Playlists Galore

I haven't mentioned these on here (I don't think) but I make playlists on8tracks all the time. There's one for Dreamseeker, and one for Shadows of Ourselves. There are also some for writing in general.




You can find them all here: http://8tracks.com/jinx-king

Love Will Remember + SOSAS paperback cover!

Right now I'm uploading the newly revised edition of Souls of Salt & Seawater to Kindle and I just finished creating the paperback cover. It's mostly the same as the old one, with a few tweaks and a new font  and layout. I'm pretty fond of it.

The paperback will be 214 pages, and the paperback of Blood of Midnight will be 239. I have no idea how much they'll cost, but I think roughly around ten dollars. I would make it lower, but, you know, Createspace doesn't roll like that.

I'm listening to old Selena Gomez music. I know Revival like just came out a few months ago, but I need more. Mostly I'm hoping tonight will be productive.

I'm aiming to finish editing Shadows of Ourselves within the next three or four days, along with writing a new collection of vignettes, kind of like Things We Saw at Midnight but. . .not. These ones are light contemporary, with a matched theme and interlocking cast. I'm thinking it will be 3 short stories and six vignettes, or something like that. But I'm not promising this, and I don't know exactly when it would be out if I do write it. I don't know right now if I'll have to wait a bit longer than I want or not, because I have to dive into Dreamwalker and Dreamkiller, and then Maelstrom, if I want to get those all out before the end of the year. I have plenty to keep me busy, at least.

Anyway, work aside, I've been seriously lacking in TV lately. Our streaming box is on the fritz and certain titles and shows just won't load. I have no clue. I just wanna watch new iZombie. I miss when the Magicians was on, and I need more magic boarding school shows stat.

Or Lev Grossman could just write a Magicians spin-off, maybe about Plum, or someone in Fillory, and I would bow to him. That could happen.

Anyway, since I've got nothing important to say I feel like I owe you all a look at the paperback cover for Souls of Salt & Seawater. Here:

Indecision & Purple Hair & Talking Cats

I do not think I'm going to write more Lilac Jones Adventures stories. In fact, I think I'm going to unpublish them. At least on storefronts. The KDP term for those ends May 7th, and I've already unpublished them, so when their enrollment in that ends I'll be posting the first three stories on Wattpad as freebies.

I have more important/meaningful.developed projects to work on and Lilac herself will probably make an appearance in another book someday, so I'm not too worried about any of this.

In more positive news, the paperback designs I'm coming up with (wraparound covers) are very pretty. I like pretty.

Too Much and Too Little

While going over SOSAS another time I've been listening to The Walk, by Imogen Heap, on repeat. I've also been stuffing my face with barbecue chips.

But I thought I would take a break from that to post a quote from the book really quickly:

You can buy the book here, or just wait until it's out in paperback. The new edition will have a map of the world in it. If I can figure out how to format that.

Or, you can request a free review copy by sending me an email, which I talked about in my last post. The gist of it is this: you like free books, I like honest reviews. And giving out free books.

So shoot me an email at ApolloBlake@mail.com for a free ebook if you're interested. Now, back to work!

Formatting and ARCS/Review Copies

Today I'm doing some editing and then hopping over to formatting work for paperbacks. I haven't put out any paperbacks yet because, frankly, I'm lazy. But I've had people tell me they want physical copies of the books, and I want them too, so I'm putting them all out through Createspace.

I've used them for paperbacks before, back when I wrote my first book, at seventeen (a novel that nobody but me is ever allowed to see, that will never see the light of day, because that's just how bad it was) and liked the finished product. So.

I'm making SOSAS my priority, and Rage and Frenzy will both be available only in the bundle edition because on their own I think they'd make too-small, floppy books. Plus they're better when read together.

I think I'm personally most excited for the Blood of Midnight paperback, though. It's going to contain Scars of Dusk, the short story, in the paperback edition, and I can't wait to see them in person. I have a feeling that cover is gonna be super pretty.

Aside from formatting paperbacks, though, I'm also looking to send out some review copies of the ebooks.

