Category Archives: Updates

Finished!

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I finished re-writing “Prophecy by Barlight” last night.

I’m going through it again to smooth it out, and I am hoping for release on Friday at 99 cents. It will be 99 cents for a week, then it will go to $2.99.

“Prophecy by Barlight” is the tale of Galdris, the poor hapless sot that buys the Drunken Unicorn, complete with a prophecy in vibrant blue letters on the wall. He soon discovers that the prophecy might draw customers in, but it also causes problems… problems that slowly eat away at him, until he’ll go to great lengths to free himself.

A comedic, fantasy story. 3500 words. (14 pages).

Expanding

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I’m going to be moving some of my books to Kobo, and possibly other platforms. That will make them available in a wider area, and give people more options.

It’s going to take a little while to get everything up and running, but hopefully I will have “Prophecy by Barlight” and “Small Bites 2” out by then.

“Twilight Tales” will be free until the 27th. Because I put it though KDP select that means I won’t be able to put it up on any other platform for a while. But… that’s okay. Eventually I may make it permanently free just to give people a taste of my writing. But that won’t be for at least three months.

BUT, that gives me time to work on some other projects.

I really like how “Footprints” is going. It is a first person story in which a man goes to his family’s cabin to deal with the death of his father. And while there something strange happens.

“Small Bites 2” should also be out soon. It has three more flash-fic stories. Each dealing with curiosity, and what happens when it bites back. “Scarecrow“, which is available in Twilight Tales, “Carmine” which is about a telepath and a vampire, and “Price of a Book” about a woman who finally fights back.

Look for each of these toward the end of the month.

Loving it!

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I got an email from a friend today. A forward actually. He wanted to share with me what Amazon was trying to sell him.

me

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There I am, right at the top! I know it’s just a little thing, but it really is awesome that they included me in their email this month.

Overflowing with Ideas

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I suppose this isn’t a horrible problem.

I am OVERFLOWING with ideas.

Tons of ideas! Why, just within the last two weeks I have written four complete plot-lines, each at least 1500 words, with fully sketched characters, settings, and worlds.

But have I finished anything?

Well, I actually have two finished short stories (3k words each) that i am trying to get polished up so I can send out. But the new ideas keep flowing.

I hate losing new ideas, so I try to write just short blurbs (fifteen minutes worth of writing) but sometimes the stories get away with me. Sometimes I see some potential for something good in them, and I just go with it.

Like last week, I was reading a thread on Reddit when I had a moment of inspiration to start writing a ghost story. The entire story sprang into my head, and I had to get it all out. I have a good chunk of both stories finished, and it would probably only take a few days to get them to the editing stage if I put my nose to the grindstone. In fact one of them, “Tux”, I already created a cover for. I liked it that much. But it also has a lot of work to go through since it is going to be a longer story. “Footprints”, however, is going to be a shortish story. And “The Ring” is the first in a series about some mysterious items.

SO!

  • Prophecy By Barlight
  • The Ring
  • Footprints

All good ideas. All nearing completion. I need to get my butt in gear.

Stats

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It’s been a while since I shared my word count.

year graph

You can see the steady rise of daily word counts. I went from an average of 200 in February  to 500 in April. I’m pushing that even higher this month.

What I’ve noticed….

When I finished a big project (in this case, Osiren’s Tears) I had a sharp drop off in word counts because I ended up spending a lot of time doing edits, cover design, formatting and the other “boring” parts of self publishing. I also had no idea where to start on the 20 projects I have lined up.

When I got a new idea the words just flew out of my finger tips. I ended up with two days over 2000+ words because of two great little ghost story ideas. Similarly, back in March I had a 1000+ day because of a brand new Sci-fi idea that I am still working out the kinks for.

Good news, I’m getting faster. Bad news, I’m going to have to spend a few more days here and there ironing out the “boring” parts of self publishing because I’ll have more content to put out there.

tux2And a teaser for the ghost story….

Around the Web

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Your semi regular dose of news from around the web.

The saga over Penguin exploiting authors continues. And now there is a class action lawsuit over unpaid royalties to go with it all.

On some lighter notes:

Some of the best known authors prove it’s never too late to start writing.

The Creative Penn discusses marketing and selling learned from some top selling indie authors.

