At the close of the old year and start of a new one, the Internet sets itself on fire trying to keep up with everyone posting resolutions, goals, plans and wishes for the year to come. I’m definitely one of those ambitious planners  dreamers. I even spent part of December taking a wonderful online course, “How to Write 50 Books a Year,” offered by Delilah and her sister Elle James. (Writers: take this class the next time it’s offered. It’s amazingly useful.) With the help of that class, I developed not only an ambitious set of work-related goals for 2015, but a workable plan to achieve said goals.

As I write this blog entry, it’s the sixth day of 2015. (I know you’re actually reading it on January 12, but I had to get the post to Delilah ahead of time). I’m already behind on the word count I needed to finish all the planned books by the end of December 2015. I’ve also started a book that wasn’t on the original work plan, one that popped into my head on January 2 and demanded to be written now. According to calculations I made before I conceived this new novella, I have more than half a million words to write this year, and I can now add another 25,000 words minimum to that. You think I’d be panicking.

But I’m not.

At my age, which is older than Taylor Swift and younger than the average mountain, I’ve learned that no plan survives contact with the enemy, as Eisenhower should have said but didn’t. (It was actually a 19^th-century Prussian field marshall named Helmuth Von Moltke, as I discovered when I went to double-check the quote. The literal translation from German is much clunkier, so I’ll stick with the version that Eisenhower may or may not have paraphrased.)

Life likes to keep things interesting. Sometimes it’s in good ways, like throwing a new book idea at you when you were already looking at six or seven books for 2015. Sometimes it’s in a more mind-boggling fashion, like discovering in December, while you’re petting your shiny new 2015 work plan, that you’ve just been assigned a new editor who may have her own ideas about which book she’ll want when. And sometimes it’s just plain stupidity, such as the gaping plot hole into which your almost-finished book falls. (By “your,” of course, I mean “mine.” I know by this point in my career there’s always enough narrative rope to pull the book out of the hole, but when it happens it does kind of spoil the hope of wrapping the first draft up by the end of the week.)

But I can handle these changes of plan. Realizing I’ve mentally committed myself to writing more than half a million words in a year is daunting, but it’s nothing compared to some of the things I’ve done to my poor characters. If I can guide my heroes and heroines in defeating angry demons or government agencies run by evil sorcerers—and finding true love in the process—I can write the narrative of my year so it has a happy ending, even if there are a few plot twists along the way.

What are your goals and/or dreams for 2015? Post something about them in the comments and one random commenter will win a copy of my new (sexy!) paranormal romance Witches’ Waves.

About Teresa

Teresa Noelle Roberts started writing stories in kindergarten and she hasn’t stopped yet. A prolific author of short erotica, she’s also a published poet and fantasy writer—but hot paranormals and BDSM-spiced contemporaries are her favorites. Or they were until she discovered that SF romance offers new possibilities for wild sex, imaginative adventure and love beyond boundaries, so she’s added that sub-genre to her repertoire. Oh, and she’s also half of the writing team known as Sophie Mouette, writing mostly light-hearted spicy romances (with occasional forays into erotica).

Teresa is a crunchy granola girl who enjoys belly dance, yoga, medieval re-creation, playing in the ocean, cooking, and growing more vegetables than she and her husband can possibly eat.  She’d enjoy sleeping, too. She thinks. But it takes so much time!

She shares her home in southern Massachusetts with her husband, a Leo in law enforcement, and two overstuffed cats. She and her husband often plan vacations around food, history, and/or proximity to water.

Find Teresa at www.teresanoelleroberts.com, like her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AuthorTeresaNoelleRoberts or follow on Twitter, where she’s @TeresNoeRoberts.

And check out her alter ego Sophie at www.sophiemouette.com.

About Witches’ Waves

Witches’ Waves (Duals and Donovans: The Different, book 4)
Samhain Publishing

“The overall message is one of hope and the healing that love can help bring, w/some really hot sex […] for good measure.” Four stars—Romantic Times

“This novel definitely hooked me for this series.”—From Me to You Video, Photography and Book Reviews

“Well written and full of emotional depth.”— Manic Readers

Buy links: Samhain /Amazon / Amazon UK / B&N Nook / Kobo / iBooks (iTunes)

The ocean is on their side. But the fight is on land—and it’s about to get dirty.

Duals and Donovans: The Different, Book 4

Long held captive as the Agency’s secret weapon—a blind witch with visions—Meaghan has come to a line she refuses to cross. Rather than betray the infant “child of five bloods” to the Agency’s scientists, she chooses death. Except when she throws herself into the ocean, she doesn’t die. Her repressed water magic comes to life.

When the sodden, delirious witch drifts into Kyle’s arms, his otter dual instincts tell him to get her to the Donovans as fast as possible. Even though one particular surfer-dude Donovan broke his heart.

Declan Donovan continually kicks himself for pushing Kyle away, but his touchy combination of water, earth and lightning magic is too volatile, and Kyle wanted more than Deck was ready to give.

When they come together to help Meaghan control her new magic, it leads the Agency straight to the child of five bloods. They’ll have to dive head-first into total trust—in their magics, in themselves and in each other—to save the child and stop the Agency once and for all.

Warning: Contains an oceanful of sex between an ethereal blind heroine who swears like a pissed-off Marine, an overly serious otter shifter, a would-be beach bum who may be descended from a Norse god, in permutations as fluid as the sea – and themes of abuse and recovery.

Series blurb:

Welcome to an America where the non-human Different and magically gifted humans live among ordinary people. Witches are both feared and honored, but shape-shifting Duals are treated as second-class citizens. The Agency, a government agency that’s supposed to monitor illegal uses of magic and Different abilities, has developed its own dangerous agenda. But when Duals and witches join forces, the Agency and other bad guys aren’t going to know what hit them.

And neither are the witches and Duals. Witch magic grows from the positive energy of love and sex–and the only thing better than one dual for sex magic is two of them!