Friday Five for December 7th, 2012

1. I completed one of my big goals for 2012 yesterday. I wrote my 12th short story of the year and submitted my 12th one. It was a tougher goal to keep up with than I originally thought. I've been aiming high with my stories too. I haven't gotten one accepted by a SFWA approved press yet. I'll keep trying, but I won't be doing this again next year. I'd like to say I'll write six and submit six, but I'm not going to set any goals for short stories. Let them come as the inspiration hits me.

2. I had a lovely visit with my mom. It was a bit crazy, but we had fun. We took my son to see Santa and rode in a little mall train. We shopped. A lot. My feet hurt afterward. It was a nice early holiday visit. Now I have a ton to catch up online and prepare for the release of The Marquis next week. Yikes!

3. Yesterday's kickoff for the Writers4Writers Group went wonderfully. Thank you to everyone that participated. If you're interested in joining, just click on the tab above and pop your name into the linky link list. Helping fellow writers is as fast and easy as retweeting.

4. I just finished Cold Days by Jim Butcher. Brilliant! I'm so excited about it and I want to talk to someone, but my husband has only started to read it. It's so hard not to shout out spoilers. And he reads so slow!

5. We put up our Christmas tree on Wednesday. We did it while the boy was taking his nap. When he woke up and finally saw it, he let out this awesome breathy gasp and said, "I love it!" Seeing his gorgeous little face light up made my month.

 

Have a great weekend!

Writers4Writers Group

Today is the official kickoff of the Writers4Writers Group. Yippee! I've teamed together with three marvelous authors, Mary Pax, C.M. Brown, and Stephen Tremp, to show our support for our fellow writers. We invite you to spare a minute of your time to do the same.

Our featured author this month is Nancy S. Thompson. Her new thriller, The Mistaken is now available on Amazon. Please stop by Nancy's blog and copy and paste her prewritten Tweets onto your Twitter page. Then stop by our W4WS Facebook page and share her link with your friends. That's it! Simple. Fast. Powerful.

The W4WS Group's Mission:

• Help writers bring awareness of their book(s) to tens of thousands of new people

• Help writers reach Amazon Top 100 in at least one category (i.e., suspense, free, whatever)

• Increase sales of their book(s) after the promo is over

• Drive new traffic to their blog and increase following

• Create verbal and viral buzz.

In A Nut Shell: the spotlighted author will choose a social media avenue such as Twitter or Facebook (or both). Each month we will spotlight one, two, or possibly three new authors.

 
Then, the good people of Blogdom will promote the author’s book to their Twitter followers or Facebook friends, and thus to incredibly large new audiences the author could not reach on their own.

Please show your support for your fellow writers and sign up on the linky list below!

Insecure Writer's Support Group for December 2012

The Insecure Writer's Support Group (IWSG) is the brilliant idea of Alex J. Cavanaugh. The purpose of the group is to share doubts and insecurities and to encourage one another. Please visit the other participants and share your support. A kind word goes a long way.

I'm eight days away from releasing the first book of my 13th Floor series. I'm sure many of you know what those days feel like. The self doubt, the panicking, the elation, the fear, and the hope. All of those mixing together causing your mood to go up and down with no warning.

I'm highly anxious about this series because I want it to represent me. I want people to recognize me as Christine Rains, the author of the 13th Floor series. Yes, I know all our stories represent ourselves as writers. Yet I have published fantasy, romance, horror, and erotica stories. I haven't put any particular one to my name, my brand. That's what I want to do with the 13th Floor series.

I think about the series all the time. The stories, the characters, the tours, how to market them, what will readers think, and can I handle it if it isn't well received. All possible scenarios go through my head. I over-think things. A lot.

I feel like I'm bracing myself for impact.

How do you prepare yourself for a release? And how do you handle the anxiety and self doubts that come with it?

Teaser Tuesday with Cursed

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

This is the second book in the Alex Verus series, but I forgot to make a teaser out of the first one. I'm enjoying these books so much. A fantastic urban fantasy world much like the Harry Dresden books, but in London. Benedict Jacka writes amazingly vulnerable and yet strong characters. A must read for all urban fantasy fans.

Here's your teaser:
Without pause the creature pulled itself to its feet and lunged straight for us.
Some days are just better spent in bed. (page 41)

The Nightmare Collection blog tour - Interview with Cassie Richards and giveaway

I'm very excited about Cherie's The Nightmare Collection. Three chilling tales of horror. You can read my review of it here. Two of the stories feature a brave young woman named Cassie Richards, and I'm lucky enough to get a chance to sit down with her today. Getting through my questions won't be nearly as difficult as surviving what happened in the woods!

