Christmas Reflections

The festive season always provides a good opportunity to reflect on the year that was, and look forward to the year ahead. A lot happened this year. Some of it good, much of it a continuation of the themes from 2020.

Before writing this, I dug up my Christmas post from a year ago. What struck me most, was my optimism.

To quote myself from Dec 2020, “All we can hope for is that 2021 is better than 2020. And, quite frankly, I’m optimistic that it will be.”

Obviously, the pandemic rages on, and consequently, I haven’t been able to leave New Zealand to see my family overseas. I likely won’t be able to any time soon, either. Much of 2021 was spent in some form of lockdown, imprisoned in Auckland and separated from my family here.

But it hasn’t all been bad. On the writing front, Sarah and I published When the Rain Falls earlier this month which has been a massive achievement for us. A bright spot in 2021. We are also deep into the edits of the next books in the series The Price of Pandemonium and Darkness, Set us Free. And, our historical fiction WIP is so close to being finished—we hit 100K words earlier this week and have about 10 chapters left to write.

Not to mention, Sarah and I have met so many amazing and talented authors in the Author Spotlight section on our podcast. It has been fantastic to connect with like-minded writers and learn about their journeys.

Finally, I should shout out my novel critique group who kept me sane during lockdown and have provided much needed friendship, support and feedback over the past year. I look forward to seeing how everyone’s novels progress in the year ahead.

So that’s it from me for 2021.

I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a happy new year. I hope all of you are able to have a restful holiday period and spend quality time with those you are close to.

Bring on 2022.

~A

This blog post marks the end of an era for me. My tenure as a researcher, doing lab work has finished.

I had my last day at the university a couple of days ago. Honestly, it was a bittersweet feeling. On one hand, I’ve spent the last decade honing my practical chemistry skills, and gathering the knowledge to teach our future scientists. On the other, I’m ready to move on and do something else with the skills and knowledge I have gained.

So unfortunately, this will be my last LabLife post.

But, rest assured, I am not leaving the science realm entirely. And I look forward to my new adventures in 2022.

~A