Quarterly Wrap Up
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #7
I can’t believe the first quarter of 2026 has passed. The first newsletter went out about a week ago now, with an update on just how eventful 2026 has been so far! You can sign up here! Both of my kids have their birthdays during these three months – the youngest in Jan and the oldest in March – so there was the trappings of making sure they had a celebration they enjoyed in school with their friends. Youngest actually started what she calls “big school”, ie the same school her sister is in, this year! Her birthday was literally the second day of school, so she’s endeared herself to…
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #6
The last newsletter of 2025 went out a couple of weeks ago. I can’t believe I’ve sent out six of these already and also started sending out short stories with alternate ones. It’s something I enjoy doing now though, and I hope you all get some enjoyment from it too. You can sign up here! If you’ve been receiving the newsletters, you know I lost a few family members in the first half of the year. There have also been losses in the extended family, of an old friend I lost touch with, and some friends and family of friends as well. That’s not to say it’s only been a…
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #5
Three quarters into the year and writing blog post intros can still trip me up. I suppose because I don’t want to just rehash the newsletter snippets that will come after this? Ah well, I’ll let them do the talking. You can sign up here! There’s something about the second half of the year that’s just – busy and quick in so many ways. These past few months have seen some travel – I finally went to visit my parents! I also came down with such bad food poisoning two days in that I was hospitalised, but that’s not important. Then there were TWO weddings within the span of a…
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #4
I’ve written four of these now and it doesn’t seem to be getting any easier. These blog intros, not the newsletters. Those are surprisingly easy, even if I don’t always remember how the entire quarter of the year has passed. This last issue went out with a free short story download and I hope that readers enjoy it. It’s one of my favourite things I’ve written. You can sign up here! My husband and I took our first long childfree vacation in April too. We went to Japan – largely because this year’s Star Wars Celebration was held there and I really wanted to go, but also because his grandmother…
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #3
The 31st of March saw the third issue of the newsletter – and the first issue of this year – go out. I’ll let the snippets speak for themselves. You can sign up here! These few months have been filled with very high highs – some weddings, a trip we decided to go on last minute with extended family to Cairo and Dubai – and a couple of very low lows – my mother’s oldest brother passed away pretty unexpectedly in early March and barely a week later, our community’s spiritual godmother also unexpectedly passed. The grief comes in ebbs and flows, and it hasn’t really hit, you know? My emotions have therefore…
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #2
The second issue of the newsletter went out on New Year’s Eve – yes, over a month ago! – and, well, looking back at not just the last quarter of 2024 but the whole of it makes me pretty happy, really. On a creative level, I think I was pretty consistently productive. 208,081 new words last year, not counting blog posts, reviews and newsletters, which as a whole? Pretty good, if I say so myself. You can sign up here! I read more in November and December than I have in the rest of the year combined! I fell deeply into the cozy fantasy side of things in November after…
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NEWSLETTER SNIPPETS; Issue #1
To paraphrase Jane Austen, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a writer in want of engagement must put herself on multiple platforms. Or at least, that’s what I’m telling myself. My first newsletter went out at the end of September. I’m still figuring out what I’ll be putting on there, what the layout will look like – I’ve already made some changes since the first issue went out – but a few things I know for sure: You can sign up here! Reading is one thing I talk about here, so you’re mostly up to date with what I’ve finished this year. I also found an audiobook of Howl’s Moving…
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jul – sept 2020; it’s a wrap
Surprisingly, this wrap-up isn’t late! The new organisational system I’m slowly trying to incorporate into my life is really helping. This past quarter has been equal parts a blur and so slow, I just want it to be 2021 already. But then, my second trimester during my first pregnancy was much the same. It’s just that the situation the world over isn’t really helping. The bright side is that we’re going out a little more – to places that are not too full of people and always wearing a mask – so we get a change of pace and of scenery. We actually just went to a beach again, had…
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apr – jun 2020; it’s a wrap
Another very late wrap-up, but well. This year has been really long, hasn’t it? I was so hopeful in the first quarter that things could not get worse. I was wrong. I guess hindsight really is 20/20, eh? Eh? But seriously though, while the lockdown here in Malaysia is not as strict as the first few months, we’re still taking care. I am immuno-compromised so i’m trying not to take too many risks, but I do have doctor’s appointments pretty much every month that I have to go for, and so we’ve been eating out those few days. My reading has been all over the place – May and June…
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jan – mar 2020; it’s a wrap
A little bit late, but well, I haven’t been blogging much at all, have I? I think I’m in another reading slump? I don’t know, on the one hand, these past three months have been good! I’ve been writing some, I’ve been reconnecting with old fandoms – but every time I try and interact again with the online book community, I find myself retreating to a few bloggers I can trust because there is so much Drama and so little nuance in the way the big names talk about things. I feel like that is why I haven’t been blogging or booktubing at all since the year has started. There…