Monday after Christmas…

Good morning! I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. As for me, it was awesome. But I do have to confess that I’m glad it’s over. Now don’t get me wrong, I love being with friends and family, but I love when things get back to normal.

I’ve heard so many writers telling this weekend that their writing time suffered during the holidays and I know that for myself. I’m behind on my current work in progress, but hopefully somewhere in between IRS testing that has to be done by midnight the 31st and cleaning up Christmas decorations, I’ll get caught up! It may take a lot of coffee…

So, how was your Christmas holiday?

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

The Monday before Christmas…

It was the Monday before Christmas and all through my house… LOL, it’s too early to rhyme! There’s only 6 shopping days left and I’m so far behind. Wow! Normally I’m done by now, everything’s wrapped and life is good. Not this year! What happened to the month of December? I know something happened to at least a couple of days because it just started and now it’s almost Christmas. Oh well, if all else fells, gift cards 😉

Not sure if anyone noticed, but I released my Christmas book in the last four days! Falling Snow is now available, but only on Amazon. Yes, you heard me right, I’m doing a little experiment to see how Kindle Unlimited does. I used it when I first started to publish but decided to expand the distribution further. So far so good.

falling-snow-front-cover200

This book is an interesting mix of heartwarming romance and suspense. This romance is based at a bed and breakfast called Gingerbread House in the north Virginia mountains. If you like this one, then you’ll love the book that will follow it. It’s not called a series, but I’ve planned several books that go along the same type of heartwarming mixed with suspense type theme.

So, have you grabbed your copy of Falling Snow? If not, here’s the link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01NAK6V37. I want you to fall in love with Katie and Noah!

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Saturday morning ramblings…

Good morning! First off, I need everyone’s help in voting for the Solstice Author of the Year! Here’s the link: http://solsticepublishing.com/vote-for-author-of-the-year/ so please go by and vote. Voting will make you eligible for goodies.

Now, on to my post for the day. As I’ve been talking about this week, I have designed a neat calendar that helps me somewhat stay on track. But as most writers know, things happen, things change.

I’ve tried several kinds of calendars and nothing really worked for me, so, I sat down and figured this out. I knew that having a whole month in front of me just stressed me out. I don’t need to be reminded that I have something releasing in two weeks or have 20,000 words to do before the end of the month.

The calendar I created is a weekly calendar. Yes, I know there are hundreds of those out there, but not like the one I created. I made it large enough to fit a 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper. each day has a large enough square that I can write the name of the book or books for each day, the word count I need to do to stay on schedule, and I can also put how far I am from finishing. Also, I have a side column for each day that gives me room for notes and thoughts that I can use for future projects or just character adjusts. Then I can mark those off as I go.

So, forgive the amateur photo, I’m not a photographer, just a writer…

As I said, it’s nothing fancy, but it works really good for me. I have enough room to be wordy if I need to be. Also, and I stress this heavily, use a pencil for your entries. That way when life comes in and wrecks your schedule, you can just erase and move on.

On release days, write those in colored pencil, that way they stand out. Yes, I need something to jog my memory or I’ll go right by the release day and forget all about it…

This is just the way I do things… Hope it helps. I’ve been playing with the idea of doing a book on being a Self-Published author, but we’ll see where that fits into my schedule. My assistant informed me that the books I now have scheduled go into 2018, but I may have to squeeze it in. At least I have the room to write it in…

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

My writer’s bag of goodies!

As I promised in yesterday’s post, here’s my writing bag. This bag goes with me everywhere, even the beach. Also, one thing, if you’d like a writer’s bag, I’ll set up one like mine for a fee. I love helping authors get started in this amazing business.

So, here’s the full package:

Ok, so I know you’re curious what everything is, so here we go:

1: Most important, the bag. It needs to be large enough to hold everything and have a padded section for your laptop. Also, pockets on the inside help keep everything separated. This bag was purchased at Walmart for only $20 and it is perfect and roomy as you can tell in the picture on the right.

2: I always keep a couple of notebooks handy for notes. The large black spiral book is for scene breakdowns and the cute smaller one with the leaves on it is for upcoming projects along with notes for characters. Of course, with notebooks, always have a couple of pens, sharpies, and pencils on hand!

