Flight of Crow Girl release and Audiobook take 2

So, trying out new things promotion and release wise. The Crow Girl sequel, "The Flight of Crow GIrl" will be released in paperback as soon as createspace sends Amazon the file. For now, it's Free for download on instafreebie. Also if you sign up for my newsletter you will get a welcome email with a link to download the original Crow Girl for free.

So that's done. Now I'm going back to attempting to record an audio book after being busy with that all day. The first time I attempted this was my last day off. I was rearing and reading to go and attempted to record for hours. Stepped back, took a break, and joined a facebook group for ACX narrators and got some help.

Now I'm back on my day off again. I've got my headset on. I've got Audacity pulled up. I've got the manuscript pulled up.......and I"m feeling like a total knob for sitting here talking to myself.

I should probably get up and eat something since the calories I have consumed since I woke up came from coffee and coffee creamer. I'll probably need some Jameson too.

Then I'll have to record a little bit at the end of the book thanking Jameson and Kerrygold for making the booze and cheese that got me through recording this audio book.

I DO have several books posted for audition on ACX that need accents I'm not sure I can do or a male narrator. I should, in theory, be able to record this series myself, since I've been performing in some capacity or the other since I was 7. I've done live theatre, sang solos, DANCED solos, done monoloques, etc.

Maybe I need to bring my laptop to starbucks and perform this audio book for everyone there. Maybe what's missing is the audience. Do you think they would ban me if I made it entertaining and kept buying frappucinos while I was there? Even when I get to the part in the book about the botanist with a foot fetish? Maybe they'll even let me stay when I start talking dick pics? Startbucks is pretty liberal, right?

All the feels and ideas for sequels

I'm getting all sorts of feels and ideas for sequels to both Crow Girl and Salome. Not like, extended series like the Mauve books, more like me hopping on stage, having my say, dropping the mic, and exiting stage left. I've been thinking maybe I should just jump on a real stage and grab a mic from someone, but they tend to arrest you for that. If I write these sequels, I can sit quietly behind my computer with my coffee and this fucking cat who keeps trying to sit on my mouse.

I never actually set out to write any series at all. I've actually been reading several series by several famous authors since I was around 13 or so. Mainly, I stole them from my mum or read the back while she was grocery shopping and demanded she buy it for me. My mum let me read all sorts of inappropriate things as a child.

As I am much older than thirteen now, I still read some of these series, almost 30 years later. Now that I'm writing, when I read these series, they kind of scare me. I see they are popular and hell, I've been reading them for decades. But in most cases, these series are all the author writes anymore and they write full time, unlike me.

I kind of think about how their fans would react if they decided to totally switch genres and write something else. Say, a crime writer gets an idea for a fantasy book or a fantasy writer wants to switch and write a political thriller. These authors have a fan base who expects certain things from their books and I wonder if they ever feel trapped by their series and characters or if they enjoy writing them just as much as the first time they created them.

Obviously, I have 0 fan base and I write what pops in my head or what I happened to dream that night. I'm pretty much all over the place genre-wise and that's where I prefer to stay. I had a blast writing The Spirus series and have ideas for future books. The Mauve series is going to follow her complete training until they eventually catch The Arm. I don't know if I'll continue once she's a fully trained agent. There may be something there when I get to that point, but I will keep writing the series until she gets her black belt and catches The Arm. She's only working on her green belt right now, so there's several more books like.

So yeah, the idea of writing a series and it catching on scares the shit out of me. Don't ask me why I have ideas for sequels popping into my head every night when I'm trying to sleep, but they are. I'm getting faster at writing, so the Crow Girl and Salome sequel may end up happening between Mauve books. I have no idea if these sequels keep popping into my head because my latest books are a lot shorter than my first three and maybe I'm just not FINISHED with it when I think I am. Maybe when I think I'm done, I need to stick it in a ziplock baggie in the fridge to marinate for a few days or go sit in the corner with a dunce cap on until I'm SURE I've said everything I wanted to say.

Oh, and by the way, Mauve: Origins is back to being perma free on Amazon now that my KU enrollment is up. I'm going to say don't go download it because it you like it, you may download the other books, then other people might do the same and people might start expecting things from me.

I'm going to go sit awkwardly in the corner with my dunce cap now

Special Agent Mauve Origins update

The original Special Agent Mauve story is getting a few new updates. I recently went through and cleaned it up and gave it similar formatting and graphics like the second book and what I'm doing with the third book.

