So I'm Rewriting a Novel...

The Land Beyond the Portal, my first published novel, is actually the second novel I ever completed. (At some point after I'd started writing it, I put it away for a few years and wrote a novel about shapeshifting lizard aliens called Solorthians. It is unlikely, for reasons needless to state, that this novel will ever see the light of day.)

Back to The Land Beyond the Portal. I finished the first draft in 2010. It was released in 2011. In 2012 I poured my heart out writing Rage's Echo, and while I did so I noticed that a profound change had taken place in my writing.

Fast forward to 2015. I knew it was time to redo The Land Beyond the Portal, quite simply because the writing itself was weaker than it is currently. I'm more than 10% of the way through the first draft of the rewrite, and I thought I'd share some of the differences with you to help illustrate what I mean.

Original version

She needed some medicine for the pounding headache she had developed within the past few nerve-racking hours and started up the steps to the second-floor bathroom, where such items were kept. When she was halfway down the hallway, she heard her cell phone ringing in the living room. Her heart pounded even harder. They were finally calling her back! The teenager wondered for the thousandth time why her grandparents didn't have their own phone and raced back down the steps, not looking where she was going. She tripped over her grandfather's pair of house slippers, tumbled down five steps, and landed headfirst on the slate floor below with a sickening thud. This was met with blinding pain and abrupt darkness. She was falling, falling...

Rewritten version:

The headache pounding behind her eyes was getting out of hand. She threw a glance at the satellite clock on the fireplace mantel, sent up a prayer that someone would call her soon, and hurried up the stairs to the second-floor bathroom, where her grandmother kept what she called her “pharmacy” inside the mirrored medicine cabinet.

Her cell phone started ringing the moment she reached the top of the stairs. Her heart in her throat, she made an about-face and raced back down the stairs so fast that her feet became tangled with each other and she lost her footing on the wooden risers.

The last thing she remembered was flailing for a handhold, and then her head made contact with the hardwood floor below, sending her into abrupt darkness.

So yeah...this is what I've been doing while working on Surrender: The Chronicles of Servitude Book 3 as well as revising Sacrifice: The Chronicles of Servitude Book 2. It's funny; I never knew that I could juggle.

New New Name, and Other Updates

This blog has a new name, folks.

Again.

In the olden days, it was Where Daylight Fades. Then it was Brain Problems!

And now it is The Lonely Artist, which is more fitting than the others (even though my brain does indeed malfunction approximately 98.2% of the time).

I've been The Lonely Artist over at Read Write Muse for the past several months, and I felt it was time to make the change here, as well. Being an artist *is* often a lonely endeavor. We sit alone for hours each day refining our craft. Many of our friends exist only in our heads. Many others live far from us, and we only get to meet them in the real world on rare (but glorious!) occasions.

One such glorious occasion.

Now that that's out of the way, I have an important announcement to make: after much consideration, I've decided to terminate the contracts with my publisher for The Land Beyond the Portal and Rage's Echo. They will be republished in due time under my own imprint. I'll be sure to let you know when they are available again!

In the meantime, happy reading! We'll chat again soon.

It's Been HOW Many Years???

I started writing my first novel, The Land Beyond the Portal, in 2003.

That was twelve years ago. I was fourteen years old.

My writing has changed a lot since the days I sat down with a ballpoint pen and notebook and began to write the story that wouldn't be seen by the reading public for another eight years. Just for fun, here are some pictures from that notebook. (Don't mind the terrible penmanship. Apparently it's a requirement for authors to have bad handwriting.)

Somehow through the joys of revisions, this chicken scratch turned into a novel. Weird.

Be Polite, Stupid!

I have been a published author for four years. In those four years, I have had a lot of book signings. I’ve had signings at cafes and bagel shops and pizza places. I’ve had signings at craft fairs and antique machinery shows. I once signed books during Bingo at my old church, and even braved 40-degree weather sitting outside signing books at a donut shop, but then I caught a cold.

On April 27, 2014 I had my second-ever signing at a bookstore. The store employees set a table up by the front doors, and I covered it in a tablecloth, bookmarks, business cards, and neatly arranged my books among them.

Then I sat down and waited to ensnare innocent customers and tell them about my books.

Partway through, one of the employees walked by and I said, “I’ve sold two so far! That’s two more books than at my worst book signing!” Then he said, “That’s two more books than most of the authors here have sold at their book signings.”

At the conclusion of the signing, I pried into this matter further. According to the employees, whom I found friendly and helpful, most of the authors who have had signings at their store sat in the back, didn’t talk to any of the customers, and became angry when they didn’t sell any books.

My mind was blown.

Sure, I’ve had my fair share of disappointments. But you know what? IT ISN’T ANYONE’S FAULT. I am one author out of a million. So are you. And you and you and you. You are not a princess so it would only be logical not to act like one.

As an author, you’re probably trying to build a name for yourself. Part of this involves forming lasting relationships with other people, whether they be readers, other writers, bloggers, or–you guessed it–employees at a bookstore. If you throw a fit when things don’t go your way, you’re only hurting your reputation. Nobody wants to read something that was written by a brat.

Muser Rob says, “To connect to people in such personal ways and then behave like a tool towards the very people who facilitated the connection to whom the connection was made, just seems…counter-writer. But then again, entitlement is more contagious than the flu.”

