Bringing my Heroes Home

 It's official, y'all. With the release of the fifth and final novel, the menopausal superhero series is now complete!

 

This has been the work of a little more than ten years, and there's a lovely symmetry in that the first book came out in 2015, and the final in 2025. 

Origin story: This series started because I watched an X-men movie with my husband, and we were talking, as we often do, while we walked the dog afterwards. I was joking that the underlying message of X-men stories is always that hormones cause superpowers, and if that was the case, menopausal women should have the corner on that market!

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 He laughed and told me to write it down. So I did. 

And to my surprise, it was more than just a little joke--it was the opportunity to create a group of female characters finding community, purpose, and love while they deal with the changes wrought in the life by changes in their bodies. Metaphorical AF, right? 

The journey: Writing them was cathartic, joyful, and sometimes heartbreaking, bringing together my personal struggles and fears surrounding aging, friendship, and what perimenopause was doing to my body, my brain, and my life alongside my lifetime love of superhero stories. 

 

The shirt says "what doesn't kill you, mutates and tries again" 

I LOVE how I ended the series, and can't wait to share this with readers. 

The whole series is available direct from the publisher as an ebook bundle: 

buy here

 

You can also get it a book at a time from the Big River site, or request it from your favorite bookseller in paperback or hardback. 

The series in order:

 

 

Going Through the Change, where it all begins. Meet Helen, Jessica, Patricia, and Linda/Leonel and laugh and cry with them as they struggle with the sudden development of unusual abilities amid their busy lives, and find each other along the way. 

Part of what I wanted to explore is what a heroic life might look like for a woman with a grown-up life: a career, children, a household, a partner. Responsibilities. This book was the start of all of that.  

 

 

  

 

Friend or Foe, a novella, serves as a bridge story between the first and second novels, and a peek inside the mind of the mad scientist who caused all this trouble in the first place, Dr. Cindy Liu. 

This novella is also included in Agents of Change, which collects the novellas and short stories in a single volume.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Change of Life, the second novel in the series, all the characters are dealing with the aftermath of the events of book one: the affects on their relationships, families, jobs, and psyches. The plot centers around Patricia, the Lizard Woman of Springfield, and her quest for answers and vengeance. 

This book introduces Daniel Price, one of my favorite creepy villains. He's been body hopping for a hundred years in a a quest to extend his own life, with no regard to who gets hurt (or killed) along the way.  

 

 

  

 

 In Face the Change, our heroes come together to work for the Unusual Cases Unit of the mysterious Department run by the Director and learn about hero life in the spotlight. As they fight The Six, a mysterious group of psychic villains, they deepen their personal connections, finding strength in each other.  

An unexpected romance came into play in this one. I LOVE it when my characters surprise me. 

 

 

 

The Good Will Tour is another novella, which works pretty well as a stand alone if you want to try the series at low investment.  Jessica "Flygirl" Roark and Leonel (formerly Linda) "Fuerte" Álvarez set out to build community good will with a celebrity visit to the local hospital and end up needing to save the day when a desperate earthquake causing woman shows up demanding experimental treatment for her wife. 

This novella is also included in Agents of Change, which collects the novellas and short stories in a single volume.   

 

 

 

Just when our heroes thought they had things figured out, a mysterious power spike challenges their control of their abilities in Be the Change. 

I had a wonderful time expanding on Patricia's backstory in this one, introducing her mother, stepfather, and some information on her siblings and half-siblings. And Daniel Price is back because he was too good not to bring back. 

 

 

 

 

 

And here's the new girl in town: the series ender: Change for the Better. Readers will probably have noticed that Jessica "Flygirl" Roark has been…odd. Things escalate in this book and the menopausal superheroes have to scramble to save one of their own, while they face down enemies within and the return of Daniel Price and the shadowy mystery man, Bertrand Dietrich.  

I'm really proud of that final fight scene and that last chapter will hit you right in the feels. 

