Tag: mini reviews

April 2023 wrap-up post April 2023 Wrap-Up Post
Monthly Review

April 2023 Wrap-Up Post

Kara Jorgensen3 Comments

Looking back at my goals for April, I feel like I was a tad unrealistic considering this is one of my busiest grading months. While I hit quite a few of these goals, others I totally fell short, but I will not feel bad about readjusting or rerouting my energy once chaos hit. Let’s take a look at what I thought would happen when I made my goals back in March before checking out what actually happened in April.

  • Writing (we’re feeling ambitious this month)
    • 23,000 words is the goal (770 words a day)
    • Because of this goal, everything else is sort of scant, which I’m fine with since this is also a heavy grading month
  • Read 8 books
  • Refill the well each week (aka do art, crafting, or game)
  • Blog weekly
  • Send a newsletter each month
  • Doctor’s appointment/taxes BOO
  • Start watching Sarra Cannon’s Publish and Thrive updated lessons

Books

My goal was to read 8 books, and I ended up reading 10.

  1. Ironiside (#3) by Holly Black- 4 stars, I thought this was a good wrap-up to the series. While this isn’t my favorite of her series, I enjoyed Roiben a lot and Cornelius as well.
  2. Rattling Bone (#2) by Jordan L. Hawk- 4 stars, my only hang-up with this book is that I felt like we got so little of the main characters together interacting. It felt plot first, characters second, which I don’t really enjoy as much compared to Hawk’s other books.
  3. The Return of the King (#3) by J. R. R. Tolkien- 4 stars, not going to lie, I got choked up in my car over Sam and Frodo. Sam’s love for Frodo is what kept me reading this series. We need more Samwise Gamgees in the world.
  4. A Thief in the Night (#2) by KJ Charles- 4 stars, this is sort of a concurrent story to another set in the same world, and I always love a semi-reformed thief who falls in with someone who doesn’t take their shit.
  5. The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen (#1) by KJ Charles- 4 stars, if you liked Poldark but wished he was less gross and gay, this one is for you as we have smugglers, family drama, and a seemingly mismatched pair.
  6. A Rose by Any Name (#2.5) by KJ Charles- 4 stars, this is a short story that comes after Thief in the Night where the siblings reunite. I loved how unapologetically sweet it is.
  7. I Hear the Sunspot: Four Seasons by Yuki Fumino- 4 stars, I have lost count of what book this is in the series overall, but I love seeing these two get closer and figure out their relationship and lives. Plus the hard-of-hearing rep is well done.
  8. The Black Pages (#2) by Nnedi Okorafor- 3 stars, this story was pretty damn brutal. It felt like it cut off as soon as we figure out what might be going on, which is the point, but it is also unsatisfying as there won’t be a follow-up.
  9. The Invisible Man & His Soon-to-Be-Wife (#1) by Iwatobineko- 4 stars, this manga has visually impaired rep that is well researched, and I always love seeing disability mixed into fantasy worlds and with monsters and such. The Invisible Man love interest is sweet and dapper as well.
  10. Persephone (#2) by Lev Grossman- 4 stars, this also felt like the start of something larger, but it cuts off in a more satisfying place. I read this mostly to see if I’d like his other books and it was enjoyable, though a bit brutal for my tastes.

Admin/Behind-the-Scenes Stuff

  • Set up all my Q2 goals, kanban board, etc.
  • Did my 2022 taxes and set up quarterly taxes for this year, just in case, because I don’t want to pay the US government any more in penalty fees and interest than I have to
  • Went to the doctor to do my 6 month please refill my meds check (a giant time/money waster)
  • I found out there are copies of The Reanimator’s Heart for sale physically at the Meet Cute Bookshop and The Portal Bookshop, an LGBT bookstore in York, England, which is VERY cool (also at some B&Ns as well)
  • Two of my books were part of an Indie April sale
  • Graded so many papers… so, so many papers
  • Finished setting up the proof copy of the university literary magazine my class was working on, and we approved it
  • Did promo for the university’s literary magazine
  • Started using my Tiktok again and have been posting daily
  • Figured out how to use Capcut for said Tiktoks
  • Made a reverse outline for The Reanimator’s Soul so far
  • Ended up running my dog to the vet in a panic, but he’s okay. He has Lyme’s Disease, so he’s getting antibiotics and supplements and such, which took up a lot of mental real estate this month
  • Worked on my craft projects consistently in order to unwind and stay mentally balanced.