Since my Kindle unlimited enrollment for the Origins story will be up on the 4th and I can go back to making it permafree (read the fine print, people. It saves lives). I decided to update the cover on Origins so that it's more in line with the second book and what I did with the third.

The new cover will be submitted tomorrow and the book will go back to always being free on the 5th, or as soon as Amazon responds to my message and makes it free again.

But lets have a cover reveal in the meantime, shall we?

Coming Soon! New Mauve book!

Mauve Part 3, the saga continues.

There's a new hacker group that could possibly bring Mauve and her team closer to The Arm. To gain access to The Vipers and to get closer to The Arm, Mauve, Cadmium, and Jeremy must go deep under cover in Louisiana, pretending to be claims adjusters. The new bounty on the hacker forum involves a program written written Affirmative, Jeremy's previous employer and Mauve and her team's last bust. The program is meant to exploit the high insurance fraud in Louisiana and give the hackers the data to blackmail those committing fraud.

While in New Orleans, the mysterious Cadmium's past blows up on everyone there. Armed with the tools they need, our trio returns home to continue their training and see how many busts they can get from this one undercover operation. Can they get The Arm this time?

Mauve part 2, the full length, is done and I've set the scene for another full length book. But no cliff hanger because I fricking hate those. If you need me, I'll be in an editing blanket fort with nicotine, caffeine, and rum

And dear government looking at my search history, I'm not REALLY going to hack any government websites, it was just research for a book. I'm also not snorting cocaine or making gun powder and acid if you were looking at my search history for other books

Combined works

When you put them all together, it looks like I actually got some shit done

Mauve-The full length book. Coming soon

What do hackers, a hairless cat, hipsters, a botanist with a foot fetish, and dick pics have in common?

You probably sent me a messed up PM on facebook and got snarked on in Mauve's full length book. Nothing is sacred and I make fun of everything.

I think I went a little more Palahniuk than The Naked Gun with this one, but it's still in the same spirit as the original short story, even if I got a little gross. Grosser than barfing on someone. (That entire thing with the eggrolls totally happened to me in real life in the 6th grade when I was traveling with a group. I was stuck in a van for hours with just a garbage bag and a bunch of people mad at me for getting food poisoning) Thankfully, most gas station food has progressed since way back when I was 11. There's a pretty sweet gas station by my parents house that sells Greek food in the corner. Like, real, delicious Greek food that doesn't give you food poisoning.

Which is more than I can say for the grocery story by my house. Sometimes, when I edit, I need donuts. I crave donuts. I go all Homer Simpson for donuts and can't get any work done unless I get a donut in my face hole. Do you know how awful it is to get donuts ruined for you because you got food poisoning from donuts from the grocery store by your house? It put me off donuts for a good month. Until I needed to edit again.

Protip: When editing or writing, the Waitr app will deliver delicious donuts, Greek food, or Indian food directly to your facehole so you don't have to take a break to cook if you're in the middle of an intense scene

Special Agent Mauve and The Spirus

Special Agent Mauve was a silly little short story I wrote based on a dream I had and a rather mortifying experience in the sixth grade (if you've read it, the eggrolls happened to me in real life). A few reviewers have gotten upset with me because it wasn't longer and thought it ended too quickly.

So little Agent Mauve is getting her own full length novel. I'm about 15K words in. We see more of Mauve's personal life and there is a new mission with new shenanigans. Will Mauve save the day in her own special way?

I'm also working on the fourth book in the Spirus series. We learn more about the tribes and Lisana finally takes the throne. We learn more about the crowning ceremonies for the tribes and we explore what the Spirus gifts can do in this book.

There are things that are required viewing when I'm writing. There's either movies I watch or television shows. I ended up switching from showtime to Starz when I found out Starz was doing both the White Princess and American Gods. I also found a plethora of period time shows for me to watch while I'm working on the Spirus books. How did I not have Starz before? I've watched Outlander, Pillars of the Earth, and now I'm watching Davinci's Demons.

There is different required viewing for the Mauve series, which I'm working on at the same time. The fact that I can stream every single season of the Golden Girls is quite a beautiful thing. I'm working my way through season 1 as I write. Blanche is my spirit animal and I speak Sophia.

Also, Midnight's Sonata will be free on Amazon tomorrow. So be on the lookout. Mauve is getting her own book and the fourth book in the Spirus series will be dropping soon

BOOK SALE!

