Events and Goals for 2015

Goal: Get more teeth fixed

My teeth are a mess. I'm hoping to be able to get at least 3 done this year. Getting the 1st one done next week.

Axes of Evil II: Rise of The Metal Gods release!

One of my short stories will be featured in a heavy metal horror anthology! I think it comes out later this month or next month.

Later in the year I'll be able to release it as a freebie, so stay tuned!

Goal: Finish Editing Website

My freelance editing business has started to pick up so I really need to get the website finished so more clients can find me.

Bite at First Sight Releases April 7th!

The third book in my Scandals With Bite series and one we've all been looking forward to because it's Rafael Villar's story! I gotta say, that grumpy Spanish vampire was fun to work with, and Cassandra, the heroine was a blast as well!



It's up for Pre-Order!

Goal: Finish Brides of Prophecy Book 3

After 2014 being almost all edits, I want to focus more on writing this year. My goal is to finish at least 2 full manuscripts, but I'm going to push for 3.

First priority is book 3 in my Brides of Prophecy series... which I also need to come up with a title for. I'll be asking you all for help with that soon!

Event: Power of The Pen Conference

I am pleased to announce that my local RWA chapter will be holding a conference on March 7th at The Red Lion Hotel in Spokane, local writers won't want to miss it!

Registration info is Here!


Event: The Novel Experience

I am excited to announce that I'll be attending  The Novel Experience Convention and book signing in Las Vegas in April!

Aside from writing, READERS will be another major priority this year. This convention will be the perfect opportunity for me to meet and interact with some of you!

There will be parties and dinners and a lot of opportunities to just hang out. I'm planning on bringing some fun swag and hope to take a reader out to lunch.

And a big piece of awesome news for the signing, BITE AT FIRST SIGHT will be available EARLY!!

Registration and Hotel info Here.

Aaaand... the first attendee who emails me after booking their room at The Planet Hollywood  will get a FREE VIP TICKET from me. The link to reserve the hotel room under the convention discount is here.

2014 Recap

2014 was an exciting year for me. I figured I'd share some of the highlights

First off, I dipped my toes into the Indie pool and launched the first book in my Urban Fantasy Romance series, BRIDES OF PROPHECY.

These characters have been in my head for FOREVER, but since the traditional publishing houses are reluctant to take on paranormal, especially vampires, I couldn't find a home for these stories there. But since that world is so important to me, I decided to release the series myself.

I present, WRENCHING FATE! 

After that, I also got two new front teeth... okay, two crowns and a filling. After nearly dying from an abcessed tooth in 2013...seriously, I almost DIED. I decided that taking care of my crappy, poor white trash teeth was a priority. I still have a long way to go.  

Umm...I'm not posting pics of that.

In May I got to attend the RT BOOKLOVERS CONVENTION in the city I've always wanted to visit, NEW ORLEANS!!

Me and author Sarah Humphreys at a Mardi Gras party they threw for the attendees. How cool is that?

It was such an incredible and busy experience that it took 4 blog posts to recap it. Here's part one if you want to read about the awesomesauce.

Unfortunately, just a few days after I got back, a good friend of mine passed away. RIP, Bill Kieffer. You will always be dearly missed. :(

I'll never forget all the times we had fun talking about music, movies, and other quirky things. I'll never forget the time we got drunk on the front porch talking about every topic in the book until the sun came up. I'll never forget that you chose to aid me in a crisis, despite disapproval from some people you'd known longer.

Okay, after the sad stuff...

Over the summer, I was invited by editor, Alex Johnson to submit a short story to a heavy metal horror anthology. 

I ACTUALLY had one gathering dust in my hard drive because I never found a home for such an oddity even though it won 1st place in the 2012 Idaho Writer's League Short Story Competition. 

AND IT WAS ACCEPTED!

I'm pleased to announce that I will be featured in AXES OF EVIL II: RISE OF THE METAL GODS, which will be released soon!

Check out this badass Iron Maiden inspired cover!

And if you're a metalhead, you'll know which album inspired this!

I finally had the opportunity to return to another beloved project. The restoration of my 1980 Datsun 210. 

Her name is Little Beast. I'd rebuilt the engine, but her body's been a bashed-up mess. But I finally found new body parts for her so hopefully she'll be on the road and pretty by next year.

Right now her front end is all torn up, but do you see her shiny engine compartment?

I got some requests for the Heavy Metal Romance I wrote back in 2012.

It's called HIS ROADIE for now...and good lord, we need to find a better title. But right now I have 2 publishers looking at it and the first sent me a Revise and Resubmit request and now I'm waiting to hear back. Even if they don't accept it, I got some excellent feedback that helped to make it a better book.

I fell in Love.