Thank you for joining me, Cassie. Let's start off easy. I know you're a teacher. What do you teach and what made you go into teaching?

I teach high school history, mainly American History and World History. I’ve always loved the past, so I knew I wanted to study history. But my choices were limited in what to do with a history degree, so teaching was the most likely option.

I'm a history fan myself, and I had a lot in my hometown. What's your hometown? Do you miss it?

Although I was born in Roanoke, Virginia, I lived in New Haven. It’s about as small southern town as you can get in Virginia, filled with rednecks. I was glad to leave. But there are a few things I miss. The mountains, my family, the familiarity of home.

My town was really small too. What was your family life like? What's it like now?

I suppose my family life was pretty normal. I’m an only child, so their focus tended to be on me. I was in everything— soccer, theater, choir, etc. I was an overachiever, and I always felt they were there for me. But everything changed overnight. Now we rarely talk and our relationship is strained. Before I went with Tim to Virginia, I had only seen them twice in ten years.

Ah, that fateful night. It's absolutely horrifying what happened. Do you consider yourself a heroic or just lucky?

I’m no hero. I just got lucky. If that car hadn’t come by and struck me, the monster would’ve likely grabbed me, dragged me back into the woods, and killed me too.

Then you were accused of the murders. To what lengths did you go to convince people to believe you about who actually committed those atrocious acts?

I begged them to believe me when I woke up in the hospital. They thought I was crazy, so imagine how hard it is to get people to believe you then? When I got out of Grayson Sanatorium, I used my resources as a history major to research local history. We couldn’t be the only ones to cross the monster’s path. I sent my findings to New Haven Police, but they didn’t believe me. Eventually, I stopped trying. It was easier that way. If I hadn’t, then those other people might not have died.

Do you feel any anger towards those people who wouldn't believe you?

Uh, yeah. Wouldn’t you? The worse was they wouldn’t believe me. I knew what I saw. Even when my name was cleared, they wanted to believe the worse in me. It wears a girl down.

I have no doubt. Do you think there's anything different you could've done that night to help your friends survive?

I go over that night every day. It’s the first thing in my mind when I wake up and keeps me awake at night. I still don’t know what I could’ve done differently. Maybe I could’ve been stronger, faster, smarter. I just don’t know.

I guess we'll never know. Thank you again for being here, Cassie. It was a pleasure chatting with you.

Author Bio: A self-proclaimed bookworm, Cherie Reich is a writer, freelance editor, book blogger, and library assistant living in Virginia. Her short stories have appeared in magazines and anthologies. Her e-books include the horror series Nightmare, a short story collection with authors Aubrie Dionne and Lisa Rusczyk titled The Best of Raven and the Writing Desk, the futuristic space fantasy novelette trilogy Gravity, and The Foxwick Chronicles, a series of fantasy stories. She is a member of Valley Writers and the Virginia Writers Club.

Author Links:
Website: http://cheriereich.webs.com
Blog: http://cheriereich.blogspot.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/bookworm0753
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorcheriereich
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4268457.Cherie_Reich

Book blurb: A legend is hungry tonight.

A child monster will get its first taste of blood in Nightmare at the Freak Show. Four friend will enter the forest on December night, but only one can survive in Once Upon a December Nightmare. Almost ten years after Cassie's December nightmare, the monster awakens to hunt again in Nightmare Ever After.

Add to Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16089321-the-nightmare-collection

Buy the book!
Smashwords https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/256004
Amazon US http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A93EMNE
Amazon UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00A93EMNE
Nook http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-nightmare-collection-cherie-reich/1113808878?ean=2940015726503
Nook UK http://uk.nook.com/ebooks/the-nightmare-collection-by-cherie-reich/2940015726503
Kobo http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/The-Nightmare-Collection/book-NTs2Bn-DK0-ypSR2cseCvA/page1.html?s=K9KRpcbL8UC68DBm7NN-KA&r=9
Createspace https://www.createspace.com/4043291

GIVEAWAY!

Cherie is giving away prizes to two lucky people!

The prize packages are open internationally and include: a signed copy of The Nightmare Collection, a signed copy of Gravity: The Complete Trilogy, and a $10 Amazon Gift Card.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Sunday sales peek and what's coming up this week

Only 11 days until the release of the first book in my 13th Floor series, 1301 - The Marquis. It's coming on so quickly. You can see all the wonderful blogs I'll be visiting on my blog tour if you click on the 13th Floor series tab above. I'd like to remind you all if you'd like to be part of one or more of the upcoming blog tours, please email me. The more the merrier!

