End of Year Post - Happy New Year & 2024 Outlook (Patreon)

Hey folks! I hope you all have been doing well. I've been enjoying much needed time off this week, spending it with family, friends, and loved ones. I wanted to reflect on this past year, talk about the successes and failures, what my plans are for writing in '24. This might get a bit long in the tooth, so bear with me as I ramble a little bit. 

To start off, as many of you already know, '23 was my first year as a full-time writer. I was making excellent money at my place of employment but the stress was so high, it was causing me to have health issues. So I made a calculated risk, made some assumptions, and jumped headfirst into being a full-time writer. Initially, things were great, until I ran into my first set of issues.

Now you've all heard me speak of these issues ad nauseam, so I'm not going to rehash the details. Suffice to say, the production of the SU audiobook put me so far behind on writing the next book that it kind of caused all my initial momentum to halt. Then both SU and Supers having poor sales back to back hurt, not only financially but also emotionally, and killed my motivation. Things had to change.

I had to take a step back, re-evaluate myself, my production process, and make some changes. I started implementing these during Supers, Dragon's Archon, and Warhawk 3, all of which seemed to help and get things written quicker; a needed requirement for the genre that I write in and you all love to read. How some authors are able to put out quality works a month at a time is wild to me. It could be because I have a problem with focusing or writing slowly, but kudos to those who can. That's just not me.

So, sitting here and looking back at the year, I'm obviously not satisfied with how much I produced as a full-time writer. My overly optimistic plan was for 8-10 books in '23. I did half of that. However, I am satisfied with the quality of works written. Everything I have released in the year is sitting at a 4.6 or higher. Looking back at where I came from with the first Aspect book, it's awesome I can see the progress I've made.

So what does all this self reflection mean? I think, personally, if I stretched myself I could hit 5-6 books in a year. When I look at my finances and how much each book theoretically could make, that's just not enough to support my family. I've been burning through my savings this year (which was the plan) in hopes of building enough runway to be in a good spot. Unfortunately, that didn't happen, so once again I am left with the conundrum: something has to change.

This is a mix of personal and professional things. On the personal side, I will be planning on moving again this year, which may interrupt some of my progress. My guess is sometime around the May timeframe. On the professional side, there are things I am going to looking for: stability and earnings. This means I either need to find a different job or I need to have enough success in my releases where only releasing 4-6 books a year could be financially sustainable.

So over the next few months, that's going to be my focus. I will still be full time writing, but I will also be applying for other jobs and writing in other genres. I love monsters and romance, so that's what I'm going to dip my toes into after I finish Warhawk 3. Before anyone asks, I will not be sharing that pen name because of how the amazon algorithm works. It's better for me to start clean. This is going to shuffle the release calendar up a bit, so let me jump into that.

To be clear what 2024 is going to look at from me:

Option 1: I find a different full-time job and keep writing harem part time. (most likely)
Option 2: I write in another genre, find success there, and alternate between it and harem. (Dependent on the success there)
Option 3: I keep writing harem full-time, find success with another release, and keep writing harem full-time. (Initial plan, but I don't have my hopes up given my last two releases.)

With all the above, here is what I'm expecting for the release calendar to look like:
Current Full-time Schedule:
Warhawk 3: Jan
(Writing alt pen) January - February (Depending on how this does will determine whether I continue)
Dragon's Archon 1: Late Feb
Warhawk 4: April
Dragon's Archon 2: June
Dragon's Archon 3: August
(If DA does well, there will be more)
Strength Unleashed 2: Once DA is done

Theoretical Part-time Schedule:
Warhawk 3: Jan
(Writing alt pen) January - February
Dragon's Archon 1: Late Feb
Warhawk 4: June
Dragon's Archon 2: September
Dragon's Archon 3: December
(If DA does well, there will be more)
Strength Unleashed 2: Once DA is done

Theoretical Alternating Schedule:
Warhawk 3: Jan
(Writing alt pen) January - February
Dragon's Archon 1: Late Feb
(Writing alt pen) Feb - March
Warhawk 4: May
(Writing alt pen) June - July
Dragon's Archon 2: September
(Writing alt pen): October - November

Another thing I'm considering is selling Dragon's Archon to another author. I may do this so that I can just focus on closing out my existing series. This may happen if I go down the part time route or the alternating route. The good news about that would be we would get more SU, Supers, and Warhawk because I wouldn't be just reliant on my harem income. I'm not sure if anyone would buy it for what I would need to recoup the costs, but it might be a good thing for both parties and something i may explore.

I hope the above isn't too much of a bummer. It's mainly self-reflection and giving a peak in my life. The thing to take away is: I'm not leaving the genre or going anywhere. It's just my releases may slow down if I find a new job or start writing in other genres. Both are which highly dependent on a lot of factors. Until then, I'll be writing harem full time except for the romance book I'll be working on later this month. 

If you all have any questions, feel free to ask them down in the comments. I'll be spending the rest of the evening playing some games and enjoying the last "vacation" day I have before jumping back into writing. You should expect to see the remaining Warhawk 3 chapters come this week. 

I hope you all have a wonderful 2024 that brings you love and happiness. 

Ajax