2006 was a delightful, strange, exciting year. I finished my second novel, completed my master’s degree in fiction, sold my first piece of short fiction, and — last but certainly not least — signed with a literary agent (!). My second novel is just about to go out to editors, and I’ve been working on revising my first.

A brief recap of the writing I did this year:

• Short stories completed: “Things that make one’s heart beat faster” (sold to LCRW); “Selected letters …”; “Daphne”
• Short stories drafted: “The Former Hero”; “Julia Caesaris”; “Lady Emma Hamilton as Charity”
• Novels completed: Novel #2 (once it’s gone out to editors, I may even stop being so overly cautious about using its content-revealing title — shocking, I know)
• Novels worked on: Borne (revision); The White Silk Tent (gathering and editing memoir materials)

Not bad, considering that only four months of the year were officially devoted to writing, as I revised novel #2 for my degree. This year, I want to: finish revising Borne; finish the short stories currently in draft form; and work on an outline for The White Silk Tent. If I can write a few new short stories, that would be a bonus. Tonight my plan is to dig out my sheaf of old notes on Borne and work on outlining more revision ideas.

I’ve just started working on a new short-short for an upcoming reading, too — it should be January 25, at Intellectual Property. More details about this when I have them.

The semester starts in one week — I’ll try not to disappear completely. At the very least, I’ll post monthly writing updates/round-ups here, along with any news on the publishing front, and I’ll try to make my posts much more frequent than that.