S.J. Pajonas's Blog, page 90

Book Updates – Hikoboshi Series Out Of Kindle Unlimited And More…

Hi everyone! Just popping in to give a few quick book related updates…

The Hikoboshi Series

First and foremost, The Hikoboshi Series, CRASH LAND ON KURAI and CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD, and all forthcoming books in the series will no longer be in Kindle Unlimited. CRASH LAND ON KURAI comes out of KU tomorrow and will be available on all vendors probably by Monday. CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD comes out of KU on February 12th and will be distributed to all vendors then.

If you’re disappointed that the rest of the series will not be in KU, well, so am I. I had a benchmark of income that I wanted to reach with this series to keep it in KU until the last book was published, and I’m afraid it didn’t even come close. My goal was that by the sixth month mark of CRASH LAND ON KURAI being in Kindle Unlimited, I needed to be making 2x in page-reads than what I was making in regular sales to justify only selling the book on Amazon, which is a requirement to be in KU. As of today, page-reads are less than half what sales are.

I will post a reminder to the blog before the end of the month that these books have been made available on iBooks, Nook, Kobo, and Google Play. I hope all of my customers from these vendors enjoy reading this series!

Editing and writing of the third book of the series, FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT, is going well and I hope to have it ready for publication in April if all goes well.

Prices On Novels Longer Than 85,000 Words

I’ve instituted a new pricing structure for my books, which means that books that are over 85,000 words will be priced at $4.99 starting next week. Books that are 50,000 to 85,000 words will be $3.99. Pricing increases will be seen on the following books:

– REUNITED
– RECLAIMED
– REVEALED
– SUMMER HAIKUS
– FACE TIME
– CRASH LAND ON KURAI
– CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD

Though RELEASED, the second book of the Nogiku Series, is well over 100,000 words, I’ve decided to keep it at $3.99 for the time being, though I may change my mind in the months ahead. These longer novels take a long time to write and are more expensive to edit. I have been undervaluing my work the last two years, and I’d like to change that. If you had planned on buy these books soon, you might as well get them now before I raise the prices!

FACE TIME In Kindle Unlimited

FACE TIME is now in Kindle Unlimited, and I plan to keep it and SUMMER HAIKUS, my two romances, in the program for the foreseeable future. They both did poorly on other vendors (FACE TIME having sold only one copy outside of Amazon in 2017), and I don’t see a reason to keep them there any longer when they can possibly do better on Amazon with continued Amazon Ads.

THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR Paperback Available Soon

I’ve ordered the proof of the paperback for THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR and it looks like I should get it early next week. As soon as I’ve looked it over, I’ll hit publish on it and link it up to the ebook on Amazon. If you’re a paperback reader, please check on the status of the paperback when the ebook publishes on January 17th. It should be there on the Amazon product page for you to buy.

The post Book Updates – Hikoboshi Series Out Of Kindle Unlimited And More… appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Done While Listening #DoneWhileListening

Everyone around here knows I love audiobooks. Love them! They’re the main source of “reading” I get done now, a kind-of “me time” that I normally don’t have. A few years ago, I was desperate to find more time to read in between everything I do around the house and work. I have two young kids and I’m an author, which means that any spare sitting time I had was spent at the computer or re-reading my own work or my critique partner’s work. For-fun reading time had dwindled to nothing, and I was definitely missing it.

At the time, I had just begun listening to podcasts while doing household chores, and often I would run out of them, yet I still had more kitchen to clean or food to cook. One of my favorite podcasts was sponsored by Audible, so I decided to sign up using their affiliate link… just to try it out. They featured a new audiobook every week, so I thought I would make a list and try out some of their suggestions.

I honestly didn’t think I’d like it. I thought there was no way audiobooks would be for me. I was a purist of words on the page! Audiobooks? They would never be the same as reading. (I’m laughing at myself now.)

My very first audiobook is still one of my favorites, THE MARTIAN. I was captivated by all the voices the narrator did, and of course, the story. I actually listened to this audiobook twice! I then moved onto all of John Scalzi’s books in audiobook format, all The Expanse books, and on and on.

It was easy to become hooked on audiobooks. Why? Because I could get so much done while listening! When I got an email from Audible a few weeks ago highlighting all the activities people had done while listening to audiobooks, I knew I would have to write a similar blog post.

Of course, I got plenty of cleaning done while listening to audiobooks, just like I did with podcasts, but there was so much more I could do!

