Pink Sticky Notes

I have sticky notes all over my desk right now.  Each one has a little piece of plot or something I need to remember to weave into the story on it. 

'When's Josh's funeral? Jeni needs to be there' is one of them.  Another says 'Rose shows up @ Gus' house early the next morning'.

The others have spoilers, or I'd share them, too.

Their pinkness isn't a thing.  Or rather it's an unintentional thing.  Pink just happened to be the color I grabbed when I went into the sticky-note receptacle.  It fits, though.  I think Jeni would appreciate the pink. 

I write the stickies when I get a flash of insight - during the day, when I'm trying to sleep, in the middle of the night... Whenever I think of something I want to do but I'm not in a position to actually do it. 

I usually toss them once I've put the idea into the book.  This last one will probably sit here until the end because it's basically the end of the book, jotted out in tiny writing on a little pink square. The others?  I haven't tossed them yet because I'm lazy.

Maybe it's my subconscious wanting to be surrounded by good ideas and proof I'm working again.  ;o)

Anyway, sometime today I have to decide if I'm going to set Sleeping Ugly aside to focus on the edits for Wish Hits the Fan or whether I'm going to do the edits during the day and write new words at night.  I've done it before, but I'm not as crazy as I used to be.  I'm so close to the end of SU I might just go for it.  Final climax and denouement.  How long those will take?  You got me.  Another 10K maybe?  We'll see. 

This is an ugly little draft right now.  Just thinking about editing it makes me want to hide. 

Anyway, time to take my coffee and my sticky notes and create worlds.  Have an awesome day everyone.

And tell me.... Do you use sticky notes?  I'm so glad Romy invented them. 

Bonus points if you got that last silly bit there. 

And yes, I know some dudes at 3M actually invented them.

A Little Update

Not much to talk about today other than to tease you with things I can't share yet.

1)  I got the preview of the cover for Wish Hits the Fan last night.  It's just what I was envisioning.  It's gorgeous.  But I can't share it yet because it isn't complete.  I gave her the go-ahead and she'll finish it and I'll show it to you then.

2)  Sleeping Ugly is moving right along.  I'm up to almost 42K now and moving into the big reveals as far as the mystery aspects of it go.  It's pretty rough and definitely a dirty draft.  If time and finances work out, I hope to have this in your hands by the end of the year.  I also hope to have this first draft finished by the end of the month, but I don't know if that's gonna happen or its just a pipe dream.  This story ended up to be way more involved than I thought it would.  I'll do the best I can do, but I'm getting the edits back for WHTF on the 31st, so that takes precedence. 

Other than that, there's nothing new.  Staying focused on Sleeping Ugly. 

Any questions?

The Monster in My Head

There's a monster that lives in my brain.  At night, after a long but productive day, it comes out and whispers evil things to me.  It tells me that I suck.  It tells me that no one will ever want to read what I've written.  It hints that everything I write has been written before.  That I'm unoriginal.  That I'm a hack.  Sell-out.  Loser.

The monster's been pretty dormant lately, but last night it crawled out and had a party in my skull.  All the vile, nasty, cruel things it could've said, it did.  And it didn't just stick to writing.  It preyed on every aspect of my life where I fear I might not have been good enough. 

In hindsight it was quite interesting from a psychological perspective.  Last night, it was just a pain in the ass. 

I tried denying the things it said.  I tried rational arguments.  I tried shouting all the things I know are true over the top of its lies.  None of that worked.  In the end, I just let it play itself out and it must've eventually run out of things to say because at some point I fell asleep. 

This morning, there are no lasting side effects except I didn't get enough sleep.  Bring on the coffee.

Before the monster woke up, I figured out the next scene in Sleeping Ugly and came in here to write it down.  Looking at the chicken scratch on a sticky-note now, the idea still works, so that's a win.  It's all a win if I don't take anything the monster says to heart. 

The monster is there.  It will always be there.  Over the years, I've learned I can't kill it.  I can only accept that it exists, ignore it, and forge ahead.

Scammers and Thieves

I know, I already talked about this on Monday, but since then, another issue has come to my attention.  Several friends* discovered that their books had been stolen in their entirety and listed as being published by a scam publisher - under their name with their copyrighted cover art and everything, but with none of the monies coming to the author.  As far as I know it's only on iBooks, and Apple is being cooperative, but the loss for some authors is totaling in the thousands.

These shitheads take the books, list them for a dollar less than the authors are selling them anywhere else, and rake in the bucks. 

Short answer: If you see a book for free or for cheaper than it ought to be - even on a reputable website - check to make sure you're getting a legal and legitimate copy.  Otherwise, it's stealing.  All of my books say Sold by Amazon, with no actual publisher data, except for paperbacks which list Createspace.  I am the publisher, so if you see anything otherwise, it's a scam and I'm not getting a penny.  Hell, I only sell through Amazon right now, so if you see my books listed ANYWHERE else, it's a scam.  They're thieves and they're part of the reason I have to scrape and scrounge to publish books. 