Pets of favorite authors.

The SPP interviews CJ Lyons. (youtube)

 

Happy writing.

Osiren’s Tears

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Prince Ashini must choose between the love of the beautiful goddess, Sekra, and duty to his own people.

Prince Ashini must choose between the love of the beautiful goddess, Sekra, and duty to his own people.

Osiren’s Tears is now up on Amazon.

It is priced at $2.99 at the moment.

I might put it up on sale this weekend for 99 cents. I still have to figure out about marketing before I do that.

However, I am going to be moving this to $4.99 next month. It’s a full length book, after all.

There is a sample available on Amazon. You can read most of the first chapter there. Try it before you buy it.

Sunshine and Roses

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Now that “Osiren’s Tears” is at the editors I realized that “Small Bites 1” is also ready to go up. SO! I will have two new books out by the end of the month.

I also have two fellow writers helping me iron out some kinks before I put out my next couple books. And my boyfriend who has been helping me when he can, mostly with encouragement, sometimes with editing and advice.

I went through everything I have ready, or near ready, and I actually have 15 books that I should have out by June! (Including the two already out.)

After such a slow start, and months between books, the fact that I will soon have 15 of them is amazing.

Couple things that helped me get this far:
1. Getting organized.
I literally had hundreds of story ideas, so many it was overwhelming. So I started by pairing it down to “What is a solid, complete, story idea”, then “what is almost finished” and was able to narrow it down to just a couple dozen stories. Much of easier to deal with.

So however your creative side isthe finding expression, narrow it down to what is most important now, finish those, then come back for more.

2. Track Yourself
I loved NaNoWriMo. Watching the little graphs go up as I wrote each day. Having a goal. Competing against friends to see who could finish first.

It took me a month in June of trial and error to finally find a system that worked best for me, but now I have it. It tracks all the important things. Words written, chapters finished, blog posts… everything at a glance with a running tally for each month. And because of it my word count is going up every day.

3. Annoying Friends
I have the guys over at SPP and STP, especially Garrett, that keep writing and publishing thousands of words every month. And I keep thinking… I’m going to catch up to you dang it! And by golly I am going to catch up eventually!

It’s the whole idea behind the competition part of NaNoWriMo. Comparing yourself to other people isn’t always a good thing… but for this I’m making an exception.

4. Don’t be Satisfied with the Status Quo
I want to do better. I want to write more, write better, edit more, and have TONS of books out there. That drive to push myself… in the end it’s really what keeps me at this.

So… GO CREATE SOMETHING! No more excuses.

FINISHED!

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I just sent “Osiren’s Tears” off to the editor! I finished the final chapter at 8pm tonight. I am so excited! But I’m not taking a break now. I have six more books for this series alone, not to mention short stories, and a few paranormal romances and science fiction stories that I have planned.

Update

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A week ago I wrote about Garrett, Zack and Cristal calling me out to be the first to send a voicemail into their show. So… here it is: (the voicemail)

You should definitely watch the whole show. It was very interesting, and had a lot less spoilers then last weeks show.

“Happy little accidents” is from Bob Ross, a man who use to paint on PBS from who I learned a lot of my landscape painting skills, and mainly just to get out and enjoy the act of making art. (Bob Ross Remix)

I was never actually able to paint along with Bob Ross, but I did learn that sometimes the simplest things were enough to make art beautiful. It only takes a little bit of paint to get the point across.

Another concept cover for Osiren's Tears

Another concept cover for Osiren’s Tears

On that note, I have been really toying with the new cover of Osiren’s Tears, and I haven’t really liked anything yet. I am trying to convey a lot of information with it (fantasy, series, war, etc) and I decided to try something a little simpler.

I am not sure this is the final version, but I like this one a lot more then other versions.

The book was suppose to be at the editors right now, however… I got sick. She was nice enough to postpone it for a week while I catch up on my edits. I still have four chapters that I need to finish up before I can send it to her. A chapter a night and I should be able to have an actual publication in just a couple more weeks.

I really hate postponing yet again, but I honestly couldn’t move or stay awake while I was sick. So I am just going to have to put my nose to the grindstone again and get this thing finished.

I think you know you’re starting to get serious about something when your excuses start annoying you, even if they are valid excuses.