It's really hard to nail down the exact time that happened, especially since we were friends for so long, but damn he's wonderful. I call him "Sexy Genius." Our first official "date" ended up with us working on a car together... which is totally my style. And I've never been treated so well.

Huckleberries.

An annual North Idaho tradition. In 2013, I had to sell all of mine. This year I got to keep some to eat! Seriously, if you're ever in the Northwest, you have to try these berries! 

Release of ONE BITE PER NIGHT!!

This was another important book for me.

When I got the offer for Bite Me, Your Grace, I had NO ideas for future books in the series. But it was a 3 book deal so I had to come up with something.

I wanted to put a different spin on the guardian/ward trope, and play with another fun setting in England: Cornwall, namely a castle! Ideas for a heroine came into play, but I was at a loss for a hero. I didn't want to the typical "tall dark and handsome alpha vampire" that I did with the last book. I wanted something different.

So, I had an acquaintance that had really cool hair, striking looks, and was as kind as he was mysterious. I inspired the hero after him.

We ended up getting to know each other and he actually came to my signing!

I now call him "Sexy Genius"

ONE BITE PER NIGHT ended up being well received with reviewers. I was almost too scared to click on the link to Publisher's Weekly's review because they can be mean sometimes. (They were pretty nice to me with BITE ME, YOUR GRACE, though they threw in a bit of snark).

Publisher's Weekly LOVED IT!!!

But there was no rest for the wicked. 

Since I'd decided to go hybrid, I also had my Indie series to deliver.

In October, I released Book 2 in my "Brides of Prophecy" series: Ironic Sacrifice

Before I was published, this book was a favorite of my beta readers. Razvan is definitely the most alpha hero I've ever written and people LOVE him!

He also has a twin brother, but you won't get to know him until book 4.

Thrills and Chills Book Signing

That month I also had the wonderful opportunity to participate in a multi-author Halloween themed book signing with Shelley Martin, Bonnie R. Paulson, Frank Zafiro, and Kaye Thornbrugh.

It was a blast!

Edits, edits, edits

Honestly, I would dub 2014 as "The Year of Edits" for me. I did not write a complete brand new manuscript the entire year. Instead I hacked away at stuff I wrote in 2012 and 2013 and added thousands of better words. 

Not only that, but I also launched my freelance editing business and despite not having gotten around to putting up an official website, word of mouth grew, and I made almost as much money off of editing as I did on book sales. And as a bonus I got to help some awesome authors make their books shine!

Art projects

I was an artist before I was anything else, and it was a joy to finish off the year with my first love.

Here are the pieces I did:

Freddy Krueger: Pumpkin Carving

Pinhead from Hellraiser: Scratchboard

Trippy Zebras: Scratchboard

My aunt's dog: Pencil.

All in all, I had a pretty good year, but I have more goals for the next. Stay tuned! 

News For My Fellow Metalheads and Horror Fans... and BRIDES OF PROPHECY fans...

I know some of you follow my blog for my horror movie and metal related posts (I'm so sorry I haven't done any in awhile. I'll have to make up for that soon.)

 

Anyway, after hearing all about my romance novels, I am please to announce that I had a short story accepted into the heavy metal horror anthology, AXES OF EVIL II: RISE OF THE METAL GODS.

AXES OF EVIL I is HERE!

So Metal!!!

I am beyond excited because I wrote the story years ago, and though it won 1st place in the Idaho Writer's League state competition, I really didn't find a home for it. It was too short, and it wasn't a romance.

So it languished on my hard drive until the awesome Alex Johnson sent me the invite to submit a story to a heavy metal horror anthology. I was all, "OMFG, I HAVE a story about a metal band in a haunted church!!" So I immediately bought the first AXES and went to polishing up the tale.

I was worried that the story, which I now call "Tesemini" (It's the Kootenai word for Spirit Lake, Idaho, the place where the story takes place) would not be accepted because it really isn't that scary. 

First off, it's kind of a prequel to WRENCHING FATE (Brides of Prophecy, Book 1) and the characters were already who they were. One of them is biologically incapable of fear. 

Second off, many of the stories in Axes I are delightfully gory, but you can't get very gory with ghosts.

Mine kinda has a Scooby-Doo feel so I just rolled with it.

So when the editor, Alex S. Johnson, emailed me and let me know that the story was accepted, I was all, "No way, really?"

He said, "I wasn't sure what to expect, but it was an instant hit with me. It wasn't Friday the 13th scary for sure, but it did have ghosts, possession and, most important, METAL. And I was smiling all the way through."

YAY!!!

So to my fellow horror fans check out AXES I and look forward to reading my story in AXES II

Fans of my Brides of Prophecy series, check out WRENCHING FATE and look forward for more adventures of Rage of Angels in AXES II!  I'll keep you all posted.