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2024 Year of Writing In Review

Lilyana Page

2024 with sparkles


2024 has been busy, busy, busy. Still, I made time to write an enormous amount this year, more than I ever have before. Here are some of my writing highlights from the past year:


  • My blog reached its first anniversary on the 21st of December!


  • I wrote and shared a 16,000+ word story, the longest tale I've ever written. I am now working through a second round of editing and revision in anticipation of submitting it to a publisher in 2025. You can read a bit about the story here.


  • I have now shared 56 blog posts with the world, on top of 11 others that I released in December 2023, bringing the total number of posts up to 67.


    And...


  • I did my first ever guest post on a fellow writer's blog.


I'm so glad I've gotten to share some of my successes with all of you and thankful for how much I have grown as a writer over the past year. I am looking forward to writing through 2025 alongside the faithful readers of my blog.


Below, you'll find a summary of my first year of blogging, as well as an overview of what the rest of my year in writing looked like!





My First Year of Blogging



Over the past year, I've published posts in a variety of categories. I've posted book reviews, poetry tutorials, poems, and stories, as well as a few other random things.


It's been touch-and-go here and there. Posts were sometimes delivered a few hours late, something that perhaps most people didn't notice, but I did, and it drove me bonkers.


I've had my fair share of incorrectly linked emails, annoying email service providers, and more. I am getting better at sending out the correct links. Most of the wrong ones were simply my error, but I am firmly convinced that Wix gave me the wrong link to copy and paste one day.


As for the annoying email service provider problem, I am slowly getting ready to switch (again!), and try a more well-known provider. You may hear more about that in the New Year.


I've got things to improve on, and a few changes to make, but overall, 2024 didn't go so badly after all. :)


To finish off this section of the post, I've compiled links to the original writing I posted on my blog in 2024, in case you missed out on some of these.



Poetry



I posted Contemplating Flanders on Remembrance Day, in memory of soldiers who have fought for Canada. It turned out quite nicely. I've written Remembrance Day poems here and there over the years, once submitting a poem to a Remembrance Day contest run by the Royal Canadian Legion (nope, I didn't win, but it was fun).


Not all of my poems took such a serious turn as Contemplating Flanders. Some of them were silly and playful, like Little Miss Muffet and Perplexing Plurals. You might include An Acorn Finds a Home in this category as well.


I spent hours writing a narrative poem based on the Biblical book of Ruth, which began as a school assignment, but I then decided to polish it further for publication on the blog, mostly because of my mother's encouragement to do so. :)


Other poems that appeared on the blog this year include Watching, Waiting, Listening, Two Hats, and The Goose Girl, which I later shoved through Google Translate, acquiring some interesting...ermm...revisions to my poem.



Stories



My biggest accomplishment in the story world this year was definitely Three Feet of Trouble, which rounded out at somewhere between 16,000 and 17,000 words. You can learn a bit more about what inspired this fractured fairytale in this post.


I'm glad I blogged a bit about where Three Feet of Trouble came from, as I honestly had forgotten a lot of the details in this blog post until I re-read it just the other day. I love reminding myself of why I wrote this or that piece.


This year, I shared two stories that have earned me honourable mentions in separate contests at different times. Here's a link to Caged and a link to Is Baking Cookies Usually So Hard?


I also shared One Busy Mom, the first piece of writing I ever got paid for. What an exciting day that was!


Last, but definitely not least, I posted Sardine Standoff, a story written by a friend of mine, Lydia Baines! She kindly gave me permission to share her very entertaining story on my blog. Thank you, Lydia!




pile of papers


All The Rest Of It



Before I started my blog, I had been sending out submissions to various magazines, writing contests, and online publications for about two years, and I'd slowly been increasing the number of submissions per year.


I wasn't sure how starting a blog would affect the number of submissions I was sending out each year, but it really hasn't messed with it at all. My number of submissions has actually improved, which is the opposite of what I thought would happen. Currently as I write this, I have sent out eighteen submissions this year, considerably more than any other year. That might not sound like a lot, but on top of school, my blog, and the rest of life it is. It is really neat to look back and see just how much I have grown in my writing over the past year.


Yes, I have submitted more than ever before this year, but often it feels like all I'm getting is that big fat rejected signal.



red rejection sticker


"We're sorry, but this piece is not a good fit for us at this time."


Sometimes they will tag a little bit of encouragement on at the end, which I do appreciate.


"Although this piece was not a good fit for us, your work has potential. We look forward to receiving more from you."


Out of the eighteen submissions I have sent out, nine have been rejected/declined, three accepted, and six I have yet to hear back about.


On the bright side of all these rejections I seem to be getting, it's teaching me to develop a thick writer skin, which is a necessary tool, even more important for when I begin pitching my first book manuscript in January. So thanks for saying no, all you hard-hearted editors out there reading my work! I'm just kidding. I imagine that editors have a difficult job too, saying no all day. You guys, that takes energy! Oh my. It's true, it does, but I'm just goofing off now, getting distracted.



green acceptance sticker


Let's talk about the acceptances. They are a cheerier topic, and fun to share about.



Back in January, I sent Is Baking Cookies Usually So Hard? to Kailei Pew's 3rd Annual Kid's Choice KidLit Writing Contest, and it was chosen as an Honourable Mention. A mouthful of a name? Yep, sure is.


The neat thing about this contest is that the coordinator, Kailei Pew, gathers up a bunch of kids to judge the contest entries, so it's a neat way to get your children's story in front of real kids.



I have been slightly obsessed with fairytale retellings this year, both reading and writing them. For the Sheree Fitch Prize, I wrote a retelling of Goldilocks, and again I was awarded an Honourable Mention.



As many of you know, I did my first guest post this year, on a fellow writer's blog, which you can find here. You can find my guest post here.



Wrapping Up



This year of blogging has been wild and wonderful, and I just want to say a quick thank you to all who have supported me by reading this lovely blog.


If you're looking for more to read (are you really?! I put a LOT of links in this post!), my blog just had it's first birthday, and I recently introduced one of the MCs in my current WIP.


Glad to have you. Stick around for a while, will ya? :)


Happy New Year!


P.S. Here is my favourite book review from this year!

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© 2024 Lilyana Page

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