October - December 2018: Sledgendary

The fourth and final quarter of 2018 was a mixed bag. It included some brilliant profile-raising moments for myself. I delivered two talks on self-publishing and attended the writing festival Sledge-Lit. However, my writing flow was heavily derailed by a very busy period at work. Overall, I feel like I'm ending the year in a strong place to spring forward in 2019. New year, new moleskine, new start.

Highlight
Sledge-Lit! This is the Winter version of literary festival Edge-Lit which I attended back in July. Much like its Summer cousin, I spent the day meeting fellow writers and readers, hearing from accomplished authors, and ending the day making friends over beers. 

Lowlight
Crashing out of NaNoWriMo, despite having a strong idea, due to an intense few months at the office. I should have followed my own advice on how to win NaNoWriMo.

I have read...

• Blood of Assassins by RJ Barker
• The Girl with all the Gifts by M R Carey

I have blogged...

• Book To The Future 2018 - My Photo Album
• My Top 5 Tips for Sledge-Lit 2018
• My Top 5 Tips for Winning NaNoWriMo 
• 18 Things I Learnt at Sledge-Lit 2018

I have written...

• A poem called The Wee Wise Weevil, which has a Julia Donaldson vibe.
• A short story called The Nuthatch, best described as a fantasy horror.
• 14,859 words towards a novella called The Maria Compass, a contemporary re-telling of A Christmas Carol. This was my NaNoWriMo project. I hope to finish this in January.

Biggest excuses for not writing...

• Very busy at work!

I have submitted...

• An entry for the Birmingham Writers' Group annual winter competition. The theme was Frozen Wastes and I wrote a short story called The Nuthatch. I didn't win but the story will feature in my third short story collection.

Out and about

• I spoke about self-publishing at Book To The Future, the University of Birmingham's literary festival.
• I spoke about self-publishing to the first-year Creative Writing students at the University of Birmingham.
• I attended Sledge-Lit 2018. It was awesome.

Dates to remember

• 1 October - National Coffee Day
• 4 October - National Poetry Day
• 6 October - National Bookshop Day
• 26 October - Four-year anniversary of Breadcrumbs.
• 29 October - Three-year anniversary of The Curse of Besti Bori.
• ​25 November - Four-year anniversary of Circ.

AOB

• I had a brilliant Christmas with lots of writing presents: a new Moleskine, the Emotion Thesaurus, and a set of storytelling dice!
• I was blown away by Black Mirror episode Bandersnatch. Now I want to write a Choose Your Own Adventure novel.
• Bring on 2019. I will try very hard to finish The Maria Compass, my next short story collection, and Nephos 3.

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