Blogs Posted

Writing

You may have noticed that I have forgone the weekly breakdown lately. I tend to do this when my writing has been feast or famine because seeing those tiny word counts certain weeks is disheartening and doesn’t really show all the other stuff I was doing, like giving a metric shit ton of feedback to my students. If only I could count my feedback as part of my monthly word count. By the end of the month, I wrote 11,500 words, which is way below my initial goal, but that goal was very unrealistic. I don’t know how I forgot that April is a horrible month for grading. April and November are when all the longer papers come in, and next year when making my goals, I really need to be mindful that, if I’m teaching freshman, I need to ease up on my word count goals. Either way though, I’m happy with those words, and I know where I’m going from this point on, which means that (hopefully) the next chunk I work on will come a lot smoother. Act I is always the hardest for me to write as it requires so much set up and micromanaging of future threads.

Hopes for May

  • Watch Sarra Cannon’s updated Publish and Thrive classes- at least 2-3 weeks
  • Read 8 books
  • Newsletter monthly/blog weekly
  • Keep messing around with Tiktok
  • Write 20,000-25,000 words for the month
  • Finish grading for the semester
  • Relax or do something fun, something to avoid an end of semester burnout/shutdown
March 2023 Wrap-Up post March 2023 Wrap-Up Post
Monthly Review

March 2023 Wrap-Up Post

Kara Jorgensen1 Comment

I’d love to know why March felt like the longest and shortest month. Oddly, this month was busy, yet I spent a lot of the time resting and re-calibrating as I worked on The Reanimator’s Soul. It was sort of a weird month. Not good or bad, just a transitional month between projects and parts of the semester. Anywho, let’s see what my goals were and what I got up to during the month.

  • Read 8 books
  • Write The Reanimator’s Soul
    • Minimum goal 15k words
    • Real goal 20k words
    • Stretch goal 25k words
  • Enjoy spring break and actually relax (as opposed to using it to catch up)
  • Blog weekly
  • Send out my monthly newsletter
  • Do some digital art
  • Plan my goals for Q2

Books

My goal this month was to read 8 books, and I read 10.

  1. The River of Silver (#4) by S. A. Chakraborty- 4 stars, a great book of additional stories in a universe I was very sad to leave. Also, yay for some closure.
  2. The Two Towers (#2) by J. R. R. Tolkien- 4 stars, once again loving Andy Serkis being a one-man cast.
  3. Tithe (#1) by Holly Black- 3 stars, it was okay. I know this is one of her earlier books, and it definitely reads like my middle/high school experience. It was weird reading a book that takes place so close to where I live.
  4. Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert- 4 stars, loved this one. The neurodivergent and mentally ill rep was great, as always with Hibbert’s books.
  5. The Ancient Magus’s Bride (#17) by Kore Yamazaki- 4 stars, we’re still mid-arc, but I am enjoying it and hoping the conclusion of this arc will be satisfying.
  6. The Magus of the Library (#6) by Mitsu Izumi- 4 stars, I love seeing a mystery deepen and characters come into their own. This is a complex yet low stress manga.
  7. A Black Women’s History of the United States (#5) by Daina Ramey Berry and Kali Nicole Gross- 5 stars, a great primer for further research.
  8. Circe by Madeline Miller- 4 stars, if Aragorn and Arwen in The Lord of the Rings was your jam but you wished there as extra baggage, this one is for you.
  9. She Loves to Cook & She Loves to Eat (#2) by Sakaomi Yuzaki- 5 stars, so sweet, so tender, so sapphic, and so much good food.
  10. Valiant (#2) by Holly Black- 4 stars, I’m not sure how this one ended up with more stars than book 1. The end sort of saved it for me because I really like Ravus and the whole Beauty and the Beast dynamic we had going.

