A Birthday Surprise, Most Unexpected

As I sat to write this post
I took a breath, wished I had some toast—
no, seriously, I want toast but am out of bread—
then pulled up my draft for Ko-fi and reread.

"Why is this poetry?" I muttered. "I've no—
"Wait." I nudge this post with a toe.
"Poetry again?" I scratch my head.
"I dunno why I'm doing this," I said.

I mean, it's fun. I do enjoy
conveying meaning while molding words like a toy.
But it's not exactly my normal technique.
Doesn't this make me kind of a freak?

It's just coming out, with not that many pauses.
No more than I'd have with conventional clauses.
I've not written poetry in a while.
I don't really think of it as my style.

But yanno? I guess this really shows
that I should pay more heed to how things close.
That something in me likes the flow.
I don't know how you readers will like it, though.

I wonder if my brain is just stuck between
the thoughts I've been having of Shel Silverstein
See, I've been remembering his poems, of late.
Some I can still quote, despite the wait.

It's been years since I read him last,
but I remember having a blast,
and I remember my brother having a book.
I think all I ever got to do was look,

not own—but anyway, enough distraction.
I meant to do this to gain traction
and help myself talk to you.
I've been silent for so long, it's true.

So, what exactly do I have to say
aside from the "Hi, today's my birthday!"?
I have committed to bringing back
First Draft Fridays on Wattpad, and another track.

You can see more about this in my post from last week,
but, though my Patreon is on hiatus, I'm still going to seek
regular production, with subscribers
getting early, annotated releases as insiders.

But, instead of Patreon, I'm using Ko-fi,
and, apparently, writing about it in poetry?
(What the hell, brain?)
(I really sometimes wonder if I'm even sane.)

(I should probably point out, that previous line—
it's an intentional, poetic design.
Serious just in emotion, in sentiment.
I'm not calling myself insane, just different.)

(Some of you readers may remember
a few years ago, someone with a temper
who pounced in the comments here
and showed serious lack of reading comprehension, I fear.)

(Anyway, that person is one reason why
I sometimes over-specify,
because I am still watched, I know.
although I left them years ago.)

Moving on, here start last week's announced plans,
specifically phase one, which lands
us straight on: "regular updates!"
which I intend to keep up with, whatever it takes.

On Wattpad, updates will be free and weekly,
though these won't necessarily be posted neatly.
On Ko-fi, updates will be paid and monthly,
and more polished, to put it bluntly.

So, do whatever suits your taste.
You can watch me here, my announcements base,
or Facebook or Twitter, but in that case,
you'll probably be getting duplicates, since I try
to limit how I diversify.

How I diversify right now, anyway.
And that's all I have to say, today.
So how is this year treating you?
I'd like to hear how you're doing, too.

—Misti

Out with the Old & In with the New

After so long of silence or near silence, I‘ve been quietly prepping to relaunch my self-publishing. I even have a few things even sitting on my hard drive, poised to help me hit the ground running. Start date I’ve had in mind for phase one of my plans is my birthday, a week from today (May 8th).

(Well, technically speaking, my start date‘s actually today, due to today being when I’m announcing it everywhere. But that’s prelaunch stuff.)

I‘ve had two parts in mind for phase one, resurrecting both my Patreon releases and my First Draft Fridays on Wattpad (…and my language study blog, but that’s another thing). That way, my fans, no matter their financial situation, can enjoy. Then phase two is wrapping up the Chronicles of Marsdenfel and the current plot arc on Destiny Walker series, and the phases continue from there. I’ll get more into that in a minute.

As I was putting things together to springboard into phase one, specifically the Patreon part, I received a newsletter from an author I have long admired and respected: Holly Lisle. She and Kristine Kathryn Rush get an insane amount accomplished despite chronic health issues, and they"re excellent teachers. (On the topic of excellent teachers, Janice Hardy and Jami Gold are, too, though they"re more information magpies than coaches.)

Anyway, back to the e-mail I received. It was really two: “Why I closed my Patreon fundraiser today" from April 4th and "So... bye-bye, Patreon. Hello Ko-Fi.” from April 9th. I saw the headlines but didn’t open them.

Then, after I posted a pre-announcement of my plans on Patreon (on the 19th, to give patrons plenty of time to adjust their donations if they needed to), I remembered those headlines. Kicking myself a bit because, over the past umpteen years, I’ve found I usually agree with her assessment of things like that, read what she was saying. She posted the same information on her blog at "Why I shut down my Patreon fundraiser" and "Why I chose Ko-Fi to replace Patreon".

In summary, the Patreon terms of service (TOS) claim some particular irrevocable rights to whatever is published on the platform for “the purpose of" what they need to run the site. That phrasing does not actually limit their rights claim to that purpose, which was recently pointed out by the very experienced IP lawyer commonly known among authors (especially self-publishing authors) as "PG" or "Passive Guy”.

PG reblogs posts potentially of interest to authors, and sometimes he adds comments. In this case, he reblogged a post that demonstrates that Patreon seems to be having cash flow issues, judging from the CEO’s own words in an interview with CNBC.

PG says he went looking at Patreon‘s TOS to see if there was any mention of patent or something like that which would mean they had a corner on the market. Instead, he found that clause that states the rights taken are for “the purpose of" X, Y, and Z. (If you don’t see how that’s not a limitation, check his post.) PG even bothers to provide a clause that would actually limit the TOS in the fashion that Patreon claims to intend, elsewhere on the site.

So I opened a support ticket with Patreon to ask what, if anything, they were planning to do about that clause. I included explicit explanation, links, and request for the issue to be kicked up to whoever could answer my question. I mentioned outright that PG—an much-experienced IP attorney—included both how the current clause is problematic and an example correction in his post.

I was thanked for pointing it out and told that my e-mail had been forwarded to the tech department. Not legal, but tech. Okay.

Then, around a week later (on April 29th), Patreon announced a new resource hub on the site for the terms and such—oh, that explains the forwarding to the tech team—and an update to their terms of service. Oh, cool. They listened! Promptly, even!

…Or, as I discovered when I looked up the current clause, they at least tried.

I won‘t bore you with the specifics of the differences, but in summary, they changed the terms to expressly limit the purpose of the license but not the license itself. It’s a simple, easy-to-make syntax error that nonetheless significantly affects your meaning. A bread knife might have the sole purpose of cutting bread, but that doesn’t prevent you from being able to use it to cut something else.

