My brain just exploded...

Well, sort of.

In case you missed it, and I'm pretty sure you didn't, or did you? My second book finally came out yesterday. Of course, to add to my impatience, which has been growing since last October, Amazon spent sixteen bloody hours getting it up! I think was around two pm (I had submitted my files at ten the night before, and it's only supposed to take twelve hours) that it finally popped up on Amazon. After that I started spamming Facebook a little obnoxiously. (Sorry) And then sat back to bask in the glow of my minor success. Relatively minor, anyway.

But that's not the real story. For as excited I was to release Finding Sanctuery, it was a bit overshadowed by London Escape's stellar performance on the freebie charts. (Yes, I know it's free, free sells, blah blah blah) You can't minimilize these numbers. My total downloads for yesterday were a little over six hundred. It's free again today and we're already up to almost eight hundred (including the six hundred from yesterday.) So let me check my spreadsheet and crunch the numbers real quick...


That brings my grand total downloads (real sales and freebies, USA, UK and other places) to a whopping 2,826.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's all I can say. Still not famous. Still not really published. But still pretty happy with where I am right now. People are reading my book. As far as I know they are liking it. Haven't had a negative review. (YET!)

I can't complain. EXCEPT Finding Sanctuary has only sold eleven copies so far! So go buy it!

T-minus whatever...

Have I ever mentioned how much I strongly dislike waiting? Okay, I'll say it. I HATE waiting.

Last night I submitted my files for the final publishing of my SECOND novel. I'm still waiting on my paperback proof copy to ship, so I can approve it for sale. But in the meantime, the kindle version should be out sometime today. Yup, love the vagueness. Amazon says it could take up to twelve hours for it to appear on their website. It was under review all night, so hopefully this means it will go up SOON!

In the meantime London Escape is free today and tomorrow to celebrate the big release of book two!

And I have plenty of things to keep me distracted from refreshing my Amazon author page over and over. School to teach, laundry to wash, floors to sweep and mop. Ah the glamorous life of an author!

It's coming...

So I finally had to stray from my song title thing, but I think we can all agree that was getting old. Plus, I have news. Real news! My book is coming out! TOMORROW! Yes that definitely requires all caps!

It's seems like I've been waiting such a long time for this, as the book was technically finished late last summer, but I've been sidetracked by a lot of different things.

I'm actually a lot more nervous about this release than I was London Escape. By the time that was published, it had been "out there" so much more. Finding Sanctuary has been kept a little more under wraps. Only myself and two other people, my beta readers, have even read it. And of course there's that fear of not living up to expectations, and we all know the trickiest book to like is always the middle of a trilogy.

This book is not filler. It's different than LE though. It's a little slower paced, though plenty of things happen. Somehow I feel like you will get to know the characters better this time around, especially Kit and Jason. I hope everyone loves it, loves them, the way that I do. I hope you're excited for this next chapter in Kit's story. I know I am!

Last year when I released my first book, Facebook played a huge part in my sales. So don't be surprised if you see me totally spamming for the rest of the week. And feel free to spam for me!

So, lovely readers, what are you most excited to see happen in the second book? 

Learning to fly...

Okay, so the song thing is getting a little annoying, isn't it? It's fun though. Even though most days the song titles don't have anything whatsoever to do with the posts, but oh well.

Busy weekend around here. I finally got some forward motion achieved with my second book. Sadly, I had to hire a new cover artist because my original artist is buried with her real job. But I'm happy with my choice and I'm looking forward to seeing what my new designer comes up with when she sends me the first draft of my cover later today. Yes, today! I'm beyond excited.

Because Finding Sanctuary is now completely wrapped up, besides the actual publishing part, I decided to sort out my massive stack of legal pads and archive all the ones labeled "FS". My "archives" consist of one of those large rubbermaid tubs under my bed. While I was putting the new ones in I decided to stack up all the notebooks I've used so far on this trilogy and count them.




 

I think the final count was like, twenty-five or so. And book three is not even done yet. Though, honestly, I spend much less time writing longhand these days. Sometimes I go straight to the computer. I just don't have time to write by hand for three hours every day anymore! It's crazy to think that I started all of this when Sophia was just a tiny baby! I was showing Matthew how I had color coordinated my tabs. Green is London Escape, pink is Finding Sanctuary and orange is book three, currently the working title is Final Redemption. He asked me how on earth I made head or tails out of all that, and I just laughed. Sometimes I don't! Half the time I can't even read my own writing. But all of it's in my head, so I'm not too worried.

