My five-word self-description—Wife. Mother. Writer. Ninja. Squirrel.—is listed in order. I know, I know. Squirrel should be higher on the list. But that’s not my point today. Tomorrow, at 11:10 PM, my daughter turns three. It’s been an interesting year. We’ve had to switch child care, enroll in speech therapy, and dole out a decent…
The Social Hermit
I’m introverted and not shy about that fact. I observe, I listen, and I assess. Take my offline life for example. When it comes to fun events, I’ll never be at the top of people’s invite list. Why? Because I’m a social hermit. Forgettable. I get glossed over while in plain sight. Makes for some…
The Hero Takes a Back Seat
I’ve noticed something odd with my current work-in-progress. Isto, book 2 of the Ninier series, is sitting at 123K at the moment. Only 16K of that belongs to my hero. It’s the lowest word count of all my POV characters (so far). I’ve sat and pondered why this might be the case. Had I fallen…
Three Months
I’ve made my decision. I’ve decided on a release date for Thanmir War. I’ve set my release date as November 5th, 2013. Why November 5th? It’s a Tuesday, and traditional book releases take place on Tuesday The baby is due late September, but may arrive early October It’s before the holidays This gives me three…
Pantser
What can I say? I like snakes. (Photo by Bryant Olsen – Flickr Creative Commons) I love being a pantser. Isto isn’t plotted. Oh, I know where I need to end up and major events that have to happen in between. But as far as outlining–that stuff isn’t for me. I struggle with writing chronologically,…
The Physical Product
Last Friday, I came home and found a box awaiting my arrival. My CreateSpace copies had arrived! Things I would change: Greater top and outside margin. The top margin was a little too high for my liking. And the outside margin didn’t quite seem to match up with the inside. Design cover off the right…
The Interior
I submitted my files for CreateSpace review today. I finally decided to finish fiddling with interior formatting. I had reviewed The Book Designer documentation, referenced my sister-in-law’s books, and reached the edge of my frustration and creativity. Interior formatting wasn’t as easy as I’d thought it’d be. Well, it probably would’ve been if I had…
The Cover
The June 30th deadline for my free CreateSpace copies is quickly drawing close. I’ve been playing with covers for a while now and have finally settled on my design. My first thought was water based, but since I came up with my tagline of “The Earth Clan has declared war and a landscaper is at…
Critique Group
When I first started getting serious about my writing a few years back, I looked for a local critique group without success. I had given up. Then, Jeri Walker-Bickett wrote a post about critique groups and I knew what she had detailed out was exactly what I wanted. It rekindled my search and I hit…
Jack’s Story
Backstory can sometimes be out of place and unnecessary. When I first conceived Isto, I had planned to dive into the history of each of the guardians with a short little flashback of when they first accepted the choice. Over two years ago, I wrote Nicholas’s, less than 1K telling of his loss and desolation….