Second: The Daedalus Enigma: Waves of Darkness Book 6 has been uploaded to Ingram and all my eBook distributors. Publication date is May 14th, but the eBook is available to pre-order on Amazon, Google Books, Smashwords, and Draft2Digital.
Third: The D2D purchase links have been added to all the Waves of Darkness books.
Fourth: I am removing The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe Season 1 from Kindle Unlimited. They will all be cycled out by mid-July. They will still be available on KDP.
In August, I will start adding the serial to my D2D catalog.
Fifth: I am progressing nicely on the revisions to Maelstrom of Fate: Waves of Darkness Book 7 and plan to release it in October rather than November. The reason for this is so I can have copies available at HallowCon.
As usual, I spent more than I made, and that was just on food. Plus, I have 3 new necklaces and a new tiara.
Though I thought I was only on 1 panel, I ended up being on 2. Fairytales and Fantasy, and How to Sell Your Book.
I only had a space on Author’s Alley on Sunday, filling the spot left by Patricia Gilliam. (She had to head out Saturday night.) Still, it was a successful convention for me. I sold 4 books, and for the first time, they were all The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe titles!
I also gave 1 copy of Pathway to Downfall to “Con Mommy” as I dedicated the book to her. I thought she was going to cry. She said she’d always wanted someone to dedicate a book to her, and I made her year. We’ve been convention friends for years now, and she’s a loyal reader and a genuinely nice person.
I forgot to tell her our vendor tables at HallowCon this October will be next to each other.
I failed to collect business cards in the dealer room this year, but I can get the info I need from the program app. I’m way behind, like a few conventions, on updating the Smugglers Cove and Hucksters Haven pages. I’m also behind on putting up convention albums on FB.
I learned a few new things for getting my books out there that I may try, time permitting.
Also, the Thing to Buy/Sell this year seems to be lightsabers. There were at least 3 vendors for that item alone. (Star Wars is the predominant preference in Chattanooga, but some Trek was represented.)
Con Nooga starts at noon today at the Chattanooga Convention Center. As a multifandom convention, they have something for just about everyone.
I will be on one of the Writers Track panels Saturday. You can find me somewhere near Room 16, roaming the dealer hall shopping, or hanging out with Con Mommy at the info desk.
Yeah, yeah, I’m a slug about updating the site; I’ve just been… busy.
Revisions and edits are pretty much complete on The Daedalus Enigma: Waves of Darkness Book 6. Any remaining typos will hopefully be caught in the formatting stage. I’m still pushing for a May release.
I have every intention of getting the cover art done this weekend for the first season 4 episode of The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe: Episode 37 Aftermath. The editing is already done.
If I ever release a hardcover version of Waves of Darkness, it’ll probably be an omnibus volume of the entire Sisters of Power story arc. Recently, I’ve had ideas for lovely (hopefully) black & white/greyscale illustrations to use in such a volume. What can I say? I need to learn the newer version of the PenUp app, since they want to overcomplicate brush/tool selections on it now. At least that app is still free and not Apple-centric (I’m still pissed at Adobe for their bias against Android devices).
In more Waves of Darkness news: I am expanding on the original 1st draft of Waves of Darkness Book 8: Hunting the Dragon. When I started looking back at the files, I thought my computer had eaten some of the chapters. I only found 18 chapter files plus the Once Upon a Tide… in my file library. Turns out I told the entire story in only 18 chapters. That is entirely too short.
While I still hope to release book 8 in 2025, I may have to push back the May date to later in the year.
No, I still haven’t started plotting book 9. I also haven’t finished writing season 4.
What have I learned this year? Tea blends are a BIG seller. I do not carry tea blends. One of the neighboe booths did.
I sold one copy of Blood Curse: Waves of Darkness Book 1. My only sale the whole weekend, but that made this a successful convention in my mind. Thank you for the pity purchase, Rich. I’ll take any sales I can get! I did get some interested browsers, and author cards were taken. Hopefully some audiobook and ebook sales will come out of this weekend.