My favorite activity is definitely knitting and listening. I barely had any time to knit before, just like I had little time to sit and read. But doing them together? It feels like I’m really accomplishing something.

I especially love to sit and knit outside during the summer at the pool while listening to a great audiobook.

The majority of this shawl was knit while listening to audiobooks this fall.

But that’s not all. I also enjoy coloring and listening to audiobooks. Coloring helps relieve stress and pairing it with a great audiobook is even better.

When my local grocery store isn’t too crowded, I also shop and listen to audiobooks! I plug in and listen at the store, and when I get back in the car, I pop open a seltzer, sync up my phone to the car, and continue the listen all the way home.

And of course, I also listen while traveling. Here I am on a plane, listening and trying not to think about the craziness around me.

But I listen to audiobooks the most on my walks. In 2017, I vowed to walk 1000 miles and I did it with the help of audiobooks. I joined the Audiobook Challenge, I kept my Audible subscription going, and I walked and walked and walked until I hit 1000 miles. Many times I stayed out and kept walking longer because I was so engrossed in the story I didn’t want to stop.

Right now, my own books are not in audiobook format, but I hope that someday they will be! I can’t wait to hear a narrator tell my stories. It’ll be a trip for sure.

Featuring THE PRIESTESS AND THE DRAGON By Nicolette Andrews

I love featuring authors I know on the blog! Today, Nicolette Andrews is here to talk about her Japan-inspired Fantasy, THE PRIESTESS AND THE DRAGON.

I asked Nicolette, “Why did you write THE PRIESTESS AND THE DRAGON?”

She replied…

I started writing The Priestess and the Dragon for fun. I’ve always been a bit of an anime/manga nerd and I really wanted to write something that was inspired by my favorite anime tropes. I posted it to a website called Wattpad and it found a decent audience who were just as excited as me about the story and it really fueled me to keep going, when I might have otherwise forgotten about it after a couple chapters. The more I wrote, the more I wanted to learn about Japanese Mythology and Japanese history and I ended up doing a ton of research on both subjects. I own so many reference books on Japanese mythology, religion and history, I could fill a whole book case at this point HaHa. I guess you could say I’ve just fallen even more in love with the Japanese culture as a result of this book.

That’s so awesome, Nicolette! You should see my Japan-related bookshelves. They are packed to the brim! Lol. I bet we’d have quite the collection if you combined them.

January 2018 Paperback Giveaway – What’s Your Favorite Vacation?

And we’re back! The winner for last month’s giveaway was A. Heaps and I’ve already contacted her to let her know she won! Her books will be in the mail as soon as we dig out of this snow. :-/

The January 2018 Paperback Giveaway is…

This month’s giveaway is a bundle of FACE TIME and SUMMER HAIKUS in old covers. This version of FACE TIME doesn’t have the epilogue, but that’s available on my website, and this version of SUMMER HAIKUS has the extended sexy scene. This month’s giveaway is US ONLY. Please don’t complain about the giveaway being US only. I do plan on doing a few international giveaways in 2018, but I would go broke shipping all of these internationally. Please read the terms and conditions on the rafflecopter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

For those who want to gain the extra entry by commenting on this blog post, please tell me…

What’s Your Favorite Vacation?

My favorite vacation was going to DisneyWorld this year. It was great fun for the whole family! I love to travel and experience new things, and there was plenty on this trip for everyone. No one was ever bored.

January 2018 Goals

It’s a new year! And a new month as well. Let’s keep things on track by setting some goals for the month.

What Happened With December’s Goals?

Edit THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR. Did this! And I just finished up the proofreading edits too! Which means I can upload and work on the paperback now.

Continue bits of writing on FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. Because I was sick, I let this slide. I could only concentrate on the edits for Daydreamer 4.

Get the pre-order up for the KAMI NO SEKAI OMNIBUS. Done. I need to update the page on this site with all the information.

Come up with an idea for Daydreamer 5. I did think of several things for this book! We’ll see which I decide to go with.

Write a BONUS SCENE for CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD. I didn’t do this but I still want to. I’m going to roll it into January.

Hit my 1000 miles goal for 2018! Done! I hit this goal and then immediately got sick right after. Lol. Of course!

Walking, reading, knitting, and more audiobooks. I didn’t get as much walking in last month as I wanted to due to being sick but I did read!

