Quarterly wrap: July – September 2024
It feels like a lifetime since my last update, but that’s probably because of a big change in my lie! Want to know what it was and whether I’ve managed to keep up with my writing and reading in spite of it? Come and hear all the gossip in my third quarterly wrap of 2024!! →
What’s new in my life
Hello one and all, it’s time for my third quarterly update of 2024! It honestly feels like a lifetime since my last update, which must be because so much has been happening in my life. The weeks might be flying by, but each week is packed to the max, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. So let’s take a look at my key highlights from July, August, and September:
Bringing my puppy home. My life completely changed (for the better) when I brought my Miniature Schnauzer puppy home in early July. Violet is an absolute joy and is growing SO quickly. I’ve included a few pictures below. Isn’t she just the cutest little distraction?? 😅
Celebrating my birthday. It was my birthday in August—the big 30, in fact. I’m not much into parties, so instead I had a couple of lovely dinners with family and close friends. My family made some very generous contributions to something I’m planning, to be revealed in due course.
Reaching my running target. You may recall that fitness is on my mind this year, and I’m very excited to have achieved the first milestone in my running goal by getting to 10km. Now the aim is to bring my time under 60min, and I’ve got a race in a few weeks!
Platform updates
Unfortunately, I didn’t publish any new blog posts over the past three months. With that little puppy on the tear and causing all kinds of chaos, something had to give, and one of those things was the blog posts. I hope to get another few out in the last quarter of the year, though. We’ll see how it goes!
There’s not a great deal else to report on my author platforms. I also took a bit of a break from posting new social media content while adjusting to life as a fur-mum, but I’m trying to get back into it now. My monthly newsletter has been going out as usual, so if you want all the goss on my life and writing progress, you should sign up here!
Writing progress
Blood of Old (Graceborn #1)
Status: Writing 4th draft
Word count: 168,800 (88.8%)
What’s new: Despite everything going on, I’ve been forging ahead with the 4th draft of book 1 in the Graceborn series. I wrote more than 60k words this quarter and now only have 6x chapters left to write. Woohoo! I’m well on track to finish this draft by the end of the year, though there are a few things I’ll need to go back and fix once I get to the end. There have been some challenging edits to make recently, so it feels great to get that done.
Graceborn #3
Status: Writing 1st draft [ON HOLD]
Word count: 65,057 (29.6%)
What’s new: Remember me saying how something had to give? Another of those somethings was the first draft of book 3 in the Graceborn series. Adding a puppy into my list of things to juggle was just too much, and I haven’t been in the right brain space to work on a first draft, which is writing everything from scratch. Now that I’m in a routine though, I think I’ll be able to jump back into this when I’ve finished the draft of book 1!
Books I’ve read
Guess what?! I’ve achieved my 2024 Goodreads challenge goal and there’s still plenty of time left to go! I only read a total of 3 books this quarter, but I did take a bit of a dive into a whole heap of entertaining fanfiction to cope with all the new stress in my life. 😅 Anyway, here are the actual books I read:
What have you been up to over the last three months? Has anything lifechanging happened to you? Did you make progress in your writing or read a great book?
Rebecca Alasdair
I'm an Australian indie author who hoards books, loves dogs and coffee, and has a tendency of staying up all night!
7 Comments
Ed
Curious, do you use Divi or Elementor for your website?
Rebecca Alasdair
Hey, so sorry I missed your comment! I use WordPress 😊
Andrew McDowell
Congrats on everything, Rebecca. I myself celebrated my birthday in August, and Beneath the Deep Wave was released.
alexwriter25
Hey Rebecca! I wrote a comment earlier, but ran into an error. So, I apologize if you’re getting multiple comment notifications.
Violet is adorable! I’m happy for you 🙂 She’s so cute 🙂
Happy Birthday again! I’m glad you got to have some lovely dinners with family and friends 🙂 So happy for you!
Congrats on reaching your running target. :] You’ll reach your goal of running 10K in less than an hour! You got this! GO REBECCA!
No worries on not posting on your blog :). That’s totally understandable. Your newsletter is great 🙂 I enjoy reading it each month!
Great job with your writing! You’re making awesome progress! I’m proud of you 🙂 Go Rebecca!
3 books is good :). I remember some years ago, I found it difficult to read a book a month. Hope you’re enjoying the fanfiction (and the books you read look great) :).
I got back to writing recently! 🙂 I’m not writing very much each day (maybe about 200-300 words a day), but given how busy things are, I’m okay with taking a turtle-like/slow approach. I’m just happy to be back at it and I feel better about this draft than I did with the other drafts I wrote. It feels a bit more focused so far. I hope I didn’t jinx myself LOL. I also am busy with book clubs, painting, walking, listening to podcasts, and other activities.
Have a great week, Rebecca! Take care, my friend 🙂 I support you!
Tomas
I finally got some writing time, though I don’t feel good for it at all. The reason is that a flood that hit my country kept me grounded and so the time I’d spend hiking went to writing instead. Nature gives and nature takes, I guess…
Congratulations on your running progress, it’s important to keep your body in good shape, not just your mind.
Rebecca Alasdair
Hey Tomas, sorry I missed your post! Notification glitch. Sorry to hear about the floods; I hope everything turned out okay! I definitely agree it’s important to keep well in mind and body. Running and hiking are great ways of doing that. 😀
Tomas
No problem. Things are better now, at least, November was really beautiful.