I decided against making a dedicated 2024 wrap-up post after spending half the year depressed in a way that I’d never experienced before. My first cliched instinct is to say that 2024 passed in a blur, but really it was more like a kaleidoscope except all the colors were gray tinged with black. Last year I:

• sold a book on proposal about the impact of reality TV on a marriage.
• released two books: Looking For Love in All the Haunted Places and Suitehearts: Drama and Destiny.
  • Regarding Haunted Places specifically: I love this book. I really do. I have warm, fond feelings of myself whole writing it. I had so many hopes and dreams for it. But ultimately, this became my first time releasing work so widely disliked that it made me question everything about myself. There are two extremely critical reviews that I can literally quote verbatim because my brain refuses to let them fade. I never had to turn off my tags and mentions on social media before until this happened. They’re still off actually.
  • When you’re already mentally down bad so far, you’re roasting in the Earth’s mantle, it surprisingly doesn’t take much to reach obliteration at the core.
• released fourth short story “Bonne Nuit” in the We Mostly Come Out at Night anthology.
• accepted that Haunted Places might never find its audience and attempted to move on.
• accepted that “Claire Kann” does not have an established readership whatsoever.
• completely tore down and rebuilt my writing structure, routine, and mantras from nothing.
• wrote several drafts of the aforementioned marriage book
• spent many hours sobbing during my sad girl sunrise walks
• read some books I liked and watched some movies I loved.
• had brief stints where I stopped being a hermit and traveled: Romance Con in Milwaukee, Steamy Lit Con in Anaheim, and When We Were Young in Las Vegas.
• met my adult romance editor and reunited with a good friend in person.
• figured out that I operate best under a structured, repetitive schedule. Without it I begin self-sabotaging in potentially harmful ways.
• stared giving up in the face on the twelfth floor and choose to see another day.