2023 Author Goals

Mariajauthor/ January 9, 2023/ Author Journey/ 1 comments

Hi everyone, Happy New Year! It’s been a while. I thought coming up with my 2023 author goals would be a great way to kick-start this year’s blog. So, without further ado, here are my goals for this year:

1. Have the 3rd Novel in my series Published

The sharp-eyed among you may have noticed my first goal has carried on from last year! I’d hoped the 3rd novel in my series would be published in 2022, but the publication process has taken a bit longer than anticipated. However, I’m excited to say lots of progress has been made. Various stages of editing and proofreading have been done and I will be signing off on the finalised manuscript very soon.

I’m hoping for a provisional publication date by the Spring, but it’s still up in the air – I’ll let you know when I know more!

2. Get 4th Novel ready for Submission in 2023

I’d love to have my 4th novel ready for submission to my publishers in 2023. The novel is written and has already had a round or two of revisions/editing, but there’s still lots of work to be done. The story still needs to be tightened up, as well as ensuring I have the balance right between my two main characters.

My 4th novel is dual POV, between Daniel (my MC from the first 3 books) and Imogen, a secondary character in book 3 who has become an MC. As such, it’s been trickier to get their agency and goals across in the way that I want. However, I’m excited by this story and looking forward to getting back t it.

3. Carry on Drafting Book 5

Last November, I used NaNoWriMo to start writing what I hope will be book 5. By the end of the month, I’d written 50k and about half of the manuscript. I’m really liking where this story is going, so I’d love to have the manuscript finished in 2023. Possibly to start editing, too – watch this space!

4. Try Amazon Ads in 2023

A few months ago, Amazon made it possible for authors to try Amazon Ads directly through the Amazon Author page. This has been great news for me, as previously it was only really accessible for self-published authors through their Kindle Direct dashboards.

However, partly due to some real life stuff going on and partly because Amazon Ads look far more complicated (and a bit intimidating!) I haven’t taken the plunge yet. So, in 2023, I’m committing to finally learning about Amazon Ads and trying one or two out.

5. Build back an online Writing Presence

You might have noticed that in the last six months of 2022, I slipped off the radar a bit. This was partly due to an online ‘burn out’. I went full throttle for the first 6 months trying lots of new things, posting daily on multiple social media platforms, etc etc. While this was great in many ways, it left me a bit exhausted by the summer!

Then in the second half of 2022, some tricky real life stuff happened. While I was able to continue writing, to be honest, I kinda lost motivation to do much else writing related things, specially online. My blog posts, newsletters, social media posts – especially on Instagram – ground to a halt.

So, I’m committing to building my online presence up again in 2023. I’m planning on taking it slowly, as I don’t want to be overwhelmed by having to post twenty things a day etc – but I’d love to get back to a weekly blog post, monthly newsletter and posting on social media a few times a week.

6. Read 20 Indie Books in 2023

I hit my 2022 GoodReads challenge to read 20 books, with a total of 22 books read. 21 of those were indie books. That goal was manageable, so I’m setting my self the same goal as my benchmark in 2023. Tune into my blog post next week where I’ll talk about my favourite indie books of 2022!

So, those are my 6 goals of 2023! Do you have any writing or reading goals this year? Why not let me know, I’d love to connect with you!

Thanks for Reading!

Thanks so much for reading! Why not check out my other blog posts, or published books?

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Till next time,

Maria 🙂