100 Things That Made (Up) My Year (2025)

Hello, my friends and happy new year!

If you are reading this on Jan 1, 2025 2026, I am on my way to my second VCFA residency to teach a class on using games to write! I’m stoked, to say the least.

i’m stealing the idea for this newsletter from Austin Kleon, author of Steal Like an Artist. no irony here. i thought about breaking this down into sports stuff/book stuff/writing stuff but then i didn’t want to.

i thought i would struggle to get to 100. by the end, i was smushing things together to make more room.

1. newsletters. spending more time with the ones that i’ve subbed to, resubscribing to old ones, and sitting with like-minded folks once or twice a week in the morning. morning shakeout, austin kleon, jami attenberg, especially.
2. my first fell run. 15 miles. i learned too late what “technical difficulty 5” means. i hold that learning sacred now. camping with grace near the venue and getting rained on all day the day after.
3. getting into critical role campaigns FINALLY. watching mighty nein.
4. writing down the books i read in a little notebook, not on goodreads. including things that goodreads wouldn’t, like podcast books, chapbooks, arcs.
5. getting more comfortable with my bullet journal, making the process belong to me, collections that suit me.
6. starting to doodle.
7. crashing marathon weekend in Toronto in October. hanging out with parkdale roadrunners. niagara falls. kitten and bear scones. sleepy pete’s biscuit breakfast sandwich.
8. finishing my first trilogy with the release of The Sovereign. saying goodbye to Touraine and Luca (and Sabine and Pruett and Aranen) has been bittersweet but it’s an indescribable feeling to share them with you. gonna hold the memory of that launch party close. i lost my voice.
9. Ambessa: Chosen of the Wolf.
10. Fate’s Bane.
11. writing Warmongers. it still feels monumental, the undertaking, but i love this book and what it might be.
12. my D&D crew. we’re not actually playing D&D most of the time, but i love the evenings when we sit around and play make-believe with each other, the flush of the improv, the inspiration we give each other (literally and mechanically).
13. finally getting my shoulder re-imaged. i have some answers now and a plan that will change my life—hopefully for the better. but that will be for next year’s list to tell us…
14. the loss of andrea gibson.
15. selling (and writing) codename: monster slayer.
16. digging into solo rpgs and discovering ironsworn and the great wide world of them.
17. getting to read friends’ books before they come out and knowing that they’re awesome.
18. getting to read friends’ books after they come out, and watching people fall in love with them like i did.
19. discovering new authors, debut and new-to-me. getting swept away by someone else’s way of writing, thinking, seeing. maybe those should be reversed. seeing, thinking, writing. maybe not.
20. going on a ‘girls trip’ with my mom and her bestie in Colorado. we went to the garden of the gods, ate some wildly good pizza and Ethiopian food, and went to a hot spring. i also ran a half marathon training run at altitude and wondered why i wanted to die.
21. i ran 16 miles in a row.
22. i beat my highest ‘miles run’ year. previously, it was 749.4 in 2021. this year, it’s over 800! last year, it was 283.9.
23. i took a novella class with leah nieboer at the porch and read some books i probably wouldn’t have read. the taiga syndrome by cristina rivera garza. the awakening by kate chopin. passing by nella larsen. the great crew i got to talk with once a week even though it was 1 am my time. best time zone miscalculation i ever made.
24. some good books. especially older books. another country by james baldwin. ammonite by nicola griffith. fool’s errand by robin hobb. the extinction of experience by christine rosen.
25. at my first residency at VCFA. meeting my colleagues, remembering how much i love other genres like nonfiction and poetry.
26. the desire path that cut through from our dorm to the main campus building.
27. watching the baby swans and coots and really all the little birds get born in the spring along the canal when i’m running. watching them grow up and then fledge.
28. dutch comic con, getting to make new friends, spend time with old friends, and talk to lots of readers. olieballen and van stapele cookies.
29. the uk tour leg! it was the first tour i ever had and seeing so many people come out to see me (and my friends ;)) talk about our stories…well, for a writer, i’m shit at describing how it made me feel. good. it felt good. meeting all of the great booksellers—across the UK, Toronto, Kansas, California, the Netherlands! And those virtual who have been lovely as well!
30. hearing your friends’ and family’s habitual phrases come out of your (or another friends’) mouth.
31. all of my parents coming to london to hang out for the sovereign launch party.
32. going to ireland with two of my parents and a grandma. the Belfast museum. Poulnabrone, the neolithic tomb on the burren in Ireland. the Cliffs of Moher. i mean, god, what beauty. the Giants Causeway.
33. switched over to qobuz from spotify. i like the music journalism it includes.
34. this talk by hanif abdurraqib. also, his instagram. he’s an artist who keeps me grounded in what i want to do with my own work, with my own life.
35. i bought a new sword. it did not arrive yet, but it is a beautiful arming sword.
36. hanging out with friends. cheeky nando’s. work days at my house. writing retreats. quiet old people house parties. long walks through toronto forests.
37. discovering aunties, an african street food joint. i love the red stew beef variations. mostly, i go in, ask them what they’ve got today, and they load me up.
38. i have two new niblings, both born in the latter half of the year. babies! cuties! marland and vander.
39. meeting strangers on runs. the kismet of a brief passing, just the vague familiarity of “maybe I’ve seen you before?” before you’re gone again, maybe never to meet again
40. spending time with other writers. writing retreats. world fantasy con. cymera fest.
41. writing almost every day. morning pages. quick jots. mind maps. 5000 word days. 5 word days. brainstorming card days.
42. we finally painted a room in our house. it looks great and now i’m excited to do other rooms. it banished a little of the fear and overwhelm.
43. rearranging my office.
44. buying new art for the walls. smutty fantasy art. see you next virtual event. ;)
