A Time For Everything

Let's Catch Up, Shall We...?

Mason Marchment hugs goalie Jake Oettinger.

Well, how 'bout dem Stars? Yup, our boys in Victory Green won the first round against the Minnesota Wild. In a shocking turn of events, the Seattle Kraken eliminated reigning champs the Colorado Avalanche, and so we'll play the Kraken in the second round. Round Two starts Tuesday at the American Airlines Center

DD and I had hoped to attend at least one game in each series, but tickets for series two are already over $100 each and I really can't justify that. Not with everything else I'm trying to do. Maybe when they reach the Stanley Cup Final... But in the mean time, it's gonna be watch parties.

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The author event at the library a couple of weeks ago went well. I had two titles at two different price points available and sold one of each. Woo hoo! I also donated one of the historicals to the library.

Shout out to Alison Long at the Haltom City Public Library, who is made of awesomesauce. The event was lovely as it always is. And... While I was there, I got a library card so that I now have a second library system's e-book collection to check books out of!

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We're no longer trying to re-home Waldo and Rascal. I'm officially their new mom. I've been working on a post about Rascal so that'll be coming along in a bit.

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I have finally taken the plunge back into writing. Well, revisions mostly. As I've mentioned more than once, I put writing aside last year when Mom happened. I was right in the middle of a book at the time, so it's been sitting there and those boys have been waiting patiently for me to finish telling their tale.

In June, I'm going to my annual writers retreat, and I wanted to work on this particular book. I know it isn't ready for me to make any kind of writing progress on it and that I'd need to read it through to figure out what's what.

Well, I dove in and let me tell you--that manuscript is a hot mess on fire in a dumpster. So many inconsistencies not only in the timeline, but in the story path I wanted to take. So that's what I've been doing. Asking and answering questions, making decisions, and untangling the knots I created for myself.

It's challenging and frustrating, but it also feels really good. :0)

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On a writing side-note, I got the cover for book six in hopes that it would motivate me to finish book five. I want to complete the series sooner rather than later, and I can't move on to Six before I finish Five.

I'm pleased with it.

Have a super week. Catch you Thursday. Also:

The books are all nestled, all snug in their box, while visions of dollars dance through my head...

Okay, not really, but it would be exciting if I came home with fewer books than I left with. :0)

In the meantime, I've dug out all my stuff and have setup a facsimile of my table at home so I know what it's supposed to look like. Since I have physical books this year, it has to be a little different, so yeah--dry run.

There will more authors and probably more visitors this year since the event is being held on a Saturday during normal library hours...

That's a little nerve racking to me since, as I've mentioned before, my choice of genre is not quite as mainstream or accepted as many others... I'll have a lot of my dear friends close at hand and so I'm choosing to believe it'll all be fine.

The coordinator sent out a huge list of questions which I've been working on writing up answers to...not all of them will be used at the event, so I'll have them to utilize here or at my Goodreads presence.

On another note, I'm not happy with the printed copies of one of the books--not after spending close to $70 for twelve copies that are now "damaged."

The proof copy I received in regards to the cover was perfect. Now the placement of the title and author name on the spine left something to be desired and Amazon had no way for me to fix it.

So I ended up just deleting both and asking DD to print me some, let's just say, labels on her Cricut. But when I got the new actual copies, the cover image was skewed and bits of the illustrated frame were cut off during the trimming process. UGH.

I wonder if the removal of the text shifted the image somehow...but how? Or why? Not that it matters at this point, so not only am I unhappy, but I'm disappointed.

Now the physical book I received from Draft2Digital looks great. Their system took care of all the logistics. The front cover looks super as the cover image is lined up correctly with the edges of the spine. The title and my name are properly centered on the spine...

So, probably needless to say, but moving forward I'll be getting physical books from D2D.

I guess I'm as ready as I'll ever be for Saturday's event.

Have a great weekend.

It's not what you think, lol.

Picture taken by the husband of the lady in purple who is the only one not an author.

She is, however, part of a group that promotes Texas authors and she wanted the picture, but she graciously allowed us all to grab it.

Anywho...

For the last handful of years, the Hurst Public Library hosts an event called "A Night of Romance." Almost a dozen of my writer group peeps have attended over the years and I was invited a few years ago as well.

While I'm not traveling to conferences for the next couple of years, I'm happy to participate in anything local.

So that event was held this past Friday. A good time was had by all. Sadly the number of authors in attendance was way lower than in years past. One has a new career and was unable to attend. One has moved out of state. As for the rest, I'm not sure. Lingering COVID fears / hangovers maybe? Next year, I'll have to remember to share the opportunity with my writers group as soon as I get the email from the coordinator.

Here's my table...

This year there was also belly dancing!

Just FYI, belly dancing is not for skinny women with no hips. :0) Kudos to these women.

I don't get a lot of purchases at this thing, partially because I don't have physical books, which I might have to work on for next year. Maybe have one or two books ONLY in physical form, but also because it seems like a lot of the visitors are much older women who don't read m/m romance or are women with their other halves, neither of whom are interested. And I get it. It's a bit of a niche genre.

I also think the fact that it is mm romance needs to be more obvious as well. Maybe I need a new table runner that includes "author of MM romance" or one that bears my tag line...

Lots of time to ponder and prepare.

This year I also participated in the panel. There were four of us and we just answered general questions. Thankfully the questions were sent in advance to I could percolate my answers ahead of time.

If you'd like to watch the panel, click here.

I had fun as always and am looking forward to next year already. If you're in the local area, maybe you can stop by.

Have a great week.

Back when I first registered for last year's GRL (2020), which became this year's GRL (2021), I did so as an "author" because the "featured author" tier sold out, as it usually does, in a matter of minutes. I'm not kidding. So I put myself on the waiting list for a featured author slot should one become available. That was a year and a half ago and I don't remember doing so.

However, I got an email from the organizers on Wednesday saying there was a slot available. I had forty-eight hours to let them know if I wanted to upgrade.

Did I?

I had to weigh the cons--the additional $100--against the pros: additional exposure by way of added opportunities. I talked to a few fellow authors, one in my genre and also attending and two online friends, not in the genre, as well as to DD. Three of the four were of the opinion I should go for it.

So I'm going for it. I let the organizers know I wanted the slot and am awaiting instructions for upgrade.

One of the additional opportunities is to participate in an author Q&A or in a storyteller panel (topic TBD by me or by someone else). Both of these make me nervous. Not because I'm nervous about talking in front of people. As long as I know what I'm talking about, I'm fine.

But because the Q&A is "on the fly" and my brain doesn't always process immediately or well until I've had time to think about things. Now I'd be talking about myself mostly, so that shouldn't be terrible. I know myself pretty well, right? But I attended some of these when I went to Albuquerque and Portsmouth to see what they were like and sometimes the questions do require more processing. Maybe I take a notepad and write down the questions to circle back to...

I'd prefer a storyteller panel because I could research and be prepared, but what could I possibly offer except a primer on hockey and the interest in that would probably be pretty small. And panel means more than one person and that means me soliciting others or others soliciting me to participate. The challenge there is that I'm new. No one knows me, I don't know anyone. Most of the attendees have been going since the conference started and they all know one another. This crowd can be a bit intimidating.

DD suggested I just not participate. Which is definitely an option. But I'd hate to let it go to waste...

So if I can come up a really cool idea for a panel topic, I'll go that route. If I chicken out, I'll default to the Q&A...

Topic suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Have a great weekend!!