Happy New Year!! As we ring in 2016, it’s time for the Wickeds to fess up to some writing goals for the new year!
Edith: My first goal is to thank all our lovely blog readers and commenters! We love having you pop in to share our world, our guests, and our celebrations, and hope you’ll keep coming around all year.
Now, for more mundane goals: Write Local Foods Mystery #5, Mulch Ado about Murder, 
due May 1. Finish polishing Country Store Mystery #3, When the Grits Hit the Fan, due March 1. Organize a big splash to release Delivering the Truth, Quaker Midwife Mystery #1, on April 8. Turn right around and celebrate the release of both Murder Most Fowl and Grilled for Murder on May 31. Write Quaker Midwife Mystery #3, and later do copyedits and proofs on #2, Breaking the Chain. Oh, and also write proposals, which will hopefully be accepted, for Local Foods numbers 6-8 and Country Store numbers 4-6. Fit in attending Malice Domestic, Bouchercon, and Crime Bake. And exercise. And a family vacation. And a summer garden. Yes, I’m already tired!
Liz: Echoing Edith in the thanking department! Also thanks to all our guest bloggers for jumping in and adding variety to our blog. We love you!
First up, I have to finish book 5 in the Pawsitively series, Custom-Baked Murder, by April 1. Then I’ll be deep in the editing process of Cat About Town book 1, as well as writing book 2. And of course, synopsis for book 6 in the Pawsitively series, and most of the writing on that. And I still have that other book I wanted to finish editing to start shopping around…
Going to work in a real vacation – a visit to Key West – in 2016, as well as the typical conferences. Plus the day job. Yikes.
Sherry: I want to write two really good books — book four (A Good Day to Buy) and book five (I Know What You Bid Last Summer) in the Sarah Winston Garage Sale series. I want to make each book better than the last. And I want to write two proposals for series that have been rolling around in my head.
Jessie: I will be revising the first book in my new Change of Fortune series and writing the next one. I also want to write one other book I have in mind. I need to develop a website for my new series and all the accompanying social media that supports it. And, of course, there will be blog posts here and at Killer Characters and Maine Crime Writers.
Julie: Writing/finishing Book #3 in the series (working title Chime and Punishment), and celebrating the release of Clock and Dagger in August. Like my friends, I will also spend some time noodling with some new ideas. I am also going to conferences–Sherry and I will be at Left Coast Crime, the Wickeds will be at Malice, Jessie, Sherry and I will be in LA this spring for a Sisters in Crime event, many of us will be at Bouchercon, and of course, there’s Crime Bake.
Barb: My year feels very front-end loaded. My Christmas novella Nogged Off is due to Kensington on January 15. Thankfully, it is mostly done. Just polishing left. Then, book 5 in the Maine Clambake series, Iced Under, is due April 15. On the personal side, my daughter Kate and fiance Luke will be married in The Wedding of the Century in Portland, Maine, in May. After that, I’ll be writing Maine Clambake #6, but honestly that feels very far away.
Readers? Happy New Year! From all of us to all of you, may your reading and writing year be a wonderful adventure in 2016. Now, tell us your goals, small and large, long-range and immediate!
May all your goals, dreams and wishes come true! Of course I will benefit from them, too!
Thank you! And to you, too.
Happy New Year to you all. May all your plans be executed effortlessly.
That’s unlikely, Gram – but we’ll shoot for successfully! Have a lovely year.
Happy New Year to all and thanks to the Wickeds for ongoing inspiration and celebration. Finishing/polishing Book 4 in the Witch City mystery series (Murder Go Round)-due at Kensington Feb. 15. Continuing work on Book 5, (Grave Errors) due in September and brain-storming Book 6. Just read a blog about turning a play into a novel so will work on my twice produced stage play “Two On, Two Out” with the aim of selling the novel, then turning it into a screen play. Why not? Started a stand alone romance novel while I was between contracts so will try to finish that. I’ll try to do Crime Bake too. Mostly because I want to meet you all!
You’re busy! Please do come to Crime Bake.
