When was the last time you had a performance review?

I have had more than a few in my life. There was one that I’d like to forget, but the others have passed mainly by without a hitch. I believe that the goal is to acknowledge the things that have gone well and find an item or two that can be improved.

Everyone has something they can do better. Even the best in their field would point out a hole in their game that they’d like to improve upon. Michael Jordan was notorious for the amount he practiced. Indeed, he wanted to get better at something. I’m not comparing myself to the greatest basketball ever. I’m just saying that we can all find things to do better at.

When I did the first update in March, it was an experiment to see how things were progressing in my writing career. Three months later, I added another milestone and felt very happy with the results.

I hit a bump in the road this quarter and might never have felt the need to disclose such a thing if it weren’t for this update.

Many things were at play that threw me off my game. I visited Ohio to see family and check on my father’s health. Two writers’ conferences. A nasty bout of Covid that lingered for more than a week. A second illness that knocked me down but wasn’t Covid. My annual excursion to a rock & roll festival. Just noting that all those things happened in three months makes my head spin because there were regular family commitments, high school football games, and commercial real estate deals to get done.

The one constant in it all was I wrote every morning. I maintained that habit even when I was sick. My girlfriend thought I was demented when I dragged myself out of bed to tap the keys. It’s the only thing that made me feel good on those rough days.

During the third quarter, several things suffered, but my output of words remained steady. We’ll discuss those below.

On to the performance review.

Some Exciting News – Part II

In the first quarter update, I mentioned that Hector Acosta’s story “La Chingona” was selected to appear in Best American Mystery & Suspense 2022. That story originally appeared in The Eviction of Hope.

Well, some other news came out this quarter: Frank Zafiro’s “The Rumor in 411” and Scott Kikkawa’s “Joe Sukiyaki” were listed as Distinguished Stories.

Frank’s story appeared in The Eviction of Hope, and Scott’s tale appeared in A Bag of Dick’s.

That’s some big news for two 509 Crime Anthologies!

Books Released in Quarter #3

I released Cutler’s Bargain at the end of September.

While I’m thrilled with the fifth book in that series, I’m disappointed in how I rolled it out. Due to the things described above, I wasn’t mentally prepared to properly market the book. Therefore, it came out under the radar, through the back door, without any fanfare, [insert your favorite euphemism here].

Instead of simply releasing the book, I should have taken stock of where I was mentally and emotionally and waited. Even if the novel had to wait another thirty days, giving the book its proper push would have been worth it. I’m stoked about Cutler and his growth, and I’m incredibly excited about how he’s behaving in this book. I would have liked to get that energy out in the world before the drop date.

I guess there’s no reason I can’t do that now. As I write these words, I realize I can still get out there and give it the ol’ college try.

Books Delisted in Quarter #3

This is something I hope doesn’t happen very often. I pulled two short stories off Amazon: “Murder by the Roadside” and “Death at Sunset.” They are available as part of the short story collections Murder by Any Other Name and Black and Blue in the Lilac City.

I did this for a couple of reasons. First, I didn’t want folks paying $0.99 for the standalone short story and then buying the collections at the regular price. Second, I am now giving away “Murder by the Roadside” to subscribers of the newsletter.

The Blog

I set a goal of one blog post a week.

Over the past month, I slipped off this pace and am five posts behind. To catch up by the end of the year, I will have to put a little extra hustle into my blog writing efforts.

It’s been fun creating content for the site and a bit of a challenge, and I try to find things that aren’t continuously publishing-related (as this post is). Writing about movies related to the crime genre was a blast, and letting folks know more about the 509 was something close to my heart.

If you liked some of the earlier posts, would you take a minute and let me know?
Or, if there’s something completely different that you’d like me to touch on, let me know.

Books I’ve Read

I’ve held up well here. According to Goodreads, I’ve read 37 books so far this year, which puts me one behind schedule. However, they can’t track two additional books I’ve read because they haven’t been released yet (Everybody Knows by Jordan Harper and Live and Die this Way by Frank Zafiro).

Seeing that number should make me very happy. However, I am not sticking to my reading plan. Several years ago, I adopted a strategy of one non-fiction book for every fiction book I read. The idea was that I would learn something and then read for pleasure.

Right now, my reading is 2-1 fiction to non-fiction. I’m not suddenly going to read many non-fiction books before the end of the year. Nevertheless, this is a trait that I would like to stay aware of, especially when the new year rolls around.

If you’re interested, you can track my 2022 Reading Challenge at Goodreads by clicking here:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/779689.Colin_Conway

New Writing

As I said earlier, I stayed on task this quarter, and things are looking good for the remainder of 2022 and 2023.

I finished the first draft of 509 Crimes Stories book 12. Book 13 in that series will be a collection of previously released short stories. The seventh Cozy Up novel is shaping up nicely and will be released late next year.

So the current release schedule looks like this:

11/03/2022 – Cozy Up to Danger – Book 6 in the Cozy Up series
02/04/2023 – The After-Hours War – Book 10 in the 509 Crime Stories
05/05/2023 – The Fate of Our Years – Book 11 in the 509 Crime Stories
08/03/2023 – Cozy Up to Terror – Book 7 in the Cozy Up series
11/03/2023 – The Night of the Dead Boys – Book 12 in the 509 Crime Stories
02/02/2024 – When the Wicked Rest – Book 13 in the 509 Crime Stories

What’s nice is that the only book not finished in that schedule is Cozy Up to Terror. I expect to finish it by the end of October and spend the next eight months prepping it for release.

As you can see above, I’ve concentrated on the 509 Crime Stories. After paying so much attention to John Cutler and Sam Strait, the pendulum swung toward the 509. Now, I need to find a happy medium, but I’m not sure what that looks like.

There seems to be a demand for new Beau Smith adventures, so I might spend some additional time writing the eighth Cozy Up. Even though they are shorter than a 509 book, they require more effort due to the humor angle.

With that said, I have two ideas brewing for Cutler and a new one percolating for Strait.

If you had your choice for the next book, what would it be—509, Cozy, Cutler, or Strait?

And that’s it. We made it to the end of this performance review.

I mean, quarterly update.

I hope you’ll stick with me through this year and next as new mysteries and adventures are on the way.