A Few Things

1)  I had my dates wrong for getting Early Grave back from the editor.  She said the 28th.  I had it written in my date book as the 26th, I assume because I had originally planned to have it to her on the 26th of January and so the return would be one month later.  Derp.  Anyway, we're still all on track for a late April / early May release.  It all depends on how much work there is to be done and whether life intervenes.  :fingers crossed:

2)  I posted a little snip of Sleeping Ugly over at Silver James' blog this morning.  (Edited to add: In the comment section.)  And reading it this morning reminds me that I still love it.  Look for it to be published by the end of summer, good lord willin' and the crick don't rise.

3)  If you don't remember, Sleeping Ugly is about a supermodel who gets cursed so she becomes ugly when she sleeps and then gets prettier throughout the day until she looks like herself right about the time she's ready to go to sleep again.  Oh, and there's a dude who got the curse, too, only he's normal throughout the day and ugly at night.  So they're working together to figure our who cursed them and fix this crap.  Then the cops show up to question her about the murder of her estranged brother...  It's weird and wild and fun.

4) But first, Early Grave.  Agent Ned Washington of the SCIU has been sent to Toledo to figure out if they have a serial killer who's murdering old people in nursing homes and then catch the heinous bitch.  If you read Fertile Ground, you might remember Ned from the scene when Teri first gets to the Detroit office.  If you've read either of the SCIU novels, you'll remember Lynn - the tech gal.  She plays an important role in this book.

That's about it for me this morning.  If I think of anything else, I'll let you know. 

Milestones

If you've friended me on FB (and still bother to follow along), you might've seen that I officially rolled over 2000 books sold this morning.  So, I'm celebrating.  Woohoo.

Yeah, it took 3 years of publishing to sell that many copies.  Yeah, it's good in a way.  It depends on the perspective.  If you're a traditionally published author, maybe that's not so woohoo for you.  :shrug:  I am not now, nor will I ever be, traditionally published.  If you've had a lot of money to throw at advertising, maybe 2K is a low number in your world.  I haven't had that option thus far, so I'm feeling pretty good about it. 

Sure, I wish it was more.  I sold a thousand books my first year.  By that projection, one might think I'd bw passing the 3K mark right now.  Actually, I had hoped it would be exponential and something more along the lines of 1K the first year, 2K the second, 3K the third, so I'd be at the 6K milestone right now.  Hopes and expectations are good, but they're not reality. 

Still, it's a milestone.  And worthy of a minor celebration.  If I drank, I'd toast myself.  Instead, I'll just have some coffee and get ready to get back to work after my week off. 

How do you celebrate the milestones in life? 

Taglines and Covers and Junk

Monday, Silver asked for a tagline on Blink of an I.  On Amazon, it's basically, 'In the blink of an I, the whole world can change.'  I think I told her it was 'In the blink of an I, the world can fall apart.' or something.  Maybe it should have been 'In the blink of an I, the whole world changed.'  Cuz the world has already changed.  Then again, Mary's world is changing throughout the book, so maybe the tense is right.  I dunno.

Are any of them grabby?  Therein lies the rub.  I think so, but I suck at that sort of stuff.  If I was scanning for a book to read, that would attract me enough to read the blurb.  And the blurb would entice me to buy it.  But that's me. 

I was reading an article this morning that talked about covers and how the cover should convey certain things to a potential reader depending on genre.  Umm, yeah.  Again, Blink's cover conveys the right things to me.  What other people might think?  I was never any good at figuring out what other people think.  The article suggested looking at other books in the same genre and going with the same feel as those.  All the newer dystopian novels I've seen or read have been geared to the YA group, and Blink is not YA.  If I want to go to what I think are similar books, they were all written before I was born - Anthem, Fahrenheit 451, 1984, Brave New World, etc.  I don't think anyone is actively marketing those anymore.  And they're so famous you could probably slap a brown paper bag on them and they'd sell.

