Gnome Con 2016, so that happened!

Amazing that it's already been more than a week since I went to Gnome Con and rocked out my first ever vending opportunity. So here's the essential breakdown. Gnome Con ran from March the 4th through the 6th: half-day Friday, full day Saturday, 2/3 of a day Sunday. I got there on Friday not long after they opened for set up and got myself all ready to go. I bought 15 copies each of my first two books. Though the third book was ready for downloadables that weekend, I didn't have any physical copies. That made me a little sad, but the good news was that it was done in time to be put on sale. On Friday, I sold about half of my physical copies. I was offering them for 2 for $20, in hopes this would help them move. I also included download cards, which I got from a blog post on Magical Words. They are super easy to make and they can be sold for a couple dollars a piece. I sold each of the three for $2 and then a pack of three for $5. All in all, a good deal to get my books in the hands of new readers. So far, I've only gotten one email about someone being unable to download the books that I put up through Google Drive, so hopefully that means everyone else has been getting them easily enough. I also, for the first time, used a Square reader. This was a little daunting as I learned how to make it work, but after a couple tries, I got the hang of it. Worked out pretty well.

I know, I know, you want to know how much I made at this shindig. Was it worth it for me to do? Yes, I have never vended before and having a chance to do so at a small convention in my hometown was priceless experience. Nothing like it. Monetarily, was it worth it? I made about $200 after taxes, in GA you have to pay sales tax even on things like convention sales. That is a hundred dollars more than I spent on the table, but didn't completely cover the amount of the merchandise. So did I break even? No. Would I still do this again? Yes. I'm actually currently in talks to take part in another public venue and perhaps sell more books. The chance to interact with new possible fans is something I simply can't pass up. My best seller was Dark King Rising though I sold a copy of Chains of Fate to, Bill Blair, one of the guests there at the convention through my boyfriend.

In other, not less important news, my boyfriend has become my fiance. He decided it would be a fabulous thing to do to propose to me at Gnome Con on that Friday after I got set up. I was surprised, pleased, and a little miffed because here I was trying to be a professional author and he was going to make me cry in front of a bunch of people I didn't know. Over all though, it turned out quite well. We're now planning a wedding, even though neither of us has some much as ever planned a party. Here's hoping we'll get the wedding of our dreams in a year or so.

So Gnome Con is gone for another year. I don't think I'll ever have another one as eventful as this one, but I don't need it to be. I look forward to do it again next year and doing even better.

Big Big News!

Hello again, ladies and gents. Of course, there are many lovely things I could talk about but I want to talk about one thing in particular: Handselling books. I never thought I would get the chance, but this year, I will be handselling at Gnome Con 2016. Gnome Con is a small convention held here in Savannah, GA, which is for gamers, comic book geeks, and readers. I am extremely pleased that this is going to be a part of my life. By the time this happens in March of 2016, I will have my third book out, Wearing His Ring. Dark King Rising and Chains of Fate will also be there and I will be taking preorders for the second book in the She Becomes Death series, Wielding His Scythe. It will be amazing.

On top of getting to vend at the convention, I will be joining friends of mine who always attend. This will make it a wonderful experience for me because I rarely get to share my professional happenings with my friends. One or the other at times, but not both.

What else is there to say? I'm in the second draft of She Becomes Death book one, Wearing His Ring. About 25k in with a little over a month left to write. So 50k due in 30 days. That sounds about like NaNoWriMo. With eleven years of that under my belt, I'm fairly certain I can manage.

Looking around the blog, I need to spend some time on what I've been reading lately. Lots of professional development books (Lots of craft and business books) thanks to the StoryBundle from November. I paid $30 for 25 ebooks including titles like Million Dollar Productivity. Writing about them should give me a better perspective on what I want to learn from each book. I also recently read Level Up Your Life by Nerd Fitness founder, Steve Kamb. Another book I learned something from, so want to talk about that too. Look for that review coming up soon.

New Year! Forward ho!

