Where the Wild Pony Takes Me

Lookee a new blog layout! I was in the mood for color, so here we are. Also, my nails are green with multi colored sparkles, way too young for a woman my age. If I get a job interview I will change them to a discreet pinkish tan.



To my surprise, Her Cyborg Awakes has been selling. It went live with the $2.99 price last Wednesday. Since then it has made enough to cover my mortgage. Not that it has to--hubby and I both have day jobs, all is well. But it does surprise me. After 6k free downloads (actually more than that if I count UK) I didn't expect actual sales. It also has five reviews, which I have found hard to get for my other books.


Alien Blood, book two of this series--Diaspora Worlds--is in edits. I decided to self publish it also, so have lined up a cover and editor. I plan to release it on July 6th, before the Kindle world forgets who I am. Two other books in the series have plans and beginning chapters roughed out. And two additional books have initial scenes written.

So I'll go with it.

Dream On...by Steven Tyler, Aerosmith

This is an old song. It came out when I was in my teens. I wonder how many times I've heard it? I no longer own the album(or cassette or 8 track--I had a great 8 track player in the seventies.)

It's a ballad about dreams--paying your dues, learning . It moves along, mellow, thoughtful-

--and then it changes. Tyler drags it up an octave and suddenly the mellow dream on becomes intense, urgent. A desperate, hard rocking wail--this is important, take notice, get committed!

Because that is what it takes to see a dream come true. It won't happen with 'merrily we roll along...' Those of us who are writers, or artists--we know this. Others might think we are nuts for all the hours we put in, for what seems to be small reward. But we are seeing the future, the path, a vision.

I'm not a huge Aerosmith fan, I  was more into Tom Petty, John Mellancamp and Fleetwood Mac back in the day. But this song is pretty much my favorite rock ballad. It was written by an artist, and performed by one. Nothing pisses me off more on American Idol than to hear someone sing it as a straight ballad, with out the  octave higher intensity. I was on pins and needles during Steven Tyler's AI performance. I feared--he's old, he won't be able to do it. So  relieved and thrilled when he sang it the way it should be sung. Thank you, Mr Tyler.

Every time that I look in the mirror,
All these lines on my face gettin' clearer
The past is gone,
It went by like dusk to dawn
Isn't that the way,
Everybody's got their dues in life to pay
I know,
Nobody knows,
The way it comes and the way it goes
I know that everybody's sinned,
You got to lose to know how to win

Half my life's in books' written pages,
Lived and learned from fools and from sages
You know it's true - all the feelings come back to you

Sing with me,
Sing for the year,
Sing for the laughter and sing for the tears
Sing with me,
If just for today,
Maybe tomorrow the good Lord'll take you away 

Maybe tomorrow the good Lord'll take you away

Dream on,
Dream on,
Dream on,
Dream on 'til your dream comes true
Dream on,
Dream on,
Dream on,
Dream on 'til your dream comes true

Dream on,,Dream on, Dream on, Dream on, Dream on, Dream on, Dream on

Sing with me,
Sing for the year,
Sing for the loved and sing for the tears
Sing with me,
If just for today,
Maybe tomorrow the good Lord'll take you away 

Maybe tomorrow the good Lord'll take you away

STILL Editing

I did think I would have Urloon ready for submission by now but no! Seems like I've been on this project foreveah. And now I am re-editing Galacatic Game so both are in the same world. It is pleasant writing, because I love both stories and characters. And after the Cybot Awakened issue it is good to have a workable goal for future submissions, since it looks like that publisher is never going to release the book. 

(* Please look up your prospective epubs on *Preditors and Editors* and *Piers Anthony!* And email current authors for their recommendations!*)

The secondary male character in GG, Dooley, is in the batter's box because his romance starts in GG--but he loses her to a cyborg army. Oops.

Every once in a while though I have to take a break from editing and revising to write on a new story. Or pick up an old story out of my files that jumps into my brain. The story right now that is clamoring for attention is a light fantasy romance set in the same world as Faunication.  I know some of my ideas are waaaay out there and suspect this is one of them. Adler, a Griffin-taur(human torso face etc, griffin feet and wings), who is a wizard's apprentice is required to attend the Bridal Faire by his father and find a wife.  He needs to marry out of his 'kind' (long world building issue dealing with fertility) and really had not planned to marry until he reached Master Wizard status, since school keeps him so busy. Calling it Bridal Faire or Faire Reckoning.

I have new music for writing when I need to drown out the family and concentrate--but I can't do that in my quiet bedroom! Firefly soundtrack.