 

 

 

 

Through Thick & Thin is a collection of side-stories for the menopausal superheroes. It’s confession time in "Coming Out as Leonel." Join Patricia, the Lizard Woman, as she unravels the puzzle of Dr. Cindy Liu's disappearance in "The Right Thing," and then see her softer side (and her "better half," Suzie) in "Underestimated." Get ready for a wedding, and a heroic rescue, in "Flygirl's Second Chance."

These can be read separately of the novels, but I think you'll enjoy them more if you've already read at least books one and two. They're also all included in Agents of Change. 

 

 

 

 This anthology collects the novels and short stories into a single volume. 

• Friend or Foe
• The Good Will Tour
• "Coming out as Leonel" 
• "The Right Thing" 
• "Underestimated"
• "Flygirl's Second Chance"  

(this might be my favorite cover in the series, combining the silhouettes we used for the novels with the stripes or rays we used in the short work) 

 

 

 

I have some readings from all this work available on YouTube or in the Menopausal Superheroes slideshow on the "Read My Work" link in this website.  

And if that's not enough Menopausal Superheroes for you, you can also read another short story, "Intervention", exploring the background of Patricia and Cindy Liu in Theme-Thology: Mad Science or read a couple of free holiday stories I created for my newsletter subscribers: O Scaly Night (Patricia's version of Santa Claus is…violent) and (Flygirl's son gets to see her in action) Max's Mommy. 

If you find me or my publisher, Falstaff Books, at a convention or other in-person event, you can also get the very cool omnibus edition (second volume coming soon), and I hope to be able to share links for audiobooks in the near future.  

I'm working on a book tour this fall and winter to celebrate the completion of this series, so you may have a chance to come see me in your neck of the woods!  

Thanks to all of you who came along with me on this journey. Writing is great, but we need readers to make it worthwhile and I am so pleased that so many of you have connected to my characters and found escape and expression with me in these stories. 

May you find strength when you need it, joy in friendship, and love in one form or another.  

Wasting time? Or filling the well? An open book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

What is your favorite way to waste time? (be non-productive) Bird watching? Long walks? Does it help your writing?

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I'm…not very good at being nonproductive. Or as other have put it, I don't know how to relax. 

I've got a restless energy most of the time and a drive that can be unhealthy at times. This feeling that there isn't enough time to get all I want out of this life. 

But I have learned to value a few activities that aren't directly productive for the recharge, reset, and brain-wandering time that lets my subconscious figure things out.  

Plants are a big one for me. I'm a plant appreciator, even though I'm not an especially skilled gardener. I love to go on long walks in the woods or in parks, or even just in my neighborhood and "see what's growing." I have a plant app that tells me interesting things like the variety of names that plant is known by and whether this is a healthy specimen or not. I take a lot of photos so I can share my joy in all these small beauties with friends and on social media.

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 Baking and cooking is another one, though not in the summer--I melt! I love picking something I've never made before and trying it out. Bonus if it means I get to try out a new-to-me ingredient or piece of kitchen equipment. Bonus bonus: you get to eat your work!

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I also enjoy board games, watching old movies (with popcorn), and playing with my dogs. 

When I need to just zone out, my ADD brain requires multi-tasking. I put on an audiobook or a television show/movie that doesn't require my full visual attention, and listen/watch while I play a pattern matching game on my handheld video-gaming device. Currently, I'm back on Dr. Mario on my Switch, but the game changes every few months.  

 None of these feel like wasted time to me though. I can feel the ways that they feed me, fueling me for other endeavors. So maybe the truth is that I still don't know how to waste time.  

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Revision: An open book blog hop post

 

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Discuss: "Write the book you want to rewrite—because most of writing is revising! Don’t agonize over every word in a first draft; that will only slow you down. Just write the story. Get it onto the page. Drafting is the stage where you capture the idea. Revising is where you figure out how to really tell the story well." -Beth Kander, author of I Made It Out of Clay
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Revision works differently for everyone. Heck, I feel like it works differently for me depending on the project. Never the same game twice.

This quote from Beth Kander sounds to me like it's advocating for what I've heard termed the "vomit draft" or "garbage draft" where you write a complete draft without letting yourself go back and revise while you're still drafting. I have quite a few writer friends and critique partners who swear by this technique. 

It doesn't work for me though. 