I have a fairly aggressive writing schedule planned for 2016. In addition to revisions on Greek #3 and Knitting #2, I need to write Knitting #3. I want to finish two proposals for new stuff (one is mostly done) as well as have proposals ready to go when the time comes for the publishers to make decisions on my current series. I also want to indie publish a couple of things: a Greek novella in the first half of the year, and a romance set in my Bonaparte Bay world (done, but needs a fair amount of revision). And I have a general fiction story blocked out. It’s something totally different than anything I’ve ever tried and I’m looking forward to stretching myself as a writer, to see if I have the chops for it. Realistically I probably won’t get to that until midyear or beyond, but it’s on my radar. I’m also going to be working on getting my Master Knitter certification from Webs (largest yarn store in the country), but that will take a couple of years because of the way the required classes are scheduled. Generally, I want to up my game in several areas, especially the quality of my writing. I am really, really, REALLY looking forward to 2016. I foresee a wonderful year for the Wickeds, Accomplices, and all our lovely readers!
You’re making me tired, Susannah – and it isn’t even noon! Best of luck with all those projects.
A lot of these projects are in progress or will take a relatively short amount of time, so it’s all doable 🙂 You and Sheila are my productivity Goddesses, Edith!
We all sound like The Little Engine that Could, chugging along merrily (I think I can, I think I can…). What an amazing group!
I’m finishing County Cork #5, coming in 2017 (assuming I find a name for it), and the next Orchard Mystery (October 2016) , which I think is Seeds of Deception, is on my editor’s desk. There’s another Museum Mystery, Dead End Street, coming out in June, and I think the one after that will involve Betsy Ross. There will probably be at least one Relatively Dead book this year, especially since I realized the timeline in the series lands it right around Halloween.
And of course, there’s always Ireland, and that pie-in-the-sky cottage. Working on it…
Looking forward to all those books – and to the cottage!
I’ve got all I can do with staffing the local shelter and other real world duties; keeping up with email and Facebook about wipe out the free time (had to give up sleep time to read Delivering the Truth but it was worth it)
Sorry about the sleep time – but glad the read was worth it, Barbara!
Happy New Year! I’m exhausted from reading your goals this morning-I’d take a nap but I have to cook. Thanks for providing persistent, positive entertainment throughout the year. One of my goals is to treat myself to a conference this year.
Oh, good!
Thank you, Vida!
Thanks for being here with us, Vida!
Wow. I got tired just reading all this! I feel like such a slacker. Book 3 in the Brewing Trouble series is due May 1, so I’ll be working on that. Book 2–Tangled Up In Brew–comes out October 4th. That’s really all the concrete plans I have. I’d like to see my police secretary mystery sold, and I may try to finish my WWII short story. I’d also like to come up with an idea for a cozy set in the 1940s. I need to brainstorm that a bit. Oh, and I’ll see everyone at Malice!
Great!
You guys are making me tired just reading about this. It might be the jet lag and the long travel day home yesterday setting it, too.
But stop the presses! Sherry, Jessie, and Julie are going to be in LA this spring, and no one has told me yet? Details! Dates! I must get this on my calendar so I can meet you!!!!!
My goal? Read all the fabulous books the Wicked Cozy authors release this year. And keep reading and reviewing. I’m setting a goal of 100 books read this year. We shall see how I do with it.
And, while I still haven’t officially signed up for it, Malice is still very much on my mind this year as well. I really, really, really, really, really (you get the idea) want to go this year.
Wow 100 books! I hope you make it to Malice and that we can see you in Hollywood.
Reblogged this on Brand Fearless ~ Kim Fleck and commented:
Have a wicked good 2016!
Hugs and Happy New Year Health and happiness and kindness for all. Thanks for those “mundane” writing goals — sublime, really, and I blissfully await the creative outcomes. <3
I loved being a guest with you this fall – thank you for inviting me, Edith- and hope to meet up with some of you in person at Malice. Goals? Getting the next book – working title Brooklyn Wars -in on time. I have several months of really serious work ahead, determined to up my game on that tricky devil, the plotting. Not exactly sure how the action will get from here to there (I say that with every book) ….and after that? Why, begin the next one, of course. I am deeply impressed at how some of you write several series.
I did it! I signed up for Malice 2016- I am so looking forward to it! And. well, goals, sure I have a few but I signed up for Malice- isn’t that enough? I probably would not have signed up at all if I hadn’t been fan on a stick this past year! Thanks Wicked Cozies!
Can’t wait to meet you!
I cannot wait to meet all the Wicked Cozies who attend- I was totally going to put that in my comment above but I thought it would a little like “crazy book lady-ish”!