Becky Allen Books

YA fantasy writer. Not a morning person.

  • It has certainly been a year. Whoops.

    Hello, friends! So, uh. It’s been a year since I sent a newsletter. When I wrote last year’s January missive about hope, I was feeling very optimistic — for the world, and for my ability to send a newsletter every month. Well, we’re now staring down the barrel of year three of a global pandemic,…

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  • Writing Through the Pandemic: 2020 Wordcount

    Hello! First a reminder that I only update this blog once a year for this very word count post. If you want to know what I’m up to more often, try my newsletter (though even that isn’t too frequent…). After everything the horrors of last year took from us, perhaps the pettiest complaint is that…

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  • My shadow falls over a sidewalk where someone has painted 'It's a BEAUTIFUL day' the day the 2020 election was won by Biden

    On a new year and a fresh start –

    Hi friends, Happy new year! Welcome to 2021, and good riddance to the hellscape that was 2020. Though that feels weird to type for a variety of reasons, but especially because nothing actually changed except a digit in the date. It isn’t a big change. But it feels big, and naysaying that feeling just seems…

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  • On (not) finishing projects –

    Hi friends, Well, March was quite a month, huh? I almost don’t believe it’s over. I have no idea what April will bring, or May, or… You know what, I’m not really going to talk much about current events, except to say that I am fine, and doing about as well as anyone can be…

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  • An instagram screenshot where I talk with a classroom of students

    Rereading my own work –

    Hi friends, It started with career day. My sister/roommate is a high school teacher and once a year I get invited to take part in her school’s career day, and spend a morning talking to kids about my career. I go back and forth between talking about my day job in tech and my creative…

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  • On ideas and anxieties —

    Hi friends, I have some happy personal news, which is so simplistic it probably doesn’t count as news at all. It’s this: writing has been going well. Last month I put out my single annual blog entry, where I total up my writing stats… and in 2019, I wrote considerably more than I had in…

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  • Recovering from Burnout: 2019 by the Numbers

    2019 marks the fifth year I’ve tracked my writing and done a summary of it.

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  • On resolutions, and rebuilding –

    Hi friends, Happy new year! Welcome to the 20s! And look – it’s January 1, so I’m going to talk about resolutions and goals and planning, because of course it’s on my mind. Though first I want to say that I have a weird tension about goal setting and resolutions and whatnot, because I don’t…

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  • A messy notebook page broken into four columns, each representing 25% of a story outline

    I’m going to throw my laptop out a window…

    Hi friends, I hate my writing process.  I mostly try to avoid writing about writing in these updates, because there are about a bajillion other newsletters out there that are for writers. I don’t think I have much I can add to the genre. But this has been on my mind a lot, because even…

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  • On swimming and anxiety –

    Hi friends, I swear I did not mean for this newsletter to be a journey of my personal attempts at self-improvement. Oh boy does that sound obnoxious. Instead what I set out was to just write about what was on my mind every month (and yes, I have failed at that “every month” part, but…

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