I'm really looking forward to publishing Finding Sanctuary. Well, that's a bit of an understatement at this point! I feel like I wrote London Escape for the purpose of being published, while Finding Sanctuary was totally for me and my readers. All five of them. So I hope they enjoy it. ;)


(An offhand note about music. If you listened to any of these songs so far, you might notice that I have completely random, and sometimes terrible taste in music! Lately I've been listening a ton to The Fray, Lifehouse, and Linkin Park, as most of those are on my "book soundtrack" for Finding Sanctuary. But I obviously have  a serious thing for classic rock, too. I  have my dad to thank for that. I literally grew up with Aerosmith, the Stones, Led Zepplin, and Pink Floyd. To this very day "Learning to Fly" is one of my all time favorite songs.)

Accidentally in love...

Watch out! It's Valentine's day and I'm feeling super corny, as I am prone to do about two to three times a year. So, if you know me at all, you probably know that I'm not hugely into Valentine's day. Why? Well,  we all know there's a bigger holiday around the corner...

Anywho, it's a fun day for the kids, how did all our holidays suddenly start to revolve around the kids? Oh right, around 2006.

Matthew and I don't really have a history of good V-days. Our first would have been '05, just a few months before our wedding. Yup, you read that right! On that particular day Matthew was sick and I decided to go over to his parents house and make him soup. I ended up burning it (which is so unlike me to have a cooking disaster!) and it was terrible. Since then, I think we've usually been sick or something on Valentine's.

So tonight we don't have any major plans. Like I said, there are other more important holidays. Anniversaries....birthdays....birthdays....

I'm making a special dinner and we're going to let the kids eat out in the living room and watch a movie while we eat ALONE. That's enough to make it special. And then Matthew will probably have homework to do.

So I leave you with today's special song! This was "our" song when we were dating. At the time I had no idea it was from an animated movie, oh well! (Also, I was going to post the regular Counting Crows video, but it was..um...weird!)

The wind...

So, that's over with. And by that I mean the contest. I was expecting the finalists to be announced around noon today, but was surprised to see at nine on the dot they had already been posted. I nearly had a panic attack when I clicked to open the PDF file. It was alphabatzed by first name, so I knew when to expect my name. Of course, I didn't see it. I'm trying to not take it too hard, obviously. But...well, that's hard too.

No one wants to feel like they're destined for mediocrity. I've said from the beginning I think my book is good, not great, but good. I'm proud of it. I like that people like it. And I know I've said a million times that I refuse to let the lack of mainstream success define my own view of success.

Again, that's hard.

For now I'm focusing on what I do know.

• I wrote a book, actually I wrote two. Two and half if you want to get technical.
• People like my book, for the most part, as far as I know.
• I will always be writing, always trying to get better. I'm only 27 (almost 28) I have my whole life to get published.
• I love writing, and I will never stop. No matter how many times my manuscripts get rejected. Hell, London Escape has been rejected some sixty-odd times.

For now I'm going to focus on getting Finding Sanctuary out there by the end of the month. I have a few decisions I need to make regarding that, but it should be forthcoming soon. 

Today's song...

Lost in the echo...

The song title theme continues. Actually I've just been picking whatever song is stuck in my head at the time. This is today's.

Since Finding Sanctuary is pretty much done, besides actually being published, I'm taking a much-needed break from writing. Ever since I published London Escape last June I feel like I've done nothing but write, write, write, edit, edit, edit, proofread...well you get the idea. It's a lot of work. Especially when you're basically doing everything yourself. And my books aren't long books, so I shouldn't complain. LE was 60K words and FS is 71K. So yeah, not exactly a ton of writing.

What was I saying? Oh yes. So I'm taking a break and actually reading and not writing at all. (That's not to say I didn't read last year, because I read 75 books.) Day before yesterday I finally got my hands on Ready Player One, which I've been dying to read and ended up reading it in less than twenty-four hours. After that I moved on to a highly recommended book (it's been blowing up on my Goodreads feed) called The Nobodies Album.

