May Update Amid the Chaos

I figured I should do a May update while it is still May. Things have just been so busy lately, I've barely had time to breathe, so I'm taking some time to get caught up on things tonight. Here's what has happened in the last month:

In my writing world:

1. Riding the Board comes out in a few days. June really has crept up on me and I didn't even realize it's less than two weeks away. I haven't even really told very many people about it. Sometimes life just gets in the way of my plans. It's actually quite annoying.
There's still time to take advantage of the discounted Daily Dose and get a whack of great stories from some amazing authors for a pretty low price.
You can see the list of stories here: http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=3838&cPath=63_854

2. I've decided to go to the Gay Romance North-West Meetup in Seattle. If you're from the area and can make it, you should come. Registration is really affordable (only $15 if you register early, and $25 if you don't), and they've got a good lineup of authors going. I believe the venue only holds 275, so register early if you can. It's going to be a blast!
Here is the link for their website where you can register: http://gayromancenorthwest.wordpress.com/


3. While I was in Disneyland (already the Happiest Place on Earth), I received an email from Dreamspinner Press letting me know that they were contracting my Hope Cove series. I can't tell you how excited I was. I danced (which is totally acceptable in Disneyland). There are three novels in total, and the first one is due to hit shelves in November of this year, the second in December and the third in January. It's going to be a very busy summer/fall, but I am so looking forward to it.

4. Skylar M. Cates and I have begun working on a co-authoring project. We intended to write it over the summer, but once we got started talking about it, we were too excited to wait. So... less than two weeks into it, we're almost done!
The novella follows the two main characters: Trey a punk rock star who comes from an over-privileged family, and Liam, a classical violinist and teacher. I will have more details to release soon, but for now I think it's going to be pretty good!

5. I am the luckiest little writer in the world because I get to beta read some really amazing stories. I will keep you updated on which ones as they become available, but let's just say that there are some pretty awesome stories that are going to be coming out in the next year.


In My Personal World:

1. I'm a vampire. Okay, not really, but I am getting pretty good at phlebotomy. I started my practicum at the lab and hospital. I am living with my aunt for a month while I'm here, and so far things have been going really well. I wasn't entirely sure I would like my new job (because nobody likes hurting people and even fewer people like needles), but I am finding that I am really enjoying it. Not so much stabbing people with a 21-gauge, but the talking to people and interacting with them. It's nice to be the person that gets to make a painful experience maybe just a little less awful.

I'm also finding the science-y side of it really interesting. I've always liked biology, but getting right down into it has been good. And fun!
There are some downsides too. I've only been on the job for two weeks, and have already seen some pretty sad stuff. I almost lost it the other day with a mom who was crying because the doctors were trying to decide between two pretty horrible diagnoses for her little boy. That was hard.
There have been some surprises along the way too. When I walked in there I expected that there would be some people who would feel nervous or maybe faint (my sister is one of those people), what I didn't expect is for them all to be big, muscular, tough-guys. I had a guy yesterday that almost collapsed on me (although, this guy, I wouldn't have minded so much ;) )

2. My sister is back in Canada. I can't tell you how happy I am not to live on the other side of the continent from her. She's only a 45 minute flight away now, rather than a 7 hour one, so I am a pretty happy camper, but am hoping that she decides to move to Vancouver so we'll be even closer! A girl can dream.


That is all the news I can think of for now... Although my brain feels pretty scrambled, so there are no guarantees that I didn't miss something really important.

So Many Projects...

Last night, my phone buzzed at 9:30. It was my boss letting me know he needed me to work this morning. I had planned to stay up studying/writing and had had a double cup of coffee at 6. I tried to go to bed at midnight. I really did, but my mind was racing and I couldn't seem to shut it down. I read J.P. Barnaby's Mastering the Ride (pretty good, by the way), but I still wasn't tired, so I spent the next three hours plotting out a new novel in my head.
The plan was to get home from work, write down what I had thought about and then set it to the side until I finished Ironhearted. It didn't work out so well. I can't seem to get it out of my head. Part of the problem might be that it's centered around dance, and now that I've started thinking about it again, it's hard to stop. Ten years ago, my entire life revolved around dancing. It was who I was, then life got busy and university happened and it fell to the side. I haven't been inside a studio in years, but I still dream about it. I miss it. And now the prospect of being able to recreate those feelings is making me itchy to write.
I don't want to abandon Trevor and Haydn though. Their story isn't even close to being finished and the other two couples are waiting for me to finish the third book before submitting. I have a lot of work to do and such a short time to finish it all. Now really isn't a great time for another project to creep in, but that is exactly what has happened.
And rather than tackling one or the other I am on here, rambling about it. Is there an award for worst use of time? I think I could be a contender.
I did manage to get a couple of the casting couch interviews set up to post though. They're going to be so good. I am so excited about having so many authors participating. It makes the weeks leading up to Keeping Sweets' release that much less painful now that I have something to look forward to for all those days. 

