The God-Wife Reborn: out NOW
Latest News:
June: the final days of May and the first days of June have been lovely ones. Tidal Bones was republished in Crow & Cross Keys (I am in awe of the work of some of these small presses and magazines, so beautiful!). I was lucky enough to get a story included in a more local project (more to come!). AND I had a longer piece (12000 words) accepted into a Dragonsoul Press anthology: Beyond the Veil. This piece is lots of fun and a personal favourite of mine (I am really into stories with older characters and villains as the hero - without being heroic - at the moment). This 12k piece was one of the 15 Nanowrimo 2024 stories. I was a bit worried for it, that the steam/sex scene may make it wrong for a lot of places. It FOUND a home!
May: Inkd Publishing accepted one of my humorous, YA /dark academy satire pieces for an upcoming horror anthology. They DID say they'd accept humour as well as horror, heh. Very excited about this. Whilst I have always had stories linked inside the Hell-Colony world, this year (2025) I have been pushing a bit harder to create stories linked in other worlds. Different characters, but the same world/war-setting or in this case, school. This piece Necro-Mantic Troubles is cutely linked to the same humour/satire feel of Bumps in the Night. Hopefully Bumps in the Night will one day be in print, beside its quirky cousin Necro-Mantic Troubles.
April: I enjoyed Warwickcon so much I signed up for the Toowoomba con event: Comic-Geddon! And... they accepted me! More about this event here: https://www.themakersmarkets.com.au/markets/comic-geddon
April: I attended Warwickcon 2025. This was my first visit to this part of the world and my first Warwickcon. Wow! What an amazing place and amazing people. I had such beautiful chats with young creatives and readers. Thank you for having me, Warwickcon!
February 2025: It's GenreCon time! This is a fabulous annual event for all genre writers and readers. The best speakers, vibe and people, gathering to talk all things writing, editing, publishing and marketing. I cannot afford to go every year, but I scrimp and save to go every second year. 2025 is the year! This is happening across the weekend of 28 Feb-1st Mar. As part of the ticket you can put an application in to pitch your work to agents and publishers, and, guess what? I was ACCEPTED to pitch! I will be pitching to an absolute dream publisher and a dream agent this weekend. Arggh! SO flippin nervous!
February 2025: did my first ever book shop event this month. A big thank you to Books @ Stones, a fabulous little bookshop in Stones Corner, Brisbane. This is the closest any of my books have come to being in a bookshop. Such a supportive little bookshop!!!
February 2025: Metastellar Magazine will be publishing not one, but TWO of my short stories in their next "Best of" Magazine, both Snoogle Hunt (a new piece) and also Affordable Resurrection, one of my reprints! They produce one of the most professional, gorgeous anthologies I have ever seen. Very excited to be part of this project!
January 2025: Twas my goal to be brave and get myself into more places to chat to more readers! I am excited to report that I was accepted into Warwickcon (regional pop culture festival) in April as well as into a book signing event at Books@Stones in Stones Corner Feb. I am updating my events page with where I will be, when!
January 2025: Black Hare Publishing accepted a brand new short story. Travel, The Boy and The Anchor will appear in one of their projects soon. Contract SIGHNED, details about the project and the publishing date soon!
January 2025: publishing day for any of my pieces is so exciting. I create a heap of blogs and social media pictures in advance and bite my nails down as I wait for my words to appear in print. Twas a bit of a laugh this week as I spent a few few days checking a publisher's website, fussing over time conversion programs, all ready to launch images and blogs the moment the story appeared... Only to realise it would not! The Tension Between is NOT publishing 9th of Jan 2025, but 9th of Jan 2026. Oh dear! I have quite a long time to wait. Our eyes do have a tendency to read what expect to see!
December: I had some beautiful news this morning, with magazine Crow & Cross Key accepting a reprint for publication in their magazine in May 2025. I love the look and vibe of this beautiful online magazine. More details about the story they are publishing closer to the publishing date!
December: Nanowrimo update! I stepped out of the Nanowrimo space last year, concerned by some of the things that were happening in that space. 2024 had some more complexities inside the Nanowrimo business but I still love the concept - writers and writing communities coming together to challenge themselves to do something crazy. This year I completed my goal of 15 brand new short stories completed to a clean first draft level. I also completed my word target, 50k-80k new words, coming in around 75k words.
Of the fifteen short stories I wrote, I think I will be chasing publication for 14 of them. Of those 14, one is already out. A second and a third should be out inside a week!
December: It has been a quieter year, publishing wise, which has not been a very nice feeling. Rejections pile up and you start to worry and wonder. BUT in the gloom, this amazing sparkle: 96th of October finally accepted one of my stories (having rejected 11 others, most of which have now been published elsewhere). 96th of October is FREE to read here: https://96thofoctober.com/articles/fish-or-chips/
November: my next BIG event is ARRA's A Romantic Rendezvous Sat 22 Mar 2025. You can book tickets HERE: https://www.trybooking.com/1209908
What's in the pipeline?
Novels:
- Five completed novels in the submission (ie publisher slush pile rejection dance) stage.
- Several novel length pieces are sitting with their wheels off in the backyard, giving me sultry looks, itching my brain! I have written 40k and counting on a BRAND new, first words on the page sci-fi adventure, monster romance new novel in just under two weeks. My goal is to complete a novel as a challenge with friends in July. Which one will it be? I completed Swamp Witch this year. Can I complete a second novel through the second half of 2025?
Short stories/Novellas:
- Several longer short story/novellas completed (between the 10-40k range), out chasing publishing opportunities.
- Short stories chasing publication in webzines, anthologies and magazines.
- The plan is to have 20-25 pieces (shorts, novels and reprints) out chasing opportunities at all times. Does this happen? Nooo. It has been a bit of a slumpy year, its probably close to 10-15 out at all times. I hope to get this number up through the second half of the year!
- I will continue to create new short stories, dabbling outside humour and urban fantasy into lit fic, fantasy, horror, romantasy/smut and fantasy/adventure. I really enjoy exploring characters, genres, worlds and practicing new things through short stories.
- My goal for 2025 is to focus on 'teaser' or taste-tester short stories based in some of my novel-length story worlds. I am already doing this for the Hell-Colony world, but I have a heap of other short stories that relate to one another, or relate to a novel. I have created a new page to map this out: https://nicolewalshauthor.com/linked%2Frelated-stories
- I am attending a heap of 'cons this year. My stories are for adults. I have started to dabble in 'zines (small paper print book) to hand out for free. I am also handing out writing and creative-inspired free gifts to young people and children to inspire them to write, draw or imagine their own stories :-)
What will 2025 bring?
Let's see!