I'm more of an iterative writer, working in loops. As we've discussed here before, I'm a discovery writer, or a pantser, which means I'm not working from an outline of any sort, but just following my writing where it takes me and shaping it into an effective narrative throughout the drafts. 

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 I write linearly for the most part, most of the time, but if I hit upon an idea that will significantly change the rest of the book, I've got a decision to make: fix it now or later.

Fix it later: Sometimes, I just pop a comment or a note into the document to remind future me to go back and change something later. That's usually if it's small and won't have a huge effect on the story, but is important to address for continuity. Something like changing a detail about a character like their name, appearance, etc. Or adding a bit that will change a particular moment in the plot, but won't spillover into the whole thing.

Fix it now: On the other hand, if it's a bigger change where it feels like it's harder to predict how that will affect the larger narrative, I might not be able to move on until I've figured out how that changes what I've already written. It all builds after all, and if this significantly alters a character, it might affect other choices they've made in the narrative and take the whole story in a new directions. So, I need to go back to the beginning and pull that thread through before I move forward again.

Now, that said, I definitely agree that, especially for a book-length work, it's important that you're invested enough in the idea to be really dedicated, because you are going to be living in that imaginary world for months, maybe even years. 

 It took me ten years to write the entirety of the Menopausal Superheroes series from the first page to the final "The End" and I couldn't have stayed with it without true passion about the story and the characters. It's a real commitment! 

Usually, by the time I'm ready to send a book off to a publisher for consideration, it's been through three or four of those weird looping drafts I do my own, plus one or two rounds of revision based on feedback from critique partners and beta readers. 

If a publisher accepts it, then it will go through at least two more rounds of revision based on editorial and proofreading feedback. Then, there's the final "spit and polish" read through in hopes of catching any little errors that made it through all of that uncorrected. By my count, that's at least eight rounds of revisions--and that's when the process goes relatively smoothly. 

I have one published novel (the third in my series: Face the Change) that went through a revise and resubmit process because I tried to rush it and what I sent the first time wasn't really ready. So, that was the whole process over again. Whew! 

It's definitely a lot. But I actually enjoy revision. It can be very satisfying in the same way that reorganizing a closet or spring cleaning is--you see the difference it makes and you know that life will be better now because you made the effort.

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The Hardest Format, an Open Book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

What has been the hardest format to write in for you?
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I've tried on a lot of different literary forms over the years. They're all difficult at first, because they're new. And each project is it's own critter, so even if it's a form I've written before, it's still a new challenge.

I began, in childhood as a poet, in formal and free-verse styles. I stopped pursuing poetry seriously (i.e. with an eye to publication) in my thirties, but I still write it for myself and sometimes share it. I might still someday produce a collection if I ever have enough that fit together that way. (My published poetry is all under my maiden name--Samantha Dunaway).

I really got into personal essays in my later twenties, writing a few that made it into magazines and newspapers. I was especially proud of a few that made it into We Alaskans. That led directly into some newspaper work as a book columnist for the Bering Strait (now defunct) and the Nome Nugget and attracted me to blogging where I could "sound off" more freely in this not-journalism-but-not-fiction area. 

I played with short stories off and on along the way but didn't really start to feel like I understood and made good use of the form until 2014 or so. Now I LOVE writing short stories, especially for anthologies, for the opportunity to try on different styles and genres without the long-term commitment that a novel entails. At this point, I've had 25 or so short stories published of 73 that I currently have in my pieces list on Duotrope. I'm in the middle of writing two new ones right now.

(SIDEBAR: Duotrope has been really useful to me for tracking submissions and helping me find places to submit my work. I pay $5 a month and consider it well worth it. It's great for folks like me who struggle to organize this stuff, and it's searchable, so I can make sure I didn't send that same story to that venue a year ago and just forgot.)

After my second child was born (2007) and I needed something to help pull me out of Post-partum depression, I joined a group of novel writers and started trying to write a novel. I started and abandoned three before I finished one. That one remains unpublished and is shelved for now, but I've since written an entire five novel series (The Menopausal Superheroes I'm always talking about) and seen it accepted for publication by two different publishers. So excited to bring that one to a close this summer! I've got several other partially completed novels I plan to finish up soon.

