What I've Been Up To

I think the question is, "What haven't I been up to?"

Since January 1, my life has turned crazy-upside-down.

I released the fourth book in my AKM series at the same time I ran a freebie on book one, and Holy Book Sales, Batman! I couldn't keep up. I was selling somewhere around 300 books a day for a while, then dropped to 200 per day by the end of January. And the influx of new fans was incredible! What fun!

Let's see. What else is going on. I've done a couple of blog tours this year, and just finished up the one for my one year anniversary celebration for Rise of the Fallen, book one in the AKM series, which, by the way, has earned quite a few honors since the beginning of the year:

USA Today Recommended Read
Finalist for Parajunkees Best Adult Book 2012
Gravetells' Readers Choice runner up Favorite read in January
Gravetells' Reviewer's Choice for January

The draft for book five of the AKM series, Return of the Assassin, is finished and in the hands of my beta readers, but I have a feeling it will need major work in edits, simply because I got very little quality writing time while drafting that one. It's hard to write a cohesive, flowing novel when you can only write 1,000 words at a time or your brain is just so tired you can hardly think. I've since altered my writing schedule so that I'm writing at my peak. Hopefully that bodes well for ROTA during edits.

I've also begun work on a quartet of books that came at me from out of nowhere, but which have invaded my mind to the point of distraction. This set of stories, about a sexy artist of seduction named Mark Strong, started as a trilogy, then became a duet, went back to a trilogy, and just yesterday, I got a fourth book out of nowhere. So now it's a quartet. But I'm pleased about that, because I didn't feel like the entire story was going to be told in only three books. I already see how the fourth book ends, and I can tell you that I'm much happier with it.

I also joined Romance Writers of  America and their Indiana Chapter, IRWA, and can't believe how much I've already learned in only two meetings. I have another meeting tomorrow, and have signed up to be a coordinator and judge in their annual writing contest.

Additionally, I'm on a quest to write a minimum of 500,000 words this year, and calculated yesterday that I'm about 63,000 words ahead of pace, so I'm stoked about that. Having a job and trying to write can be daunting, but I'm making it work. Somehow. Nothing short of a miracle, but I'm wondering how long I'll be able to keep up this pace. I'm trying to give myself one night off a week, but here I am, on my night off, writing. It might just be my blog, but I'm still working. But that's what you've got to do if you want to make it in this business. Whatever. It. Takes.

Lastly, I'm heading out to RT in Kansas City in two weeks. I can't believe I've waited since last May for this, and here it finally is. My first major book convention. There's still so much to do before I leave, but I think somehow it will all come together.

I'm sure there's more, but right now I'm too tired to remember it all, so I guess I'll go stare at my muse for Mark Strong and mentally prepare for a big writing weekend. One that would be awesome if I could actually finish book one in his quartet. At least the first draft. Woot!

Happy Reading and Writing!