Fantasy Author and Very Serious Person
Recently, I shared five tips to help you survive your debut year (I mean, they helped me, so). It was pretty touchy-feely, because, well, have you met me? But I know how much people need something concrete when they're lost at sea and flailing about for anything solid, anything at all. So I thought a… Continue reading 8 Practical Tips for the Debut Author
It's been over five weeks since my debut novel The Perfect Assassin came out into the world and I've been spending most of that time decompressing. Relaxing. Reading. Sleeping (!), even, when the Toddler allows. But me being me, I've also been thinking about the past year - and beyond. It's been a bit of… Continue reading 5 Tips for Surviving Your Debut Year
It sure has been a month. I don't even know how to begin, so let's just run through it, shall we? I started a new job. Winter finally showed up. I moderated my first panel and gave my first reading at ConFusion in Detroit. I wrote a bit more of my WIP. The cover for… Continue reading January Recap (Madcap?)
The next few months are going to be a whirlwind - and not just because I have a book coming out (in 74 days [not that I'm counting {okay yes I'm counting}]). New job, ConFusion, new WIP, edits for book 3, (presumably) copy edits for book 2, cheering on my fellow 2019 debuts, trying (somehow)… Continue reading Promises
It is November 28th. There are three days remaining in November, which means three days remaining in National Novel Writing Month, that time of year when thousands - hundreds of thousands - of writers try to plunk down 50,000 words in the span of a single month. In years past, I have diligently hit the… Continue reading On NaNoWriMo and Failure, Or: How I’m Learning to Embrace My New Writing Process
As some of you already know, I've joined this year's Pitch Wars mentor crew. For those unfamiliar with Pitch Wars, this means that one (not-so-)lucky writer will get the chance to have their manuscript beaten (literally and figuratively) into shape by me. But to get to that point they - you, possibly - will have… Continue reading Hey What About Your Query, Kai?
Book three. Is. Done. Well. Let's caveat that. It's done enough. Enough that I need to put it in someone else's hands and step away and breathe and focus. Enough that at this point, I'd be going in and tweaking and finetuning and adding details and subtracting paragraphs and not wholesale stripping out and rewriting… Continue reading Book 3: Beta Time!
Congratulations on your new debut author! Given the proper care, these creatures will make a wonderful addition to your family. They are generally quiet, complacent, and 120 proof, but while they may appear hardy on the outside, with frequent gruff vocalizations such as "no really, I'm fine," "these aren't tears; I have allergies," and "I… Continue reading How to Care for Your Debut Author
Galleys/ARCs: WHAT THEY ARE ARC stands for Advanced Reading Copy, and galleys are a variation on that theme. They're an early print of the book with the post copy-edits but not-yet-finalized text and marketing verbiage all over because they're, well, marketing tools. This is why sometimes they have a title and sometimes they don't. Mine… Continue reading From the Debut Trenches: Galleys/ARCs
Well what do we have here. No really. What do we have here? Gorgeously formatted pages with words on them that look vaguely familiar, like maybe... *squints* OH GOD THEY'RE MY WORDS Excuse me for a moment while I flail. *flails* Ahem. Those beautifully-formatted words are from page one of the Perfect Assassin's page proofs.… Continue reading From the Debut Trenches: Page Proofs
