year—which I will talk about in the next blog. In the meantime, enjoy some pictures of my cats.
I hope you have had a very good holiday season!
I have finished the rough draft of the current novel-in-progress. It’s not done by any means, but now I have the whole of the story in my head and I can see so many places that need fixing. However, I haven’t started fixing the novel yet. I’m in that in-between phase that few authors ever speak of.
It’s the “Flailing About” Phase.
My experience is that I have just spent the last 4-6 weeks on “deadline mode.” This mode includes things like “no internet before word count” and “2000 words a day” and “hard core focus on the novel” and nothing else. Lots of creative people know what that’s like.
But, just like post-con blues are a thing, so is the post-novel flap. You’ve known what you were to do everyday for a month without exception. You’ve gotten into the groove. But now the groove is gone. It’s almost like discovering you have hands and discovering your pants have no pockets. What the heck to you do with your hands now?
If you are a regular writer, I recommend a quick once-over, adding all the things you know you need to add RIGHT NOW. Then putting the manuscript away for three months while you write something (anything) else. But, as I am a media tie-in writer, too, I don’t have time for that. I need to turn in the polished manuscript within 3 weeks. That’s my deadline.
But I don’t wanna. I don’t wanna work on the novel. I don’t wanna do the work I know I need to do. What do I want to do? I don’t know and I don’t wanna figure it out. See: flailing about.
Usually I have a bunch of interviews lined up to work on. Which I did this time, too. But they are done. And I polish-edited a short story and turned it in already. I have 3 more short stories to write but I’m not anywhere near doing them. I haven’t even outlined them on paper. Maybe I have in my head, but I don’t want to face the tyranny of the blank page. It is so much easier to fix what’s on the page than to create it wholesale.
Which leads me back to…start the next pass on the novel…and I don’t wanna.
Thus, I’m writing a blog post about the situation. I’m sure other authors have written about this phase of the novel writing process, but I figured it couldn’t hurt if other authors (and readers) understood a little more of what some authors (at least me) sometimes go through. The process of writing and editing novels is always changing, but I think the general phases of the process remain the same.
See? That’s about 500 words of verbal flailing and “productive procrastination” to help me avoid the edits I will begin next. Or tomorrow. It all depends on whether or not I figure out something else to do to avoid what I don’t want to do now.
But still, by tomorrow, I will roll up my sleeves and dive into fixing the novel because this is the “post” part of my mantra of “fix it in post.”
Have a cat picture. Here’s Mena in her tower.
Being in my fifties now, I thought it would be a good thing to think about some thoughts I’ve learned that I’ve incorporated into my life—or try to. I’m not perfect. I’ve broken these 50 things in to five groups: Emotions, Habits, Love, Career, and Perspective. I will post one section a week for five weeks. This week’s section is: Perspective.
The thing about perspective is that its wisdom only comes in retrospect. It is experience from the past that allows you to manage the present and mitigate future problems before they can become problems. It is this ability to compare and contrast situations while extrapolating the possible outcomes before they happen. At the same time, it is an ability to think and act instead of merely reacting.
Perspective is when a younger person goes to an older person for advice and there is a look of recognition in that older person’s eyes, but their words are tempered with the knowledge that how it happened to them, the details of how it could happen for another are different. The devil is in the details, but human nature has its commonalities.
These bits of perspective are based on my experiences, but I think they hold wisdom for those who recognize the situations.
Being in my fifties now, I thought it would be a good thing to think about some thoughts I’ve learned that I’ve incorporated into my life—or try to. I’m not perfect. I’ve broken these 50 things in to five groups: Emotions, Habits, Love, Career, and Perspective. I will post one section a week for five weeks. This week’s section is: Career.
A “career” is officially defined as “an occupation undertaken for a significant period of a person’s life and with opportunities for progress.” This used to mean you picked a job and a company and you did the same thing for the same company, progressing up a defined ladder of success for the rest of your life. It does not mean this anymore. A career is what you make of it. A career now means (to me) a general topic of industry you work in for yourself and others that changes over time.
I, myself, am in the third part of my third career. The first was everything I did before and during college to support myself (retail, server, TA, computer center tech). The second was as a Software QA engineer (Game tester, black box tester, Test lead, QA Manager). The third is as a publishing industry professional. First as solely an author, then author and editor, then author, editor, and publisher. The rest (twitch streaming, podcasting, blogging, etc…) are incidentals in my publishing career. They are not the mainstay. Nor do they pay the bills. But they enhance my publishing career and give me other opportunities.
These lessons are just ten of the many lessons I have learned over time. I think the more I learn about my chosen career, the more I understand what I don’t actually know about it. That realization, in and of itself, is priceless.
