E-reader woes

Last night while I was reading, my faithful Cybook Odessey froze. I cursed, pressed the power button to restart it. When nothing happened,  I cursed some more before letting it charge over night.

This morning, I tried to restart it and nothing happened. So I tried to do a hard reset.  Did it work? Uhm. Not really. Now it is caught on the start up screen.

And when I connected it to mum’s laptop with a vague intent to reformat the internal memory, the computer didn’t recognize it.  sigh.

So I guess I’ll have to get a new e-reader.  The drawback is that  I am not sure if I  want to get another rebranded Cybook Odessey. Why? Because the Swedish bookstore that sells them insists on making their own modified firmware.   Which is really annoying when add in the fact that Bookeen, the French company that makes the Cybooks, offered one of their rare firmware updates.  Grr.

Except it is on sale right now. Hm…

The other option is Kobo. The problem is that  Kobo isn’t available for me in Sweden. Which would mean I’d have to wait until Dublin before I get a new one.  (Yes, I could get a Kindle, but I buy far more books from Kobo, plus Kobo offers me coupons.)

Oh well. I’ll read on my tablet while making up my mind.

 

What I am reading in June

I have had some troubles finishing books lately, but I have read some really good ones.

Shaman Rises by C. E Murphy

I devoured Shaman Rises by C. E. Murphy.  It is the last book in the Walker Papers series *sob*, and it was so good. It wrapped up all the loose threads, and was filled with unexpected twists.  Go and read it!

High Seduction by Vivian Arend

I love Vivian Arend’s contemporary romances, but I was a bit slow in buying this one.  But I’m glad I bought it, since I was craving a good contemporary romance. And it didn’t disappoint.  It was sizzling, fast paced, and filled with action.

An Aria of Omen by Patrice Greenwood

I love, love this series. The setting is intriguing, the characters are well crafted, the plot is solid. The only drawback is that there is so long between releases. *sulks* But she also writes fantasy as Pati Nagle, and I haven’t read those. I’m planning to , though.

 

 

Teaser: Daughter of the Dark

I am doing edits on Daughter of the Dark right now.  They are progressing nicely, so I thought it is was a good time to post the edited version of the opening scene. Or at least the first 150 words.  :).  I’ll put up the whole chapter closer to the publication date.

 

The three stories high house with its red-brick facade and walled garden didn’t look out of place in the neighborhood, at least not on the surface. The wards I sensed told me otherwise. I knew that if I activated the Sight I would see the rainbow of colors beneath. I frowned. The wards felt like elemental magic, not shamanic magic. Which didn’t make sense. Unlike the other realms, this realm had very low levels of elemental magic. In other words, using elemental magic for spells hurt. A lot. I winced in sympathy with the mage that had been hired to create the wards.
The elemental magic based wards also meant that the owner of the house must have hired someone from another realm. Gnomes, I guessed, since they were masters at creating wards. They were also expensive.

Unease slithered down my spine.
Why would someone put in so much money and effort to ward a residence, albeit an upscale one?

Excerpt from Exile

I am  spending the weekend finishing the second draft of Exile. Since it I am planning publish it sometime in July, and it is  Midsummer, I decided to post the opening scene.   🙂 There are some typos but I hope you enjoy it!

I squinted at the scroll in front of me. It was written in High Dhurian and in a tiny, cramped script, by a long dead Priestess. I was certain the scroll contained the information about the Wise One my tutor had tasked me with to hunt down. If only there was a spell to magnify the script. I grimaced. Even if there was, the scroll was ancient enough that the spell might damage it.

Or the other books in the library. I glanced at the shelves surrounding me. For most of the other novices, the scrolls contained the gathered wisdom of the  Priestesshood of Gwynfar. To me the scrolls were headache inducing, and dull. Maybe I would have been more interested if the scrolls hadn’t been written in High Dhurian.

To me and my tutor the fact that I hated High Dhurian was another sign that I wasn’t meant to be a Priestess of Gwynfar. Too bad my mother , the Arch-Priestess, disagreed.

I sighed. If only Mother wasn’t the Arch-Priestess. If she hadn’t been I wouldn’t be corralled down a life path I didn’t want.