In itself, it‘s not necessarily a big deal. Trusting that they’re working at it would be a calculated risk, and it’s a reasonable one to either avoid or take.

The real problem comes when you consider that interview I mentioned. Patreon’s CEO says that Patreon needs to “build a sustainable business”.

Patreon turns 6 years old this month. Why are they having to build a sustainable business? And what are they going to have to do or change in order to do that?

Personally, I think the problem comes from choices Patreon made when they first launched, that they started off taking too low a % of creator income in order to support their model. If they had launched at a higher percentage, like Fiverr with its 20% fee, that would‘ve given them room to adjust the fee either in general or with Lite / Pro / Premium versions of the service without triggering all the negative sentiment and publicity that’s resulted when they’ve tried to move in the other direction, increasing their cut after they started too low.

I‘m not sure that they’ll be able to recover from that. They’re obviously trying, and I do hope they can pull it off. Patreon’s financial model, taking a % of supporter donations, that helps people with $0 or minimal disposable income. It also means that Patreon benefits most from drawing in patrons, rather than content creators, so they should prioritize accordingly. With a good search engine and SEO on the content creator’s part, that’s potentially free marketing. This is doubtless why Patreon tells the content creators that the patrons, the supporters, are customers. They actively encourage creators to give patrons early releases, special editions, unique content—actual product that the patron is funding.

Now, contrast this with Ko-fi, which expressly limits the licensure and views supporters as donors. Ko-fi gets is funded from a mix of 1. charging content creators a small fee (monthly or yearly) to be able to receive monthly subscriptions, and 2. running their own donor page. So Ko-fi actually uses its own service. (Maybe doing that would help Patreon? I don’t think they have their own page.)

This ultimately means that Ko-fi benefits most from keeping the content creators happy, rather than the supporters. Keeping supporters happy is a secondary concern—and, because supporters are there to support the person, keeping supporters happy will be a consequence of keeping the content creators happy. It's quite efficient.

Ko-fi further promotes this distinction of supporting a person vs. buying early-bird access to a product by making it possible for content creators to sell commissions. In their tutorial documentation, they outright recommend that content creators release things more like previews, snippets, deleted scenes.

What I was offering on Patreon, things didn't really fit their model very well. Ko-fi’s actually a better fit for what I’m kicking off on the 8th.

(If you‘re a content creator yourself and want to sign up for Ko-fi Gold, you can get a 10% discount by getting it with an affiliate link, and that discount applies even on top of the sale that’s going as of this writing.)

So, with all this talk of phases, what am I talking about? What are these phases that I’m planning?

• phase 0: pre-launch
• We are here!
• This is announcements and prep work. I have the bulk of this done.
• I need to track down both my file and contact the publisher for the Wynne d‘Arzon series, because I’m suspecting my submission of the last story in that series got eaten by e-mail gremlins. This is something I’m hoping to do before phase I launches, and hopefully things will go smoothly enough for be on-time in phase two.
• phase one: update regularly again
• launching May 8, 2019
• The return of First Draft Fridays on Wattpad!
• The start of monthly releases every 8th on Ko-fi! It'll be a complete story, with author's notes regarding headspace, process, inspiration, how and why I came up with a particular kenning, etc.
• I will be looking at growing to include more regular updates to this blog, my Twitter, and my Facebook page.
• I may also include getting back on-track with my language study blog in this (which needs some technical things fixed and where I have a draft of a post pretty much done and just need to post it; scope creep is a jerk).
• phase two: publish installments wrapping up open plot threads
• scheduled to launch November 8, 2019
• I’m looking to start with finishing the Chronicles of Marsdenfel and getting at least one book further in the Destiny Walker series. (I have more Destiny books planned, but I think book #4 will be launching a new arc, kind of Act II.)
• I’m also including my Torn-Up Faery Tales (as Carralee Byrd) and some Cara Lee things.
• phase three: grow into a regular publishing schedule for each penname
• tentatively scheduled to launch May 8, 2020
• Inherent in this would be releasing regularly in various series, ideally on a rotation.
• I‘m currently thinking that this will be when I return to updating Tapas, too.
• phase x: secret until I start phase three
• The reality of how I finish phase two will affect these, as well, so they’re on the shelf for now.

All this is starting in a week. Join me on Ko-fi and-or Wattpad, whatever fits your interest and budget.

How are you doing?

—Misti

New theology post over on other blog

Primarily some thoughts on how I Peter 3:7 is used to call women "the weaker vessel"—does the verse actually say that?

(Short answer: No.)

Check out the full post for more.

I'm hard at work on my various projects, including a forthcoming class: "Why Don't They Get It? what your writing teacher forgot to tell you".

How is everyone?

—Misti

Finding the Point of This Blog

This blog explicitly features my 2 pence about stuff, but the blog is about me as an author. Plus it’s hosted by Blogspot, so that has the potential to cause some issues if I use it to post certain pertinent-to-me-as-author-but-not-quite-about-authorship stuff I’m working on.

Sometimes, I just want to write an essay examining something, critiquing something, or just pointing something out. Like…what is the Biblical love that Christians are commanded to display towards others? I Corinthians 13 defines it, but what that chapter literally says and what folks say it means don’t always match up, plus there’s how words don’t mean quite the same thing across languages (or even generations), so it’s easy to assign or remove nuance that actually belongs in the word.

I finished the essay and want to post it and others I have in the works—some of which will be controversial in some circles for the sole reason that an unmarried female is writing them.

(There’s admittedly another essay or three in that thought.)

I have a knack for noticing elephants in the room that are best addressed but that folks don’t think to (or don’t want to) point out. This has proved true in…pretty much every job, field of expertise, and topic of study that I’ve explored. So I have to conclude that it’s a God-given skill.

Which means I really should be using it.

Due to various factors—including repeated scoffing and derision for being young, unmarried, and female, and someone who “nobody” would want to (or even should) listen to—I’ve often held my tongue.

I can hear some of you scoffing now. Nonetheless, I have restrained myself to when I’ve been explicitly encouraged to speak out or issues are so blatant I can’t ignore them.

And I’ve long had the uncomfortable feeling that God’s already answered my prayers that someone appropriate would point out the items I’ve noticed and I’m being recalcitrant. (It’s interesting that some of the accepted-by-the-righteous prophets and bearers of wisdom in Scripture are female—but that’s a topic for another essay, I think.)

