A (Late) Look Back at 2024

2024 has ended, and that means it’s time to reflect. In many ways, this year was not the dream I hoped it to be, especially when it came to the last five months or so, but that doesn’t mean this whole year was a wash. In fact, it was quite the opposite! 

In true Morgane fashion, I posted my goals for 2025 last week (as I somehow finished that blog before this one), but let’s take this week to look back for just a moment.

GSR Publishing

First off is the big one: I published Ghosts of the Steel Road this year! It was definitely a learning process, especially when it comes to marketing, but it was still fulfilling. This journey has informed me of how to better establish myself as an indie author on social media, even if maintaining consistency on the internet may be the death of me. Here’s to working on the sequel and the eventual end of the trilogy!

Writing

In addition to my publication activities, I also worked on other projects. Overall I wrote for over 200 hours and got over 300,000 words down to paper. I also completed two rough drafts for novels, one a little over 50k words and the other over 70k words. As an underwriter, this is very much expected of me, but I am proud that I was able to complete some drafts instead of just all random, half-completed material. Hopefully, there will be much more progress on one of the projects that got a completed draft this year!

Social Media Struggle

As mentioned earlier, though I understand the importance of social media for an author, my actual execution has certainly been lacking. I’ll admit: social media probably drains my introverted brain more than regular interaction does. Though it was a goal of mine this past year, I really didn’t succeed in maintaining a social media presence, as is expected for any indie author out there.

The Fun Stuff

One thing I did improve on this year, though, was spending a little more time doing things for myself. I read books, play video games, and cooked a bit more than the year previous. It definitely helped that I got a taste of the 9-5 life, which to no one’s surprise gave me much more free time than my current “full-time student plus two part-time jobs” life. I’ll try to be better with recording the books, shows, games, and food I consume this year in spreadsheets and photos, but know that those did happen in 2024.

Getting a Job!

Finally, I do have a second big moment from last year: I accepted my post-graduate job offer! I won’t be sharing the details, as that would ruin the point of being anonymous, but after most of a semester of panicked job applications and a frustrating lack of interviews, I somehow got lucky enough to land a full-time position. Once I graduate in May, I’ll be working in a hybrid position that I believe will give me not only a steady income, but also more time to keep up my writing and other hobbies.

Though parts of me wish 2024 had been even more successful, I have to remind myself that I won’t be able to improve with every single second of every single day. That’s how burnout happens, which is something that I am unfortunately very familiar with at this point. So, here’s to 2025, where self-care is on the menu and more words are to be written.