New Release Coming 08.08.16!

They can find you if you Jump

In one of our possible futures, an illegal immigrant (from a spacefaring universe that engaged in human experimentation and suffered a zombie apocalypse) needs to outmaneuver her bounty hunter sister without endangering either of her flatmates—one a cyborg from a universe specializing in technological modifications, the other a version of herself from a universe without the zombies—without catching the notice of the legal body that regulates and polices travel across universes and time, because none of ’em have a green card.

In other words, this is what happens when an author like me grows up both intrigued by the mirror!verses in Star Trek and wondering where all the expats from other universes are.

displaced shadows series

Coming 08.08.16!

Preorder the first three novellas—self-contained stories that’ll each take the average reader about 1–1.5 hours to read—at a special low price of only $0.99 each! See Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or Apple.

As is usual for my work, these stories aren’t written for the Christian market, but as the titles’ oblique derivation from Scripture refers to, I’m certainly aware that these stories can appeal to Christians and non-Christians both.

And yet sometimes audiences can prefer different nuances in how themes and topics are handled or conveyed. Is that not why songs have “explicit” and “censored” editions?

I’ve long wondered why songs could do that, but not books.

So these books are going to be examples of how that concept of adjusting for audience can be applied to stories. The e-books coming out 08.08 will have both the “non-explicit” and “explicit” in the same file, giving you the option to read whichever you like.

The explicit one qualifies as that mostly on account of language that would get a movie an R rating. Rather than just “bleep” them out (which would cause some issues with one of the narrators), I’m outright revising the lines.

This modification is actually going to affect some of the themes and implications, and the non-explicit version has a very real risk of implying something that’s actually opposite of what I want to convey, so the explicit ones will be the “author’s preferred edition”. However, I know some of you readers would rather have the option, and this series looks like a good fit for it. :-)

---

What do you think of my splitting the story into the two editions in one e-book? Does the series premise sound interesting to you?

…Annnnnnd it's out! (A Fistful of Water, + some other notes)

It's out! It's out! It's finally out!

"A Fistful of Water (Chronicles of Marsdenfel: Book 3)" by Misti Wolanski on Ganxy

A Fistful of Water is available now, for $2.99—and that price is going to change back to $4.99 any day, now, so if you want to get the e-book, now's the time. You can find it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, elsewhere…

Not in print, though. I've been, um, slacking a bit on that. (I have reason! I've been having a formatting detail that I can't quite get right.)

The first draft of the sequel, A Fistful of Life, is hitting the climax on Wattpad, too. That means I'm likely to have the first draft done this month, and it's possible that I'll have the book out by New Year's. Possible. Don't know if I'll make that deadline, though.

…And I really do intend to post things other than release announcements. I even have another lengthy, thought-provoking post (with definitions!) all drafted up, which likely won't get posted until December. (The reason will make sense when you see it.)

But anyway, the first note I really have to address is that I may not be able to post much until December, even if I manage to keep on target with my goal of releasing something every 2 weeks. I pretty much have some major things I'm working on, which mean I need time and energy, which means I have to give something up. (Having said that, watch me post somewhat regularly over the next few months…)

Second note: As I type this, I am feeling better than I have in weeks or months. I pretty much have realized a few details were leaving me vulnerable to infection, so I'm working on correcting those things. I have energy. I was able to do some cleaning and not feel as if I needed a nap afterwards. (I actually stopped yesterday before I started feeling worn by it, for fear that I'd drive myself into a relapse. I'll be doing more today.)

This comes after discovering a really weird remedy for a cold, which I'm going to try using as a general preventative: onion. Specifically, onion against my feet, in a pair of socks.

Erm, Huh?, right? That's what I was thinking when I first heard it. But I'd tested just having pieces of onion out by me when I was sick, and that had resulted in palpable improvement, so I figured I might as well try a piece of onion in my sock. I was peeling a new one, anyway, right? So I broke two palm-size pieces off the outer layer of onion, stuck one on each foot, put socks on to keep them there, and…

I was feeling noticeably better within the hour.

How/why does it work? I've seen various explanations, but one is something to do with the sulfur. Maybe it's aromatherapy, or maybe the released vapors have an immune-boosting effect, or maybe folks are right when they say onion absorbs bacteria. I don't know, and I don't care. It works (for me, so far—I haven't tested it thoroughly, nor had enough other folks try it to get a sense for its general efficacy and limitations).

Presumably, white onion works better than yellow onion works better than red onion at this. Which is interesting. Red onion is best for allergies.

And then if the effective agent is the sulfur, the root should be more efficacious than the main part of the onion. I plan to test that.

Now, to jump back into a publishing topic… I've completely changed the covers on my Overhill stories again. They look a lot more professional now.

See? So much more professional.