Feet of Clay and Midnight's Sonata are on sale for $.99. I meant to blog when the price first changed, but the past few days have been insane.

I work from home and just started another job. They still do not have my direct deposit set up straight. My bank has an app to deposit checks, but they can't be over a certain amount. I don't like driving to the ATM as late as I get off work and it takes away from my writing time. I have another checking account linked to my main bank, and deposit my check using their app.

I've been making these pretty awesome milkshakes with Tiramisu gelato, Bailey's, and Kahlua. I haven't put a dent in the Kahlua bottle because it's bigger than I am, but I'm running low on Baileys. Head over to Costco because I need groceries. Find out Costco has $4000 booze. I'm a much cheaper date. Grab a bottle of Baileys bigger than I am, find new food stuff that I am really excited about and go to check out. I have no idea what the Pin is on the debit card for my other checking and it takes several days to transfer to the account with the pin I know. Get told I cannot run that card as credit because of the type of card it is. And on top of it, she made me fish out my license and prove I am over 21, even though I'm WAY over 21.

Made sad panda face and went to Target. Found out boxed water is a thing. No idea if someone is waiting for Jesus to come turn that into boxed wine, but why??? Also, one can buy jarred pork fat. Maybe it's my southern showing, but I thought everyone had a canister on the stove with a strainer that you pour your bacon fat in after you cook to save it for later. It looked like coconut oil and I know I would have been really upset if I grabbed it thinking it was and brought it home and tried to make fat bombs with it.

ANYWAY, Yeah. Feet of Clay and Midnight's Sonata are both $.99 pretty much everywhere if the changes have gone through on all the sites. Special Agent Mauve is permafree. I need to go in and make Flash Permafree on Amazon, I just haven't had the time.

I've hired a PA and she's been awesome and hosted a few take overs for me. I've given away a few ARC's for Feet of Clay and hope to start getting feedback soon. When I write, I pretty much sit here thinking it's garbage, then I do my rewrites like, this isn't so bad, then I edit like OMG THIS IS TOTAL GARBAGE but then I hit publish and put it into the wind and try to promote it because maybe someone out there will like it.

Southern editing and Feet of Clay

I've been in a funk for over a month. There is a date in June that is a very hard day for me. Feet of Clay has been finished for two months now and all I've needed to do is write the blurb. Rather than write it, I've been in a blanket fort with Netflix editing. I thought I was going to be able to come out last month, then that day in June happened and I've hated everything I've written, so I've still been editing.

I've gone through Midnight's Sonata again and I'm giving Feet of Clay one last go through, then I think I may finally write the blurb and send it off.

I live in Louisiana and have my entire life. There are things about me that are very southern and things that are not. Most of the time, when I call people at work, certain parishes with thick southern accents can't understand me and keep asking if I'm from California or New York. I dislike sweet tea and like my tea bitter like my soul. There are people who think I am rude because I go straight for "wow, you're a stupid twunt" instead of "bless your heart". I'm a vegetarian democrat living in the south. But there are also things you can never take away from me that I got from here. I actually prefer the heat and humidity to cold weather. You can pry my Community coffee, grits, and Tony's from my cold dead heads.

How this effects my writing? Only a small portion of my work takes place in Louisiana. Very little actually. One chapter in Midnight's Sonata. Feet of Clay takes place in a fictional small town that could be anywhere. The more I edit, the more I have to check my southern and sit here thinking, fix it, Jesus.

There's several scenes in Feet of Clay where they go grocery shopping. Shopping carts are called buggies here. I had to fix that. I was also sitting here wailing one night around midnight screaming "Whyyyy does every character in my novels live in a house with a porch???" I grew up in a house with a front and back porch, but now I live in a townhouse and all I have is a door step. Every time there is a hurricane here and we lose power for what seems like forever, I bring the contents of my freezer to my parents house and they grill my tofu and the contents of their freezer on a propane grill and we all pig out on the back porch and eat all the food before it goes bad. It's just what you do when there's a hurricane.

The next novel up for me after I've submitted Feet of Clay is going to be a fantasy novel. I have ideas for a horror and a strange sci-fi. Since I've been in a mood for over a month, I haven't been sleeping well and have been lucid dreaming. If I think it will work for a story, I get out of bed when they wake me up, type it into this note pad file, and try to go back to sleep

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Special Agent Mauve now permafree

Special Agent Mauve-Origins is now permafree on Amazon and available for free on Smashwords, ibook, and many other sites.

