This is posting rather late on Monday, but there’s a very good reason for the delay…
That’s the final wordcount on The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath. That’s a draft, folks!
The White Raven: Morrigan’s Wrath (The White Raven duology, Book 2)
106550 / 106000 (100.52%)
So, now what? Now, this manuscript gets read over quickly, to make sure I didn’t forget any scenes that I meant to fill in later. I’ll compile it from Scrivener, and print it off… and then put it off to the side for a bit. I’ll be sitting on it until I get the edits back for Morrigan’s Heir, and then I’ll read both of them one right after the other. That way, I can be sure that the details in both agree. (and there are some edits that need to be added to Heir, because of things that changed in Wrath. And one character name that needs to be changed because the name Owyn is now retired.)
Once that’s done? I’m off for the summer! Which means… well, this house needs to be cleaned. And I have worldbuilding and research to work on. And SO MUCH READING to catch up on.
And I have a short story to write. There’s one thread in Wrath that didn’t get tied off, and one couple that’s getting their own short. But I’m in no rush.
In other news, Hidden Things is currently part of a giveaway, and you can check out the other books here. The giveaway runs until May 20th. Just in time for beach reading!
Since it’s late, that’s all there is. I’m going to bed now!
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.
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!
It started Tuesday, when my computer crashed because of an Microsoft update that didn’t go as planned. Yes, that happens. I know. When I finally got the computer straightened out and go everything back up, part of chapter 17 and all of chapter 18 of Heir to the Firstborn were missing.
That’s when I learned that something else wasn’t going as planned.
My automatic saves to Dropbox weren’t saving. And hadn’t been, for about a week.
Now, my editing files are in Google Docs, so I had all of chapter 17, and could replace those missing words into the Scrivener file. But chapter 18 was irrevocable gone, so I started Wednesday planning to get to work on recreating those words.
Yeah… there were no words written on Wednesday, because this happened.
I posted my “where were you when you found out you had finaled?” story on social media (Answer? The shower!) And I’m still just over the moon about this, especially since Written in Water is the book that I pulled out of the 2020 RITA contest in protest. So having it final in the 2021 Vivian contest is just that much sweeter.
(And yes, I’m still giggling when a certain husband of mine comes up and sings “Finalist!”)
And on Thursday, I recreated all the words.
Heir to the Firstborn
(Heir to the Firstborn, book 5)
64313 / 150000
So, last week was a pretty wild ride! And I don’t usually like roller coasters!
Today, I have something happening that I rarely do — I actually don’t think this has ever happened to me before.
I have four book releases today!
One of these is an anthology appearance, my first with Riverdale Avenue Press. Under The Cape is a sexy superhero anthology edited by Rachel Kenley, and it was fun to work on.
My story in this anthology is Time for No Mercy, and yes, that’s a Doctor Horrible reference.
The other three all re-releases of short stories. I’m starting them out in Kindle Unlimited, to see how they do. So in 90 days, they might go wide. Or they might not. It’s an experiment.
First up — my erotic retelling of an already erotic poem.
Hello and good morning! Welcome in! It’s a lovely, albeit drizzly, day here in Central Florida, and I have a new book out!
I’ll talk about the new book in a minute. For now, let’s talk speedbumps. All writers have speedbumps, those scenes that slow their writing pace to a crawl. It’s always the same — you’re writing, the characters are really talking to you, you have the energy, you’re making words…. and WHAM!!!
Speedbump.
I have two speedbumps in particular, and they both happen for the same reason. What are they? What’s the reason?
For me, it’s sex scenes and fight scenes. Both of them slow me down to a crawl. Funny, right? A writer who has built her career on steamy sex can’t just (pardon me) bang one out? (I’m sorry!)
It’s true! I’ve been known to leave <INSERT SEX HERE> in a manuscript so I can search it up later and put the scene in, just so that I don’t break my momentum. So far, I haven’t handed a manuscript to my editor with a missing scene, but you never know. One of these years, it’ll happen.
So what do sex scenes and fight scenes have in common?
Blocking.
I can’t write a “count the number of legs in the bed and divide by two” sex scene (to quote one of my favorite Terry Prachett lines). A scene that essentially boils down to “Wham, bam, thank you ma’am” (or “thank you, man,” depending on which book we’re talking about) does nothing for me. Sex scenes have to flow properly and organically, and make sense when you go from one to the next. Otherwise they just don’t work for me. Which means spending a lot of time thinking them out, planning movements, researching positions and BDSM rope dress. I can tell you that my search history would make my mother wash my mouse out with soap!
Fight scenes slow me down the same way. Writing a fight scene can be very much like writing a sex scene, because the movements have to flow, and they have to make sense.
Writing The White Raven: Morrigan’s Heir took forever because it’s a sword-and-sandal erotic romance. But it’s off with the editor now, so hopefully I wrote both sorts of scenes properly and it sells!
Now, there are fight scenes in the Heir to the Firstborn series, but there’s no explicit sex (it’s all behind closed doors), so I only had one speedbump to worry about. It didn’t slow me down too much, because Bones of Earth (Heir to the Firstborn 3) is out today.
For Owyn, saving the world meant losing everything. Losing everything led him to something worth living for. Keeping that something may cost him his life.
You can find it on Amazon, Smashwords,Google Play, or any other ebook retailer. There’s even a paperback, although it’s not showing up on Amazon for some reason. (Working on that!) And if you want to follow along with the final book once you’ve caught up, you can jump into Wings of Air by joining me on Patreon.
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