2014 in Review

So, 2014 is almost at a close. It was a busy year, though I swear it didn't seem like it while it was occurring. Writing wise, here's what I managed to accomplish. ^^

First up, at the very beginning of the year, Battle of Will released in ebook and in print. It's probably the longest story I've ever written, coming in at a whopping 132k. o_O Little wonder I wrote little else while I was working on it. But it was a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to working on the sequel at some point next year (I'll post about 2015's projects next week).

Second up, The Duke's Deception also released at the beginning of the year, a week after Battle of Will. This was a short freebie that I wrote for a charity prompt, and it was also a lot of fun (and a relief to write something shorter!). It topped out at 8k. ^^

In June, Quality Assurance published. This wasn't a new release, but a split-from-anthology release. Originally pubbed in That Famous Happy End, it got cleaned up, freshly edited, and re-released as a stand alone. It's in the Paranormal Days 'verse, and is actually the story that kicked that 'verse off (though obviously you don't need to read the stories in any particular order).

In October, The Heart of the Kingdom released. It ran as a serial first and was meant to end after book 1, but as ya'll have heard before it's spawned into a 3-4 book series. (That will also be posted about again next week. ^^)

I also wrote The Dragon of Bellerose Island; that was released in serial at the beginning of the summer and will be included in Fairytales Slashed: Volume 6 when it comes out next year.

Also, in... I want to say July or August, LT3 re-released Living Words and Saving Liam. They both got spruced up and had some excess language cut out, and were given shiny, shiny new covers.

I wrote a bunch this year, though it doesn't seem like it. ^^ That's the downside of publishing instead of simply posting. The Errant Prince was finished this year; that comes out in February 2015. I wrote Losing Ground, which is currently running as serial and comes out in ebook in March 2015. I wrote a short fairy tale (The Cursebreaker, I think I called it), which wraps up Fairytales Volume 6 and runs in serial in early spring next year. I wrote most of The Northern Wall this year (have to finish that before I get even a hint of when it might possibly be published).

So in all, it was a pretty good writing year. ^^ I'm hoping next year will be even better, since I have a loooong list of books I want to write (and I'm sure you're all hoping for certain sequels and books yourselves). Hope 2014 was not too heinous for ya'll, and that 2015 is better than 2014 by leaps and bounds. <3

Somewhat Random: On LT3's Submission Guidelines

This recently came up in various places, and my brain works in mysterious ways and won't let it go. So, new post time! This is not my usual type of blog post, so feel free to skip this one if you don't care about non-writing stuff. ^^

Being a publisher is pretty cool. I really enjoy my job and a lot of what goes into it. I think I would go stir crazy if I were just (hah) an author. It's also interesting some of the things people don't often realize? For instance, publishing is a very specific business, particularly at the small press level. LT3 is very much a small press with one focus: LGBTQ romance. We don't publish literature, poetry, YA, etc. Our brand and what our readers expect is sweet (sometimes explicit, sometimes not) romance featuring queer characters who end up happy at the end of the book.

You should run screaming in the other direction if a publisher touts that they publish every genre (unless they're HUGE and have multiple imprints and such). If it's a 3-person operation that does, say, (1) LGBTQ erotica, (2) het erotica, and (3) LGBTQ YA, that's not a good thing. The markets for a het erotica book and an LGBTQ YA book are two entirely different things and it's a sign of being stretched too thin or not devoting anywhere near enough resources to marketing the books.

This is one reason that LT3 has not branched out into YA. We don't have the resources or the time to devote to building a YA imprint, so we don't publish YA. Likewise, our core market is sweet (typically non-explicit) LGBTQ romance. Hence we also tend to stay away from books that are heavily erotic and/or include non-consensual sex that's been eroticised (spell check is telling me this is not a word, so that could be a terrible spelling on my part, and if so uh, blame the fact that I got less than optimum sleep last night).

So when you see a press that has very specific guidelines about what they do and do not take, there's usually a practical reason for it behind the scenes, even if it's not entirely evident what the reason is.

My Life in Edits

First up, before I completely forget for the 1539208th time, LT3 is throwing a Holiday shebang, wherein you can buy books for 25% off (36% off preorders) and also enter to win Kindles and LT3 cash money (or well, LT3 gift money, which is almost like cash money??).

Shameless plug, this means you can pick up the newly released The Heart of the Kingdom for 25% off, or preorder The Errant Prince for 36% off, so uh, go and buy my books??? (I'm sorry, I'm in an excessive punctuation mood apparently.) You should also look at the other amazing books up (GEEK OUT, GO LOOK AT GEEK OUT). Ahem.

