A Clean Slate: Welcome to 2024

Hello Funny People,

Happy New Year! ¡Feliz Año Nuevo! Welcome to 2024. I hope the first month of your new year has been good. For me, it's been a bit of a mixed blessing. Let me explain.

A Quick Update from the Holidays

For the most part, the holidays were...okay. 

I don't know what it says about me, but the holidays have only become more of a time of dread rather than joy. I'm a creature of habit. I like my routines. Maybe that makes me more likely to get mugged or attacked because of my predictably, but I like a predictable life. For me, predictable equals stability, something I know many in the world would kill to have in their lives. I'm also just not a big fan of all the seemingly forced seasonal cheer. For me, the holidays are an annual reminder that another year has come and gone—and what do you have to show for it?

I am glad, however, that I finished the first draft of the Space Opera before the holidays kicked into high gear. Had I not, I would've been grinding my teeth and panicking about not having the time (or calm headspace) to finish it. Even though it was a mere ten days before the big swing into the holidays, I would've been 10 days of misery for me and my creativity. 

More Recent Thoughts 

With that being said, the days following the completion of that monumental task (finishing any novel is always a trial), left me time to think. Sometimes that can be for good, but other times, not so much. 

In this case, it hasn't been good.

I find myself mid-month experiencing some very bad imposter syndrome. You'd think after finishing not one, but two novels, in a single year, selling five more short stories, and joining SFWA (I reupped my membership a week ago), that I'd be past this. But no. The last ten days of 2023 were riddled with doubt, with questioning, with feeling like I'm still not good enough, despite evidence that—if nothing else—I am at least "good enough." If i weren't, nobody, not even the most under the radar semi-pro zine, would pay for my stuff. And I've had that happen nine times now.

I said this in my "2023 in Review" post that success is the most addictive drug in the world. And I'm starting to feel as though that now, with things building, I'm never going to have any more of what I've had, professionally. 

More so, now that I'm trying to redouble my efforts to find an agent for my three books (hoping one of them will be the breakthrough), things are only going to get harder. I'm at the foot of another mountain, and I'm worried I won't be able to reach its summit.

I suspect I'll be feeling this way for a good while. Likely, I won't emerge from this valley until something else good happens, and who knows when that'll be?

All That Said...

I've been submitting my few remaining stories and setting up stories to submit when the windows open since New Year's day, averaging about one a day. I've also had few bummers (but I'll save talking about those for the upcoming In Review post), but my ingrained doggedness seems to be intact.

I'm also entrenched in the writing of another novel. This is to be the last potential "entry point novel" I'd planned to write for the world of Tegucia, and it's definitely the oddest of the three. As of the writing of this post, I'm four chapter in, and I'm already itching to get back to it during the next writing session. As to how long it will take to write, I'm not sure. Once I get it done though, I'll begin the drafting process for my next book, which I already have a file set up for on my computer.

Also, despite my anxieties, I still appear to have a few lingering short stories left in me to write. I took out one of them from the files to have a look at it, and I think it'll end up being a good one (if I finish it, of course).

On a final personal note, I hope all of you reading this who, like me, have recently been hit by the cold, are safe. These bitter winter days are always hard to bare, but if we all hang in there, warmer ones are due.

— IMC 🙃