Let me just say that healthwise this week sucked. It began on Wednesday when I had to cancel a work related conference since I had a sore throat. Then on Friday, my leg began hurting. According to Dad I have a pinched nerve in my lower back.    In other words, my body didn’t like my habit of writing with my laptop in my knee. In other words, time to get a desk. So for the foreseeable future I am doing my writing at the kitchen table.

In between this, I had a duh moment based on feedback I got from Chrysoula on Daughter of the Dark. She thinks it should be a novel. Yeah. I got a deer in headlights look when I read that. I don’t think that Daughter of the Dark  will become a 100 k words novel, but her feedback are things I really need to think about.    Not good when you have a ” publish it soon” deadline. What makes it worse is that it is my own fault. In hindsight, I should have sent Daughter of the Dark instead of The Wild Hunt to Thirzah and Sharpie. At least it is a mistake that I will not make again.

When it comes to writing, the draft of Frosthold is progressing nicely. I have typed in all of the handwritten pages, so right now the draft is at 4500. Which equals 2 pages in the handwritten outline. Sure, it is a sketchy outline, but still! So I should reach the goal easily. Part of me is whispering that this is YA, you could query agents with it! Um. Yeah. Which is freaking me out a bit. Though, technically the Wild Hunt might be YA too.

And to top of the week,I have a feeling that my body have decided that I should get con crud after all. Sigh. We will see how I feel tomorrow.

Well, now I need to go back to typing in the sketchy outline. And maybe the handwritten notes.

I had a great time in Dublin. I went to the Pseudonym panel, the Peaceful Science Fiction panel, the Celtic Gods panel, a panel about Cover art, and Catie’s party.

All of them were interesting, and the moderators did a great job even if the panels went off topic occasionally.  Especially the Celtic gods panel.  I might have rolled my eyes occassionally at one of the panelists.

I did go to fewer panels than planned but that was my own fault. l didn’t realise until Saturday afternoon that my tablet hadn’t changed timezone. At least I discovered it before MY first panel.

My panels went well.  With the exception of the first panel. In hindsight, I should have declined it sinceI have just begun.    The panel about Fairytales across Europe was fun. I liked discussing myths and folklore, especially the differences between Sweden and Ireland.  My last panel was about Betareading and Editing.  Sharpie moderated it, which made things interesting. I didn’t guilt her too much about the missing feedback.It was Interesting to hear about what other authors did. One thing we all agreed on was the importance of hiring an editor.
The best part about  the con was meeting new people. I met quite a few. Mostly because Laura Anne introduced me to everyone she knew.  Since she has spent 25 years in the business, she knows quite a few people.  I’m looking forward to go back for Octocon next year! I also decided that next time I am staying longer so I get to see more of the city.
Another thing that made me happy me happy was that people picked up the download cards I brought. I had 30 when I arrived . I have one left. It helped that I was the only one that had thought of bringing a download card. The cards cost 50 dollar to print. Mainly because I was a bit late, so I had to order a pricier shipping. And they were worth it. I have no idea how many that will actually download a copy, though.

There were a couple of oopses:
For starters I brought Urban shaman for Catie to sign Except I forgot to unpack it from my suitcase.
I roomed with Laura Anne and the first night we were woken up by the hotel dumping glass in a dumpster.  The last night I came up to a cold room and a billowing curtain. Yupp. The window had been open all the time, or at least not properly closed.. Which explained a lot.

 

I had planned to wait for a couple of days before uploading it, but in the end I decided not to.  I did the final read through and ran a spell check this morning, before I uploaded it to Publit. It is available at my bookstore and Kobo for free, and at other stores for 0.99. Why the price difference?

Mainly because Publit uploads directly to Kobo, which means I can easily change the price. For the other stores, they use Overdrive which means it takes a bit longer for Exile to upload to all the stores.

So go forth and read! It is only free for a limited time. 🙂

 

Now if you excuse me, I need to go and hide in a corner. Since other people will read my book soon.

 

For the next two weeks, I’m on vacation from the day job. Not that I plan to have calm days, though.

I’ll travel a lot.  It begins tomorrow when I am going to the West Coast to see family of various kinds, and Thirzah. It will be so much fun! *glee*

Then I am home for 3-4 days, which will be filled of last minute preparations for Shamrokon.  Then I am off to Dublin.  Were I get to meet friends, and eat fudge and cake.

Oh yeah. In between the travelling, I am celebrating my birthday. Which will also be fun. And having a cup of coffee with my aunt and sister. Maybe.

And now for the boring part of the blog post.

The to do list for today.

E-mail Thirzah

Add Thirzah’s number to the phonebook

Pack

Do the dishes

Check so that the new router works.

Load books on the e-reader.

Charge tablet+ phone

Pick books for Thirzah.

And probably another dozen things that I am forgetting! 🙂

I finally found a font that I liked a couple of days ago, so I finalized the cover for Exile this morning. ( I had originally planned to use the font that is on the cover of Daughter of the Dark but it didn’t feel right for Exile.)

I am really happy with the cover. Especially since I am not a cover designer.

Yesterday evening, I finished the edits. Yay!  Now I am going to send it to a beta reader ( I haven’t decided who, yet), while I query copy editors.

While Daughter of the Dark is being read by someone else, I’m moving on to the next project. Which is writing Frosthold in longhand.  Why? Because I want to write something set in a new world.

Though I fully expect to take a break from the writing soonish, and proof read Exile.  And format it. :).  Which reminds me, I need to order postcards from Vistaprint.  Hopefully, they’ll arrive before I leave.

Now I am off to dive into a brand new world. 🙂

For a number of reasons, I had to go to our summer cottage this weekend.  While waiting for mum to pick me up at the closest train station, I noticed that the bookstore had a back to school deal: Buy 5 things on the table for 12 dollar.  I promptly bought two A5 notebooks, one smaller notebook, and two pens.   So mum picked me up, and later that evening I settled down to read Angel’s Flight by Nalini Singh. While reading, one word popped up: Rhoswyr.

And suddenly an idea I had had about magic being more of an evolutionary factor jelled enough for me to sit down and write notes.

Which I did on Friday.  By the end of Saturday, I had 40 pages of notes, and 15 pages long synopsis finished in my new A5 notebook, but still. I am bit stunned, to be honest.  But I look forward to write Marius and Kjersti’s story.

I am also tempted to write it long hand, since I have a lot of empty pages in the notebook.   I also find writing longhand freeing, in a way.

But not today. Today I’m doing nothing writing related.