'Tis More Blessed

Greetings, Fire Enthusiasts. How was your Christmas? Did Santa forgive that bit of bad behavior this year and make a visit to your house? I hope so. I was very pleased to receive iTunes gift cards - which I am well on my way to burning up! *laughs* I also welcomed the huge Blu Ray editions of The Exorcist, Casablanca and Lawrence of Arabia into my collection. Very awesome. I am particularly fond of that last one. As you may have heard, we lost Peter O'Toole just recently. I was a very big fan of his and will miss him. Thankfully his work lives on in film. Our work will live on, too, after we've gone, but I digress.

For those of you who have missed me - bless you! I have missed all of you. I am venturing out of writers' cave only momentarily, however. As I pen this post I am at 48 thousand words and counting as I put all of my free time into writing this first draft. It is book three in my Dance on Fire crossover vampire series and I am very happy with its progress. That is why you haven't seen me in a while. I am on my traditional holiday vacation from the day job, but am still working at disciplining myself to write in the morning and then stay off the laptop and focus on family for the rest of the day. As I have mentioned previously, I spent far too much time with my nose glued to the screen these past five years or so, doing all of the promotional stuff that we have to do. Sound familiar? :) I'm getting better, but there's still much to do.

So, you may ask, have I given up on the social media? No. I am instead shifting my focus temporarily from the Internet world to the physical one. As you can see from the photo, my latest book Seeing Ghosts is now available in paperback - something which just happened. I have been giving some copies away and turning my attention to locating a store in town to sell them. Now, if you are unaware, although I live in a small town in Central California, my stories take place here. In other words, I have potentially a built-in audience that I need to do a better job of reaching. Nothing is official, but I spoke earlier this week with a shop owner and she is incredibly excited to do business together. It isn't a book store, but its clientele is the perfect demographic for my paranormal romance, and my book would be the only one there. It was my first choice and we should be announcing our partnership in the next week or so. We have already discussed book signings and other events to get the word out. She's excited and so am I.

A moment ago I mentioned something about giving copies of this new paperback away. Today is week four in author Milo James Fowler's 'Tis More Blessed Christmas giveaway extravaganza. I am pleased that he asked me to be involved, and especially pleased to offer a couple of autographed copies to raffle winners on the domestic side of things. My apologies to my friends around the world, but I haven't sold any of these yet. I hope you will understand.

So, what must one do to win one of these, you ask? Nothing. It's the holidays. We've all been running around, going crazy with the shopping, finding time for family, etc. For once let's make something stress free. Just leave me a comment, saying you'd like to be entered and make sure I can get hold of you. In the figurative sense, of course. Not the sketchy sense... *pauses momentarily, recalls how cute many of you are* Look at me! Already getting in trouble with Santa for next year! *slaps hand*

Alright, I'm going to sneak back into the cave. Love you guys! I should have more news soon, as well as news about my long awaited reduction in hours at the day job.

Leave your comment and we'll leave this giveaway open until January 6th. I would like to encourage you to check out each of the other giveaways. You can find them listed at Milo's site here. I know I'll be there.

I hope you've had a blessed Christmas and, from my house to yours, I wish you and yours a very Happy New Year.

We'll talk soon.


Peter O'Toole
1932 - 2013

"...Good-night, sweet prince..."
  



  

December Update

Merry Christmas, Fire Enthusiasts. How have you been? I've missed you.

Well, what can I tell you? Very little has changed. My day job continues to impede all things. There's still hope that it will change, but God knows when. I won't bore you with those details.

So, where have I been? I've been writing. I'm working on Dance on Fire 3. It has a proper name, but I'm going to hold that information until the end. It is the continuing adventures of Nathaniel and the Lopez family.

Once again I found myself outlining more than the book before. I had a 25 page paragraph outline with both general and specific content, outlining the entire book. Once I was pleased with the story, leaving myself enough space to have some unexpected surprises, I began the first draft.

I have been writing mostly in the mornings before work, with extended sessions happening on weekends and any time I can possibly sneak it in. I currently sit at over 20k words and have barely cracked my outline. We'll see whether that means anything or not. My first thought is it could be the longest work I've ever written (something larger than 113k words); however, it may simply even out once I get to the end. What ever happens, you'll be the first to know.

Getting the Seeing Ghosts paperback published has been a bit of a pain, but we're at the end of that process. We had some issues with cover art which caused delays, but I should be receiving the final proof copy this week. This is my first time working with CreateSpace, so I'll let you know how that goes at a later date. Demand will drive how quickly I begin working on producing Dance on Fire and Flash Point. Since my crossover vampire series takes place in my real life home town, I plan to spend a lot of time working the local angle. Stay tuned.

So that's what's been up with me. It's December, and my favorite time of year. Unfortunately, it's way too warm here in central California, and feels strange to be decorating for Christmas. It doesn't get that cold here where we live, but long sleeved shirts is all I've needed so far - and it's really sunny. So weird! I trust it will cool down before the holidays are past. I even grew my beard out. I haven't done that in 2-3 years thanks to that original author photo I started with that had me sporting one. I was so sick of looking at that picture! *laughs*

You should hear from me before Christmas, but just in case, I want to wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. *hugs*

We'll talk soon.