It’s been a long time coming, but various things have coalesced into me finally accepting that I see what I see for a reason—and that reason isn’t to keep my mouth shut.

Posting my opinions and observations still feels weird. Even the recent post on the Paris attacks makes me uncomfortable, for reasons that boil down to: I know certain persons are reading this, and I know precisely how they’re responding. Because they’ve always wanted me to keep my mouth shut and stick to the shadows.

Even though I have always experienced more blessing when I stepped out and opened my “big fat” mouth.

What does all this mean?

It means I’m going to endeavor to keep piping up—and to say more—but this blog isn’t a good place for the sorts of things I’ll be addressing. This blog should be kept for stuff related to writing, and publishing, and being an author. That’s the purpose, and that makes sense.

And the essays are gonna appear over on http://blog.mistiwolanski.com, starting with “What Is the Biblical Love We Are to Display towards Others?”.

If you look up the word “love” in the dictionary, you’ll find definitions ranging from “A friendly form of address” to “A strong feeling of affection and sexual attraction for someone”—and that’s not including what it means in tennis (ref. Oxford Dictionaries).

Yet love is central to the Christian life, an integral part of the two commandments Christ gave to sum up the Ten Commandments:

²⁸And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? ²⁹And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments [is], Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: ³⁰And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this [is] the first commandment. ³¹And the second [is] like, [namely] this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.

Mark 12:28–31, KJV

According to this excerpt from Mark 12, Christians are to do everything out of these two precepts: 1. loving God above everything and 2. loving others in the way that we love ourselves. This is entirely consistent with what Jesus told the rich young ruler in Matthew 19, as well as with the other Scriptural commands about Christian love, such as is found in Leviticus 19:18, John 13:34, Romans 12:10, and James 2:8.

Studies into these verses so often focus on what is meant by “neighbor”—on whom we are to love—rather than what we are to do: love. Love is also the first fruit of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22, suggesting it’s the first one that manifests in a believer, even before the rest of the list.

Keep reading over at blog.mistiwolanski.com.

I have plans for more essays along those lines, where yeah, it’s pertinent to life and therefore could go here, but…better not. Theological essays of 8k words might be enjoyed by some (or most) of you, but that doesn’t mean it belongs in the same web space as, say, thoughts on the viability and feasibility self-publishing. Which I should probably comment on.

But that’s all for another day.

How are you?

—Misti

I'm Alive (and have a guest post)

Hi, all!

Sorry for the long silence (I'll probably have a blog post about that, one of these weeks or months, but I've at least partially adapted to allergens here), but I'm alive! (Those of you on my newsletter should have an e-mail in your inbox.)

Today I pipe up to announce that Jami Gold has hosted me on her blog: When Is a Good Editor Not Good for Your Story?

Also have some more announcements, such as two nonfiction books available for preorder on Amazon (and if you want them on another vendor, let me know, else they'll be Amazon-only for the first 90 days after release).

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Coming 10/13/15:
The 5 Pillars of Point of View
Special preorder price: $0.99!

Not sure how to develop your own "style"? Can't figure out why a lot of readers can't understand what your character's doing or why? Wondering how to make your story "deeper" or more poignant?

Point of view the way to go.

If you understand point of view, you can also intentionally write stories that use points of view that focus on your strengths as a writer and use less of your weak points.

---

Coming 11/10/15:
Efficient Essay Writing
Special preorder price: $0.99!

Tired of spending so much time on your essays, muddling through the steps? This book gives you guidelines to help you organize the process and to figure out what works for you and your situation, rather than giving you some kind of road map that only works with a specific type of essay and teacher. It includes some worksheets designed to help you keep all you need for your essay in one place.

I can't promise this'll be out until November, but I am trying to get it to you sooner, so it'll help with this semester rather than next one.

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/announcements

Does nonfiction like this interest you? What's new with y'all?

—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?

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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

Help Me with Fistfuls of Food—the Aleyi COOKBOOK!

A Fistful of Water will be coming out soon, and to celebrate it, I'm making a cookbook with foods and such mentioned in the Aleyi stories that are available to read online now: A Fistful of Fire, A Fistful of Earth, A Fistful of Water, “Driven by the Deadline”, “Of Her Own”, “Associated Accidents”, and “Bewildering Boundaries”.

I already have functional recipes and variants for some things, like the tapioca bread of Breidentel and Wight's licorice root tisane—but I still need to perfect recipes for others, like apple pretzel salad and barley bread. My myriad allergies mean anything I come up with may necessarily be on the creative side, but I need reference recipes to work on my own.

So of the foods you’ve seen in Aleyi so far, what are your favorite recipes?

E-mail author@mistiwolanski.com with Recipe in the subject line, and include a link to your favorite recipe. (If it's offline-only, please include it in the e-mail, no attachments, and tell me your source for it.)

For copyright reasons, I won't be able to use anyone's recipe exactly, but if I use your recipe to help build mine, I'll give you (and your recipe's source) due credit. You'll be named (by legal name or username—your choice) and get a link to a safe-for-work website or site profile.

This cookbook won't be completely thorough because there are things that are frankly beyond my resources to make, right now, like tarragon jerky. And then the series isn't done. This is a project that I foresee being expanded, improved in the future.

But all that said, somebody has to get the cookbook first—and I'll be hosting a giveaway for that. ^_^

So what are you waiting for? Get to finding your favorite recipes for foods (and beverages) that you noticed in the released stories so far? (If you need to read them again, they can all be easily found on Wattpad, right now.)

—Misti

I've been poking at the Patreon website lately, and I discovered it isn't only for music artists making videos. It's for all sorts of creatives, even writers, so I now have a page on Patreon. It's not entirely done—it needs video, for one thing—but feel free to poke about, tell me if it sounds interesting or stupid, if it is (or isn't) interesting for you. I'm not sure how effective the site is for text-only writers who don't also vlog or anything like that, but I see no harm in finding out. Hope you're doing well!

Free short story!

I know it's not the same of a nice Thursday blog post, but I have a new short story out, and it's a free download today. (It's only available on Amazon at the moment, sorry; it'll be available on other vendors in about 3 months.)

"Full Rune" (free today, 1/28)

This is genuinely a short story—about 3k words, plus an excerpt from Thrice Uncharmed.

It'll show up on Amazon in a few days, but shipping costs mean I doubt anybody's going to grab it unless they're already placing some orders. In any event, if you're shopping on the CreateSpace eStore anyway, use the coupon code G55ELYAK to save $2 on the print version.

