One year ago

At the end of 2013 I bought a beautiful 2014 diary. I put it away somewhere safe and promptly forgot all about it, so I didn’t actually start using it until August 2014. When it came time to buy a diary for this year, I couldn’t find anything I liked, and there was this gorgeous 2014 diary, barely used … so I repurposed the 2014 diary and have been using it all year.

This week I have arrived at the point where I started using the diary last year. It’s like breaking open a time capsule, to see the items on my to-do lists this time last year. Things like “pay the orthodontist”. One year and thousands of dollars later, my daughter now has beautiful, braces-free teeth. Hallelujah! Or “tidy desk”. Sadly that one still needs to be on the to-do list, as my desk is never tidy.

But the most fun is seeing where I was at with my writing one year ago. I was making corrections to Twiceborn, putting the finishing touches on it. I was revising The Twiceborn Queen and trying to plan the third book in the series, then known as Twiceborn 3. Publishing was still a scary thing I was working towards, with things like “start mailing list” and “work on website” making regular appearances on my to-do lists. I remember well the feeling of nervousness: every step of the way there seemed to be some new program to learn, or another process to master.

And now, here we are, one year later. Twiceborn and The Twiceborn Queen have both been published. It’s quite a thrill, even now, to see those real live books lying on my still-untidy desk and know that I wrote them. They are both finding readers, which is lovely, and have been generally well received. I’m hard at work on “Twiceborn 3”, which is now called Twiceborn Endgame, so the end of the series is in sight.

There are other books, too, waiting in the wings. The first book of a new series has gone out for beta reading. It’s based on one of my favourite fairy tales, Toads and Diamonds, and I’m very excited to bring that one out. Can’t wait to show you the cover—it’s absolutely divine!

One year on, I’m finally feeling comfortable with the publishing process. I’m certainly no expert, but it’s good to get past the fear and uncertainty to a place where I know what I’m doing, more or less. I’ve made some wonderful author friends along the way too, who have helped me find my feet, and it’s great to have people to share the journey with. I wish I could go back a year and add an item to those nervous to-do lists: “don’t panic; it will all work out”.

But I probably wouldn’t have listened. Too busy panicking.

I’m not dead

Just dropping in quickly to say I’m not dead (though this whooping cough is making me feel pretty dodgy). I’ve been busy—between coughing bouts—working on the revision of The Twiceborn Queen. (Yes, that “sinus infection” I mentioned a couple of posts ago turned out to be whooping cough, which, alas, is also known as “the hundred-day cough”. I’ve had it since mid-January, so I still have a few more weeks of coughing to go.)

I finished the first, most labour-intensive, revision, and am now halfway through the second one. With a bit of luck I’ll get through the rest of that tomorrow. Then it’s on to smaller-level stuff like smoothing out the prose and hunting down and exterminating overused words.

I’ve already sent it to the beta readers, and will continue to work on it while I’m waiting for their feedback. The deadline to get it to the editor is the 1st of April, so I had to get the beta readers started on it before it was as beautiful as I would have liked. Feedback so far is encouraging.

Nearly there now! I’m hoping to publish in late April or early May. Can’t wait to share it with you guys!

Here’s an extract to whet your appetites:

 “Now you’re back you can check if anything’s been taken,” Tanya said. “The police will want to know.”

“Sure.” I turned the mug over in my hands, wondering which was the lesser of the two evils: ignore the police and risk them chasing me up over the supposed burglary, or file a report and draw Det Hartley’s attention to a burglary complete with random blood stains connected to my already-sullied name.

“I had to come in when I saw a strange car in the driveway,” Tanya said. “I wasn’t sure it was you. Why didn’t you tell me you were coming back? I could have picked you up at the airport.”

“No, no, it was fine. I had Garth.”

“Have you?”

“What?”

“Had Garth.”

I choked. I hoped he hadn’t heard that. Werewolf ears were pretty sharp. “God, Tanya, don’t you ever stop? He’s just a friend.” And thanks very much for putting that idea in my head. As if my dragon libido needed any encouragement to start thinking inappropriate thoughts about my employees.

She pouted. “You always say that. What about that gorgeous hunk of man flesh you work with? What’s he going to think when he sees you running around with this Garth guy?”

“Actually—” I could feel my cheeks warming as the image of a naked Garth persisted. “Actually, Ben and I are, um … together now.”

Twiceborn is out!

How long have I been writing? Depends on what you count as writing.

There was that little Easter story I wrote and illustrated for my mother when I was about seven. So cute! Or the three exercise books I filled with the story of the Romney children when I was in fifth class. It was a blatant Enid Blyton Famous Five rip-off, but despite all those words, I never finished it.

My next big writing spurt was in Year 8. I had a fabulous English teacher, who was very encouraging of my writing. (As it happened, his name was Brian Caswell, and he’s now a well-known writer himself.) I actually managed to finish a book that year. By then I’d progressed from Enid Blyton rip-offs to Georgette Heyer ones. I shudder now to think of it, but to his credit he read it with a straight face and urged me to keep writing.

So I did. But, being me, the finishing part was a real problem. Sure, I started lots of novels over the years, always with much enthusiasm. I even remember declaring 1994 to be “the year of the novel”, but that teenage Regency romance was the last one I finished until 2007, when the ducklings were at last old enough for me to be able to string two thoughts together in a coherent manner again.

It was also the year I discovered NaNoWriMo, which has been a huge motivator for me ever since. I completed the first draft of a contemporary romance that year, and was hugely proud of myself.

