Rise of the King -- now available!

Yes! It's never easy getting through the editing process, but once you have it finished there is no other thrill quite like it. Rise of the King, the second book in The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir fantasy series, is now available on Amazon. It's so exciting to see the story continue and see where these characters will go next.

Description:

With the second orb missing and his father dead, Kallum Syer Theras must continue on with the quest outlined in the ancient prophecy. He is forced to return to Livingston to claim the crown and locate the third orb.

Before he can reach the capital, Kallum is pulled in two directions and is forced to split the group again in order to rescue those he left behind in search of the second orb.

In Livingston, Kallum will have to face off against the Vlandamyuirian nobles to avoid a civil war to keep the Dark One sealed in his void prison while dealing with a jilted betrothed and a plot to keep him from the throne.

In celebration of the release of Rise of the King, the first book in the series, The Path of Light, is now available at the low price of just $1.99 for those of you that haven't yet been able to begin the adventure. Be sure to grab your copy today!

April -- What a month!

There is nothing like April. There are so many great reasons this month happens to be one of my favorites of the whole year. Forget for a moment that this is the month when spring starts to seem like spring. We get more sunshine. Birds sing. Flowers bloom. It is all great -- but not why April is so great.

It isn't even the fact that this particular April will see the release of the second book in The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir fantasy series. Yes, Rise of the King is in the final editing phases and will be out first as an ebook within the next week. Very exciting, but not why April is so awesome. I say that only because it's not every April -- so far in my life -- that one of my books has been released. I might have to revise that in the future. We'll see what happens next April.

We're getting closer to why April is so great when I say -- Baseball! Yes, that's right. April and Opening Day for baseball go hand-in-hand. Nothing gets me more excited than realizing from now until October I'll have a baseball game to yell, cheer, scream, and cry over. Since my team -- the 2010 World Champion San Francisco Giants -- will be taking the field this very day, I'm on the edge of my seat. Kicking off a summer full of pitching, hitting, running, sliding, and scoring makes April awesome. I'm going to savor every day of it.

However, the reason April is the best -- well, one of the best months -- is that April also happens to hold my birthday! Ah ha, yes, that is what makes April so very special -- it's got a day dedicated just to me. How can you go wrong there? My birthday and baseball -- April is hard to top!

Do you have a favorite month?

Lucky 7 Meme

Opps, It's happened again. I've gotta watch my back around that Summer girl. She's always tagging me! But seriously, I want to thank Summer from Writing Belle blog for tossing me another tag -- this time in the Lucky 7 meme. In this meme, you need to go to page 77 of your current manuscript and go to line 7 and copy 7 lines, sentences or paragraphs. Then you pass the tag along to 7 more bloggers.

I'll share a snippet from the upcoming Rise of the King: The Chronicles of Vlandaymuir Book Two, which will be coming out in April. So, if this wets anyone's appetite you can dive into the rest of the story very soon.

“Mayhap Sera is just with me this night. It has been a long stretch since I had time to test the fates.” Chance shrugged and tossed more coins into the pot.

Another few rounds and again the dice tipped and toppled into new formations after Chance tossed them. He grit his teeth and clenched a fist as it cost him another win. He hid his discomfort behind his mug, drinking deep as Jayde giggled in his mind.

“Enjoying yer game, Jayde?”

Laughing louder now, he could just picture the gleam in her eye, “Aye, I am. You should have taught me the game. I would be better at fixing things for you.”
 
I hope this little tease has caught your attention. Now, it's time to announce the recipients of my tagging! Here they are, in no particular order:

 Georgina Taylor
Ann Cory
Liv Rancourt
Wodke-Hawkison
Angela Scott
James Garcia
Morgan Shamy

To pen name or not to pen name -- That is the question.

While I love my fantasy series, and as I'm anticipating the final touches on Rise of the King, book two in The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir series, I've had some other story ideas bouncing around in my head. I'm excited about them, and have already jotted down some basic story points as I continue to let these new ideas develop.