Particularly for Dreamseeker:

Dreamseeker is a novella I wrote with teenagers hunting monsters, kissing, and travelling to other worlds! It's urban fantasy with sci-fi elements, and here's a quote:

“I’m always going to be there to help you fight, Hugh.” Why were we whispering? Why was he so close? Why—

Whyishetouchingmelikethis?

Hugh’s fingers were tracing the bare skin of my forearms, fingertips smoothing over the cold of the room and destroying every thought that passed through my head. There was just the heat of him, the thrill of his touch that never got old.

“I know,” he said. “I know you will.”

So, there you have it. Romance and terrifying monsters! Plus, that's a pretty cover.

If you're interested in reading Dreamseeker (or any of my published titles!) and leaving a review on Amazon or Goodreads, leave a comment below with your email, or email me at ApolloBlake@mail.com, and I'd be happy to send you an ebook of whichever title you're interested in.

Among other things, I'm reworking the Lilac Jones Adventures (going through and giving them a firmer editing, as well as writing another one or two stories to wrap up that series. Originally I was going to write a spin-off novel, called A Darkness So Divine, but the idea for that book was a loose, underdeveloped one, and although I'm probably use those characters someday, that project in and of itself is scrapped. At the same time, I need to end Lilac's story, because I think her stories and fun and cute and because I owe it to anybody who was invested in them.

I'm also giving Souls of Salt & Seawater a firmer editing, but that's honestly just grammar and formatting stuff where I've found tiny errors. Lots and lots of formatting, and it kills me every time.

So, yeah, that's what's up: I'll be posting links to paperbacks within the next week or so, and the new editions of SOSAS and TLJA should be out sometime soon, as well!

I'll probably be doing a rafflecopter giveaway for new Lilac Jones ebooks once they're out, so keep an eyes out for that. And, as always, thanks so much for reading guys!

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It's All Good

Here's a list of some songs I'm listening to while editing:

• Just One Yesterday by Fall Out Boy
• Too Much by Pale
• Jinx by DNCE
• Mirrors by PVRIS
• Make a Shadow by Meg Morris

I also have Lemonade playing on repeat, but my favorites are Daddy Lessons, Don't Hurt Yourself, and Six Inch.

It's all good as long as I'm getting work done.

Which, you know, I am. When I'm not reading. I just went through a really big reading slump and I'm starting to get out of it. I just devoured the last Lunar Chronicles book, which pissed me off, because it introduce the first canon gay character of the series as a nameless throwaway who preyed on a straight lead with mind illusions. Not really cool. It was still a great book, though, I just get annoyed at how a lot of straight authors write about us sometimes, especially when they just don't write about us at all, like we don't exist.

On the more positive end of the spectrum, I picked up Cut Both Ways by Carrie Mesrobian again and I'm gonna finish it soon. I bought it a while back because I wanted a book with boys kissing boys, and this had that, plus a really pretty cover.

I have like ten books on the go right now and stacks and stacks of them around my room. I just finished Unchanged by Heather Crews as an ebook and now I'm reading her new book, Pshcopomp, which has been really good so far.

I'm probably going to do an Indie Pick spotlight on that or something, or see if I can interview her for the blog, because I love her work. She has some free short stories about vampires I'd really recommend reading, but since I've been loving this book (which is futuristic dystopian kind of deal) so much, I made a graphic for it:

I think the protagonist might actually be a white girl, or at least half white, but I was picturing her as afro-latino, with really good hair, like above, so. Yolo.

This book is really aesthetic, and I love aesthetic, so you can, and should, get it here. I'll warn you though, it gets pretty dark. (Trigger warning for physical and sexual abuse/rape.) But all the darkness is handled pretty well and not, like, glossed over.

Aside from that I've been rereading snippets of Ink by Amanda Sun, Extraction by Stephanie Diaz, and Lady Midnight, by Cassandra Clare.

Sometimes I like to pick things I've been through, even several times, off of the shelf and just read a few passages.

Sometimes I do it for one passage and end up rereading an entire book. That's just how I roll, though.

Obligatory What?

OBLIGATORY INSTAGRAM PLUG, THAT'S WHAT, BITCHES. YOU SHOULD FOLLOW ME:

It's mostly selfies nobody asked for and pictures of the nature around my home, but there's some art and books thrown in there for good measure. Check it out! (If you dare.)