Catherine Fitzsimmons's Blog: Jinxed, page 4

New art: Solstice

I had a couple of reasons for making my newest art. First was that I got an iPad and Apple Pencil and was eager to try out both for art. I also received a free trial of Clip Studio Paint Pro, which I’ve heard good things about and which looked quite promising from the information I’ve read about it. I’ve much more to learn still, but am really enjoying it already.

As to why I painted this picture, that’s a bit longer story. I saw a few posts online a year ago about the origins of the cuetlaxochitl—or as it’s more commonly known in the imperialist West, poinsettia—but only this season did I read up on its true history as a plant cultivated by and sacred to Aztec civilization (along with the sordid personality of its English namesake). Combined with my usual annoyance with the unchallenged sexism, racism, ableism, etc. of many “classic” holiday songs, I decided to make a painting that incorporated as many Christmas symbols co-opted from other cultures as I could (and which my limited Google-fu came up with). And because I’m me, I made it a dragon.

On a more personal level, I have not enjoyed making art this much in a long time. I wasn’t only pleased with how it was turning out, I loved the process of working on it. I am greatly looking forward to making more art on my iPad.

Anyway, here’s the completed piece:

Waiting for the other ball to drop

Honestly, 2023 is a year I’m not sorry to see the end of (hence my actually writing my year-end post before the calendar turns, for once). This was the year my health took a nosedive. The cancer was only the most dramatic issue; I had plenty other concerns that ranged from inconvenient to frustrating to affecting daily life.

But you’re not here to read me whinging about medical concerns, so let me move on to the rundown of this year.

Reading: I met my goal of reading 30 books this year in early October and have reached 38. Read several fun books, checked off a few that had been on the TBR for a while, and finally read books from some author friends I’ve met over the years. I also started diving into the many ebooks I’ve collected over the years. Mostly, the free downloads from authors I’m not familiar with have not grabbed me; I DNFed fourteen books on Kindle alone, mostly quite early in, but a few between 50-75% completed. No five-star reads this year. Top book: I’ll call it a tie between Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse and Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan.

Writing: The big news here is that I completed the Sisters of Chaos trilogy with the release of Elderra’s Champion in June. While there are still a few short stories and a novella or two from the same world that I wouldn’t mind getting out, I’m quite happy to move on. That said, radiation tanked my motivation and I haven’t done much writing in the second half of this year. I did start a new (standalone) novel, but haven’t quite gotten traction on it yet, nor have I managed to finish some of the short stories I started or have been developing. I’ll have to just sit down and make myself write at some point, but I’ve been focusing on other hobbies of late.

Art: Although I did very little art for fun, I did enjoy the excuses I had to play with new/rarely-used media. I’ve also finally cleaned off my art table so it can once more be used for its intended purpose, and picked up some supplies that I’ve considered for a long time. (In other words, I may finally be a kneaded eraser convert.) I’ve been more into art the last month or so of this year, particularly since I got an early Christmas gift of an iPad, an Apple Pencil, and Clip Studio Paint Pro. I have really been enjoying that combination and hope to have a rather fancy new piece to share before end of day tomorrow.

Video games: The stress/exhaustion of radiation had me enjoying these a bit more this year, particularly The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, which I sank over 270 hours into, more than any other game I’ve played. I think I still added more games than I completed, but I did play (or at least attempt) a couple I’ve been considering for a while and have delved into the Kingdom Hearts universe. Working on KH2 at the moment and am interested enough to spend the money to add the games I don’t have. As a fan of Final Fantasy, Legend of Zelda, and other non-connected/non-linear game series, I’m finding the ongoing storyline quite interesting. Top game: Tears of the Kingdom, of course.

Music: Another hobby that suffered the lack of time and motivation from the cancer treatment. I’ve even cancelled my subscription to the app I was using to learn guitar, piano, and ukulele. Still interested in learning them, but not prioritizing it.

TV/Movies: …yeah, I think I’m done with these. Attempted to watch a couple shows but just not interested enough to sit down and do it. Watched a couple new movies at others’ behest and felt very meh about them. I don’t even want to re-watch the movies and shows I used to enjoy all the time. I’d rather spend my time doing one of the above instead.

