January 2020 Update

It’s about that time for another daily musing. I post these less and less as book reviews and advocacy take up most of my time.

As we can all agree, January felt like it lasted about 100 years. I am very happy to be in February and getting on with the year. The days are getting warmer, and I try to spend more time outside. It makes me feel much better.

If you’ve clicked around the blog, you may have noticed some changes. Mostly organization… I am hoping the new menu options make it easier for you to navigate and find topics that you need. The biggest changes are in the Books I’ve Read tab. I am making more of an effort to categorize my books by genre and let you know if they are #ownvoices reads (#ownvoices means books that are about marginalized groups are written by authors of that group). After the latest controversy with books and cultural appropriation, I want to make it easier for you all to support marginalized writers!

Speaking of writing, I haven’t updated you on my drafts. Well, the memoir draft is done. I am taking a break and restructuring it. I don’t think I’ll attempt to publish it for several years… basically until more happens in my life because I doubt people want to read a memoir of my 25 years on Earth. When my life took a turn for the worse almost a year ago, I started writing a contemporary romance. With that draft almost done, I am at a similar stage of restructuring and an initial round of edits. I am letting that sit on the back burner for a while. It is a project that’s important to me because it let me escape into my ideal world after everything came crashing down, but I see a more urgent need. A YA fiction featuring a transracial adoptee. Today, I officially started work on my latest book. Growing up, I didn’t have a book about a TRA by a TRA. I don’t know if I will ever get to the point of publishing this, but I have to start somewhere.

Reading is also in full swing. I’ve received 4 ARCs (Advanced Readers’ Copies) for #ownvoices work, and I am super thrilled to get to read and review them! I have some contemporary fictions to read as well, so the time blocking and managing my free-time is very helpful right now. I review everything at Goodreads (you can also find a link to my Goodreads on all of the blog pages), and I review most books here. There are always some I really felt neutral about and just don’t want to spend the time posting about.

Work is exciting as ever. I’m back to researching and being a teaching assistant. Lucky for me, I have a team of undergraduates who make my life much easier. I’m working on getting them to time block so then we can all be organized and efficient. Mentoring has always been a passion of mine, and I am happy I can continue with it at work.

As 2020 continues, I want to turn this blog into more than just books. As I have mentored, I realize just how much we can gain from learning from each other. I will continue to post reviews and advocacy, but I also want to share some of my day-to-day skills and track how those change over time. I’ve shared about managing time and I have a post about my writing process being posted soon. So, you may be seeing some new topics coming up… perhaps some thoughts and reviews on some of my absolute favorite products (as an Asian woman, it took me a long time to find beauty products that work for me).

Until then, continue taking care of yourself!