Anyhoo, just sitting here thinking about things and wondering if I'm doing enough or doing the right things or what I should do now.  And second-guessing myself, of course.  Post release day stuff, when I'm not actively working on writing or editing and so the brain has time to spin in hamsterwheelesque circles. 

It's Alive! It's Alive!

Blink of an I is live now!  Yeah, yeah, I said the 21st.  I got it done early and uploaded it to Amazon this morning.  It's live now.  And it's only 99c for a limited time.  Probably through the end of the week, depending on my brain.

Have at it, folks.

I'm going to go collapse somewhere.  

Just a Little Teaser...

With the release of Blink of an I fast approaching, here's the first chapter to whet your appetite...

Blink of an I

Part One  

Seven colors, seven castes,

Created so our Union lasts.

Seven colors, Black and White—

Keep our Union future bright.

Violet heeds the servant call.

Indigos are helpmates all.

Management is left to Blue.

Health belongs to Greenish hue.

Yellow creates for Union needs.

Orange trains the castes for Union deeds.

Leaving Red to shepherd all.

All castes answer our Union’s call.

Beyond the colors, above the caste

Black maintains the laws they’ve passed.

Overseeing us all, as is their right,

The Union dons the color White.

Their shining light above us ever,

May the Union live forever.

Chapter One

Mary Jones stood at a forgotten place where the ocean met the land, basking in her solitude.  No one would disturb her.  Anywhere you weren’t supposed to be was off limits.  And she wasn’t supposed to be there. 

She didn’t care. Every chance she got, she trekked the many blocks to stand on this strip of land between the ocean and the bay.  It calmed her.  It strengthened her.  It made her believe she was capable of facing what lay ahead, when most days she didn’t feel competent enough to get out of bed.

Above her, a twisted hulk stretched into the air like a man straining toward a loved one torn from his embrace.  On the opposite side of the strait, she could almost make out another structure reaching back through the fog. 

Or maybe she was only remembering it was there. 

On sunny days, she could see across the thick belt of water where another twisted husk waited.  Two corroded towers between the shores of the strait rose from the waves—silent guardians of a past she would never know.

Her fingers traced, yet again, the strange symbols rising off a brass plate at the base of her forgotten friend.  The squiggles might’ve once told what the expanse was for, but their meaning had been lost.  Below her, the surf crashed against the rocks and silently slithered back into the bay, whispering secrets in a language she wished to understand.

Turning her back on her favorite mystery, she directed her eyes across the bay toward the hills, wondering if the upper castes who resided there knew what any of it meant.  Surely those people would’ve been taught these things.  Mary was certain that at some point in the distant past, someone believed this structure important enough to build.  It ought to be important enough for someone to remember, even after all the intervening years.

But if anyone still understood, they would never tell someone like her.  She was nothing. To them or to anyone else.

Trailing her fingers through the rust, she tried to let go of the agony brought on by struggling against her caste.  In this place, between the ocean and the bay, her caste level didn’t matter.  The structure behind her didn’t care if she was a lowly Indigo or a lofty Red.  After so many years in the foundling home, she found structures were better company anyway.  The wasted creation above never pointed and laughed at her questionable parentage.  It never shunned her because her clothing was a coarser cloth or a poorer color.  The warped and corroded metal simply stood, making her hope perhaps once upon a time people hadn’t cared about such things either.  Clearly, if men could build such mysterious monuments, they wouldn’t have had time to dwell on origins and castes.

Her gaze drifted partway along the coast.  Nestled inside the grid of streets stood her other favorite place in the city.  Nothing more than sandy brick and dusty windows, without any outstanding characteristics to draw anyone’s attention, the building remained prominent amongst the surrounding derelicts.  Like its brethren, it showed signs of age.  Unlike them, it wore its age proudly.  A cracked windowpane here, a crumbling brick there.  Minor details that did nothing to associate the structure with the stolid sentinels around it.  None of the others would ever rise to the grandeur it was still wrapped in.

Mary never saw bright eyes peeking from between the heavy draperies but each time she watched, she was certain they were there.  Somehow, she knew a warm body sat tucked away inside, secure behind the folds of cloth.  She couldn’t imagine it any other way. 

