writing

D’oh!

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Hello peeps!

Yes, I just likened everyone to an Easter marshmallow confection. That’s how I feel today…soft, squdgey, bit sweet, and like I’ll swell up and explode if anyone were to stick me in the microwave. Such is life.

Anyway, I just realized that the last post I had on here was saying that the paperback of Vhantalya was delayed. I never updated!

I have a shame.

I was able to fix the cover issue with the print versions of Vhantalya, and it is now available in paperback and hardcover through Amazon. Though I have been looking for alternate ways to get print books, perhaps to sell directly here off my website, I haven’t yet found a viable alternative. The hunt will continue, but for now if you don’t want to support the ‘Zon ebooks are available pretty much everywhere. My books have also been added to Storygraph, and of course you can still find them on Goodreads.

So as the end of the year (this crazy, terrible, exhausting year) creeps in and 2026 inches into sight, let me share my hopes for the coming year.

Amaranth, the first book in a duology set in Kaloran some time after the events of Vhantalya is currently progressing. I really waffled with this one. First it was supposed to be one book, but it became clear that it would be roughly the size and shape of a skyscraper if I did that, so I broke it into two. Then, most of the way through the first version I decided to completely change it up, and wrote a second version. Then reread the first version, decided I liked it better, and went back to it. Then reread the second version, realized I really liked it too, and decided to take elements from both (and sacrifice some, can’t forget that part) and am now working on the third, melded version.

I was hoping to have it to betas by the end of the year but as that’s now but weeks away and I’m roughly halfway through with what I need, I expect more I’ll be on the call for betas probably no sooner than February.

In the meantime, work on my modern(ish) day standalone book, So My Grandma Summoned a Demon, continues apace. A slow pace, granted, but apace nonetheless. I am determined to get this one out in 2026 as well, so look for a call for betas to come hopefully fairly close on the heels of Amaranth.

And it may be a bit ambitious, but I am also hoping to have either Scarlett or Ink in a Black Sea to betas, at least, before 2026 comes to a close. Both would be amazing, but I’m not holding my breath for that.

Lastly, the beginning of A Rat’s Honor has been penned and it is the next standalone after SMGSAD I have planned for release. Look for that hopefully early 2027.

In short, 2026 books to be published (by hook or by crook!):

Amaranth

So My Grandma Summoned a Demon

To be to betas in 2026:

Amaranth

So My Grandma Summoned a Demon

Either Scarlett or Ink in a Black Sea (or if insanity hits and I win the lotto and can devote all my time to writing, both)

2027 books to be published:

Tribulant (the second in the duology with Amaranth)

Either Scarlett or Ink in a Black Sea, depending

Possibly A Rat’s Honor

*whew*

And now that I’ve laid all that out back to work and hopefully not as long to the next update!

Take care, and happy holidays to everyone!

February 2025

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Hey everyone!

So I doubt I’m the only one for whom the last three months have been the longest decade of their lives, so I just want to take a moment and spread some love, hugs, and support to everyone, everywhere, who are struggling right now. Though it may not feel like it at times, you are seen and loved.

On a more cheerful note, though my writing was on hiatus for the good part of two of those three months, I’m happy to say I’m closing in on getting the final edits for Vhantalya put to bed. I don’t have an official launch date yet, or a date when ARCs will be available, but I am trying really hard to get everything done and dusted and launched by May 16th.

Why? Well, I’m glad you asked! On the weekend of May 23rd I will be attending BookNetFest, in Orlando, Florida! I plan to bring a few copies of Vhantalya and Reboot along with me to give away, and I’m really looking forward into meeting several of you that will also be attending!

Given the state of…*waves at everything*, I have opted out of flying to Florida and will instead be taking a train. As this adds quite a bit of travel time to and from, and because I will have little to do on the train beyond stare broodingly out the window, get involved in a strange Victorian-style murder mystery, or read (or so I hear that’s how it happens when authors board trains), I have decided to bring my portable keyboard and knock out the first draft of one of my unstarted novels.

I have…a lot of those, so it took a little while to narrow down which one I wanted to go after, and I’ve finally decided on A Rat’s Honor.

I’m a pantser, and very often the idea is all I have in mind when I sit down to write, so keep that in mind when reading my summary below (things are very, very open to changing!). In my head this one contains shades of the Redwall series, The Rats of NIMH, the Tale of Despereaux, and Watership Down (still to this day my favorite book).

