Though I have not been officially diagnosed with ADHD, I am fairly certain I have some level of the adult form. (I’m a therapist, I’m allowed to decide that.) This has been coming through loud and clear in my writing.

I have genre ADHD, and as an unagented, unpublished writer, I have the freedom to do as much genre and category hopping as I want. I like to think of it as exercising my writing muscles. I mean, you wouldn’t go to the gym and only work your arms, right? Sure, you’d have killer biceps, but would your legs be able to hold up the awesomeness of your upper body?

When I started writing seriously again, I went straight for YA. That was what I was reading most at the time, and that’s what seemed natural. I wrote two YA books, one contemporary and one speculative fiction. The spec fic was much better than the first, but after polishing and beginning the querying process, I was ready for something new and different. I started working on an adult novel on human trafficking.

This was unlike anything I’d written before. While my first two completed novels were third person past, this was first person present. Not only that, but told in alternating timelines. I’m very proud of this book, and hope to complete it within the next month or so. But because the content is so dark, I needed a break.

So for NaNoWriMo, I tried adult contemporary romance. And I loved that too. It was a fun and funny novel, easily written in a month, and well-received by my writing group. I’ve never done funny before, though I find myself quite entertaining (ha!), so this was also quite different, and again told in first person present.

After Christmas, I wasn’t quite ready to go back to the world of human trafficking, so I tried an NA contemporary. It’s about halfway finished. A little dark, but fun at the same time. It’s possible.

I have starts on a YA horror, another YA dark contemporary, and two MG. I have a full year of writing ahead of me, and I love it.

Of course, I try to read in all these genres as much as possible as well. I’m doing a 2014 book to movie reading group, which is forcing me to step outside my normal reading, including a nonfiction (what?!?) and several titles I never would have considered otherwise.

I like to work out my reading and writing muscles as much as possible. After all, all perspectives inform others, and though I hope to never be stuck in one genre/category forever, I know I never want to lose that flexibility.