Tomb Raider Fans Stay Winning

 We finally got a Lara Croft skin in Fortnite and I. AM. LIVING.

I can't help but hope the fact that they gave us Classic Lara isn't just a way to appease fans and they're going to go back to a more original look for her in the next game. I don't know why the character models for Lara looked so good in the 2013 game and in Rise, and then in Shadow of the Tomb Raider they did her so dirty and made her look like a potato. Lara does not look like that and poor, beautiful Camilla Ludington does not look like that. She earned a better character model to go with her performance. Plus they tried to give us an outfit in that game with the OG turquoise coloring which was a nice idea but it had poor execution. It was kind of fugly.

Also the fact that they gave us a classic Lara model but kept the breast size reduction from more recent games is nice; it proves she can look good in that outfit even with the changes and I hope it triggered those fanboys who whine about her and Tifa Lockheart's cupsize. Leave these poor fictional women alone lmfao.

In all reality I feel super badass in the Tomb Raider skin and I have won my first two solo wins of the season in it. I particularly love the long braid. God, I missed the braid; what an iconic look. If they gave us a variant with her classic red sunglasses I'd lose it, honestly.

I hope they bring back Team Rumble: Vaulted mode this season at some point. I didn't mind Solid Gold mode either but Team Rumble being plain old squads is boring af.

Now I'm going to go hopefully write something worth reading, like maybe the House of Ink rewrite I just promised everyone on Wattpad. Later!

There Is Nothing But Ice

 It's insane to think that pretty soon it's going to be winter - the leaves all fell so quickly I pretty much missed it. I guess I should look up more. :/

Some insane stuff was happening in my personal life lately, so this blog has been neglected as a result. I didn't forget about it (even though nobody really reads it, or at least very few people do) and I'm not going to abandon it. I mean, I do abandon it for months at a time sometimes, but I always intend to come back.

I mostly just want to keep a log of what I'm working on and when, what my mindset is regarding my books and my writing, etc. It's useful to me when I'm looking back, and it's a nice momento to have for my writing life.

I'm back on Prozac (those aforementioned insane things happening in my personal life demanded I face my demons) so that's slowly been kicking into my system and I'm settling into a new sort of normal. Medicated normal. Which is good, because I need to be. Mental health issues are so easy to ignore and push-off dealing with until it's almost too late, but I got a couple large wake-up calls and I had to rely on my family and my doctor to make the right choice for me.

Prozac worked really well when I was on it back in high school, so I'm hoping revisiting it as an adult is an equal or greater success. I probably shouldn't have stopped taking it, but that's a learning experience, I guess.

Still, stuff will hopefully be better from here on out.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about zombies and dragons, and now I'm working on a project that has both. I have to get them both done before NaNoWriMo, because God Damn, I am going to sit down and hammer out my vampire serial for NaNo if it kills me. And if it does, maybe I'll even get to come back as a sexy fanged goth femboi fiend. :) I bet immortality would be fun. It would have to be that cool X-Men regenerating properties kind of immortality though, because what's the point of living forever if you're not also a super-cool badass?

The first episode of that vampire serial is written, but I don't think I've mentioned it here and I am not naming it until I have more work done on it. I have loose outlines for the first four to five stories. There's going to be six in the first season.

But it doesn't matter, 'cause I have too much to do before thinking about that. No vampires for the next ten days of October; these days are about white blizzards, snow-frosted dragons, and magical artifacts.

I am putting out a pretty new edition of Iceblood soon! Maybe early next month, which seems way too far away even though the dates I'm looking at are like, 12-12 days away, lol. It's not going to have any real changes in it, it's just a new cover to go along with the new sequels and their stunning covers. I love the new cover of Iceblood, though, it's finally just right and it really suits the story more than any of the previous covers. I think Iceblood and Blood of Midnight were the two hardest books to put covers to, for me, which is why they've been through so many.