A group of rats that have been experimented on by a shadowy government agency find themselves alone in the rubble of a post-apocalyptic world (disease or zombie, I haven’t quite decided yet). Humans have disappeared, and strange threats howl in the night outside the walls that keep them safe. Far more intelligent than any wild rat thanks to the experiments, this colony have developed their own society, culture, mythology, and religion.

One young rat, Artmark Fleeker, breaks taboo and ventures into an area strictly off-limits to all but the colony’s spiritual leaders. There he discovers some human media, including tales of knights, dragons, sorcery, and chivalry, and determines that he wants nothing more in life than to be a knight.

For a while, all he can do is daydream and practice in secret, because if the others of his colony found out what he’d done he’d be cast out forever. Or worse!

Then one day he meets a new and unexpected friend, and when his colony and everyone he loves is threatened by foes both within and without, and their entire way of life is thrust into jeopardy, what he’s learned may be crucial not just to their evolution as a people, but their very survival.

It is only then that Artmark truly begins to understand how valuable honor is…even for a rat.

A Rat’s Honor. First draft coming to a train near you in May!

It’s the final countdown….

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One thing I don’t think people tell you about when it comes to publishing a book is that there are a trillion and one little details that need seeing to. Not the least of which is updating your blog to keep people appraised of your mad spins as you chase your own tail!

My website is going to be going through some small growing pains in the next week or two to prepare for launch.

So, amazing news first! Reboot has been doing fantastic in ARCs, with an overall rating (out of 11 so far) of 4.25 stars! I still can’t believe it!

Reboot is officially up on Goodreads (with some reviews already there), and I’m working on Storygraph. It’s is up for ebook preorder through Amazon KU/Select here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D4KHP81W.

It will be up exclusively on Amazon through KU/Select until September 15th, when the ebook version will no longer be exclusive through Amazon (though still there through KDP) but available pretty much everywhere you can get an ebook: Kobo+, Smashwords, Apple, etc. I will have direct links where you can purchase up on this site by launch.

It will also be available in paperback and hardcover June 16th! I’m debating whether I’m going to leave the physical copies exclusively on Amazon or if I’m going to also have them available through Ingram Spark. More to come on that!

So little to do and so much time!

Wait…strike that. Reverse it.

You may have also noticed that my ‘works in progress’ page has disappeared. That’s because I’ve been shuffling things around so much its getting to the point I almost need to update it once a week. So its been scrapped. Right now, I’m working very hard on getting Vhantalya publish ready, and finishing up my first drafts of Ink in a Black Sea, So My Grandma Summoned a Demon, the new Tree Y’Edenel duology, and The Human Heart.

I also seem to be over the frustration and heartbreak of losing my entire manuscript of Scarlett and having to start over from scratch, and I may just pull that back out to finish earlier than I expected.

More, as always, to come! Thank you to everyone, and Happy Pride!

We’re FINALLY here!

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Hey everyone!

Couple big announcements today!

Reboot is now officially in the ARC stage and now has an official launch date!

Reboot will finally be published and available for purchase on Sunday, June 16th!

I know, doing a book launch on a Sunday is a little unorthodox, but without spoiling the book for those who didn’t have a chance to beta read, the date was too good to pass up. Add in the bonus that it is also Father’s Day, and I just couldn’t resist.

For those who don’t know, ARCs are Advance Reader Copies, or Advance Review Copies. They’re uncorrected proofs of the book (physical and/or e-book) sent out pre-publication in the hopes of generating hype and reviews for launch day. They are not the sale copy, and while they should be fundamentally complete ARC books are still subject to change up until launch day. Netgalley is a free to use site for professional and amateur reviewers both small and large.

If you are interested in signing up for an account and reviewing Reboot, I have links added both to the Coming Soon! page as well as the main page. The link will take you directly to Reboot’s listing.

Thank you everyone for all your help and support. I can’t believe we’re finally here!

The thing about being the worst, it’s only up from there!

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Hey everyone, and welcome to 2024!

I am the literal *worst* it seems about updating the blog posts here and keeping you appraised of what’s what. You may have noticed, especially if you’re a beta of mine, that although I had three stories on my works in progress to finish in 2023, every single none of them actually got completed.

So yeah, about that…

I did quite a lot of work this year. Had a couple of firsts. And by firsts, I mean drafts of course!