I've gotten some really lovely reviews for Heart*, for which I am thankful! I hope if you've read it, that you enjoyed it (or at least, that it didn't make your eyes bleed or fall out of your head from rolling them too hard ;3).



With that out of the way, this week is going to be subsumed by edits. I can feel it. The doom of edits, it doth approcheth. I've got content edits for The Errant Prince, and I've got cleaning up to do on The Northern Wall and also the untitled short story I wrote in NaNo. I'm going to work on the short first, since it's most overdue and also will be quickest.

Then Errant Prince. ^^ Then The Northern Wall, much to Megan's relief, as she's still waiting on me to write the final chapter or two. :3 /I may be a jerk.

Then. Then. Maybe I'll get the chance to write again. Or maybe it'll be Christmas and time to do all the January stuff. One of those.

In any case, this has been your regularly scheduled rambles. If I forget to post again before Christmas, I hope ya'll have a lovely holiday. I'll be traveling up north to New York to visit family and experience real snow for the first time in like, two years. Peace <3

NaNoWriMo

National Novel Writing Month (herein referred to by the short and easy-to-type NaNo) was in November. I had a lofty, lofty goal of writing 75,000 words this month instead of the goal of 50,000 words.

That did not pan out, partly because of travel but mostly because of my headaches. I'm happy with what I did get done, though, and that's all that matters. I did NaNo last year, and I mostly wrote steadily (with some big jumps at the end). This year was all big 5-7k chunks with multiple days of not writing in between. (Me on headache meds vs me off headache meds, I guess??)

In any case, I scraaaaaped over the finish line yesterday. Unlike last year, I was working on several projects rather than just one, and here's what I managed to get done:

(1) I finished up the last few chapters of Losing Ground (my current serial  /shifty look)

(2) A cute little fairy tale called The Cursebreaker. It will be part of the fairy tale serial in April or so, after the fairy tale (Tommelise by Diana Jean) that will be following the current fairy tale (Bad Romance by Remy Jensen).

(3) A short story (novella) for a charity prompt that I've owed since last year because I'm a terrible person (I also may have started and scrapped this one like, five gazillion times). It's untitled ATM, and set in Morcia (AKA Battle of Will 'verse). It'll eventually be available through LT3, though it needs some serious clean up before I inflict it on the editing department. :3



So that was my November. I am now behind on objectively All The Things, so I must get back to work. (Look, three weeks of posts in a row! Aren't you proud of me? ^^)

The Errant Prince

I don't think I've announced here, but my next release from LT3 will be The Errant Prince, which is a fantasy novella that features an M/M couple, one of whom happens to be trans. ^^ If you want to skip the babble and just go preorder it, sight unseen, you can do so from LT3 right now for 15% off:

The Errant Prince

Myron's task is easy enough on the surface: locate the runaway Prince Tamsen and bring him home. But Tamsen is not merely a talented wizard, he's an exceptionally stubborn one, and dozens of others have already failed at the task. When he manages to find the cabin where Tamsen is hiding, Myron isn't foolish enough to mistake the find for a victory. Instead of attempting to drag the prince home by force, Myron tries a different tact: patience. He might not be able to best Tamsen magically or physically, but Myron can certainly out-stubborn him. He's nothing if not used to doing what other people say he can't. But neither prince nor soldier expected stubbornness to be the crack in armor they've both become adept at wearing...

So this story. I originally started writing it with both of the MCs as cis, but I think some conversation on twitter or another made me look at the story and go why not. Because ffs, why not make one of the MCs trans? Then I was all, oh, hey, well if one of them is trans, I can make it geeky fantasy, right, and put it out with LT3's Geek Out collection*. That didn't pan out, mostly b/c the MCs were too busy alternately flirting and angsting to geek out properly. It also (as I swear, everything does) got longer and longer and I missed the deadline. ^^

*The Geek Out stories are FANTASTIC. GO PREORDER THEM ALL.

Ahem. So The Errant Prince. I'm ridiculously happy with these characters (the flirting, I love it, they're so adorable), and I hope ya'll enjoy it as well. ^^

Featured author!

I totally meant to post this earlier, like, Nov 1 or 2, but as you can see that did not happen. I fail at keeping my social media stuff up to date, ack.

In any case, if you've been waiting for a sale to buy my books, LT3 has me as featured author for November! To save $$ on my books, enter code MILLER during checkout, and that'll get you 20% off. It applies to ebooks and preorders only (b/c bundles and paperbacks are already discounted), but that gives you plenty to choose from. ^^ You can also grab any of my books in print for 25% off at any point, btw, so if you want those, you can get them at any point.