Maybe tomorrow she would visit.  Perhaps then she would summon the courage to quench her curiosity.

If there was time.  Between work and sleep, she never had enough time.  The Union made it their business to keep every citizen busy busy busy.  Only by stealing moments here and there could she even visit this place.

From her perch, she could see the first bright fingers of dawn, inching over the hills to chase away the mist.  Their arrival was her cue and, as much as she hated the thought of the day ahead, she turned her feet away from the mystery of the building. 

The first dozen steps were little more than the shuffle of a child sent off to bed too soon. When a bell sounded in the distance, though, her heart seized against her ribs and then began racing.  Her pace quickened.  Soon, she was running.

“Late again,” her superior would say with a terse shake of his head.  She would be shuttled into her cube and set to do twice the work, if only as punishment for her transgressions.  If she worked very hard, she might be allowed to leave before the clock blinked twelve. 

Not until she reached the two-story building that held her workhome did she finally slow her pace.  She gasped for breath like the fish the Violet fishermen pulled from the bay with their great nets.  Just a few more moments, she thought as she tried to return herself to some semblance of normal.  Surely, they can wait a few more—

“You okay?” said a rough voice behind her.  “Look pretty done in to me.  Sick maybe?  You want I should get some help?”

Turning, Mary opened her mouth to answer, but the bright purple of his coverall and the vidcam above them had her swallowing her reply.  Her lateness, combined with her other transgressions, ensured a fresh heap of trouble and additional black marks on her record.  And if that wasn’t enough, talking to a Violet would ruin her for sure.  If the Union Guard was watching the playback, that was.  Most days they didn’t bother to check the vidcams in the workhome sector but the way her luck always ran, today would be the day.  The Violet would probably get the worst of it, the lowest caste was always in the wrong, but she couldn’t afford to have another addition to what had to be a very thick file embossed with ‘Mary Jones, I246’ somewhere in the recesses of the UG’s headquarters.

Giving him no more than a quick nod, she pushed herself away from the lamppost.  His dark eyes narrowed and he reached out to steady her.  Shrugging his hands away, she let out a hiss of breath and said, “Get back to work before they see you.”  One quick tug to straighten her own deep blue coverall made her as ready as she would ever be.

The Violet was still standing on the sidewalk staring after her when she approached the entrance.  In the reflective glass of the door, she noticed how his eyes clouded with dismay and she wondered whether they would as easily sparkle with laughter.  She might’ve enjoyed talking to him.  In another world. 

But this was the only world she had.

Shaking away such thoughts, Mary stepped into the dim interior of her workhome.  The lattice of cubicles was nearly silent, but from each cube drifted the soft voices of her fellow interpreters.  A sea of indigo- clad bodies hunched over their vidscreens, watching whichever Union program they’d been assigned, their hushed voices providing feedback to their recorders.  No head peered out from its assigned space. No face poked above the divider to see who was late again.

She walked around the edge of the grid, taking the long way toward her own cube to avoid the seeking eyes of her supervisor.  If she could slip inside and get to work before he noticed, maybe this latest incident wouldn’t bring another penalty to her account.  Thinking about her growing number of debits to the Union, she cringed.  Every day, through her own stupid errors, the amount she owed increased far faster than her ability to earn credits.  At this rate, she would never be free.

Luck was with her for once.  Her boss hadn’t seen her duck into her cube.  With a grateful sigh, she settled behind the screen inside her space.  Her assigned material had begun playing at her assigned worktime, as always, so she missed the beginning of the program she was set to interpret.  But she was used to the problem.  With no means to ever make the feed start over, she’d gotten quite inventive with her interpretations.  Pushing an earplug in, she caught the end of a tirade from one of the characters.  The story was almost verbatim of yesterday’s piece, and she opened her mouth to tell the Union a change in the script was needed.

 “I246!”

The harsh voice dried up the words in her throat. When she didn’t immediately answer, it barked again.

“Mary!  Mary Jones!”

