Shari’s Life: Writing and Sorting

Shari's Life

So here we are, at the end of February already and I am still not entirely sure where January and February all went! However, I am looking forward to warmer weather and spring to come!

I haven’t written as much as I would have liked to this month. I managed 2 chapters of Demon’s Past in total, but I am taking the attitude that every word written is a step closer to finishing so I am not allowing myself to get too frustrated with this. I finished Chapter Twenty-Nine this morning, which is a pivotal chapter in Taku and Thane’s story! I post little snippets of Demon’s Past over on my Instagram account so do please check that out!

image1With the help from my sister, I was able to have the massive sort out in my flat that I wanted to do and have moved the furniture around in my lounge. It is amazing what a difference a layout change makes. It also feels much more spacious and I even have a slight echo to the room now! I also reorganised the squishmallow invasion so they all have new shelves to live in now. I also got this neat cake stand from Ebay to put the little squishvilles in!

My goal of keeping up with Social Media hasn’t gone much as planned so far but I am hopeful of changing this in the coming weeks! I want to get back to more regular posts on here too! So keep an eye out for that in the coming weeks too!

I hope everyone is having a great weekend!

Shari’s Life: Day in Brighton

Shari's Life

IMG_8699Yesterday me, my sister and nephew went to Brighton for the day. We went to the Sea Life Centre first, which we all really enjoy! It is in the original Victorian building so as well as seeing some amazing sea creatures, I got to enjoy the Gothic architecture too! My nephew loved it. He has been a few times before but always gets so excited! We were also able to watch them feeding the turtles and piranhas. As well as sea creatures they had a colony of leaf cutter ants. It was fascinating to watch them carrying leaves about four times the size of them up and down the tube tunnels and into their ant hills. My favourites are always the sea horses though. They are so adorable!

We’re going to try and do at least one outing like this a month with my nephew as he enjoys them so much. He’s been asking to go back to ‘see the Romans’ so next month we will probably do the Roman Palace at Fishbourne. As it gets more to the summer we can also do more out-doorsy attractions again like the Wetlands Trust at Arundel and the Weald and Downland Museum which is a firm favourite with all of us!

0181E382-E9D3-4BA9-82E6-C125A9EAE65FAfter the Sea Life Centre, we got some lunch and went to look round some of the shops. It was very busy so we didn’t linger, but we did visit the Miniso store which I loved! We had been once before but it was before Covid I think! Honestly, I could have spent so much in there but I was very restrained and only bought 3 things!  I bought two blind capsule beach dolls that look absolutely adorable! I cannot wait to open them and see who I got! I also bought this lego-ish Fragrance Store model! They also had the fan shop and sandwich bar, which I want to go back and get when we go back to Brighton next month!

My plans for today are to walk down to the Tesco Superstore in a bit to check for the Valentines Day squishmallows. I have been checking for weeks now and they haven’t had them 😦 My sister found a few of the ones we wanted in the Tesco Extra at Fishbourne but we still need to find Leon the Monster so I am hoping today will be the day!

When I get back from there I have some overtime booked for work and then I am going to do some more writing. I really want to hit Chapter 30 of Demon’s Past today if possible! I have also got back into Animal Crossing and hope to finally finish Mallepa 2.0!

I hope you are all having a great weekend!

Shari’s Life: Writing and Social Media

Shari's Life

Rather than New Year’s resolutions that I always fail to keep, I set myself a couple of goals for this year. One is to finish and publish Demon’s Past. I feel that this is achievable as I am more than halfway through now. I started writing this novel at least two years ago now and have been reluctant to finish it as I felt when I started that it would be the last book featuring Taku and Thane. The two of them are characters that mean a lot to me and I didn’t want to ‘let them go’ as it were. However, I do feel that there is more scope to continue their story after Demon’s Past, but I will only publish further a continuation if I feel it is as good as the other books featuring them. The Demon’s Blood universe will certainly continue as I have more of Koji’s story to tell as well his relationship with Atsuo.

Another goal is to start Perfect World 4. I believe I can certainly do this too and I have the opening scene all planned out, I just need to put pen to paper as it were. I doubt a draft will be finalised this year, but a start will be something and I am very keen to do this.

My last goal is to maintain a consistent social media presence. I don’t know if anyone else finds this but for me social media is hard. A lot of it is to do with my social anxiety and I’ve never had any negative feedback to what I post, but it is still there. So for me this is out of my comfort zone, but something I am keen to do. I am taking this slowly and am sticking to Instagram mainly for the time being. It is the social media I enjoy the most as I get to show my creative side with designing my posts too. My Instagram page is here if you want to check it out or follow me on that. I am aiming to post a couple of times a week at the moment.

Have you set any goals for the year? If so, I would love to here what they are and how they are coming along!

Print Proof of New Era

I’ve managed to pick up another viral infection, so I am feeling pretty yuck today but my proof copy of New Era (Perfect World Book 2) print edition arrived so that cheered me up! It looks really good and I can’t wait to be able to sign it off for publication! I will have to wait a bit though as it contains the blurb for Perfect World Book 3 which hasn’t been released yet! 

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I have also managed to stick to my writing goals for the week so far! I am over halfway through the formatting for Perfect World 3 and I’ve been able to write a chapter of Demon’s Past so I am very happy about that!