Speaking of which, The Heart of the Kingdom has been out for just about a month now! I hope those of you who've read it enjoyed (and if you haven't picked it up and are eying it, November is the time to get it! ;3). If you're inclined to review it, that'd be cool, though for personal sanity reasons I do not look at reviews. My poor, soft heart can't take it. :3

The sequels are taking shape in my head, though I haven't had a chance yet to work on them more (NaNo projects are other little things I'm finishing up. Oh, hey, I can blame that for my lack of updating!) I'm still working out whether it'll be three or four books, though after Book 2 I may break to see if I can't (finally) knock out the Stolen Hearts sequel. (Seriously I fail so much I can't believe people still follow me. :3)

Oh, and Heart is a full and complete stand-alone book, btw. No cliffhangers, though one of the planned books (#3 or #4, depending on whether my idea for the currently slated #3 book works out or needs scrapped) is a follow up with the two MCs.

Links below if you're interested in picking up The Heart of the Kingdom:

All Cenric wanted was a necklace to gift to his lady love, in the hopes it might persuade her to actually become his lady love. Instead of love, however, Cenric is informed of her engagement to someone else, wakes up to find his house burning down around him, and is dragged away by a man who might have saved him, but won't say much about why one necklace has Cenric running away from someone willing to kill to get it back. Less Than Three Press Amazon Barnes & Noble Kobo ARe Bookstrand

Giveaway! The Heart of the Kingdom

Holy crap how is it nearly October already? I don't know, but October means Halloween, Megan's birthday and shenanigans, and The Heart of the Kingdom comes out as an ebook/paperback release!

The Heart of the Kingdom is a novel based (extremely loosely) on Snow White. I had a ton of fun writing it, and I adore both the MCs to bits. Cenric has the (mis)fortune to buy an ostensibly cursed bit of jewelry, and gets stuck with Hunter (a.k.a. Rylan), who is a Huntsman who doesn't always think things through and is trying to get the necklace back to its owner. There's curses, shenanigans, dwarves, elves with sharp, pointy teeth, and general ridiculousness in all the best ways. (Or so I like to think ;3)

This is Book 1 in the series of at least two, potentially three. Each book features a different couple, though, so you're good to read this one and then never look at another of my books ever again. :3 Book 2, The Northern Wall, is about 90% done, but uh, other projects have shuffled it off the prime burner despite my sulking at it.

Uh, but enough of that. Celebration time! Have a giveaway. Two winners, both for any format(s) of The Heart of the Kingdom that you'd like.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Ends on October 15, release day. ^^ If you want to broaden your chances, make sure you hop over to the LT3 Goodreads Group and throw your name in the hat there. Good luck, and I hope you're all enjoying the start of fall! (I know I am!)

Misc News

Living Words and Saving Liam

The second editions of Living Words and Saving Liam are out! These aren't much different from the originals, I mostly cleaned up language and fixed some minor inconsistencies. The biggest changes are (1) the shiny, shiny new covers and (2) I created a map for Saving Liam. If you previously bought the book through LT3, the new versions overwrote the old, so you can download the new versions from your past order history.

If you haven't picked these up, or if you picked them up elsewhere and can't get a shiny new version, LT3 is offering them (and Megan's 2nd Ed. of Sandstorm and The King's Harem) for $0.99! That price only lasts through end of day Thursday, so get them before then if you want the super cheap price.

   


The Heart of the Kingdom

This is currently running in serial (I may have mentioned this once or twice or a dozen times in various places ;3), but wraps as a serial on October 1. It's also listed in the ebook market, so if you're not a serial person and want to check out a ridiculously convoluted fairytale rewrite of Snow White, now's your chance to preorder. (You can do so here.)

I've already started on a sequel for it, because I don't have enough to work on. ^^ That's tentatively titled The Northern Wall and is 90% done. It'll require pretty big edits before it's ready to send to LT3, but I'm pretty pleased with the rough. That's getting set aside, however, b/c I need to have another serial ready to take Heart's place. But look for that next year, if you're interested.

That's all the news crap I've got for the moment. Hope ya'll are having a good August!

 

Serial stuffs

So there are just about four chapters of The Heart of the Kingdom left, which means it'll wrap in serial on October 1 and be available in ebook (and print) on October 15. (It's up for preorder now, btw.) Yay! I'm neck deep in a sequel to it b/c that's what's struck my fancy for some reason. It will not be the serial following Heart, though, and that's what this post is about. I've got two ideas, and am not sure which to pick. That's where you lovely people come in.

Poll time!

Which serial should I write next?

(If the above doesn't work, the poll is visible in the sidebar of the blog. ^^)

So what are these stories about? They might be vaguely familiar to anyone who's been following me since old, old LJ days.

