Life has thrown me many curve balls, in Dec 2020 I had a TIA mini stroke and it has been a long road to recovery. I would take 1 step forward and 10 steps backward with my memory. I started doing various activities to try to strengthen my short term memory. Word Searches were something that used to be easy for me to do, but after the stroke the first time I did a puzzle it almost beat me, but I refused to give up. A simple word search took me an hour. I was frustrated and angry with myself. I refused to let it beat me. I started working on them daily and the task became easier. Everyday is a journey and everyday I see a little bit of my old self.
I have watched more zooms than I care to, however, I am very thankful that I could attend conferences and trainings even if they were via zoom. It was a way to stay connected and for that I am very thankful.
May 19 & 20, 2022 is the annual Clarksville Writers Conference. I am so excited, they have an amazing list of authors presenting this year.
In June of this year I will become a grandmother. I am so excited.
In regards to my writing, I am a part of a writers group here in Dover and it is a great supporting group of local writers. We all bring something that we are working on and we all take turns reading a section of the work and then the group critiques it. Good, honest feedback! I love it, who could ask for more.
Shanghai Sunset has been completely gutted and rewritten. I have edited and revised the new version a lot. Last year I started submitting again. I took a break from submitting so I could work on getting all my manuscripts typed, since I hand write everything first. I feel freer writing that way. I had three new beta readers read Shanghai Sunset and their feedback was remarkable. They made great points and asked questions that really made me think as a writer. Their feedback was invaluable, without beta readers we are shooting in the dark that an agent or publisher will know and understand our story. In reality without these three beta readers I would have had gaps that I would have missed because I know the answers, the back story and where the story is going, but my readers don't.
I have started working on a new story with new characters. I am so excited. It is fiction. I also started working on a memoir. The memoir is a little more of a challenge than my fiction writing.