 Some books you're not sure about when you start, others you like right away. This one I knew I liked right away. I just really enjoyed the narrators "voice" right from the get-go. Especially since this particular narrator is a writer. Literally at 1% on my kindle there was this quote: "I've always known that the best part of writing occurs before you've picked up a pen. When a story exists only in your mind, its potential is infinite; it's only when you start pinning words to paper that it becomes less than perfect."

I wanted to shout, "yes!" Because I totally get that feeling. Currently, I'm in my most favorite portion of book writing on my third book. Just sitting around imagining every scene in my head before finally sitting down to write it all out. And it happens at weird times, too. This past Sunday I actually found myself sitting alone during the service and for some insane reason started visualizing the one of the most pivotal scenes in book three. Strange. But like the quote I posted, nothing I can ever write on paper will compare with what I see in my head, in it's most perfect form.

A dream is a wish your heart makes...

I know, gag, right? But someone in this house (who shall remain nameless) has been playing the Cinderella soundtrack non-stop. So guess what song is currently stuck in my head? That one ^

Anyway...so I've been thinking today, about dreams and all that junk. And writing, of course, always writing. Because really what else do I think about. Besides the obvious...kids, husband, dinner, dishes, school ect.

Writing. Oh and the ABNA. And my chances. What are my chances? Well, right  now they stand at one in ten thousand. How do you like those odds?

Never quote me the odds.

(Haha)

Next week they will announce the two thousand books that  made the first cut. Technically then I only have a  one in four hundred shot, since they will only pick four hundred per genre. And guess who is in the (arguably) most competitive genre? That's right, me, and little old London Escape.

Basically, in my head, if I'm being totally honest, I have zero chance. I mean, I already did the whole querying and trying to get published route and we all know how that went... abysmally. But...but...but...there's always a chance right? Wrong? I dunno...

(I'm aware I'm rambling. Dude, this is what this blog is for.)

I've been lurking on the ABNA message boards and reading other authors pitches. And I have to say, right now I like my chances. I would say more, but I don't want to sound like the arrogant jerk I can be sometimes...*ahem*

My pitch? Well, it's simple. I used the same one I used on my Amazon description page. Why? Because if it ain't broke, don't fix it! They way I see it, that description alone got me 2K downloads. Also, when I submitted my book I swore to myself that I would second guess what I have already done. Which meant zero re-writes and zero tweaks to the book.

Sooooo...that's all.

Get off of my cloud...

Oh hey, look who's back! Wait, you didn't notice I was gone? *sigh*

So yeah, I've been offline. I'd like to say it was for some noble cause, like giving up social media for lent. Or giving up internet so I can focus on my family more or writing more. Let's be real, my internet has been out. But I'm back now, so it's all water under the bridge. That being said,  I have decided to cut back on a lot of the "time sucks" on the internet. Pinterest, I'm looking at you! And on the upside, it did give me plenty of time to finish my book. I must have done at least two more full proofreads in the past few weeks. No, it's not coming out quite yet, but soon, I promise.

So, even though I haven't been online, I've certainly kept busy. Matthew and I finally spent some time re-doing the kids' room, which meant I spent a lot of time purging. I organized our storage space down in the basement (oy) and basically just started thinking and preparing for our hopefully inevitable move this summer.

No news on that front. *double sigh*

It's all good, I guess. We made it through January, which is officially my least favorite month of the year. I decided it's like Mondays. You just have to survive. Nothing good will ever happen on a Monday or in the month of January. I'm serious.

BUT it's February now. And I have high hopes for February. For one, on the 13th Amazon will be announcing first round picks for the ABNA (Amazon Breathrough Novel Award). They will take the book pool down from the 10,000 applicants to 2,000. 400 in each category  Do I think I will be one of them? Nope. But part of me can't help but dream.

Hopefully I will be blogging more this month. We shall see. Oh and I decided to make all my blog post titles song titles. Because I'm a nerd. I picked this one because I had the song in my head. Elijah was like, "what are you singing?" Story of my life...

(Also, I made the post title a few posts back "Ramble On" and totally didn't even realize it was a Led Zepplin song until my friend Jenn pointed it out. And Led Zepplin is one of my all-time favorites. DUH CACEY!)