New Year Resolutions

Put your hands together for the lovely and talented Ms Jana Downs!

            It’s that time of year again. Everyone is thinking about the previous 365 and wondering what the next 365 will bring. We all make promises to ourselves (that 99.9% of the time we will not keep) and try to imagine that the new and shiny year ahead will be infinitely better than the last. It’s a time of hope that is rarely seen when we’re midway through July and neck deep in whatever social, financial, or personal drama that we will inevitably get caught up in at some point over the course of the next few months. So since we’re hoping for less of that life-inflicted “stuff” right now and promising ourselves that we’ll just be happier if we keep our promises, I’ve decided to pledge to myself and the universe to make a better resolution.

            I’ve resigned myself to the fact that that extra 15 pounds is not going to come off. I’m busy and lazy, the combination will not equal any significant weight loss, not to mention the fact that “losing weight” is the number one resolution people make and never keep. I don’t want to be that person that gives a vague generalization about their New Year’s resolution, “I resolve to be more wonderful”. Uh-huh. Right. What does that even mean? So I’m going to approach this resolution thing with a little more thought than I had previously. What did I respect about myself? What did I dislike about myself last year? And where the heck do I go from here?

            The first question is easy to answer. I’ve been writing my whole life and this year is the first year people beyond myself and my reading partners have ever been privy to my work. Getting published was not an easy road or a simple experience. I’ve been through a veritable color wheel of emotions: dismay, determination, dismay again, stress, impatience, joy, happiness, elation (yes I know they’re all synonyms of one another but they represent different moments. Let me show off my literary skills a bit. :P), and then satisfaction. I’m proud of that accomplishment and I think that my resolution has to include more of the determination that got two books and a novella out this year.   

            What did I dislike about myself? Well, this question is a lot less easy to swallow. I disliked the fact that I allowed other peoples’ opinions and attitude problems to affect the thing I love most about myself. I’m a writer. We get crap. We need to get over it. No one is going to love everything. In fact, some people will claim to dislike something so intensely and so rudely that they manage to create an entire soap opera over their dismay over the book that you’ve spent hundreds of hours working on. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind critiques. In fact there is nothing more useful to me than a thoughtful critique. But let’s face it. There are a lot of Jerks in the world who want to say something cruel just to say it. I let those jerks get under my skin, deep enough that I stopped writing entirely for a couple of weeks because I was simply too down on myself to open up the laptop and dig into something significant. I don’t want to be the pitiful Golem like creature who sits in the pit otherwise known as my office writing stories on my laptop that other people aren’t allowed to read, while screaming “my precioussssssssssssss!” because some angry hobbits tried to jack my confidence over who really owns my bloody ring, er, story.

            So where the heck do I go from here? What resolution about 2012 can encompass both the loved and hated moments of 2011? Here’s what I came up with: avoid the hobbits (they’re meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Frodo may have saved the world but Sam married someone else in the end so he didn’t get jack for stealing the bloody ring) and I’m going to write like 2012 is really going to be the last 12 months of my life. My challenge to everyone this year is to make a resolution that means something to you and stick with it. Don’t give into temptation to pledge to do something you don’t really care about. Fight your own hobbits and remember your own accomplishments. Maybe you’ll finish 2012 with even loftier ambitions because of it.

. ^_^ Good luck and stay scandalous!    

 Ravyn's Destiny

Buy Now: http://www.bookstrand.com/ravyns-destiny

The demon Prince Salvatore is a kingdomless monarch getting tired of life. Watched over by five Ravyn warriors, he’s spent generations trying to take back his kingdom from his murderous cousin. All he desires is to return home in peace. Then he meets an unexpected treasure, a human who won’t tell him his name. Now he wants something for himself that he never wanted before—love.

Destin is a faery King who has been unlucky in relationships. He’s been hurt in the past and has given up on love. By playing a bartender in the human world, he keeps his distance emotionally from other people, until he meets a gorgeous foreigner who wants him to take a chance.

When fate thrusts the two of them together, can they learn to embrace the unexpected gift they’ve been given? Or is their shared destiny just too good to be true?




Here, here, Ms Downs! Don't let the hobbits get you down. :) Want to win a copy of the 3rd book in the Ravyn Warriors series, Ravyn's Destiny? (Trust me, you do!) Comment below and slap on that contact info!

Contest ends January 15th at midnight EST.