Enjoy!

—Misti

Kickstarter Almost Over—and some stuff going on

The Kickstarter for A Fistful of Water ends tomorrow! Last chance to get the series at a discount before the holidays—if the project funds.

(Well, except for the e-books of the first two books, which are irregularly priced at various vendors, thanks to some quirks in self-publishing that aren't my fault. It's really weird at Kobo, where my side of everything says they cost $6.99, but when I look them up in the Kobo store, the book pages say $4.99—which is probably why Amazon has A Fistful of Earth at that price, right now. *shrug*)

And I'll probably start posting the first draft of Chronicles of Marsdenfel #4 over on Wattpad. I'm not sure about the opening bit, but that only means I can't be sure if it works or not. So those of you interested in reading a first draft can tell me. ^_^

I still haven't entirely decided what to call that. I was going to call it the name Pneumarian suggested, then recently realized I might actually need a book #5 in the series (*gulp*), which might do better with that title.

So to make things less confusing in case I do juggle titles, I'll probably start it off as A Fistful of ???—AFo4, for short—and see where we go from there.

I also haven't forgotten my plan (mentioned in my newsletter) to report on Holly Lisle's How to Revise Your Novel course, as applied to AFoW. I've just been…busy, then sick, then… Well, still sick. I feel as if I'm getting better, but it's slow. I have so many food sensitivities at the moment that I can't even drink chicken broth. (No garlic, onion, or carrot for me.) I can't put olive oil in my ears, either. :-(

(Oil in the ears is soothing when they hurt, and when there's neem in that olive oil, it's a nice antibiotic. Unfortunately, I'm also sensitive to trees at the moment, and guess where neem comes from… *facepalm*)

But that "sick" thing is why I'm so far behind on NaNoWriMo. I may catch up. I want to catch up. Not sure if I'll be able to, but I plan to try.

I think I'll take another nap first, though.

How are y'all?

—Misti

On Changed Plans and Things That Trigger Them

I meant to apply my marketing class to the Kickstarter, but when I thought more about it, I realized I've already messed it up. Oh, well. There's always the next one.

I intentionally attempted to help fans by making my Kickstarter a way to get the Aleyi series for less with the pre-sale…and nibbles have been…pretty much non-existent. (Note to self: Holiday season crowdfund projects need a longer deadline, not a shorter one—and they probably aren't going to work until I have a larger fanbase.)

That's okay. I don't mind failing like that (and frankly, it might still succeed). If it doesn't, that's fine. It's not as if I'll be having to buy a cover for A Fistful of Water—although I'll probably revisit the filtering I do to the photo. I can't quite figure out how to get the effect I'm wanting.

And CreateSpace just made their "Expanded Distribution" free.

What does that mean?

"Expanded Distribution" (ED) refers to additional sales venues to which CreateSpace can make a self-publishing author's book available—including the CreateSpace Direct program, which lets bookstores and such buy your book at a wholesale price. ED used to cost $25…and any books sold through those vendors pays the author a lot less than the other sales venues.

Some self-publishing authors have avoided it due to the cost, and they're jumping on it now. Some have put their books in it as they could afford it and are snatching up the new free ED for new releases and for any old ones that didn't have it yet.

But some authors don't see ED as worth their while, either because of the pay cut or because of where they have to price their books to be able to put it in ED. These folks are generally fretting over keeping print prices "competitive"…compared to mass market paperbacks. (Note that CreateSpace produces trade paperback size books, not mass market paperback size. The mass market paperback size doesn't work with print on demand publishing; that size requires offset printing runs to be economical.)

Personally, I'm putting every book I can in ED. That's me. I don't know how many CreateSpace users are going to do that.

In other news, you might have noticed the widget on the right, where I'm doing NaNoWriMo. I've updated my "FIRST DRAFT PROGRESS" section in the sidebar there to show the things I hope to finish this month. So far, I've finally finished drafting the sequel to "Thrice Uncharmed", and I've discovered that the sequel to "The Nymph and the Goblin" is going to be longer than I originally thought it would be.

After I finish that, plan is to jump into my "How to Focus" guide and my book on writing essays efficiently. I suspect the sequels to the above sequels might weasel their way into that list, though.

In any event, December and probably January will be major revision months for me, so I can get those things to you. Maybe I can finish some of those short stories on the back burner as a break. Hmm. I'll still have First Draft Fridays to do, so… we'll see what happens. Especially since I'm moving in a few weeks.

But Lord willing, the next few months will be nice for fans who want more reading material by me. ^_^

Anyone else doing NaNoWriMo? What are y'all up to, this month?

—Misti

Chronicles of Marsdenfel Book 3: A Fistful of Water (and Other News)

A Fistful of Water is done!

Well, drafted. Now I'm putting it through Holly Lisle's "How to Revise Your Novel" class—or, at least, I will be, soon. I seem to be running short on hours in a day, lately.

For those of you who have followed me for a while, you're probably unsurprised that I'm now running a Kickstarter for A Fistful of Water.

But before you click away, this one's a bit different than my others.

First, this Kickstarter is intentionally designed to let you pick up the next book (or even the entire series) at a discount.

Second, this Kickstarter includes opportunity to get a collection of all Aleyi short stories—including the no-longer-available "Butterfly Boots" and one as-yet unreleased one—which will only be available through this Kickstarter.

For you readers of my blog, any donation amount will get you the e-book of the limited-edition story collection. Just comment here with your Kickstarter username or PM me there with your commenter name, so I can know who you are.

And I do mean "any". Minimum donation amount on Kickstarter is $1.

Of course, there's always the possibility that it won't fund, but one reason I am low on hours in the day, right now, is that I'm seeking to apply a marketing class I'm in to Kickstarter. Which means—

Well, I'll let it be a surprise. But I think you'll find it amusing. :-)

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Now, for other news: My First Draft Fridays over on Wattpad is on hiatus for this week at the very least. Possibly for a bit longer, but it will be returning.

Non-Writing News: I made brine pickles. I dislike them, but I'm not sure if that's a matter of how I flavored them or that I just don't like brine pickles. Considering they were a bit salty and I don't care for saltiness, I'm assuming I don't care for brine pickles and will be attempting vinegar ones, next time.

Writing News: I'm also doing NaNoWriMo this year.