If I'm being honest, Rage & Frenzy may need new covers soon as well, but I'm not thinking about that right now! Here's a little thumbnail version of the new Iceblood cover for your enjoyment, though:

Books 2 & 3 are going to be called Scoundrel and Catalyst! I hope you guys will really check them all out and enjoy them. And really, I hope enough people buy them that I can afford to get Cyberpunk2077 next month, but that's probably a pipe dream, ha.

More later. Time to write write write! If you guys are doing NaNo next month comment about your plans and motivations below! I'd love to hear about people's preptober activities!

Blogger Hates Me

I'm aware my last couple blog posts look really messed up. I have no idea what to do about it because every time I try to edit them, Blogger just doesn't actually update the changes. I can't fix the font to match the rest of the blog (Helvetica is how I roll) and I tried making the fonts larger but it honestly made them smaller. I blame it on the fact that I originally wrote and posted them from my iPad. Ugh. If you can't zoom to read, you can skip 'em, because I didn't say anything too important.

A new edition of Iceblood and a new edition of Storm of Masks are both out, they have nice new covers, and that's about it. Iceblood got a new round of editing and I think it's a lot better now. You should go read it...

I'm also aware I haven't blogged since August. (Bad author!)

I did that because I've been writing/editing other stuff, and I replaced blogging with morning pages for a while there. I'm going to try to balance them out more now and blog a little even if I've already done morning pages. It's a lot of effort though. >.>

The truth is my main energy reserves are all going towards resisting shiny new ideas. I fell for one the other night and wrote the first chapter and now I guess I'm just writing a full novel. The Novel That Shall Not Be Named. Until I do name it, but I'm not telling you guys the title right now (it's one word and starts with P though) because what if I don't finish it and then people are excited for a project I never finish? Yikes.

I just finished editing the new edition of Shadows an hour ago, a full three months behind schedule, lol.

It was totally worth it to take my time with this project, though. I have a few more minor edits to do, then a final read-through, and then it should be good to publish later in the week. I've got financial stuff to take care of in a few days so once it's all done, the ball should get rolling on a few cool things! The new edition of Shadows + the new special edition of Shadows are both coming, and I'm super proud of the work I've done on the book. It's better than I ever thought it could be and it jumped up from 126k words to just over 150k words. So I added like 24k of new material, more or less, and I genuinely think all of it is gold. I have an outline for the short story I'll be including in the special edition and I'm really excited to write it soon!

Anyway, like I said; more ACTUAL blogs to come. I just wanted to post an explanation and excuse here for the fugly formatting on the past couple posts. I hate it more than any of you do, promise. >:O 

Catch me on Instagram @ApolloBlakeBooks

What It Takes

What it takes to write a book:

  

Yup, that's it. Coffee, and cookies, and my butt in a chair. That last one is the hardest part. Especially since these dogs want to distract me so, so bad... I'm babysitting my brother's dog Otis. (Follow him on Instagram here.)

He's adorable, but don't let it fool you, since we've got him he's eaten 3 dish towels, a $600 dollar cheque, a blanket, 2 chew toys, 2 footballs, and more. We can't keep him out of anything, and he has a bad habit of jumping onto the kitchen counters and grabbing anything out there. He's a cuddlebug, though, even when he's biting at you.

I'm determined to finish the new edition of Shadows within the next few hours, though, so I can publish it already! 

I'm hoping I can head up to the she-cave today and record some music in there, since I have no privacy in the house while everyone else is on vacation. I really want to put out a new EP today. Too ambitious? We'll see, lol.

Listen to my latest song here: Maybe You Were Right

Back on the Bandwagon

I'm hopping back into writing and being productive. I'm putting out the new edition of SOSAS in a few days so I'm trying to finish it tonight so I can write a short story before morning.

Today I'm recording a couple new tracks or even an entire EP. I'm slowly getting the hang of cutting and enhancing vocals, so that's nice, and I'd like to apply it and put out something that feels more professional than my last few EPS.

