In this chapbook, Lee Murray—the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of the Taine McKenna series and editor of Black Cranes: Tales of Unquiet Women—lays out a systematic approach to establishing a vision and setting goals that help aspiring authors build sustainable and long-term careers.
Drawing on the experience and techniques that guided her own rise as an author, Goal Setting (Literally) features Murray’s best advice for scoping out your creative career, setting goals you’ll actually hit, and charting your development as a writer. Most importantly, she asks two fundamental questions many writers ignore: what does success really look like for you, and how are you going to get there?
Whether you’re a new writer planning a pathway to take your career to the next level, or a fan of Murray’s fiction searching for a behind-the-scenes glimpse at the way Murray built an extraordinary career, this chapbook is a peek into the mindset and philosophy of one of New Zealand’s most acclaimed writers of fantasy and horror.
Lee Murray is an author, editor, and poet from Aotearoa New Zealand, and a USA Today Bestselling author. She is the winner of multiple Sir Julius Vogel, Australian Shadows, and Bram Stoker Awards, and is her country’s only recipient of the Shirley Jackson Award for psychological horror. She has also been shortlisted for numerous other awards, including the Aurealis and British Fantasy Awards. Titles by Lee include military thriller series, the Taine McKenna Adventures, supernatural crime-noir trilogy The Path of Ra (with Dan Rabarts), and short fiction collection, Grotesque: Monster Stories. She is the editor of nineteen volumes of dark fiction, among them Black Cranes: Tales of Unquiet Women (with Geneve Flynn) and Asian Ghost Short Stories (Flame Tree Press), and she was named Lit Reactor’s Editor of the Year for 2021. Other works by Lee include non-fiction title Mark My Words: Read the Submission Guidelines and Other Self-editing Tips with Angela Yuriko Smith, and several books for children. Her short stories and poems have appeared in prestigious venues such as Weird Tales, Space and Time, and Grimdark Magazine. She is a Rhysling- and Pushcart-nominated poet, and recently won an Australian Shadows Award for her poem “Cheongsam” which appeared in Tortured Willows: Bent, Bowed, Unbroken. A manuscript assessor, international literary judge, conference panellist and guest of honour, Lee is a former HWA Mentor of the Year, NZSA Honorary Literary Fellow, and a Grimshaw Sargeson Fellow. Read more at https://www.leemurray.info/