October Monthly Wrap-Up

Today is the last day of October, which means that… NaNoWriMo starts at midnight!  Eeek!  I said that last month too, but we’re so close now.  NaNo has been on my thoughts for quite a while already, but that’s not all that’s been going on.  Here’s what happened in October:

Books Read:

I finished twelve books this month.  Two were audiobooks.

• City of Lost Souls – Cassandra Clare
• Fangirl – Rainbow Rowell
• Muse of Nightmares – Laini Tailor
• Evenfall – Gaja J. Kos & Boris Kos
• The Wren Hunt – Mary Watson
• City of Heavenly Fire – Cassandra Clare
• Into the Hollow – Lynn Vroman
• Slasher Girls & Monster Boys – Various
• Blitzball – Barton Ludwig
• Fawkes – Nadine Brandes
• Frost Blood – Elly Blake
• Jack Jetstark’s Intergalactic Freakshow – Jennifer Lee Rossman

So about ten books per month plus audiobooks (Frost Blood and Fangirl were both audiobooks) is about what I can normally average.  I expect fewer books read next month since my focus will be on writing.

I’m currently reading an ARC for Here and Now and Then, and then I will be reading The Cruel Prince or an ARC.

Blog Stats:

• I had a really good month on Twitter and am up to 1664 followers.  I’m hoping to get to 1666 today since that would be a little fitting, and then get over that on November 1st because I don’t really want 666 to be in my follower count for long, LOL.
• Blog users have seemed to have leveled off.  I wish I could visit more sites, but I just haven’t had time.  Don’t expect that to change during NaNoWriMo though.
• I have ten scheduled posts at the moment.  The only posts that I need to write during NaNoWriMo are ARC reviews, a review of Fawkes, tomorrow’s post on Amazon.com deals of the month, a Top Ten Tuesday post on Platonic Relationships in Books, and the Monthly Wrap-Up for November.  Other than that, I’m all set for NaNoWriMo.

Writing:

• I finished writing Hero, and now I’m editing the book.  I’ve edited 12 chapters so far of the first draft.  I already know that I’m going to rewrite chapter 1 when I do the third draft.  I want it to start off with a more impactful scene.  All of that will probably wait until next year though.
• I finished publishing My New Best Friend to AO3.  I wanted to finish that this month so I won’t have to worry about it in November, or leave people wondering what happened in the story.
• Total words published to AO3 in 2018: 96,948.  I’ve written about 120,000 words on other books that are currently unfinished/unpublished.  So that’s pretty good for a year.  I don’t expect to publish anything else this year, although I will be writing more words (obviously).
• I have about 26 pages of notes for The Brightness of Shadow.  I’m ready to do this!

Life:

So let’s just say that I could really use an amazing 2019 to make up for the last couple of years.  Yesterday, on my way to visit my daughter in the hospital, I ended up in a car accident that totaled my car.  The airbag deployed and everything.  My dd will probably be in the hospital for a long-term stay, but the main thing is that she gets better.  I have a bunch of bruises all over, but that’s probably about it.

I was really hoping that school would be cancelled today on account of snow, but no such luck.  Somebody needs to teach kids Spanish and German, and that would be me.  And then I have work tonight when it hurts to walk.  Oh joy.  But I’ll be okay, and that’s what matters.

So that was October.  Went out with a bang.  Let’s hope that November is better and I come out of that with an amazing first draft of my new book.