The other day I went wild and bought like 15 or 16 new stock images and made a bunch of new book covers and I'm in love with them, so I have to do something with them. 2018 has not been half as productive as I hoped it would, so, I have to do something about that...

Hopefully I can update later today and say the new edition of SOSAS is publishing!

Someone Free Grimes (Plus Adventures in Puppysitting.)

Remember when Grimes put out the best album ever? Remember how we've been waiting for new material ever since and it hasn't happened?  Remember a couple months ago when she posted shady Tweets about her label and gave us some tea?

The only new music she's put out since then is a snippet of a new bop in an Apple commercial:

It sounds like a bop for sure, but we need it now, not later. I'd love to hear the full version. I'm glad more artists are going independent. Even if it means lower budgets at least it minimizes situations like this with shitty labels. It happens in publishing too, people get fucked over by their labels and publishers and management all the time. There are shady business practices and betrayals and drama. It makes my head spin.

I was watching an Emma Blackery video (I'm waiting for her new album too!) earlier where she talked about a chain bookstore basically blacklisting her and refusing to list her book or promote it because she got mad at them on Twitter for violating a release embargo on the book. Since when is that okay?

It's wild to me that people's entire careers are subject to random whims like this on the part of people higher up in the chain. Or to bandwagon hate, because that happens and ruins careers too. It's also weird how so many artists in the past just couldn't put things out on their own, at least not if they wanted decent exposure.

Now we have the Internet and everyone is kind of enabled to build a brand and name for themselves off of nothing. 

I recently put out a new EP on my SoundCloud called Plucked From Orbit:

(Listen Here)

I don't really make music with the expectation of being known for it or it gaining a lot of attraction. I just like tooling around with synths and different sequencers, and I like making glitchy sounds and album arts. For me it's more about enjoyment and the concepts than making /actual/ bops.

Although I do want to learn to make more mainstream sounding pop bops eventually. Right now I'm basically creating ASMR sounds :P

I'm supposed to be working on a new edition of Shadows to put out next month. But I'm a serial procrastinator, so instead of writing the new novella Lovecursed or updating my notes, I'm planning a new edition of Souls of Salt & Seawater. And listening to lots of Billie Eilish. Not gonna lie.

I've also just been stewing over how many good movies are coming out.

Aquaman, The Nun, Godzilla, that new Bella Thorne movie with the ghosts (it looks cheesy as hell, but that's half the fun) and stuff like Darkest Minds, Glass, Mary Queen of Scotts. I'm really excited for Riverdale season 3. Cults and supernatural elements? Sign me up. I didn't expect them to go full supernatural until season 4, but I'm all here for it.

A couple weeks ago I spent an entire royalty check on vodka, 'cause that's the kind of irresponsible human I am, and got smashed. My parents were having a huge party with dozens of people milling around and bonfires and camping and stuff, so that was a mess, and I didn't want to be sober throughout it, and I'm guessing neither did Kuma. We also babysat my brother's wild dog during the whole ordeal, and the thing is vicious. Also, my selfie stick finally came! Here's some snaps from the weekend:

(Otis is cute but don't let it fool you! He bites! He still thinks he's a lap dog, too...)

(Me & Kuma!)

(Testing the selfie stick, lol)

Now the vodka is all gone and I'm left with an empty wallet. Next time I get paid I'm buying charcoal toothpaste to remove the coffee stains from my teeth, and some charcoal face masks to go with it. I need to do something about this breakout. Ugh. 

I've gotta go take the dog for a walk and then come back and hammer away at this new edition of Shadows so I can finally share the cover with you. I only made it yesterday so I can't act like I've been sitting on it long, but it feels like it. It's very Pirates of the Caribbean... And I really have to go finish it, so I'll leave you with this here:

Thanks for reading!

Buy my books here.

Shadows of Ourselves New Cover! (Cover Reveal)

Y'ALL. LOOK AT THE PRETTY STUFF:

I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS COVER! I CAN'T EVEN!