An Exciting Start to 2013

We are only one week into the new year and life has already been interesting. Busy, but interesting.
In my personal life, I am finishing up the last part of my course, and so will have a limited online presence for the next couple of months. The course is fairly intense and as much as I would rather be writing, school has to come first.

For Keeping Sweets, I have received a comp for my cover and have been working with Paul Richmond and Brooke Albrecht towards my perfect cover. So far, things are looking good and I can't wait to see the final product! The manuscript has entered editing and I should have the first round of edits in the next few weeks. I know I still have a while to wait, but I keep checking my mail. I really am impatient.

In the meantime, I have been working on writing my dedication, which was more difficult than I thought it would be. There are several people in my life who have been my cheerleaders when it comes to writing and I'd love to mention them all, but I think I'm supposed to keep the dedication to less than twelve pages!

Also, fellow author Lex Chase and I will be doing reciprocal guest blog postings in the next few months (both out books come out around the same time). She will be taking part in my casting couch interview series (check back for updates) and will be interviewing me about Keeping Sweets and writing in general. The interview is tentatively scheduled be to posted April 13th. My very first interview as an author. I am so excited.

The Hope Cove series is going almost exactly as planned. Installment Brokenhearted and Wholehearted are both finished and Brokenhearted is in beta editing. I am currently about one fifth of the way through the third installment, Ironhearted. I've set a deadline for myself of the end of January for completion of the series, but it may be a little too ambitious with the overload of school work I have looming. I will do my best to finish on time, but sometimes, life gets in the way, and that's alright. Lots of time to write once I've finished all my final exams.

So that is the update of what is going on so far this year. 2012 was so amazing for me and 2013 is shaping up to be even better. A banner year, and the year before I turn 30. I think that's something to be pretty proud of

Happy New Year!

I had a serious pair of grumpy pants on earlier today. I mean the really, really tight ones that pinch and rub in all the wrong places.

This year, I spent New Years Eve alone. First time ever. Xto is away working and my family went to Maui. Now, before you get to feeling all very sorry for me, I was invited out to a party, but I chose not to go. I wanted to stay home and get some work done. That didn't stop me from throwing my own pity party though.

All sorts of little things went wrong today. Getting ready for work, I ran out of eyeliner (complete disaster), I was at work on New Years (horrible tragedy), I forgot the right pen (cause for meltdown), etc etc etc.

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Now there is just under an hour left until midnight -- the joys of being the second to last time zone to change over -- and I am feeling much better. Know why? I thought about all the amazing things that have happened to me this week alone. There have been too many to count over the last year (some of the highlights were: I got married, my first novel was contracted, I began the process of changing careers, I traveled to some really amazing places, and I met my new niece Isabelle), but three of the highlights from this week:

1. I got my cover comps from Brooke Albrecht, who is amazing, and they were everything I could have hoped for. I had a hard time choosing, but I think I've picked one and I should have the final copy soon. Of course the moment I have it, I will post it here because it needs to be shared. So gorgeous.

2. I finished the first book in the Hope Cove series. It took me a lot longer than I thought it would, but I was working on a few other projects at the same time. I actually finished it, did a happy dance, went to bed, and then at 5:00 the next morning, woke up to the realization that I had written the ending all wrong. So I rewrote it in my head, went back to sleep, then got up and rewrote it for real.

3. I finished the second book in the Hope Cove series. You know those other projects I just mentioned? This was one of them. And I finished it about an hour ago.So yeah. Two books in one week. It was my goal to have them both finished by the end of December, and I did it with two hours to spare! So those are done. One more book and the series is complete. I've started the third and hopefully it will be done by the end of January, which makes February the Month of Epic Edits before I can submit it in early March.

There have also been a host of other, smaller accomplishments this week, like, for example, me flying all by myself without completely losing my shit during takeoff and landing (I am not a good flyer), and making it through Ikea during boxing week without being trampled to death.

So looking back on 2012, some really great things happened, but I am hoping for even better, even greater things from 2013.

Happy New Year!

Merry Early Christmas

There is officially less than a week left until Christmas. Life is hectic for everyone everywhere and our family is no different. We leave tomorrow morning to spend Christmas at my parents' house. I am so excited to be going home, but there is so much to do before I leave. I haven't even started packing yet. In fact, I haven't even started writing my packing list yet.

Instead of actually starting on that list, I'm updating instead. I just can't help it. Too many exciting things happened this week. So here it is, the list of all the totally thrilling stuff that happened to me over the last seven days:

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1. The editing department from DSP contacted me to fill out my blurb questionnaire. So effing exciting. I was completely over the moon until I actually tried to fill them out. I've never felt so brain-damaged in my life. Those questions were hard! Questions like "what is your book about?" Huh? What? Who knows? I sure don't. I managed to get it filled out and sent back, although embarrassing detail: my friend Lex Chase (hilariously talented author) warned me that spell check doesn't work on the form for some reason, so I went over that thing six times looking for errors. Satisfied that there were none, I fired off an email with the attachment and in my haste I left the subject line of the email as "blub questionnaire". Fingers crossed that the editing department doesn't retroactively cancel my contract for being a dumbass.

