I’ve been “days” away from being caught up on all my writing projects for the past two weeks…but weeks are made up of days, so this still counts, right? 🙂

My last remaining tasks are for the Beneath the Waves bundle, which launches on June 15th. This is the fifth bundle I’ve cureated, and I learn new things each time.

My biggest lesson with The Faerie Summer was that I need to write down – and follow! – a launch checklist, instead of assuming I’ll remember everything. I do actually remember everything, but a list would help me think of things earlier, so I could get ahead of the game. With Beneath the Waves, I learned that it’s totally fine to launch two bundles a month and a half apart, but that it’s way less stressful if you’re ahead on all of the bundle-related tasks.

One slight complication time-wise was that I decided to completely redo the cover for “To Be a Monster” last week. This was the right decision – the original cover fit the theme of the story, but wasn’t super compelling. The new version looks much better, but I spent forever tweaking colors and trying different fonts – including yet more time today.

After the past few months, I’m full of motivation to get ahead on my deadlines. I’ve committed to delivering six short stories between August and December, and I’d like to get them all done as soon as possible. Not only will that give me more breathing room, it also means I’ll have time to run them past my editor, and I’ll have more time to work on cover designs (since all six will need covers). I’m launching two more bundles this year, have six in the works for next year (that will likely jump to at least ten), and I have plenty of non-bundled stories to work on. So I have to be careful not to let my guard down. 🙂