Sword and Sorceress 30 Release Week!

It's out! Sword and Sorceress 30 is now available in both e-book and print. The volume contains my second Justice short story, "Diplomacy in the Dark."

So far, the e-books are available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble, and the print book is available online at Amazon. If you want to support your local indie bookseller, you can always have them order a copy through Ingrams.

Hopefully, I'll have the full-length novel, A Question of Balance, out soon as well. It's currently with my beta reader, who also happens to be the timekeeper for their local high school's soccer teams. Unfortunately, regional tournaments started last week. ARGH!

I shouldn't complain since it's totally my fault for not getting the story to my beta sooner. And I totally rely on this person because without them, I wouldn't have licensed the two short stories to my favorite anthology!

What I can give you a sneak preview of is the cover from For the Muse Designs. Cool, right?

Sword and Sorceress 30 Is Available for Pre-Order!

The Kindle version of Sword and Sorceress 30, with my Justice Anthea story "Diplomacy in the Dark", is available for pre-order! As far as I know, there will be a paperback version, but it's not showing on any of the retail sites yet. But if you want instant delivery to your reading device on November 2, get your order in now!

In the meantime, I'm busting my ass on editing the full-length novel!

(Not that I'm excited about this or anything. *grin* )

Back in the Saddle!

Things on the home front finally settled down last weekend. Our impromptu houseguest moved out ten days ago, and as of Monday, September 20, I'm back to working full-time.

Hallelujah!

Or it was. On Friday, we found out my father-in-law needed to go in Monday to have a pacemaker surgically implanted. Then Genius Kid came down with some bug Saturday night that required a trip to our doctor.

On the plus side, I got a lot done last week. I've prepped Amish, Vamp & Thieves for my formatter, entered the data for the paperback's ISBN, finished the front matter and delivered everything to her. Bless her, she had everything back to me on Sunday for review.

Next up is getting Blood Sacrifice ready for paper printing.

A Question of Balance is done, and is in what I call it's resting phase. That means I write something else before I start editing. Sort of like a palate cleansing. While I hope to have it ready around Sword and Sorceress 30's release date, I won't make any promise because I'll jinx the process. *smile*

So what am I doing to cleanse my palate? Zombie Goddess hit 27K last week. I'll work on it for the rest of September and October, keeping my fingers crossed that I get it done before NaNoWriMo starts. For this year's NaNo, I want to get the bulk of Ravaged, Bloodlines #7, done.

The Nnnnnnnnnnnn series is currently on hold. My co-writer Xxxxx Yyyyyy bowed out for personal reasons, but she released her rights to the story and characters and gave me her blessing for finishing the project. If I can get the other three books mentioned above written, edited and published by the end of the year, I'm hoping to pick it up again in January.

It'll be a busy last three months of the year, but it really feels good to be working again. Now, if I can only keep everyone healthy and out of my hair...

Proofing the Proofs

When you're published by someone else, there's nothing like the feeling when you get the proofs from the editor. You haven't looked at that particular piece in ages. Even when you go through a small press and their cycle is only six months, instead of two years like the big guys, it's like reading something fresh and new.

It's your last chance to change anything that might be hairy in the text. It's also the time to make sure new errors weren't introduced. Then there's that little trepidation when you hit the send button, the fear you've missed something vital that will bite your butt when the piece is published.

Yep, I'll be feeling all of that over the weekend. Last night, Elisabeth Waters sent me the proof for Sword and Sorceress 30. The second Justice Anthea story, "Diplomacy in the Dark", will be in the anthology when it comes out on November 2.

In the meantime, I'm still scribbling away on the first novel with these characters, A Question of Balance. I'm hoping to have it done and ready to publish by November, also. Here's the link to the first chapter if you're curious.

The Latest Craziness

When it rains, it pours.

First of all, I've given up trying to fix the damn blog post on my website. Then I found out that the company that subhosts my website is closing, so it's time to make some changes. Over the next month, you'll be seeing the updated "Suzan Harden - Writer" as my webmistress and I migrate the old stuff to a new host.

Jaye and Elaina are jamming on the paperback formatting and new covers respectively for the Bloodlines series. I'd planned to start rolling them out at the beginning of this month. But once again, personal crap has hit the fan. I hope to start uploading by the end of the month along with the new novels.

That same personal crap has put what I hope is a temporary halt on the writing of Hero De Facto. It's frustrating because we're only a handful of chapters from completion and we've got a fantastic cover artist lined up.

The only good news I've got right now is that another Justice Anthea adventure will be in Sword and Sorceress 30 in November. After the bullshit of the last five months, I take that one victory.

I take that back. The other good thing is getting back into Sam's head after three years. I'd forgotten how much fun she is.