Year Ends and Hell Yeahs! by Alex English

Photo by Alan Hurt Jr. on Unsplash

I may be strange, but one of the few things I miss about having a proper job is the performance reviews. Back when I was employed, I knew how well or otherwise I was doing (in fact, sometimes I knew too much). But as an author, I’m never quite sure.

As I'm my own boss I've decided to take responsibility and review myself. As I'm a kind and supportive boss, I've decided to stick with the positives and forget the negatives. I like to call this my ‘hell yeah list’, and I write one every new year. I’ve been doing this for (almost) a decade now, and it makes interesting reading going back over them. It's a lazy person's gratitude journal – a few bullet points slung together once a year to help me focus on the good things.

What sort of items should go on the hell yeah list? They can be anything you like – you're the boss after all. I include all sorts of stuff, from hobbies to personal life as well as work. Here are a few of my writing-related highlights over the decade:

Circa 2011 I was celebrating learning how to box and making a wedding cake for my brother-in-law (not at the same time). The only writing-related entry is interviewing Larry Lamb for a Country Life butter commercial (something I’d almost forgotten I’d done - thanks, list!)

In 2012 I’d had my first baby, quit my day job, sold some recipes to a magazine, taken a children’s writing class at CityLit and sent out my first picture book manuscript. I’m glad I put this on – starting to send manuscripts out was a key step for me after playing around with writing children’s books for more than a decade before that. I found that rejections weren't quite as terrible as I had imagined.

By some fluke, in 2013 I had my first picture book contract. I’d also completed my first younger fiction manuscript. This never ended up selling, but it felt like a big achievement at the time to finish a story of 12,000 words. I also started, but ran out of steam and didn’t finish, a middle-grade story.

2014 was the year I published my first picture book, YUCK SAID THE YAK, braved my first school visit and achieved my dream of being on stage at the SCBWI mass book launch! I also made it to the end of a new middle-grade story draft.

In 2015 I got my first agent, ran my first festival event and went to Folly Farm for the first time. I redrafted my middle-grade story, but it still wasn’t good enough to send out. It’s still in a drawer now.

BSU Corsham Court campus

In 2016 I signed a contract for my first picture book with Bloomsbury (still forthcoming… in 2021!) and started my MA at Bath Spa.

In 2017, I had my first award nomination when Mine Mine Mine said the Porcupine was shortlisted for the Dundee Picture Book Award. I also ‘survived World Book Day’ and wrote my first educational title for a Korean publisher.

A move to Paris was a big item for 2018, as was finishing my MA and completing a screenwriting certificate with UCLA.

I haven’t written my list yet for 2019, but it’s bound to include signing with my wonderful new agent, Thérèse Coen, graduating from Bath Spa and getting a book deal for my first middle-grade series SKY PIRATES.

My hell yeah lists help me to finish off the year and look ahead to the new one with excitement. Do you keep a list of your past achievements?

Alex English is a graduate of Bath Spa University's MA Writing for Young People. Her new middle-grade series SKY PIRATES launches in July 2020 with Simon & Schuster. 

Her picture books Yuck said the Yak, Pirates Don't Drive Diggers and Mine Mine Mine said the Porcupine are published by Maverick Arts Publishing. More of her picture books are forthcoming in 2021/2022.
 
www.alexenglish.co.uk