The elemental earth wizards story basically rolls like this. Carter's mother owns a mid-sized earth territory that's under siege by a horrific disease that's killing off the plants in the territory faster than she can fix it. Carter, is a weak earth wizard, so he can't help much, and then a newcomer shows up in town, with more than enough power to overpower the family's weakened grip and steal the territory from them...

The urban fantasy witches rolls like this:  Witch dude has a normal, everyday sort of practice doing magic for hire, when, of all people, an elf shows up looking for a love spell to make his intended fiancée more palatable (we're rocking the elves Do Not Approve of witch magic shenanigans). And then, b/c I like this trope too damn much, the two of them get (temporarily) stuck physically touching b/c of a spell gone wrong and then shit goes wrong for everyone.

Poll runs through midday Wednesday, at which point I will be kicking into high gear to get the first draft done ASAP. B/c I'm awesome at scheduling.

Free books!

Want a free book or dozen? Check out Digital Book Day! On July 14, 2014, a whole lot of authors are going to be offering up books for free. (Including me!) I'm offering up Drinker Class X, for those of ya'll who didn't get a chance to nab a copy during LT3's anniversary giveaways in April. Drinker will be available for free from the LT3 site (because I have the power!) for the entire day of July 14.

Click below to check out Drinker and Digital Book Day:

New covers for old shinies!

 

New covers for old shinies! The lovely Aisha Akeju did these, and I am so in love with them both. ^^ The new versions will be out in the next few months (there is formatting and I want to clean them up and such), but I couldn't resist sharing in the interim.

Quality Assurance, serials, and other various things

I'm a slacker when it comes to my own blog posts and such. ^^;; I'm pretty good at keeping on top of LT3's social media, but past my twitter, I don't seem to update my author stuff much. So I have some 3-4 pieces of news to dump on ya'll at once.

QUALITY ASSURANCE

First up, Quality Assurance is currently on preorder and will be released on June 18. This is a short story I first wrote for LT3's very first anthology, That Famous Happy End. If you've got that anthology, don't bother getting this (unless you want it as a stand-alone). It went through another bout of editing, but nothing major changed. Mostly I just weeded out my qualifiers, b/c good grief do I love me some qualifiers.

Quality Assurance is also the story that kicked off the Paranormal Days 'verse, so if you've read Beach Remedy or Megan's Herbal Remedy, it's set in that same 'verse. ^^ Lee from Beach Remedy is Astor's cousin, who is the brother of Quinn in Quality Assurance. (Megan did Astor's story in LT3's Bad Moon Rising anthology, so he got some love in there too. ;3)

In any case, you can find that here (save 15% until June 17), and it'll be up at all the usual suspects soon.

SERIAL STORIES

 

Second and third, I've now got two stories running as part of LT3's serials. (Taking over the world!) Uh. But I think I've blabbed on here about The Heart of the Kingdom before, that's the main one. It's the snow white fantasy rewrite and it's rolling on into part two now. :3 Fun stuff is happening/about to happen.

The other one, I don't think I have mentioned. It's part of the fairy tale serial (it's shorter than The Heart of the Kingdom, which was waaaaaaaaaaaay too long to be suitable for fairy tale serial) and is called The Dragon of Bellerose Island. It's sort of kind of a riff on Beauty and the Beast, and I had a lot of fun writing the two MCs. Leandre is well-meaning but doesn't always see the big picture, which causes him to be stuck on inside the spell on Dilan's island. Dilan is a shy half-dragon who would prefer to hide away from the world forever, and now he's got to deal with Leandre. :3 Funtimes.

OTHER STUFF

I've got a couple short stories on my plate ATM. One is finished and features my very first trans* character. It's called The Errant Prince and is about a soldier-type dude going off in search of a runaway prince. The soldier is expecting a spoiled brat, the prince is expecting a bossy, order-following soldier, and neither of them is expecting the other. ^^ I'm hoping to get that one published at some point this year, just waiting on a last few betas before I throw it at Sam and tell her to do something with it.

Past that, I've got a mage-soldier short for a lovely (and very patient) lady that I need to get cracking on. I have some good ideas on that, just need to sit down and get it out. I also need to get started on the serial that will follow The Heart of the Kingdom (I'm thinking Elemental magics, b/c that's always cool to play with) and various other projects that I won't mention here b/c I don't want to get people's hopes up when I have no idea when they'll be actually done. ^^;;

That's all I've got. I hope ya'll are having a lovely summer so far!

Birthday!

