2022 plans

Oct

2021

On Your Mark… Get Set… GO!

Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home
(Heir to the Firstborn, book 6)

18295 / 150000 (12.20%)

I finished edits on Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads, so I started writing Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home last week.

No, I did not write eighteen thousand words in a week. (That would be something, though!) There were five chapters that were already written when I decided that Heir to the Firstborn needed to be two books. Last week, I actually wrote 4,830 words — Chapter One, and part of Chapter Two.

Last week, I also worked a bit more on the synopsis for Blood Price, which will be book three of the Flesh and Blood series. There was some backstory that had been alluded to in Blood Bound that actually needed to be worked out because they find out the truth in this book.

Pen to Paper is on its first scheduled break, and I’m working on getting a couple of units for the last level finished up. (Specifically, the last two levels). This program… it’s just been a year since they came to me and said “We’d like for you to take on this task force and put together this program.” What a YEAR this has been!!!

For my next trick? Well… I can’t tell you yet. What I can say is that I also need to get to work on the presentation I’ll be making at the RWA National convention. Which is coming up… ah… next month. Okay, I REALLY need to get to work on that!

More on the sooper sekrit project in two weeks.

Back to work!

Oct

2021

New Beginnings Lead to New Endings.

This is it. I’m starting the last book in the Heir to the Firstborn series this week. I finished my first read-through of Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads (and discovered a couple of places where a Scrivener crash led to changes that I made not making it to the final document! Eek!) The manuscript is now in the hands of Darling Editor, and I’m starting Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home either later today or tomorrow.

It’s a little weird. I’ve been writing this series now for three years, posting it on Patreon one chapter at a time. It’ll probably be four years of writing by the time it wraps.

And then what?

Well, I’ll have six books and a short story to show for it. Two award nominations and one win. I’ve learned a lot. Grown a lot, both as a person and as a writer. Have I changed so much? Not sure, but I’m in the inside. I don’t know if I’d see it.

So where do I go from here?

Might be a little premature to ask that question. I haven’t written the book yet! But once it’s done, and in edits, then I get to decide what I want to do next. Do I keep the Patreon? What do I put there once Heir to the Firstborn is done? I have a couple of options there, I think. At least three projects that would lend themselves to the New Adult model I’ve already established on Patreon (If you’re keeping score, those possible projects are The Willow Sword, The Iron Virgin, and The Mentalist’s Cat.)

Things are currently in a holding pattern with other writing. The things that are out in slush piles remain in slush piles, and I’m waiting… which, in the traditional publishing model, is a lot of what you do. You write… and you wait.

That’s what I do. I write, and wait for things.

(I might need to put that on a shirt…)

The things I’m waiting for?

- The White Raven: Morrigan’s Heir
- The Ice Raven
- John Zebedee and the Heir to the Elvenlands
- John Zebedee and the Monstrous Town
- John Zebedee Meets the Witch Queen of the Elvenlands
- Blood Bound (Flesh and Blood, book 1)
- Bonds of Blood and Steel

And that’s not even counting Sapphires and Gold, which has been under contract for a while, but things happened and more things got delayed.

Meanwhile, I keep writing. Because that’s what I do.

Sep

2021

Home Again, Home Again.

This weekend was NecronomiCon, and we had an exceptionally good time. It was our first time back at a science fiction convention since 2019, and… well, okay, it was a little weird. I would not have expected quite so many people to be so… cavalier with regards to the convention’s mask requirement. I mean… we’re FEN! We’re smarter than that!

At least, I thought we were.

Definitely had a good time, though. Friday night was the return of the Writing the Naughty Bits panel, which I hosted, and which this year was a wonderful craft discussion on writing sexual tension and sex, and how one doesn’t necessarily have to lead to the other. My Saturday panel was unfortunately cancelled due to technical difficulties. Sunday was a really great discussion on the Hero’s Journey and the Heroine’s Journey, and how the names of those don’t necessarily have to match the gender identity of your protagonist — I proposed that they be renamed to the External Journey vs. the Internal Journey, which seems to be the major difference between them. Following that panel, I had a delightful conversation with an independent filmmaker who came up to me and said, “I know NOTHING of the romance genre! Teach me your ways!” Not because he’s interested in writing romance — he wants to be sure that if he picks up a romance project, he gets it right! So we spent a good half an hour with me explaining and him taking notes.

Came home. Crashed HARD (tired Liz was TIRED!) and woke up to an invitation to be a guest at a new-to-me convention in February! I’ll be a virtual guest at Boskone from February 18th to the 20th And yay for virtual guests, because I don’t really fancy the idea of going to Boston in February!

