Loading, reviewing, publishing!

So this is the weekend!

It's a month late, but goodness if I'm not proud. I'm only stopping by to drop off a couple lines before I'm off to continue the finishing touches/synopsis writing/category marking that distinguishes 'publishing' from daunting, exhausting 'editing'.

Thank you so much for the responses this last week. Yesterday alone, I received three letters from readers containing such encouraging words that I was fueled to work until about 3:30 in the morning. I really mean it when I say I couldn't have done this without your support.

Now, I'm afraid I have to get back to work, but you can bet I'll be back in a couple days with the 'big annoncement' I've been waiting months to make. Until then, I hope Chapter 15 of Sulfur will suffice.

Sulfur: home stretch.

Okay, so I haven't posted recently. But I have excuses. I have a whole stack of excuses including the following: school, work, health-related outages, etc. However, those are just excuses, part of the usual barrage of stressors life throws at you. The real reason I haven't posted in so long? I'm almost done with Sulfur. I don't mean that I'm almost to the next stage of the editing process; I mean I'm almost done with the editing process. I'm getting ready to publish, and during this phase everything in my life takes a deep inhale with anticipation.

I've reread Sulfur in it's entirety (It's better than Farro in my opinion - phew!) and now I need only wait for that husband of mine to read through the seven or so chapters he has left. Then we'll both have called in done. I get it formatted, put together, and send it off.

Somehow, I kept postponing posting here because I kept hoping that "tomorrow will be the day", but I can't put you all off forever. Soon, I tell you now, soon. And then you won't have to rely on my episodic updates.

I can't wait; I want to move on to Beauty and the Beast and Ancient Egypt.

(For reading, here's Chapter 14 of Sulfur, featuring the return of Bomani.)

Sulfur Begins!

... and Farro gets promoted!

I've been so busy over the weekend celebrating my birthday and catching up on life that I've been a little MIA. I'm back now, with some pretty thrilling updates (at least thrilling for me!), I'm starting the promotion process for Farro this week and I've started writing Sulfur.

A note on the first, I've been contacting book blogs about Farro. The act promotes deep, uncomfortable memories of my very brief and wholly awful stint as a telemarketer. I experienced the same feeling when querying agents, with about the same amount as success. So far responses from the book blogs have been incredibly kind and helpful, invalidating my fears, and I hope they continue to be that way! I'm excited for their opinions -- good or bad!

The Bigger News -- and the thing you probably want to know most about: Sulfur has begun. I have wrote the opening line, the opening dialogue (spoken by Bomani), even the opening event (secret for now). I love starting books almost as much as I love finishing them. I love picking where I should start in the story and scraping that and starting later. Farro originally began the day Khensa was kidnapped from Junktown, and her subsequent months in the temple. After writing this however, I didn't like the feel of it, the drag and the flab, and so I said, "Screw it, we're just starting at the end of it." Low and behold, a beginning. With Sulfur, I had a similar work through. Originally it was to begin with "the gang" getting ready to depart on their big quest and heading out on their mission and evading guards and staying under the radar and ugh, when does it end? Bang, Sulfur starts in the middle of the desert.

But when do we get to see it?

After my Beta-Readers have had a chance to go through it and reply.

Wait, what? Beta-Readers? You have Beta-Readers?

For Farro I had two teenagers reading it and acting like my cheerleaders. They didn't make any changes despite the grammatical errors, they are just reading it for the fun of it. A couple more Beta-Readers have been added to the Sulfur list because they have asked to be included and I was only too happy to oblige. "Why yes, you may read Sulfur and critique it, as long as you wave a pair of proverbial pom-poms in my face while you're doing it." Oh Beta-Readers, like dogs nipping at me heels.

Farro Published

Farro is now available in the following formats:

Kindle Edition $1.99

Nook Edition $1.99

Soon (in the next week or so) Farro will also be available in trade paper for those of you that like to hold the book in your hand. I know I do. Many of you have probably already read Farro, if that be the case, please consider sharing Farro with a friend, leaving a review, or even buying a copy. Thank you for your support, to an indie-author like me it has meant the world!

I'm going to keep this brief. I have lots to do, including writing a Bonus Chapter to help celebrate the release! I'll also be diving right into the sequel next week. Lots to do before then.

Editing is done, Farro is published, I'm sleeping again. Oh happy day.

Love,

Arreana