I had one panel on Saturday; Homegrown: Writing from Our Roots, along with Louis Herring-Jones, Phillip K. Booker, Mel Todd, and moderated by William Joseph “Hillbilly” Roberts. It was fun to learn I wasn’t the only one who participated in bottle rocket battles in the woods as a kid. The panel was about how we use our experiences, aspects of places we grew up, and people we know or knew in our writing.
Late Saturday night featured the “Chattacon Choir,” a very hammy group-sing of Bohemian Rhapsody and Paradise by the Dashboard Lights. Both singers and audience participated in the performance while in varying states of sobriety or the lack thereof, over emoting, heckling, and pantomiming lyrics.
Think if MST3K did this live with a large group.
I finally got to hear how this tradition got started many moons ago when the convention was still held at the Chattanooga Choo Choo. The first time was a spontaneous event which spread throughout almost the entire convention. Now it is contained, for the most part, to the consuite.
I did get to talk with my second cousin, Mary Robinette Kowal (this year’s Literary Guest of Honor), before the convention ended Sunday. Took having to say which side of the family I’m from before she could finally place me. As I pointed out previously, we haven’t seen each other since we we little kids, several decades ago. We had a nice, if short visit. Both of us were getting ready to leave.
I plan on doing a table again next year, though I still have to pre-register for it.
I got some progress made with various projects while manning my table. I made a good start on writing episode 45 of The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe. I also finished my first round of edits/revisions on Maelstrom of Fate: Waves of Darkness Book 7, which I plan to release in October. I moved that up from November, because I hope to attend HallowCon this year.
I also did a new pencil sketch of Belladonna. It felt weird drawing real world again. You can’t zoom in on a screen to fine tune details with real pencil and paper like you can on a drawing app. Since the sketch involves full frontal nudity, I will not share it in this post.
I might put it on her character page. I haven’t decided yet.
I do offer this caveat. The between-the-episodes segment is strictly adult content/erotica that just happens to advance the plot of the overall story. So, NO KIDDIES PLEASE.
I hope everyone had a pleasant holiday season. I just wanted to let you know that the season 3 omnibus for The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe, Pathway to Downfall is now available on Amazon.
I would show the cover here, but WordPress isn’t giving me the option to insert media right now. I will probably have to do it from my phone or tablet. Weird. Had to sign in on this computer, too.
Twice now, we’ve had a large visitor in our garage. Sorry, I don’t have a picture. If it returns, I’ll try to get one. If I recall correctly, both visits were on rainy days.
This was not a typical house spider. We’ve plenty of those lurking about. I named it because its size merited a name. Spy-Daar resembles a tarantula but is not hairy, nor is it that large. It has a body as thick as my pinky and a legspan of just under 3 inches. It is the color of high-grade dark chocolate, so dark it almost looks black.
I don’t know if it came in to escape the cold and damp or to hunt camel crickets. It didn’t move fast when I saw it.
I’m not really sure. So much seems in flux at the moment.
The final episode for this season of The Adventures of Pigg & Woolfe: Episode 36 The Fall of Tunilia is live on KDP. Check the page for Season 3 for the purchase link.
I’ve finished formatting the season 3 omnibus, Pathway to Downfall, but I still have to do the cover design. Needless to say, I seriously doubt I’ll have copies available until Con Nooga in February. Amazon does not do speedy delivery on book orders, and Chattacon comes early this January.
Season 4 is going to be released one episode every other month. I only have half the season drafted, and I still need to type and edit what is written so far. I’m also debating removing the few early episodes from Kindle Unlimited so I can release all the episodes on Smashwords/D2D as well as KDP. At only 99-cents each, that won’t hurt my royalties (nonexistent, mind you) from Amazon.
I need to update my ad images for my annual Take a Pirate Home for Christmas campaign. I’ll also be enrolling in the Smashwords End of Year Sale again. Think I’ll go with the 75% discount this time, which will make all my Waves of Darkness ebooks there available for 99-cents! That sale starts December 15th and runs through the 31st.
Remember, at Smashwords, you can find files to work with just about any type of eReader you use.
Meanwhile, I need to see about getting a new washer. It started leaking while filling this weekend. Not good.
I’m also unsure of what I’ll be doing at my day job for the last 2 weeks before Christmas. That is a bit annoying.
Tamara Lowery's Scribblings 