It's the fifth, we are firmly in the year of 2016. Huzzah! Well done all. Now to see what happened last year worthy of note versus what we have possibly planned for this year already. Truthfully, I can't say that I put out my first publication last year. If you've been around a while, you might remember a little project called Objects that I put out in September of 2014. That little book of short stories holds the honor of being my first real publication. However, that doesn't mean last year wasn't a year for milestones. I put out my first novel last year in June, Chains of Fate. So far all the feedback I have received has been good. There are a few nitpicky details I will be fixing before the anniversary of the book and the publication of book 2. I followed that up with a second book in December, Dark King Rising, for a total of two books out in the year 2015. I'm trying something a little different with Dark King Rising as I started out offering it on multiple platforms while I went with Kindle Direct Publishing Select on Chains of Fate. As much as I enjoyed running the free promotions on KDP Select, I didn't really see myself getting a lot out of it. These days, free books just don't move like they used to. Glut in the market, I more than suppose. In short, last year was a good year for my writing career. I started it off running. I know, I know, the big question is: Did anything sell? Well, technically, no. I'm not doing well in the sales department. I am not, however, worrying about it. The books are good. Word of mouth is moving slowly. It will take some time for it to gain the appropriate momentum.

What's on the board for this year, 2016? Well, first I have a third book coming out which will be the first in a trilogy, Wearing His Ring. The trilogy title is: She Becomes Death. The other two books are slated to come out this year as well, as soon as I can get them out of my hot little hands and into the hands of readers. The sooner, the better. Not rushing though. I must say that, I am not rushing. I'm giving myself 2-3 months at a stretch to work on the manuscripts because I think that's the best thing to do. Enjoying the process.

I get to make my first public appearance as an author with a table at Gnome Con 2016 down here in Savannah, GA. For those who don't know, Gnome Con is a small convention, still growing, that is put on over a weekend. This year, it's the beginning of March. I'm looking forward to that and trying to have my third book ready to go by then. Selling actual physical copies will be quite interesting, I'm certain. Who knows, if I do well, I might get asked to be a guest at some point in the future. That would be ace.

So here's the rundown:
Wearing his Ring: February 26, 2016
Wielding his Scythe: March 2016
Winning his Kingdom: April 2016
Blades of Fate (The second Chains of Fate book): June 2016
That gets me to the middle of the year with an entire trilogy completed. I think that's thinking far enough in the future for right now. I'm sure more new things will happen that I feel the need to post about. Until then, ta-ta.

On Books and Star Wars

Friday, December 18th 2015, a day that will be forever remembered as the day Dark King Rising came out electronically. Okay, so maybe I'm not a big enough deal yet to overshadow Star Wars, but I can dream. It is however important to note that I will indeed be joining the ranks of authors with more than one book out in having my second full length novel, Dark King Rising available for purchase. For those who would prefer a paper copy (more people buy paperbacks than you think), the novel is available through Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I look forward to hearing more from those who haven't yet purchased it. I sent early review copies to my email list several months ago in hopes they would be able to do me the ultimate favor of leaving reviews on that day it becomes fully available. I'm sending out an email with the right links for review leaving tomorrow morning.

So what's today's post about? Gratitude. I feel a lot of it these days. I have no idea how far I would have made it without those who have stood on the sidelines and cheered for me in spite of the obvious setbacks of rejections and depression. No matter what, I have a cheering section and they do everything they can to make sure I keep producing. Most important thing out there. So THANK YOU to all of them. I also want to say THANK YOU to my readers, the many and varied ones that buy my books and make feel as if I have done something momentous by leaving behind little bits of praise. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for that. I cannot even begin to tell you how much it lifts my spirits to be able to have some small impact on other people's lives.

Finally, I must mention the family. Mom, Dad, and sibs who have always chosen to believe in my ability to do whatever I put my mind to. Otherwise, I might have given up on this ages ago. No one can say what the encouragement is worth.

Looking for the Magic

Ever get to that point in a story and go: But where's the magic? In a fantasy, this should come early. In others, it may come late. Yet that question should always be there. If you can immediately tell where the magic is, good. Keep going. If you've got to do so digging, or some adding, then you had better get to it.

Please understand I don't mean magic just in the terms of magic systems or flying horses or sentient cutlery. I mean, the draw, what gets your reader in the door, plops them down in the chair, and makes the hours whisk by. Every story has it in there somewhere. By all rights, it ought to be waving its hat at hello on page one, but sometimes you need a little more set up to get it off the ground. Whatever you do, you should never have a story with NO magic. Godawful waste of time that.