Novels are BIG, and it took me a while to develop a process and be able to track work that large and keep it consistent over a longer creation period. But discovering Scrivener software helped me a lot. It's so easy to re-arrange work and use color coding and image labels to help track things like POV or then-and-now timelines.

I've also written a couple of novellas along the way. I quite enjoy this form--longer than a short story, but not as involved as a novel, bridging what I love about short stories and what I love about novels. In fact, the project I'm working on now is a trilogy of romance novellas and I'm loving working on them. 

So that's a long-winded answer to a relatively simple question. The short version: short stories took me the longest to feel competent at, so I guess they've been the hardest for me. 

But I LOVE to try new things. Maybe screenplays will be next. I've got some friends who do some writing for indie films and that could be amazing to try my hand at.

So, how about you? Have you tried a variety of formats? What proved most challenging for you?

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Tools of the Trade, an IWSG post

    

Welcome to the first Wednesday of the month. You know what that means! It's time to let our insecurities hang out. Yep, it's the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop. If you're a writer at any stage of career, I highly recommend this blog hop as a way to connect with other writers for support, sympathy, ideas, and networking. If you're a reader, it's a great way to peek behind the curtain of a writing life.

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG.  The awesome co-hosts for the July 3 posting of the IWSG are JS Pailly, Rebecca Douglass, Pat Garcia, Louise-Fundy Blue, and Natalie Aguirre!

July 3 question - What are your favorite writing processing (e.g. Word, Scrivener, yWriter, Dabble), writing apps, software, and tools? Why do you recommend them? And which one is your all time favorite that you cannot live without and use daily or at least whenever you write?

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Scrivener was a game-changer for me for novel-writing (and other long-form works, like nonfiction, essay collections, or short story collections). 

A great visual of why I love Scrivener

When I was writing my first novel, back in 2009 or so, I was using Microsoft Word and it was frustrating AF for me. One giant document, with no way to jump around within it quickly and easily to get to the piece I wanted? 

(My understanding is that Word has upped its game since then, but too late, I've moved on. I now only use Word for processing edits from my publisher). 

I'm not 100% sure in my memory of how I found Scrivener. Maybe by doing National Novel Writing Month? But it won me instantly with the corkboard. Suddenly I could keep the whole thing in view in a way that really worked for me. 

See, I'm a writer who writes in layers. 

My drafts begin kind of thin and bare-bones, and as I work, I come back around in loops and add depth, descriptions, breadcrumbs, interiority, setting, as it comes to me. So that means I don't necessary start on page one and finish on page three hundred, but I might write a scene that I know isn't coming for a while to give myself sort of a goal post to aim at, then go back and fill in what happens to get us there. Or I might have an inspiration in chapter 17 and go back and pull that thread through the whole book before I move forward. It's probably not an efficient process, but it is working for me.  

chapter organizational view

I've never been all that great at holding the whole thing in my head at once, balancing the big picture, small focus thing. But Scrivener makes it easy for me to off-load parts of that. I can color code my folders, use symbols to indicate different organizational elements, pick up entire chapters and drag them to a different part of the book with ease. I've never lost something to a messy cut-and-paste or glitched out the document and screwed up the formatting like often happened to me Word. 

The novel I'm finishing now (series ender for the Menopausal Superheroes--still settling on a title), for example, is organized by day, with chapters that all take place on the same day grouped together. 

Within each day, there are chapters with different points of view. Patricia, the Lizard woman of Springfield, gets a green book symbol, Leonel "Fuerte", the strongman, gets a yellow book. Jessica "Flygirl" gets a cloud, Sally Ann gets a light bulb, Mary gets a magnifying glass. This lets me see at a glance when I've left a character out too long and need to consider what they're up to during this section. 

corkboard view

When I look at this in "corkboard" I get the same symbols, my chapter title, and a bit of the text for the page. If I choose, I can write more of a summary of that chapter to show here and I have done that sometimes, using the "scene cards" technique I read about in the DIY-MFA book by Gabriela Pereira, which asks you to record 4 pieces of information for each chapter/scene:

• a title for the scene
• the major players
• the action
• the purpose (structurally)

It's a kind of outlining or at least record-keeping that works for me, even though I'm a pantser and am sometimes writing this down AFTER I wrote the scene, and has been really helpful in revisions. 