Being in my fifties now, I thought it would be a good thing to think about some thoughts I’ve learned that I’ve incorporated into my life—or try to. I’m not perfect. I’ve broken these 50 things in to five groups: Emotions, Habits, Love, Career, and Perspective. I will post one section a week for five weeks. This week’s section is: Love.
Love, in all its myriad forms, is complex, messy, beautiful, life-giving, soul-rending, and a thousand-thousand other adjectives, metaphors, and thoughts. I think, in essence, love is what makes us human. Family love, platonic love, ardent love, self-love (can’t forget that last one even though so many of us do for so much of our lives). I think love is one of the most important things we can recognize. Here are some of the things I’ve learned.
Being in my fifties now, I thought it would be a good thing to think about some thoughts I’ve learned that I’ve incorporated into my life—or try to. I’m not perfect. I’ve broken these 50 things in to five groups: Emotions, Habits, Love, Career, and Perspective. I will post one section a week for five weeks. This week’s section is: Habits.
Habits. These are the buttons that we (and other people) program into ourselves so we do things without thinking too hard about it. It’s a little like driving on autopilot. Get up and brush your teeth. Make coffee before going to work. Brush your hair before you go out the door. Wash clothing on Wednesday. The list of mundanity goes on. They keep life moving. These are all habits.
Most of these habits start out as accidental or something that our parents drilled into us as children. As adults, after we have learned just how useful healthy habits are, we need to force them into being. It’s not as easy as when we were children. As adults, when we want to establish a new habit, we need to work at it, plan it, and take deliberate action to plant the seeds. It takes time and mental energy to create these new patterns. Here are some of my most important habits.
Next up: Love.
Being in my fifties now, I thought it would be a good thing to think about some thoughts I’ve learned that I’ve incorporated into my life—or try to. I’m not perfect. I’ve broken these 50 things in to five groups: Emotions, Habits, Love, Career, and Perspective. I will post one section a week for five weeks. This week’s section is: Emotions.
Emotions. These things are intrinsic to all of us but are sometimes unfathomable. Many times we react rather than hold and contemplate then act. That’s because some of these emotions were programmed into us through interactions with others. Other emotions have been hard earned through experience.
Next up: Habits.
Each year, I wrap up what I’ve done and how I feel about the year. I have the urge to give caveats and excuses for the “lack of work” I did in 2023. I’m not going to do that. I deliberately took the first half of 2023 off and I don’t regret it. Still, when you are a full-time freelancer in the publishing industry, you often feel like you live and die by the cold hard numbers. I’ve been doing this for 17 years now and I think I’ve almost learned that my self-worth is not wrapped up in these yearly report cards.
2023 Numbers
This is a respectable amount of work no matter what my inner critic says. I don’t mind it as long as I remember that I didn’t start writing in earnest until July 2023. Also, a number of projects that were supposed to be released this year didn’t happen. So, there’s that. There are the numbers. Do with them what you will.
Looking Forward to 2024
Of course, taking it easy in the beginning of 2023 means that I’m already deep into the weeds of things for 2024. I’m working on a new Shadowrun novel that is the end of my YA Shadowrun series. It has a tight deadline. I have four contracted short stories due in the first half of the year that I need to write in and around the novel. I also have two anthologies in the works for publication in 2024. Both are in the end stages. So, yes, there’s already a lot going on.
Then there is “Dear Penpal, Belgium 1980.” This is a unique, middle grade-appropriate ghost story told through 24 physical letters, and is a passion project I conceived over five years ago. I finally got the ball rolling this year. The kickstarter for it is at the end of March 2024. Once it funds (dear universe, please), I’ll have 15 months of physical and digital rewards to send out. The Husband will be helping me, but it is still a lot of work. I am so excited about it. Won’t you be my penpal?
On the freelancing side of things, I’ll be taking on more editing for Catalyst Game Labs while writing for them. Shepherding the anthologies through their end stages. Writing contracted and other short stories. At this time, I have four in-person conventions planned: Norwescon, Origins Game Fair, Gen Con*, and Can-Con. I’m the Editor GoH of Can-Con. I’ll be a dealer at Norwescon and Origins as well as doing panels. (Gen Con isn’t confirmed but is hoped for.)
In general, after I get this first novel done, I plan on 2024 being a new, steady, busy (but not too busy) year for me. I’m hoping 2024 is the year I figure out how to keep work and life actually balanced and not the pretend stuff I’ve done for the last few years. I know there are some big changes coming up in my life and I’m looking forward to experiencing them.