The thing is, my new stories are in different genre than the fantasy I've been writing in so far. One is a horror short story. Well, short story right now. We'll see where it goes as it develops. My stories tend to start small and want to grow as I write. The other story is a murder mystery/romantic suspense.

I know. I'm all over the map. So, what I've been wondering is do I release these different genre under my name, which is already established as a fantasy writer, or do I release them under pen names? I know that some of my favorite authors have released different genres under different names, but eventually, it seems that they all end up feeding back to whatever name is the most popular.

I guess what it comes down to, especially in these days of social media, do we just write what we want to write and use one big brand name to cover it all? Do we establish different brands for each genre especially if they are vastly different? Is there no crossover? I know that I read many different genre so I believe that I would read something out of what I would consider the author's main genre just because I enjoy their writing and story telling.

There are so many questions, and I'm sure a ton of different ways to look at this situation. It's not something I have to decide right this moment as the other stories are still early on in the planning, plotting and writing stages. However, if I'm going to use a pen name -- the sooner you get that name out there the better, right?

My biggest fear is that I barely have enough time to attempt marketing with one name, what would I do with multiple pen names? I think I'm overwhelming myself. I definitely don't want to get swamped in social media overload -- at least not more so than I already am. Decisions, decisions -- I can see this debate lasting a while. Let me know what you think. Do you write in multiple genre? Do you write under multiple names?

Perfect timing for March Madness

I'm not saying I planned it. Sometimes you just get lucky. I am so lucky, at least in the timing, not so much with everything else. This timing worked out exactly in my favor. I finished my first round of editing and passed the book off to beta readers just in time for March Madness. Yes!

For those of you that don't know, March Madness is all about basketball. I love college basketball, and having 68 teams battling head-to-head until the championship game in April is just the best. Only thing better is of course baseball, but we have a few weeks before that gets started.

With all the focus on my editing on Rise of the King: The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir Book Two, I wasn't sure I'd be able to enjoy the games. I'd hate to be writing -- Kallum swung his sword up and the shot was good! Three pointer! -- It just wouldn't work. I have to watch out at times that I don't write what goes on around me and stay focused in one world at a time.

Now, I don't need to worry. I can sit back enjoy the games and wait for the readers to get through with the book. My basketball reward for getting the book finished. Don't you just love how things work out sometimes? The next great thing -- The book should be ready for release before opening day of baseball. Wonder how that worked out so well? Guess it's just the luck of the Irish working for me.

It's here! It's here!

So, the mail came and usually there isn't anything exciting in it. I mean, who mails things anymore, right? Anything that might make me happy would most likely arrive via email, so when the package awaited me, I got a little giddy.

I opened the package, I was pretty certain it wasn't a bomb. I mean no one would want to take me out, and there it was. I stared. I giggled. I clapped. I jumped up and down. There it was! My book in print, The Path of Light: The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir Book One! I couldn't take my eyes off it. I almost was afraid to touch it, then of course I couldn't let it go. I rubbed it and stroked, I hugged it and petted it, I thought I might call him George.

It was just a proof copy, sure, but it was my book. Suddenly, it made it all so very real. All those ideas that rattled around in my head were now tangible. I could hold them. I could stroke the pages. I could snuggle them. It was a magic moment. I'm still in shock. I can't wait to go over it for final approval and get it available to everyone else. This made my week!

I did it! I did it! I DID IT! Made my own map.

YES! YES! YES!

*DOES THE DANCE OF JOY*

It wasn't easy. Some of it wasn't pretty, but I did it. I wrestled them pixels and programs into some sense and finally created my very own map. I wasn't sure that I would be successful, but I did it! I couldn't help but take a few moments to admire and gloat over it. After all, I wasn't sure I'd ever get to see it on my computer screen in a recognizable form. It is nearly identical to the sketch I made oh-so-long-ago when I started writing The Path of Light. Now, here it is in digital form made by me. Can I gush? Can I? Oh wait, I did!

I used a combination of AutoREALM and Gimp to bring this map to life. I drew the basic map pieces in AutoREALM and then uploaded it into Gimp. With Gimp I was able to add the background, wording and compass to make it all into one piece. Then there it was, my map! Now everyone can see what I'm looking at when I'm writing on The Chronciles of Vlandamyuir. This is Vlandamyuir!