2. The art department from DSP contacted me to fill out my book cover spec sheet. The email was from Paul Richmond, who I adore (not that we've actually met, but he is seriously talented and hilarious to boot -- if you haven't seen his video about his bootlegging revenge escapades, you need to watch it now). I got that all filled out too and I really can't wait to see what they come up with. This whole thing is starting to feel more real for me now, and I think once I am able to see the actual cover for the book, it'll feel like I'm a real author. It's pretty much the most exciting thing that's ever happened.

3. Xto came home early from work on Monday. He scared the shit out of me, because I thought someone was trying to break into our apartment, but then I realized that a burglar wouldn't use a key, so I stopped being scared and got happy instead. It's so nice to have him home, and so rare. We had a glass of wine, stayed up watching Tosh.0 for a while before bed.

The next morning he took me for breakfast in Fairhaven just outside of Bellingham. If you're from the  area and you've never visited the old part of Bellingham, you need to go now. Today. Do it. it's beautiful. Breakfast was at the Skylark Cafe, which I recommend. They have banana bread French toast. What more could you want in a breakfast food?

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4.Yesterday, I got to open my Christmas presents from Xto early. I am a very lucky girl and got completely spoiled this year. He bought me a Canon printer that I so desperately needed and (drumroll please) my new KINDLE PAPERWHITE. I am completely in love with it. This is technically my fourth Kindle. Xto teases me that they are just burning out from overuse. In reality I am clumsy and keep breaking them. The Paperwhite though? Epically good. The thing glows. GLOWS.

5. Last night, Lex Chase (previously mentioned hilarious & talented writer extraordinaire) sent me the second installment of her Pawn Takes Rook series to read through. Granted I am only on page six, but so far it is completely amazing. She makes me so jealous sometimes with how funny she is. The first book comes out in March from DSP, so in three months, go buy it.
Here is her "Next Big Thing" blog post for the first book to tell you all about it.

6. Today, I hit 60,000 words on my WIP Brokenhearted (the first book in the Hope Cove series). It's officially a novel! I only have a couple of scenes left to do and then some heavy editing before it's ready to submit. I've set a deadline for myself of the end of February to have all three ready for submission. It might be a little overly ambitious, but shoot for the stars, right?

NaNo Hangover

So NaNoWriMo is officially over. I'm hoping everyone that participated feels like they accomplished something great whether they got to 50K or not.

Three months ago I had never heard of NaNo. It was completely new for me and what an experience. Talk about lighting a fire under your ass. Seeing other people's word counts rise around me made me want to write...and I'm not a competitive person. Unless we're playing Monopoly. Then I'll kick your ass.

I'm pretty proud of what I managed to accomplish for my first time though. I wrote just over 68,000 words, 52,000 of which were on the second installment of my three part Hope Cove book series. Now I just have to finish the last little sections on the first two, write the third one in its entirety and hopefully they will be ready for submission sometime after Christmas.

I am going to try and get some freebies and excerpts posted up here in the next couple of weeks, so all of you who read this (a.k.a. Mom) you have that to look forward to!

Day 1 of NaNoWriMo

So the plan was to get up at 4:30 am when the husband did and get started right away...and then I fell back asleep and work up three hours later. Whatever. A girl needs her sleep if she wants to be awake enough to write proper smexy books.

And so without further ado, meet Declan Grant (or at least what  the Declan Grant that lives inside my head would look like if he were real), the newest deputy of Hope Cove, Maine. He's the protagonist in the story I'm writing for NaNo.

He is so fucking yummy, isn't he? Almost makes me want to get arrested to end up in cuffs with a guy like this.

Addendum 1: There are still a few hours left of the day for writing. Generally anything I write after 9:00 is utter shit, but the point of NaNoWriMo is quantity, not quality, so bring on the Write or Die!
I've managed to write almost 6,000 words today, which proves that everything is easier when you're doing it
for bragging rights.

Knocked on my Ass

After working with kids (a.k.a. germ mongrels) for years and being married to a guy who spends more time in hospitals than anywhere else, I would have thought that by now I'd have contracted and subsequently developed an immunity to every cold/flu virus on Earth, but those bastard viruses keep mutating and attacking.
And I am not one of those people who handles being sick well. I don't get little sniffles and carry on. My eyes water and swell until they're red and half-shut. It's hot. Really.
So that's what happened and I've been a whiny, drippy mass of ick for the last few days and not been productive at all, which makes me angry because I really really wanted to finish the first Hope Cove book by the end of this month. Looks like that probably won't happen, but c'est la vie.