I hope you have had a lovely holiday season and I wish you a bright new year. May you realize as many of your hopes and dreams as it is feasible within the laws of physics. (Me? I will never stop wishing for my own TARDIS.)
Once upon a time, almost three years ago to the day, I got the urge to write a near future SF mystery story set in a subaquatic city involving robotic pets. I had been inspired by a mini-documentary about the AIBO robotic dogs in Japan. It only took me a couple of weeks to write the novella. I knew it was good, but it wasn’t great. I needed another set of eyes on it.
Then, the awesome Marie Bilodeau offered to edit it. She did so in short order and had some insightful things to say about it. While she did love it, there were some definite, specific issues—some of which she outlined in her email to me. The rest she left as comments in the manuscript. I knew she was right about it all, but by that time, the shine had worn off the project, it was just a personal story I had written with no market in mind, and I had other contracted novels to write.
Thus, it languished in my email for three years.
It’s no secret that I’ve been taking the first quarter of this year easy. I’ve pushed myself hard for the last five years (five novels and six novellas and everything else), thus when this year’s contracts got delayed, I decided to relax a little. Until I remembered I had several personal projects I wanted to work on. Which I did…sorta. None of them had due dates or markets in mind. Still, I wanted to work on them while I waited.
Thus, I did—on one of them: Dear Penpal. But mostly I tinkered at it. What should have taken merely a month to write is only 1/3 written in the last four months. As a full-time writer, this won’t do. If I don’t have contracts or deadlines, I still need to write. I have an agent and cats to feed.
Coming to this conclusion, two things in the universe conspired to help me. First, another publishing professional like me (author/editor/RPG writer/media tie-in writer) asked for an accountability buddy on a discord we’re both on. As someone who never wants to be the smartest person in the room, I knew her by her considerable reputation and jumped at the chance.
(As an aside, I’ve discovered the perfect accountability buddy for me is someone I know in a professional capacity, am friendly with on acquaintance terms, and respect, but not someone I hang out with on a regular basis. We chat during our meetings, but it is all work related chat. There’s something about wanting to impress this familiar stranger that really pushes my “get it done” button. But I digress…)
The other thing that happened is that Uncanny Magazine opened up for novellas from May 1-15. At the time I read that, I had about two-to-four weeks to whip my languishing novella into shape and submit it. Suddenly, I had a deadline. Not only that, I had a professional author I was now meeting with weekly to talk about what I did that previous week—did I meet my goals? Why or why not and what’s next?
Long story short—I revised, edited, and polished that SF novella in just under three weeks and submitted it to Uncanny Magazine. Whether or not they accept it (and I hope they do), I’m pleased to have finally finished it. It’s a wonderful story. Thanks to Marie’s astute observations from three years ago, I think the novella turned out pretty good.
Now, I have Dear Penpal to work on while I wait for the various (editing and writing) projects that are on my radar but haven’t landed yet. After all, I have an accountability buddy to answer to and time to do it. No excuses left.
Recently, I’ve been watching Quincy’s Tavern on Instagram. I find his bartender shorts amusing, soothing, and appropriately geeky. However, I did come across one of them that made me think. It’s called Blanket or Sword? It is a quicker, more fun way of asking: do you want comfort or a solution?
This is something I’ve come to lean on a lot recently. The world is tough right now. Friends are ill or their personhood is under attack. There is a lot to be sad or worried or angry about. The trick is not to get caught up in a doom spiral—either as the person speaking or the person listening.
When someone complains about (or explains) a problem, you have choices on how to respond. As I think most of us have realized that we aren’t telepathic, text is an imperfect medium, and sometimes you don’t actually know what the speaker is asking for, it is better to be direct and ask. Sometimes the person is venting and needs a listener. Sometimes the person is aggressively asking for help while venting. Sometimes…and this is the tricky point…the person is complaining just to hear themselves talk, and they have an answer on why every single suggestion you make just won’t work.
It is this third person who saps the life and empathy out of every sympathetic / well-meaning person. There is such a thing as empathy fatigue. It’s a sad place to be in. It’s the kind of place that allows you to listen to a loved one’s tale of woe and not respond or to respond badly. (Which, in my case, comes with a side helping of guilt later when I think about the interaction.)
I really think that more people need to be willing and able to ask “Blanket or the Sword?” or “Are you venting or asking for help?” I also think we, who need the blanket or the sword, must strive to be aware of our need at the time because there is nothing more frustrating than someone who either won’t listen or will turn away every single suggestion with an “it will never work” attitude.
We all need a little help sometimes. Leeloo once trapped herself in my suitcase.
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 the Hugo Award. 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.