Today also marked the arrival of the author proof of my first hardcover, and me posting my first Tiktok — an unboxing video of the hardcover. As I said in the video, it’s PRETTY, but I need to fix the cover art, which is in process now. I also need to remember to turn off the notifications on my phone when I record a Tiktok — Beaker makes an unexpected cameo.

@easchechter

#booktok #newbooktoker #unboxing

♬ original sound – Elizabeth_Schechter

Never had a book before that I could click my nails on. That’s pretty neat! Those hardcovers should be available soon-ish.

Edits are now underway for Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads, and I’m almost done with the synopsis for Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home. I want to finish the edits before I start writing the final book, so that I have all the details fresh in my mind. We’ll see how the timing goes, though — I have until November 19th, which is when the last chapter of Crossroads goes live on Patreon. So I need to have at least a chapter or two of The Way Home ready to go by then. I don’t want to break my never-missed-a-week streak in the home stretch!

And I think that’s about all in my neck of the woods! See you all next week!

Sep

2021

Down Time and Catching Up.

I’m taking a week or two to rest my brain before launching into Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home. I actually haven’t even started on the edits for Crossroads yet — I figured I’d work on them at the table at Necronomicon, and shoot to have them done by mid-October. Which means that the on sale date for Crossroads will probably be December. Once I have that set, I’ll announce it.

I realized just now that I’ve been sitting on the cover for Crossroads, too.

Choices must be made. But choices have consequences.

Part of my brain break has been laying the groundwork for what I’ll be doing after I finish The Way Home (or while I’m working on it, depending on things.) I’ve written a synopsis for Blood Brothers (Flesh and Blood book 2), The Iron Virgin (that Pirate and Princess thing), and I’m working on the synopsis for Tower of Light (the gay steampunk retelling of Metropolis that I was challenged to write years ago by one of the best editors I ever had). I’m hoping to get the rest of the Flesh and Blood synopses done before Necro, but Tower of Light is going slowly — I’m having to be very conscious of matching the beats of Metropolis. So I may save Tower of Light to actually write until I have nothing else going on.

Stop laughing.

I’m also still working on RWA things. Pen to Paper is running, and my team is working on incorporating our development tester feedback into upcoming units. I’m tech support on call for our participants, and having a great time with that. I’m also working on another couple of projects that are still in the warm Jell-O stages, and won’t be solidified until after our first Board meeting, which will be… soon? Ish? I don’t have a date for that yet. So there is a lot in flux in that area.

Coming up on the end of third quarter also means starting to look at what I’ll be doing and publishing in 2022. Right now, I know for certain that I’ll be wrapping up Heir to the Firstborn, releasing a box set of the Swords of Charlemagne books (February 1st, 2022!), and I will be rereleasing the Rebel Mage books — I have all new covers for them. I haven’t set up a schedule yet for most things yet, but I will next quarter. I need to decide if I will be doing a box set for the Heir to the Firstborn books, but I’m not going to decide on that until I finish The Way Home. If I do put one out, it will be late 2022. That’s the publishing that I have control over. I’m waiting to hear what’s happening with John Zebedee (it appears that the project may have been pushed back, but no official word yet), and with the myriad of things over with Riverdale Avenue Books.

And that’s about it for this week. Back to work!

Sep

2021

Time to Clean!

I’m cleaning the house.

Now, if you’ve been with me long enough, you know what that means.

Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads IS FINISHED!!

Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads
(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)

126460 / 130000 (97.28%)

I figured out what the problem was Thursday night — I’d been slogging over one scene for nearly a week, and I finally took a step back and asked myself “What is the point of this scene? What does it do to advance the story?” Answer? There was no point to scene. It did nothing for the plot that couldn’t be done somewhere else. So I ripped it out and finished the book Saturday.

One of these days, I’ll pay attention to my subconscious telling me to stop that.

So, since the book is done, now what am I going to do?

Well, clean the house, to start. I have synopses that I want to finish up, and work that needs to be done for Pen to Paper and for other RWA projects. I’ll get started on editing Crossroads in a week or two, but in the meantime, I want to put together a box set of Swords of Charlemagne to release in 2022 (once Table of Stone is out of KU), and I need to start uploading the Rebel Mage books for 2022 releases. I have Necronomicon in a couple of weeks, and I need to plan for that.

But first? This house will be cleaned.

Aug

2021

It’s Starting!!!

Today is the day!!!

Pen to Paper starts today!!!

Ten months of hard work and hustle, and it finally starts today. This past week we had our onboarding meetings with our Guides and with our Participants and everyone is so excited and enthusiastic, and loving the materials they’ve already seen.

To quote my son, I have an excite.

via GIPHY

I also have a lot more work to do. But today, I have an excite!

Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads
(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)

116776 / 130000 (89.83%)

I didn’t get the draft synopsis done last week for The Iron Virgin (the pirate thing), and I didn’t get as much done as I wanted on Crossroads, but I did finish my revision on Blood Bound, so that will be heading off sometime this week or next. I also had a really exciting something drop into my lap, and that needs to get worked on. Nope, not saying. Can’t say. But OMG!!!

I’ll tell you all more when I can. Promise.

Needless to say? I’ve got a busy week ahead. And an even busier one next week, with Orlando Reads Books coming up! Catch you all next week!

Aug

2021

Goodness, is that the time?

The time, at the moment, is 11:27 AM on August 9th. And in one week, the RWA Pen to Paper program, the project that has been eating my brain for the past year, launches.

You know that gif of Kermit, standing backstage and biting his nonexistent nails?

via GIPHY

Yeah… that’s a fair approximation of how I’ll look on Sunday….

That is, when I’m not like this…

via GIPHY

Because it’s starting. It’s really starting. We created something from the ground up and people are excited to be a part of it. This program is… well, it’s amazing. Yes, I know I’m as biased as a new mother in this regard, but really, it’s AMAZING.

And it starts one week from today.

In other news — yes, I do have other news — the worldbuilding for this new pirate thing is coming along. I might even have a rough synopsis this week. Which will then get put aside to percolate because I have to finish Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads, start Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home, edit Crossroads for a late fall/early winter release, and edit Blood Bound so that I can get that back out to Riverdale/Circlet. My barefoot pirates (and yes, there’s a reason for them being barefoot!) will have to wait!

Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads
(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)

115164 / 150000 (76.78%)

Notice how that number dropped from last week? That’s because I moved about 13K words out of this manuscript and into The Way Home. I’m thinking there are maybe another three or four chapters to this one, so I am shooting to have the draft of Crossroads done this month, and I fully intend to try and make the November release date I put into my planner at the beginning of the year. But… it might be December. I’ll see how revisions go and keep everyone posted.

Not much else is happening. I’m prepping for Orlando Reads Books, starting to think on costuming for Necronomicon and Books at the Beach, and looking forward to two conferences I’ll be attending as an attendee (for the record? Emerald City Writers Conference and Trans/Inter/Cross: A Symposium on the Fantastic Between Genres, Media, and Cultures.) I have RWA Nationals in November, and Keiser Supercon in December.

Still planning on being a puddle in January.

Jul

2021

Home Again, Home Again

And tired to my bones. But so, SO happy! The RWA Retreat in Nashville was amazing! Not just because I finally got to meet AND HUG some of the extraordinary people that I’ve been through Hell and back with, but because of the incredible sense of hope that came out of this past week.

The message of this entire weekend? We are romance writers. We are the RWA, and together, we can move mountains. We are going to come through this. Stronger and better than ever.

It. Was. GLORIOUS!

And the hotel — WOW! The Gaylord Opryland is amazing. And it’s a really short walk from the hotel to the Grand Old Opry, so like any country music fan? I made pilgrimage. (And I’m not ashamed to say that I was in tears walking up to the building. The sheer weight of history and passion in that structure is overwhelming.) There are too many pictures of the Opry and of the hotel to post here — my server would faint! So you’ll have to go look at my Facebook. Opry pictures are here, and Hotel pictures are here.

There may be pictures of me from the retreat on someone else’s camera, from the Pen to Paper presentation, or from introducing Sherrilyn McQueen (writing as Sherrilyn Kenyon) on Friday morning. I haven’t seen any yet. If I do, I’ll share them.

There wasn’t a lot of writing done while I was gone — most of what I did was in a notebook, in and around other things. (I did have some productive time, though. I finished my proofreading of Psionics for Skillskape, and I finished my readthrough of Metropolis and started planning out Tower of Light. That one is still in the squidgy early stages of story — have a vague idea of characters, but not much else. Which is fine, because I have quite a way to go on Heir to the Firstborn.

Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads
(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)

123553 / 150000 (82.37%)

It’s official — Heir to the Firstborn is two books. Heir to the Firstborn: The Crossroads, and Heir to the Firstborn: The Way Home. Which may mean some major revisions in Crossroads. We’ll see what happens once I get it to a point where stopping this one and starting The Way Home feels right.

Now, on the upside, that means that Crossroads should be out in November, in time to be my planned sixth release this year. And it also means I have a little more breathing room in figuring out what will be coming next on Patreon.

Tomorrow is a book birthday — Ashes and Light releases in KU. The paperback is up in Amazon today, and will be up everywhere else tomorrow… I hope. (There was an issue with Draft to Digital putting the paperback up for sale a month and a half early. They fixed it, but let’s see if it goes on sale tomorrow the way it’s supposed to!)

There’s not much else going on. This week is catch up. Next week is vacation, ending with the Vivian Awards, which will be livestreamed! I may be a mess coming itno that, because we will just be back from vacation. We’ll see.

No blog post next week! See you in two weeks, when I will either be a Vivian winner, or will in complete honesty say it was an honor to even final!

Tune in to find out which!

Jul

2021

On Your Mark…

This week starts the race that will be July. I have just over a week before I leave for the RWA Retreat, and I have THINGS that must get done between now and then.

Things I need to do:

Finalize the presentation that I’ll be giving at the retreat.
Save presentation to a thumbdrive and put it in my travel purse.
Email the presentation to the office (just in case)
Finish the video logs for Unit 11. (These will be DONE before I leave, durn it.)
Write the Unit 11 quiz
Decide which knitting project I’m taking with me for the Fiber meet-up I’m hosting.
Decide which research materials I want to bring (Hrm… Tower of Light or SooperSekrit Edwardian-era project?)
Write up a packing list
Pull out my suitcase
Pick out clothes

And in and around all of that? Working on Heir to the Firstborn, prepping for the Ashes and Light release on the 20th, and maybe going out for dinner (to an actual restaurant – gasp!) for our anniversary right before I leave.

Heir to the Firstborn(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)

118734 / 150000 (79.16%)

Heir to the Firstborn proceeds nicely, if slowly. I sincerely doubt that the 150,000 word target will stand for another week, which will then lead me to the question of… one book or two.

I know. I KNOW! I said this was going to be one book. But, I also said that about Wings of Air, and look where that got us (hint — 118,734 words into the second book of what was supposed to be one book.) Heir to the Firstborn is going to be massive. And while that doesn’t much matter in serial or as an ebook. In print, that’ll be a problem. Because there are only so many pages you can put into a trade paperback before it falls apart.

So we may very well have Heir to the Firstborn: The Progress and Heir to the Firstborn: <something that has to do with the second half of the book>

(Book one may not be The Progress. I have to decide. Book two will either be The Crossroads or The Way Home. We’ll see.)

But we’ll also get to meet an interesting character in that half of the book. I started writing his scenes already, and I love him to bits. Nope, not telling.

Now, if I do break this into two books, then I will definitely make the November release date that I was worried that I’d miss, because that part of the book is done. I will need to make new cover art for the second book, those. Not a huge problem there.

I’ll make up my mind about it at the retreat.

Jun

2021

Busy Rest of the Year!

I just updated my Appearances widget over there —->.

Starting in July, I have something every month for the rest of the year.

I don’t normally book myself that hard, but… ummm… yeah… I think I overdid it just a bit.

Starting in July, you can find me…

RWA Retreat
Nashville, TN
July 14-17, 2021

***

Orlando Reads Books
Orlando, FL
August 26 – 29, 2021

***

NecronomiCon
Tampa, FL
September 24 – 26th, 2021

***

Books at the Beach
Clearwater Beach, FL
October 21 – 24th, 2021

***

RWA National Conference
Going Virtual!
November 18-20th, 2021

***

KeiserSupercon
Orlando, FL,
December 10-11th, 2021

I think after KeiserSupercon, I’m going to be a puddle.

And in and around all those, I have this book I need to finish…

Heir to the Firstborn(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)

104611 / 150000 (69.74%)

And I have Pen to Paper to work on. I’m learning to do video editing logs, because you never know what you can do until someone puts you in charge, right?

So I think that by the time 2022 rolls around, I’m going to need another retreat. Or a vacation. Or a nap. Or something.

But I have plans for 2022. I’ll be re-covering and re-releasing my dark erotic romance Rebel Mage series in 2022, and the Chronicles of John Zebedee should be out. I’ve got Blood Bound to re-edit and get back into the slush at Circlet, and I’ve got ideas on reworking The Willow Sword so that it actually gets past chapter three this time. (cue Bullwinkle: “This time for sure!”)

There are a lot of things professionally going on. And 2022 is also my 25th wedding anniversary, so there’s going to be SOMETHING going on for that, too. Not sure what yet.

But first… let’s finish this book.

2022 plans

On Your Mark… Get Set… GO!

New Beginnings Lead to New Endings.

Home Again, Home Again.

Down Time and Catching Up.

Time to Clean!

It’s Starting!!!

Goodness, is that the time?

Home Again, Home Again

On Your Mark…

Busy Rest of the Year!

Works in Progress

Appearances

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