Having said that, though, not all writers publish exclusively to Amazon, so keep your wits about you when you're shopping.  Cheaper may seem like better, but it's not.  It's screwing your favorite authors and putting money in some heinous asshole's pocket instead.

Better more powerful people than me are on this one, but as soon as they nix one, another crops up.  Like publishing books wasn't hard enough.  Sheesh.

And if you're a writer facing all this bullshit, keep your head up.  Fight the good fight when you can and cover your ass when you can't.  :hugs:

*As far as I can tell, none of my books are listed on iBooks.  Yet.

Introducing Jeni Braxxon

Hey All! 

On a whim this morning, I'm going to introduce you to my current heroine - Jeni Braxxon.  She stars in Sleeping Ugly, a paranormal mystery of sorts. 

Now, I'm still peeling back Jeni's layers, so some of this might be subject to change...

It was morning and I was ugly.

Near as I can figure it, I pissed in the wrong witch’s pool at some point.  All I know is one night I went to Spanky’s, drank a lot, danced a lot, and went home with the first available hottie.  The next morning, I woke up cursed.

And ugly.  Did I mention ugly?

Not the best outcome for a twenty-two year old fashion model, let me tell you.  I had a photoshoot the following week.  I had an agent who kept promising me the cover of Vogue if I kept going the way I was.  Sure, twenty-two is a bit old for a modeling career to take off, but I had hopes.  It had to take off.  It wasn’t like I had skills to do anything else.  Even on a good day, I’m not fit for fast food or retail sales.  Like this, I’m not fit for even that. 

Who wants to buy food or clothes from a hag?

I spent the first twenty-four hours of my ugliness trapped inside my apartment with the drapes drawn and the door closed.  After the initial shock of seeing myself, I threw towels over all the mirrors.  It was like someone was sitting shiva in there.  Until I tried to get ready for bed. 

With nothing to do and nowhere to go, I opted for an early bedtime.  Brushing your teeth is an interesting experience when you can’t see yourself.  So I sucked it up and pulled the towel down.  Prepped for a glimpse of gruesome, I got the second shock of the day when a nearly normal me stared back.  Other than looking like I had the roughest day of my young life, I was me again. 

Chalking it all up to the worst hangover ever, I swore off booze and went to bed, confident in my beauty.  I didn’t remember falling asleep.  I don’t even remember dreaming.  I closed my eyes in the dark one minute and opened them the next in the soft light of dawn.

I wish I could say I felt a tingle or a twitch.  Even a burning sensation in my nether regions would’ve been preferable, because it would’ve provided a warning.  Nope.  I got nothing.

Except ugly.  Overnight ugly.

At first I totally doubted my sanity.  Nobody gets ugly overnight.  Then again, no one gets pretty throughout the day either.  Either a person is always pretty or they’re always ugly. 

Psychotic break now or one earlier in my life—neither option made me feel any better about myself.  Of course, the only other answer seemed just as crazy.  Magic isn’t real.  Curses don’t happen in real life…

Unless they do.

I hope to have the first draft done by the end of the month and then in my editor's hands sometime after Wish Hits the Fan goes live in September.  (Or whenever JC gets the final edits to me, if that's feasible at the time.)  We'll see.

Cheaters and Liars and Scammers

Not a happy subject for a Monday morning, but I'd like to take a moment to address something I heard about this weekend.  People are out there cheating and lying and scamming their ways onto the bestseller lists at Amazon.  Apparently, there are 'services' that guarantee they'll have hundreds of people 'read' your book in Kindle Unlimited (for one low price, of course).  This shoots your book up the bestseller lists, which presumably gets you more sales.  This also gets you paid for page reads in KU.  But they aren't actually reading the books.  And those people who buy the books based on their list number are getting kind of pissed because they got scammed into buying a less-than-stellar book.

David Gaughran, author of Let's Get Digital (the self-publishing bible in my opinion), talked all about it on his blog, and FB, and through his Twitter page.  He also gives ways you can combat this crap, if you're motivated.

Personally, I'm too tired and sad to mount a battle against this.  As if there weren't enough hurdles to making sales in this business anyway, here's another one. 

Now, I'm not going to sit here and tell you I haven't been tempted to do some pretty unethical things to get sales.  Tempted, yes.  Like I'm always tempted to eat watermelon.  But like eating watermelon, the aftereffects of being unethical are BAD.  Karmically bad.  Metaphysically bad.  Soul cramps, if you will.  So, I don't do it.  I won't do it. I will never pay someone to commit fraud to give me a leg up.  Make book on that.