Well, sort of. I'm falling under the "Rebel" classification, this year, where I'm focusing on writing 50k words rather than writing a single novel draft. (The "Rebel" classification is allowable under the formal rules of NaNoWriMo, despite the name being short for "National Novel Writing Month". Speaking of the official name, that missing hyphen bothers me.)

I've designated November as a "Month of Finishing Things". So the sequels to Thrice Uncharmed and The Nymph and the Goblin, my "How to Focus" guide promised to those on my e-mail list for my study guides (sign up here), and my book on how to write essays efficiently that people have been nagging me to finish for years.

I expect that to be about 8k–10k words of fiction, plus 45k or more words of non-fiction. If I'm wrong about how long the non-fiction books will be, I have some short stories that can be added to the "to finish" list.

Have you reached a "finishing" step on any projects, lately? How are your projects coming along? Are you doing NaNoWriMo this year?

—Misti

This Is Why Many Pro Authors Don't Re-Read Their Work (plus some news)

The audio edition of A Fistful of Fire is in progress. I'm hearing every awkward sentence, every this-would've-been-clearer-with-a-transition spot. I'm noticing anew all the "problem" areas—some of which were done on purpose to fit the overall story and narrator.

I suspect I'll be one of those authors like Kathy Tyers, who has gone back and revised some of her early novels. Now, she waited a decade before doing so, and one of the reasons she revised was to strengthen the Christian themes. (Original publisher was mainstream; second publisher was Christian.) But still—she's one clear example of someone who has two editions published for more than one book. (I own, er, all the originals, some signed. I used to have all the revisions, too, but I gave one away and haven't yet replaced it.)

I'll probably wait at least a few more years before I attempt such a revision myself, though. (One thing I do want to do is a third person, past tense edition of the series. I started the conversion for fun, and it's interesting how it changes the entire feel.) Even if I do that, though, I'll leave the earlier editions available in some fashion, for those readers who prefer the original over whatever I change. (S.J. Maas? If you read this, when you get your rights back to Queen of Glass, please release an edition of the original that was taken from FictionPress. I know the plot wasn't as tight and there were problems with it, but I actually liked it better.)

So while my fingers are twitching and my inner editor is wailing, "That's wrong!", I'm firmly reminding myself that it's exactly what I wanted it to be. (Well, except for the handful of typos we've found.) And for my first released novel to be precisely what I wanted it to be—that's something that wouldn't have been possible, if not for God's blessing on my writing and friends who critiqued it, and if not for self-publishing getting viable before I finished it, because there are reasons to avoid doing what I did. Good reasons.

And that was part of why I did those things to begin with. I wanted a story with a fairly passive narrator, for instance.

But that doesn't stop me from cringing when I read those things, now, because they aren't what I "should" have done. Or they could've been done better. Or differently, which can seem "better" when you're just looking at what's on the page.

Ah, the joys of being an ever-learning writer. ^_^

I've been working on that Realities of Self-Editing e-book, and I'm torn between the urge to expand it, making each section clearer and more applicable to both fiction and non-fiction, and the urge to just focus on clarity fixes and not worry about the rest. I'm trying to do the former, but I'm almost always tired, these days, and I keep catching myself doing the latter.

(I have an appointment for later this morning with a practicioner of integrative medicine who should at least be able to identify what's causing my myriad of health issues. [She's helped at least two people I know, and she's currently helping my mother.] The list of what could be causing my symptoms is as long as my arm, and there's probably more than one factor involved, but I'm not sick enough for conventional medicine to do anything but start me on the cover-the-symptom funnel of medication. I've started one, which is helping one thing and possibly another, but it seems to be making something else worse, so I'm…hoping I can find an alternative.)

On the bright side, God's been blessing me with a clear mind, regardless of how my body's feeling—and I know from prior experience with some of these symptoms that this should not be the case—so that's good. (Never fear, clients and fans: You're still getting my full quality work. I'm just not working for as long in a day because I'm sleeping more.)

But I'm still getting a nice amount done. My e-mail sign-up form for my fiction releases is all nice and pretty and set up…and still not embeddable due to something in the auto-setup that I've not yet figured out how to hack. (The embedded form is too narrow and cuts off text. So I'm working on that.)

In the meantime, my testing has shown it to work perfectly fine, and I've set it up so you can sign up for updates on everything or on specific names/genres. First e-mail is almost ready to go out. (And I'm probably going to send it out before I feel as if it's "ready", because I probably won't ever feel "ready", since I've never actually run an e-mail list before. Though I've known for years that I should.)

Finding that balance between too much caution and too little of it—it's far easier said than done.

Do you like it or dislike it when an author revises an old work? What do you think of revising your own already-released work?

—Misti

Happy Autumn, All

Yay, it's officially autumn! That means the day is (usually) comfortable for me, temperature-wise, the pollen count usually isn't high at all…and my mother's miserable from her tree allergies and cold intolerance. (And when I say my mother's cold intolerant, she's cold intolerant. In pain and shivering in seventy-degree weather, even with socks, pants, sweater, and a blanket.)

One of these days, I'm going to get the pertinent allergy treatment from BioAllers for her, if I only thought she would take it… (But I've gotten her taking HistaBlock now, which helps. Success with the herbal remedies!)

So, now that most people who are doing school are in school, what am I up to, this autumn? I mean, other than work and whatever medical stuff that gets tossed my way?

• Finishing A Fistful of Water.

The end is nigh, I can tell, but I'm still waiting to hit that little rush of words that tends to hit me at the very end. Not exactly looking forward to the revision stage—it's missing pieces, and some aren't quite right, but which pieces? Where? Ergh. Well, I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

• Finishing Twice Bold.

This is the sequel to Thrice Uncharmed. I've been intending to finish it for months, but it's like pulling taffy. Drafting the climax now, though, so Lord willing I'll have the entire first draft done by the end of the week.

• Finishing the sequel to The Nymph and the Goblin.

It's proving to be a slaughtering of "Cinderella". It's actually kinda disturbing, and I don't know yet if it'll end well or badly.

• Finishing a fanfic based on Hugh Howey's world of Wool.

I have to read the rest of the series, first, but Hugh Howey's Wool is part of the Kindle Worlds program, which is pretty much a system that lets derivative works be authorized for specific intellectual properties. Plan is to release that under the same name as Thrice Uncharmed.

• Finishing Realities of Self-Editing, the book.

I've been sitting on that project, mostly done, for long enough that I'd forgotten about it. I remembered recently and have been dusting it off and resuming its cleanup.

