Anna Aden Writes

Project Progress Project #1: book 2 in my main series Finally completed the novel! The next is doing the design cover. I have tentative covers and maybe something on TikTok which make take a new skill base. New issues, risks, blockers: Doing some TikTok marketing if I can.  Project #8 Complete LinkedIn Learning course or gain 40 CPD/CPE credits Due to job hunting and other things, I haven't done anything here but they have increased the price of the subscription by about 30-40%. It went roughly from £136 to £180. This was because I stopped the subscription. I'm currently on a free trial but if I get a job, I'm going to stop it.    New issues, risks, blockers:  My job hunting seems to be getting in the way.  Project Review Project #7 Watching Instructional videos on BBC Mastro Not done anything so far.  Other Project Status Project #3: Review romance conference material On Hold Project #4: Review Jericho conference material On Hold Project #6: Genre explorat...

Project Progress Project #1: book 2 in my main series I am on the final rounds of edits and it's all looking good. The pace is slow because after 11 years of writing on and off, it's hard to keep on reading it. Hopefully, it just me and not the actual story.  Changes I've changed the main female character's name to something more elegant. It's a really nice name and suits her more than the first name. Then I'm also working on the cover design. I may add some tattoos to the Hero and main love interest. He is currently shirtless so I'm thinking putting him in a teeshirt or something.  New issues, risks, blockers: None at the moment, I just need to keep on. Project #8 Complete LinkedIn Learning course or gain 40 CPD/CPE credits I've now completed 21.8 CPD/CPE credits out of 40 credits. One course proved useful for a job interview so I'm glad I did it.    New issues, risks, blockers:  None apart from boredom. Project Review Project #7 Watching Instructio...

The progress  So far so good, and now I'm thinking about the covers and epilogue. Do I need an epilogue?This is draft of the blurb. What do you think?  The Blurb She has a son to raise, a future to build, and zero time for a man with a record. He has freedom to guard, a family to defy, and one look at her that changes everything. Twenty-year-old Precious survives on rules: trust no man, rely on no one, and keep her three-year-old son safe. Upton Thomas breaks every single one the moment he walks into Mrs. Cee’s chip shop—ex-con, old-money heir, and far too cocky for her liking. But walls crumble when her son collapses and her world stops. In the chaos of a hospital corridor, Upton is the only constant—the only one holding her up, the only one she can’t push away. One reckless kiss later, and the man she swore was temporary is suddenly in her flat, her bed, and the edges of her heart she thought were sealed. Upton is fighting his own war. His powerful family wants to control hi...

Project Progress Project #1: book 2 in my main series Looking good and I've completed a draft round. Now I need to tie up elements and hopefully finish soon. I'm thinking of changing names but I'll see. New issues, risks, blockers: None at the moment, I just need to keep on. Project #8 Complete LinkedIn Learning course or gain 40 CPD/CPE credits I've now completed 16.6 CPD/CPE credits out of 40 credits. The last two modules were mostly irrelevant so I skimmed past them. One I just doubled played in the background to hit the completion rate. It a python course but the material was out of data, as well as the libraries on jupiter so it basically useless, plus programming is boring at times.   New issues, risks, blockers: boredom    Project Review Project #7 Watching Instructional videos: On Hold I signed up for the BBC Maestro costs last November and have barely looked at them so I may start and blog about them here. I'll see. It may be the motivation I'm looking ...

Quarter 1 Project Status Project #1: Finish book 2 in my main series On track/in progress Project #2: Publish my novella Completed Project #3: Review romance conference material On Hold Project #4: Review Jericho conference material On Hold Project #5: Google Drive Review & consolidate tentatively completed for now. Project #6: Genre exploration On Hold Project #7 Watching Instructional videos: On Hold Project #8 Complete LinkedIn Learning course On Track/In progress Project #9 The cover design course On Hold Which projects delivered meaningful outcomes vs. activity? At this time is it probably the Project #5: Google Drive Review where I had to jump in deep and do a file audit, which led to the discovery of how much work I've put into some incomplete projects. It was meaningful because it has realigned some of my goals and motivation to be more focused on the projects I have. I often forget about my novels-in-progress but that was a good reminder.  https://dabwrites.blogsp...

This may be repetitive of my quarterly review.  Project Status Project #1: Finish book 2 in my main series On track/in progress Project #2: Publish my novella Completed Project #3: Review romance conference material On Hold Project #4: Review Jericho conference material On Hold Project #5: Google Drive Review & consolidate tentatively completed for now. Project #6: Genre exploration On Hold Project #7 Watching Instructional videos: On Hold Project #8 Complete LinkedIn Learning course On Track/In progress Project #9 The cover design course On Hold Breakdown Project #1: Finish book 2 in my main series I've completed this round of edits, and it's looking good. I just need some tightening here and there. At the moment, I'm on a break but I hope to resume it soon. I have also outlined a plan of what I need to focus on. New issues, risks, blockers: None at the moment though I'm taking a short break.  Project #5: Google Drive Review & consolidate After a few false sta...

February 2026 Goals Monthly Update cute kittens My Master Goal Lists:  https://dabwrites.blogspot.com/p/2026-goals-projects.html I'm trying out different formats but this is what I have now. Project Status Project Status Project #1: Finish book 2 in my main series-in-progress On track/in progress Project #2: Publish my novella experiment-write-to-market series Completed Project #3: Review romance conference material On Hold Project #4: Review Jericho conference material On Hold Project #5: Review & consolidate other writing information on Google drive target: 30 docs in progress/ behind Schedule Project #6: Genre exploration On Hold Project #7 Watching Instructional videos: On Hold Project #8 Complete LinkedIn Learning course On Track/In progress Project #9 The cover design course On Hold Details of those on track Project #1: Finish book 2 in my main series-in-progress Progress this month  I have decided to make this my main focus for now rather than spread myself t...

