I think 2023 is going to be a bit different for me work-wise. Right now, I have one small project under contract and that is it. As a freelance author and editor I should be terrified, but I’m not. Probably because I know there are a number of projects coming down the line, and even though you can’t trust a damn thing in the publishing industry until it is under contract (and even then it can be suspect), I’m confident at least one of these (rather large) projects is going to land.

The problem will come if more than one of them lands too close to another.

Fortunately, all of the projects in the air are awesome and I’m really looking forward to working on each of them. It’s part of my new professional strategy: Do not accept a contract that you are not in love with. If it doesn’t tick 90+% of the boxes, let it go and give someone else a chance to pick up the ball and run with it.

All this is to say that I won’t be listing out all my projects and their timelines because I can’t. This is rather like the year of the Iceberg Duck. Iceberg: because most of its bulk is unseen. Duck: because it seems smooth and graceful on the water as it sails by, but it is paddling like mad underneath.

What do I know? Not that much. Most of it speculative

• I have a novella and two anthologies to be released in 2023 along with numerous short stories.
• I have one or more anthology projects planned.
• I have a couple of Shadowrun projects to work on.
• There is a multibook novel contract in the works.
• I will be teaching classes for the Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers in February and March. There will be more during the year, but that is what is currently scheduled.
• I have three major projects floating around my radar, but until they land, they are just blips on a screen.

At times like these, I turn to what I do know: I need to finish paying work first. I have two original projects that have been eating my brain for over a year. I also know my best bet is to work on the things I can control and the rest will sort itself out in its own time. Thus, I will begin by working on the bits of Shadowrun that I can and then I’ll dive into Dear Penpal—a fictional YA epistolatory project inspired by my time in Belgium living in a 300+ year old manor house in 1980. Those will keep me happily occupied for a few months. Then we will see what we see.