Photography: Continues to fall off, with possibly the fewest pictures taken this year since I first got a digital camera twenty years ago (with its all of 2 megapixel resolution and maybe 64 MB memory card). That said, if I don’t need the telephoto lens, my phone camera does a pretty fine job with photos, getting crisp colours, higher resolution photos than my DSLR, and some fantastic picture modes including portraits, panoramas, slow motion and time-lapse video, and built-in 3X optical zoom. So I am still flexing my photography skills (beyond funny cat pictures). I’m just terrible at sharing them.

In a nutshell? Well, cancer defined a significant portion of my year. While some interests did languish and perhaps I did more passive hobbies like reading and playing video games, I’m not disappointed with my productivity this year.

As for 2024, well. I swore off resolutions years ago, but I think I’m even going to eschew goals for most endeavours this year. I will indulge playing instruments, watching TV, baking, and more if I feel like it. It would be nice to have a new book ready by the end of the year, but I’ll let inspiration with writing, and art, flow as it will.

I do these things for fun, after all. Perhaps that should be my goal for 2024: just enjoy myself.

…although I’ll still set another goal of reading 30 books this year.

Is he strong? Listen, bud…

I’ve had people requesting updates on my cancer treatment, so I thought I’d give one here.

For those who only follow this blog, I spoke prematurely when I said that my diagnosis was not going to be a significant impact on my health: shortly after I made my previous post, the doctors decided that I needed radiation.

There’s… a lot I could say about it. (I got a “So you have cancer” packet of pamphlets and information from the hospital. It’s half an inch thick. I summarized the important parts in a notes file on my phone, which is still three pages long.) Side effects, things I have to do, measures (and medicines) I might need to take, what I need to have on me at all times, how to cope physically and mentally, and on and on.

However, I doubt most people are interested in the minutiae, so I’ll just paint a picture of what radiotherapy looks like.

When I’m called back from the waiting room in the second basement, I take a brief walk to the treatment room, which doesn’t look much different from any other hospital procedure room. I don’t change into a gown; an open-collared shirt suffices for where I’m getting the radiation. I recite my birth date, the radiation therapists ask how I’m getting on, if I have any new side effects, I take off my mask and glasses and such, and lie down on the treatment table, which, in the way of hospitals, is about the size and comfort level of an ironing board.

About a month ago, I had a CT scan during which a mesh mask was custom-fitted to me, by heating it up and having nurses press it down to conform it to my face and neck. It now has holes cut out for my eyes and mouth, as well as the treatment area, and the radiation therapists strap me down to the table with it. (It both prevents one from moving during the treatment and helps to pinpoint the location of the radiation.)

A gel pack is positioned over the treatment area to catch any stray ions, gaps between that and the mask are stuffed with paper, and after the therapists trade some medical jargon, they leave the room to the sound of an extremely digital clock tone. (You know, the classic bell song, like Big Ben makes on the hour?) Sometimes, the therapists need to come back in to make some adjustments to the gel pack or padding. Then, the large machine that dominates about a third of the room, all plastic and indecipherable screens, rotates a couple arms around me while I lie there. I feel nothing.

They play music in the room, usually oldies (as I begrudgingly admit the songs of my childhood are now). The actual treatment time takes about as long as “Bohemian Rhapsody”.

That’s it. The full session takes fifteen minutes, and the radiation department operates like a well-oiled machine. My appointments have never been late, and even when I am, I’m taken in quickly.

I started treatment two weeks ago, every weekday, and have now completed 1/3 of the course. So far, I haven’t had much in the way of side effects. I had a sore throat for a little while last Saturday, terrible dry mouth the following day, and had a headache after getting home from today’s treatment. I’m also getting quite tired at least once during the day, but it’s difficult to tell whether that’s new fatigue or the same that I’ve been fighting for the past few years. I haven’t needed the medicated mouthwash I was given for pain, let alone the liquid morphine.

However, the side effects are supposed to worsen as treatment progresses, and will continue to worsen or at least remain as bad for a few weeks after the treatment has ended, so I’m bracing myself for worse. On the bright side, radiation treatment has come a long way even in the last twenty years, so some aspects shouldn’t be as bad. I shouldn’t lose my hair, as an example.

The good news? It’s critical to maintain one’s weight during radiation therapy, so even if it becomes hard to eat, I have full permission to subsist on ice cream and add calories to other easy-to-swallow foods. Also, on a more personal level, I’ve been given a lot more leeway to play video games.