Like many Dhurians I had a gift of moon magic, but I lacked the devotion to spend my life as a priestess.

I froze when Mother’s voice drifted towards me. I shook off the brief paralyzation, and rolled up the scroll. This part of the library was technically forbidden to Novices, due to its proximity to the oldest scrolls. Which was why I had chosen it. There was information about the First Clan Mothers in other scrolls but it was watered down . What I needed was to read the scrolls written by them. Or transcribed by later generations.

The importance of thinking ahead

My publication schedule for 2014 is set.  I know what I will publish, even if I am not certain of the exact dates. So now I’m thinking of 2015.  Which feels a bit odd. I’m used to writing whatever I’m in the mood for. Now I have to treat it like a business.  Set a schedule, yet allowing enough flexibility for any changes ( both good and bad) that occur.

So next year I’ll make a loose schedule, probably more of a list of the books I want to publish  and roughly when.   What said schedule will contain depends on what I write during the next 6 months.  For example, I have 5000 words on Archangel’s Hunt which is my next writing WIP.  When Archangel’s Hunt is finished, I’m planning to write Cauldron 2.   It might be a bit optimistic, considering all the other things I need to do.  But once Daughter of the Dark is published I am taking a break from revising until Oct, when I  need to edit  A Shadow of Love.

Next year I am planning of spreading out the revision and the writing. I have to, otherwise I will get burned out.  And no one wants that.

That said, I have so many plans for 2015.  I’m tempted to take one year of from releases  and just write new things.  I realise that would be a bad career move, though. So I’m not going to. But if I did, the sequels to the Wild Hunt would be on the top of the list. 🙂

 

Out and about in the sun

 

 

 

I rarely write about what I’m doing, but I thought I would make a difference for this weekend.

It began on Thursday, when my brother graduated from Med school. *beams* I’m so proud of him. He celebrated with a party, which was lot of fun.  I chatted with people, got to see his face when our youngest brother showed up. The whole family had been keeping that from him, as a surprise.

And when I got home, I had a pleasant surprise too: The edits where waiting for me, and the cover.

Then the next day I decided to visit Smaka på Stockholm.  It turns out I wasn’t the only one. It felt like half of Stockholm was there. I did have Banh Mi at a food truck, and liked it a lot.  It was on the outskirt, so less people there.

Yesterday, I went for an hour walk along the water, that ended when I stepped in poop. Of the human version, I suspect. Ugh.  So I scraped it off, and then cleaned the soles when I got home.  In the evening, the family went to see Jag ringer mina bröder by Jonas Hassen Khemiri. It was really, really good.  I’m hoping it gets translated to other languages since more people should see it.

The result of a really good weekend is that I’m beaming and ready to go back to work on the revisions later today.

 

 

Edits!

Last night  the edits for Daughter of Dark landed in my inbox. I read the edit letter, but decided to wait with reading the draft.  Honestly, the edit letter made me so happy that I have been smiling all day. It also worked as a motivation boast for finishing The Wild Hunt.  I have been struggling with them lately.  Now I have a reason to finish them ( well, beyond the fact that Thirzah would have shown up at my door, demanding more, if I didn’t finish them. ). At the moment,   I cannot wait to begin editing Daughter of the Dark.   The edits will help me turn the draft from good to great. You will love it when it is out.

I have been thinking of which books Daughter of the Dark are similar to, and conclusion I have come to is the Sianim novels by Patricia Briggs and the Raine Benares series by Lisa Shearin. In other words,  Fantasy with a good dose of Urban Fantasy elements and a varying degree of Romance. :).

 

I have also seen the first draft of the cover.  And it is so pretty.  That said, I’m not showing it until the cover is final. Sorry.  There is potiental for too much hassle otherwise.

But I’m really happy I hired Storywonk for the edits, and Skyla Dawn Cameron for the cover art.

Oh, and my webhost also has a mailing list option. I plan to poke around with it, since I just discovered it. I think the first step is to add an e-mail subscription button, though.

Edit: No, the first step is to create an e-mail address.

( I discovered this when I for a couple of minutes thought I had broken my webpage.)