Team Update

Greetings, Champions! The final round of the Favorite Secondary Character Poll is just about ready! You can expect to see it out sometime next week. In the meantime, I thought it would be fun if I gave a bit of a team update!

As many of you are aware, I can’t do this alone. I have a whole slew of people who stand in the gaps and help me. Here’s what my amazing crew has been up to:

Myrrhlynn: Cover-artist: Though Nibelart made the actual artwork for my Second Age of Retha series, Myrrhlynn still did the typography, and she and I worked together to create the concept design. She just finished the updated MBRC covers (More on that in future posts) but she already has the image picked out for my next Timeless Fairy Tale cover!

Editor #1: Comma Queen: Editor #1 has been hard at work whipping the next Second Age of Retha book, The Desperate Quest, into shape! I owe her a big thanks for tackling this project. She doesn’t know much about video games so when editing The Luckless her comments were both insightful and hilarious whenever she came across a gaming concept that was a bit weird. (She says Desperate Quest is an easier read!)

Editor #2: Stylistic Wizard: Editor #2 has been very busy with her own work! Her book, Strains of Silence, was recently published by Harbourlight Books! (The book is contemporary and tackles some heavy topics, but it’s got Editor #2’s beautiful style of writing!)

Britta: Head beta-reader: I’m super excited for Britta because she’s about to start writing a creative writing class–woohoo–but I really owe her a big thanks, or a gallon of ice cream or something. Britta has been powering through some of my old books, looking for typos and mistakes. (And I mean OLD BOOKS. We’re talking Princess Ahira old.) Her role is particularly key given that the books need to be cleaned up for Meg’s job.

Rock-Star-Meg: Assistant: Pretty soon here Meg will be sweeping away all my manuscripts, and will be update the formatting for the ebooks, and formatting every book for print publication! (Wooohooo!) We’re not ready quite yet as I’m still figuring out the formatting myself, but it’s coming!

As for me, I’m between books at the moment. I’ve been editing The Desperate Quest, but I’m also prepping for my next Timeless Fairy Tale story. There’s a million little things I need to do (like apply the typos Britta finds so Meg will be golden when the time comes) but I’m really looking forward to my next book. (And no, I’m not going to share what retelling it is…yet. Buwahah!)

That’s everything with us! Thanks for reading, Champions, I hope you have a fantastic day!

Introducing: Assistant-Rock-Star Meg

Good day to you, Champions! I’ve got some fun stuff to share today! For starters, I’m part of a giveaway that highlights “excellence in indies,” which is a huuuge contest you can enter for the chance to win lots of books. It’s being held over at “Reading is My Superpower,” which is a review blog, and they were nice enough to let me write a guest post! Check it out here!

Next up, today I finally get to introduce you all to my new rock-star author assistant, Meg! To help you guys get to know her a bit, I thought I’d do the same thing I did with Britt and hold a mini interview.

Kitty: Hello Meg, welcome to the community!

Meg: Thank you Kitty!  I am happy to be here!

Kitty: Could you tell us a bit about yourself?

Meg: Well sure! I was born and raised in a small town in the Midwest. Jesus has blessed me with a wonderful husband and a beautiful little farm where we raise milking goats.  I love coffee, anything chocolate, and spending time with good friends and family.  I also enjoy reading, Scottish Country Dancing, and watching movies. Lastly, my favorite Timeless Fairy Tale is Cinderella and Colonel.

Kitty: Meg will mostly be in charge of my email inbox and sorting everything out—though she’ll also be popping in on Facebook too! Besides keeping me more organized, she’ll also be answering some of the more common questions. (For example: Is the King Arthurs series really over? ((Yes.)) Will Life Reader get a sequel? ((Yes, but not for a while.))) If there’s a more personal email that’s sent to me she’ll shoot it my way so I can respond, so I’ll still be reading my messages!

Meg: Yes, I will only be handling the “easy” emails.  Kitty will still reply to you on specific matters.  But please be patient as we make the transition with the email. 

Kitty: With Meg helping me combat the slog of my inbox, it will free up my time for other aspects of the business, so I’m very excited to welcome her to the team. She’s also a long time friend of mine, which is really nice as I know my inbox and you Champions will be in good hands.

Meg:  Thank You Kitty. I appreciate that you have such faith in me and asked me to be a part of your team.

Kitty: That covers the intro! I’m confident you wonderful Champions will have fun getting to know Meg—and witness what a calming influence she is on me, ha-ha. Thanks for reading, Champions, and have a lovely day!

Meg:  I look forward to meeting and getting to know you all! Thank you for letting me join your community!

Kitty: Of course–we’re so thrilled to have you!

So with Meg acting as my assistant, Britta, who is once my intern but I now consider her my lead beta reader; Myrrhlynn on covers; And my awesome-sauce editing team backing me up, we have quite the little posse now! Which reminds me, thank you to everyone who added in their favorite fairy tale retellings on my last post–we had an amazing discussion and some really good recommendations were shared! (I’m thrilled to have bulked up my reading list for the summer, woohoo!) If you didn’t get a chance to check it out yet, here’s a link to the post.

That’s it for today, Champions! Thanks for reading, and if you like give Meg a warm welcome in the comments and check out that giveaway I mentioned at the start of the post. 😉

Cinderella & Fanart!

Greetings, Champions! I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! I’m here today to share some fun news: Cinderella and the Colonel is getting an update!

Ta da! The new cover~~

In addition to the beautiful, fantastic new cover, Cinderella & the Colonel received an edit! The majority of the changes were all stylistic/grammar/punctuation fixes, so in general the biggest change should be that the story will read more smoothly but you won’t be able to exactly pinpoint why. However, there is one tiny new slice of a scene that lets you see dear Fred’s perspective earlier in the book.

The new cover isn’t showing up on C&C‘s Amazon page, but when I checked the sample it’s the cover that’s on there, so if you get the edited version it should come with the new cover.

If you want the cleaned-up version, you’ll need to contact Amazon! Although I’m the author I have no control over pushing the updates onto Kindle devices, so go to Amazon Help  –specifically digital services–and request the newer version. (Historically, other Champions have mentioned the fastest method is to contact help via phone or instant messenger. Email takes longer.)

The timing is not the greatest as we are smack dab in the middle of Sleeping Beauty frenzy, but since I’ve been working on this edit for several months, and Myrrhlynn made the new cover way back in summer, I decided to give into my impulse and release it now!

Up next, we have some truly beautiful fanart, done by our very own Britta Vana!

Ray-Ray Wishmore, by Britta Vana

Her fantastic picture is of Raven Wishmore from Life Reader! She did a fabulous job–particularly with the differences in Raven/Ray-Ray’s hair! For those of you who are curious, Britta said she used FireAlpaca to make it. Thanks, Britta, for using your beautiful talent! 😀

Alright, that’s it for today, Champions. Good luck getting the newest version of Cinderella!