I don't use half of what Scrivener can do, but it has still revolutionized the whole process for me and alleviated a lot of stress and worry. 

So, thanks for coming to my TED-talk :-) In all seriousness, I am quite a fan-girl of Scrivener, but you should always remember how individual this process is and find the tool that works best for you and your process. No matter what we're talking about, your mileage my vary. 

So, how do you organized your creative life and projects? I'd LOVE to hear it about in the comments. And don't forget to check out the rest of the blog hop and see what else is out there to try!

Celebration time, an open book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Do you have a special way of celebrating when you finish writing a book? Or other achievements in your journey? How do you reward yourself?
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When I finish writing the first draft of a novel, I'm so elated that I almost don't need any other celebration. I feel like I could float away from the joy of completing the book. I imagine it feels similar to what athletes experience when they get to the top of a mountain or the end of a race.  

I do, however, tell my inner support circle right away--my husband, my kids, my sister, my mother, my critique partners. Those are the folks who have been in the struggle with me for the months or years that it took to bring a project to fruition and they'll rejoice with me. 

In fact, I just got there once again at the end of June, on my writer's retreat to the mountains of North Carolina. How perfect to run into the main room, arms in the air, and take a victory lap, with my critique partners right there to whoop and holler with me. I should always try to finish a book while on writer's retreat!

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Of course, finishing *writing* a novel isn't really the end of that journey. There's still editing, revisions, and the actual publishing process. 

The BEST moment is when I hold the paper copy of my work in my hands for the first time. I keep a spinner rack in my office that has paper copies of all my novels and short stories in anthologies on it and it's a major boost to me just to look over and see how many books are there. 

For my first novel in this series, which was also my debut novel, Going Through the Change,  I had a book launch party at a local bookstores. Cookies and punch, copies of the book for sale, a Phil Donahue-style interview with me by a writing friend, reading from the book. My whole family came out and so did everyone local enough to me and it was one of the best nights of my life. 

Me, my daughter, and my dad, looking happy and related at my book launch party in 2015.

In fact, I think I'm going to do it again for this book. After all, it's the series ender, coming out ten years after the first book. Finishing the entire five book series (and accompanying novellas and shorts) feels like something to really celebrate. 

4 novels, 2 novellas, some shorts, and a collection of all the shorts.
One more novel coming soon!

In fact, I'm working on setting up a book tour for it, hoping to partner with some of my writer friends across the country and hit a string of bookstores, libraries, and other venues. 

(Hit me up, writer friends, if you might be interested in partnering with me on events in 2025, especially if our work has any obvious connections: feminism, aging, menopause, superheroes, female friendship, etc.)

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Too old or young for writing? An open book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

How old is too old to be a writer? Too young? 

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One of the great things about writing is that it's something a person can do at any age. 

Once you're literate in at least one language, at whatever age that is, you can start writing. 

And even at the other end of the spectrum, when some of us start to struggle with things like fine motor control, vision, and mental endurance (if we weren't already), writing is still a possibility, even if you have to change the tools you use to do it. 

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Since I'm a writer who didn't start taking this seriously until I was 42, I'm probably a little biased towards older writers, but I've met some very talented very young ones, too (and I only get a little jealous that they've gotten it together sooner than I did). 

Each stage of life comes with its own insights and wisdom, so a writer isn't necessarily more or less prepared to take on a story or a topic based on their age. Experience isn't age-specific. Neither is imagination. I'd argue more that skill comes with practice and effort, things that a person of any age can invest in. 

Personally, I feel like I'm about 35, and I've felt like I was about 35 since I was about 15. (In reality, I'm soon to be 53). 

My writing life is going well. I'm pleased with what I create and happy to be finding an audience. I've got the confidence to say no to opportunities that aren't going to be good for me, and not eat myself up with worry about whether I've made the right decision afterwards. 