Happy birthday to me! And happy my birthday to you, too. :3 In honor of my birthday on Sunday, LT3 is hosting a 30% off sale from now until end of day March 30, so hop on over and stock up on anything you may have been contemplating.

If you're interested in a chance to win a signed copy of Battle of Will, head on over to Goodreads, where the giveaway there is still open (and will be open until end of day March 31).

That's all I've got. Hope ya'll are having a lovely March, and that spring comes quickly for those of you in the frozen states. :3

Giveaway and random status things

The Heart of the Kingdom is in full swing over at LT3's serials. For those following along, the real fun starts next week. :3 :3

It's been two months since Battle of Will dropped, and if ya'll haven't had a chance to pick up a copy, or if you'd like a paperback copy, I'm throwing a giveaway through GoodReads. Giveaway is open until March 31, and open to everyone everywhere. (Note: the giveaway thing is a bit buggy; there are entries, but on the book page it says there isn't. So if you enter and see that, your entry is there, GoodReads is just being weird.) Widget is below:

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Battle of Will

by Sasha L. Miller

Giveaway ends March 31, 2014.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Odds and Ends

First up, sale! LT3 is having a 20% off sale now through end of day Feb 15, so if you've been waiting for any reason to pick up any of my books, now is an excellent time to grab them. ^__^ Here is the me-specific listing of books, minus anthologies (which are on sale, but are listed under "Various" for multiple authors ATM*.


Second up, there's still two days left for giveaway entries. If you'd like an audiobook copy of Saving Liam, bop on over to this post and throw your name in that hat. If you'd like to win some serial subscription time to read The Heart of the Kingdom and a bunch of other neat serials, go to Goodreads and throw your name in this hat. (Note: you'll have to join the LT3 Goodreads group to join that giveaway, and obviously have a GR account.)


I swear there was a third thing, but I can't remember it so I'm going to run off to the next task on my to-do list. :3 Hope ya'll are having a good week.


*I am implementing a fix for this, and am super excited that it's nearly in place. ^__^ So sooon, it will have all my books, anthologies included.

Saving Liam - audiobook giveaway

Exciting news! Saving Liam is now available on audiobook. ^__^ It's available on WorldWide Audiobooks currently, and will be available on all major retailers soonish (processing can take a few weeks). You can keep an eye on where it's up here.

 To celebrate, I'm throwing a giveaway. There's a couple ways to enter, but uh, this is my first rafflecopter giveaway, so uh,  hopefully everything works, and I haven't screwed anything up. o_O

a Rafflecopter giveaway

New Free Read: The Duke's Deception

Back in October (or somewhere around there), I offered up writings for a fundraiser and was taken up on that by two lovely peeps. The Duke's Deception was one of the stories I wrote, written for the ever lovely Mara Ismine, and will be up for grabs starting on Wednesday. (The other story is still half-done and being a brat. >_<)

You can grab it from LT3 or any third-party vendor (excepting Amazon, since they require a price and then price matching, so I suppose you COULD buy it from Amazon, but that seems silly when you can grab mobi format from anywhere).

All Larkin wants is to be left in peace, live a life free of lies and deceit. But agreements have been made and he must see them through if he ever hopes to achieve his goals. But between nefarious dealings, dangerous encounters, and one stubbornly determined prince, the obstacles may ultimately prove insurmountable …

Battle of Will - Release and Giveaways

Battle of Will is live! You can get your copies at LT3, Amazon, B&N, iTunes and pretty much every other retailer out there. ^__^ The book is your basic enemies-to-lovers trope, with a side of magically-bound-and-can't-leave-each-other's-side trope.

At a memorial service meant to honor the dead and mark the beginning of a truce between Skirfall and Morcia, Ackley spies a figure who does not belong—a mage interrogator whose presence will only cause harm should the Morcians realize who he is and all the people he has tortured. But the problem rapidly grows much worse than that when Ackley realizes his true purpose is assassination of the Morcian crown prince—an assassination Ackley prevents, but at great cost. Banished from his own country, bound magically to the crown prince of his enemies, Ackley is certain of just one thing: whether he can figure out how to break the spell or not, his death is assured.

If you're willing to play the odds, there are a few places you can go to enter giveaways. First up is the LT3 Goodreads Group, where there's a giveaway for each of our January releases. These giveaways are open until January 18, so you've got a few weeks to throw your name in those pots (including the one for Battle of Will). Check that out here.

The other giveaway is part of New Year's Kisses game/giveaway. Battle is part of a group giveaway (AKA, you enter to win and get a prize pack that includes it). That specific giveaway is here, but be sure to check out the other giveaways and kisses at Kay Berrisford, Tara Lain, and Angel Payne's blogs for more book and gift certificate giveaways.