Reviews, beta readers, and my lost kitty.

I got my first review! It's a 5-star review on Smashwords. This is very exciting and makes me very happy that someone enjoyed reading what I wrote.

So far this last week I have been focusing on finding beta readers for my next few releases. Erotica is a tricky genre and it seems to be more difficult to find people willing to critique than for other types of fiction. Please feel free to contact me via Goodreads if you are interested in beta reading. I have some feedback on one, the one I planned to release next, so I'll probably go with that one as my next release. I will start revisions on it this weekend.

I have been reading a few indie books by self-published authors over the last couple of weeks. I have added my reviews via Goodreads if you want to check those out.

My female cat is missing. We got her a little over 3 years ago, my father found her as a stray in his shop in an industrial area. He brought her home but she didn't get along with their dog- so my mother gave her to me. She is very soft and extremely friendly and I fear someone made off with her when they saw her outside. We hung up fliers, put ads online and notified the animal shelter and local vet clinics. She has unusual features so hopefully we'll find her. We had another stray we took in 8 years ago go missing about 3 months ago and we never found him. He's an orange tabby so hard to locate- we never found him. I've had cats my whole life and losing 2 like that so close together is the worst luck. The whole family is upset and I'm just heartsick. I suppose we should have had them microchipped but we didn't, and now we're at the mercy of fate.

Critique, revisions, fantasy, and the BDSM club.

The last couple of days I have stepped back from working on writing erotica. I have been sending out my next release for critique and have gotten some feedback to work with on a revision. I'm still waiting for one other person to return their comments and then I will combine what I have and focus fire on that.

I have not heard back from the BDSM-friendly editor yet, but her response time in the comments on her page worked out to be about a week and a half. So I will give that some time.

I have still been writing, however. I've been working on my fantasy novel. I probably shouldn't talk about that particular work here as it will be released separately from my erotica, but I'm feeling really good about it and it's moving along nicely. I've only been working on it for eight years, so maybe this year will be the year I finish it...

I have been working on it most of today and yesterday, and I've taken a break to write this blog post. Once I'm done here, I will read some of the book I'm reading to review on Goodreads before I tackle another piece of my fantasy novel.

During some of my research on writers resources, I came across the group for the BDSM club my husband and I go to. I realized that we have not been there in over a year and I was a little sad. We've had so much going on with work and home life. I think that for the benefit of my writing and for a little fun after what has so far been a very difficult year, personally, we should schedule time to go within the next month. I'll see if I can work that out.

I published my second book!

I released my second book, Candle Lover, on Smashwords yesterday. It is my shortest story, coming in at about 1800 words so I made it available for free. It is pending on Amazon, and will be $.99 there until they price match once it's accepted. There are almost 60 downloads on Smashwords so far, which I'm happy about.

I am busy this week working on polishing some of my upcoming stories. I have two sequels that I'm working on- one for Summer Beach Vacation and one for another story tentatively titled Julia and David which has yet to be released. My biggest time eater has been editing, so that will likely spread my releases out somewhat.

I have reached out to a BDSM-friendly specific editor for my next few items I am working on releasing. I have not heard back yet but I think that is the right direction considering the subject matter of these particular pieces.

I have created a cover for one of my to-be-edited pieces that I feel particularly proud of. It didn't take a lot of photo-shopping but what I did do looks really good. I like all of the covers I have done so far, considering I am somewhat new at it. I plan to continue to do my own covers for the foreseeable future.

I have joined some groups on Goodreads that are for authors to network and share advice on self publishing. I have not actively participated in any of them yet because I am still trying to learn the etiquette of the groups. I have already learned a lot so if nothing else that is progress.

I don't have much on my author page on Goodreads because my full bookshelf is under my "normal" Goodreads. I can transfer a few books over but I am mostly trying to keep it for books going forward. In order to make sure I am fully engaged in community, I have started to review books that I am reading. I am trying to target indie and self-published authors specifically, when before I would have just searched genre and been met with the majority as mainstream publishing results and been fine with a star-rating with no feedback. I understand that feedback helps readers find what they are looking for, even if the book is not for me personally. I am being mindful of that when I give reviews.

I am still waiting on some editing feedback for a story I'm planning to submit to Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 4. I want to make sure that my submission is not rejected for minor errors and has a real chance for consideration.  

I published my first book!

I published my first book on Smashwords and Amazon last week. It's my vanilla lust story, set in Daytona beach. It's short and hot and hopefully will make readers as happy as it made me writing it. I'm already two thirds of the way through part 2, which I hope at least a few people will be looking forward to.

Self publishing was a big step for me, creatively. It gave my motivation a boost and I've been very productive with my writing this week. Not just writing, but creating covers for my writing as well. I haven't gotten a lot of feedback yet, but getting myself out there is satisfying.

I wasn't sure when I should start adding some of the other work I have been sitting on, but I've decided to release my short story, "Candle Lover", later this week. I plan to make it free on Smashwords due to its length. It's a stand-alone piece I couldn't work into a longer story, so hopefully it will give readers a little taste of what I can do. I believe this particular piece of erotica falls under "paranormal".

Here is a preview of the cover: