Release date

Jan

2024

Release Week!

The time has come — it’s release week for the final book of the Heir to the Firstborn series. Look at them!

Image of the seven books in the Heir to the Firstborn series. A small, stuffed Highland Cow plush looks over the covers. — (Coo and Boo approved)

And there we have it — the complete Heir to the Firstborn. And when I say complete, I really mean it this time. No more story here. It’s done. REALLY, it’s done.

Which is… a little bizarre, to be honest. I started the series on Patreon in June of 2018 with an outline for four books. Now, five and a half years and seven books later, I just announced on the Patreon that the page will be going dark at the end of February, and will stay dark until I have something new to share there. (Which, I think I do, but right now it’s just an opening scene. It needs more fleshing out.)

Seven years isn’t the longest I’ve spent on one series, I don’t think. I mean, Tales from the Arena isn’t done yet, nor is The Artificer (which started with House of Sable Locks). But neither of those was intended to be a series. Heir to the Firstborn was always planned out as a series, and it just sort of kept going. But it’s the longest I’ve worked on a single creative project continuously, because I was posting a chapter a week every week non-stop for the first six books.

Getting those characters out of my head after all this time? Takes a complete change of subgenre… so I’m currently working The Sea Prince as a palette cleanser (I described it to someone last week as a sort of fantasy-steampunk Master and Commander. Except it’s Age of Sail, so timing-wise that might be candlepunk? I don’t know. If you do, let me know!)

The Sea Prince has been in my queue since 2009 — it’s almost old enough to drive in this state. There have been a lot of false starts and a lot of putting it back on the shelf before I finally figured out where the story was broken. Now? I’m on chapter 23, and starting to pull this book toward a close (and how many of you are gasping in shock because didn’t I just get started on this again less than a month ago? Yes, yes I did. The words have been FLOWING. I’ve written five chapters in three weeks. That’s roughly 15,000 words.) I think there may be between 25K and 50K words left, but I can see the end from here, and I like it.

Then, of course, I need to write the second book in this series…. hopefully, it won’t take me as long as it took to write the first one!

Preorders

Coming TOMORROW to all your favorite bookstores — Valley of Shadows (Heir to the Firstborn, Book 7)

Print preorder is now available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, which means you should be able to order the paperback at your favorite brick and mortar bookshop.

Works in Progress

The Sea Prince
(The Coral Throne, Book 1)

78426 / 120000 (65.35%)

Jan

2024

Quiet Now.

I can has quiet now?

I love doing things and meeting readers and getting out, but there’s something to be said for an unbroken stretch of time where I can just drink coffee and put words on the page.

(sips coffee) Ah… quiet now.

Yesterday’s Meet and Greet at Spellbound was fantastic, and I am looking forward to being invited to more events there. At the moment, I am between consignment contracts, but look for The Chronicles of John Zebedee on their shelves real soon now. (How soon? I’ll let you know.)

The only thing that went wrong was nothing to do with the bookstore and everything to do with the mail — the box that should have arrived Saturday with advance copies of Valley of Shadows disappeared from tracking on Friday. Here’s hoping they find it, but there’s now no rush for them to do so — I’m not going to be in person anywhere until March, when I’ll be reading and volunteering at ICFA.

So what am I going to be doing with all my quiet time? Well… there are four started books on my nightstand that I really should finish. I have a started novel on my screen that needs finishing, and research that needs doing. There will be edits coming in sometime soon that will need to be taken care of and gotten back in. Quiet doesn’t necessarily mean not busy, at least for me. For me, it just means that I don’t have to change gears from backstage author to onstage author, with all the planning and prep that goes along with being onstage.

So, for the next month and a half or so, things will be quiet. There will be words, and research, and reading, and while there may be some shenanigans, they will be quiet shenanigans.

At least, I think they will be quiet shenanigans. If they’re not? Then you’ll be among the first to know!

Preorders

Coming January 30th to all your favorite bookstores — Valley of Shadows (Heir to the Firstborn, Book 7)

Print preorder is now available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, which means you should be able to order the paperback at your favorite brick and mortar bookshop.

Works in Progress

The Sea Prince
(The Coral Throne, Book 1)

71295 / 120000 (59.41%)

Jan

2024

An Advanced State of Higgledy-Piggledy

The first day of class is the perfect time to tell someone that their class isn’t at this campus, it’s at THAT one all the way on the other side of town. Right?

Needless to say, today has been in an advanced state of higgledy-piggledy.

I’m trying to convince my son that they’re predisastering the semester for everyone’s convenience. I’m not sure he’s buying it, though. Then again, I’m not sure I’d be buying it if I found out an hour before class that we have to drive half an hour to the back of beyond, to the campus with “Warning: Bear Crossing” signs on the walking paths. Oh, and if the person who was supposed to be doing the driving wasn’t home…

We made it work. The campus is pretty. There’s a Starbucks nearby (because of course there is), and the teacher seems to be a good sort.

But now you know why I’m getting to my blog post after 5PM Eastern… and since it’s after 5PM, I need to go start cooking dinner. Back shortly.

(time passes)

Two and a half hours later, I’m back to finish this post, and hopefully get some words in on The Sea Prince. Today feels like it’s been a lot longer than the clock says — the clock says 7:51PM. My body says 11:51PM and you should have been in bed two hours ago.

I’m not sure why we were all in such an all-fired rush to get older when we were kids. It’s overrated and I want my money back.

Off to attempt words. Wish me luck.

Preorders

Coming January 30th to all your favorite bookstores — Valley of Shadows (Heir to the Firstborn, Book 7)

Print preorder is now available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, which means you should be able to order the paperback at your favorite brick and mortar bookshop.

Works in Progress

The Sea Prince
(The Coral Throne, Book 1)

64370 / 120000 (53.64%)

Appearances!

For ONE DAY ONLY, I’ll be having a Meet and Greet at the Spellbound Bookstore in Sanford, Florida! I will be there for 3PM to 4PM on January 21st, 2024. Come out and support small business!

Jan

2024

Rabbit, Rabbit!

Welcome to 2024!! Saying Rabbit Rabbit at the new year is supposed to bring good luck. No, I’m not sure where it came from, but rabbit rabbit all the same.

It’s been a lovely, relaxing holiday, but it’s time to start ramping up to get back to work. I’m not going to get back to writing for another week — well, not back to writing The Sea Prince, at any rate. There’s something that popped into my head yesterday that I need to write down so I can see if I need to chase it or bank it for later. But when a really compelling voice waltzes into your head and makes you stop to listen, it’s something that need to be written down. We’ll see where it goes.

That story seed wasn’t the only thing to waltz into my head this holiday season. I had a character start talking to me, and I thought it was for something new. Nope… he’s one of the big bads for the Children of the Sword series, and I think the reason that it wasn’t coming together was that I was looking one way, and the story was really over there. What does that mean? It means that, while Swords of Charlemagne and The Chronicles of John Zebedee all exist in the same universe, the convergence of those two series isn’t happening where I thought it was.

Now, I’m not saying I’m going to run out and start writing Children of the Swords tomorrow. There’s too much research to be done — I know nothing about Edwardian England or WWI. That’s currently being addressed, so I’ll say that we can plan to see The Seer (Children of the Sword, book 1) at some point in the next few years.

What am I going to work on this year? Well, edits for Morrigan’s Heir will be coming this month, and then I have to read and revise Morrigan’s Wrath and send that in. Edits for Bonds of Blood and Steel will be along sometime later this year, and I’ll be turning those around as quick as I can. I plan to have The Sea Prince done no later than April 30th, because I’m taking May off entirely (why? High school graduation, that’s why!) Then, come July or August, I’ll be diving into Tales from the Arena: Dead Man’s Hand, because it is time to wrap up that series.

But that all starts next week. This week? I’m still on vacation. Still reading, still researching, still resting my brain.

Preorders

Coming January 30th to all your favorite bookstores — Valley of Shadows (Heir to the Firstborn, Book 7)

The print preorder will be set up sometime this week — I am waiting on the wraparound cover art.

Works in Progress

The Sea Prince
(The Coral Throne, Book 1)

63623 / 120000 (53.02%)

Appearances!

For ONE DAY ONLY, I’ll be having a Meet and Greet at the Spellbound Bookstore in Sanford, Florida! I will be there for 3PM to 4PM on January 21st, 2024. Come out and support small business!

Nov

2023

The Prep Begins

T-minus-10 days until Thanksgiving. The prep begins. I started today with the baking of the pumpkin pie. Why start so early? Because I want to enjoy my Thanksgiving, thank you very much. I started today with cleaning a room, and baking a pie. Tomorrow, I have to get my ~~head~~ eyes examined, so I’m not cleaning, but I am going to get all the shopping done, and I’ll be making candied ginger because I need it for the cranberries and for the turkey, and I can’t find candied ginger without a wheat warning anywhere. I’m also starting sourdough rolls (technically I started today because I fed the starter, but I make the actual dough tomorrow.)

I actually sat down to make a schedule of what gets cleaned and/or cooked on what day covering every day between now and Thanksgiving. Every day has a room to clean or shopping to be done, and a dish to prepare. This early, things will head to the freezer, which will leave room in the refrigerator to defrost the turkey that I’ll be brining next week (I use Alton Brown’s turkey brine from Good Eats.)

My plan is that by the time Thanksgiving comes, all I have to do is get up, have breakfast, watch the parade, and put the bird in the oven. Everything else (with the exception of whatever fresh vegetables I make) will be done and just need to be warmed. That way, I can have a relaxing time with my house full of people. It’s a plan that’s worked very well for a very long time now.

I haven’t given much thought yet to Cookiepocalypse. One holiday at a time, right? But Cookiepocalypse is coming, and I’ll be taking requests from the young people in my life as to what cookies they want. And from the older people in my life, too. Once I know what I’m making, I’ll make a schedule for baking that allows me to also keep working on Balance of Power.

I’m starting to think that Balance of Power may need a new title. I’ve gone far enough away from the original outline that Balance of Power no longer quite fits the story. The current front runner in my head is Valley of Shadows. I think it fits better. We shall see what the Patrons think.

In other news, I found out the other day that Morrigan’s Heir has been pushed back to early 2024. As soon as I have a date, I’ll share it.

And that’s all the news that’s fit to print. It’s much later in the day than I usually post to the blog, but it’s been a busy day! And there’s another busy day tomorrow.

Catch you all next week.

Works in Progress

Balance of Power
Heir to the Firstborn, Book 7

55575 / 90000 (61.75%)

Promotions!

First in Series Friday is Coming! Friday, November 24th (Black Friday in the US), the first books in Heir to the Firstborn, Rebel Mage, and Swords of Charlemagne will be on sale everywhere for 99 cents.

Then, on Cyber Monday, the sale continues! The Cavalcade of Authors will be holding a huge Cyber Monday sale, and for that sale, I’ll be adding in Forged in Fire AND Bones of Earth! To know when the link goes live for this one, you need to sign up for my newsletter. (I usually only put out one newsletter a month, although if there’s a new release or a big event, there might be a special edition.)

Feb

2023

Halfway There!

The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath
(The White Raven duology, Book 2)

45011 / 90000 (50.01%)

Halfway to a draft! And I’m at the halfway point in the story, so my counts are pretty good. I’m not going to lie — I wrote 25 words to bring the count over 45,000 words before I took my wordcount today. Because I was THAT CLOSE.

I was working on a beta read for another author last week, so again had no words on The Sea Prince. I’ll get back to that today. I need to put some more thought into the world, because it’s feeling a little flat. So that may mean going back and reworking some of it. Which makes sense. If I didn’t properly prepare the foundations, the structure isn’t going to hold together. And I did the initial worldbuilding for this project before I really knew how worldbuilding actually worked. Things are… sketchy in places. And you can use whatever definition of sketchy you like in that sentence. They all work.

The Chronicles of John Zebedee comes out one week from tomorrow. You can still preorder it and have it in your inbox on the 7th. Paperbacks wherever paperbacks are sold, and I’ll have signed ones if you want to order directly from me — you can hit the “Signed Books” link up top, or click here.

Which reminds me — I need to go order copies for me to sign!

(runs off)

Back now. Copies ordered. Website updated, and I’ll need to do that again because something changed and the covers are NOT rendering properly. I need to fix that.

Once John Zebedee comes out, my next release date is out of my hands — I don’t know yet when Morrigan’s Heir will be coming out. As soon as I know, you’ll know!

And that’s about all from this neck of the woods. Back to work, getting as many words in as I can before I head off for ICFA.

Feb

2023

Monday? Why Does It Have To Be Monday?

I was going to ask why it always seems like Monday, then I realized that I blog on Mondays, so of course it always seems like a Monday when I do this. It IS always Monday when I do this!

(pause for more coffee)

It’s been an eventful week, in a good way. Last Monday, I got the cover art for The Chronicles of John Zebedee, and I’ve set up the preorders! Not all the stores are available yet (Barnes and Noble is slow), but most of the big ones are ready, so click the graphic to order!

This one, I actually forgot to post about last week — Children of Dreams has been nominated for a Paranormal Romance Guild Reviewer’s Choice Award! These books are nominated by reviewers, but voted on by the public, so if you’ve read Children of Dreams, please click on the graphic and vote!

I started The Sea Prince back up again, since edits are off my plate for right now. I’m not sure when I’ll get the edits for Morrigan’s Heir, but until I do, I’m going to keep plugging away on Morrigan’s Wrath and on The Sea Prince

The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath
(The White Raven Duology, Book 2)

36067 / 90000 (40.07%)

The Sea Prince
(The Coral Throne, Book 1)

41188 / 120000 (34.32%)

I’ve started giving some thought to the books that will follow The Swords of Charlemagne and The Chronicles of John Zebedee, because the two will converge in Children of the Swords. I don’t have a fully fleshed out idea just yet as to where the story is going, and there’s some research to be done. So that’s a teaser for you (Another teaser? The first book is tentatively titled Seer.)

And I’m about to roll the Rebel Mage books out wide — meaning that you’ll be able to order the ebooks from places other than Amazon. That will happen Friday, February 10th, so if you’re looking for those books on Apple or Kobo, Friday will be the day to start shopping!

There isn’t much else going on in this neck of the woods. This time of year is usually quiet, so I’m taking advantage of that and making words.

Time to go make the words.

Jan

2023

Preorders and Covers and Pages

And a good Monday to you all! Happy end of January!

Why am I so cheerful? Because I finally got the cover for The Chronicles of John Zebedee squared away!

The preorders are being set up now, and as soon as I have the links, I’ll share them. Look for them in the newsletter on Friday! (Are you not getting my newsletter? It’s only once a month, and there are recipes…)

Children of Dreams is up for an award — the Paranormal Romance Guild’s Reviewers Choice Award. This award is voted on by the reading public, so if you read and enjoyed Children of Dreams, go vote! Voting is open for another few days, and you can find the ballot here. I also had a fun interview, which you can see here.

I’ve been busy with The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath, too. It gives me something to do while I wait for the edits on Morrigan’s Heir.

The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath
(The White Raven Duology, Book 2)

33415 / 90000 (37.13%)

I’ve seen a lot of talk recently about writing history, and presenting a rosy view of history. Which, I’m not going to lie, I’m totally doing in The White Raven. There are details that are accurate, but the view of Rome… not so much.

The thing is, I know I’m doing it. The White Raven isn’t set at a fixed point in Celtic history. It doesn’t have to be — it’s a fantasy. I do mention Rome in Princes of Air — there’s a comment in Niall’s book about dining while reclining like Romans, and that’s all it was. A throw-away comment that wasn’t meant to do anything more than give the reader an idea of what was going on. To Niall, Rome was a concept, not a place. He’d heard of it, but that’s all.

Lorcan actually experiences Rome as a place. However, the Rome he experiences is only tangentially the Rome that actually existed. There was never an Emperor named Lucanus, for example. This is a fictional Rome set in my fictional universe where Gods walk among men… and sometimes do more than walk. So I can pick and choose what parts of Roman history I want to use, while being relatively accurate to Roman culture and religion.

Which is probably going to get me into all sorts of difficulties with the history people. But it’s fiction, and I’m going to put an author note in the books saying pretty much what I just said to you. That this is my fictional world, that it’s only lightly based on the Rome of our history, and honestly, there are men and women who can turn into ravens in this universe. That doesn’t lend itself to an accurate depiction of Rome…

So we have a fantasy romance, set in a romanticized version of Rome, starring a man who can turn into a raven because reasons.

This absolutely sings historical accuracy, right?

Nov

2022

Worlds Begin. Worlds End.

And tomorrow, the world of Adavar ends. At least for now. I can’t think of any other stories that will be told in the world of Heir to the Firstborn, but that might change. I don’t think they will involve any of the current characters, though. Their story wraps tomorrow.

(click the graphic to go to the Amazon series page)

It’s strange. When I first started this series, it was supposed to be four books. If you’ve been with me long enough, you’ll remember me talking about how there was too much story for four books, so I was going to add a fifth one. And… yeah. Six books. Characters who REALLY got under my skin — I still say Owyn is my favorite out of all the characters that have walked out of my subconscious.

And it’s all over tomorrow. My part in it, anyway. Now it’s your turn, oh Reader.

(I will say that there’s one character who’s sort of poking at me, but I don’t know what they want yet. If they tell me, then there might be some more Adavar. But until they start doing more than a mental “I’m not touching you!” I’m going to ignore them and focus on Lorcan.)

The White Raven: Morrigan’s Heir
(The White Raven, Book 1)

18418 / 90000 (20.46%)

Now here’s an amusing tidbit. I wrote The White Raven: Morrigan’s Heir a few years before I started Heir to the Firstborn. And there’s a character in Morrigan’s Heir who I now need to give a new name.

That was the first time I used the name Owyn. And he’s nothing like Heir’s Owyn, who is so much of a strong character and strong voice in my brain that the name Owyn is now being retired.

So when you finally meet Bran in Morrigan’s Heir, his name was originally Owyn.

And, with the Heir to the Firstborn coming to a close, I’ve made an executive decision.

I’m taking the rest of the year off. I need to reset and recover from what’s been a heck of a year, so I’m taking some time off. I have books that are piling up to read, research I want to do, movies I want to watch, and my house needs cleaning. I need to plan for 2023, and set my goals. Oh, and Cookiepocalypse is right around the corner! So I’ll be taking my winter break early, and I’ll pick up Morrigan’s Wrath in January.

You may now open book on if I can actually make it to January without writing new words.

Nov

2022

Civic Duty or Something.

And today, I’m writing this blog in the jury room of my county courthouse. It’s slowly filling up with people (mostly unmasked people because… well… Florida).

Yes, Dear Reader, I’ve been summoned for jury duty.

I’ve been summoned before in Florida, but the last time, I was a homeschooling mom of a child under ten, so I was excused. No excuses here. So welcome to the jury pool.

The last time I was in a jury pool, I lived in New York, where I had the interesting situation of being chosen for a jury, then having to be excused because the opposing counsel was the husband of my Weight Watchers leader. Which had apparently never been brought up as a reason for excusing a juror before because I clearly remember the looks of abject confusion on the faces of the judge and the lawyers. “Wait, you… what? Does that count? I… okay.”

I’m not sure how long I’m going to be here today. Or how many days this week I’ll have to report. But they have wifi, and I can bring my laptop, so there will be words.

The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath
(The White Raven, Book 2)

14424 / 90000 (16.03%)

Visions in Smoke drops tomorrow, and Children of Dreams next week. There’s still time to get those preorders in!

And that’s about all I’ve got today. This room is now packed, and it’s 8AM. Time to go be a responsible member of society.

Release date

Release Week!

Preorders

Works in Progress

Quiet Now.

Preorders

Works in Progress

An Advanced State of Higgledy-Piggledy

Preorders

Works in Progress

Appearances!

Rabbit, Rabbit!

Preorders

Works in Progress

Appearances!

The Prep Begins

Works in Progress

Promotions!

Halfway There!

Monday? Why Does It Have To Be Monday?

Preorders and Covers and Pages

Worlds Begin. Worlds End.

Civic Duty or Something.

Works in Progress

Appearances

Find My Books!

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