I designed this cover for Wattpad, because I wanted to see if I could attract some new reads by changing up the face of the book. I love it so much, though, I might end up putting out a paperback edition of it at some point.

I'm working on buying stock for book two so I can have a cover in this style for that as well, with Hunter on it. I've already made one but I don't know if I love the model for Hunter, so I'm gonna re-do it once I buy the new pictures.

Anyway, I'm back to working on Dru Frost book 2! Which also has an amazing cover. I can't share that with you until I have a draft though, so...

But There Are Good Days Too

Last night I complained about marketing being too much work. I complained about writing being hard. I wrung my hands in frustration because every word I put on the page felt like I was stepping in mud, and it was weighing me down, and I'd never be able to finish another book.


Then, I took a break. Counted to five. Opened my wip. And I wrote 6000 words, almost without stopping.


There are good days.


You can power through writers block.


It just takes a lot of willpower. And lots of coffee. And maybe the chapter you put down isn't your best, but it has something special to it, some little flair you love, that's keeping you excited for when the time to edit comes. Sometimes that can be enough.


Rewards are little things when you write all day. We work alone. It's stressful, and tiring, and sometimes the best feeling in the world is knowing you hit the 6k mark, and that tomorrow might be a little easier.

The Struggle Is Real

Marketing is torture. Seriously. It's the worst part of being self-published.

My books won't sell if I don't push them on people, but my anxiety refuses to let me. It also makes writing painful sometimes. Like tonight. Which is why I'm writing this blog post instead to rant about it.

Sometimes when I'm writing it feels like I'm flying, and I hammer out like seven thousand words in a sitting and walk away glowing, feeling like a boss. And then sometimes, like tonight, literally nothing sounds more painful than writing.

I'm struggling to put down a single chapter, let alone more than a thousand or two words. It's uncomfortable and it has me on edge.

Normally when it isn't flowing, I just do something else. Tonight I'm forcing myself to keep going, because I'm determined to put out two novellas next month, but I have to be honest, every word feels painful. Even this blog post is giving me difficulty.

Sometimes I can sit down and write about whatever is in my head--I talk about stupid tv shows I like or what I'm listening to. And sometimes that's fun. Most of the time it is. Then there are nights like this, where it feels pointless, like I'm just adding to the noise and I have nothing important or useful or meaningful to say.

The truth is, some of the joy goes out of writing once you start having to constantly stress over the financial aspects of it. I'm worried about how good my writing is or what vibes I should go for with a project, and then it's compounded with whether or not it will even sell, or how I'll get reviews for it when I can't even email a book blogger without having a mild identity crisis.

I know I'm not the only one who goes through it, either, but this can be a really lonely profession. We all feel that. I get it.

Still, it sucks.

For tonight, I'm just going to remind myself I've done this before and I can do it again, too. I've written 50,000 words in five days. I've written 75,000 words in fourteen days. I can do this. I've finished seven books, what's one more, in the grand scheme of things?

I'm going to take a deep breath. Keep writing. And hope for the best.

AwesomeGang Interview + House of Ink Cover Reveal!

I did an interview over at AwesomeGang the other day, and it's live :) You can check it out here!

I also just posted a new Cosmo Knox book for pre-order; House of Ink is the first book in a series of the same name, featuring erotic gay romance novellas with inked hunks and the twinks they love. :) I'll post links when it's live! It's out on March 5th, if this pre-order is approved!

Here's the cover:

Go & Kiss Everybody That I Know

Title from the song 'Good Good' by Lo.

So. I'm here. Still alive. Still writing. I'm launching a new erotica pen name so I can bring in more income. I used to write and pub erotica before I launched my Apollo Blake & Cosmo Knox names, and I can't afford not to go back to it now, it's just too profitable, and I'm not bringing in enough cash from the books I feel truly passionate about.

These are still fun and fluffy to write, but not what I really, really /want/ to write. I look at it as more of an exercise or practice. And it does help nail down crucial author skills.