Admin/Behind-the-Scenes Stuff

  • Finished the major compiling for the university literary magazine my class was working on (low key stressful since this was the first one since 2018)
  • Sent the university literary magazine to the printers
  • Wrote the preliminary blurb for The Reanimator’s Soul
  • Setup the preorder for The Reanimator’s Soul at all major retailers (except Google Play, which I will do soon)
  • Started doing crafts again, yay! I started working on a Halloween village plastic canvas kit from Herrschner’s, which I’m really enjoying doing since I haven’t done plastic canvas since high school. It’s very centering.
  • Made my quarter 2 goals and setup my Kanban board
  • Enjoyed spring break with only a bit of freaking out (my brain has been on fire all month)
  • Retail therapy for a case of the stressful sads, which means buying washi tape and planner stickers

Blogs Posted

Writing

If you saw my false starts blog post, you’ll know that I ended up basically rewriting the whole beginning of The Reanimator’s Soul. I’m not going to lie, I was very annoyed at first. I felt like I fell behind as soon as the month started, but ultimately, my writing word count goals take a backseat to story quality and starting over was necessary. I have to keep reminding myself of this when I internally freak out over being behind. Behind is better than words that are lukewarm and don’t make sense in the larger context of the work. It took me about a week to figure out what I needed to fix and how to make it better. In the end, I wrote 12,000 words this month, which I’m pretty happy with since all of these words make sense and have sent the story in the proper direction. I’m feeling much more confident at this point, so fingers crossed no major rewrites will be needed at the 25-33% mark.

Hopes for April

  • Writing (we’re feeling ambitious this month)
    • 23,000 words is the goal (770 words a day)
    • Because of this goal, everything else is sort of scant, which I’m fine with since this is also a heavy grading month
  • Read 8 books
  • Refill the well each week (aka do art, crafting, or game)
  • Blog weekly
  • Send a newsletter each month
  • Doctor’s appointment/taxes BOO
  • Start watching Sarra Cannon’s Publish and Thrive updated lessons
New blog post: january 2023 wrap-up post January 2023 Wrap-Up Post
Monthly Review

January 2023 Wrap-Up Post

Kara Jorgensen1 Comment

Phew, January has been one of those months where it is a mad dash toward the finish line, but it has also been one of the best months I have had in a while. Writing/editing Flowers and Flourishing went well, and that’s been sent out to my newsletter subscribers. The spring semester started, and my students seem like a good bunch (hopefully energetic and interested too). Best of all, I feel like I’m finally coming out of my winter exhaustion. Anywho, let’s take a look at the goals or aspirations for January that I made last month

  • Figure out how quarterly taxes work
  • Start working on the second Reanimator Mysteries book
  • Book research
  • Read 8 books
  • Blog weekly
  • Finish editing Flowers and Flourishing
  • Send out Flowers and Flourishing with my January newsletter
  • Finally, a little relaxation via gaming or art regularly

Books

My reading goal for January was to read 8 books, and I read 10 books.

  1. The Six Deaths of the Saint (#3) by Alix E. Harrow- 4 stars, still loving the Into the Shadows series (different authors each book). The way Harrow plays with time in this short work is superb.
  2. The Kingdom of Copper (#2) by S. A. Chakraborty- 4 stars, you know a book is good when you finish it and immediately dig around to find the next one. It is a doorstop, but it was so worth it, especially if you like Middle Eastern flavored mythology mixed with court intrigue.
  3. A Mirror Mended (#2) by Alix E. Harrow- 4 stars, more broken fairytales with our universe-hopping hero only this time she falls into the wrong story and she must save herself and an unlikely ally.
  4. Tread of Angels by Rebecca Roanhorse- 5 stars, so frigging good. An atmospheric mystery complete with angels, demons, and a gritty new world.
  5. Into the Windwracked Wilds (#3) by A. Deborah Baker (aka Seanan McGuire)- 4 stars, if you like Wizard of Oz-esque tales, this series is for you. It is meant for a middle grade audience, but it’s still complex and intriguing for adults as well.
  6. Lost in the Moment and Found (#8) by Seanan McGuire- 5 stars, a phenomenal read about childhood trauma and what happens when you can’t trust the adults in your life, one of my favorites from this series so far (though I love all of them).
  7. Mummies, Cannibals, and Vampires by Richard Sugg- 4 stars, a bit of book 2 research. It focuses on the way corpse medicine was used for centuries, the rehabilitation of doctors as a profession, and the way the rich made use of the poor. Fascinating stuff, writing at times could have been tighter/better organized.
  8. A Garter as a Lesser Gift by Aster Glenn Grey- 4 stars, a Gawain and the Green Knight retelling set during WWII, it does a great job of capturing the original story while keeping it fresh and modern.
  9. Not Your Valentine by Jackie Lau- 4 stars, a contemporary romance where a woman who has had her breakup go viral denounces love only to recruit her friend into being her fake boyfriend to get her friends off her back. You can guess how this goes wrong.
  10. Dark Archives by Megan Rosenbloom- 5 stars, fascinating look into the history of books bound in human skin with forays into medical ethics, book challenges, fakes, and the history of several examples.