2026 Goals Monthly Update I've decided to do it this was so I can monitor the progress under the heading and move on. I was wondering if I should write about the projects separately rather than a huge review. I need a way of organising this.  My Master Goal Lists:  https://dabwrites.blogspot.com/p/2026-goals-projects.html I'm trying out this format to see if it works so shall be using these headings if they apply. STATUS : Goal is set but action has not begun. On Track / In Progress: Active, moving toward the goal on schedule. RISKS - At Risk / Behind: Experiencing delays or obstacles. KEY RESULTS/MILESTONES: Sub-tasks required. BLOCKED : Cannot proceed due to dependencies. COMPLETED/DONE : Goal achieved. PAUSED : Temporarily stopped. Project #1: Finish book 2 in my main series-in-progress  STATUS : Ongoing.  This story is made up of five parts and I've completed part one which is called Strangers To Friends. Here I needed to add two secondary o...

Happy New Year. Last year, Affinity Photo became free to use and because I no longer had access to PS I decided to go for it. To be fair, it has been on my list of software to use if I lost access to PS. However I know from being on their mailing lists they had two main sales where prices where slashed to 50-70%. The summer and black Friday sales. When that didn't happen this summer, I held on tight because it a fair bit of cash. Then before black Friday there was this announcement. In the interim I was using Photopea which is pretty good. The caveat was I using it on my current Mac which has about 4GB. It works so why change it. Actually, I got a new one before I left my organisation because they gave 10% discounts.  Note I say free to use because you still need a license to access this and I'm not really sure what Canva is doing when it checks.  Affinity vs Photoshop vs Photopea the main difference to me. For now the main difference is Photoshop (PS) is super efficient and r...

2026 Goals Realistically based on my past performances, I'm carrying forward the two main goals. I tend to grossly underestimate the time given, and overload myself. It makes me feel productive to have many goals. :) Anyway, I've been carrying over my goals from 2023 where stretch became actual. Without further ado. Finish my main novel-in-progress book 2 : This needs more draft passes than I am willing to admit, but I'm working on being realistic and seeing how much effort things take me. Draft passes, then editorial-copyediting/proofreading-which can take up to 3 months, cover design and all that. I rarely consider those steps in my goals. Publish my novella : I want to do this in January but I'm thinking of reader magnets and all that stuff. It was a world to sharpen my 'commercial' writing skills. I have three shorts associated with it. If I do write those, it may be delayed. Am I going to put them on my PadlockStack (Substack) or blog or some reader magnet?...

Change in circumstances, meant I no longer had access to Photoshop and I was dithering about whether to buy Affinity but I decided to wait for the Black Friday sales.  I tried Canva, too clunky and tedious. Then  I found out about Photopea which for a light user isn't bad (see below). So I used that instead. I could have subscribed but I'm a very light user only using it when I needed to do a book cover, therefore it didn't maks sense. But I think it's okay.  Using Canva and Photopea While trying Canva for my cover I got a seven free pass to Canva premium so I used it. I've been a member for years, but for occasional and light use, when I'm doing books.   It has some good premium templates though the layering is clunky, maybe that's why the integrating with Affinity. Who knows. However I was able to get some good ideas. The main issue with me was licensing because I heard Amazon was terminating accounts over copyright infringements, and there was no clear do...

I found chapter 2 which was playing around with masks a bit tedious. As I said the instructions aren't very clear however a good tip with I think is worth remembering is the blending option. It's described below.  These are a screenshot of the 'before' images  Layer Masks Theses were just playing around with masks, nothing serious or interesting. Blending Options According to Caplin 'this is one of the most powerful tools in Photoshop that allow users to hid or show picture elements automatically without TOUCHING A BRUSH OR LAYER MASK'. A good tip was using the underlying layer in blending mode  I think this is best tip so far, and worth playing about with. This is show the firearm in the library and the airplane. 

This book was published 22 years ago! So I am bearing that in mind as I got through it. However I've found it is  not very intuitive and that has nothing to do with age. It's just difficult to understand. It took me a while to find the CD ROM - yes, it's that old - however I'm sure I probably got it about 15 years ago, but it doesn't matter.  Though the files are still the same psd formats, the quickmovie instructional videos did not work because of the age. This was irritating because a lot of the exercises seemed to rely on users following the video rather than the instructions.  It starts off chapter 1 which is Natural Selection and roughly has eight lessons. Regarding copyright I used the images supplied on the CD with the book or from https://www.loc.gov/free-to-use/colors-tell-the-story/ where you can get free stuff. The fundamentals The first project was using the quick mask tool but the instructions weren't very clear, and it took a while to understand. ...

Adobe Photoshop 2024 release - Classroom in a Book by Conrad Charvez I did most lessons except the web ones, preparing for print, editing video and working with camera raw which I didn't think was worth it. I did not learn as much as I think I would have, but I borrowed it from a library so there was no cost to me. I think it's probably overpriced at $64.99 or £51.99.  However the caveat, and there is a caveat, if it was part of a work project, I probably would buy it. After all I did get the 2023 Illustrator Classroom in a Book which cost me £48.99 - I didn't finish it however I got enough skills and confidence to do my book cover featured blow.  Cover from learning the illustrator in a Classroom book I guess depends on how much value a person gets from it, and how desperate you are. I was desperate when I paid £48.99 even though I had access to LinkedIn learning webinars.  Good Selling Points It a good showcase of what Photoshop 2024 can offer but rarely goes in de...