Status Report - November 2014

The last eighteen months haven't been the greatest for me and my family. We had plans. Plans that would be best for each of us to fulfill our personal goals. And the great god Murphy laughed maniacally and did everything he could to fuck those plans up.

As I write this, I'm sitting in a hotel room hundreds of miles from our new home, waiting for my car to be repaired. Yep, Murphy has been so good to me lately. (If you couldn't tell by the dripping sarcasm.)

But all the problems doesn't mean I haven't been writing! However, it does mean that the 2014 production schedule has been officially shredded into more pieces than Iran-Contra documents.

So here's the 2015 plan:

The Bloodlines Series
I'm writing the last four books as we speak. In edition, I've re-proofed the first three books, and I'm half-way through re-proofing #4. I've already talked with someone about contracting her to format the entire series for both e-book and print starting in January. I'm also on the search for a new cover artist so there's a unified theme and style for the covers. The plan is to re-launch the entire series late winter/early spring. I'll post a chapter from the new books once a week over at the Blood Lines blog.

The Justice Series
I've thought long and hard about how I want to launch this series. There's a particular artist I want to hire for Justice Anthea's stories, but he's expensive which means I need to save my pennies. Also, I don't want leave readers hanging between books, so I plan to release the first three books, A Question of Balance, A Modicum of Truth, and A Matter of Death, hopefully around next Halloween.

Nnnnnnnnnnnn Series
I'm collaborating with another ex-attorney/fantasy writer, Xxxxx Yyyyyy. (P.S. I highly recommend her book, Aaaaaaaaaa!) This is my first time working with someone, and I'm really enjoying it! It's about a couple of attorneys who handle the legal problems of superheroes. Our projected release date for the first book is May 1st.

All the credit for the series tagline goes to Xxxxx:

Franklin & Winters, Attorneys at Law — You saved the world. Let us handle the cleanup. For a free consultation, call 888-555-HERO.

Seasons of Magick Series
If I have any spare time next year, I plan to do a collected edition of the Seasons of Magick series.

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The money side
As far as sales go, they are down. We're talking the $200/month ballpark collectively across all platforms for all of 2014. I blame it on my lack of publishing. I've found the best marketing is releasing a new book every few months, and needless to say, my last releases under the Suzan Harden name were over Halloween week last year.

Ironically, the reason I'm selling anything at all is thanks to Nora Roberts. The title of the third book in her O'Dwyer trilogy is...Blood Magick. So my book of the same name is showing up on e-book searches, and people have been trying it out.

Alter Ego has been doing slightly better in sales because the last novel of a trilogy was released in May and she participated in a charity anthology over the summer.

I'm hoping all of this will improve once I start releasing books from both of us this winter. Keeping my fingers crossed anyway.

As always, your mileage may vary.