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I'm good with how it worked out for me, and only occasionally mad at myself for "wasting" time in my younger years. After all, the things I did then made me who I am now and brought the people I love into my life. Travel, home-making, reading stories to my children, and walking in the woods may not have earned me any publishing credits at the time, but all those experiences feed what I write now. So, they were worth it, both intrinsically and extrinsically. 

But you know what? People are judgy, especially on the internet. No matter what you do and when you do it, someone will disapprove and try to make you feel inadequate. 

Don't let them! 

Art is for all ages and stages. 

Do it for you!

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Still writing, after all these years, an open book blog hop post

  

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Do you ever ask yourself if you are still a writer?

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Though I have plenty of moments of doubt in the pursuit of my creative life, my identity as a writer is never in question. I have always written (since I first learned how!), and will always write. 

Writing is how I process the world, my feelings, events…all of it. Like the quote from EM Forster: "How can I tell what I think till I see what I say?"

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Publishing is another kettle of fish though. It can really feel like there's no return-on-investment in seeking publication and audience for your work. If you let your identity as a writer get tied to your financial or critical success in publishing, losing heart is almost inevitable. 

There's going to be rejection. There are going to be poor reviews and unkindness and judgmental behavior. It's a risk you take, when you put your art out there, hoping for connection, hoping to find someone who "gets" what you're doing. 

Not everyone will. 

When it's been a long time since I've seen anything into print, I can have some doubts about my publishing career, start to feel that imposter syndrome pulling down on my soul. 

But, no, I never have to ask if I'm a writer. I write, therefore I am. Or, maybe I am, and therefore I write. Either way, it's not possible for me to give that up. 

Do you have to fight off doubting demons in your creative endeavors? How do you pull yourself out? I'd love to hear about in the comments! 

(the earworm from my title: 

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Top 5 of 2023, an open book blog hop post

 

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

Tell us the top five best things that have happened to you in the past year. (Focus on writing, but other things are allowed)

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I'm not sure these are in order, but here are five great things about my 2023 in writing: 

1. Day job success: 

This might seem off topic for a post about my writing successes, but my day job as a content strategist at a big financial company (a new career which I started in May of 2022) is going well. I like the work, but it doesn't drain me dry like teaching did. It pays better, too, which alleviates some stress. 

And all of that makes for a better writing life. It's hard to focus on your imaginary friends if you're worried about feeding your real family, after all. 

2. Convention time feeds my inspiration and energy

I went to several conventions and events this year, promoting my published work, networking, and just enjoying feeling successful and just a little bit famous. My work sold well at several of these, and I got to participate in some great panel discussions, and meet a few writing world celebrities. 

Highlights include having someone who had not read my work before buy the $100 omnibus edition of the Menopausal Superhero series (what a show of faith!), talking with horror author Gabino Iglesias about Puerto Rico and parenting while writing while we shared a signing table, and visiting the Poe Museum with Esther Friesner, a comedic fantasy author known for Chicks in Chainmail. 

In front of the Poe Museum with writing friends

Now that I've been doing "the con circuit" for eight years, I've got this whole family of writer friends and it's a joy to get time to spend with them a few times a year. 

3. Travel! Puerto Rico, Beach, PNW

The opportunity to travel is one of the great joys of my life and I had three lovely trips this year: to Puerto Rico with all the Bryants (including the elder daughter's partner), to the beach with my youngest kiddo and a few of their best friends for birthday aquarium fun, and to the Seattle area of Washington with my mom to visit my sister. That's a lot for one year!

The family in a park in PR

Travel always sets my brain and spirit alight, and that's got to be good for my wordsmithing. I wouldn't be at all surprised if El Yunque or the beach or Rattlesnake Lake shows up in something I write soon. 

4. Two new publications

I didn't publish a lot this year--my focus has been on the series-ending novel for the Menopausal Superheroes series, which hasn't left me much time to focus on submitting short stories or writing other new pieces. So, I was pleased as punch to still manage to get two new stories into anthologies this year!

My new anthologies!