• Keep the About That Herb blog going, one post every other Monday.
• Write the "How to Focus" guide promised to my one e-mail list.
• Set up e-mail lists for my fiction, ideally giving folks the option to subscribe to all of it, to specific pennames, or specific story worlds.
• Finish writing a planned project that students I know have been asking me for, for some years, now.

That sounds like a lot, but I expect it to be something like 100k words—which isn't really all that bad, over 3 months. It's very doable.

Now, to just break it down into pieces and do it, because I ideally also want to get well into drafting the sequel to Know Thy Frienemy by winter, maybe finish some of the half-done short stories sitting around.

Speaking of which, yesterday I found a nice new cross-platform timer (hush! I only have four…not including the physical ones). It has its flaws, like all do, but it's built on the Promodoro technique and lets you make a to-do list, estimate how many 25-minute increments it'll take to complete, then tracks how many it takes. I've not yet figured out how to handle when things get done mid-time increment, though—so far, I've only managed to reset things. So I'll be playing with it further today and seeing if I'm just tackling it wrong or if it doesn't have that functionality.

What are y'all up to, this autumn? Any writing goals?

—Misti

This Is Why Some Authors Don't Read Their Reviews

Know Thy Frienemy, the sequel to Destiny's Kiss, will release on Tuesday (9/10)!

First, please excuse me while I swallow hard, then smack myself upside the head because I have little left to do for both the e-book and the print book, so my urge to run around screaming like a chicken with her head cut off is a distinct overreaction.

But this is intimidating. It's a sequel. In a series that is fairly disturbing—the narrator, Destiny, is a Christian teenaged modern-day slave—and she's not right, emotionally, to the point that even she notices, and she's been through some terrible things.

From the early review on Goodreads, that's come through clearly, but I'm kind of chewing my nails now because that review demonstrates that a particular pertinent detail that unreliable narrator Destiny doesn't realize will be missed by at least some readers. I knew that would happen, but seeing it in a review? The very first review?

I'm not now suddenly thinking the story is terrible. It isn't. I'm more concerned that I'm still not targeting my ideal audience properly and that readers won't want to put up with further books in the series until certain details will make more sense.

But we'll see what happens. The former (a failure to properly ID audience) is far more likely than the latter. The reviewer did call Destiny "passive", when she's "reactionary"—which is, well, her, right now.

The novels' standard price is $4.99 US. I'm considering temporarily dropping the price on book 1 when book 2 releases, and I'm also considering posting book 1 on Wattpad, but I've not decided yet. In any event, if you're curious to look into them further, I've embedded the Ganxy showcases below, which should automatically update as further links and such are added.

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"Destiny's Kiss" by Misti Wolanski on Ganxy

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"Know Thy Frienemy" by Misti Wolanski on Ganxy

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In any event that "Oh, no!" feeling is why some writers don't read their reviews. They freak out and think things are absolutely, positively terrible…

I admit, I'm not immune to that particular soul-sucking feeling, but I do endeavor to tackle it and squash it with logic until it goes slinking off to bother someone else. A benefit to having a hormone disorder, I presume—I'm used to handling mood swings that happen for no reason other than my body decided to make a little extra something at an inopportune time. (Yes, it's as annoying as it sounds. I don't even like bawling with cause, but bawling for no reason whatsoever?)

And when logic isn't helping? I go read reviews of some books I enjoyed that use some unpopular techniques, like Sunshine by Robin McKinley (or anything by her, really—her stories always seem to meander through the plot in a way some readers loathe) and Hart's Hope by Orson Scott Card (which is dark fantasy in an intentionally archaic style, which has gotten lambasted for violating the "rule" "Show; Don't tell").

*rolls eyes* They're rules of thumb, not rules. ^_^ I feel better already, just remembering those.

Even when a story is precisely what it's supposed to be, folks will dislike it, complain, and make assumptions about the author's writing ability and what they were aiming for. One of my better-selling short stories at the moment received two 1-star reviews from folks bewildered by it before it got a 5-star from someone directly in the target audience.

And then there's the review on Thrice Uncharmed, which politely pointed out that it could've been expanded more on the themes and climax. That reviewer's right—it could've been—but I chose not to on purpose. Maybe that reviewer would've enjoyed it more had I expanded it, but maybe he just thinks he would've. *shrug* It is what it is.

And really, all writing "is what it is".

And Seanan McGuire just had a new book come out this week in her October Daye series! Yay! Like unreliable narrator urban fantasy? Go check it out! It's probably even at the library. ^_^

Do you have any fun reviews, comments, or new releases to share?

—Misti

What Do You Want Me to Work on Next?

I've decided to let my readers overtly influence what I work on for my next First Draft Fridays project over on Wattpad, after I finish A Fistful of Water.

How? I have a five-question survey, all questions optional, which lets you make your opinions known on genre, length, characters, etc.

I also ended up doing JA Konrath's 8-hour challenge: Write a story and have it to market within 8 hours. I ended up doing a crack!fic featuring various characters from the Misty White space opera penname. I had fun writing it, but we'll find out if anyone else will have fun reading it.

It has some spoilers for various stories under that penname, but if you're curious to see what I came up with, it's…

Disorientate-tion on a Weekday Morning

Canni from “Buzz and Bunnies”, Tammy from the Catati stories, and Kintah from the Corps space stories all improbably meet, order Starbucks, and learn things about each other that, perhaps, they’d rather not know. Crack fic.

(A crack!fic of about 4400 words.)

Get it for free on Smashwords with the coupon code ZP85G (expires mid-September).

The fairly repetitive mentions of it being a crack fic are intentional—it's my attempt to keep someone from getting it without knowing what they're getting.

And Know Thy Frienemy is just about ready for release, so I've committed to a release date of September 10th. *gulp*

I've set myself up for an interesting autumn, that's for sure.

Have any opinions or thoughts to share on what I'm up to? Have any projects in progress that you want to share?

—Misti

A (Kinda-Sorta) Slightly Early Blog Post…

Because I have an announcement!

Okay, if you've followed me for a while, you may remember the Thrice Uncharmed novelette, which I originally posted on Wattpad. The one that got a contract? It was originally scheduled for release in a few months…

But I was prompt about getting it through the process, right? So evidently*…

It's free today, as I write up this post—thus why I'm posting early—but I don't know when all the free days are scheduled.