She turned her eyes toward the sound, but all she could see were shadows.  “Yes, Mr. Dayton?” she inquired softly, recognizing the voice and hoping she could avoid the worst of his anger today.  She didn’t hope too hard. 

As he stepped out from between the cubes, she could see his ruddy complexion growing redder by the second.  “What’s your excuse this time?”  His question came out clipped, as if any delay was choreographed specifically to irritate him.

“Pardon me?”

“Did you think I wouldn’t notice your cube’s been empty for the past half-hour?” 

Her shoulders sagged.  “I’m sorry, sir.  It was the…  My home vidset…  Must be something wrong with the…  I didn’t hear the call to work again this morning.  I’ll call someone to come out and look at—”

“What makes you think I give a damn about your excuses?” He puffed out his amorphous chest.  His blue coverall stretched across it like a water bubble about to burst. 

“But you just asked—”

“Talking back to a higher caste? You are pushing the limits of the good graces of the Union.  After what you’ve done, of course, I shouldn’t have expected anything better.”  Pointing one thick finger down the aisle, he gazed toward the ceiling as if he didn’t want to have to look at her.  “The Union has released you from this job.  Pack your personals and present yourself in my office.”

Mary palled.  The horror of being released from her workhome hovered at the back of her mind with each tardy arrival, but she never honestly believed it would happen.  She needed this job just to meet her weekly debits.  Sure, the Union would find another placement for her, but being released from a job only ever meant a downward shift.  She thought again of the Violet lingering on the sidewalk, of the ones who fished the bay or cleaned the gutters, and a fine sheen of sweat chilled her to the bone. 

“I’m sorry, sir,” she said with her head held low.  Maybe if she groveled enough, she could appease his anger.  “It won’t happen again.  I’ll work extra hours tonight… Be in super early tomorrow… Anything…” 

“I’m positive it won’t happen again.  I cannot allow it to happen again.” His tone of voice froze her to the core.  “Now do as you’re told.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. 

An evil grin split his face and he strode toward his office without another word.

As she picked over the scant items she could call her own, a few brave faces peeked out from their cubes.  None of them cared. They were merely curious about who had been released, glad the axe had fallen on someone else’s neck.  No matter how much the Union tried to instill the idea that work was a privilege, no one worked as hard as they should.  The other interpreters were no exception.  They knew they could be next to face release and the shame it brought.  They’d been spared.  This time. 

Why she had been singled out for release escaped her comprehension.  As she shuffled toward the last cube on the left, her mind raced from one possibility to the next, settling on none.  In the end, she had to admit she’d finally pushed her luck to the edge of its limits. 

Stretched so far, it had finally burst.

Like every other morning Joe Dayton, B112, sat behind his plasticine desk, a heavy scowl creasing his portly face.  This morning, however, would be the last she’d see of him.  The Union never reassigned a person to the same workhome.  At least that’s something positive, she thought, but she wasn’t sure the benefit was worth the cost.

“Do you have any idea why you’re being released?” The way he asked made it seem like he knew the answer but enjoyed asking anyway.

“I assume it was because I was late again, but I can explain—”   

“Hush!”  He shook his head and then snapped his fingers in her face.  “That’s how much the Union cares about your excuses for shirking your duty.”

“Yes, sir.”

He smiled again, and Mary wished he would stop.  His smile always reminded her of the bedtime stories at the foundling home—all of those vicious monsters who bared dripping fangs before eating bad, little girls. 

“Despite what you may think, your release is not due to your lateness.  Although, in my opinion, that should be reason enough.”  He poked one finger into the center of his other palm as he spoke, giving Mary the feeling he would stab her just as easily if he could. 

“No,” he said.  “The Union has found you to be incompetent at your present occupation.” 

Incompetent?

Dayton spoke his words like he was reciting the script for a vid in which he was the only actor.  “You will be reassigned to a position more in keeping with your abilities. Which is to say… None.  I expect you’ll be gutting fish by this time tomorrow.  Or maybe you’ll be graced with an assignment to work in a greenhouse, sweltering in the heat and covered with dirt.”  A small snort broke from between his wet lips.  “In my opinion, you deserve worse.”

