Tonight I’m going to celebrate the end of 2013 with panache and class.

Yep, I’m going to crack open a bottle of champagne, cook up some finger foods and pass out around 11:30PM. That’s just how I roll.

I’m so hardcore.

I’m looking back over 2013 and I must say I’m rather pleased with what I’ve accomplished. I passed my 2013 word count goal of 370,000 by a lot (501,200 is the rounded down number) and finished Wraithkin (100,000 words). I also wrote the sequel to Homeworld with Eric Brown in September (another… 75,000 words?), and saw four anthologies I’m in be published (What Scares the Boogeyman?, Dreams of Steam IV: Gizmos, Dreamers in Hell, and Mental Ward: Echoes of the Past). I’m writing a sooper seekrit project with Mark Wandrey right now, which should be done by March or April. I moved, which was a big deal (I liked Kentucky, but I love living in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia). I got a dog. I joined my first fan club/organization. I kept my (relative) sanity.

Good things, all said in done.

For 2014, I have some very specific goals. First, I’d like to hit a word count goal of 500,000 words this coming year. Granted, this is going to be a bigger challenge than 2013’s goal, simply because I’ll have to average almost 1,700 words a day. That’s not a lot, per se, but it’s still enough to make me work. I’d like to finish Darkling, the sequel to Wraithkin, by September. I’d like to have my project with Mark done by April. I also owe my editor a bunch of Tobias Fox stories, as well as his first novel. I’d like to write a Star Trek novel, but I’d have to bug the agent about that one.

Things I’d like to get done: write the first Failsafe novel, titled A Banner Burned. That’s… probably not going to happen, simply because the amount of other projects I have to finish before then. I’d also like to write another novel in Eric Brown’s Homeworld universe, starring Saul, but that’s a “maybe sorta kinda” thing. I also would like to write Obliterator, the sequel to Corruptor, by the end of 2014, as well as begin Devastator. The Warp universe isn’t going anywhere, and with the advances in tech that have been sprouting up in recent years since I first wrote Corruptor (way back in… 2005? 2006?), I’ve gotten some awesome new ideas for the world (nice to see that my prediction of cloud-based free gaming came true) and really don’t want to waste the characters I have running around there (primarily Tori and Dylan). 

I’m hoping to get more reviews done for Shiny Book Review, but that might not happen. If I can manage three a month I’d be happy, but I may have to settle for merely two. 

I’m also looking forward to seeing more stories I’ve written be published. Anthologies such as Terror by Gaslight, Hero’s Best Friend, Sha’Daa Facets, and Heroes All should be coming out in 2014, and all of them have stories I’ve written featured within. I’m also looking forward to the latest Dresden novel, Skin Game. I’m hoping that George R. R. Martin lives long enough to finish A Song of Fire and Ice.

I hope that my brother stays safe while finishing up his final rotation to A-stan. I hope my dad stays (relatively) healthy.

But most of all, I hope that everyone has a reasonably satisfactory 2014. I mean, there’s always some bad with the good. I’m hoping that the bad is outweighed by the tremendous good.