Mixed Bag
Since In the Blood is at the printers, and a large part of what I have to do involves waiting, I thought I’d do a sort of cornucopia of things I’m doing or that I find interesting.
Editing
I’ve got some editing work lined up for a book by another author which I’m planning to publish later this year. It’s a sci fi novel, which is nothing like anything I would write myself, but it’s FANTASTIC, and I’m very excited to help this writer bring his story to readers.
Once we’ve done a contract and things are finalized between us, you’ll hear about that since I’ll be working with him very closely throughout the process. All I can say right now is that I’m thrilled, and I can’t wait to make it happen.
Family
My mom had knee replacement surgery three and a half weeks ago, so I’ve been caught up with helping her with her recovery from that. Things were difficult at first, but before the end of the week, home health will be discharging her, and she can begin outpatient physical therapy. By this time next year, I expect her to be much more active, and you will probably hear about some of our adventures together camping and traveling in our tent. She’s really looking forward to getting back to that level of independence, and it’s not far away now.
Word Cloud
I thought it would be fun to do a word cloud to show the most common words I use on this blog. Turns out, the biggest word is “writing,” which shouldn’t be surprising at all. “Work,” “book,” “write,” “story,” and “books” seem to feature prominently as well, along with “time” and “can.” These all seem both appropriate and positive and exactly what I would expect from a writer.
Bullet Journaling
I don’t know if you’ve heard about bullet journaling. I hadn’t until this past April, but man, now that I’ve started, I am obsessed with it.
It’s revived my love of doodling and calligraphy, which I love, and I really do feel like it’s made me more productive and organized. Plus, it’s just plain fun. So much more so than keeping a regular planner would be. It’s like planner meets scrapbook meets coloring book meets journal, all in one. I bought myself a bunch of supplies for decorating it, and it’s really made it a much more entertaining and interesting hobby. Best of all, the bullet journal is literally whatever you decide to make it. You have total creative freedom to organize and create it in whatever way works best for you.
If it looks like something you’re interested in, googling “bullet journal” or looking it up on Instagram or Pinterest will give you a ton of cool ideas to try. I also bought some books on cool lettering techniques, and I’m still experimenting with them.
Gardening
I’ve become an avid hobbist gardener, and this year we decided to dedicate our garden specifically to food that we could use in a salad. We planted two kinds of lettuce, curly kale, spinach, radishes, carrots, peppers, and cherry tomatoes. In addition, we’re also growing peas and yellow squash.
The raised bed made of concrete blocks sits up high enough we can sit on the edge to weed or harvest without having to strain to reach things.
In the past, I’ve used upcycled wooden pallets, but now that we have the raised bed garden, it’s unnecessary. We are fast approaching a time when it’ll be too hot for the lettuce, so we’ll have to find something else to plant in its place.
This week, I’ll be picking all of the spinach and kale that remains so it can be blanched and then frozen for use in eggs later on.
Other Writing
Here’s a roundup of my writing plans for the near future:
- In the Blood comes out July 1st.
- Book Two, Out for Blood, is currently being edited, and I plan to have it ready to be published this winter.
- Book Three, Trial by Blood, is well begun with about a third of the novel already written. It will be released in 2018.
But The Blood Royal Saga books are not the only thing I have plans to write.
- I’m working on a hard cover coffee table book with my mother about our trip to Newfoundland. It’ll have photographs as well as our retelling of events. I’m hoping to have that book published this winter as well.
- I have a YA novel I want to write that is Viking related. I don’t want to say too much and spoil things, but I’m very excited about the story.
- A friend of mine and I are planning a collaboration that’s got to do with pirates and werewolves.
- She and I are also discussing a collaborative vampire novel, and I’m extremely excited about this possibility.
- I’ve got several urban fantasy/supernatural/horror short stories in the works. Some will be sent off to journals and anthology publishers, but others will be published by me.
Various and Sundry
For a summary of everything I’ve talked/posted about over the last week, here’s my Paper.li page with all the stuff in it.
Would you like to be interviewed on this blog? Have a book you’d like me to review? Let me know!
NEW RELEASE!
Book 3 of The Blood Royal Saga is here!
The Real Delia 
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