Still, once I pop out a few fun, cute erotic romances, I hope I'll produce a steady stream of income to focus on, in this order:

Gaze of Starlight (BoM book two)
Riot of Souls (Deadheart book two)
Whispers We Let Die (Liesmith book two)

I know people REALLY want a sequel to Liesmith, but it will take a while. I wrote book one in 14 days, but then I let it sit for nearly a year. Editing only took 20 or so days, though. So there's that.

I just need it to be one of, if not the, best book I've ever written. Because that's what Shadows of Ourselves is right now, and it's sequel should top it, at least a little.

This series is gonna be epic, I tell you that much.

I'm gonna stop talking about writing and go write, but I'll update again later, hopefully with some chicken casserole in my stomach and more coffee beside me! 

Star Wars Movies That Would've Been Better Than Rogue One

A lot of people liked Rogue One.

We don't know why they liked it, but they did. I've seen them talking about it. A lot.

In my opinion, it's the worst Star Wars film, or at least tied for last with Phantom Menace. I know it's popular to hate on Phantom Menace, but whatever, I'm jumping on the bandwagon. The best, IMO, is The Force Awakens.

Rogue One, though? Rogue One is just...I mean, it's Pompeii in space. Minus Kit Harrington's abs. Which is always a great disadvantage to start at.

I haven't seen The Last Jedi, because I'm poor. AKA I'll be waiting the entire sixth months until it arrives on Netflix. I've heard it's a hot mess, though.

I'll reserve judgement until I see it, but I have seen Rogue One. I mean, I've seen parts of it. Like the first hour, I think. I can't power through your movie when a cgi robot has more charisma than your entire human cast, people. I'm sorry, I just can't.

Especially when the script gives less of a fuck about these characters than I do.

So, I thought I would come up with some ideas for better Star Wars Anthology films that they should have made instead. And still should make. Hire me, LucasFilm. I will be good to you.

NIGHTSISTERS: a movie about one of the Dathomirian Nightsisters Talzin hired out as an assassin; the journey she goes on, significant kills, maybe she goes rogue (¬‿¬) & disobeys orders so they could still get that rebellious vibe they wanted? 

FORCE PRIESTESS: we deserve a movie about the Force Priestesses and their planet, which, let's be honest, is the SW version of the Garden of Eden. It also has that Journey To The Center of the Earth vibe going for it. We could also just get a movie about a human character travelling to find said planet & immortal women.

ESCAPEE CLONES: set during the clone wars; two clones fall in love (mildly incestuous since they're all cloned from the same guy I guess, but whatever) and run away. Adventures follow. There are so many directions an escapee clone story could go down it's mind-blowing.

STRANDED: a Twi'lek pilot crashlands on a mysterious planet and is hunted by large, scary, ravenous beasts. Definite Alien vibes with this one. A horror survival film set in the EU. It's what we need.

FORCE RIVALRY: in which two siblings, maybe twins, awaken their force-sensitivity at the same time and each drift to different sides. Each of them has a romance, it's epic in scale and culminates in them going to war and fighting to the death. Maybe the twin who's fallen to the dark side wins but are filled with such remorse for killing their sibling that they revert to the light somehow?

ICARII: An Icarii traveler and explorer who survives the genocide of their people vows revenge on the Empire, joining the war in some fashion. Or maybe it's set before they were wiped out, and it's a political drama about Selestrine's rise to power? Either way.

BASTILA'S DAD: He was a charming treasure hunter. Indiana Jones in space is way better than Pompeii in space, right? Wake up, people! Raiding tombs on ancient, uninhabited planets? Sounds like my cup of tea.

EARTH: a group of idealist humans, maybe some form of escapee prisoners set out to leave their war-torn, corrupt corner of the galaxy and colonize a planet far, far away (¬‿¬) and end up going through a wormhole or some shit, at which point they reach a new, crystal green-and-blue planet, Character A asks what they'll name it & character B says 'Earth' ... cut to black. Yeah, it's corny as fuck. I miss when movies were allowed to be corny.


