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
Monday, December 29, 2014
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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.
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.
Monday, December 8, 2014
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
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
Monday, December 1, 2014
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? ^^)
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? ^^)
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