A Look Back at December

 

Business Goals For January

Publish THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR. At this point, this is a foregone conclusion. I’m going to upload my final files today, get the paperback into the Createspace system, push all the buttons, and sit back and wait. My ARC team already has the non-proofed book and many have read it. We’re good to go!

Write more on FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. I need to pick up this book, read what I’ve written, edit that, and then start writing again. The first half rambled WAY TOO MUCH, and I know some scenes I can cut already. Then I need to pick up the ball and run it into the end zone.

Write a BONUS SCENE for CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD. I’d like to do this this month and post it to the blog.

Upload all the Daydreamer books. I have this awesome high school friend of mine who reads all of my books AND has a crazy total recall memory (I know, I’m so lucky to have her!) She helped me write down all the characters in all my Daydreamer books, remember the small details that I had forgotten, and helped me iron out inconsistencies that had crept in over the last four books. I then went back and put a one-chapter teaser of the next book into each of the ebooks. Now everything should be peachy keen with them all. I just need to go through and upload them at every vendor. That’s a lot of work, so I’ll spread it out over two or three days.

Personal Goals For January

Celebrate my birthday on January 18th. I’m totally the type of person to work through my birthday. But I should take a break and do something nice for myself. I don’t know what, but I’ll think of something.

Fight off these recurring sinus infections. I realized recently that it’s not the Claritin I’ve been on that’s kept the sinus infections away, it was the two mild winters we had! Now that we’re in the single digits for weather here all the time this year, the heat is on constantly, and I’m getting recurring sinus infections again. Sigh. I hate this. I’m doing everything I can to fight them but I may need antibiotics again.

Keep walking. Despite not feeling well, I need to keep walking. It’s good for me.

Keep reading, listening to audiobooks, and knitting. I have a new book I’m reading that I’m enjoying and also an alpha read from my critique partner.

The post January 2018 Goals appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Teaser Tuesday – Mei Loves A Good Mystery

It’s time for Teaser Tuesdays again! This time we’ll be featuring THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR, the fourth book in the Miso Cozy Mysteries series.

When I first started this journey with Mei, she was a reluctant detective. She wanted to help, but she didn’t want to cause harm to her mother’s reputation (or her own). She just wanted to help Akiko. Now, three books later, Mei realizes that solving mysteries is actually a lot of fun, and something that she’s pretty good at. So when a mystery falls right in her lap in THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR, it doesn’t take much convincing for her to help out. The only problem becomes juggling all of her responsibilities now that she’s pregnant, running a tea shop, and helping her mother at the family farm. Mei will just have to call in extra help to get the job done.

Want to purchase THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR?

This book will be available on January 17, 2018! View the cover, blurb, read an excerpt, and purchase THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR via my website…

Check out THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR now!

This novel is available on Amazon, iBooks, Nook, and Kobo. Google Play is coming soon!

The post Teaser Tuesday – Mei Loves A Good Mystery appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

2018: The Year I Don’t Compete

Aaaaand it’s 2018! 2018, people. Where is the time going? I feel like life is just zipping by, and before I know it, I’ll be 70 years old and totally stunned at what I see in the world. Lol. Anyway, it’s time for another yearly declaration!

2015 was The Year I Say No.

2016 was The Year I Give No Fucks.

2017 was The Year I Have Fun.

Originally, my 2018 was going to be “The Year I Focus On Me,” but after running that title past a few people, I realized that it sounded a little selfish. Me, me, me. Am I right?

So instead, 2018 will be The Year I Don’t Compete.

This is the year I won’t look at anyone else’s career in relation to my own. I’m going to do what I want to do, when and how I want to do it, and no one is going to sway me to do it differently. I’m going to learn my own lessons because that’s what I need to do. I can’t keep looking at other authors’ successes and their lessons and think they apply to me. In most cases, they don’t. After four years of trying to mimic what other people are doing, it’s time to set my own pace, my own platform, and not look for the magic spell that’ll make everything work. It doesn’t exist. The only thing that’ll work for me is developing my platform and hard work.

I’m sure you won’t find that a surprise coming from this Capricorn. Lol.

With that in mind, here are my goals for 2018!

Writing Goals

I will publish 3 books this year – 1 cozy, 2 sci-fi. The cozy is publishing in two weeks. The sci-fi books will be in spring and fall, most likely. There may be more things published, but this is the bare minimum I’m promising. Because…

I will write in a new series. I have this idea I want to write about, and I’ve had it brewing for over a year now. I actually sent it as a proposal to Radish, but they rejected me, so now I get to do with it what I want. And I’m not sure if it’s going to be a series of ebooks or something different. We shall see.

