About Books

  • ·

    Goodbye, day job …

    32 Comments

    Well, if you read the title of this post, you know that I no longer have a day job. Unfortunately, this was not my choice. Like so many other folks, I was the victim of job cuts.

    I worked as a features page designer at a daily newspaper. Basically, my job involved designing feature pages for publication, editing stories, working with freelancers, posting stories/photos to the newspaper’s website, etc. There had been rumors that there would be job cuts (they called it copy desk consolidation) at my newspaper since the summer of 2009. If there’s an industry you don’t want to be in right now, it’s newspapers/journalism. Newspapers across the country are dying a slow, painful death, which is sad. If newspapers are still being printed in five years, I’ll be very surprised. They’ll either be online — or not exist at all.

    But nobody at my newspaper ever really confirmed anything about the job cuts, and all the rumors I heard kept pushing the date back and back. Plus, the newspaper won a Pulitzer Prize in 2010. Well, on Nov. 8, 2010, the axe finally fell. I and several other folks (other copy editors/page designers) got called into an office and were each given a letter telling us our last day at work would be Dec. 13.

    Happy holidays, huh?

    So I am now unemployed as far as the day job goes. I thought a long time about writing this post because my personal life is just that — personal. I don’t talk about it very much, if at all. But there are so many folks who are out of work out there — I thought posting this might help someone, if only to let folks know they are not alone. (And the reason I waited so long to post this is that I was waiting for all the final paperwork to go through.)

    I have a lot of mixed feelings about losing my day job. Obviously, losing that steady paycheck and insurance is the most troubling thing. I don’t think the job cuts were handled well either, but I’m not going to get into that here. I’ll also miss a lot of the folks I worked with. People always talk about the stages of grief. I think I’ve been through all of them at this point. LOL.

    But part of me is also really excited by this change, and I’ve decided to look at this as my chance to see if I can make it as a full-time author. I have four books coming out in 2011 — Tangled Threads, Touch of Frost, Spider’s Revenge, and Kiss of Frost, plus an Elemental Assassin short story in The Mammoth Book of Ghost Romance anthology — so I’ve already got enough work with revisions, copy edits, page proofs, blogging, and promotion to keep me busy for the year.

    Honestly, the book stuff had been getting to be more than I could handle and still work full-time too. I was super-busy and super-stressed all the time, so much so that I’d been thinking about trying to cut back and only work part-time at the newspaper. (I asked about working part-time after the job cuts were announced, but that was not an option.)

    So one good thing about losing my day job is that I will hopefully have time to do some book stuff that I’ve been wanting to for a while now. For example, I have an idea for a new urban fantasy series that I’d like to write. I also want to do something with the fourth Bigtime book that I’ve written — maybe post it on Amazon or get it published through an e-press. I want to write some more short stories and maybe even try my hand at something new — like writing category romance for Harlequin.

    I’m treating writing as a full-time job, and I’ve been working 40 hours a week (and more) ever since I was laid off. There’s always something to do, whether it’s blogging or revisions or looking over page proofs. I’ve been busy, but so far, it’s been a lot of fun. I’m not nearly as stressed as I was before, which I think is a good thing.

    Some folks have asked what they can do to help. Well, if you like my books, I hope that you’ll tell your friends or your local libraries about them. Hopefully, I’ll sell enough books that my publishers will want to continue my Elemental Assassin and Mythos Academy series. Fingers crossed.

    I’ve been sending out resumes — lots and lots of resumes — in hopes of finding a part-time job. I currently do some freelance book reviews, and I’m thinking about using my writing/design skills to offer a promotions package to authors — a press release, a bookmark design, and a flyer design. Maybe even do some book editing. We’ll see.

    So don’t cry for me, Argentina. I’ll be all right. I’d seen the writing on the wall for a while, and I’d been planning accordingly. It’s a brave and scary new world, but I’ll land on my feet.

    Who knows? Maybe this time next year, I’ll be glad that I lost my day job because it will have led to an opportunity that I might not have had otherwise. It’s a nice thing to hope for, anyway. 😉

  • Anticipation …

    32 Comments

    I can’t remember which blog I saw this on, but not too long ago, I read a post where someone said that buying a book is actually better than reading it.

    I think that person was onto something.

    I love going to the bookstore to browse through all the newest releases, I’ve got a long, long list of Amazon pages bookmarked on my computer, and I read most of the reviews in Romantic Times every month looking for new books. I eagerly await the release date of books by my favorite authors, and I usually buy a book that I’m looking forward to the first week that it comes out.

