There has been a lot going on in my own life lately. I know many of you care about such things, so in lieu of writing tips today, I wanted to fill you in on some things.
On work. After a few months without steady work, I've secured a long-term contract as a narrative editor for an upcoming action RPG. It's really fun work, combining my experience in writing, editing, and branching dialogue. I also get to work with some pretty great people (and a stable paycheck is no joke).
I'm also still taking on private clients. When I restarted my editing services, it was with the intent of keeping them going indefinitely. Rebooting freelance work is hard, and ultimately, I'd like nothing more than to serve private clients full time if I can. So, if you need editing for your novel in any form, let me know!
On writing. This topic's harder. A couple of months ago, I lost my agent. It was nothing bad between us—Tricia Lawrence is a fantastic agent!—but the agency was restructuring, and she and I hadn't sold anything in a long while. I don't fault her decision one bit.
It's also been a while since I've been able to focus on my own writing. I've been doing more for the kids this past year as well as going through therapy for myself, both of which resulted in less mental, emotional, and temporal resources to create worlds. I'm still hopeful that I will be able to return to it soon (see "On life," below), but yeah, it's been hard.
I do still have one novel sitting with a publisher. It has gone through a rewrite and a couple of rounds of revisions. I'm hopeful something will happen with that soon, but without a contract, there are no guarantees yet. We'll see.
On life. There have been a lot of changes in my household in the last several months, and a few more coming. Many of you know that my real job is being the dad of many, many kids. And this past year, I have been the stay-at-home parent in addition to work, which (as stated) has contributed to a reduced ability to write for myself. (Current events aren't helping either.)
And even more changes are coming. Chief among them is that my first-born biological son has moved to the States, and several others (we have five boys within a year of each other) may be moving out soon as well. This is hard emotionally and comes with a lot of unknowns. Empty nest syndrome is real, folks (and yes, I recognize how weird it is to talk about an "empty nest" when three to six of them are still at home).
But who knows? Maybe once I've worked through the emotions of it all and solidified a new schedule, I'll be able to write some more. I certainly hope to. I have a lot of hopes for my near future, but right now, I feel like I'm in a liminal state, waiting for the end of the transition.
Until then, I'm gonna keep doing what I'm doing, working on my editing, spending time with kids who haven't left, and working on myself.
So, that's me...
