Monday, January 4, 2010

2009 in Review

It's hard to believe that it is 2010 already. So much happened in 2009, especially with my writing.

2009 was the first year that I really decided to become a writer. I had only written two original short stories ("The Case of the Tom Cat" and "Soul Survivor") before then. I had three started novels that I stopped writing after the first chapter or two. It didn't look like it would ever happen, but then I was bored at work. I work as a library assistant for a small library, and I found that I had a lot of free time, so I decided to give writing a novel a shot.

On January 15, 2009, I wrote the first chapter of The Phoenix Prophetess and sent it off to my sister and my writer friend Christine. With their encouragement, I continued to write the novel (mainly a chapter a week) and sent it off to them. On September 15, 2009, the first draft of The Phoenix Prophetess was completed, and nothing was the same ever again.

So, I wrote one novel, and then I got roped into doing NaNoWriMo 2009 by Christine and Aubrie. In one crazy month, I wrote my second novel Virtuoso. At the beginning of 2009, I never thought I would finish one novel, and then, I had two written.

In April 2009, my mystery short story "The Case of the Tom Cat" was accepted to be published as an e-book. This publisher has since disbanded, but the accomplishment made me want to write more.

Since May, I have written ten short stories: Once Upon a December Nightmare, Hell Has No Fury, Eclipse, Bella's Battle, Wishes, Hounded, Neptune's Treasure, Io Saturnalia, Defying Gravity, and Cat and Mouse. Of these ten short stories, four have found homes.

"Io Saturnalia" came out in December in Emerald Tales "Winter Solstice" issue.

"Once Upon a December Nightmare" has been contracted by e-book publisher, Wild Child Publishing.

"Hell Has No Fury" was contracted by WolfSinger Publications for their All About Eve anthology.

"Neptune's Treasure" was contracted by Wyvern Publications for their Mertales anthology.

Of all my short stories ever written, five out of twelve have been contracted or published. I think that is amazing for my first year writing original work.

Of the twelve short stories, three are in submission land: "Soul Survivor" with Abandoned Towers; "Cat and Mouse" with Emerald Tales "Carnivale" issue; and "Defying Gravity" with Pill Hill Press's Fire & Ice anthology.

There have been more rejections than acceptances, but that is all part of the publishing world. Most recently, "Wishes" was rejected by Pill Hill Press for their The Four Horsemen anthology. They said that the story wasn't right for the anthology, and they sent me a link for their open submissions, encouraging me to send my stories to them, which I'm planning to do and already have done (with "Defying Gravity"). The other rejection was "Eclipse" with Sorcerous Signals. No reason was given for the rejection.

Overall, I would say that 2009 was a success.

Two novels written, ten short stories written with a grand total of 221,656 original words.

By the way, I also read 42 books in 2009. It's down from previous years, but still a decent number of books.

3 comments:

Aubrie said...

That's twice the number of books that I read. Man, I need to get my butt in gear.

Cherie Reich said...

Hehe! The year before that, I read nearly 80 books. I try to get at least 50 per year. I think with the Kindle that I'll be reading more in general.

Faith said...

Hi there fellow Emerald Tales subbie! Just dropping by to say hello and good luck in 2010! I got my contributor's copy of the Winter Solstice issue yesterday ('The Sacrifice' was my contribution), and plan to snuggle down and read it today... looking forward to your story!