I will participate in NaNoWriMo in November again, and Camp NaNoWriMo in April. I want four months this year where I do consistent first-draft writing. I’m currently aiming for February, April, July, and November. If I have more than that, I’ll be pleased.

Advertising, Marketing, Blog, and Social Media Goals

I will start a niche website Love Japanese Fiction. This will be a website that focuses on Japan-related or Japanese fiction in the English language. So translations from Japanese are also included. Books about Japan or Japanese people can be written by anyone, Japanese or otherwise. This will give me a chance to find more like-minded authors and help promote them as well as my own work. This website will be at LoveJapaneseFiction.com.

I will continue to advertise and spend money on both promotions and ads. This worked out well for me this year. Steady ads on AMS with sporadic Facebook ads. I won’t be spending money on list building, only sales.

I will be raising my prices on some books. I’ve been undervaluing some of my longer works. Prices will go up in mid-January for books longer than 90,000 words. Some paperback prices will also go up.

I will be using Kindle Unlimited strategically and only when it’s truly working for me. This means that the Hikoboshi books will be coming out of Kindle Unlimited (they never hit their income goals I had set for them) early this year, and FACE TIME will be going into Kindle Unlimited as it only sold one copy wide this year. More on this in mid-January.

I will spend less time on social media. I have goals for Facebook in that I want to stop reading the comments on Public/Page Posts where all the toxic assholes exist. I also want to spend more time away from Facebook and reading more. Twitter will continue to be relegated to the automated bots. Keep up with my Instagram postings and interact more there. That’s about it.

I will blog more. I’m already blogging more now that I’m not doing a newsletter anymore. I will keep it up all year.

I will do at least one discussion post per month. I want my blog to be a place where we can discuss book-related stuff, so I’ll be looking for discussion topics once a month. I’m aiming for posting them around the 20th of every month.

I will develop a new method of income. I have two ideas here to develop more methods of income either from my writing or my writing expertise. Both of which I’m just brainstorming right now, so this goal is a little nebulous.

Personal Goals

I will read more. I did not read enough this year and that’s because I got discouraged with all the crap I kept trying to read and then hating. But I’m going to work on not being discouraged and moving onto better books so I can keep reading.

I will listen to 30+ audiobooks. If you missed it, I declared my intention to continue with the audiobook challenge this year and listen to 30 books. I have increased the pace of my books to 2x and I hope to listen to more of them.

I will walk 1000 miles in 2018. This was a great goal in 2017. I want to do it again this year!

I will lift weights twice a week – Tues and Thurs. I have these DVDs that I love that let me concentrate on an area for 10 min. I’m going to do 2 10-min sessions, Tuesday and Thursday each week, probably arms and abs.

I will finish the shawl I’m knitting and knit another one. This is self-explanatory. Gotta keep knitting!

I will meditate more. This is something I’ve seen other people doing and I’m intrigued. I’m totally a Capricorn in the fact that meditation feels like “lost time” though I know it’s not. I want to start with once a week and work my way up. If you have meditation recommendations, please leave them in the comments.

And that’s it! I think this is plenty to get me started in 2018. Phew! I’m already tired.

Sunday Update – December 31, 2017

Last Sunday Update of the year! And as such, I will be keeping this short and sweet since I need to concentrate on my New Year’s post for tomorrow and making proofreading changes to Daydreamer 4.

We didn’t do a heck of a lot this week. Christmas was nice and spent with family. I did all the driving which was good for my blood pressure. Lol. Amongst the top Christmas gifts I received were a sweet pair of AirPods for all of my audiobook listening, a pasta maker, and some fun writing books.

The rest of the week was spent indoors as much as possible. I finished off my antibiotics but I’m still not 100% well. My right ear is still all stuffed up. I’m waiting for it to drain, at this point. It’s FREEZING OUTSIDE. Like -5ºC and below, for most you who don’t use Fahrenheit. So we haven’t been going outside. The kids are restless and climbing the walls because most of their friends’ families are SMART and left to go someplace warmer for the holidays. Totally can’t blame them.

I’ve also been dealing with a problem on the WordPress side of my blog. One of my plugins went bad about two weeks ago and has been gumming up the works and making it impossible for me to schedule posts to go live here. So I spent some time fixing that, and it’s still not totally fixed. I’ll have to manually post to the blog until I get everything working correctly again. Sigh. It’s always something.