Ten days down, twenty to go. I got this.

The Big News

* This is just a stock photo. My blood pressure tends to be on the low side.

It’s been an interesting spring. But let’s start a little earlier than that.

When I moved to Canada eighteen years ago, I’d had a lump in the base of my neck for a few years. I’d managed to ask a nurse at Planned Parenthood about it before I left the States, but there wasn’t much else I could afford to do about it. So, I anxiously awaited the day I attained permanent residence and could then get a health card.

The family doctor I got examined the lump and figured it wasn’t anything to worry about, but since I was concerned, he went ahead and referred me to a specialist who removed it. The biopsy afterwards identified it as a myxoma, a benign tumour that usually appears in the heart—in fact, I couldn’t find any information online about myxomas that weren’t in the heart. Weird, but it was gone.

Fast forward ten years or so. Another lump formed in the same place, right next to the scar from the previous surgery. I dawdled on getting our current family doctor to look at it. When I pointed it out, however, she immediately referred me to an ENT. Last December, I finally saw said specialist, who ordered a biopsy.

The fine needle biopsy was inconclusive. A bigger needle biopsy was ordered, with local freezing and an incision to try and get deeper into said lump. At the time (while I cringed from the pressure being put on the area beneath the freezing), the doctor performing the aspiration said that it just looked like scar tissue to him.

Great.

However, a couple weeks later, the ENT confirmed that there was evidence it was another myxoma, and I had it surgically removed. …again.

Two weeks later, I had my follow-up, everything looked good, though the pathologist who biopsied the removed tissue found the myxoma strange (because yes?) and wanted permission to send a sample to Mt. Sinai hospital in Toronto for a second opinion. I could only smirk at that, especially after researching myxomas fresh and the only mention I could find of them appearing outside the heart was in a scholarly article which stated that those happened primarily in seniors and once removed didn’t recur.

How fun! I’m so special I’m a case study!

9:00 that night I get a phone call from the ENT. The pathologist called her back to let her know that it was not, in fact, a myxoma.

It was cancer.

Insert record scratch noise here. And queue the longest week of my life.

To be clear: this is a slow growing, very treatable type of cancer. It is not a countdown timer on my life, it’s not even a significant impact on my health (this type of cancer doesn’t really respond to chemotherapy so that’s not in the cards at all; surgery is the primary treatment method).

That said, the words you have cancer hit like a sledgehammer.

It’s like depression: it colours everything you do; it’s always lingering at the back of your mind, ready to tear apart your happiness at the worst moment; everything suddenly seems so much more urgent, yet so much more difficult; it makes it hard to sleep and even eat; it jumps in with intrusive thoughts no matter what’s on your mind (yes, but you have cancer). Reading about how treatable and non-aggressive this type of cancer is is very different from knowing from a single phone call that it’s sitting in there, doing its best to eat away at my body.

Over the twelve weeks since then, I’ve come to understand, on a fundamental, subconscious level, that it’s not anything to worry about. (And I don’t mean because there isn’t anything else I can do about it; it’s really not a serious health risk to me.) It’s just meant a lot of appointments, tests, and general trips into downtown Toronto.

Along with another surgery. That happened May 30 and tomorrow I can finally pick up my cat again (well, one of them; I’ve been giving the petite eight-pound girl more cuddles than she can handle). This week I’ll find out if radiation is necessary (or recommended), though the otolaryngologist is pleased with the results from the second surgery and thinks we can merely monitor it for now. I figure it’ll mean continuing follow-up appointments for probably at least a few years to come, and it may require another surgery to remove every last trace of it.

For the curious, it is a low grade fibromyxosarcoma. A sarcoma is a soft tissue cancer (that of fat, muscles, nerves, etc., and apparently also bone somehow?) and low grade means slow growing. As far as I can tell, the fibromyxo part has no relation to anything other than this particular type of cancer (although it’s hard to miss the similarity to myxoma, which these these types of cancers are often confused with). It also has an incidence of one in eight million. I am probably the only person currently being treated at Princess Margaret, one of the top five cancer centres in the world, for this particular type of cancer.

I really am special!