Incompetent.

Her face fell and his grin grew wider.  If he got much happier, he could probably swallow her whole.  “I really am very sorry, sir.  Please don’t release me.  I promise it won’t happen again.”

“A promise you can’t keep is no promise at all,” Dayton said, reciting a quote from the Union vids.  Suddenly, the pale blue of his coverall made his eyes appear colorless.  Mary felt like she was peering at gaping holes into his brain.  “This isn’t about your inability to arrive at work in a timely fashion.  It is about your not being able to do the job our great Union has spent untold resources training you for.  They’ve coddled you along for too many years now, but someone has rectified the error and the Union has given up on you.”  He sniffed the air and wrinkled his nose as if she were garbage.  “You no longer have value here.”

His words landed like physical blows, and she had to steel herself from shying away.  To have no value was the worst thing Mary could imagine.  Nothing was lower than a Violet, and even they had value.  “Please, sir.  I’ll work harder.  I’m not useless.  I have value.  Please—”

“Be quiet!  You’re finished here.  I insist you leave these premises at once.  The Union will give you your reassignment before the day’s end.  I truly feel sorry for whatever doomed supervisor gets you this time.” 

With no hope of changing the Union’s directive, she hung her head and turned to leave, his final words chasing her down the aisle.  “Personally, Miss Jones, I hope they turn you into a slave.  It’s more than you’ll ever deserve.”

Ducking her head and jamming her hands into pockets filled her meager possessions, she let her feet carry her away.  Melancholy threatened to overwhelm her.  It had been the only workhome she’d known since they released her from training five years before.  And now it was as off-limits to her as the structure where she’d started her day.  As off-limits as everything else she wanted.

Once outside, she allowed her feet to choose her path, but they led her away from her sleeping quarters instead of toward them.  The Union’s laws demanded she rush back and pack for quick removal to a place more suited to a Violet.  But she was in no hurry.  Oh, they’d punish her for this additional transgression, but at the moment, she didn’t care.  She didn’t want to sit in the tiny quarters she’d occupied for all her adult life, waiting for them to move her someplace worse.  Listening to the unit’s vidset bark out its unending stream of Union messages would only underscore the fact they’d declared her incompetent. 

Incompetent.

The word echoed in her ears until she couldn’t stand it any longer.  After all the years spent listening to how much she owed the Union, and all the effort she wasted trying to be exactly what they wanted her to be, the announcement she’d failed was the worst thing anyone could have told her. 

Incompetent.

Even the years of vicious taunting from the other foundlings had been sweet whisperings compared to this.  At the home, there had always been ways to disappear, hiding in a closet or cowering under a stairway until they found another target for their cruelty.  If only she could escape as easily from Mr. Dayton’s voice reverberating through her head.

Unmindful of the time and lost to her surroundings, her purposeless steps brought her to stand in front of the sandy brick building.  Mary didn’t know how long she’d been standing in front of the odd, little place.  She wasn’t even sure why she didn’t simply go inside.  Nothing was stopping her now.  She could walk through the doors and present herself to its residents.  They would welcome her like a long-lost friend, the way she’d imagined since she discovered the place years ago wandering from her sleeping quarters to her workhome. 

She didn’t know where the feeling came from, but it was like a word on the tip of her tongue or a quick of movement out of the corner of her eye.  A niggling, hidden memory so close to the surface she could touch it, but when she tried, it became mere ripples on the water.  The place simply called to her, so elusive and yet so enticing.  Today, she could finally figure it out.  If she had the courage to take the first step.

She cast her gaze up and down the street.  Empty.  Everyone was working at their assigned job somewhere in the vast city.  Everyone but her.  It was the law.  If you weren’t working, you weren’t serving the Union.  And to not serve the Union was tantamount to stealing. 

If she stood too much longer—empty street or not—she would draw attention.  Before too long, the UG would notice her loitering.  A guard in his black uniform would step from the shadows, followed by others, until they surrounded her and dragged her away. 