I’m looking at my calendar for January and getting anxious to get stuff done. I’m excited about concentrating on me and my work in 2018. But more on that in tomorrow’s blog post…

What else happened this week?

Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without decorating sugar cookies on Christmas Eve.

The opening of the presents!

I can’t wait to use these!

My kids each got bath bombs in their stockings. I loved this Earth one.

Halfway through the week, we did dentist appointments for both kids.

The kids got a Lego Dimensions set and it provided some much needed distraction.

We made it out one day to get dosas for lunch and hit the Asian grocery store.

And my youngest really wants to do more sewing so she got these little sewing kits for Christmas. I helped her put together this little octopus. Super kawaii!

Coming up this week on the blog: my New Year’s post, January Goals, Teaser Tuesday, and the monthly giveaway.

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A Look Back At 2017

Hoo boy. Looking back at this year, I’m surprised I survived. The dumpster fire that is our country tried really hard to suck me in and distract me. There were many days when I spent hours on Facebook, scrolling and hoping for good news, and then the day was over and I had done nothing. John Scalzi wrote a great post about how hard it is to stay creative in desperate times (and here at the LA Times) and it really resonated with me this year. It was hard to stay focused, and oftentimes, I could not.

Still, it was a fun and fruitful year, and lots of my goals became clarified by September. I started out the year strong with lots of walking and writing. We went to Disneyworld as a family in the summer and had the best time. And I enjoyed the fall in my wonderful park. I made a lot of decisions about the course of my career to come and kept the boat afloat through some hard times. All in all, I think I did rather well!

Let’s take a look at what I managed to do…

2015 was “The Year I Say No,” 2016 was “The Year I Give No Fucks,” and 2017 was supposed to be “The Year I Have Fun.”

Did I have fun this year with my career? No. Not always. I struggled a lot with my path on this author journey. I listened to too many people who gave me the wrong advice. I let other people tell me that my advice was worthless because I wasn’t successful. I had doubts. A lot of them. It wasn’t fun at all. I remember walking home one day from dropping the kids at school and thinking, “This is not ‘having fun,’ is it, Stephanie?”

It was then that I decided to do something about it. I left the majority of the Facebook author groups I belonged to, places that didn’t add anything positive to my life. I actually started my own author group on FB and filled it with people I love, which helped me have more fun. It wasn’t much longer before many of the author groups on FB either imploded or folded, so I feel like I did the right thing there.

I decided to get rid of things that did me no good, like my traditional newsletter. Now, I blog and my subscribers get all my posts instead, which is a much happier place for me. I got rid of paying for newsletter subscribers or paying for constant advertising that wasn’t working. It was really freeing! And I finally feel like my money is going towards things that make a difference.

Looking back at 2016 and the “Year I Give No Fucks” I’m really glad I had that base to work on for 2017. I continued to not care about stuff like making a best seller list or getting involved in a high-stakes box set or doing newsletter swaps with everyone. I told my awesome crit partner, Tracy, at some point that “I just pretend like I’m the only person on the planet publishing. I’m the only one who matters.” No competing. No comparisons. It’s just me and my books and whatever *I* want to do. That mindset has done me a lot of good in 2017.

All in all, I did well this year. I think my net income did grow because, even though I did spend a lot of money on ads, my gross income is much more than it was the previous year. I’ll have to do the books and find out, but I’m pretty sure I made *some* money. Hey, it’s better than nothing!

Books and Writing Goals Accomplished?

(All last year’s goals are in bold, and my notes on what happened with each come after)

I WILL PUBLISH FOUR BOOKS THIS YEAR. This is a tricky one because I technically published only 3 novels this year but then I also published a few other things. Here’s what came out:

THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE OPENS A TEA SHOP Feb 27, 2017

CRASH LAND ON KURAI Jul 18, 2017

SUMMER HAIKUS Oct 1, 2017 (Re-release)

CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD Nov 15, 2017

OZONI AND ONSENS: A DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE NOVELLA Dec 7, 2017 (Previously only for newsletter subscribers)

I WILL WRITE ALL YEAR LONG. Nope, I didn’t do this. I even took time off! Why? Because this was the year I had fun, and there’s nothing that kills fun like working every damned day. I did find myself always in the midst of a first draft or revisions on something though. It was nice not to have a dry spell.

