As someone who is actively building a personal brand and is working on a range of different writing projects, I’m sharing some of my big, scary, audacious goals for this year.

This is the year I’m getting paid to write and creating my best pieces of work. The year I’m fully diversifying and monetising my income streams. The year I’m planting some major seeds for projects down the track.

And, it’s the year I’m going to show you exactly how it’s done and take you on the journey with me. (P.S: Inspired and want to actually hit your publishing goals this year? Check out my recent podcast ep on creating a business bingo card for your 2025 goals!)

Keep an eye out for these projects as they come to life:

1) Release Blood Magic in April

This is my first book release in 3 years.

I spent two months throughout 2024 writing this book (which equaled a LOT of early morning wake-ups in the dead of winter) and I’ve been promoting it non-stop since October 2024 as part of my launch runway.

The book comes out on April 15th, and I still have heaps of marketing planned for the final four months of the launch. (P.S: If you’re interested in seeing what I’ve done so far, check out my breakdown in this post).

This book release will lay the foundation for the next two books I plan to release.

2) Write and release two additional, new books

As part of my plan to write a collection of dual, fairytale retelling duologies, I’m doing a lot of work towards this in 2025.

I’ll start writing the second book in the Blood Magic duology in January, aiming for a September release.

Then towards the middle of the year, I’ll be starting a brand new duology I’ve been planning to write for a few years, to hopefully release by November.

I usually try to only write 2 – 3 books maximum each year, as I’ve found this is what works best for my creative process. I also tend to ‘sprint’ my first drafts over 8 – 12 weeks.

3) Secure foreign acquisition rights

Another thing I’m testing out this year is a marketplace called DropCap, which helps you to license your book rights to foreign publishers.

I’m choosing Kingdom of Sirens and Monsters as my guinea pig for this project is because it’s my bestselling duology to date, it has word of mouth and brand awareness like no other series, and it’s loosely inspired by Greece and based on two fairytale retellings – which are all great selling points for overseas markets.

If acquired, this will greatly increase my reach and help me enter new markets.

4) Republish The Starlight Chronicles Series

This is a stretch goal of mine – I have a seven book fantasy series, of which 5 out of 7 books were published with my publisher before I walked away in 2020.

I’ve been sitting on reverted rights since then but finally have a plan to re-release the series.

I am planning to put this series on Kindle Unlimited as a low-ticket lead into my greater body of work and ‘drip’ out the books over 6 months. Before I re-launch, I plan to do some major edits on the first book and get new covers designed.

5) Two secret writing based projects

Two things I’d like to expand my skillsets in and create pieces of work around are a large-scale video game and a TV show. I already have ideas for what I want to create in both mediums.

I’ll be spending some time this year learning the required skills for these projects (e.g. screenwriting, coding, etc.) as well as learning how to craft pitches to potential partners or investors and finding a clear route to get these projects off the ground.

6) Start a media company

I want to launch some kind of media company down the track (think digital media, podcasts, online gift guides, etc.) and I’m still figuring out what niche I’d be passionate enough to create content around.

For this to work, I know I’ll need a massive following, community, and lots of reach, so there’s no time like the present to start building. I’m starting now by creating content and blogging around a handful of things I know really well and love: fantasy reads, cosy games, and personal development.

7) Write 24 issues of The Retelling

Starting January, The Retelling will be a bi-weekly newsletter ‘retelling’ my real time entrepreneurial journey, as well as marketing, monetisation and business lessons as a multi-format writer and storyteller.

I plan to share this to LinkedIn, Facebook and Substack to document my journey, showcase the projects I’m working on (and lessons learned), as well as link back to all the things I’m creating regularly (e.g. portfolio pieces, podcast episodes, new books, etc.)

In the long-run, my goal is that this will become an industry leading publication and document my founder journey through many different brands and passion projects.