Cover reveal for Rise of the King

I'm happy to reveal the cover for the second book in The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir series. Rise of the King is nearly ready to hit the market and I hope that all of you will be able to take the time to give it a look.

If you haven't had the chance yet, be sure to grab your copy of the first book of the series, The Path of Light, so that you can be ready to continue the journey with Kallum Syer Theras and his friends as he battles the forces of the Dark One and the nobles at Ahzyr Palace to fulfill the ancient prophecy and free Vlandamyuir from the evil that stalks it.

Voices in my head

I find myself with a decision to make. I'm in the middle of putting out my fantasy series, The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir, with book two nearly complete. Ideas for book three are festering and waiting for me to start getting them down on paper. However, I also have a couple of ideas for other stories poking at me. Both are in new genres and I wonder, should I ignore them until I've gotten my fantasy series finished or should I take some time between fantasy books and work on these other ideas?

Don't get me wrong, when I say ignore...those pesky voices just don't go away...I mean I jot down the scenes in my head, sketch out some dialogue that just won't be silent, but for the most part I try and keep my focus on the book in front of me. I don't like to read more than one book at a time, it is even harder trying to write more than one book at a time.

So, I keep a notebook handy while I'm working and even in the middle of a scene for my fantasy work, something will pop into my head on one of the other ideas begging for my attention. I have pages of notes, thoughts, suggestions and scenes piling up. Since I sometimes need to write down notes for book three of my fantasy work, you can imagine how cluttered my notebook is getting. I just have to make sure I don't ever get any of them confused. It could make for a wild transition in the middle of a book.

On one hand, I suppose having ideas overflowing from your mind is a good thing. It is better to have too much to write than suffer writer's block. I've been lucky to have avoided any significant cases of writer's block. Does that mean I have really loud voices in my head? When I was little having a vivid imagination got me into trouble, now it is my source of inspiration.

I've lived with my fantasy characters for so long they are like family, I'm not in a hurry to bring their story to an end. However, these new friends just won't leave me alone. I'm definitely going to have to schedule some writing time with them so they don't get mad and leave in a huff. There is nothing more annoying than characters that get you started on a story and then give you the silent treatment.

Well, all the voices wonder why I'm writing a blog post rather than paying attention to them. Time to get back to work before one group or the other starts a war...hmmm? I wonder what would happen if...

More ideas, I hope they never end!

Book Two Status Update!

*Does the happy dance and the M&M wiggle wiggle wiggle wiggle wiggle*

So, I've been added a bit here and a bit there while staring at the computer screen and letting the letters blur together before clicking onto something exciting like Bubble Town. However, that was all before yesterday.

Yesterday, I had an epiphany! I opened up my work in progress, the second book in The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir series. Most of my procrastination with writing lately was the indecision on how I wanted to end book two and set up book three. Yesterday, I figured it out.

I sat down to write, wanting to at least make an effort into forward progress, and give me some sense of something by adding words to my word count, even if they weren't always great words or even the right words. I used a new little trick I read about called fast drafting from Lynnette Labelle's blog. The concept is straight forward. Write the dialogue, write the scene -- don't try and give a lot of description. Instead let the story flow and advance. You can fill in the gaps and flesh out the scenes more in future edits.

There have been a few difficult scenes for me to tackle in this book and this technique helped get me over the rough spots. Once the action in the story moved beyond my stumbling blocks, the rest of the book fell into place. I suddenly knew the ending and what I wanted to happen. I got 5,000 words written yesterday not including making a rough outline for the end of the book.

Mission accomplished! I was surprised that the fast drafting method did help clear my head of questions and indecision. Once that was clear, I was able to listen to my characters better and let the story flow. Hurray!

Maps and Fantasy

One of the first things I used to do when searching out the next fantasy book I was going to read was look for a map. I love fantasy books, series especially, ones with maps. It always helps me picture the layout of the land, and the relationship of the places that the characters travel.

