The words on everyone’s lips right now is that 2020 was hard. For many people they weren’t sure they could endure.

I had my own problems, my NYE celebration was under a red sky of an alien planet as we waited for evacuation orders due to Australian bushfires. We were the last car to be allowed passage from the greater area, the police closing the road behind us as the way forward became dangerous. We got home, and after just a week back at work I realized my life needed to change, and started looking for another job. But the replacement fell through just as I’d terminated my existing employment, because of covid. For a brief period I nervously called myself a full time writer while we relied on one income and savings. I spent four months not getting as much work done as I wanted, before a new job came around. Our shower broke… it seems so inconsequential, but I haven’t had a shower in 9 months because of covid and lockdown and not wishing to put anyone in a difficult position. The daily mental strain of not having that small convenience was so hard. But everyone’s 2020 was hard. There were personal emotional struggles at home, and with my books, but the one thing that I got out of the year was boundaries.

I know what I can and cannot do anymore and I’ve amended my website to reflect that. I’m not offering author interviews or book features as separate pages, I’m going to make it a part of my blog. I’m not going to review here, I’m going to confine my searching to Netgalley, recommendations, and ARC requests to review on Netgalley, Amazon and Goodreads.

One of the most important things to me that I am stepping away from is beta reading. I got so many requests this year I overpromised on many of them and shouldn’t have. You are still more than welcome to submit to me, I will still look at 5k samples and may take on more work, but it will depend upon demands of 2021 and there promise to be quite a few.

Most of all, I am not walking into 2021 with any expectations. There is always the NYE promise, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s 2020 was blown out of the proverbial water. I am moving forward with hope, or at least a positive outlook that I’ll do the best that I can.

With the promise of helping the many writers journeying with me. With the joy of seeing my work into paperback form. With more stories, and one that has ripped me to shreds over the last few months, but I’m proudly announcing my ND self to the greater world.

2020 wasn’t a fire we walked through, not an inferno we buckled under. 2020 was a time where climate change caused disasters, centuries of inequality broke forth in riots against long held traditions of racism, and the changes in our behaviour and attitude to health were thoroughly re-examined under the wave of a plague. It forced us all to re-examine our lives, and purpose in the world. How every day mattered even as they all bled into one another as we stared at the same four walls for months on end.

I’m sorry if your year was rough, not a blanket statement to everyone, just to you, because I don’t know what you went through, but that you’re here, reading this, matters. That you didn’t quit, or even if you did, that you still went on, matters. If you kept writing, hobbies, dreams, lives, afloat this year I’m proud of you.

I want the best of 2020 for you, hope its brighter and full of laughter, and if not I’ll still be here for you.