But even with "For Want of Cruelty" being free, the stories essentially don't sell. (Small surprise, considering the old covers really sucked.) Hugh Howey's recent post on exclusivity presents the data on going exclusive with Amazon vs. being on all vendors, and per his math, being on all vendors costs him readers.

I do not plan to go exclusive on Amazon with my Aleyi or Darkworld writing, but it occurs to me that if I'm going to unpublish anything from all other vendors and make it exclusive on Amazon—and I really cringe at the thought of doing that—then those stories are a fantastic choice for doing so.

I'm currently reformatting the innards of the stories to use the new covers. Once that's done, I'm thinking I very likely will pull them from other vendors and put them in Amazon's KDP Select program (and in the Kindle Unlimited program), unless you readers convince me otherwise.

So… Do you think I should make the stories exclusive to Amazon (for the time being)? Why or why not?

But if you don't want to influence my decision, here are some other questions:

Have you tried (or will you try) the onion remedy? Are you staying healthy? Are you looking forward to the finishing of A Fistful of Life?

—Misti

Now Available! Twice Bold by Cara Lee

And it's only $0.99!

Sorry for the super-short post today. I had other stuff I wanted to say, but this is ending up a REALLY busy time for me, plus I got sick last weekend (funny how that always happens exactly when you don't have time for it), which is also why my newsletter is late. Agh. I've not forgotten it, I promise. Week after next should be slower… As things stand right now, even this week's Wattpad updates are gonna be delayed.

But I'm looking at the to-do list with an attitude of, "Hmm… How do I arrange these pieces to get everything done?" rather than "AHHHHHH! TOO MUCH!" So that's good. :-)

I also discovered that one of my car problems was that it needed a new battery. Replaced that today. Cost more than I hoped, but less than I feared, so that's all good.

How are you?

—Misti

Coming Tuesday: Twice Bold

Twice Bold, the sequel to Thrice Uncharmed, is coming out 8/5/14 (and will cost $0.99 US)!

Wynne Imaguman doesn’t dislike Hector Primuman the Fourth, heir to the governor of the Arzon space colony. She’s just terrified of what she’s managed to learn about the colony and wants to flee as soon as she can. She’s been groomed to be Hector’s Partner, though, and he’s all but admitted he loves her. She doesn’t want to be cruel, but if she doesn’t make everyone think she’s falling in love with him, they’ll change her so she does.

Hector Primuman the Fourth has known the truth of the colony for as long as he can remember, and he’s also known that Wynne would be terrified once she figured it out. He doesn’t blame her—he doesn’t care for it, either—but there’s nothing he can do about it, other than let Wynne, the only person he’d consider a friend, break his heart.

And that’s if they can get her out before either of them ends up dead or psychologically altered.

In the meantime, the first one is only $0.99 US, and the centuries-earlier short story “Full Rune” is even free! If you’ve not read them yet, why not pick them up now?

---

In other news…

AKA "Why today's post is late"

I’m fighting some illness and my car decided it didn’t want to start, today, when I wanted to go to the store for a remedy to help my body fight this off. So forgive me for saying little, today. I'm tired, cranky, and not the best company. :-) I am functional, though, which is good. Just…slow. (And praying that my car decides to start up again.)

Are you interested in Twice Bold? Why or why not? And how are you?

—Misti

So I've Been a Bit Busy Lately…

You may remember my short story bundle "PRIMpriety", with a novelette and two other short stories, which is set in a completely different world from my other work. The cover for that has always been…meh, at best, so I've been wanting to change it, preferably in a way that made clear who the MC was for that particular story (because I have more in that story-world).

I also had a few unreleased stories with her just sitting on my hard drive.

So a side comment from one gal I know produced the light bulb moment (…which she's done several times for me in the past few weeks…) for how I could handle the covers, so I did, and I decided to split up the stories while I was at it…

And I now have the novelette and two short stories released independently, plus two short stories on the longer end (5k words and 7k words) available. The covers still aren't fantastic, but they're better, which is what I was going for.

This particular series is fairly gruesome and has some R-rated language, so be warned.

Easiest place to see it all (and pick up the short short story I pulled out of the bundle—which may be the only one of them without the cursing) is on Smashwords.

(Speaking of Smashwords, if anybody likes clean romance, Lindsay Buroker's romantic suspense title Wounded is only $0.99, as of this writing.)

Vampires aren’t (un)dead—they’re just what result when an unseelie fae messes with a human. Most vampires don’t know about their fae origins, but Lyn’s special. So special that she's lethally allergic to sunlight, that she’s lived nearly two centuries but still has to work under the table, and that she REALLY can’t afford to be snacked on. It’s a long story. Here’s part of it.

The 3 from the bundle:

The newbies:

Unfortunately, some other things I'd intended to have ready by now haven't happened, but at least this is something. ^_^

Does this series interest you? What about the covers? Have you written/done anything lately that you'd like to share?

—Misti