*crickets*

Ahem. So, anyway, once I start writing a first draft, I’ve never wiped it and started over from scratch. I’ve certainly never wiped it *twice* and started over…but that’s exactly what I did with The Tree Y’Edenel. I got about 90k into the first draft and realized I wasn’t even a third of the way through. I like a big meaty book, but a 500k word MS was probably a *bit* much. I was also waffling over the direction it was going, so I set that original draft aside and began fresh.

Then, about 60k into that version, I stopped again. Though I liked a few nuggets of this new draft, for the most part it felt even more wrong footed then the first and wasn’t going to be any shorter unless I completely rushed the characters through it. That wouldn’t serve the characters, the book, or my readers.

I read back over the original 90k, approaching it with a bit of a fresh perspective, and ultimately decided to merge the two. I also realized that no matter which approach I took, this story was going to be much too long for just a singular book.

So I made the hard choice to split one book into a duology. The first draft for part 1 now stands at 105k and I am within spitting distance of wrapping it up. I’m also launching directly into part 2, which I expect will round out the first draft at about a similar word count.

Of course this means I had to rearrange a few things. The Rose of Fire, the next book in this same saga, has been bumped now to next year to make room for the duology, which bumped every subsequent book back a year as well. But I’d rather take more time and give you, dear friends, a better quality read.

I haven’t been idle on the other two stories that were slated for 2023 either. I have made good and rather satisfying progress on both So My Grandma Summoned a Demon, and Ferry Tail, and I will continue to work on these even as I start to tackle 2024’s first draft list. I’ve also rearranged (again) and added to (also again) my WIP list. There are also some title changes, most notably to the Willem series that I am starting this year.

And good news! The first draft of one of the stories slated for this year, the Human Heart, is already done! I need to give it some edits, of course, and rearrange the ending a little bit, but it should be up and about and ready to toddle to beta readers here in a month or two.

Even better news: the finishing line for Reboot is now in sight! I’m doing a few more quick edits now based on beta feedback, and then Reboot will be going to the editor. I’m nearly done with the cover as well, just need to give it a final spit and polish. As of this writing, I am bound and determined to at least have ARCs out and a firm launch date set by the beginning of May this year, just in time for BookNetFest!

So exciting! At least, I’m excited, and I hope that a few out there are a little tiny bit excited as well.

Happy New Year, and may yours be filled with joy, love, and wonderful books to read!

Writer’s Workshop!

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Hello everyone!

So this past weekend I attended my first writing workshop and I have to say, it was a lot of fun! I learned a lot, had a few nice chats with some lovely writers, got the first ten pages of Reboot critiqued (it’s a thumbs up!) and had an all around good time!

As some of you know, I have more than a few WIPs and many of them I need to Indie publish due to having burned my first publication rights years ago. However I have been very strongly considering seeing if I can’t get some of my newer fiction, such as Reboot, published traditionally.

I’ve been weighing the pros and cons of both Indie and Trad publishing and just finding myself in kind of a ‘should I, shouldn’t I?’ back and forth that has gone on an embarrassing amount of time.

However after attending the workshop I find myself leaning very strongly one direction over the other, and I have finally come to a decision.

I’m going to make a serious go at Indie publishing my works. All of them. Including Reboot.

That’s not to say in the future on some wacky unreal day if my stuff is doing well enough and I get approached by an agent I won’t consider transferring some works into trad publishing (hey, it worked for Andy Weir, right?) but for now, this is my path.

So now all my professional research time is going to go into that, making sure I have the whyfors and the wheretos in place.

Along those lines my writing schedule hadn’t changed so far as my new projects list, however the *publishing* schedule is going to alter a bit. For Vhantalya, I want to wait until I have a few of the sequels done before I release it, that way I can put them out at a decent pace and people won’t have to wait forever for the sequels to be done. So though Vhan is a gnat’s wing away from being ready to go up and in print, as soon as I finish this last polish it’s going into my Dark Vault (I just now decided to make this a thing LOL) until its younger siblings catch up. So, bad news, you’ll have to wait a bit longer for that but good news! Once its here you won’t have to wait an eternity for the sequels!