Whether the original tumour removed some twelve to fifteen years ago was misdiagnosed as a myxoma (and which would mean I have been living with untreated cancer for my entire adult life) or whether the myxoma became malignant, I may never know. The doctor hasn’t been able to obtain the slides from that biopsy. Given that it took four biopsies to identify this one properly, I wouldn’t be surprised if the first one was in fact the same thing.

I mainly wanted to write this to let people know why I’ve had to cancel plans or haven’t been able to get to some tasks as quickly as I would like, or why my output in general hasn’t been as high recently (well, that and the other health problems I’ve been dealing with concurrently, but that’s another story). I’ll be fine, and I don’t need outpourings of empathy or assistance getting things done. (But hey, if you feel like buying a book, you’ll make my day.) I certainly have it far better than many, possibly most, people getting treated at Princess Margaret. I’ll get through this.

So, hi. My name is Catherine Fitzsimmons, and I have cancer.

Trilogy finale drops in one week!

As usual, I’ve failed to update this blog or promote myself, but next Friday, the final book of my Sisters of Chaos trilogy, Elderra’s Champion, is releasing.

You can preorder it to have it shipped now directly from the publisher (i.e. me, so you could even get it signed if that’s your thing) or from Chapters/Indigo, Barnes & Noble, Books a Million, Amazon, your local indie bookstore, or anywhere else you’d like.

I’m also having a Zoom launch party next Saturday, June 10. It’s an open call so feel free to come in with or without video or audio. It’s just going to be a casual hang out. Details and meeting link on the event page.

To those who have read any of the books over the years, thanks for your support. All I’ll say about what’s coming next is it ain’t gonna be epic fantasy.

New Year 2023

As usual, after months of silence, I return to this blog for my annual new year post. Maybe it’s my ongoing health issues, New Year’s Eve messing up my entire week so far, or coming up on the fourth year of the pandemic, but I’m not feeling particularly hopeful about 2023. I do, however, have good things to look forward to, including another 11 great books I’m going to publish this year.

First, a wrap-up of 2022:

Books: While I didn’t read nearly as many as I did in 2021, I did surpass my goal of 30 to reach 35 books last year. I read more middle grade novels and graphic novels, but I also read some nonfiction and general audience novels. My TBR pile has built up again from a couple book sales and from my first trip to Gen Con since 2019, and I’ve also just dipped my toes into the many ebooks I’ve collected over the years. Top book from the year remains Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir.Video games: I added more than I completed and had a fairly long break throughout summer and autumn, but I did start and finish a handful of games. I enjoyed Metroid Dread. I played the original Legend of Zelda for the first time. Two things that struck me about it was how the future games are very much a continuation/extrapolation of it, and how open-world the first game is. I haven’t officially pulled the plug on God of War (2018), but I beat the storyline and there’s one optional boss I’m going to try one more time (after which is another optional boss that will probably murder me). Top game: Spider-Man (2018).TV/Movies: Disney+ was our only streaming service until a month ago, so any new media was focused there. Watched most of the new Marvel and Star Wars series and finally started getting burned out on both. Heard good things about Andor and She-Hulk but just haven’t dredged up the interest; same with the newest Marvel movies. I’d rather read or just watch YouTube. However, we got Netflix in December and I’ve started watching a few series there. That said, we are not binge-watchers and Netflix’s tendency to encourage it annoys me. It’ll probably be a few months before I finish these. Top show: Stranger Things.Writing: Eventually finished initial edits on Elderra’s Champion, the third book of my Sisters of Chaos trilogy, and got feedback from both beta readers. Some fairly significant edits still to do, but I’ve tried to ramp up my production on them. I also somewhat spontaneously wrote a short story, the first >1,000-word story I’ve written in a few years, and particularly original one that’s not a tie-in to one of my novels. I also started writing a new novel while Elderra’s Champion was off with beta readers.

Other endeavors fell off a bit this year. While I did a new acrylic painting for the first time in years, I otherwise haven’t really done any drawing in months. I’m slowly continuing to learn/practice guitar and piano, recording some of the latter for collaborations with a couple musicians. Also, at the very end of the year, I decided to try out my child’s ukulele, and it turns out I love it. I also started seeing people and doing events again this year, both of which have been so nice, even if I still mask up every time I go out.