If you're a writer, heaven hopes you are also a reader which should be where you get your first taste of this amazing craft. As a younger, I enjoyed Anne McCaffrey's Pern and the worlds of David Eddings. Later, I would cut my teeth in horror with Clive Barker and Stephen King, who remains perhaps my undisputed favorite author of all time. In some of these cases, the magic was magic and the possibility that anything might happen. If you don't know, Pern starts out as Science Fiction and breeding dragons in laboratories. (I am and perhaps will always be a lover of dragons. I liken it to the childish love of horses, magnificent, majestic animals.)

So where's the magic in your story? it can sometimes be boiled down to a question; the central question that keeps your reader reading. In Blades of Fate I posit what would happen if you had waited forever for someone only to find out when they returned they were nothing like you remembered. This is a slightly different question from Chains of Fate the first book in the set which asks, what would you do in order to bring back the one you loved? Or the question behind Dark King Rising, When your imagination creates the greatest evil what will you do?

Each of these asks a question and the text offers an answer by the time you get to the climax. Therein lies the magic of the text, the draw, the beauty. All that makes it amazing.


Happy Holidays to All. I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season. The paperback of Dark King Rising is available through Amazon and Barnes and Noble. The Kindle/Epub edition comes out this coming Friday, so make sure you get yours!

The Obligatory So Now What Post

December has started. NaNoWriMo has ended. Say goodbye to another year. Not to writing because I do that all year long, but to the breakneck, frenetic pace that is the headlong rush for the finish line I only do during the month of November. All things aside, I got a lot done for the fact that I only wrote 23 days out of the 30 day month. In that time, I managed to pen 70K+ which is nothing to sneeze at. Perhaps not enough to put me up there with those greats who can finish 100K in 30 days, but enough to get me a decent way into writing an entire first draft. Blades of Fate stands to be perhaps my most ambitious novel yet considering it is a piece set in a world I thought I was fully shut of several years ago and thus had to essentially relearn in order to tell this new story. Let me just say, it was not like fitting into a pair of comfy old slippers. It was more like wrangling on a pair of ill-fitting, poorly cared for thigh high leathers. Once you get them on, you're doing pretty good. Getting them on is however a beast.

A little bit of housekeeping. I'm taking down the free story I wrote over the month of October: October Sky. Don't fret. It still exists to be read, but those who didn't read it in its initial run on the blog are going to have to start paying for it. I'm putting it up on Amazon and Smashwords as an ebook with a price varying from Free to 2.99. In short, I haven't quite decided on my price point yet, so it's still up in the air. If you did get a chance to read it and thought it noteworthy, why don't you head on over to Amazon, Goodreads, or Smashwords and leave behind a little review? All the love is much appreciated.

For those who lament when my next book is coming out cease your wailing. I intend to once again start writing short fiction on the blog as well as prepping several of my previous works for publication through Amazon and Smashwords. That should sate the appetite while I come up with new and increasing flights of fancy to send us all on. I'm thinking I might start with something Science Fiction-y. You'll just have to hang out and see.

In the meantime, Dark King Rising is still available for preorder with its debut on the 18th of December. Amazon | Smashwords . The preorder price is 2.99 but it will be going up as well once the first week of the print is out, so get it while there's a good deal.

Onward and Upward! The New Project: October Sky

Well, I finished Dark King Rising. First draft ended up just south of 92,000 words. I'm putting it away for a week or so to get some feedback from others on the story's readability and such. (If you'd like to be considered as a beta reader, drop me a comment at the end of this post and I'll see about getting you an electronic copy. Be the first in the door to read something new and special.) That of course leaves me with the usual problem of: What do I do now? I have a half-dozen novels planned out but NaNoWriMo is in November, which is a month and 2 1/2 weeks away. In short, I don't want to start another novel right now because I'm looking at starting something new the first of November. (Wanna find me on NaNoWriMo? I'm our.lady.of.ashes, don't forget the periods.) As I was lamenting this fact to a friend last night, I was also busily thinking of what can come next. I need something that won't take me that long to write or polish. Something I can turn out by Halloween and be done. As a matter of fact, why don't I write something specifically for Halloween to give to my newsletter readers? I'm sure they would love to get something new and awesome in their inbox. That's why they signed up for the newsletter after all. (And to those who have already signed up, I'll be sending out the first newsletter soon to get feedback on what project you would like to see next.)