I could do this for days. I could go on and on.

In fact, after I see Last Jedi and Black Diamond, I probably will make a longer list of potential EU stories. Because I miss my middle school fanfiction days, if I'm being upfront. I skipped school to read gay Harry Potter fanfiction, and now I'm skipping my deadline to write this sloppy ass blog post for you.

Feel free to post links to the worst Star Wars fanfic you can find in the comments! That's all, folks!

***

You can buy my books here.


Or follow me on Twitter here.

Gotham City Sirens, Now, Please

They made a Suicide Squad movie before a Gotham City Sirens film. How much of a jackass do you have to be to do that? Dozens of people had to approve this at various levels, right? Can we fire them?

Gotham City Sirens will be better than Suicide Squad, AKA, A 2-Hour Commercial. Mark my words. Nothing will ever be as iconic.

Nothing.

I mean, Margot Robbie doing that elevator run in heels in Suicide Squad without a stunt double kinda rivals it. But only that.

I'm also really excited for Marvel's Runaways. I haven't started it yet, because I want to binge.

Also because I'm not willing to pay for Hulu.

I mean, I really feel like Hulu used to have a free, ad-supported version, did they not? I might be hallucinating. Or they might've just removed it. The only reason I was ever interested in Hulu before was for the Delirium movie, but that sucked.*

*Sorry Emma Roberts. You just didn't do the thing, sis.

There's also Black Lightning and The Gifted. I think those are the only other superhero shows I'm interested in right now. Those and Jessica Jones, of course. She's in a league of her own though.

I think this is all on my mind because I'm writing a story from a villains' point of view right now. Or outlining it, at least. And it's going to be fantastic. And diabolical. But I can't talk about it until I've written it, so I'm gonna go do that.

***

You can buy my books here.

Or follow me on Twitter here.

You Can Have This

You guys can have this... It's a link to my Medium!

I'm posting there now, and I love it. I'll be cross-posting stuff from this blog there, but it will also contain original content and posts you can only find on that site. :)

If you're wondering when new material is coming out... SOON!

Right now it's time to update my old ebooks, publish new editions with new formatting and updated social media links, and then, THEN, I have two stories in a new series called Island of Gods coming out as my first releases of 2018.

If you like creepy, Lovecraftian tales full of body hair, eerie vibes, and tentative self-discovery & unraveling...my new stuff will be right up your alley.

Fury & Rage Repackage

As you can see, Rage & Frenzy are getting makeovers! This will be the new look of the Unbroken anthology series from now on! I'm in love with these designs and I think they fit the books much more than the old ones.

That's honestly all the news I have. Pretty covers. I'm sure you're all getting sick of that, because it's just covers and not new stories...which is why I'm hard at work on new material. And I'm gonna get back to that now. 

I'll post links in the next few days when these are live!

The new editions of Fierce Powers and Blood of Midnight are both live now, here! Thanks for all the support you guys <3

New Year, New Theme

Things are looking pretty different around here. Obviously. And I like it. The New Year is a time for change, and all that...

Honestly I was just starting to get bored of the old one.

I only posted 34 times last year, which isn't half as much as I wanted to. That's like, one month's worth of post. In a year. I'm going to try to be a lot more active in that regard in 2018. Plus, with a flashy new theme, I'll want to hang out here more. It is really simple (I even kept the default colours) but I like it.

In fact, I think it might be my favorite blog theme yet.

So, there's that.

My other main goal for the year is to put out more full length novels. I put out a bunch of novellas and short stories in 2017, but for the first year in like four or so years I didn't put out a single full-length novel. I could've buckled down and written Riot of Souls, but I never did, so now I'm in this boat and I have to start bailing out water.

Yup, 2018 is my year to buckle down and put out a bunch of books. My goal is five or six. Plus some novellas and shorts in there for good measure.

