Greets Bloggoradicals! ’Sup y’all? I know it’s been ages since I dipped my digital quill into the blogoverse, but I have real reasons. Top of the list is that the Amazing Hip and I are buying a condo (because when you live in Orange County that’s what you do!). In short, it’s been a bit of a nightmare, but that’s a long story best told over a pint or five of barleywine. Besides that, I’ve been doing some heavy editing for a series of chick-lit novels coming out sometime next year. The lovely author is English, and I have been having the time of my life honing up on my British slang and speech, and I already feel smarter for it. Because, of course, adding a British accent to anything automatically ups the intellect quotient by a factor of ten, amiright?In Spectras news, the Spectras Arise Trilogy: Omnibus Edition did this crazy thing last month and hit Amazon's Bestseller List for Science Fiction, Galactic Empire. HOLY! I can't tell you what a rush it is to see something like that. It's a total Sally Fields moment, you know?In other news, my latest novel is out to beta readers, and so far the feedback has been good. Which excites me no end—I really went off my usual game with how I crafted this one, so am radically removed from any objectivity over how good (or, let's face it, bad) it might be. I’ll let you know more about it when the subsequent novels in the new series are closer to fruition. Things are a bit behind at the moment thanks to the whole nightmare house-purchasing thing. (Did you know that living out of boxes is quite the creativity killer? True fact.)And finally, I’ll be participating in a panel at the Book Carnival bookstore in Orange on June 27 called The Elements of Genre with authors Martin Lastrapes and Kate St. Clair. The panel is part of the larger Summer Writing Project put on by Black Hill Press, JukePop, and 1888. Here’s a bit more about it from the project website.
Both Black Hill Press and JukePop champion two abandoned mediums. Black Hill Press fights for the novella—a distinctive, often overlooked literary form that offers the focus of a short story and the scope of a novel, while JukePop is rejuvenating the lost art of the serial, pioneered at the dawn of publishing, when authors such as Charles Dickens received critical acclaim and feedback from mass audiences by serializing novels one chapter at a time.This joint venture presents authors with the opportunity to craft their novellas one chapter at a time with immediate quantitative and qualitative feedback from their readers, while also broadcasting their words to an audience eager for the next great storyteller.Throughout the months of June, July, and August, we partner with local bookstores, libraries, and universities to schedule a series of educational lectures, panels, and workshops for the community.Summer Writing Project 2015 begins on June 1 and continues through August 31.
If you’re a SoCal writer, come say hi! The panel series has something for every kind of writer and promises to be a great time for all.So that’s about it. I’ll be falling off the edge of the world again this week as we move to our new house and settle in.PS: Look forward to a bunch of cat pictures in the coming months—because you can’t buy a new condo without populating it with a new furball. I know, I know, you can’t wait, can you?
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