*ETA clarification: It's entirely my fault that I didn't realize the story was released. I'd told Astraea Press to release the e-book whenever and wherever they liked. They probably even told me the new release date, and I forgot the change. That would not be unusual for me, because I didn't write the change down. (There is a reason my desk is a study in how many different kinds of notepad you can have.)

Isn't the cover great for the genre? I <3 it. (ETA: And I'm having a frustratingly hard time posting it… It showed earlier. Why not now? Ulgh!)

I believe it's in the KDP Select program at the moment—which, come to think of it, might mean that the official release date is still in a few months, because I requested that they limit any Select involvement to one 90-day stint. Hrm.

Anyway, I don't mind either way, and I really don't care enough to track down why, right now. (Honestly, I'm more biting my nails, because I'd thought I would have more time to figure out what to do for the print version's cover. Because if there's going to be a print version, I have to do that on my own. And I do want a print version.)

I'm also biting my nails because I'm running behind on getting Know Thy Frienemy out. (This month has resulted in two discoveries: 1. No, I really am not okay if I fail to take my feverfew. 2. A vegetarian diet makes me quantifiably unwell. I wasn't exactly trying to skip the feverfew or go vegetarian. I was experimenting. And probably had a bad ear infection, to boot.)

(That's an odd expression, "to boot". I now find myself wondering where it comes from and must post this before I go on the research tangent.)

Interestingly, the vegetarian thing made my mother ill, as well, but not as quickly as it did me, and she realized the cause sooner than I did. (In my defense, I first had to realize I was having a silent migraine and treat that before I could notice something else was wrong…)

I've also upped my vitamin D intake to 2x–4x the recommended daily allowance, but it makes me feel so much better emotionally that I'm sure my levels are still low.

How're y'all? Any news to share?

—Misti

How the Wattpad Thing's Going

In case you don't know, Wattpad is a site for people to blog their stories…sort of. You can use it like that, or you can post things all at once for free samples and all.

Now, there are some downsides. You can't monetize or advertise your stories on Wattpad, though you can theoretically get permission to do so. They seem pretty reasonable about that kind of thing—for example, self-publishers post links to where you can find the story for sale, if you want it, as a matter of course, and they (as of this writing) don't mind.

How do I know they don't mind? A Fistful of Fire has been featured there since 5/30 (as I mentioned in my June news post). I don't know how Wattpad determines what to feature (other than I went to them with a complete work and blurb and asked "Hey, are you interested in featuring this?"). You can recommend titles to be featured.

Hmm… *wanders off to recommend a title…*

This is the weird thing about Wattpad: I can't find the blog post wherein I first heard about the possibility of getting featured. I also can't find the e-mails I received from Wattpad staff about it. (I've lost them before, and I remember being puzzled about why they didn't show up when I searched. This time around, I've searched [again] through my e-mail. No dice.) ((Watch them be right in front of my face, once I do find them again, eh?))

I know it was a mention on David Gaughran's blog post that brought it to my attention. This couldn't have been it, though, because I made my initial contact a few months before that. Judging from the dates, it could have been this post.

Which would explain the "It is?" responses I get when I say it's possible to recommend your own titles to be featured on Wattpad. Because nobody's posted a walkthrough, that I can find.

But in any event, A Fistful of Fire got featured there at the end of last month. I sought featuring with the goal of reaching readers, and that's working. I might hit 21k reads by the time I hit "Publish" on this post. (Admittedly, each "chapter" counts as a separate read, but there are only 10 sections on that title there. So once I account for those who stop partway through or who come back to re-read something, I've probably gotten over 2k reads in the past month.

Wattpad seems to reconsider their "featured" list every two weeks or so, at which point they might leave you there or bump you down or off. I actually moved up on the list. (Per one of my friends who's been watching the featured listing longer than I have, Amanda Hocking has been on there for months.)

I'm also using the site to host my "First Draft Fridays", wherein I post at least a scene in a specific WiP every Friday until the first draft is completed. That's succeeding, too.

So Wattpad's working great for me.

That said, I can't unequivically recommend it, because there are reasons to not blog your novel. It can also be difficult to build traction on the site, unless you can get featured or have a fan base elsewhere.

But as for me, I'm pleased with how things are going over there.

What do you think of Wattpad? Do you have a method you prefer for your own writing to reach readers, or for you (as a reader) to reach writers? Do you have any opinions to share on the way I'm using Wattpad?

—Misti

News for June 2013…

First, I apologize for my blog posts lately. I've been consistently forgetting to define my terms, and I know better. Thank you for calling me out on it. (And for the nice thoughtful comments.) ^_^

Second, A Fistful of Fire has been featured on Wattpad as of last Wednesday.

Third, I've decided to post A Fistful of Earth on Wattpad, at least temporarily. I don't promise to keep it up, but the prologue's up now. Another chunk will go up tomorrow.

Fourth, A Fistful of Water seems to finally be flowing. I'll have over 5k words to post tomorrow. It may help that I finally remembered the existence of Stickk and that I'm past the midpoint, so hopefully I'm over the mid-book doldrums altogether until I hit the climax—and when that happens, Stickk should keep me from wallowing.

Fifth, I really don't get why climaxes intimidate me so much.

Sixth, I've also been hit with an idea for a Tuelzi novel to take up where A Fistful of Water lets off, so the "quartet" might end up being Fire, Earth, Water, [Tuelzi], with Air being a separate prequel. Or maybe it'll be a quintet. Kind of depends on how the books turn out. I think Tuelzi's story might be a better note to "end" the series on than Geddis's, but we'll see.

Seventh, I might have already done a cover mock-up for that one (isn't quite what I want, but it's close enough to suffice if I can't find an image that matches what I want) and be tentatively calling it A Fistful of Life…

Eighth, I'm also revising Know Thy Frienemy (sequel to Destiny's Kiss, looking to have the ARC done this month and the novel done next month, though the cover isn't finalized.

Ninth, my apologies for any typos or omissions in this. I feel as if I'm forgetting something. But I can always post again.

Do you have any news (writing-related or not) that you want to share?

—Misti

Blog Post of Randomness

I have a lot of little stuff going on this week, no one thing sufficient for a full post—

Okay, that's strictly untrue, but one of my little things is that I'm sick and don't want to compile yet another argumentative piece. (To give an idea about what I've been mulling over lately, is "free will" idolized by being emphasized and election being downplayed?)