In that vein, here's the paperback cover for Blood of Midnight:

It's really pretty and text-free and simple and it's gonna look fantastic in person. Now I just need Amazon to stop fucking around and accept the formatting for it, which they've refused to do twice in a row. Hopefully the third pdf is the charm?

Something Pretty...

Remember the new edition of Fierce Powers I mentioned in my last post? It's a thing now. And it's really pretty.

 

I'm in love with this cover, for obvious reasons. I hope it will turn more heads than the old one, which didn't really suit the book and was kind of bland.

I just published this so I'm hoping the new version will be live in a few hours. I'll post when it is!

The Dru Frost Chronicles

Happy New Year everyone! I'm definitely ready to start a fresh year and wipe the slate clean; it's been a really long, distrestting, bleak year. I was stressed and didn't really confront my problems head-on the way I should have. Honestly I spent most of the last half of the year in a hibernation state. I feel a little like a zombie.

In 2018 I'm going to be much more goal-oriented and really throw everything back into my books. I wanna start working to get more titles out. I think if I publish five or six more books I'll finally get to a point where I can sit back and take a breath. My portfolio just doesn't feel big enough, and a few more full-length novels to pad out my catalogue would be nice.

Even though I've got plenty of books out, it feels as if I haven't shown off my true range or abilities as an author. I've been slacking for months so I'm taking the new year as an opportunity to cut it out.

In that vein, I'll be republishing Blood of Midnight with a new cover! The Evernight Falling Series is also being renamed The Dru Frost Chronicles. I feel like it suits the series better.

Here's the new cover:

 

I'm kinda in love with it! I know it's risky to publish a cover with no words, but I've seen it before and I like the vibes, even if it seems a little rebellious... (Besides, Dru would approve.)

I've been trying to redirect some excitement and attention in the direction of this series, because as much as I love Blood of Midnight, it's been the biggest flop out of all my full-length novels. I don't know if it's due to the lack of strong marketing presence, the presentation, the lack of reviews, or allo of the above. Probably all of the above.

Mostly I think it's because vampire books are so saturated.

It probably doesn't help that I wrote a kind of unconventional plot with an open-ending and that I stomped on the corpses of a bunch of popular genre tropes. Whatever... :)

Which is why I felt like it needed another makeover and the new series name. I'll be writing and publishing the second book soon--in Tears of Sunrise Dru will be a YouTube medium who spends her time offline exorcising evil spirits--and I wanted to really try and give the books a better online presence so that book two will have a warmer reception.

I'll be looking into sending BoM to a couple book bloggers in the next few weeks, but in the meantime if anyone would like a review copy of the beautiful new edition, copy below and I'll send you an ebook! :)

I'm also going to work to get paperbacks of this and all my other titles out before the halfway mark of the year. I've been slack with paperbacks because the formatting is such a pain, but I'll be fighting my way through it in the next few months!

I haven't really been doing much except sitting around getting stoned and listening to pop music for the last few weeks, which sounds like a dream but has honestly been really boring. Christmas vacation felt like purgatory, complete with really bad writers block I kept trying and failing to break through. I also got the flu a week before Christmas and spent days and days in pure hell. I got bronchitis during my bout of the flu so I couldn't breathe and I was bed-bound for days and days.

That experience was agony. Honestly, I got so restless. Sneezing so much also gives you a headache. I couldn't smoke any weed since I had the flu and bronchitis, obviously, and I couldn't drink coffee since caffeine aggravates the flu, so I was going into withdrawal and cravings from both because I'm so unused to not having them (seriously, my diet is 90% caffeine and smoke) that I started losing my mind.

At one point I had the worst migraines I've ever experienced, remembered caffeine withdrawal exists, and drank a small glass of Pepsi to stave off the symptoms. I felt like I was drinking a healing potion in a video game, I kid you not. The Pepsi saved me. (The Pepsi saved me may just be the most poignant thing I'll ever write, sorry not sorry.) I'm fully recovered now, but it still sucked.