Since I want something small I can write and finish, I've decided to cap this new project, October Sky, at 25,000 words. It might end up being shorter than that, but I'm seriously hoping it won't end up being longer. Granted, I just wrote a 92,000 word book in a little over two months, so it's doable for me to finish 25,000 in a month and two weeks. I just have to sit down and work on it everyday like I did the last book. Then I can work on pounding it into shape.

October Sky is the story of Emmaline Simmons and the missing October stars. You see, in the world she lives in the stars power the well of souls, the conduit between the living and dead. However, when a major constellation goes missing, the well cannot be powered and souls start piling up. Emmaline must then journey into the Heavens and find the missing constellation before All Saint's Eve or Halloween night in order to insure that the well opens and the dead can pass through to their eternal rest. I think it's going to be YA, but I'm not entirely sure. It's still in the planning, rough scene sketch phase.

In other news, I'm still looking for feedback on the covers. (You can find them on THIS POST.) I personally like both of them and have gotten various different opinions via my Facebook page and my Twitter, so I'm aggregating all the opinions and considering what would be the next logical step.

The Creative Act of Faith

I subscribe to a blog called Magical Words which is about writing and written by a number of very good authors. The piece that I received in my box today was by David B. Coe and called "Ideas and the Creative Act of Faith". In his blog post, he details where he is now on the creation of a new idea, which is not very far in the planning stages. He also discusses how every act of creation is an act of faith.

We start our projects believing that when our work is done, the finished product will be complete and coherent, a reasonable representation of the vision that drove us to begin in the first place. But of course, we have no guarantee of this. We have only our confidence in our own creative process.

I am at a completely different place in the creative process. Instead of at a fresh beginning, I am deep along the path of a story and wondering if I will have the strength to make it through to the end. Don't get me wrong, "Dark King Rising" is progressing along quite well and has exceeded the word count I initially planned for it by some margin. However, I wonder if, in the end, it will be a complete and coherent narrative. I think we have this moment of doubt with every manuscript. At least I do, I can't speak for everyone else. By the same token, I believe in the story I'm telling and its ability to captivate. As no one else has really read it, that is a leap of faith as well.

Tonight I'm working on plotting out the final few chapters of "Dark King Rising" so that over the next few days I can make a great stab at finishing the manuscript. I gave myself six weeks to get it into shape. I'm in week five. I have a week and a half left to finish it. Can I do it? I don't know. I'm hoping. It depends on how badly I get mired in the ending chapters. Hence the need to plot them out more fully than I have already and make sure the ending is going to make sense after everything the characters have gone through. When it's all said and done, I hope to have enjoyed this book to its fullest before turning around and editing it a couple passes. Then and only then will it be good enough to be read by others.

Dark King Rising: Chapter One

Here's the entire first chapter of "Dark King Rising" for your enjoyment. If you like it, leave a comment or send an email to our[.]lady[.]of[.]ashes[@]gmail[.]com

Dark King Rising passed 50K.

My current project, "Dark King Rising," has just passed the 50k mark for this draft. In its honor, I am putting up a small excerpt:

Turning back to the book, Marie closed her eyes and envisioned again what it had been like writing the coming scene. She could smell the coffee going cold in the mug on her desk and hear the understated hum of her netbook. Her hands caressed the keys, then pounded out each individual word. It was a satisfying thing to write.

“As the mural finished speaking, the laughter came again but it was followed by applause. Timothy scanned the theater. The seats were empty, but it was as loud as a standing ovation around him. He turned away from the wall again heading for the stage. He reached the orchestra pit and found himself face to face with the front of the stage. Looking left then right, he searched for a way to get up there. The only light was still coming from the spotlight. It was so bright it brightened some of the room. Timothy walked along the front of the stage cringing at the rolling laughter which came and went in tides. Finally at the edge, he saw a staircase. Some of the children were mounting those stairs from the wall. Timothy put his hand on the railing but snatched it back when he encountered something sticky. He held his hand up before his eyes. It was streaked with blood. Just then another wave of laughter rolled through and he reconsidered whether or not to continue forward, but he couldn’t go back. Back meant into the hallway of desperate mouths and wagging tongues. It also meant going without his objective: the voice of the Dark King. No, he had to press forward and face what lay ahead. Without touching the railing, he headed up the stairs.”