Which is a natural seqway into my next note: the second book in the Immortal Elements series, the Tree Y’Edenel, I have been chipping away at and working diligently on the book cover. I had a not-insignificant portion of the first draft done before I realized it was going to end up an unwieldy monster and not the best written as I was trying to pigeonhole myself into an outline. As a consummate pantser (no offense to plotters!) my creative mojo just doesn’t work that way, and I end up grinding to a halt and struggling to put words on the page *just* to put words on the page. This doesn’t make for a happy writer, a happy book, or happy readers in the end.

About eighty thousand words in I did the computer equivalent of dramatically tearing off a notebook sheet, balling it up, and throwing it into my ‘save but don’t use’ folder, and started again. I am now 25,000 words in and things are not entirely smooth yet but definitely going far more smoothly than before.

“But Mel!” you might say, eyeballing the date. “You said you’d have it ready for betas by now!”

Why yes. Yes I did. Apologies for that, clearly that won’t happen. The best I can say at this moment is that it will get to betas sometime this year. As promised, I am starting my official first draft of So My Grandma Summoned a Demon today, and I will be writing both. I expect SMGSAD will be on time for beta reads but the goal of my schedule is not necessarily to write, polish, and put out a finished work in that time frame (that would be insane, and anyone actually writing a book from scratch and putting it out so quickly likely is not putting out well-written or professional level content) but to get three of my books written (first draft, start to end) done each year. And I’m still confident all three of 2023’s projects will accomplish that by the time 2024 rings the bell.

And though I am not yet ready to commit to a release date, it’s looking pretty good that Reboot will at least be have a release date, if not be released, by the time that happens as well. So far the reception has been excellent, beta edits are underway, and I am tweaking the cover now that I am 100% sure it *will* be the cover since I am going the Indie route now. So watch for more news on that!

Let’s see, what else. Ah!

On the reading front! I found an awesome series called ‘Liches Get Stitches’ by H.J. Tolson that I am having just a lot of fun reading. I’m on the third book of four, ‘Lich, Please’, and for any humor fantasy lovers out there I highly suggest it. It’s light, it’s fun, it’ll give you a few giggles, it won’t weigh you down, and I identify with the main character, Maud, on a *visceral* level, especially in book 1.

I am also reading Deathborne (Dragon Seer #1) by S. Kay Lanphear. Lanphear is an Indie author and this is their debut. If you like fantasy that isn’t slapped in just a rehash of medieval England, and a book you can sink your teeth into, this might be your poison. This was just released so there isn’t a ton yet in the way of reviews, and I’m currently only 20% of the way through it, but so far I am quite enjoying the setting, characters, and the world that Lanphear has built for us. Check it out, and support Indie authors!

I think that’s it for now! If you have any thoughts or comments or Indie books you really enjoyed and want to support the author, please let me know!

Cover is up!

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Finally! So it took a lot longer than I was expecting. Clearly I have a lost a bit of the old speed that I had (breaks out the walker and hacks a few coughs in geriatric), and this cover has a lot of little fiddly details that took a lot of time. Still, here we are!

I’m about halfway through my reread of Vhantalya, highlighting areas that I need to quickly neaten up, and then we’ll be to the beta readers. If I have talked to you about being a beta reader, or if you are interested in being one, please email me and include in the subject header which story you are interested in beta reading. I only need about four per story, and I believe Scarlett is full. Also, don’t limit yourself to just what’s on the front page! Look at my future project timelines and if you see any there you’d be interested in trying your hand at, give me a shout. Just keep in mind the timelines those will be finished.

For those that I select for beta reads, there will be a deadline to get it back to me, as well as a form that will ask particular questions or what kind of specific feedback I may be looking for, in addition to the usual general feedback. Mostly, looking for plot holes, inconsistencies, good pacing, things like that.

So that’s where I am with Vhantalya. I’m on schedule with Reboot as well, knocking out a nice ten thousand words plus a week. At this rate I should be finishing on schedule for June/July with the first draft. I might be a bit biased, but so far I think it’s some of the best writing I have ever done. After that, it’s off to find an agent!

Lastly, I’m also working on my artwork, not just book covers. I used to have my work on Deviant Art a long time ago, but l looked at it recently to see if I wanted to revive it and I don’t think I want to keep on with that site. Instead, I will be building a website and portfolio for my art on ArtStation. Once that website is up and running, I will be linking it to this page. I specialize in digital photorealistic/semi-photorealistic paintings but I want to expand my hand into more cartoon/animation/comic styles as well.

Love you peeps!