But I'm not going into all that today. I might another time. But as for today…

What's Up with Misti, in No Particular Order:

My Kickstarter for Know Thy Frienemy ends in a week. As things stand, it looks as if I'm not going to hit it. (Which is okay, honestly—I won't be bawling in despair over it. So please don't feel as if I'm trying to guilt you into participating.) Update 5/4/13: And now it's due to fund!Update 2: It funded! Thanks!

I…well…kinda-sorta already did the cover for A Fistful of Water myself. I'm still fiddling with it, but I have the text, and I have the photo. Just figuring out how to do a natural-looking watercolor effect.

Allergy-induced infections are a pain in the ears.

A few drops of oil are remarkably soothing for inflamed ear canals, after you get past the "That feels weird…". (I prefer argan nut over the apricot kernel oil. I have some mullein-infused olive oil, too, but I keep forgetting to strain it, so I can't use it right now. I have a vial to put it in, though.)

Being sick is annoying, but it can be rather conducive to finally rebuilding your website from the foundation up. The content's still pretty much the same, but the back end… Oh, the back end is so much better. (No more WordPress! Yay!)

I'm still hammering out a few kinks, like a phantom right-hand 1em margin/padding, caused by something I can't seem to track down, probably related to either definition lists or images. But the few password-protected pages? I got my PHP right on the get-go, for those. Success!

I might redo the nav bar altogether, though. As it is, it…blergh…. (Update later same day: I fixed the buttons. They're a lot prettier now.)

I've also been, well, playing with code, and produced a demo page* with a nav bar I like a lot better than the one I have currently had originally, though it, too, is isn't perfect (…yet?).

*That link's temporary, by the way.

My birthday's in a week. I'm not old. I'm nowhere near old. But I actually remember my mother, when she was the age I am now. I was in grade school and reading her psychology textbooks. (I've since realized that the psychology textbooks might explain how I handled getting bullied, in school.)

Fortunately, my illness has fallen on a week where I can take things slow, because my deadlines aren't that bad. Though I am trying to get something done tomorrow that has a deadline of Friday, and tomorrow I'll be getting a file due Monday, but the editor says there's (probably) not much in it.

The aforementioned "probably" is because there's one not-quite-tiny detail that's probably fine, but it's dependent on "Hey, did the person who acquired my story intend to tell me to change this?" If so, I'll have to change it.

Uh, yes I did just mention an acquisitions editor, who processed a story and got it on to further editing. "Thrice Uncharmed" is under contract. Did I forget to tell you? Got it Tuesday, and I'm getting my first round of edits back tomorrow. Which means I really need to finish writing the sequel, to get it started in the process before the first one comes out. (Which is my goal.)

The editor is demanding the second story, too, actually. ^_^

The pre–line edit version of "Thrice Uncharmed" is still over on Wattpad for the near future, though it'll be coming down soon…probably in the next week or two, if not the next few days. Pulled.

Oh, and I flunked Camp NaNoWriMo. Oh, well. At least I made progress.

And I am still making progress on A Fistful of Water, so that's what counts, right?

I modified Kait Nolan's "pizza bites" to a tomato-free pork-free Greek version to be dipped in tzatziki sauce. (Note that Kait converted it to gluten-free herself, mentioned over on her writing blog, with gluten-free all-purpose flour and 3/4 t. xanthan gum. The bites are fairly quick and easy to make—within an hour, including bake time—except for the dicing prep. If you're doing it by hand, that can take a while.

And that's my lot of random news, this go-around.

You have any random (or not-so-random) news or response to news, that you want to share?

—Misti

New News: First Draft Fridays

I am decided: Fridays will now be First Draft Fridays, for some WiP. It'll take off tomorrow (Friday the Fifteenth), on Wattpad.

Why Wattpad, of the options for fiction sites that feature decent ToS? Easy-to-use interface. Using Wattpad—and only Wattpad, at least for now—will be the easiest method for posting those first drafts.

(And it helps that, just browsing around, I recognize some of the other authors on there from my online meanderings.)

So… Wattpad is chosen.

Now, the story I've chosen to start with is science fiction romance; you can read the opening scene of “Thrice Uncharmed” on Wattpad now. Why did I pick “Thrice Uncharmed” as the story to blog? I'm going to submit it to a particular small publisher once completed, and I've confirmed that publisher is fine with stories starting life as blogged, and it should end up a novelette).

So the posting of this story will give me time to get used to posting a first draft, getting in the habit, and deciding how I want to handle this in general. After seeing how it goes, I'll decide on how I want to continue it—such as, stay on Wattpad, blog the first draft to A Fistful of Water, that sort of thing.

Because I'll be submitting “Thrice Uncharmed” to a small press, I suspect the final cover will end up completely different from my original mock-up (assuming even the title remains the same), but here's the cover that I've put on Wattpad:

Wynne Layuman doesn’t hate Hector Primuman the Fourth, but with their steady rivalry through school and the way everyone keeps tossing them together, she can’t bring herself to like him much, either. Eventually, people use the outdated Earth adage, “The third time’s the charm,” as if the third attempt to set Wynne up with Hector hadn’t happened by the time they hit Dyad (age sixteen). She expects she’ll end up Partnerless at Triad (twenty-four) and then assigned one—the colony’s young and still needs to propagate, after all—but for it to be someone who she’ll love or who can understand her when she starts talking the heat capacity of con-carbon? Dream on.

Hector Primuman the Fourth, great-great grandson of the man who founded the original colony, has long known he’s odd. With the genengineering that advanced his mind at the expense of his body, the closest thing he has to a friend is the one girl who can (usually, sort of) keep up with him: Wynne Layuman, whose materline has worked in construction since the second generation, and whose paterline has provided many of the most ingenious innovations used by the colony. But Wynne’s highly competitive—and popular—leaving him aware that while she’s the closest thing he has to a friend, the feeling isn’t mutual.

Can Wynne and Hector get past the rivalry to develop something more, or will others’ meddling sabotage whatever chances they have?

Note that it is a first draft, so it will be rough, with typos and such. (And yes, that lady's camisole looks odd, I know. It was my first attempt at painting one.) If you're interested, check it out. If not, let me know what you are interested in seeing more from me. (I mean, other than the next Aleyi novel. I'm working on it.)

Are you interested in the story? Is there another story you'd rather see? Have you ever thought about (or actually have) blogged one of your own stories (and if you have, care to share a link)?

—Misti