You can read "The New Guy" a bit of science fiction set on an off-world botany lab in Breaking Free, an anthology from my critique group and "The Other Jack" a horror piece with urban legend vibes in Tangle & Fen from Crone Girls Press, a small feminist horror press I've had the pleasure of working with several times now. 

If you check them out, remember to leave a review! More reviews = more visibility, even if they are brief. 

5. Progress on that series-ending novel

The first Menopausal Superhero novel, Going Through the Change, came out in 2015 and I've been writing in that universe ever since, seeing three more novels, two novellas, and a collection of shorts into the world, as well as that omnibus edition I was telling you about. 

I love my heroes, and have enjoyed writing these action-adventure-comedy-women's fiction books, but it's time to move on to other projects, so I'm also happy to be wrapping it up. 

But writing a series-ender is a different sort of writing task than writing "the next one" and it's taken me longer than the others. I feel like I'm near the end now, though, and I'm hopeful that I'll be able to share the finished series with you in 2025! (That seems far away, but it'll also go quickly, I know). 

It'll be the end of an era, and I'm hoping to celebrate with a big publication party and maybe a book tour. We'll see what me and my publisher come up with :-)

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So, that's my year in words. I hope 2023 was kind to you as well, giving you a lot to feel grateful for as the year comes to an end. Don't forget to check out the other posts in this blog hop and leave me a comment letting me know how your 2023 went. 

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Teacher-Writer-Mom, an Open Book blog post

Welcome to Open Book Blog Hop. You can find us every Monday talking about the writing life. I hope you'll check out all the posts: you'll find the links at the bottom of this post.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? 

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I'm that rare and odd creature: the person who became what they said they were going to be when they were a kid. I would occasionally flirt with other ambitions, catching an enthusiasm from a book or a movie. There was my brief affair with archaeology, and my short-lived interest in law, but I always circled back to the trinity: 

Teacher-Writer-Mom

I was about 5 when I decided I was going to be a teacher, a writer, and a mom. I announced it to my family at a holiday party. Everyone nodded sagely and went back to their cigarettes (it was the 70s). 

I loved school, books, and kids, so it seemed like a no-brainer to me. Of course, my vision of what being any of things was like was, well, less than accurate. I had no idea how overwhelming all three of those roles can be individually, let alone wrapped up into a single person-sized package. 

I imagined that teachers got paid to play with kids, that writers got paid to make up stories. I knew moms didn't get paid, but they still got to hang out and play with kids all day, so it couldn't be all bad. I'd have plenty of money from teaching and writing, right?

With that childish understanding of money and time, I assumed I'd have a lovely country estate with a tower room to write in and someone tending my garden and horses, and plenty of energy to handle all of these things. 

But I did do them all…eventually. 

Just not all three of them at the same level all the time. 

I got my first teaching job fresh out of college and continued to teach for 27 years before I left the career for something less stressful and more lucrative (I'm a Content Strategist for a big financial company now). 

I had my first kid when I was in my late twenties, and started to scale back my teaching a little. I volunteered for fewer extras, streamlined to try to lessen the amount of work I took home every night. But then I was doing two of the three: teaching and momming. Sometimes I wrote. 

I had my second kid in my mi-thirties. I scaled back my teaching even more. I gave up teaching English and began teaching beginning Spanish which had a lighter paper grading load and could more easily be forced to stay within working hours only, if I was disciplined. Sometimes I wrote

Throughout all those years, I always wrote, off and on, when the mood hit me, when I could steal the time and focus. But it took me a while to get around to finishing and publishing things, in part because of teaching and momming. There are, after all, only the 24 hours a day. 

But I started taking it seriously when I was 42. And that was another rebalancing, taking time for myself, and negotiating space for a writing life with my career and family. I guess I'd built up a head of steam, though, because once I committed and focused, I got my first book contract with two years, and I've worked steadily ever since. 

Here we are 10 years later, and I've got 41 titles to my name, counting all the editions: everything from short stories included in anthologies, to novellas, to novels, and even a poem or two. 

My Amazon page

I did it y'all: I'm a teacher-writer-mom, even if I technically don't teach for a living anymore. 

How about you? What did you imagine for your adult self when you were a child? Is that what happened? 

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