New year, same resolution

My resolutions rarely change.

2016 was a wild ride. The year ended with a Dec. 30 surprise 70th birthday party for my mother, Connie, who has 19 stents, has had two open-heart surgeries, has an artificial heart valve, and beat cancer last year. If anyone’s earned a party, it’s her.

Connie Corrigan

On the fiction front, I turned the page –– at least for the time being –– on Peyton Cote and in November started a new book that will take me the coming months to complete. Peyton is not dead. She’s far from it. But after a decade writing a third-person female, it’s nice to write a first-person male again (I began, after all, writing Jack Austin thrillers from 2000 to 2007).

While my personal reprieve provides me with a sense of clarity, the publishing world continues to spin in directions no one understands. Print and digital book sales figures industry wide were all over the place in 2016, but audiobooks appear to be on the rise. As are adult coloring books. Adult coloring books?

So what will 2017 hold for the book biz? Who knows? And in this volatile industry, I learned long ago to worry only about controlling what I can and setting lofty goals. This year, my aim is to make the book I began in November better than anything I’ve written to date. And to get book III of the Peyton Cote series, Destiny’s Pawn, in as many reviewers’ and TV execs’ hands as I can. (A producer and writer are shopping it currently.)

No resolutions for me. A new year, and hopefully, God willing, a new book.

Happy New Year!