Bye, bye, 2017...

It’s the final post of the year, in Too Many Books to Count! I can hardly believe January is just around the corner. Honestly, I don’t think I’m ready for it, at all. I was having too much fun with Christmas, wore myself out, and now the end of the season is here. The holidays are almost done, the year is almost through… and I find myself wanting to say a few final words, before we say goodbye to 2017.

2016 was a year that I felt I had to defend. Everyone was angry at 2016 (or so it seemed), while I thought it was a fabulous year.

2017… I don’t honestly know what I should say about this year.

It’s been an interesting year, without a doubt. It was the year I got promoted to assistant editor, the year I released Dwr and Letters from Hell, the year of so many great and fun things—but it was also the year we suddenly and unexpectedly said goodbye to my grandmother. None of us thought that would happen so soon. We thought we had years and years to go, that she was the strong one who would live on well past others who now live on without her. And so she is, living on, just not where we can see her. But sometimes I do feel her looking at me and laughing, especially when I remind people of exactly what she would say in a given situation.

2017 was predominately a good year. Many amazing things happened in my life. Things put themselves in order, got themselves to where I both needed and wanted them to be. I grew and developed relationships, I expanded my writing, I learned things about craft that had been eluding me for years, and I finally got back into reading. I started new books and scrapped them, I finished writing the last of the Druid Novels, I laughed until my sides hurt, I cried until I couldn’t breathe… but it was a good year.

As 2018 approaches, I find myself wondering what it will behold. What amazing things, what sorrowful things, what beautiful and tragic things will take place in the coming year? What will we all become, by the end of 2018? 

We’ll have to get there to find out.

But the thing I really want to remind you, is this:

If you go into something with positivity, you’re only one step ahead of most. Keep your positivity, keep your optimism, don’t let the world drag you down into its uncertainty. Don’t let anyone else define you or tell you what you’re supposed to be. That’s up to you. Your year is what you make it, your year is what you mold it to become. And yes, some of the things that make up this year will not be under your control, but your response to those things? Yeah, you get to decide that.

So keep your head up. Your year is what you want it to be.

Let’s make it a good one, shall we?

[love and cheers to 2018]

{Rani Divine}