45. my new salkan backpack. and the carabiners i got to hook onto it. purely practical. great for the quick couple day jaunts i find myself on, especially during the tour phase.
46. running gels. so. many. running gels. styrkr, precision nutrition, gu, maurten, various canadian maple varieties.
47. my first sword tournament—escaped pools and made it into eliminations. sword classes. huffing the bag back and forth. sidesword. longsword. messer. sparring. edward buckler hands. reflex training. technique. footwork. bruises. dented masks. broken gloves. christmas parties.
48. gosnell’s ginger-honey braggot. black lines oat nog. sour beers and how much my beer friends don’t like them.
49. season 3 of the wheel of time. i’m still gutted they cancelled it because it was all setting up to get better and better. the hills of tanchico is still a BOP. siuan/moiraine has given me more inspiration than you want. seeing the cast at the premier. all my wot friends who came to the uk for the event.
50. brian, an aforementioned wot friend, writing songs about lesbians for my books.
51. i finished 3 drafts of three new books: a giant novel standalone, and two novellas. warmongers, fell runner, monster slayer.
52. the freedom flotillas to gaza.
53. marketing! this is the year of learning that.
54. blogging and people reading the blog! new subscribers and old just saying hi and nerding out with me. getting my ideas out when i want to has also let me think about a wider variety of things more deeply. writing more nonfiction in general.
55. also, moving my website to ghost. i have vastly preferred that over wordpress, even with the cost. worth it for ease of use on both sides, i think.
56. thinking about new ways to share my work with other people. different formats, different genres.
57. working on the sort of secret project, originally envisioned as a serial, called mirrorsworn. even though i don’t know what shape it will ultimately take, it’s been exciting to think about and to imagine what storytelling possibilities it ultimately offers.
58. tromso, norway. jumping into the harbor in nordic january right before a blizzard. polarbröd. a several hour long meal at smak. the best cod i’ve ever had. getting frostbite while dog sledding.
59. going back to my undergrad alma mater (University of Kansas) to give the Gunn Lecture (my topic was war in fantasy, an expansion/re-approaching of my war in fantasy essay). it was wild to go back as a professional, hanging out with old professors as a peer, talking to grad students. amazing experience.
60. going to Riot HQ to give a talk to Riot Noir about writing Ambessa.
61. shaved a minute off last year’s 5k for a new PB.
62. faces and phases events at the tate modern and queer circle spaces for zanele muholi’s london leg of the project.
63. hanging out with online friends in real space for the first time. shout out to brent and kiki and brian.
64. hanging out with exes. 😜
65. recording this conversation about writing bad relationships with the story engine crew.
66. the graffiti wall. fan art of all the girls.
67. hosting author talks, like the one for idolfire with grace curtis or the one for the raven scholar with antonia hodgson.
68. running all over the world. toronto. griffith park in la. venice beach in santa monica. the canals in the netherlands. phoenix park in dublin. the river clyde in glasgow.
69. smithed my own knife!
70. what a year for concerts! wardruna! melissa etheridge! twenty-one pilots—yes, they played “the line” from arcane. even beyonce (though that was an accident).
71. met joe abercrombie for the first time. pretty amazing event since i learned about him almost half my lifetime ago and now, here i am, doing the thing he helped inspire me to.
72. writing and pubbing the sex essay. it felt good to pick through a text and really look closely at the things an author was doing. haven’t really done it so deliberately since school.
73. virtual meetings with book clubs and book stores!
74. listening to podcasts while running. coach bennett. morning shakeout. critical role.
75. hanging out with my grandma.
76. the annual christmas eve pub meal with my partner (and homie). we’ve decided we don’t actually like these special holiday meals but it’s fun for the spirit.
77. new notebooks.
78. wicked. i loved having the musical be back in the conversation of the world. i missed it being in my life. i loved the fan art explosion.
79. dice. i’ve become a dice gremlin this year and i have no regrets. gifted dice. themed dice. friend dice. dice trays. oops.
80. getting comfortable (for a little while, at least) pressing the 16kg kettlebell.
81. new running socks.
82. running caps!
83. that peanut chili oil stuff.
84. runs with friends. mid-run coffees. post-run coffees. sprint laps. long, slow snaking loops.
85. fuzzy house boots.
86. the snazzy touraine-coded black-and-gold military vest with no sleeves that i wore for the launch of the sovereign.
87. spending some concentrated time off of social media. locked out, no password. weird to get used to, to fight the automatic itch, but nice eventually.
88. sharing a gym with the one other person who wakes up in the morning to get it done.
89. friends who come in from out of town.
90. new people discovering my books. one unrelated book leading them to the rest. people telling me, “my friend/lover/ex told me to read this!” or telling me, “i made my friend/lover/ex read this”
91. when they add “because of chapter 15” 😏
92. a certain realization/resolution i came to at the tail end of the year.
93. getting a new desktop and working from a single monitor. i feel less scattered. my computer has more power and more memory.
94. the family all converging for one niece’s birthday. hanging out with my older nieces (when they were the only ones). teaching them pink pony club. them getting pink ponies and requesting the song when i’m gone.
95. getting buffer. seeing neighbors after i run and them telling me i look buffer.
96. bonne maman jam advent calendar. jamvent.
97. eating last of the seasons tomatoes right off the vine at wolf’s lane. (i used to hate tomatoes.) whore pasta aka puttanesca.
98. getting a split keyboard. learning a new typing layout.
99. bougie tinned fish, namely adding sea sisters to the roundup. my favorite: butter and seaweed hake.
100. a kettlebell workout with my dad.

2025 was a wild year, and 2026 is about to be even wilder, I promise you that.

May your swords be sharp and your back strong,

C. L.