Non Hughes

So that post from last year was a bit of a downer, huh!

I was feeling very doom and gloom, dragging my feet from rewrites to edits and staring at the words with empty eyes… Nothing was going to get better, I was never going to be good enough, why bother chasing my dreams? It’s so much work with no guarantee of pay-off, and it hurts.

Turns out I was suffering from depression and anemia! They did a pincer movement on me, and I didn’t have the capacity to feel positive. Honestly, looking back at last year I’m amazed I managed not only to write the book, but to rewrite it better. Every week, I sat down and slogged my way through.

And you know what? I really like the book. I’m proud of myself. Even if it’s not the one that lands me an agent, or the one that gets me published, and even if middle-grade is going through a major slump that seems to have no end, I’m going to keep going because I love what I write. I love writing.

Reading has helped a lot with that, actually. I took time over the Winter to read good middle-grade fiction both from established and debut authors. It helped me reconnect with what I love about books. I also did a lot of beta reading for people this year, which was humbling and lovely. I was able to help people who were making mistakes I’ve already learnt from, and learn from those much further along in the craft than me. It’s truly the best thing you can do for your writing.

Looking back at 2024, even though I didn’t meet my goal of getting queries out to literary agents by autumn, I feel accomplished. The book I wrote in January-March was so much better than any book I’d written before, and the Summer rewrite overtook it. Every book I write is better than the last, and so long as I keep going, it truly is inevitable that I will meet my goals. Probably. Maybe.

I finally sent out those queries in the last couple of weeks, which is really scary. A whole year of work is likely to slurp right down the drain and get me nothing but rejections, just like last time. But if last time taught me anything, it’s that everything will be fine. I was so demoralised after my last book got crickets, and I felt like giving up, but I didn’t and I’m a better writer for it. If I’m rejected again, I’ll just write a better book again.

Speaking of writing a better book, I’m in the process of planning my next project. I think it’s as commercial as a book set in the Iron Age can be, and I’m already having a lot of fun. Turns out it’s easier to enjoy things when you’re getting all the medications you need. xD

2024 was really really crap, but it’s done and I’m proud of what I accomplished. Fingers crossed that I learn just as much in 2025!

I’m not going to break down a month-by-month plan for this year, but I aim to write, edit and query my next book (tentatively titled The Willow Lynx).

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Bonus:

Favourite Winter reads! I know my last blog post was about books I’ve read, so I won’t prattle on, but here’s some books I’ve loved since then:

• Mayowa and the Sea of Words by Chibundu Onuzo – love love loved this book! Gloriously imaginative and full of feels, with a strong message and determined protagonist! Can’t recommend enough!
• Fia and the Last Snow Deer by Eilish Fisher and Dermot Flynn – beautiful prose and illustrations, wonderful, tingly, immersive, I could feel the cold of it, and then the immense warmth of the ending.
• The Storm and the Sea Hawk by Kiran Millwood Hargrave – liked this a lot more than the first in the series, especially the development of the friendship between the main characters!
• Lonely Castle in the Mirror by Mizuki Tsujimura – very slow but real-feeling, a nice break from all the super high stakes action-packed books I’ve been reading.
• Inkbound: Meticulous Jones and the Skull Tattoo by Philippa Leathley – I’m currently on chapter six! It came out today and I was already opening it as the postie was pushing it through the letterbox. It’s great so far!

Next on my list are a few books I missed from 2020-2022, when I wasn’t reading much:

• The Stars Did Wander Darkling by Colin Meloy
• Ajay and the Jaipur Moon / Mumbai Sun by Varsha Shah
• The Land of Roar and sequels by Jenny McLachlan