Yes, that's the title of my steampunk YA.

I'm planning and outlining and aim to be writing by next week and I'm loving this story so much it's in my dreams!

Something strange and exciting occurred yesterday afternoon, when I realised that artificial intelligence is going to be important in this story and a whole exciting world of possibility opened before me.

You know when a story suddenly grows a lot bigger than you ever expected? That.

:)

I believe this. There's a strong element of it couldn't be worse than last year, of course, in that Janette's and Bev's health crises were scary as hell. But that was then and this is now, and I believe this is going to be a good year.

I'm waiting on some things that I can't talk about yet. Exciting things and several of them, but we all know how things can come to nothing in the writing world, so while I'm quietly excited and looking forward to hearing back from people, I'm not going to say more about any of it until I have something real to tell you.

How's that for coy? Sorry. :)

An article of mine appears in Vision this month. That's the first happy thing of my writing year. More happiness to come.

If anyone is searching for something new to do this year, I recommend this free two-year course.

I did it three years ago. It's a wonderful course and I made several new friends who are now old friends. I'd already written a novel when I started the course, but found learning someone else's method opened new horizons for me.

You have to join the Forward Motion site to sign up for the course, but that's free too and it's one of the best writing sites I know.

The course is written and run by the site owner, Lazette Gifford, who is a multi-published author. She posts one lesson per week and you work through it. There's no pressure: no marking or scores. It's very much a get out what you put in thing.

Many people sign up then drop out without ever doing anything, and others drop out throughout the course as life gets in the way. Some aspects of Lazette's planning methods, for example, aren't for everyone, but that's no biggie. If a lesson doesn't work for you, skip it.

There's a private forum that only you and your course-mates can see, and you're encouraged to post snippets and comment on each other's work. It's a slow burner that might seem to go on forever in the planning stage, then suddenly you're looking back at several thousand words you've written and your novel is taking shape.

Year one is pretty much about planning, writing and editing the thing. Year two focuses on submitting and getting it out there.

I had a great time on mine and I'm about to start submitting the novel I wrote on the course.

Edit: In fact, I enjoyed it so much I've just signed up to do it again! :)

Happy Christmas, everyone! Have a wonderful day!

Love and peace to you all! xxx