I wish you a safe and peaceful holiday season and all the best for the new year. This year had its challenges, but knowing you were out there supporting me gave me the motivation to continue writing and doing all the things!

In 2017, some cool writer stuff happened:

• My first book, Life in the ’Cosm, had a second print round. (The latest edition includes words of praise on the back cover by two authors I really respect!)
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• Speculating Canada’s Derek Newman-Stille interviewed me on Trent Radio. We talked about writing characters with disabilities, cosplaying, Life in the ’Cosm, and then spent the rest of the time laughing.
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• I discovered a new joy with writing short stories. Two of my stories are awaiting a verdict as to whether they’ll appear in anthologies!
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• I moderated my first panel at Limestone Genre Expo called When to Listen to and When to Ignore Writing Advice. I also sat on two other panels.
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• My poem Invisible was published in Lady literary magazine.
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• I participated in a couple of super-cool panels at Can-Con 2017: Spooning with Spoonies: Disability and Sexuality (a Spoonie Authors Network panel) and Absurdist British Humour in Speculative Fiction.
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• Author and presenter Mony Dojeiji interviewed me on The Author’s Journey. We talked about my story as a writer and other cool things, like The Spoonie Authors Network. (Video coming in early 2018!)
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• Renaissance press invited me to provide words of praise for S.M. Carrière’s Daughters of Britain and John Haas’ The Reluctant Barbarian. (It made me feel so important, like my opinion mattered!)
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• I had mad fun at the Renaissance table during Ottawa Geek Market, Ottawa Comiccon, and Queer Between the Covers in Montreal. It’s fun meeting people and being silly with my fellow authors and the Renaissance press staff.
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• I met or got to know more authors this year who I am proud to call my friends, like Jamieson Wolf, Stephen Graham King, and ’Nathan Burgoine, to name a few. (Meeting authors is FUN!)
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• Contrary to belief (in myself), I wrote just over 50,000 words during my first-ever NaNoWriMo for the Xax and Viv biography, The Stealth Lovers. Once again, I engaged on a “well, I’ll try this” journey, and so far, I am loving the manuscript. What’s really been nice is that people have volunteered to beta-read it, and I’m not even done! That makes me happy.

While I loved discovering short stories, NaNoWriMo helped light the fire back under my butt for novel writing. My plan is to submit (God-willing) The Stealth Lovers in 2018, and then go back to Life in Another ’Cosm.

But in the meantime, I am going to enjoy my holidays, eat perhaps a little too much cake, and chill like an ice cube at the North Pole.

Again, all the best to you! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! My best hopes for you and yours in 2018. ❤

Cait Gordon is the author of Life in the ’Cosm, a comedic space opera where boy meets girl, but girl doesn’t notice boy because she’s sharing a body with another boy. She is also the creator and editor of the Spoonie Authors Network. You can follow Cait on Facebook and Twitter.