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2023 Recap: Favorite Books, Films & More

February isn’t too late for a review of last year, is it? Because wow, what a year 2023 was! From planning my wedding, to getting married in April, moving in May, falling into the new life rhythms of being a wife, seeing For King & Country in concert, embarking on a brand-new writing project, traveling to Toronto in the fall, and turning 28 (among many other memories made)… I feel like I’ve emerged on the other side of 2023 as a new person.

But instead of getting all sappy on you, I’m here to do a roundup of all things story- and art-related! Favorite books, movies, albums, you name it! Because it’s been WAY too long since I contributed to your Chronic TBR Problem*, right?

*Not to worry, 99.98% of all readers suffer from this. It’s incurable but not, so far as we know, deadly.

Here we go!

Top 5 Books of 2023

On the Writing Desk (2023)

Hey ho, my friends! I recently sent out a BIG UPDATE to my newsletter subscribers (you can sign up HERE if you haven’t already) and figured… maybe I should share some of that news here too.

IN SHORT:

A lot has happened in the last year. I got married, for one! (To the absolute love of my life: a real-life prince charming who’s a big ol’ nerd like me and has become an invaluable brainstorm partner as well.)

And I’ve made quite a shift in writing projects. Read on for the details!

The Brightest Thread // A Long-Awaited Update

IT’S ALIIIIVE! …The blog, that is. Come in, come in, take a seat! Don’t mind the dust. I’ve kept all my dragons at home today, since the last thing we want is a flaming herd of dust bunnies. (One of these days I’ll get around to doing a spring cleaning here.) Am I permanently back to blogging? Not yet. But for today? YES. And if you’re there on the other side of the screen, I am SO DELIGHTED to see you again!

The reason we’re here today (sitting amongst the dust bunny herd… *cough*) is because it’s been much too long since I shared an update on The Brightest Thread and the whole querying journey.

And this is a bit of a tangent, but if you’re wondering where the pancake-flipping heck Tracey has been all this time, the answer is: everywhere and nowhere. Life is both fuller and wonderfuller than ever these days, which means that I’m prioritizing people and the world away from my keyboard. At the same time, I’m in the process of rediscovering the joy of writing… which, over the last year or two, has meant ignoring the blog in favor of writing another few pages of a manuscript. Perhaps one of these days I’ll learn how to do BOTH again: keep up a blog/newsletter schedule WHILE writing and living life in the right measures. 😊

All right! On to The Brightest Thread! The last time you heard a big update was July 2021, when I figured out a new opening, finished “final” edits, and began querying agents.

Y’all should really stop believing me when I say “final” anything. #onlyhalfkidding

So where do things stand now?