I WILL START UP A PEN NAME BEFORE THE END OF THE YEAR. Nope, and I’m not sure I want a pen name now. I’m pretty sure I can do everything I want to do in publishing under this name. I don’t feel like starting over. That’s no fun.

I WILL MAKE SOME BOX SETS THIS YEAR. I did make a boxed set of the Nogiku Series and put it everywhere it needs to be. I also have a pre-order up for the Kami No Sekai Short Story Series that publishes in February. I’m not ready to box up The Daydreamer books yet. Maybe next year.

Marketing, Promotions, Advertising, and Social Media Goals Accomplished?

I WILL SPEND MONEY THIS YEAR. I did spend money this year on advertising. I bought Mark Dawson’s Ads for Authors course and I used it to make effective FB ads which I will continue to do more of in 2018. I continually spend money on Amazon ads every day. I did spend some money on growing my mailing list, which I won’t be doing anymore.

I WILL INCREASE MY MAILING LIST TO 10,000 SUBSCRIBERS. If anything, I went backwards on this goal. I realized that growing my mailing list was only costing me money and not gaining me the fans I was hoping for. My open rates plummeted and only a few people bought books when I had new launches. So now I’m not even using MailChimp anymore and I’m just using my blog, something I wanted to do from the beginning but many people told me that was a mistake. I’m not listening to those people anymore.

MY SOCIAL MEDIA WILL NOT CHANGE. This is the one goal I stuck to like glue. I said, “My Facebook personal profile is a place for me to be personal. I will continue to talk to people via my Facebook Page. Twitter is where I put stuff I’m interested in. Other than that, I will share my work to Google Plus and LinkedIn. My Tumblr is still doing well, and I will continue to post to Instagram every day.” And yeah, I did all of that, and that’s what I plan on doing next year too. Next year, though, I will spend less time on Facebook, more time reading.

Personal Goals Accomplished?

I WILL WALK 1000 MILES THIS YEAR. Yay!! I accomplished my goal in early December and I loved having that goal to work towards all year round. It kept me sane and centered. I can’t wait to get back to it in January. I’ll be doing it again.

I WILL PARTICIPATE IN THE AUDIOBOOK CHALLENGE. I did this and posted about it to the blog yesterday. Check out the post here.

I WILL KNIT MORE. My yearly goal actually panned out this year! I finished off the shawl I had been working on for years and started a new shawl, which I’m almost done with!

I WILL USE MY INSTAPOT AT LEAST ONCE A WEEK. This definitely happened and I’m still very happy with it.

What else happened in 2017?

We did a fair amount of traveling in 2017 including visiting my family in Charleston, we went to the indoor waterpark, Kalahari, in Eastern Pennsylvania, and then our big DisneyWorld trip in June, which was my favorite family vacation of all time.

I redesigned the blog this past summer. I was ready for a change and wanted something more flexible and easier to keep up to date. I also redesigned my header images and the images that share to FB for all posts going forward. I’m happy with the design and I plan to keep this design for three or more years.

We had that cool eclipse! The solar eclipse was so much fun. We made our viewing boxes and talked a lot about the science behind the eclipse. I really enjoyed it.

After kicking butt on my walking goal all year and then crossing the finish line, I got really sick in December. The head cold finally morphed to an upper respiratory infection and sinus infection and I needed antibiotics for the first time in over two years.

I saw lots of wildlife in the park! Deer, ducks, geese, herons, kingfishers, and a fox are at the top of the list for my favorite encounters.

I started doing monthly videos during the summer, and I love them. It was hard to remember to always take video every day, but after a month, it became habit. Some days I take extra videos so that I have some back-ups in case I forget one day. No big deal. I cheat a little. Lol. Haven’t seen my monthly videos? They’re on YouTube, and I post them every month in my goals posts.

I gave up going to the gym. At some point during the summer, I got so tired of waiting for the men in the gym to share the weight machines that I gave up and stopped going. There was one day when one asshole was using two machines at once, and he got mad at me when I sat at one of the machines. Of course, all of these guys are huge and intimidating, and I just didn’t want to go through the trouble of giving them a piece of my mind. I plan to do more weight lifting at home in 2018.

I stopped dyeing my hair. Yep. I decided to go gray and stop dyeing my hair. I may do some funky colors again like I did in 2012 and 2013, but otherwise I just didn’t want to deal with the hassle of it anymore.