I'm working on part two right now and there's an evil cat in it, based off several resident felines. It's a little ironic that I take a break from editing Feet of Clay to write this and one of these jerks knocks the Q off my keyboard and I can't find the key to put it back on.

I type on a USB keyboard and there is still one on my laptop keyboard, but switching between the two is awkward. I'm also realizing how much I previously undervalued that letter. As I sit here lamenting my lack of the Q key, one of the resident weirdos is just sitting behind me licking my back. He's probably going to weird out in a few minutes and go leaping across the room. This cat previously hated my guts, but he got into a fight with one of the other cats and I had to take him to the vet to get an abscess on his leg drained. He had to stay in the bathroom for a week and after a week of watching me use the toilet and shower, he now likes me. He's lived here 10 years and has hated me up until we bonded in the bathroom.

Special Agent Mauve part two will be coming out shortly. Feet of Clay is done aside from writing the blurb. I have been putting off writing the blurb for a month now because the thought makes me feel squirrely. I've been editing in my blanket fort so I don't have to do it. Sometimes there is ice cream and Netflix. Sometimes I suck my thumb and curl into the fetal position when I think about the blurb.

Next up, once I get over my blurb issues is a fantasy novel and I got the idea for a horror novel when I couldn't sleep. Because really, who wants to stick to one genre? I know the entire plot for the fantasy novel, since it's been in my head so long, but just the general idea for the horror. The rest will probably come to me at 3am when I'm trying to sleep, like always

Not adulting this month

Feet of Clay is finished. The cover is nearly finished. It's been finished since the beginning of May. Why is it not published you ask? Because I wrote the damned thing and still have no idea how to write the blurb for it, nor which genre box to put it in.

So I've been refusing to adult and write it. Everything I've ever written has been re-edited, including Midnight's Sonata, which is over 500 pages. It needed it because I found a random 3 one of these asshole cats inserted. I also started part 2 of my Special Agent Mauve series.

There's a bunch of twists in Feet of Clay and I want to write a blurb that hooks people without giving it away. I've also chatted with a friend and she believes it kinda, sorta, MAYBE could fit under dark romance, but I would have to put a warning about the end so that I don't piss people off.

I've looked at several dark romance books on Goodreads and while it kinda sorta fits there, it also doesn't. It's about a couple and a relationship. It wouldn't go under women's fiction because it's told from the point of view of the guy. The girl intentionally remains a mystery until the end, when I give her a voice through journal entries.

I went to New Orleans yesterday to see a touring show at the Saenger. I brought my Kindle so that I could finish reading the novella's I'm reviewing and my tablet JUST IN CASE I decided to adult and write the blurb. My kindle battery died right after we finished eating and got back into the car on the way to the theatre so I couldn't read.

One would think not being able to read on an hour drive home would force me to adult and write the blurb, but I gleefully stuck my fingers in my ears and said NEENER NEENER NEENER and played on facebook the entire drive home.

Eventually, I will put my big girl panties on and force myself to sit down and write this blurb like a grown ass adult.

Speaking of Special Agent Mauve, while I was in New Orleans, a rather bold pigeon crossed my path trying to eat garbage off the street. There are no attack pigeons in the second part of Special Agent Mauve like there is in the first, but there is a rather tech savvy cat that is based off my foster cat.

My foster cat is still available for adoption if anyone is looking for a cat who likes to snuggle, but also knows how to do things to your computer that causes it to blare showtunes at 2AM

Feet of Clay, new reviews, and upcoming works

I've finally finished Feet of Clay and it's going through rewrite now. I have no idea how this would fit in any of the genres on Amazon though. It's about a relationship, but a messed up one and people are supposed to be conflicted on if they want these people to end up together or not. So it's not romance. There's a few sex scenes in it, but I wanted to take a shower after writing them, even though there is nothing kinky or dirty about it. It's definitely not erotica.

Someone suggested Dark Romance to me and I'm not sure if that would be it either. He turns her into an addict and she turns him into an alcoholic. There's really nothing romantic about the relationship other than he really tries hard to make it work. I'll figure it out eventually.

Special Agent-Mauve got it's first 5 star review on Amazon and someone said it was both snarky and they enjoyed reading something that did not take itself seriously. That was what I was going for with it. I mean, there are attack pigeons in this book. The ending, what happens during her first mission, really happened to me in real life when my parents had us going on youth group trips. It's one of my most unpleasant memories, but I can life about it now.