    But sometimes, once I get that much-anticipated book, it sits in my TBR pile for weeks … if not months. For example, I got Catching Fire and Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins back in August … and I have yet to read them.

    Hangs head in shame.

    Why do I do this? Well, if I’m on deadline, stuffing envelopes, or whatever, sometimes I just don’t have time to stop and read a book. Other times, I’m in the middle of a book already or have something else that I need to read first. Sometimes, I’m just not in the mood to read.

    So why do I go ahead and buy the book anyway, even though I know I may not get to it for awhile? I blame the anticipation factor. There’s something about picking up a book with a cool cover, being intrigued by the cover blurb, and bringing that book home from the store.

    Just holding a new book in my hand fills me with anticipation. Maybe I’ll discover a great new author, maybe the book will be the perfect blend of romance and adventure, maybe I’ll fall in love with the characters, maybe it will be the best book I’ve read all year, maybe the writing will be so great that I’ll wish I could write something half as good.

    Maybe … maybe I need some serious help when it comes to my book addiction. LOL.

    What about you guys? Do you think the anticipation of a good read is better than actually reading a book?

  • · ·

    Gin and ghosts, oh my …

    16 Comments

    I’ve signed the contract and turned in the story is so I guess I can finally announce this. I’ve been invited to write a story for The Mammoth Book of Ghost Romance anthology — and it’s going to be a Gin story. 😉

    Right now, I’m calling it Haints and Hobwebs: An Elemental Assassin short story, although that title might change a bit. And since someone will probably ask this, some folks in the South use the word haint for ghost, and I thought it would be a cool variation to use in the story.

    The story takes place in between the events of Tangled Threads and Spider’s Revenge. I don’t want to give away too much of the plot, so I’ll just say that the story is told from Gin’s point of view and has her doing what she does best — which is taking care of business as the Spider.

    The book will be out in October 2011. I don’t have a list of the other authors writing stories, but according to this post I found on Carolyn Crane’s website, she’ll be one of them.

    I’m really, really thrilled about this. It’s such a cool honor to be invited to participate in an anthology, especially one of the Mammoth anthologies, which I’ve heard so many great things about. As a reader, I love anthologies — I think they’re a great way to try several authors for one price. As an author, I’ve been wanting to be part of an anthology for a while now and hopefully pick up some new readers who may not have tried my work before.

    Anyway, I’ll post more details — including the exact release date — when I have them. But for right now, here’s a preliminary version of the cover art. Enjoy!

  • Prices, prices, prices …

    12 Comments

    One thing that I wanted to mention in regards to Touch of Frost, the first book in my new Mythos Academy young adult urban fantasy series, is the price — $9.95, according to Amazon.

    I’m wondering if some readers will complain about this — especially since the book is shorter than the ones in my Elemental Assassin series, which are priced at $7.99. For the record, Touch of Frost comes in at about 87,000 words. There are also some extras/bonus features in the back of the book, so let’s say the final word count is about 88,000 total. Tangled Threads, the fourth book in the Elemental Assassin series, comes it at about 95,000 words.

    So why will Touch of Frost cost more? Well, for one thing, it’s coming out in trade paperback — a slightly larger, bigger paperback than the mass market format that the Elemental Assassin books are printed in.

    But mostly, I think the price has to do with the market –$9-$10 seems to be the general price point for most YA books out there that are published as trade paperbacks. For hardcover YA books, it seems like the price point is around $15-$16.

    I don’t know why this is. Maybe teens don’t care to spend more for books than adults do. Or maybe their parents are just so happy that teens are reading in the first place that they don’t blink at the price of the book.

    Personally, I don’t mind paying a little extra for the YA trade paperbacks. I like the size, the covers are almost always gorgeous, and I think the fonts in them are usually a little bigger and easier to read. And the trade paperback YA books are still less than the $14-$15 that adult trade paperbacks are priced at. However, I’ll admit that when I buy books (YA or adult), I usually shop around for the best price — or have a coupon handy. LOL.

    Now, my YA publisher, Kensington, is really good (and really smart) about giving discounts on their e-books. Most of the Kindle editions of their mass market romance books are around $2 — or more — below the paper book prices. I’m not sure if they’ll do the same kind of pricing with the new YA line, but I don’t see why they wouldn’t. So if you have an e-reader, you can probably get a good deal on Touch of Frost when it comes out on July 26.

    Anyway, I guess the point of this post is that I don’t set the prices — I just write the books. No matter what price you buy my book at, I hope you’ll think that it’s time and money well spent.

    What about you guys? Do you like the YA trade paperback format? Do you mind paying more for YA books? Share in the comments.