You can say that again, Rob. It seems that some authors want to be treated like the next Stephen King when they’ve done absolutely nothing to deserve the treatment. You have to WORK to build an audience. You can’t expect a bookstore to do it for you. And treat other people the way you would like to be treated. Show some respect. If you don’t sell any books at your book signing, thank the store anyway for letting you be there and for having given you the opportunity to sell them. 

And when you refuse to talk to any of the customers at the place where you’re signing books, it’s your own fault when nobody takes an interest in your novel. You know what I do? I greet people as they walk by. Then I ask them what they like to read. Then I tell them what my novels are about.

It’s that easy.

Granted, many people still won’t be interested in your books. And that’s okay. Not everyone reads thrillers. Not everyone reads paranormal romance. Not everyone reads mysteries. Find the people who do. And be nice to them. Because when you’re rude, you give authors a bad name and pretty much kill your chances of ever being successful.

So, authors, I implore you to be polite with everyone you encounter, whether it’s online, on the phone, or in person. BE POLITE. Because if you don’t, I will find you. And then I will kick your butt.

A Belated New Year

I'm always the sort of person who lags behind. I still don't own a smart phone. My Christmas tree is still up. I put up my 2015 calendar yesterday. That water bill I've been meaning to pay is still sitting on the table amid a bunch of crap I need to clean off of it.

I haven't even set up any events yet this year. I should probably be ashamed of myself.

What HAVE I been doing, you ask?

Well, I've been writing, catching up with my reading, and staying inside with my cats where it's warm.

With kitties as cute as these, wouldn't you stay inside with them, too? ;)

I'll start posting updates about my current projects when they near completion. In the meantime, stay warm, and have a happy new year!

Servant: The Chronicles of Servitude, Book 1

Servant has been released.

It has a shiny new cover (it's a long story why I ultimately could not use the first one, which was beautiful), and is my thickest novel to date, which is a little bit misleading since it's printed on thicker paper than my previous two novels. I mean, it DOES have more words than the other two, but if it was printed on the same kind of paper as the other two, it wouldn't be as thick as it is.

Wait, am I rambling? [glances around nervously]

Anyway.

Servant has been more than three years in the making. Needless to say, I'm glad this project is finished. In the meantime I've been working on a manuscript called SACRIFICE, which will be Book 2 in The Chronicles of Servitude. (If you couldn't guess, Servant is Book 1. Solitude is Book 0. It's fun counting from zero.) Sacrifice will probably be released in the fall of 2015. I say "probably" because crazy things happen and like to throw giant wrenches into one's plans.

Blue Harvest Creative did an amazing job formatting Servant and designing the cover. And look how they did the interior!

Servant is available in both Kindle and paperback formats from Amazon. You can order the Kindle version here and the paperback here. Happy reading!

Bobby Roland knows things he shouldn't. 

Plagued with premonitions of disaster, he fights to save others’ lives. What Bobby doesn't foresee is that rescuing a stranger from death will place him in the line of fire. 

He discovers a world of evil spirits and tormented souls when he becomes entangled in a madman's plot to kill the Servant, a man chosen by God to exorcise demons from the possessed. When Bobby falls under spiritual attack following the encounter, he must choose between saving others and saving himself.

Solitude: The Chronicles of Servitude, Book 0

Yesterday, September 9, the prequel short story to my upcoming series of novels was released on Amazon.

Originally I had no plans of writing Solitude. Servant was to be the first book of the series, and that was good enough for me.

But then fellow authors Katie Cross and LaDonna Cole each released stories that tied into their own series of novels, and my author brain said, "Hey, I can do that, too!"

To my surprise, it wasn't that hard for me to come up with an idea for a story that would lead into the beginning of Servant. In Servant, twenty-year-old protagonist Bobby Roland has been in Oregon for a year after previously having lived in Utah, New York, and Ohio. Bobby tells Randy Bellison, a man who for some reason seems to attract poltergeists or some other unsavory thing, that he used to work at a music store in Utah before moving to Oregon.

And you know what's funny? I had no idea what compelled Bobby to pack up his bags and leave Utah.

So when writing Solitude, I finally figured out why, and now you can, too.

Premonitions of disaster tend to put a damper on one's plans. 

Bobby Roland would much rather spend his evenings practicing songs on his electric guitar, but fate has a different idea tonight. 

Bobby hangs out with a local rock band on the weekends, and he knows one of the members will be killed at tonight’s jam session. But who will be hurt, and how will Bobby save him? Can he set aside his fear and be vigilant enough to find out, or will it be too late?

Download your very own copy of Solitude today!

http://www.amazon.com/Solitude-Chronicles-Servitude-Story-Book-ebook/dp/B00NE9EBA4/ref=la_B00BPFG71A_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1410364158&sr=1-5

And add it to your to-read list on Goodreads, too!

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23171260-solitude

If you've read this far, let me tell you a fun little fact. A couple years ago I discovered The Piano Guys, a beautiful music group from Utah, and that's where I came up with the idea that Bobby worked in a music store there. Also, go listen to The Piano Guys. There's a cello involved, too, but I guess "The Cello Guys" didn't sound as good.