New Cover Art

The Secrets of Slade Sanders has new cover art. I love it.

That's done . Now onto getting the 2nd book "The Secret Life of Slade Sanders" edited
And I'm still working on this third novel. Which is coming along. I can't complain there.
Not having to work for a month is a big help.
I'm going to miss having so much time off to write.. An author's work is never done.

So Much Work, So Little Return

I hired a new illustrator to re-do the image on my book cover.   The first one didn't work, they couldn't complete the project.  Found the new one on Twitter. We'll see how this one works out.
The new Illustrator seemed perplexed when I told her I simply wanted an image from her and not a whole book cover. After I told her that I am a designer myself, she then proceeded to give me her resume, not sure why. 
But we came to agreement, I'm looking forward to it.

Small Favors

I'm bloody happy that I only have 7 days of work left.  I basically have the entire month of December off.  There's nothing bad about that.  Not going to that survival job is always  a good thing.
Plus I get 5 days off for Thanksgiving.    Two more work days till that little break. 
Even so, things are starting to pile up.  I was thinking what would I do for an entire month, well, the gaps have begun filling themselves in. 
I need a website.  
Doctors appointments
Gotta do my hair....

To name a few. 
But I have an entire month. 

What did I do on Halloween?

I went to a Halloween attraction called The Haunted Hillside, in Uniontown.
It was $20 dollars and much better than that last Halloween attraction I went to.
The one up in Wexford.  The workers were actually there in substantial numbers, it was warm and the whole thing started on time.
They had some awesome costumes, I saw several I genuinely liked. No consistent story line though.  It started off promising, Black Ops against mutants but that quickly moved to ghost and then a haunted cornfield, then the finale was a Deliverance, inbred, red neck , homicidal hillbilly thing.  It was all done well, just not cohesive.  We spent an hour walking from where they dropped us off at back to where we came in.  Brilliant.

Did I mention it was $20 dollars?

Holloween Hayrides and Painting with a Twist

I haven't taken a painting class since college.  I don't remember enjoying the painting class in college.  So, a BYOB, step-by-step painting class should be good. And it was.  I got me some green apple Smirnoff Ice and had a good time.

Overall, not too bad.  I would do it again.
Halloween  Haunted Expedition...it was $15 dollars of exercise by walking through a cornfield in the dark.    It was cold so they said at least 15 people didn't show up to work the event.  Our little group was alone, walking through a cornfield along the linear path, trying not to trip over anything. I did succeed in doing that. 
There was a distinct feeling of "where is everyone"?   There were 3 interactive attractions (if you want to call them that)  and some Spencer's Gifts masks but little else going on.
It was my 2nd Halloween feature type thing. I don't get to go to these that much.

No Rest...

There really is no rest for the weary.  I got the weekend off from survival and now I am to ponder how to promote my novels. 
Free, is of course better than something I have to pay for.  

I am still trying to catch up on all of the TV I missed during the week.  I only have The Originals left.  I am desperately trying to cut some shows out and I have but there are so many left that I still like watching.  Thursday nights alone, I have 7 shows.  That's  over 7 hours of television!  

Gotta make time I guess.

Poetry and other things I'm not ready for...

I guess Matt and Trey didn't make the cut this week.  It's suppose to only take them 3 days to  make an episode...

I've been checking out poetry books lately.  I want my character's dialogue to flow like poetry.  Hannibal (Tv show) is my inspiration for this.  I loved the dialogue on that show.  I'm already planning for my 4th book even though I'm not finished with my 3rd. 

I have to survival work extra this week so this will cut into my author's time substantially.  It's pretty fucking bad.

Published at last!

This was two years of hard work.  I loved writing this book, I love writing all of my books but I'm relieved that it's done.  At least phase two is done; I know a lot of hard work is still left.  I'm in for a whole new can of worms.  Now I have to promote this thing.

The Secrets of Slade Sanders is available. 
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0165YX402

I have to promote this one, continue writing my third novel and prepare my second novel for publication as well.  Writing is definitely my second job but it's also my chosen career.

Dedication

I'm dedicating this blog to my novel writing career; for what it's worth, for however long it lasts.
This week I thought up a new story line for another novel.  I'm particularly excited about that.
I took this past month (September) to focus on getting my first manuscript (The Secrets of Slade Sanders)  published; still working towards that goal.  Almost there, almost there.   I am re-doing my cover design; partially .
Still developing the flow of my third novel. It's coming along but it reads like a paint by numbers.