Writing Diary #1-2026
This is my weekly writing diary: a record of the work done and the work resisted, the small wins no one applauds, the doubts that show up anyway, and the long game of building a writing life
Events
This week I have been notified that I have a booth at Clunes Book Festival so I was posting in Facebook groups for writers to share the booth with. I am also going to be appearing at the Book Fair Australia.
So far I’ve been struggling with direct selling, however after my two successful Kickstarters, I feel more heartened and motivated.
Confirmed events in 2026:
Saturday 21 and Sunday 22 February, 2026 at Book Fair Australia, Melbourne Exhibition Centre
Saturday 21 February Building your creative outlet into a business panel at Book Fair Australia
Saturday 14 March, Creative Ground Open Day at Hunt Club Community Arts Centre delivering memoir workshop
Saturday 21 and Sunday 22 March 2026, Clunes Book Festival
Thursday 21 May 2026, Growing up Muslim in Australia event at Darebin Libraries
Marketing
I have started Facebook advertising for my completed YA Sassy Saints Series, 3 books in total, and a Facebook ad for the first book in my Seka Torlak Series, first book published, #2 and #3 on preorder. The advice is not to do Facebook ads unless you have at least three books so it’s worth doing it now.
I paid for SPF Facebook advertising for authors and use this course to figure things out. I’ve been getting more comfortable with Facebook ads and had one running for my Kickstarters and for the launch of Time Kneels Between Mountains.
When looking at 20booksto50K group most authors who are succeeding in their writing and having robust sales use Facebook ads.
I’ve also been on the fence about Amazon ads. I can see the value of Facebook ads as I am wide, so my books are on retail platforms, and by using my website as the link I both promote myself as an author, get people to follow my social media and buy my books from whatever retailer they want. However, the advice is that Amazon is usually 50% of your sales, so I think I need to try for a month and see what happens.
I have booked Written Media promotions for Sassy Saints series and will be booking promos for the release of the second book in my series. These promos help discoverability and reviews and the advice is also to undertake these regularly, so I’m going all in this year with booking these as part of my release strategy.
Translations
This year my goal is to release my books in other languages. With the advent of AI there is a company called Scribe Shadow that a lot of authors are using to translate books, and then get a human editors to review. My situation is complicated in that I can’t release my books in any other language until I have a Bosnian translation. Scribe Shadow doesn’t do Bosnian translations, so I figured out a work around.
I translated my book Time Kneels Between Mountains by translating chapter by chapter through Google Translate, and then getting my husband to review. The result wasn’t great as there is a lot of issues with point of view, my book is first person female narrator and it translated to male verbs, also it did all different terms for family relationships. For example grandfather is Dido, and it translated to Djedo or Dido sometimes, grandmother is Nana, but it translated to Baka, and we also have specific terms for paternal and maternal aunts and uncles, and these are also different for Bosnian specific family terms, as opposed to Croatian or Serb.
Then I saw a post about someone who was translating and mentioned prompts, lock sheets etc. So I asked Chat GPT what should I do as a workflow to translate to Bosnian and it gave me the skinny. I translated my bonus short story using this process and had hubby proofread it and it yielded a much better result. So moving forward I’ll be using Chat GPT and it’s suggested workflow.
For now I’m wanting another Bosnian reader to go over the novel and just give it another read to reassure me that it’s in good knick before I publish. In the meantime I’m going to start translating the other books with Chat GPT and from now on will only need my husband to do one read through.
Once this first book is out, I want to start using Scribe Shadow to translate in other languages.
Friendship on Hold
I’ve been working on a middle grade novel that I want to publish. Originally it was trad published by an educational publisher and I got back the rights. I re-wrote and added a chapter, and created graphics using Canva and a new cover, but never quite got around to publishing it.
This week I went back to it and I just don’t like the graphics and I think that’s what’s holding me back. I tried creating Chat GPT graphics, however I read an article about copyright issues with the use of Chat GPT so I can’t pursue that.
I think I’m just going to publish it without any images. I want to include teaching resources with it, so comprehension questions etc at the back so need to edit this and prep the book. This will be a small launch as I just want to have two middle grade books that I can market to primary schools this year. The other one is The Tree That Stood Still, which has graphics I made with Canva that I’m happy with, and teaching activities, as well as an answer key.
I also had an idea for a third book that I’d like to work on at some point, but don’t really have a plan when as I have a publishing schedule to keep up with Seka Torlak Mystery.
Ghost Among the Gumtrees
This is the second book in the series and the Kickstarter was successful. I’m waiting for the funds to be released from the platform and for another proof copy and then I can fulfil this. It’s scheduled for release on the 01/02/25 on all platforms.
Work in progress
I’m currently working on book 5 of the series. I wrote a rough 30,000 word draft in 20 days and now need to go back and expand and revise. I find that I need to get the story down in a whoosh and then I have it all laid out in front of me and can craft it properly from the beginning. My goal is to try and get this done by the end of January. I’m also realising that book 4, which is drafted, needs a good revision and can see clearly now some plotting issues.
Substack
I’m figuring out Substack and have a goal for a loose publishing schedule. Mondays I’m going to be publishing personal essays. The first one is dropping tomorrow and I’ve got the week after scheduled too.
Wednesdays I’m going to be posting articles based on my podcast that are about writing advice or life lessons in general.
And I will be doing a weekly writing diary. Not all of them will be this long or detailed. I’m currently on holidays so have a lot more free time and am doing a lot more writing things.
However, I love doing weekly writing updates for my own motivation, but also because I want to share lessons and process with other writers. This year my plan is take myself seriously as an indie author and I have a publishing schedule for my next series, and a firm marketing plan, so I want to chart how it’s progressing.
If this is something you’re interested in, then subscribe and follow my 2026 journey.