A Backward Glance - #NewYear #NewReleases #Giveaway

Image by dbderuiter from Pixabay

We’re only a few days from the start of a new year. Like many of us, I’m tempted to look back over 2019 and draw some conclusions. 

In my meat-space existence, the past year has been busy and productive. I did a lot of traveling and accomplished quite a few of my career goals.

Since I don’t write full time, there’s normally a trade-off between my real-world activities and my writing. Still, despite being so busy, I managed get more books out in 2019 than I have in years.

I started in January, with the release of Sin City Sweethearts, the third, and up to that point longest, volume in the Vegas Babes series.

I didn’t really expect to continue the series beyond that point, but with Valentine’s Day approaching, I felt the urge to put out a seasonally appropriate title. I wrote Valentine’s Visit: Four-Way Friend Swap in about a week. Although it’s part of the Vegas Babes series, it’s a bit more romance-y in tone and content, focusing as it does on two committed couples. 

 

Mid-year, I got the news that one of my publishers was shutting down and releasing the rights for the titles they’d published. I re-edited, expanded and re-titled my third novel as The Heart of the Deal. The re-branded novel has sold much better than the traditionally published version.

I also managed to get two shorts, The Last Amanuensis (speculative erotica) and Refuge (multi-cultural erotic romance) back onto the shelves.

During July and August, I took a long trip back to the U.S. to visit family and friends. To keep my blog readers occupied during the month I was gone, I organized a “Free Reading Fest”, with lots of stories and prizes. When I returned, I collected all those stories and published them as Crowd Pleaser: Erotic Shorts, which is 100% free on Smashwords.

Meanwhile, I was working on the next Vegas Babes book. Babes in Bondage came out just after Halloween, nearly 50K of wildly creative, over-the-top erotica.

I think that will be the last Babes book... but I’ve thought that before.

I didn’t really plan any more releases for 2019 – I was too busy – but then I got inspired by the upcoming winter holidays. I ended up publishing two very different holiday titles. Cherry Pie and Mistletoe is a sweet, hot erotic romance featuring characters who are over sixty. In contrast, Santa, Baby! is anything-goes holiday smut, with a mild femdom theme. I’m amazed to realize that despite end-of-year professional responsibilities, I managed to write and release 20K in about three weeks.

So what about next year? I’m not sure, but I do plan to put out another title in my Asian Adventures series, set in Vietnam. Then I’ll package those books into a boxed set. I’m also going to do a boxed set of Vegas Babes... unless I get inspired to write one more installment.

As for new efforts, I have a notion for a new steam punk erotica series called The Toy-Makers Guild, about an elite group of Victorian engineers and artists who excel at creating implements of pleasure. I also have a half-written vampire/shifter romance that I abandoned a few years ago. I hate to waste that effort; I may recast it as an urban fantasy.

But what would you like me to write next year?

Leave me a comment letting me know your preferences, and you could win a prize: your choice of any of the books I published in 2019. I’ll draw two winners, once we make it to 2020.

Meanwhile, Happy New Year to all of you! Wishing you love, joy, peace and prosperity in the new decade.