This week, there's a lot of exciting things happening. I'm hosting Cherie Reich tomorrow for her newest release, The Nightmare Collection. I'll be interviewing a brave young woman by the name of Cassie Richards and talking about her horrific experiences with the monster.

On Wednesday, it's the Insecure Writer's Support Group hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh. I'll be posting on the right day this month!

This Thursday is the very first Writers4Writers Group post. It's a brilliant way for writers to help other writers through social media. It's as fast and simple as a tweet.

I hadn't checked on my sales for about four weeks. November was a busy month. It was also a very bad month for sales. I've noticed a few other writers have mentioned this as well. Maybe everyone was too busy NaNo-ing? Or maybe I just need to promote some more.

Fearless still does pretty well. Hopefully it'll get a boost when The Marquis is released. These are my Fearless total sales since August. (Not including anything that's been downloaded from Kobo as they don't track free downloads.)
Amazon - 3921
Smashwords - 890
B&N - 3

Downloads for L'il Gal Al and the Zombies of Amarillo still mosey along like a tortoise on a desert vacation.
Amazon - 5
Smashwords - 89
B&N - 3

Colonization Blog Tour - Guest Post with Aubrie Dionne

Please welcome sci-fi romance author, Aubrie Dionne.

Colonization is her newest book, and by far, my favorite of all her stories.

You can read my review of it here.

Take it away, Aubrie!

Why I Love Working with Inkspell Publishing:

When Inkspell publishing agreed to take Colonization: Paradise Reclaimed last spring, I was ecstatic. I’d had two offers from two different publishing companies, and Inkspell won hands down. Their website is gorgeous, their covers are phenomenal, and I loved the sound of the stories they had coming out. I thought my book would be a perfect fit.

Not only that, but they have a print contract for most of their books, which is hard to find nowadays with small publishers. Having a print book is a great marketing tool. You can only do a Goodreads giveaway if the book is in print, and some reviewers won’t take ebooks, not to mention book signings, so print definitely opens more doors.

As I got to know the people at Inkspell, I loved the company even more. They are polite, courteous, and always get back to me as soon as possible, unlike other companies I’ve dealt with that don’t return my emails at all. They make me feel special, and they support my book wholeheartedly. I think it’s important to find a company that believes in you and your work.

As I started to read the ARC’s coming out of Inkspell, I was amazed. Want by Stephanie Lawton was so irresistible, I couldn’t put it down. I ate it up like chocolate balls and ice cream. Frozen by Annabelle Blume was another steamy hit. Book after book that I read I liked. I knew I’d truly found a home for my YA books.

Aubrie Dionne is an author and flutist in New England. Her writings have appeared in Mindflights, Niteblade, Silver Blade, Emerald Tales, Hazard Cat, Moon Drenched Fables, A Fly in Amber, and Aurora Wolf. Her books are published by Entangled Publishing, Lyrical Press, and Gypsy Shadow Publishing. Her newest YA sci fi novel with Inkspell Publishing titled: Colonization: Paradise Reclaimed, was released in October. When she's not writing, Aubrie teaches flute and plays in orchestras. She's a big Star Trek TNG fan, as well as Star Wars and Serenity.

Visit Aubrie at her website and her blog. You can find her on Goodreads and Twitter.

Colonization is now available on Amazon, B&N, and Inkspell Publishing.

Blurb: Finding a new home has never been so dangerous.

Andromeda has spent all seventeen years of her life aboard a deep space transport vessel destined for a paradise planet. Her safe cocoon is about to break open as Paradise 21 looms only one month away, and she must take the aptitude tests to determine her role on the new world and her computer assigned lifemate. As a great-granddaughter of the Commander of the ship, she wants to live up to her family name. But, her forbidden love for her childhood friend, Sirius, distracts her and she fails the tests. The results place her in a menial role in the new colony and pair her with Corvus, “the oaf”.

But when Andromeda steps foot on Paradise 21, her predestined future is the least of her worries. Alien ghosts from a failed colonization warn her of a deadly threat to her colony. And when Sirius's ship crashes on the far ridge in an attempt to investigate, she journeys to rescue him with Corvus.

Andromeda now must convince the authorities of the imminent danger to protect her new home. What she didn't expect was a battle of her own feelings for Sirius and Corvus.

Can she save the colony and discover her true love? 

GIVEAWAY TIME!

   a Rafflecopter giveaway