Monthly Wrap Up

Ending 2024, Starting 2025

2024 proved to be an exciting and daunting year. I spent so much time buried in producing a novel and coach training. Then there was setting up a webpage and at least having a basic page for coaching. There is plenty to expand on and fix heading into 2025 after the Hope*Story conference next week.

May goal for 2025 is more connection. Now that I have a trilogy out there, I want to do more right here to go with the trilogy and beyond. See what I did there? This is Tales of Karnum and Beyond, after all. Keep reading to see what is going on and how you can join in.

Council of Light

I have a very simple launch plan with a few graphics, the book blurb, and instructions. It starts next week, so there is still time to sign up if you wish to help. You can read the book details and fill in the form at https://altheadamgaard.com/launchteamapp.

The book releases on the 28th.

Cyborg Claude

I pulled everything up today, including the critique I had for the start. The feedback proved it was as rough as I thought. After all, it was an alpha read by my critique group several months ago. I needed to know what worked and what did not. It requires some lead in before the hectic action that goes with spies on a foreign planet slams you in the face. I need in media res, but guess what, it needs a connection for the reader. Connection is my word for the year on so many fronts, but I digress.

With all the tedious setup in Scrivener done, I’ll be working on rewriting this starting the 9th of January. This will not be a professionally edited work other than what I’ve learned for ferocious self-editing and at least one other person doing a casual reading to catch where they get hung up. With that known by you, I want to invite you to comment on what you think of each episode or at least give a like if it passed muster for you. Your feedback will determine what I would need to compile the story into a novel in the future.

Currently, it sits at 117K messy words. ProWritingAid listed 3636 things I needed to fix in the rough draft. That’s what I get pulling out something written just over two decades ago, when my best training and mentoring came in the past decade. Here’s to applying all of that to this messy beast to bring you an entertaining space opera of spies in space with a primary member who is a cyborg. Or is he?

New Works to Come

I had fun drafting a short story. It took a lot of work and research since it had to have just enough accurate history and fit into the requested frame work. It felt great drafting something entirely new instead of all the editing that went into June through December for Council of Light. I can’t say much more about the short story, but I can talk about the fresh drafting that will start in February.

I have Last of Dragons around half drafted and plan on finishing it. It will be part of my Karnum Archives Series, which will expand over time to other historical tales that explain many fun tidbits that come up in my Light Series. You’ll see reference to this one in book 3, Council of Light. I’m not setting a date for when this one will be done. Once through everything I have slated for January, I can see how much time can go into this project around the planned ongoings of 2025, which include Cyborg Claude and keeping up with my other Substack, An Abundant Life.

Book Reviews

These may come a little quicker this year. Maybe. I really missed reading a lot last year. The amount that I did is way less than what I used to do. I’m fortunate that reading other things does not heavily influence what I am writing at the same time. Some people find it hard to read and write because they may wind up sounding like the author they are reading. I rather analyze how they did things, but find my spin on how to use something I see them doing. It’s more about how they handled things with the mechanics of writing rather than the story idea itself invading my writing.

Writers need to be readers. We need to know what is out there and why it is so good or hit the best-seller lists. Maybe it got there because it is an excellent story or it was mediocre with an awesome marketing team to push it to its status. There are always things to learn to improve oneself in this industry on all fronts.

Hope*Story Conference and Writer Coaching

I’m headed to Charlotte, NC next week for a conference that is being hosted by Hope*Media. I am a certified writing coach for them and have already enjoyed helping a couple of their Hope*Books writers with where they were in their writing progress. I’ll have the fun of helping out and spending time in the Coaches Cafe.

After the conference, I plan on updating and expanding my coaching services. I have a basic page I slapped together with simple coaching packages, discount codes ready for select writers’ groups I belong to, and a very general lead magnet about the five things your novel needs. Based on how I also have helped non-fiction writers now, I know I can expand it to more than just novel writing, though that is my forte. I can also include helping with organizing, getting unstuck, critiquing, how to properly self-edit, and all with encouragement. After all, if this engineering nerd can go all creative in disability and produce fun fiction, so can you.

Final Words

This Substack will remain my fiction for readers space. I only share all of my author journey to give you insight into what it takes to produce books and put them into the world around all the other fun of being an authorpreneur.

If there is anything you wish to see here or ask me, respond to my newsletters or leave comments on the various posts that spark you to do so. As I stated with Cyborg Claude, I would love your feedback. This year is all about connection. Tell me what works for you and what does not. Point out my typos, wonky wording, and good story points. I leave that up to you. I’m not going anywhere, even if none of you chime in. I will take your feedback seriously. If you don’t share your thoughts, I can’t respond. I’ve also found that wherever questions or feedback occur, there are definitely others wondering and thinking the same thing. Why not be the first to point it out to me?

Here’s to 2025 being a great year with lots of fun writing for me and plenty of reading for all of us.