Second Edition

Happy Birthday to Aptitude!!!

And to celebrate a first birthday, every girl needs a new outfit, right?

Can you spot the difference?

How 'bout a closer look?

Emma Dolan is such an artist - I made a suggestion to update the cover for this second edition and she made it perfect! 

I'm tying up loose ends and the Second Editions of Aptitude and Game Plan will be out soon, available online and from me. I'm so excited to see them in 'real life' again :)

N

Outside the Box

The bonus of being a writer is you can sit alone at your desk or Starbucks table or library corner and talk to imaginary people. I'm sure it's a stereotype but I fit it: Authors are all introverts who shudder at the idea of public exposure and — eek! — real people. Mingling terrifies me. Strangers are scary - not in the boogyman way we're taught as kids but in the 'what if they hate me' way of middle school. (Maybe I'm mentally stuck there, and that's why I like to write YA?)

But books don't promote themselves... books are shared.  I'm not talking about sales - I will (and have) spend more money than I make to get my books 'out there'. I'm talking about reaching more readers, getting into hands and thoughts of people who will enjoy the story and think about it after the last page. That kind of promotion. They are shared from reader to reader in a way that, in a writer's greatest hopes, extends out picking up momentum as it goes. The best advocate to push that snowball is the author. (Wait, no, the best one is Oprah, but that's just a pipe dream). So... the very stereotypical nature of the author is actually counter intuitive to the very way the process needs to be done.

Since I'm not with a big time publisher who has a budget and team for marketing, the marketing team is me and the budget is el zippo. So I need to Talk To People.

This one just makes me laugh :D

Proof

Lookie here:

What this young sir is holding is a PROOF of my upcoming release It Should Have Been a #GoodDay! It came for my review in the mail yesterday - and holding a hardcopy paperback of a real live book that came all the way from my brain is just as exciting the third time as the first and second.

But I don't get the word "Proof". I guess it's short for "proof-reading" or something. Right? Maybe? Professor Google says proof can be defined as "a trial print of something" which fits.

But I associate this kind of Proof with the first-listed definition:

This is Proof.

Proof that this book is real. This publication is happening. Proof that I have a book. That I wrote a book. That I write.

See what I did there?

N

Casting call

I've cast the roles of Emily, Thomas, Brogan and Henry - my beloved in It Should Have Been a #GoodDay:'

 Brogan

Emily

Wait, how'd he get in there?

Thomas

Henry

Thoughts? Who'd you rather see?

Join the discussion on the Indiegogo page.

N

COVER!

Head on over to the Indiegogo campaign to see the COVER REVEAL! Under the 'Updates' is the video reveal :)

It's so beautiful, done by Valerie Bellamy at Dog-Ear Book Design.

N

One small step for writer-me...

One giant leap for... um, I guess, writer-me too.

I have two projects in the works... one will be published the traditional way and the other is my foray into indie publishing.

For me the indie publishing isn't a second choice - I did not send this story out to a bazillion publishers, I half-heartedly sent it to one and then decided I'd rather try it on my own.

I'm working with Savvy Fox Author Services. She has mucho experience in the publishing world so she's being my guru. I'm excited about it. (her website is in the making).

To date it's been talk, talk and more talk... but today she sent me a quote for the services we've discussed and I sent her an etransfer. It's real, folks!

In the meantime, I've received the edits back from my first go of drafting my traditionally pub'd novel and I have this month to work through their suggestions and make my edits. I've mapped out the problems leaving the right side of the page for solutions:

Don't let the writing on the right side fool you - those are more specific examples of problems than solutions... eek! But I've gotten past the overwhelmed stage into the more productive let-me-at-it stage so here I go!

N

Review of 2014 and Gear Up for 2015

Another year? Already?

Since Game Plan was published in November of 2013 much of early 2014 was spent in the afterglow of debut publication :) I travelled to Vancouver and hoped my way back via Saskatoon and Toronto to promote my story... it didn't result in wide ranging publicity like I hoped, but I visited with great friends and talked to new people - even got to run a workshop at my own high school, which was the highlight.

Spring and summer were spent writing my third novel and and submitting my second... what a roller coaster that is, doing both at once. The excitement and hope of creating, the frustration of rejection, all swirled together from day to day sometimes from hour to hour.

Fall brought acceptance of my third story, sorta out of order. I felt kinda like I was leaving the second behind, abandoning and forgetting it, giving up. And that felt awful.

I discovered Wattpad and posted Nine, which became featured (and has over 8000 readers!), the first chapter of Game Plan and a companion short from Charlie's point of view.

The biggest writerly decision I made this year is to try self publishing. Kinda scary, though now that the decision is made, it's less scary and more exciting. I can't wait to do all the parts, and have to be careful not to rush into it and miss the chance of making it the best story possible.

So where does that leave me going into 2015? What goals are set? Not 'revolutions' as PJ calls them, but goals:


1. Create an excellent second story with the direction and support of Fierce Ink Press.
2. Process through the stages of Self Publishing and create a fantabulous story.
3. Up my GoodReads 2014 reading challenge from 35 to 40.
4. Stay off the diet Coke.
5. Write more short stories, submit to lit magazines.

I should probably be more specific, eh? Like with specific numbers and timelines and stuff... but little steps right?


N

Curveballs

I've been working on two projects lately:

1. Communicating with a publisher about my thirdly written story.
2. Moving towards self-pub'ing my secondly written story.

Sitting in the orthodontist's waiting room with Elliot I got an email out of the blue that swapped the stories outright. Curveballs are hard to catch. Uncertainty drives me nutty. But after a fumble I've smothered the curveball and am back in the game... excited about moving forward.

Baseball is awesome, it works with any situation.

N

The Golden Egg

In my research about self pub'ing I found a quote that went something like this: "The hurricane will kill the goose that lays the golden egg." Wherein the hurricane referenced the onslaught of bad writing that is published through self publishing just because they can.

I'm jumping on the band wagon, joining the club and the fray, signing up, buying the farm - oh wait, I think that one's different.

I'm finding the golden egg. Or am I laying it? I'm confused. I'm going to publish Aptitude myself. Now that I've decided, I'm freakin excited instead of terrified :)

Feel free to come along for the ride.

N