So, what’s ahead for 2023? I don’t have goals for most of the above; I don’t care about watching more TV, even if I am enjoying some series, and video games are too varied to make goals for completion there. I miss reading when I’m focused on video games and I miss gaming when all I do is read. So, I’m going to continue setting a goal of 30 books this year, and I will likely get more into my ebook TBR as well.

As for writing, finishing Elderra’s Champion is not a goal anymore; as of Friday, it will be officially coming in June. I was hoping to be finished with my edits by the end of 2022, and may honestly be continuing to tweak down to the first printing (publisher privilege). Beyond that, as mentioned, I already have another novel on the go, though I also have several short story ideas that have been percolating for a few years that I’d love to get down as well. It would be nice to start releasing stuff more regularly, but hey, as long as I make that June release, I met my goal of halving the release time between books 1 and 2.

Once again, I’d like to practice my instruments more regularly (and perhaps try not to be too intimidated by those lessons). Art I will continue to let come as it comes. As for visiting people/attending events more often? It sure would be nice.

For now, I’m just hoping to recover from that one late night soon. Happy new year and I hope 2023 brings you all the joy and luck you deserve.

Winter sketchbook

March update: video games

As I mentioned in my previous post, I’ve been escaping into video games a bit more so far this year. First, I finished off the original Final Fantasy VII, after starting it before the 2020 release of the remake. As one of the snooty teens who rejected the idea of Final Fantasy games moving into futuristic settings when FF7 originally released – and who has since absorbed a fair bit of lore and spoilers from the game – playing the original game was an interesting experience.

For one thing, my original impression that it was moving away from its roots was unfounded. It is very much a classic Final Fantasy game; plus, the creators really did an excellent job translating the style of game into 3D, for being the first example of it. The story was interesting, but somewhat less than I expected. I suppose the amount of lore that has built up around the story raised my expectations of what was present in the original game. Still, it was an enjoyable game, and I can see why it became a classic.

After that, I started up Spider-Man. While it looked kind of neat from videos/commercials, I wasn’t particularly interested in playing it, mainly because it’s not the type of game I normally seek out. However, a friend loaned it to me (*cough* last summer…) and I finally started it up late January.

And, if you’ll forgive the pun, it was amazing. The game play was crazy fun and the huge number of side quests were all terribly compelling. The story was fantastic with top-notch voice acting, and reminded me exactly why I love Spider-Man as a character so much. Manhattan was brought to life so beautifully I feel like I know it even though I’ve never been there. And the ending brought me to tears. It is, perhaps objectively, one of the best games I’ve ever played. 10/10. It was enough to make me immediately buy Spider-Man: Miles Morales, though I probably won’t get to that one soon with all the other games I have to play.

I tried to convince myself to start the 2018 God of War after that, since it was also loaned to me, and I even installed it on the PS4 to do just that. However, before I managed to make myself start up the game, I stopped resisting the call of Metroid Dread.

I was as much a fan of Super Metroid as anyone else, same with Metroid Fusion, but after playing Metroid Prime and (most of) Metroid Prime 2, I wasn’t as stoked about returning to a 2D platformer as so many people seemed to be. But I couldn’t own the latest Nintendo console and not get the new Metroid game, and I didn’t doubt it would be fun.

It took about five minutes of game play to get sucked in. I should’ve known better, of course; there’s a reason these games (along with Castlevania) became their own genre. There’s barely enough plot to support the action and little of it really makes sense, but none of it matters because it’s just so fun. It’s the perfect balance of puzzle-solving and dexterous button pressing with very little story getting in the way of running around, exploring areas, pew-pewing aliens, and collecting as many artifacts as I can find. I die a lot, though unlike with Spider-Man and other games, I’m actually playing on the harder (read: normal) difficulty setting.

I’m a decent portion through the game at this point, though I do keep getting sidetracked looking for new items as soon as I gain a new ability. Still, I don’t anticipate playing this too much longer. As for what’s next? I’d better get started on God of War, and hope none of my other recent acquisitions (like Horizon: Forbidden West or any of the Kingdom Hearts games) grab my attention too much first.

March 2022 update: Books

Time for my first monthly update since the year began. I’ve not made much progress on editing this year, unfortunately. Books and video games have been my poison of choice this winter, so I decided to delve into both a little more thoroughly in separate posts.

Please note: I am not a critic and do not pretend to be. I read what I like and have neither the time nor inclination to go into detail why I enjoyed/what I didn’t enjoy about the books I read.