I bought a PC. This is a true shocker. I basically bought a PC to be my dictation machine. So far, so good. I don’t hate it, but I only use it when I’m writing a first draft. Otherwise, I use my Mac all the time.

And finally, I switched over to Vellum for all of my ebooks and print books. I’m very happy with the convenience of Vellum and I love the design of all of my books now. This is one of my favorite purchases of 2017!

My Favorite Blog Posts

These are my favorite blog posts of 2017!

Patience Is A Virtue – Good things come to those who wait… Yes, it’s true.

On The Merits Of Author Dreams – An essay in which I talk about dreams, success, and keeping going.

Losing (And Finding) My Way – I changed how I wrote and lost my way. Now I’m back to where I started.

The Results Of My Reader Survey – Here are the results of my reader survey! (Video)

Neon Beast – I finished this knitting project I had been working on for almost three years! Meet Neon Beast!!

Happy 4th Anniversary In Publishing! – It’s my fourth anniversary of being a publishing author! Here are all my positive and negative takeaways from this year and what to expect in Year Five and beyond…

Why I’m No Longer Using A Mailing List – I’m making the transition to using my blog with a notification system to reach my readers and here’s why.

Let’s Make Salmon Hot Pot! – Recipe – This is my favorite thing about winter! Enjoy this hot pot treat and fill up your belly with salmon soup and lots of veggies. You’ll love it.

Japan Tea Shop Inspiration – Tea is an important part of Japan and my books! Let’s look at some inspirational photos for Mei’s tea shop from THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE OPENS A TEA SHOP.

And That’s It!

Come back on January 1st to hear about my goals and aspirations for 2018!

The post A Look Back At 2017 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

2017 Audiobook Challenge Round-Up + 2018 Audiobook Challenge Goal

Well, I’m excited to say that I more than met my 2017 Audiobook Challenge goal! If you want to see what the Audiobook Challenge is all about, you can read up on Caffeinated Reviewer’s final 2017 post of the year. I chose the Stenographer level of 10-15 audiobooks for the year and managed way more than that. Let’s look at the list.

BABYLON’S ASHES by James SA Corey
WRITE TO MARKET by Chris Fox
AN UNWELCOME QUEST by Scott Meyer
HEARTLESS by Marissa Meyer
EARTH ALONE by Daniel Arenson
THE HANDMAID’S TALE by Margaret Atwood
COLLAPSING EMPIRE by John Scalzi
A SCONE TO DIE FOR by HY Hanna
EARTH RISING by Daniel Arenson
INDEPENDENCE by Nick Webb
GODS OF RISK: AN EXPANSE NOVELLA by James SA Corey
LAUNCH TO MARKET: EASY MARKETING FOR AUTHORS by Chris Fox
STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND by Robert A Heinlein
TEA WITH MILK AND MURDER by HY Hanna
THRONE OF GLASS by Sarah J Maas
CROWN OF MIDNIGHT by Sarah J Maas
TWO DOWN, BUN TO GO by HY Hanna
EARTH FIRE by Daniel Arenson
DEFY THE STARS by Claudia Gray
THE ILLUMINAE FILES by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman
TILL DEATH DO US TART by HY Hanna
ARTEMIS by Andy Weir
STRANGE DOGS by James SA Corey

I thought I would be done with the audiobook I’m listening to right now before the New Year but it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. But still, 23 audiobooks is a great showing for me and a heck of a lot more listening than I thought I would do. I’m pleased with my results!

What was my favorite audiobook of the year?

I think it’s a tie between DEFY THE STARS which not only had great narration but also a fantastic storyline and ARTEMIS which I just wrote about in this week’s Book Chat. ARTEMIS combined great storytelling with an awesome narrator as well, Rosario Dawson. I loved both of these to death! Coming in third place was definitely HANDMAID’S TALE narrated by Claire Danes. She was the perfect narrator for that story.

2018 Audiobook Challenge

For 2018, I’m going to up my game to the level of “My Precious (I had my earbuds surgically implanted) 30+” audiobooks. I’m currently listening to my audiobooks at 1.5x speed so I might try increasing that to 2x speed. We’ll see if I’m comfortable with that!

Want to participate in the 2018 Audiobook Challenge? Head on over to Caffeinated Reviewer and sign up!

Did you have a favorite audiobook this year? Let me know in the comments.

The post 2017 Audiobook Challenge Round-Up + 2018 Audiobook Challenge Goal appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.