In more positive news, Shadows of Ourselves has been rising more and more on Wattpad. It just broke 12k reads over there, which is the best X-mas gift I could ask for. I'm really proud of that book and the fact that it's my most popular feels really validating!

Aside from that, my only real publishing news is that I'll be slapping a new cover on my anthology Fierce Powers. I don't know how to market it because it's such a weird mix and match of stories, but it should at least look pretty, right?

I'm really only excited about the new Winchester movie (who doesn't love weird giant haunted houses?) and all the cool new music coming out in 2018...

Kimbra has a new album coming out, Ariana Grande has an album coming out, Melanie Martinez has an album coming out (which, despite the controversy surrounding her will still be full of bops) you know Troye Sivan won't put off his second album another year...it's just going to be a really good year for music. In all truth I hope Trisha Paytas puts out a couple new EPS this year.

We won't get any new Game of Thrones until next year, but you win some, you lose some. At least we still get the Tomb Raider movie, right?

Wordly Warfare

I'm stuck in editing hell again. I keep coming back here despite my best intentions to never write again, because it drives me up a tree, even when I feel like I'm having fun. Right now I'm polishing up the first chapters of Break This Gilded Cage (the first installment in my new vampire serial, I Am Your Fate) before I write the last three.

In non-writing related news, I've honestly just been watching zombie shows on Netflix and napping. I'm so exciting, huh?

I spent my Halloween night drinking spiked coffee and listening to Spotify, so nothing too special is happening. I think I may put out a new chapter of Fascination on Wattpad tonight, though. So, slowly, the ball is moving forward on a few different projects. I just put Shadows of Ourselves on Pronoun for free, so once it's live maybe Amazon will finally price match?

It's been a hell of a time trying to get them to do that--Shadows is on InstaFreebie and Wattpad, but Amazon doesn't really care about that. RoAnna Sylver said they finally price matched her book once she put it up on Pronoun though, so maybe it will work for me too. I hope so. Shadows needs the love, and I think if it goes permafree on Amazon it will start to get the hype it deserves.

I'll probably make Break This Gilded Cage free, too. Every other installment of the serial will be 99 cents, since each one is only 15 to 20 chapters.

Anyway, enough of my rambling. I'll have a better, less pointless blog post tomorrow or maybe even later tonight. Until then, here's some good music.

I Haven't Forgotten

I haven't forgotten about this blog. I mean, how could I? I have a long history of writing embarrassing, mortifying personal details on here because I like to pretend that nobody reads it. When I'm not pretending that everybody reads it, I mean.

I've just been really busy doing things like writing, putting off writing, hating myself for putting off writing, and more along those lines...

I've also been watching a shit-ton of American Horror Story and Riverdale, but you all probably have been, too, so you can't fault me for that. That's just how it is. Anyway, I haven't got much to say tonight; I'm listening to it rain cats and dogs outside, and our actual cats and dogs (including Roxy, the stray we took in) are all inside, safe and dry. I'm about to start drafting more on Dreamsinger, the sequel to Dreamseeker.

In case you missed the new edition of Dreamseeker, it looks like this;

The cover for Dreamsinger is even better. And it has a hot shirtless boy on it, just for bonus points.

In other news, Netgalley -or the St. Martins intern with their companies' Netgalley password, blessings to whichever- decided to treat me like the prince I am, and send me an arc of her new Valkyrie fantasy, which I've been waiting for for just about forever. I'll probably start reading that tonight and...well, I'll probably finish it tonight, too, because who are we kidding here. I just finished rereading The Selection, too, and now I'm gonna reread The Elite. I need good old comforting rereads right now.

I'l leave you with this: I just created a Medium account and you should definitely follow me there for articles and advice about publishing, book promotion, and my wild ranting about pop culture. Kind of like this blog. But better. And hosted on a more popular site. (I think.)

[Another reminder, Shadows of Ourselves is free on Instafreebie, and this is the newest edition with the best editing, so it's a sweet deal. Get it here.]