If she was going to do anything, it had to be now.

“Well?” she said, prodding her wayward feet into action.  “You brought me this far.”

Her heart raced as she took her first hesitant steps toward the structure.  The air was somehow harder to breathe, but she needed to know what was inside.  The craving took precedence over what would happen if the UG caught her approaching a building she wasn’t authorized to enter. 

Within seconds, she found herself on the stoop.  There the fear caught up with her again.  It whispered she could be invading someone’s sleeping quarters, their safe haven away from the Union’s eyes.  It told her she would get caught.  It hinted that whoever was inside wouldn’t want her.

That last fear was the worst of all.  Whatever the Union could and would do to her, the thought she wouldn’t be wanted, here of all places, almost turned her toward her own sleeping quarters. But she wasn’t wanted there either.  Torn between fear of the known and of the unknown, her hand hung halfway between clutching her chest and knocking.

Before she could think, her hand thrust forward and three sharp raps echoed in the stillness. 

Silence followed. 

No one was home.

I hope you enjoyed it.  Look for the book to be released on Wednesday, February 21st (so only a few days to wait, eh?) for the super-low introductory price of 99c.  It'll go up to its regular price of $2.99 after a couple days, so get it early and save.  (And if you miss the sale, it's only $2 more, right?)

To Print or Not to Print?

Ah, therein lies the rub.  Whether it's more marketable to offer works in paperback or to suffer the slings and arrows of only going ebook.  Or something.

As I approach release day for Blink of an I, I'm once again questioning whether to offer a work in hardcopy as well as ebook.  Supposedly, having a hardcopy version available lends validity to the ebook.  I'm not sure about that.  I know plenty of people who only have their books in eversion and they don't seem to be hurting for sales.  And I have hardcopies of all my books so far, but they don't seem to be doing much for my sales. 

It'd be nice to have some hard data on the subject, and there might even be some somewhere, but I'm not in the mood to go looking for it.

It's not like putting a hardcopy version out there is that hard.  A pain in the butt sometimes, but not hard, per se.  A little more formatting, a print cover.  It's a little more expense, too, with purchasing proof copies, etc.  But not enough to make it totally out of the question.

Which still doesn't answer my question.

If I put out paperbacks, I could offer them as contest prizes.  But so few people enter my contests, I'm not really seeing any good come out of those.  The one person here who regularly enters has already won a copy of this book anyway - in eversion.

If I have paperbacks, I can hand sell them.  Except my hand sales are so down, I don't even bother trying anymore.  I could give them away to people I know...  Yeah, that's not really happening lately either.  Being a hermit has its downside.

Lazy me says 'just put this one out ebook only'.  Publisher me says 'put them both out so you cover all the bases'.  Not sure who'll win.

What do you think?

If I do put out a paperback version, it won't be out for at least a month after the ebook, because of shipping proof copies, etc.  

The Photos Within the Cover

As you can see, the cover of Blink of an I is made up of a bunch of different photos.  I was going to make it a contest to see who could figure out the most images, but meh.  Contests never do well here.  Instead, I'll just tell you what I chose to include, if I remember right... 

From left to right...

Row 1
1) a dinosaur trapped in rock (taken at Dinosaur National Monument in Utah 2003)*
2) a graveyard (the same one from the cover of Accidental Death)
3) an old airplane at a museum in UT*
4) the grave of an unknown soldier
5) the steps to a brownstone in NYC

Row 2
1) the turbines inside Hoover Dam*
2) a civil war reenactment
3) the Golden Gate Bridge
4) Denver International Airport*

Row 3
1) not sure exactly, I think it's on Wall Street
2) an old barn
3) a woman staring off into the distance (also used on AD's cover)
4) the bridge at Starvation Reservoir in UT*
5) the Rio Casino in NV*

Row 4
1) the inside of a factory in TN*
2) the smoke from a grass fire in CO*
3) row houses in San Francisco
4) burning wood
5) the Statue of Liberty
6) a veterans' memorial in Utah*

Row 5
1) three bridges side by side
2) the cathedral at Notre Dame University*
3) a stand of birch trees in Utah*
4) a circuit board
5) an old barn

Everything with an asterisk, I took on my wanderings.  You'll notice a lot from Utah.  I did a bit of traveling around and took a lot of good pictures when I lived there 10/2002 - 6/2004.