But of course, “first draft finished” and “publishable quality finished” are two very different beasts. I did NaNoWriMo again every year except one, and produced many more first drafts, but I didn’t revise any to a publishable stage until this year, 2014.

That novel is Twiceborn, and the ebook is available now on Amazon.

Or to put it another way:

OMG I PUBLISHED A BOOK!!!

I’ve been waiting such a long time to say that.

Twiceborn cover reveal

I’m very excited to be able to show you the cover for Twiceborn at last. It was done by Yoly at Cormar Covers several months ago, but I didn’t want to reveal it till I was almost ready to publish.

Guess what? I’m nearly there! Twiceborn is buffed and polished as shiny as I could make it, and it’s now off at the formatters getting a fresh lick of paint. It’s almost a Real Book!

Are you ready?

Here it is in all its glory:

Twiceborn small

Isn’t it gorgeous? I feel like a proud parent showing off baby photos, only this baby doesn’t have forcep marks on its face, or a weird pointy head. Or jaundice. Or any of the other not-so-photogenic features my real babies had. And unlike Baby Duck, the insides of this baby are all present and correct too.

Let me remind you what the story’s about:

 “Still grieving her beloved son, Kate O’Connor’s just going through the motions. She doesn’t care that strangers often shadow her on the unorthodox courier jobs she does for a friend. She doesn’t even care what’s in the packages till the day she returns from a special rush job with no memory of the event. But it must have been pretty wild, because now there’s a werewolf in her kitchen trying to kill her – and he’s just the first in line.

Dragged into a supernatural war of succession between the daughters of the dragon queen, Kate discovers a Sydney she never knew existed, peopled by all kinds of strange half-human creatures. To have any hope of surviving she must uncover the explosive secret hidden in her memory – but first she has to live through the night.”

Can’t wait to share it with you!

Book covers and headless bodies

How do you feel about headless bodies on book covers? Not as in decapitated and spouting blood, but the kind of cover where part of the model’s head is cut off by the top of the book.

Like this:

 

Or this:

Love ’em? Hate ’em? Never even thought about ’em?

There are some people (and Drama Duck is one of them) who will pass over a book if the cover shows the model’s face. They don’t like the image interfering with their own imagining of what the character looks like. I don’t know how many of these people there are, but there are enough to have spawned a trend in cover design for obscuring the model’s features. Sometimes that’s done with shadows or positioning the head at an angle, but quite often the top of the face is just chopped off.

I like both those covers I showed you, but I must admit I’m more of an “eyes are the windows to the soul” kind of person – I like to see a face. Not that it influences my buying habits at all. I’m usually drawn to colours first anyway, and if I stop for a closer look it will be the blurb and a sample of the writing that decides whether I buy or not.

But now I’m working with a designer on the cover for Twiceborn. The great thing about self-publishing rather than going with a traditional publisher is you get complete control over what your cover looks like. Trad-pubbed authors get little or no say in their cover design, and are sometimes stuck with covers they hate.

But having to make all the decisions can also be the bad thing about self-publishing! Headless or full-faced? Which do you prefer in covers? Or isn’t it important to you? (I could well be over-thinking the issue, I realise. Maybe most people really don’t care and I should just take a deep breath and move on.)

What do you think, Internets?

Getting closer

blurb-small

My novel Twiceborn is another step closer to finding its way into the world. Yay! Do you like the new supermultigrated blurb?

I’ve just finished a big revision job: going through and adding more details.

I’m a lean writer (sadly that’s a metaphor – my jeans are getting too tight again. Damn things must have shrunk in the wash …). My natural instinct is to get to the point, not waffle on about the scenery or what people look like. Of course no one wants to read five pages describing the view, but all my beta readers agree that I go too far in the other direction.

So what started as a 60,000-word first draft, which became a 72,000-word revision and then an 82,000-word revision, is now fast closing in on 88,000 words as I flesh out the world and the story of Kate and all the other characters I’ve grown to love. (Well, some of them I don’t love, but that’s okay. You’re not meant to like the bad guys!) By this time next week this final revision should be finished, and Twiceborn will be off to a professional editor.

It’s getting closer! Close enough to start getting excited, though there’s still a lot to be done. Close enough to start imagining what it will be like to hold a book in my hands that has my name on the cover.

I could get used to this authoring stuff!

 

Would you read this book?

Okay, suppose you’re looking for a new urban fantasy to read. Would this blurb entice you to pick up the book?

“Whoever said ‘what you don’t know can’t hurt you’ had never been in courier Kate Donohue’s shoes. She can’t remember anything from a special rush job this afternoon, but whatever happened must have been pretty wild, because now there’s a werewolf in her kitchen trying to kill her. And he’s just the first in line. Suddenly Kate’s running for her life, but if she doesn’t remember what happened soon, more than her life will be at stake.”

In case you haven’t guessed, I’m working on the blurb for my upcoming book, previously only known by the highly imaginative title “Dragon novel”, but now tentatively titled Twiceborn.
I feel as if that last sentence needs work. It seems to kind of fade off, but I don’t want to give too much away. Blurb-writing is harder than it looks!
Here’s another, slightly longer version, with a different last sentence:

“Whoever said ‘what you don’t know can’t hurt you’ had never been in courier Kate Donohue’s shoes. She can’t remember anything from a special rush job this afternoon, but whatever happened must have been pretty wild, because now there’s a werewolf in her kitchen trying to kill her. And he’s just the first in line. 

It’s a nasty introduction to the hidden world of the shifters, but the news gets worse. It’s a world at war, and Kate will be a casualty if she can’t remember what happened – but first she has to live through the night.”

Any better? Worse? What do you think?