Admin/Behind-the-Scenes Stuff

Buckle in, buttercups. It’s been a busy month.

  • The Reanimator’s Heart won the Queer Indie Awards for Best Historical Romance!
  • Officially finished writing Flower and Flourishing (yes, I said I finished last month, but I needed to add/rework some stuff)
  • Edited Flowers and Flourishing multiple times
  • Proof-read Flowers and Flourishing (though I’m sure there are still typos *laugh sob*)
  • Formatted Flowers and Flourishing, set up my Bookfunnel account, and set it up there as a newsletter freebie
  • Updated all my newsletter info to match the aforementioned update/book release
  • Sent out Flowers and Flourishing to my newsletter subscribers (sign-up at the top of the page if you want it or you can add it on Goodreads)
  • Made a landing page on my website for Flowers and Flourishing
  • Announced the title for the sequel to The Reanimator’s Heart, which is The Reanimator’s Soul (add it on Goodreads)
  • Started brainstorming ideas for The Reanimator’s Soul before I start writing
  • Started doing research for The Reanimator’s Soul
  • Spoke at the Romancing the Gothic Book Club about The Reanimator’s Heart
  • Looked into quarterly taxes- more confident about it but also feel like puking every time I think about it
  • Played video games weekly to unwind
    • I started playing Lemoncake but didn’t really love it because I’m not great at those sorts of running around, optimization games
    • Then, I started playing Bear and Breakfast and have been enjoying that much more
  • Finished drafting all my lesson plans/notes for the new class I’m teaching
  • Created all the syllabi and Blackboards for my classes this semester

Blogs Posted

Writing

I’m not going to post my weekly stats again because it’s a weird mix of writing and editing, which isn’t very quantifiable. What I can say is that I started the month at 29k words in Flowers and Flourishing and ended the month at 37k words, which means I wrote 8,000 words. Considering I was absolutely fried at the beginning of the month, I’m really happy with this. Some of these words were brand new, others were fleshing out and/or changing things I wrote in the first half of this book. Writing and editing for me is never a linear process. I tend to do a two steps forward, one step back kind of thing where I write, edit, write, edit, then do a major edit, then write more, and repeat. A lot of people like to zero/fast draft and then start a new draft from beginning to end, but that just isn’t how I work. I tinker with my past writing session’s words as a warm-up before I jump back in. For me, it eliminates a lot of stress at the end when I need to clean up the manuscript since almost all of it has been touched multiple times. While writing this month, I also made a list of things I needed to edit/tweak in a Notepad file and had that open as I wrote. That way, I could make sure I mentioned little things that became important later. Notepad as a tiny, moveable stickynote while I’m editing/writing does wonders.

I also did a lot of brainstorming for The Reanimator’s Soul. In the past, I’ve been bad about actually putting pen to paper with ideas, and then, I get mad at myself when I forget them. The hope is that if I write a bunch of stuff down and pick through it after, it will help me figure out where to start the story and make outlining a bit easier.

Hopes for February

  • Learn more about writing mysteries specifically (research!)
  • Outline Act I of The Reanimator’s Soul
  • Write 500 words a day (14k total)
  • Grade a shit ton of papers with my brain in tact
  • Manage stress
  • Do more art
  • Read 8 books
  • Blog weekly
  • Send out my monthly newsletter
new blog post: december 2022 wrap up post December 2022 Wrap-Up Post
Monthly Review

December 2022 Wrap-Up Post

Kara Jorgensen1 Comment

Ah yes, December, the month of chaos where I am full of food, have no idea what day it is, and am perpetually stuck between finishing the year and looking toward the new year. This month was a bit weird because, of course, we had the holidays to contend with, classes ended (yay for grading a shit ton of papers), and my partner was dealing with some med changes/season affect disorder, so fun all around. I don’t want to be a downer, so I’ll try to reel myself in. This month was similar to November’s levels of exhaustion, but I’m finally starting to feel better. Fingers crossed January is when I finally perk up more fully. As a reminder before we begin, here were my goals for December:

  • Finish writing Flowers and Flourishing
  • Edit Flowers and Flourishing
  • Read 8 books
  • Blog weekly and send out my December newsletter
  • Finish Christmas prep
  • Have 6 weeks of lessons prepped/outlined for next semester
  • Set goals for Q1 of 2023

Books

The goal was to read 8 books, and that’s exactly how many I read.

