2012 has been an incredible year for me. A lot of unexpected things happened, some of them good, some of them sad.

I switched publishers this year, a move that was planned long before the death of Roxanne Jones in September and the closing of L-Book in October. I joined Ylva Publishing in mid-2012, and it’s been a great six months.

In June, my novel Hidden Truths won a “Goldie” (GCLS Literary Award) in the category historical romance.

I also started writing in German again, after six years of writing exclusively in English. Translating some of my stories from English to German and the other way around has been an interesting experience.

I published my first novel with Ylva Publishing, Something in the Wine, in October, and the sales numbers have been amazing.

I also wrote and published two novellas, Manhattan Moon and its German version, Vollmond über Manhattan. And I wrote a total of five short stories in 2012, two in English, three in German. Three of them have already been published in our Christmas anthologies, Gingerbread Hearts and the German version, Lebkuchenherzen. The two others will be part of a romantic anthology that will be published in time for Valentine’s Day in 2013.

In October, I went to the Frankfurt Book Fair, the world’s largest trade fair for books. So many books, so little time…

Same problem with reading. I had very little time to read in 2012. Not counting the books I read for work or for research purposes, I think I read only about fifteen books, among them 96 Hours by Georgia Beers and Silver Collar by Gill McKnight.

At the beginning of the year, I started keeping track of my writing hours and the time I spend beta reading for other writers.

So let’s take a look at the numbers for 2012:

On average, I spent about 1 1/4 hours writing and about 20 minutes beta reading each day.

My New Year’s resolution for 2013 is to republish two of my novels, Second Nature and Backwards to Oregon, and to finish and publish the next novel in my shapeshifter series, True Nature. If there’s enough time, I would also love to start a completely new writing project, either an urban fantasy novel or historical fiction.

I’m planning on visiting the book fair in Leipzig in March. I hear it’s even more interesting for readers than the book fair in Frankfurt.

So what were your writing and reading highlights of 2012? And what are your plans for 2013? Let me know in the comments.

Happy New Year to everyone! May it be a healthy and happy one.