3: The yellow binder holds my schedule, which I’ll share another day this week. It’s a special schedule that I’ve set up for myself which helps and I’ve changed it several times until it was just right for me. It also has pockets and extra pages for additional notes.

4: The large green accordion folder is labeled by month. Each month holds a folder for each individual book that is to be written that month. Inside the folder, I put notes, outlines, character sketches, and pictures that inspire things in the book.

5: My wrist brace is always with me. Yeah, I know, I’m getting older and need a little help every once in a while, but it’s always available for when my wrist gets stiff or painful.

6: Index cards are also included for quick notes and plotting. I like to number them and lay them out beside me as I write.

7: Of course my laptop is included along with a mouse and my trusty laptop lap desk, which of course doesn’t fit in my bag. But if you’ll notice, it has a handle so I can hold it along with the bag.

8: Headphones are essential for listening to inspiring music, which I’ll also post something on in the coming days. I always have a couple of pairs, just in case I misplace a set or one goes out.

9: Last but not least, my Kindle. It’s for research!!! Authors need to read a lot in their genre, to keep fresh. So, when I’m stumped, I read 😉

Ok, so you know some of my secrets! Shhhhh! Don’t tell anyone that I’m somewhat organized because it will totally throw off my reputation.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

Ghost Lover on Sale!

Ghost Lover will go on sale later today! It’s the first book I published and the one that made me a bestselling author in its first year!

christmas-sale

Writing on a schedule…LOL!

Good Tuesday morning!

I’ve been working on my 2017 writing project schedule and it’s so exciting thinking about the future works that will come from this crazy writer’s head. One of the problems with setting this up is as I think about the new works, my mind wants to write them, now!

But, I’m trying to be a disciplined writer… yeah, that just doesn’t work for me. Now, let’s just get this one thing straight, I do schedule the books release dates and make sure that I have enough time between now and the release date to write said book, edit and to revisions.

The funny thing about this writer’s brain is that stories are constantly coming into my head, so what do I do when that happens so that I don’t lose it. I have a handy dandy notebook that says in my writer bag. Writer bag? Yes, my writer bag. Tomorrow’s post will be all about my writer bag. It’s quite nifty even if I do say so myself.

But, back to scheduling, whew, I get so distracted. As for scheduling, as a writer, I do need some discipline or I’d never finish a single piece of work. It is fascinating to me when I sit down to work on my schedule for the next year. Of course, I always have works that spill over into the new year, but then I need to fill up the rest of the year. Right now I have works scheduled into 2018, which is amazing.

So, if you haven’t tried working out a schedule, I suggest you sit down and pull out a calendar or planner. All you need to do is make a list of your current work in progress, then a list of upcoming works. Figure out the word count that you desire, divide it by the word count that you want to complete on a daily basis. Now you’re ready to write them in your calendar and schedule it out. Believe me, the time and effort it takes will be well worth it. But remember, don’t over schedule yourself, which I have a tendency to do. Make a workable schedule and enjoy the moment you finish each work of art.

As always, good writing and May God Bless You…

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Without Internet! What I learned

Good morning! It’s good to be back with the rest of the world. If you’ve noticed I was absent for several days, which is due to the fact that I had no internet since last Wednesday. It was very eye-opening, to say the least, and here’s what I learned in those six days without connection to the world.

Let’s start with, I grew up in the age before the internet; so I’m aware of what it’s like not to have it, but when you run a business in today’s world, it’s detrimental to have it. I never realized until this past six days how many of my programs need the internet to run efficiently. Of course, I could do some things, but the bulk of the program wouldn’t work due to no connection to the main server, wow!

As a writer, it was a quiet time with no conversations with fans or fellow writers. Also, I finished a book and was set to release it, but guess what can’t do that without internet. And as a writer, I need to promote, promote, promote, that also can’t be done without the internet. I felt like I was out in a remote field somewhere without food or water, in regards to my writing. But as luck would have it, I was able to meet my daily word counts and expand on them without the interruption of social media, that was a plus!

In a whole, I felt disconnected with the world and I can say I’m happy to be back with the living. It’s not just the social media aspect, which is important when you are an author and also run a website/publishing company, but it’s the fact that in today’s world, the internet holds an important role in most everything we do.

With that said, it’s wonderful to be back with all of you wonderful people. Now, on with my life which is already in progress.

As always, good writing and May God Bless you…