When I first started writing my own series, I had sketched several different versions of the map to my world. I eventually had a large version tacked on my wall above my computer that I could look up at and keep myself oriented as I wrote. Then I got fancy and came up with a smaller version, slightly different than the original, in the overall shape and size of the realm in general. This was another hand-drawn offering.

Somehow over the years, my large version was misplaced, but I still have my secondary revision. I still keep it handy as I'm typing away on my second book in the series. The places are familiar. The shape of the land as well known to me as my own hometown. I love looking at the cities, the forests, the rivers, the oceans and all the places I created, but that my characters have yet to explore or discover.

My biggest disappointment with my first book The Path of Light in The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir Series, is that I didn't get my map done in a digital format. I know how maps make me feel more connected to the stories I read; I want to offer that same connection to my readers. So, after getting my book out there and realizing that if I love maps, I need to include my map, I went in search of how to accomplish this task.

Since I am a complete klutz when it comes to actually attempting to draw anything myself, I was looking into different programs that might offer me the ability to bring my hand-drawn creation into the digital age. This was easier said than done. There are a number of programs that offer you the ability to create a map for your book or project. The problem begins with the fact that I'm nearly as incompetent when dealing with drawing or creative programs as I am doing it freehand. Photoshop still intimidates me.

So, rather than waste money on programs that I figured would leave me more confused than mapped. I decided to search out any free programs that could give me a taste of what I was getting myself into without making me feel too foolish. Okay, so the foolish part would happen no matter what, because I am at a loss for most things dealing in technology. Write it down, sure. Click, drag, paste, HTML...whoa, I'm lost!

I followed a bunch of links. I looked at dozens of websites. I read several posts on a forum and everyone pretty much agreed -- There aren't a lot of good free programs to draw a map, especially if you are graphically challenged. I did find one option, AutoREALM, that was free. It has a lot of buttons, pictures, options, and stuff I have no idea what it does. After a few hours of "Let's push this button and see what happens," I knew I was in trouble.

Several test maps later, I knew whatever I did it was going to take some practice. Jumping in with both feet, I took out my hand-drawn creation and went about trying to recreate it. I would get the outline settled, add some mountains, plop in trees for the forests, draw some rivers and then decide it wasn't quite right. I am learning as I go, so I suppose that is all part of the process.

My goal, is to have a useable map to go with the second book in the series. We'll see how my graphically-challenged efforts measure up. Another good thing is, I am learning to stretch beyond my comfort zone. I'd never tackle creating a map on my own. I'm still not sure why I'm doing it to myself now, oh right, I do love a good challenge.

Around the corner...2012

With a whole new year stretching out ahead of everyone, it seems like this is the perfect time to start setting new goals, make a to-do list and plot out the next twelve months. As a writer, I know how well things go when you start plotting -- at least for me. My characters never stay within my plots. They often show me much better ideas as the story unfolds. Therefore, I don't know that goal setting, list making or outlining would be wise as I head into 2012.

If I my life was a story, I'd just write things down as they happen and find out all the surprises along the way. I know that at the start of 2011, I had no clue that by the end of the year my book would be out there to share. So, I don't know what 2012 will bring. It's exciting and scary facing the unknown.

Of course, I'm not just throwing caution to the wind and hoping and praying or anything like that. I do have plans for 2012. Book two of my The Chronicles of Vlandamyuir series is in the works. I'm hoping to have it ready for readers sometime in the spring of 2012. Writing will be a focus, but just like as I write, I don't know all the twists and turns waiting for me.

One thing I am looking forward to -- the Twilight Zone New Year's Marathon! I'm so glad Syfy does this every year. I can't get enough of TZ. I watch it every year, catching old favorites and I swear finding out new episodes as well. You'd think that would be impossible, but it's not. There is always an episode that is not familiar to me. It makes watching even more exciting. There is nothing quite like the old classics.

My goals for 2012 will remain simple for now:
Keep writing -- never know what will happen in the lives of my characters.
Watch the Twilight Zone -- the classics are a classic for a reason.
Keep reading -- what better way to expand your horizons, but by exploring other worlds.
Be happy -- it's a whole new year and the possibilities are endless!