2017 in Review

This past year was an incredible roller coaster, and it closes out my second year as a full-time author. I've had some high-highs, and some low-lows, but for the most part, I'm very pleased with how my professional year turned out.

I'm especially proud of my word count accomplishment. I ended 2016 having written 540,000 words. That was a heck of a lot of words, but I wanted to beat that in 2017. And I beat it. I beat that word count in July, thanks to certain books like Their Life As They Live It, Saved, and Seen bleeding from my fingertips very quickly. And then I surpassed that goal by leaps and bounds, and I'm crazy stoked to say I hit a HUGE milestone. 

On December 26th I passed the one million word mark!!!! And as of yesterday, I ended 2017 having written 1,013,164 words.

*throws confetti*

Apparently the Excel sheet I use to keep my monthly count only counts to 999,999. LOL!

I also published ten new novels this year, some with publishers and others self-published: As I Am, Hot Licks, Here For Us, Sound of Us, Their Life As They Live It, Uniquely Us, Saved, Seen, Heard, and Wild Trail. These books ended two existing series (All Saints and Off Beat), continued another (Perspectives), and also began three new series (Us, Breaking Free and Clean Slate Ranch).

I really threw myself into the deep end of the Kindle Unlimited pool this summer, thanks to Samhain Publishing closing their doors (again) for the final time. As soon as I got my rights back to the first three Perspectives books, they went right back up on Amazon, because I was preparing my second ever self-published book under this pen name, Here For Us, which was a spin-off of Perspectives. I was also excited to re-cover and re-release my five-book Cost of Repairs series. Some of them got new content, as well, and I really enjoyed being able to give Weight of Silence a brand-new epilogue that really lets readers see Gavin and Jace down the road.

This was also the year I not only discovered non-shifter Omegaverse existed (thank you, Leta Blake!), but I also dove in head-first! Writing the Breaking Free series was, for me, extremely therapeutic, and a reaction to all of the horrible things going on in the US government right now. It was my way of working through the loss of civil rights and freedoms, and the way progress is steadily being ripped to pieces. I truly love my little Omegaverse universe, and I'm so thankful my loyal readers followed me on that unexpected journey.

So what's next?

I don't know if I'll make another million words in 2018, but I'm going to try for at least 600,000. We'll see. But you guys will see some of last year's million in the next coming months.

Stronger (Breaking Free #3.5) and Found (Breaking Free #4) will be coming out in January/February-ish. Stronger is how Serge and Dex met and fell in love, and is a novella. Found is a full-length novel featuring Senior Constable Isa Higgs and his unexpected second omega mate. 

I'm also (finally!) re-releasing my paranormal novellas Prodigal and Frozen, along with a new installment, Chosen. These will release in February/March, depending on the Breaking Free books. Why can I finally guarantee it? Because they have wonderful new covers waiting to be used!

There are also two more Clean Slate Ranch novels done and in varying stages of edits. Roped In is Colt and Avery's second-chance romance, and it's also seriously kinky. It's always the quiet professors who like to tie guys up and flog them. *wink* *wink* It releases May 21 from Carina Press. Book three, Saddle Up, is Miles and Reyes's book, and if Roped In is kinky af, then this one is syrupy sweet and slow burn. I'm definitely mixing things up in this series! I don't have a release date yet, but I'm sure it will be Fall 2018.

Those are all the finished books.

Works-in-Progress:

I plan to continue multiple series, including Perspectives (which I'm working on right now), Cost of Repairs, Us, Breaking Free, and Discovering Me. I know I've been promising a new Cole/Jeremy book for ages, and I have a chapter but that's all. I'm hoping a story shakes loose soon. I'll also do various freebie shorts for my newsletter readers and my Facebook reader group, featuring favorite couples as the mood strikes. If you aren't a newsletter reader, there's a simple sign-up link in the blog's sidebar.

And later in the year, I hope, hope, HOPE to make it to GRL this year. It's going to be in Virginia, about 3 hours drive from me, so no airplanes! Keep your fingers crossed, because I'd love to be able to spend time with all of the lovely folks I've befriended on social media these last few years.

I want to send a special shout out to Lyn Taylor and Sloan Johnson for their amazing cover art work this year. You ladies are amazing at what you do, and I hope to keep working with you in the future. Also to my fellow members of the Queer Romance Freebie Fan Club--you guys have helped keep me sane this past year. Huge thanks to my editors and beta readers for making my work better in every way.

And to all the readers who've made it this far in this lengthy post, THANK YOU. I cannot do this without you and your continued support. Every interaction, every meme, and every word of encouragement fuels my words and keeps me writing. Continue to be your awesome selves!