Anyway, I tried to pick pictures that would mean something and I think I succeeded.  Whether anyone gets it?  :shrug:

And Now, the Blurb

Coming soon to an Amazon near you, I give you the blurb for Blink of an I...

Raised by the Union to believe she’s worthless, declared incompetent by a system she doesn’t understand, Mary Jones wants nothing more than to run away and hide. When an underground society known as The Order chooses Mary for a mission to escape the city, she’ll discover she’s more than she was ever allowed to believe. 

Accompanied by a man she’s not sure she can trust, Mary travels through lands ravaged by a long-forgotten war, discovering a past the Union wants everyone to forget and an idea worth risking everything for. She never promised the Order she’d come home, but after experiencing a world without Union control, she’ll return to see them stopped, even if it means risking her life and her liberty in the process.

And if you missed the cover, here it is again...

Links and junk to come later.   And even with the angst, I'm still on track for a release date on or before February 21st.  I can't wait.

SQUEE!

Update: I created a Goodreads page for it today.  Go here to add it to your Want to Read list.

Cover Reveal

Good morning, Everyone!  Since the release day for Blink of an I is fast approaching, I thought you might like to see the cover.  Previously, I asked commenters to vote on several different mock-ups for this cover.  And I appreciated all the comments, both on the blog and via email.  However, the correct answer was E) None of the above.  After the contest, I took the comments and suggestions and re-did the cover.  I like it.  Hubs likes it.  I hope you do, too.

Now, without further ado...

I still don't have a blurb*.  I need to cobble that out soon, though.  Look for it in the coming days.

(I did the cover myself using MS Image Composer.  All images used to produce this cover came from either photos I took during my travels or from Morguefile.com.  All rights for the finished cover and the individual images therein reserved, of course.)

* I wrote the blurb this morning.  Well, actually I revised the old blurb I used for querying until I had something I like.  It'll be posted here on Friday.

But First, Coffee

I was sitting here yesterday morning inputting the edits from AWE when I hit a mental roadblock.  A crisis of confidence, if you will.  Sort of a...

"I can't do this."  "No one will like this."  "OMG, this is so lame."  "I'm going to need at least three more edits to make this anything anyone could even kinda want to read."

So, I walked away.  Not a 'walk away dejected to never return', but a casual stroll to get out of that creepy headspace.  I ate a sweet roll.  I watched some TV.

Someone somewhere (I forget which blog) talked about the whole 'feeling like a fraud' thing the other day.  This is it.  And while I know in my heart that the little voice in my head saying all those things lies like a cheap rug, it still gets me from time to time.

But...

I can't let it stop me.  I can't let it even slow me down.  I have promises to keep.  I have to shut this unproductive brain thing down and move on.

Thank goodness I built some extra time into the publication schedule, though.  Because I do need a little time because it does slow me down.  A little.  And I've already used some of it up dragging my feet because I think my subconscious knew this was coming.

and*...

I think I hit on the crux of the problem, the seed - if you will - of my crisis.  I want this book to be perfect.  Perfect.  Every sentence laid out so the reader has perfect clarity.  Which is nigh on to impossible.

As I said before, this is a scary book - for me, as a writer.  This is why.  I don't think I've been this nervous about a book since I finished my first one and sent it off to be ground up by the query machine.

Today.  Today I am committing myself to sitting my ass here for as many hours as it takes to accomplish some actual progress.  Because I will hit my deadline. 

But first, coffee.  

*I actually wrote this post off and on throughout the day yesterday and some this morning.  The first part up to the * was written in the morning.  The next part was written around 2:30pm after several failed attempts to work on editing for more than ten minutes without succumbing to the crisis of confidence again.  Realizing this, however, did not help.  I only managed 21 pages edited yesterday.