I started off the year veering away from middle grade novels briefly, along with my usual habit of reading only one book at a time. The first three books of this year I read more or less simultaneously, which I think I’ll be avoiding from now on.

First, I finished off Cytonic, third book in the Skyward series by Brandon Sanderson. I had suspected that this would be the end of the series, which turned out not to be the case. The story did go off in a different direction for longer than I expected, but it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had such a thing happen with Sanderson’s work. There were some interesting surprises, though overall, it was simply a fun continuation of the series.

After that, I finished When the Sleeper Wakes by H. G. Wells. Since I’m publishing a graphic novel adaptation of the book later this year, I thought it would be a good idea to read the original. There are some very interesting concepts presented in the book, including predicting television, propaganda being used to control the masses, and rule by an oligarchy that controls the vast majority of the money on Earth. However, other concepts in the book are… let’s generously say dated. It may not have been written that way maliciously, and there may be historical precedence for those choices, but it’s an aspect that needed to be modernized. Aside from that, Graham is a very passive protagonist, even for its time. While I enjoyed reading the book for the most part, I’ll admit it was, at least from a modern perspective, a lowlight of my year so far.

I then snuck in Moonshot: The Indigenous Comics Collection, Volume 2. Although some of the stories were shorter than I expected, I absolutely loved the variety of art and writing present, the realness and rawness of comics by indigenous creators, as well as the beauty of the stories they told that highlighted indigenous mythology. This book was a joy to read.

But, forgive me for saying that the next book has been the highlight of my year so far and since: Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. I loved both The Martian and Artemis, so I really should have jumped on this book sooner, though it wasn’t until a friend started gushing over it that I finally checked it out of the library. I suppose I’ve had enough in general of the ‘story opening with a character suffering from amnesia’, though with Weir’s typical blend of excellently portrayed science, humour, and down-to-earth characters, it immediately hooked me. And, by setting up the story that way, I completely didn’t know what to expect, which made the experience that much more engaging. Suffice to say, it was a wonderful story and I highly recommend it.

After that, I returned to some middle grade novels, starting with yet another dragon-themed book recommended by my local library for the lunar new year, The Dragon Warrior by Katie Zhao. This also interested me because through the other MG books I’d read, I’d yet to encounter one based on Chinese mythology. I started off reading this book simply enjoying the fact that ’12-year-old girl goes on a magical adventure through her culture’s mythology’ has become common enough to be a trope. However, The Dragon Warrior ended up taking darker turns than I expected. It’s not as intense as some of the MG books I’ve read over the past couple years, but the directions of the story made it a surprise. It was very interesting and I currently have the second book in the series waiting to be read.

Then, I returned to another MG novel I tried to read late last year but didn’t make it through for one reason or another, Dragon Pearl by Yoon Ha Lee. This was a very different rendition of the same trope, as it takes place in a spacefaring future. The blend of science fiction and Korean mythology worked very well together and overall it was a more space opera book than any other MG I’ve read so far. This was my first introduction to Yoon’s work, but I’ll be keeping an eye out for his other writing, including his adult science fiction.

Last weekend, I took a trip to Chapters/Indigo so my daughter (and I) could spend the gift cards we got for Valentine’s Day. The books I was most interested in weren’t available in store, but a graphic novel in the MG section immediately caught my eye: Wingbearer written by Marjorie Liu. I hadn’t heard of it before, which isn’t surprising, since it turns out it was only scheduled for release this week. It is a very fantastical story of charming characters and beautiful world, with gorgeous artwork by Teny Issakhanian. It sucked me in from page one, and while the twists were for the most part fairly predictable, it was still captivating enough to make me sad that it only just released and there isn’t even talk of a volume 2 yet.

Finally, just last night I finished off one of the books that has been waiting in my TBR pile since last summer, Three Seeking Stars by Avi Silver. I’ve met Avi and partner Sienna at a few different conventions, and it was at the launch party for Two Dark Moons, the first book in the series, that I bought it, which I enjoyed enough to want to preorder the second book as soon as it was available. Continuing in that tradition, Three Seeking Stars expanded on an already richly realized world, helped along delightful characters on their journeys, and juggled both ideology and culture clashes very well. The raw emotion of the characters even brought me to tears at once point. This is a wonderful book to sink into and escape with. I shall also treasure my Instax photo of Avi and Sienna’s bearded dragon which I got for preordering.

