Alexandra GardnerWork-In-Progress Wednesday # 6
Where in the 2026 Are You, Queen?
Hello, and chaotic day to all y’all, my lovely minions of chaos!
Well… it’s April somehow???
I’m not sure how that happened???
That said, there’s quite a few things that I meant to get around to that just… fell off the face of the planet — like me, apparently.
So let’s do a quick 2025 wrap-up, then let’s get started on expectations for 2026.
(Buckle-up, this is going to be a bit longer than my normal newsletter).
What happened in 2025?
Published:
- Light of Chaos Series Collection Volume 1 (Books # 1 – 3)
- Coven Witch (Light of Chaos: Born Elementals # 2) Novelette
- Mórrígan’s Curse (Light of Chaos # 5)
- Rogue Caster (Light of Chaos: Cloak & Dagger # 1) Novelette
Projects written:
- Sticks & Stones: The Underground (7 short stories)
- Sticks & Stones: Mischief Manor (12 short stories)
- Sticks & Stones: The Fae Realm (2 short stories)
- Sticks & Stones: The Crematory (5 short stories)
- Light of Chaos, books 6 & 7
Projects put on the back burner:
- Sibling Charm (Light of Chaos: Born Elementals # 3) Novelette
Whew! That was A LOT of stuff. So much stuff. The only “breather” in there is that the short stories average 10,000 words each, so in reality, they total out to be roughly 2 full-length books (when compared to the main Light of Chaos books). Yeah, I know — that’s still a LOT of writing. Not to mention the editing for the published items.
The year came and went, with struggles and triumphs, but now we’re in 2026, and it’s already been… interesting.
What’s happening in 2026, you ask?
Currently:
- Editing all Sticks & Stones short stories and sending them to beta readers. (I’ve completed first-round edits for all but 2 of the stories already, and have had 5 of them beta read. So, I’m making headway toward publishing a few of them in the summertime-ish).
- Wrote, sent for beta, and am now editing a new steamy paranormal romance novelette (17,000 words)
Later:
- Put together “Light of Chaos Series Collection Volume 2 (Books 3.5, 4, 4.5)”
- *Hopefully* wrangle “Sibling Charm” into submission
- Poke at Light of Chaos # 6 and see if it bites
Still seems a bit ambitious, TBH…
My goal this year is to center my focus. Last year, I was trying to do 9,001 things, and it really took a toll on my mental health. I pushed myself too hard to meet a ridiculous, self-imposed publishing schedule, and it cost me. I spent so much time pushing myself to write, edit, and publish that I’ve seen my babies leave the nest… and fall straight to the ground without spreading their wings. (AKA “Published into the Void that is amazon’s content-suppressing algorithms” — which are getting more and more ridiculous with each passing day, especially now that amazon is using AI to “help” authors categorize books. AKA — remove books from categories that it THINKS books don’t belong to / put them into categories they DON’T belong to… — and assign obnoxiously similar keywords that reduces search terms that can be used to find genres/themes — among other things).
When I say “center my focus,” I mean I want to focus on the demon of publishing: Marketing. I want to reach new readers who will love the Chaos Universe. BUT ALSO!!! I want to continue to bring new content to current readers, which is why I’m prioritizing the 10,000-word short stories. This year, I’ll be publishing The Underground series. There are 4 main stories (and 3 shorter-short bonus stories that will be free downloads, which range from 3,000 – 6,000 words). The Sticks & Stones stories became somewhat of a passion project, and they were the breath of fresh air I needed after spending 3 years repeatedly rewriting full rewrites of Mórrígan’s Curse.
Some of the toll on my mental health is that I’ve *never* had a book give me so much trouble. Most of my full-length books were written, beta-ed, edited, and formatted within 12 – 18 months. Mórrígan’s Curse was 3 years of just WRITING, REWRITING, and EDITING before even getting content edits from my editor. It felt like bashing my head against a wall, lighting myself on fire, and jumping into a dumpster to burn in the flames of Elmo Hell.
Mórrígan’s Curse *is* much improved for spending that time tightening up everything and bringing in new concepts and elements that I never expected to introduce. Such as the “dangerous” Legendary Sibyl coming into contact with three powerful covens, which helped better launch the existing content in books 6 and 7. Part of the “issue” was that Mórrígan’s Curse is one of my most complex storylines to date, and with so many interwoven plots, everything had to line up in a logical way that not only flowed but maintained the on-going high stakes.
All that to say, I hope you find Mórrígan’s Curse to be one of the strongest stories I’ve written in the Chaos Universe.
With all of that in mind, it’s unlikely that Light of Chaos # 6 will publish this year. I’ve maintained a publishing schedule of one main-series novel per year since 2019. It practically makes my OCD (real OCD, not joking) skin crawl to think that I might not maintain that publishing schedule. The logic behind maintaining that one-per-year schedule was keeping readers engaged, but it’s hard to engage readers when I’m not marketing. If readers are unable to find my content due to amazon’s algorithms, then there’s no readers *to* engage.
Beyond that, I’ll be taking things as they come.
Thank you for understanding and for your continued support.
More to come later.
As always, welcome to the Chaos.
With love 🖤,
Your Queen of Chaos
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