Snarky and not taking life seriously is pretty much how I live my life, which isn't really that evident by my first novel, Midnight's Sonata, nor Feet of Clay. Those both have a little of me in there and are about serious subjects, but really, where I am now in life is that when life throws me a curve ball, I try to laugh about it.

I'm going to write a sequel to Special Agent-Mauve and I already have an idea for what that is going to be. My next book, after Feet of Clay is published, is going to be a fantasy novel I've had in the back of my head for years. Because really, who wants to be pigeonholed into one genre?

Dream vomit

I dream vomited another short story. I may expand on it eventually. Everything I've published this year has been dream vomit.

I've had sleep issues for as long as I can remember. I drove my mother crazy. I'm the oldest and everyone told her babies just sleep all the time. Then I showed up and never slept. I eventually had a sleep study done and found the right medication to knock me out and keep me out. I'm not even going to discuss the conversation that was had in the surgery room when they dosed me to knock me out and five minutes later, I'm still complaining about how much it burns in my IV and they had to dose me again. I think it has something to do with being a ginger. I read an article about it years ago.

I still have nights where I don't sleep well. Monday night was one of those nights. Then the lawn guys showed up at something like, 6AM. I dreamed "Flash-A Death Story"  sometime Monday morning.

Kate is driving home from her shift at the hospital. She knows she should take a nap somewhere before she leaves, but she needs to let her dog out. The road is not well lit and she misses her turn. As she goes over the train tracks, there is no barrier or light telling her to stop, but as she crosses, she sees the train coming. FLASH. There is a white light. Another FLASH. She wakes up naked on white stairs with people talking over her. She wakes up again and she's being experimented on. Is she in hell, purgatory, or something worse?

Now available on Amazon

Writing and things

I've just discovered that my first novel, Midnight's Sonata, which was released in January, has hit the pirating sites. They have my cover, synopsis, and a file they are claiming is mine. I'm pretty sure it's really malware as the file they have for download is twice the size of my master file. If it's not, I hope the people pirating at least pop over and leave a review.

I'm getting close to finishing my second novel, Feet of Clay, but right now, the cat desires that I play fetch with her. My little dog has not figured fetch out yet and the pit bull will play it for a little while, but after about the fifth time of throwing the ball, she just stares at me with this look on her face like, "I can't believe you just did that!" This cat cannot get enough of fetch and will play it for hours. She just dropped a hair tie on my keyboard, so it's fetch time.

I edited my short story, Special Agent Mauve for the first edition after sending it to a friend to see what she thought. There are now attack stalker pigeons. Because there needed to be, dammit. I also went on YouTube and watched several Krav Maga training videos so I could flesh out the real training and her getting knocked on her ass. I've started planning the second edition, but research is crucial.

I have a friend on Facebook who is about as far on the other end of the political spectrum as me as possible. I met him because he is awesome and adopted one of my foster kittens and friended me in the store. We will go into epic, 150 comment political Facebook debates that generally end with kitten pictures. I like people who have totally different beliefs than me that can hold civil debates about it. He got me up to speed on some of the training that will be in the second story for Special Agent Mauve.

I do have to add, there are movies I watch while I write. I watch them over and over, depending on what I'm writing. There were several that I watched over and over while I was writing Midnight's Sonata. There are those I watch while writing Feet of Clay. Sometimes it's because of the story, sometimes it's because someone in the movie reminds me of one of my characters.

For Special Agent Mauve, I binged watched all three Naked Gun movies and True Lies. Which is why the stalker pigeons were desperately needed.

I should be wrapping Feet of Clay up soon and will be looking for ARC reviewers

I've published a short story that I hopefully intend to turn into a series. It was another dream I had while half asleep, half awake.

An anonymous hacker group called "The Arm" has hacked the databases of almost all the secret agencies in the world and released the real names of every agent and people being actively recruited. All the agents have gone into hiding, as well as the recruits. Our heroine works a dead in job at the lowest totem in the insurance world. She used to watch James Bond movies with her father growing up. She views this as a chance to become a secret agent. Now that there is an agent shortage, online programs have popped up to become a secret agent. She signs up for a correspondence course to learn to be a secret agent. The course wants her to do the physical training on her own. She doesn't have much money, so she trained herself to fight using Tae Bo YouTube videos and she teaches herself to shoot with a potato gun.

She's ready to rule the world as a secret agent

Special Agent: Mauve-Origins is available on Amazon kindle. It's a short read, but I'm hoping to have longer editions for the next chapters due out pretty soon