A solid showing so far and plenty more great books to come. I want to dive back into my TBRs, though I still have three other MG books from the library to read in the next two weeks, and every time I go back I see more that interest me. Not to mention that it’s only one month until the release of the fifteenth Wings of Fire book and I haven’t read any of the books past the tenth still.

So much to read, so little time.

The future is now

I’ve been doing new year posts for a few years now. The novelty has perhaps worn off a little, and due to various reasons I’m feeling a bit cynical about celebrating the new year. But I don’t really want to get into it and I’m sure you don’t want to read it either, so I’ll move on to the whole point of these posts: goal-setting.

First, the wrap-up from last year. Writing wasn’t quite as successful as I’d hoped, as I haven’t quite gotten the draft of the final book of my Sisters of Chaos trilogy ready for beta readers yet. I have, however, completed fairly significant edits over the text from the first draft I finished at the end of 2020. In early December, after finishing the initial edits I marked out back in last January, I did another complete reread and noted just a few smaller areas of concern I still need to work on. At that point, however, the novel went on the back burner as other projects took precedence.

I rediscovered joy in art in 2021 in a way I haven’t in many years, and even used up the last page in the sketchbook I’d been drawing in since 2012. I also tried out/revisited media I hadn’t experimented with in a long time, and tried some new techniques that visibly improved my art even in the few drawings I did last year. In fact, I have some other artwork, from as far back as last summer, that I’ve yet to share here. Obviously, adding posts to this blog hasn’t been a priority for me of late.

Music also became a stronger focus this year as I worked on learning both piano and guitar (and even got a fantastic new guitar as a birthday/Christmas present). I even recorded and shared a few covers and started composing an original song. I’m slowly making progress on both my instruments and with singing.

I ended up reading 52 books last year. 12 of them were graphic novels and 45 were middle grade (four of the remaining are classified as teen/YA books, all of those graphic novels). I’d been wanting to delve into middle grade books and found some absolute treasures among the selections I read.

I didn’t end up playing through as many video games as I wanted to this year – in fact, I fear I may have added more acquisitions than I completed. But, I had the opportunity to play The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Horizon: Zero Dawn and am making my way through the original Final Fantasy VII.

For this year, I want to say I want the third Sisters of Chaos book to be completed and ready for publication by the end of the year. I don’t have much editing left to do on it and hopefully I can have it out to beta readers by the end of this month. What transpires past that point is difficult to predict, but it shouldn’t be a stretch to have the manuscript finished within twelve months.

Art I’m going to indulge whenever the mood strikes me. While I am enjoying both the act of drawing and improving my work, I have no goals.

The same goes for music, though I’d like to be more consistent with my guitar and piano lessons. Much as I’m enjoying recording new video game songs, I want to focus more on just playing instruments rather than trying to learn arranging, mixing, and mastering as well. I say that, of course, as I continue working on my most ambitious song yet.

I don’t have any specific goals I’m trying to achieve with reading, so I’m going to once again set my reading goal to 30 books and see where it goes from there. My TBRs have started to collect again after some purchases last year, though it’s only a handful left after reading the graphic novels this week. I’d like to expand my scope a little, perhaps start getting into some of the many ebooks I’ve purchased/downloaded. That said, there are still at least eleven middle grade books I can think of off-hand that I’d quite like to read (two of them scheduled for release this month).

As for video games, I’d just like to get into new ones quicker. I’m finding anymore that it takes me a while to get truly invested in and comfortable with new RPGs. Case in point: I just reached the second disc of Final Fantasy VII yet have only really gotten emotionally/intellectually involved with the story and game play in the past handful of play times. I like the story – liked it from the beginning – but it took me so long to get the hang of the game play and trying to figure out what’s going on and what I should be doing that it’s taken months for me to feel like I’m really playing it; the same was certainly true of Horizon: Zero Dawn, and was a large part of why I didn’t play more games last year. Considering how many games I have to play for so many different systems, I don’t think I have the luxury to take my time each time I start up a new game. I don’t really know how to overcome that, but I’ll have to figure it out somehow.

If nothing else, writing, art, reading, making music, and playing video games help to distract the mind. On that note, I think I’ll go start up the Playstation Classic.