  1. Last Gender (Vol #1) by Rei Taki- 4 stars, a manga that follows several people who all frequent a queer club. A bit grittier(?) than I expected, but I liked the frank nature of the portrayals of all the characters.
  2. Undercover (#5) by Tamsyn Muir- 5 stars, as with all Muir books, it’s gorey, sapphic, and so unexpected. If you liked Gideon or Harrow, hit this up.
  3. Masters in This Hall (#3) by KJ Charles- 4 stars, an off-shoot story from the Lilywhite Boys where a decorator gets tangled up with a killer and the only way out is to team up with an irate past flame and an unexpected ally.
  4. Afterlives: The Return of the Dead in the Middle Ages by Nancy Mandeville Caciola- 4 stars, nonfiction research for a future book. It is academic but incredibly interesting as we get to see different kinds of dead and the geographic/theological changes.
  5. She Loves to Cook and She Loves to Eat (Vol #1) by Sakaomi Yuzaki- 4 stars, an adorable sapphic manga following a truck driver who loves to eat and an office worker who loves to make pretty (and large quantities of food). Being neighbors sparks the potential for something more.
  6. Hen Fever by Olivia Waite- 4 stars, a new woman moves into a town with a chicken breeding contest and finds love in a quiet, sunny woman who is hellbent on winning the festival and raising a once-thought-dead breed of chickens.
  7. Rosaline Palmer Takes the Cake (#1) by Alexis Hall- 4 stars, a single mom enters a TV baking contest, falls for an asshole but eventually realizes she needs to take back control of her life and what she really wants.
  8. The Girl from the Other Side (Vol #12) by Nagabe- 4 stars, a volume that fills in with short stories. It was very cute and sweet, not a lot of substance but I loved seeing Shiva and Teacher again.

Admin/Behind-the-Scenes Stuff

  • Finished Christmas shopping, wrapping, decorating, *insert stressful holiday stuff*
  • Graded all my students’ portfolios and grades
  • Contacted ACX to get Kinship and Kindness changed from exclusive to non-exclusive (aka in the future I can publish the audiobook to sites besides Audible/Amazon and iTunes)
  • Listened to and approved the first 15+ minutes of The Reanimator’s Heart audiobook (same narrator as K&K!)
  • Worked on my lesson plans for my new class next semester and did 11/15 weeks worth of classes (aka I have 8 left to plan)
  • Set up my goals for 2023 Q1 and my 2023 bullet journal (it’s a lot of work)
  • Did an impromptu title reveal for the second Reanimator Mysteries book (I will do a more formal post here soon)
  • Edited Flowers and Flourishing. It’s currently in the let it rest stage before I go through and edit it again, but it will be coming to newsletter subscribers in late January. Join my newsletter to get it for free!
  • Edited what my newsletter automatic subscriber reply says in preparation for Flowers and Flourishing coming out. If you subscribe now, it’s the same, but I wanted to have the new copy ready for next month.
  • Played Lemoncake on PC (haven’t finished it yet), but if you liked Diner Dash or other timing based food/serving games, this one is basically the cozy version

Blogs Posted

Writing

I’m not going to do a week-by-week calculation because I wrote sporadically during the holidays and the numbers don’t make sense when you factor in editing and such. Instead I’m just going to talk a little bit about the writing process here. I struggled. Part of what sucks about what happened in November is that I sort of got out of practice/routine with my writing, so it ended up very much being done in small bursts, which is frustrating after having it be more fluid. I probably have a scene or two I will need to go back and add after I edit the second time, which is fine and expected. More than anything, I want to put out the best story I can for my newsletter peeps. Flowers and Flourishing has been fun to write and a far lighter (yet still pretty heavy) tone than The Reanimator’s Heart, and if you liked Kinship and Kindness, I think you’ll like this one too.

Hopes for January

  • Figure out how quarterly taxes work
  • Start working on the second Reanimator Mysteries book
  • Book research
  • Read 8 books
  • Blog weekly
  • Finish editing Flowers and Flourishing
  • Send out Flowers and Flourishing with my January newsletter
  • Finally, a little relaxation via gaming or art regularly