May your Christmas be filled with laughter and joy! And your hearts open to love. On such a beautiful day I decided to post another one of my deleted scenes. Actually, this is more like an extra scene, since it was never meant to be put in my book. It's just something that popped into my head when I was writing Forged in Fire. I hope you enjoy it! The following scene happens just before the events in Till Death and Beyond start. I loved this little glimpse into Ciaran and Natalie's interactions (pre-TDAB), especially since I got the opportunity to witness Ciaran's journey in Forged in Fire, and now I'm writing Natalie's story.
Once again - I hope you enjoyed it. And Merry Christmas!
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As my title suggests, this post is about a Christmas wish. But let's start this from the beginning, shall we? Back in September I had an Amazon freebie mostly hoping to see how this service works. I didn't have any expectations what so ever. I'm not that naive. And that's a good thing, because without pouring money into advertisement the results were bleak. I had more than a hundred downloads, but they resulted in 0 reviews. Now fast forward a few weeks when I decided to do a goodreads giveaway (the one for $119, yes! I am crazy!!!). But I wanted to check if the paid service would result in something better. Oh, it resulted... On the plus side more than 700 people added my book to their goodreads "to-read" list. But after the giveaway ended and the winners got their books, my Customers who bought this item also bought list on Amazon book's page got completely screwed up. This is how it looks now: It might be just me, but I imagine that most people who read about spirituality or educational reforms don't read many romances. But hey, maybe I'm just narrow minded. Who knows. The funny thing is - that row looked very differently prior to goodreads' giveaway. Another plus would be - I finally got a review! But is it the review I was waiting for? And here we come to the part about Christmas wishes. I must confess that for about a week (or even more) I have been listening to Mariah Carey - All I Want For Christmas Is You nonstop (I was in the Christmas mood, what can I say :D). And somehow I would always end that line with the word "reviews". So when a few days ago I saw that there was a new review on Amazon, I was ecstatic! Now every author knows how important reviews are. More importantly, how hard it is to get them sometimes. Little did I know my joy would die a sudden death the moment I started reading it. Don't get me wrong. This is not a post to whine or bitch about a bad review. I have had them before. And I respect people having different opinions or giving constructive critique. The latter is very welcome. (I do want to improve.) What threw me, however, was the part where the reviewer basically admitted that she knew she would not like my book before even reading it because it was not her cup of tea. And to think that's precisely the thing I asked before doing the giveaway - for people who know they wont like it not to enter! This is a lesson for me, I guess. And my Christmas gift apparently! But speaking about Christmas gifts... I remembered that a have a few deleted scenes for Book1 and Book2 that I wanted to share for a long time now. But I could never manage to do that. See, I'm a perfectionist! And I publish only after rounds of editing and rewriting. But these little scenes have never seen an editor in their lives! (They could definitely use some polishing.) But somehow, after this bad review I feel like I can finally do this. This is a scene that got cut from Till Death and Beyond because the book had already more than 100k words, and it wasn't that relevant to the plot. (Although I hated cutting this, and not being able to explore this.) It's been years since I did my last freebie. Why? You might ask. The simple answer is that it rarely pays off. A huge part of people who download the book don't even read it. And the ones who do read it find out too late that it's not their cup of tea; and then leave reviews how they didn't like it because the book is set in fantasy world, or because it has sex!
Yes! The book has sex. And yes, it is fantasy! It's not something I hide. The genre IS Paranormal Romance after all. So if you don't like this genre, please refrain from downloading. You won't like it. For everyone else... download to your hearts desire :) The reason I'm doing this could be that September is my first books's birthday. And I wanted to celebrate this occasion somehow. But there is another reason too. I was looking into goodreads giveaways (I used to giveaway a print copy of the book once a few months and it used to be free; well, shipping and book cost aside), now - they want $119 for the service. I almost clicked the button. Almost. But after some googling, and some reading I decided to try a service Amazon let's me use for free. If goodreads can deliver a 100 copies of my e-book for $119, I wonder how many e-books can I give without spending a hundred dollars. Without spending anything! Maybe to do a comparison I'll do a goodreads giveaway one of these days. For now... Enjoy! It's limited time offer. When I started NaNoWriMo in November, I didn't know what to expect. It was my first attempt and I eagerly began typing words, hoping to have at least a rough draft after everything was over. It seemed easy at first. I was making my word counts and the novel was moving along, but about 20 days in I hit a wall. And then another, and another, and by the next day my head hurt from banging it against those walls.
All my careful planning, that I've never done before, no longer worked. The story had taken roads previously unimagined. And while I do love when this happens, the goals set for NaNoWriMo became a hindrance to explore the unknown. In the end, I did write my 50k words. I AM A WINNER! It's an amazing thing that I am very proud of. Even if my story is nothing but a bunch of unconnected scenes that scream for rewriting. After such an experience, I needed a break. And... I decided to start December with an entirely different mood. That's why I'm having a SALE! Till Death and Beyond is ONLY .99 for the next few days. So go ahead and grab it! It will be an adventure you'll never forget!
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AuthorI write books I would love to read with fantasy worlds I would like to be a part of. Where anything is possible, but nothing more magical than love. Categories
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