Marie paused.

Hope you enjoyed. Watch the page for more milestone markers.

May Progress Report [A Cover Reveal in my Future]

It's the end of May and what have I done on my projects. I think I've been pretty productive.

Project One: The Becoming
I completed the first draft at 78,223. There are already things I know are going to come up for either fixing or axing in the rewrite, but for now it is complete. Time to put it in the freezer for a couple of months while I work on something else.

Project Two: She Becomes Death (trilogy)
I haven't made any headway on this project. Granted, I need to print it out and send it to a friend who has already offered to read it for me and tell me where the warts are. I'm thinking I will get that done in the next week.

Project Three: Chains of Fate
I commissioned a cover for this book and it came back amazing. So I have the kicktail cover I was looking for back in April. I've formatted the interior file and set it up on Createspace. The proof copy is in the mail. This is becoming very real. The next thing you know I will be a published author.

Project Four: Dark King Rising
Adding this one to the list. My next novel in progress. It is the next book I have close enough to completion to consider getting a cover for.

I've made some progress and that is good. I am definitely looking forward to next month.

After the Project

Yesterday, I sent my novel, "Dark King Rising", out to a publisher. Immediately after I hit SEND a wave of relief washed over me and inside a sense of contentment whispered, "It is done". I was riding high on the sense of accomplishment of having not only completed something, but having begun the logical next step of putting it out there for a possible audience. To quote a TV show, I felt like "King Kong on cocaine". Judge my tastes how you will. Today is different.

Today, I look with longing at a file I no longer have to open and find myself wondering about the lives of people who have never existed anywhere but in my mind. Today, I feel let down and a little broken, the first few steps into a self-imposed exile. Today, I'm depressed. From King Kong to a field mouse and the tractor's coming.

I've been told, by artists wiser and more experienced, this is not unusual. There is first the elation, then the deflation. Like Icarus you marvel at the sun and then seconds later are choking on the waves. This is the artist's life. In a way, I guess you could say, we (artists in general) spend our lives chasing that high. The knife's edge of done before the full recognition of being done sets in. The moment of marveling at Narnia before you realize you're once more in England and have to go to school.

I don't know that I'm ready to start on something else yet. Not that I don't have enough projects to keep me quite busy, but I don't feel quite closed with this one yet. As if I need a mourning period before I can fling myself fully into the next thing, the next world, the next villain, the next protagonist, the next problem. So for now, I putter. I flirt with a book (or three). I watch bad television. And I wait for the tears to pass. I have a standing appointment with friends who write this evening and will try to stir myself to the next project.

Oh, who am I kidding?

Before I typed the ominous words "THE END" on the final page of "Dark King Rising" other characters were clamoring for my attention like children when Momma has finally come home from being long away. They badly want to escape their infancy and live their lives on the page, but I've been so busy raising one, the others have simply had to wait. Now they sense THE END of their waiting, that one lucky one of them will be next. So they tug at my attention and whisper in my inner ear of things we could do together, of empires we can make and break, of adventures unstarted, and they seek to lure me onward no matter how tired I may seem. I'm almost ready to hear them. Maybe later today.



"King Kong on Cocaine" comes from an episode of CSI. :P

A new project: "Watched"

This is just the first paragraph of a project I haven't actually started yet. I just want to have it somewhere I can look at it.

In every room, she was assaulted by windows. They stood high and defiant, daring her to attempt shutting out the world beyond them. Alison looked at them with dismay, shielding her eyes from the light. "This must be what it's like to live in a glass house," she said and we all know what happens to those who live in glass houses.

Over and over again, I think I'm going to start on another book. Unfortunately, "Dark King Rising" has been going somewhat slowly on my most recent round of edits. It's getting there, slowly but surely. I hope to have the edits finished by the end of next month. Also...this is my 100th post. I'm a little amazed. Guess I should post a little more often.