If I never sell another book because I refuse to be unethical and an asshole, so be it.  At least I'll be able to live with myself and sleep at night.  (Or if I'm not sleeping, it's not because I have soul cramps.)

Anyway, I guess there will always be people who have no problem being unethical.  Cheaters and liars and scammers.  If you're a reader, be on the lookout for books that come out of nowhere to land on the bestseller lists.  I guess there's a way to tell what the book's previous ranking was before it hit #1 (the Movers and Shakers lists?), and if you see a book suddenly jump from the hundred thousands to the single digits, be wary.

Meanwhile, I'll be sitting over here writing quality books without any scammy crap to get in your way.  I don't load unrelated back matter for more page reads.  I don't spam.  I don't pay people to read my books or to review my books.  I don't use services to give me a leg up.  I just write books that I hope readers will enjoy.

On a happier end note, Sleeping Ugly is moving right along.  Just under 3K written yesterday which left me at 19699 words so far.  I hope to have this first draft done by the end of the month.  Totally doable, if I don't fall off the wagon.

Oh, and before I forget, there's a Goodreads Giveaway starting this morning and running through the 31st.  One winner will receive a paperback copy of Up Wish Creek for their very own.  

At the Editor, Time for Stats

Hey Everyone!  Since I got Wish Hits the Fan off to the editor last night, I thought it might be fun to run down some stats for you.

So, Wish Hits the Fan (Once Upon a Djinn #4) is currently sitting at 62990 words (or 62969 in .doc form - why that's different I'll never know) and 222 pages.  This is, of course, the third draft of the book, so let's back up a bit.

The first draft of the book was only 47859 and 179 pages.  I finished that on February 25th of this year.

The second draft was 58339 words and 205 pages.  I finished that on June 26th.

Then, because I had dragged my feet all of the month of May, which put me behind so that I didn't get the 2nd draft done until the end of June, I beat myself with a stick and cranked through to get the 3rd draft done today.

It wasn't due to her until tomorrow, so we're starting the clock then.  JC has promised me a 3 week turnaround.  So, July 31st?  Fingers crossed it doesn't have too much wrong with it, so I can turn it back in to her quick.  I'm still looking at September, but the quicker I get it done, the earlier in September this will be in your hands.  Yay!

Now, one of these days I'm going to have to keep track of the hours I actually put in on one of these things.  I know for the past few days, I started working on the edits around 7am.  And I usually finished up around 8pm, on average.  BUT, and it's a big but, I don't work straight through.  I work for a while, break, work some more, break, call my mom/go fishing, work some more, do chores, work... you get the idea.  All told, though, it took me about an hour to enter a page worth of edit notes, and there were 19 of those to change the 2nd draft into the 3rd draft.  And, it took me about an hour to make a page of edit notes.  So, figure about 38 hours over the course of about two weeks.

Ugh, it felt like more, but unless I missed something somewhere, that's it.  Plot holes fixed, typos eradicated to the best of my ability, continuity issues smoothed. 

All I know is that when I finished last night, I felt like a deflated balloon.  And tired.  Now I can rest... a little... before I jump into my next project.  What that will be... your guess is as good as mine.  I had a wonderful idea for a new book when I was trying to nap yesterday afternoon, but it was gone by the time I got up.  D'oh.

Doncha hate when that happens?

Why Publish in Print?

You know, I wish I had the answer.  I still publish in print, despite the fact that I haven't sold a print copy of a book in over a year.  In fact, the print copy of Natural Causes should be available soon - good lord willin' and the crick don't rise.  (And the reason it's months after the ebook release is exactly the fact that I haven't sold many print books and it ain't cheap getting these without anything to show for the expense.)

I guess part of the reason why I publish in hardcopy is because I like print books.  I especially like holding a print copy of my books in my hands.  I like petting them and smelling them and thumbing through them.  It's a thing.

Another part of it is that I read somewhere that having a print copy available - even if buyers choose ebooks instead - adds legitimacy to the book.  :shrug: I'm not sure if that's true, but I do know that with sales off the way they are, I'm willing to try. 

Another part of it that offering free copies of print books is supposed to help with sales and reviews.  Sometimes yes, sometimes no.  If they actually read the book and want to read more of my stuff, they can find all the books in the back of either print of ecopies of my books.  And if they actually read the book they received free, they could possibly write a review.  (Umm, except for that one gal who got a copy free through Goodreads and put it up for sale almost immediately as a New, Signed copy.  Good luck unloading that, lady.)

In truth, I'm not sure what having paper copies of my books actually does for me.  Other than the expense of copies and shipping, it doesn't hurt to try.  Who knows, maybe the wiser heads are right and they really do help.  Either way, I have physical proof I wrote books for after I'm dead, right? 

What do you think? 

And, if you want a copy of the version of Blood Flow with the original cover say "pick me" in the comments.  I'll draw a name or two at the end of the week.