When I was in grad school in 2003, I worked on a special section for the Columbia Missourian called Vision 2020. As the name implies, we were looking ahead at what we thought would happen by the year 2020.
Sadly, I don’t remember what we put in it. That is one of the things that has fallen away post-surgery. But I do remember thinking how very far off 2020 sounded then. Seventeen years ago. So much has happened since then.
The past decade brought some major challenges, including a difficult divorce, bitter custody battle, and to cap it off, brain surgery.
But it also brought many joys. My daughter was born in 2010. I married the love of my life in 2018. And I took the helm of WMG in 2012.
It’s an amazing thing to love what you do and work every day with awesome people you genuinely care about.
So, as we begin our new decade, I’m reminded of how very blessed I was for the past decade and how many wonderful things I have to look forward to in this one.
And as for 2020, we have a very busy year coming up at WMG. As I look at the publication whiteboard in my office, I see very little white and a whole lot of writing.
Dean Wesley Smith has already turned in the first project from his Make 100 Kickstarter: a collection of short stories called The First Thirty-Three: Stories from the Make 100 Kickstarter Challenge.
Kristine Kathryn Rusch is working on a cat-themed volume of Fiction River Presents, which will be released first in a Storybundle she’s curating that launches the end of March.
Fiction River: Doorways to Enchantment releases at the end of the month.
We have a plethora of WMG online workshops underway, including several great ways to start the new year and the new decade: The Decade Ahead, The Great Challenge, The Great Novel Challenge and The Great Publishing Challenge. Click on the name of each to learn more or to sign up.
We have so many exciting things in store this year. I can’t wait to tell you about all of them as they unfold.
Here’s to an amazing new decade!
Allyson Longueira is publisher of WMG Publishing. She is an award-winning writer, editor and designer, working mother, and brain tumor survivor.