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atthequillsmercy

Camp NaNoWriMo Complete!

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See, I knew it would be done in less than 50k words. I’m counting this as a win.

I completed this last night and I’ll start editing it today. In case this your first update on this project, it’s the sequel to a book I published ten years ago; “Gods in the Grey City.” And in some shameless self promotion, it’s on sale at Smashwords right now! You can check it out for free until July 21st to see if you’d be interested in the sequel when it’s complete.

When I have the manuscript more fleshed out and organized, I’ll post s a preview over on my Patreon for my patrons.

This was a wild ride but in the end, I had a good time. Not sure what I’ll work on after this but I’ll figure that out once this book is published.

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atthequillsmercy

Camp NaNoWriMo Day 14 (a late update)

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At a certain point every night, I try to put my phone down and leave it alone so I can track my sleep and not be tempted to play around or doom scroll. This was my word count from yesterday.

I need to somehow get to 25,000 words today to get caught up and be on track for the possible 50k words. I say ‘possible’ because I’m not going to force it if I finish the story and I’m under. That’s not the point of this whole thing.

I’m a little stressed (meaning a LOT stressed) about how far I am from the right track but I’m not giving up. I was able to do this in November, I should be able to do it again.

I’ll try to update again today. It depends on how tired I am.

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atthequillsmercy

Writing Update: Current Project and What’s Next

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Right after my newest release, I started work on the third and final part of my Dahlia series. Even with an outline, I floundered a bit with the introduction but things are moving along. I can’t give an estimated release date yet but I am having fun working on this series.

What I really want to do next is another installment of Go Away Girls. I already have an idea for it, I just need to outline it before I start it.

Right now, my sales are not in a place where I can take time to work on really long projects; like the next installment of my vampire series. I’m getting there VERY slowly but I’m keeping my projects short so I can publish more books more often. I have 18 total titles under my belt and I’m pushing for 30 or more before the end of the year. I am looking into bundling these shorter works together. I just need to figure out how I want the covers to look.

For sneak peeks and earlier news, check out my Patreon!

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atthequillsmercy

NaNoWriMo Day 22

I am behind. And, I don’t really feel bad about it because over the weekend, I was doing chores and writing until almost 3 am. Last night, I decided getting some halfway decent sleep was more important.

Only to be woken at 3 am because my nose decided breathing wasn’t important anymore but, whatever. I need to whip out the humidifier…

As as I’ve stated before, I think this story is going to be under 50k words overall. I have the one big fight scene and the conflict resolution and I’m done. As, I’ve said, I may end up adding more words in the editing process (since I have been reading back over what I’ve written and a TON of descriptions need to be filled in and/or fleshed out) and I’m looking forward to that process! I want what I’m picturing in my head to be clear to others when they read it.

I think what I look forward to most about all this is when it’s done, I can start working out again. I sneak in words all day, I go home for a really fast dinner, fast shower, then I’m back at it for a few hours.  This has consumed my brain and time. It’ll be nice to take 30 minutes for a quick run to clear the stress of the day, then go write some more. Or maybe do some reading; since I’m behind on my reading goal for the year. I also need to keep doing needlework so I can use up all the yarn I bought. I guess December will be as busy as November even without this challenge.

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atthequillsmercy

NaNoWriMo Day 19

It is so adorable that in October I thought I would be doing daily updates like it would totally fit into my day while I try to furiously write, work full time, function as a mom, and also a human being all at the same time. Ah, how young and foolish I was a few weeks ago…

Anyway, I beat my word goal today! If you’ve been following me on Instagram, Twitter, or Tumblr, you’ve probably seen me express my prediction that I won’t meet my word goal; not because I won’t hit the 50k word goal on time, but because the way my story is playing out in this rough draft, I may reach the conclusion before I hit that word count. Does that count as a win? Because I think that counts as a win. It’s just how I planned for the story to turn out and I am not going to pad the story with extra words to hit this goal. After editing, it may be longer (because I’ve been reading through my Freewrite drafts to make suure I keep character names straight and things like that) since I know there are places where descriptions can be expanded so the reader knows what the fucking hell is going on. I want this to be a good story, not a 50k word manuscript that will be a good story if I bash my head against it enough.

I am enjoying this story. I like working in this world and it’s characters. I think I may have something pretty cool here and I don’t want to fuck it up with restrictions. So, as I sit here at almost 11:30pm, I think I have a good thing going. This is harder and easier than I thought it would be. I suppose coherent thoughts about all this will have to come together around December 1st.

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atthequillsmercy

It’s here!

Dahlia Part 2 releases today! You can click that link or head over to my store to purchase a copy!

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atthequillsmercy

Open for Business!

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My store is ready! I’ve got most of my short stories ready for sale and I’m thinking of moving the longer books there, too.

I’ve still been doing some needlework, that I sell here, and I may post them in the store here as well but I kinda like my existing needlework shop. But, we’ll see how much I can get done.

For now, I’m going back to prepping for NaNoWriMo and I’ll be posting more consistent workout updates.

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atthequillsmercy

New Release! Dahlia 2

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On the heels of Amazon playing games with me, I have a new release! The next part of the Dahlia trilogy is currently in pre-order and will be released on October 26th! You can support any of your preferred retailers by clicking here, and all my books will be available via my blog as I am in the process of building a store here. I’ll probably end up selling more than just my ebooks but we’ll see how much I can get done.

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atthequillsmercy

Oh, Amazon thinks they’re funny…

This morning, I wake up to this lovely email:

Hello,
 
Amazon blocked your book titled Fruit of the Dead – Season One: Episode One stating they found it freely available on the web.

They are asking for proof of rights, rights reversion letters, or contractual statements showing you have the complete rights to this work. As part of the sign up to add content to Amazon through this site, you were notified that no portion of your book can be posted freely available online, as it causes Amazon to question the copyrights. I will include Amazon’s email below for you to read through.
 
Amazon only gives us a few days to comply with these requests. Please immediately respond to this email with any documentation you have available as proof of copyrights and confirmation that the content posted on https://simily.co/all-stories/fiction/lightinash/fruit-of-the-dead-season-one-episode-one/ belongs exclusively to you. You will need to sign (physically sign) and send us a form that states this that we can forward to Amazon. 
 
This is some bullshit because Simily, while offering 4 free stories for a user to read, is a paid subscription site. Meaning my story is NOT freely available and I’ve made more money from Simily in the last month than I have from Amazon. My only reply was to say Simily isn’t a free site and that’s it. They can take their documentation and shove it.
 
If they decide to be a giant fucking bully and pull my books, I will have no fucking problem selling the digital copies direct from my blog. I’ve been thinking about putting a store on here for awhile and every day we find out how shitty Amazon and Jeff Bezos are. I’ve been actively shopping at alternative places and I only buy from Amazon if I have no other choice and I get gift cards from Swagbucks or any other of my points sites. I’ve had ethical debates in my head of having my books on there at all because I dislike them so much. So, not that they will give a shit, but I don’t care if Amazon pulls my stuff. Call my bluff, guys. Ya’ll won’t miss me anyway!

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