State of Writing

I Know, it’s been a while since I last blogged about anything writing related… I’ve been, well, writing. And learning a lot about marketing. My books are selling quite a bit better than ever online, which has been helpful due to the pandemic situation and the cancellation of all my in-person events (I estimate a $30,000 net loss from the shutdown.)

Anyway, I’ve still been pretty active and responding with questions on the blog and doing some consulting. I’ve also been working hard to grow my newsletter list to 4,000 subs and monetize it. Currently in the middle of FOUR books! A nonfiction one, two more books in my new high fantasy series (the Esfah Sagas) though one of those is co-written, and another one that is a rough outline.

Just thought I’d pop in because I do have a new blog post coming out this week!

 

State of Writing

New draft of Wolves of the Tesseract 3 is done 🙂 I’m pretty excited for it and feel I wrapped up the whole story neatly (although I don’t think the ending is predictable at all) . The new draft comes ahead of schedule and should be ready for my ARC team in the near future. It weighs in at about 105k words, so roughly the same size as book 2. Artwork was completed before I’d even had a workable outline due to my fear that i might lose contact with the cover artist and so I made sure to get that right away after launching book 2.

State of Writing

Success! I have finished Wolves of the Tesseract 3! I completed the epilogue last night at about 11pm. It still needs a lot of polish and I made numerous notes for scenes I need to add or places and characters I need to revise/add/inflate before I even put the story down, so I’ll try to do some of that over the next couple days so I can put this story away for a few months and come back to it in the new year.

What I’m really happy about, though, is that I completed two stories in two months, like nanowrimo, and then double nanowrimo. I began Gunslinger of Dystalgia on October 15 for my first book and then launched the very next day into The Architect King and burned through another 90k words to complete it by Dec 15.

No celebrations. No fanfare or banner waving on sites like 20Booksto50K… just the pride of doing it. Now, somebody buy or review, dangit 😉

I need a nap.

State of Writing

Hey friends! I haven’t posted a State of Writing in about a month, (it’s a weekly ordeal for me on Mondays.) I wanted to spend every scrap of time writing through November. And it paid off!

I didn’t officially participate in Nanowrimo. Between huge year-end promotions, a book launch, and the actual writing, I just didn’t need one more thing to have to update. That said, I did write a book in November: I completed the second installment of my unreleased series about Merlin’s secret rings. I think The Gunslinger of Dystaslias is around 50-60k words in its first draft. But wait, there’s more! I kept on writing and launched directly into Wolves of the Tesseract: The Architect King which will complete the series. I’m a little over 63,000 words right now and hope to finish the book in less than two weeks (about 30k more words to go or so!)

I’d keep blogging, but I gotta get back to writing!

State of Writing

I had a killer weekend and more than tripled my previous sales event record! I sold 173 books at #galaxycon minneapolis. It was a very good show–I did a little pre-release special and had paperbacks of 50 Shades of Worf available… a big box of them. Like the normal amount of books I sell total at a con. They sold out on day 1. I could have sold 100 copies or more and underestimated the response to my new humor book (now with more paperdoll action!)

I’m taking today off to focus on the writing that I didn’t do over the weekend and to relax a little. Now if I can just keep all the distractions away.

State of Writing

Nanowrimo is coming up! And I’m deciding not to do it this year… I started early, instead. I’m trying to use my November focus to set a goal of finishing my second book in the Hidden Rings of Myrddin the Cambion series and I’m already half done as of last night. I’d also like to complete a detailed outline of Wolves of the Tesseract 3 before December so I can be plugging away at that book. I’ve got lots of time off between Nov/Dec so I expect things to go pretty well for my goals.

In other news, I’m working on a few other authory things as well. I have my biggest comiccon (in my homestate) of the year and expect to hit a new high-sales record for the third time this year, and I’m about to pay for my booth at the third largest convention in the US… I really don’t like traveling… but I do love selling books!

State of Writing

Very busy in my non-writing life, which is pretty normal for me, but I’ve been working on some things that have kept me from writing as much as I’d like. I’m throwing a little more attention at it now, leading up to November’s nanowrimo. I’m planning to complete The Gunslinger of Distaslias (book 2 of my Hidden Rings series) as my Nano entry. It’s pretty well outlined, along with the rest of the series which I hope to complete next year, but I need to get this one out of the way to stay on track for my writing timeline. I’m due to complete Wolves of the Tesseract 3 by the end of Feb.

Sidenote, I have two books scheduled to drop in November: my comedy and a thoughtful/nerdy devo book for my faith-based audience. I’ll post info about both over these next couple weeks, and promise to get a new info-blog up about some writing and marketing advice!

State of Writing

It’s been too long since I wrote a blog (almost a month now.) I promise it’s for a few good reasons. Firstly, my day job has been very busy. Secondly, my weekends have been packed with conventions. And thirdly, I’ve been pretty deep in edits and other book work.

Dekker’s Dozen 3 is in the bag and ready for ARC readers, Ashes of Ailushurai is still in progress, and Wolf of the Tesseract 3 is in prewriting (once the outline is done I hope to be in nanowrimo season, and plan to write my next Hidden Rings of Myrddin the Cambion). I’m also on the final edit of The Shadowless. I’ll probably share cover art soon.

The business side of the industry is also bogging me down. I’ve been reading books by different experts and looking for ways to take my writing to the next level. Hopefully that happens and soon!

State of Writing

I’m half a dozen chapters deep on revisions for Dekker’s Dozen. I like to give it an initial revision right after completing a rough draft. It’s always interesting to see where i was initially going a different direction with things until the story presented something different/better. I find that an early revision while things fresh helps snip off frayed edges and loose ends like subplots that never developed or foreshadowing that isn’t quite right for how things actually turn out.

On the other side of the writing world (the less fun business/production side,) I have most of my cover art ready for Shadowless and I’m only waiting on art now for my comedy. I want to get banners for both and redo all of my graphics, etc.

This week, I’ll keep plodding along on these edits. I’m not pushing anything major at the moment–I’ll be at MN Renfest slingin paperbacks all weekend, so that will take a mental toll on me. Feel free to drop by for a visit!

State of Writing

My blog has been a little more light than normal on content, I’ll admit. There are good reasons for that. I have been both finishing books as well as selling like a madman. I spent all of last weekend at the region’s largest renaissance festival selling books… and every weekend before that, too, for the last month or so. I did finish Dekker’s Dozen 3 and I am in the process of wrapping up final touches on several other books (cover art, editing, etc.)

This week, I’d like to work on an outline of my next story that I want to write this fall. I have lots of ideas, but I need to start whittling them down and focus on what story lines I must begin to tie up as I conclude a trilogy and close out one of my book series (while also injecting enough emphasis on another series that I’ll write that also takes place in this same universe).