Taking Stock, Moving On

Sports franchises going through poor seasons say they're having a "rebuilding year" because it sounds better than "terrible year."  There is something to be said, though, for the basic concept of a rebuilding year--taking stock of where you are and trying to put the fundamental pieces in place for moving forward.

The end of the year is a natural time for writers, like everyone else, to take a step back, see what they've done, and think about building that foundation for the next twelve months.  As a writer, I wouldn't go so far as to say I had a terrible year.

But a rebuilding year?  Yeah, I'll cop to that.

By my count, I wrote thirteen new stories in 2024.  That's not bad, but I've had years when I wrote more than twenty (26 being my high).  My 2024 stories totaled roughly 52,000 words, for an average of 4,000 per story.  Of the thirteen, three were submitted to open-call anthologies, seven were written for anthologies I was invited to contribute to, and the remaining three were submitted to magazines.

I had fourteen stories published in 2024, which, again, is down considerably from my 2022 high mark of 21.  Ten were in anthologies, four in periodicals.  Two were reprints (details and links can be found on my website).

Other writing-related 2024 moments worth noting: I attended two conferences (Bouchercon and ShortCon), joined the Sleuthsayers, was nominated for a Shamus award, signed a contract for a collection of some of my stories, and was elected the President of the Short Mystery Fiction Society (since I ran unopposed, it was a landslide).

My work with the SMFS probably accounts for some of my decline in production.  Before I was the President, I was the Derringer coordinator, as I discussed at (probably excessive) length in my very first Sleuthsayer column.  Both positions took up a lot of time I might have spent writing, but I don't regret  holding them.  The SMFS has been enormously important in my development as a writer, and if I can give something back that helps other writers in similar ways, I'm happy to do so.

What I ultimately think was more damaging was something that offers far less fulfillment or meaning: social media.  I allowed myself, at various times this year, to get sucked into the vortex of Facebook and (shudder) Twitter/X, as well as, to a lesser degree, other platforms.  It's astonishing, and distressing, to realize how much time and mental energy this can take up, if you let it.

The conventional wisdom is that social media is vital to the life of a writer these days.  We need the connections.  We need the leads. We need to actively promote ourselves.  This is unfortunate, because I'm increasingly of the opinion that social media is also toxic to the writing life.

That's only in part because of the time it sucks up.  It also promotes a mindset that is actively destructive to the kind of quiet contemplation and reflective thought vital to productive writing.  It shreds the attention span.  It offers a constant stream of distraction.  It promotes a continual buzz of anxiety, because in the world of social media everything is a crisis, everything is dramatic, everything is conflict, and the ways in which the world is on fire just multiply the longer you look.  At least, that's what it was doing to me.  How can I write a nice little murder story when hundreds of people are screaming at me that the collapse of civilization is just around the corner?

Since a certain event in early November that I will not discuss directly, I've been off social media almost entirely.  I haven't been on Twitter once, and I deleted the app from my phone, keeping my account only to prevent anyone else from taking the name.  I've made a few Facebook posts to promote new publications, but avoided looking at anything else on the site.

I'm finding this is very good for me.  I'm less anxious and depressed.  I'm writing more, and enjoying the process more.  I'm also reading more, with more sustained attention.

The problem, of course, is that to a certain degree social media is important to writers today.  It's not just a matter of promoting our work, though that is important.  It's also the place where we establish and maintain our relationships with other writers, with publishers, with readers.  Lord knows not many people are writing emails these days, let alone letters (I have no idea what the literary biographers of the future are going to have to work with).  Since the social aspect of being a writer is important to me, it feels impossible, and unwise, to sever my ties with social media entirely.

So this is the dilemma I face going into 2025: how do I reap the benefits of social media without paying the costs?  I'd honestly be interested in hearing how other writers deal with this problem.  Do you use social media?  Which platforms, and how much?  How do you keep it in check enough to not interfere with your writing?  Is social media, for you, ultimately a boon or a curse?

Whatever your answer, I hope everyone reading this had a productive 2024, and I wish us all a better 2025 than we might be expecting.  See you in January!