Falling Into Autumn

What? It’s September? How in the name of holy frijoles did that happen?

If I’ve been quiet on the blog (and there’s really no ‘if’ about it), it’s because I’ve been working up a storm. Actually, storm doesn’t even cover it. It’s been more of a tsunami of productivity.

My first priority has been to make sure I’m doing everything I need to in order to get DRUID LORDS out by the end of the year. Right now, the release date is set for December 14th. I’m leaving myself a little wiggle-room. After all, that’s still three months away and both hell and highwater could come before then. That being said, I’m on track. I’ve got this month to finish the draft, a few weeks for changes, a couple weeks for betas, a couple weeks for more changes, a couple weeks for editing, a couple weeks for more changes, then BOOM! It’s December!

If you actually want to know specifically what I’ve been doing daily, I’ve been posting updates on twitter like this one:

If I titled chapters, I’d call Chapter 14 of DRUID LORDS: “Where everything goes to shit and hand-waving freak-outery ensues”

I’ve been told by a certain friend that it’s probably a good thing I don’t title my chapters. She has a point.

My other work has consisted mostly of freelance jobs: one editing job and two cover art jobs. I don’t seek out new clients anymore for either type of work. I keep a pretty break-neck schedule with my own writing. But, these projects were all for women I’d worked with before, and, I’ll admit, I enjoy it.

I’ve also been reading. I’ve read some truly dire books. Just this week I deleted four books from my Kindle after having not even gotten through the first chapter. I usually try to give them more of a chance than that, but honestly! I have 214 unread books on my Kindle. Life is too short (and my to-be-read pile too long) to read books that have me cringing by page three.

That being said, I did read some good books this month!

In the fantasy category, I read Lindsay Buroker’s Emperor’s Edge. What I loved about this series (I read them all!) was the shameless adventure and funny, engaging characters. The first book in the series is permenantly free, so if you’re up for a rolicking steampunk adventure, you’ve got nothing to lose!

I also read a quite engaging mystery called Murder on the Mind by LL Barrett. This one is more a psychological thriller, I’d say, than a edge-of-your-seat type ride, but I enjoyed the depth and the different take on the mystery. It’s a sort of amateur sleuth setup, with an interesting twist. The main character is an insurance investigator who lives through an attack that leaves him with mild brain-damage. However, when he’s in recovery, he starts having dreams and even hallucinations of the most gruesome kind. Turns out, the things he’s seeing might actually be real.

The last book was an interesting one… I don’t read much non-fiction (beyond the news, but that sometimes feels more like fiction), but this book caught my eye because it was written by an FBI veteren who specialises in the field of behavioural analysis. The book is called It’s Not All About “Me”: The Top Ten Techniques for Building Quick Rapport with Anyone. I picked it up because the fictional cop in my Caledonia fae series, Munro, is interrogating someone in DRUID LORDS that proves to be quite a tough nut to crack. Now, I’m far too polite a person to grill someone, so I have to admit I have no idea how to get someone to tell you something they don’t want to. I thought this book might give me some insight, and it certainly did! Not only did I learn that Munro was going about his questioning completely the wrong way, I also realised why I react to some people the way I do, why some people turn me off instantly while others I open up to easily. It’s quite an interesting read. It’s short, but the information I gleaned from the book made it very much worthwhile.

So… this has been my summer, pretty much! Work, work, work, with a smattering of reading. I can’t believe it’s aumtum already, but looking forward, I have a packed schedule between now and the end of the year. I’ve more to do than I can handle… plus there’s those 214 unread books on my Kindle…