THE LOOKING BEAST-- my steampunk contest entry

I entered a short story contest, deadline today. It had to be about the sculpture pictured, a Beholder, by steampunk sculptor Daniel Proulx.I entered THE LOOKING BEAST IN THE GARDEN. I had the setting already built, in another story, so that made it seem familiar. It is only a 2k story, so is really just the meeting of my H/H and the Looking Beast. But it was fun. 

2k is not that easy to do. Plus--characters galore--H/H, The Looking Beast,

three kids, butler, yardmen, maids and Buttercup the pony.

Here's more about the contest: 

Contest

The winner receives steampunk jewelry. My daughters all have their fingers crossed.

I've been told!

I came home from work early since my twins need to be taken to Cheyenne at 4 am. Stuff to do.

I worked on Galactic Game last night. I'm on the last scenes.

I have been in a grumpy mood all afternoon, which really isn't my norml mood. I'm generally pretty cheerful. But not today. It could be the high winds with gusts to sixty mph we are experiencing here in the High Desert. Negative ions etc.

But in the midst of routine chores, Gema, my heroine in Galactic Game, sends me a message. I have one pivotal scene all wrong! Our hero , while hunky and beloved, should be absent in one scene they share. She wants to do it ALONE. So okay. I'm rewriting.

So maybe the bad mood was Gema's. On another plane. Or something

My Latest Work In Progress

(From my picture file, this story is set on a fantastic water world.) 

I'm not a linear writer. I don't start one story, then write that story through to the end, edit it and submit.

Instead I hop. I'll work on one story, until a snatch of dialog or an issue in another story invades my mind. Then I have to write that, since the invader won't go away until I get it down. I might work on five stories in any given month. And I might write the ending before the middle!

Now, that all changes when I decide it is time to submit. Once I have the full synopsis written, the story begs to be finished.

I'm happy today that I finished a synopsis for a scifi romance. I originally wrote this story as a short short,  a sexy slice of life for two weary war refuges on an exotic planet. A  hopeful life-will-go-on-and-be-great story. 

Later I decided to lengthen it and tell what happens after that sexy slice of life and the challenges they face as new immigrants to a sea world. Not to mention she's pregnant, which complicates everything. The story also has marauders, rebellious youth trying to go back to the sea, an evil cult leader, alien water creatures and second chances.

We've had bad news lately with my lay off and other inconvenient things, so real life has been more of a struggle than usual. I haven't been feeling like my normal cheerful self. I think I need this story. Right now it is titled Refugees on Urloon.

New Author? Need a website? CHEAP?

Many new ebook authors can't or do not want to spend big bucks on a
website.

But still, they want a site. They need a web presence.

There are free websites WITHOUT page adds out there. I have mine at Weebly. I've heard wordpress will redirect a domain name, too.I bought my domain name, melisseaires.com, (website )and then did a redirect so my free website has my domain name.

Being a bit of a control freak, I like being able to do all aspects of the site. I put up html for books and blurbs in a simple way--I create it here in blogger, switch to html and copy it, then paste the html into my website's html template. It is no more difficult than posting html into a yahoo loop post.

I am just using a template weebly offers. I know I could scrap that and find a template to purchase. but I like my site so have no interest in starting afresh.

My Sooper Seekrit Past

No, this isn't a blog about meeting my husband in a cult and all our cultish adventures--THAT I don't have the energy for!

Years ago I wrote Spuffy fan fic (that's Spike and Buffy fan fic). After the end of the show I moved on to paranormal original stories for publication.

Over the years I've taken down two fan fics. One was an alternate universe fantasy with the Buffy characters, I plan to use that fantasy setting/plotline someday. The other was a fluffy Christmas fantasy I took down tonight. I felt terrible taking it down, but part of the paranormal plot and non canon characters fit so slick in a new plot idea, like my subconscious planned it.

Funny, those fan fics got thousands of hits/reads, far more than anything I've written for publication.

I've spent the past two weeks recording new ideas, something I haven't done in a while. Mostly these past months I've been editing several stories. Needed a break!

You know what? I don't hate my fan fics. Yes, I found errors--but the stories still evoked emotions, took me back to that short fan fic 'golden time' when the fan fic community was so vibrant for me.

The rest of my fan fics will stay in the archives. They were so closely tied to the show/canon and characters, the stories wouldn't make sense out of that context. I mean, you had to know how the character of Giles had changed to 'get' one of the stories--they were a form of commentary on the show...how I thought the show and characters should go.

Lazy Sunday Writing Thoughts

I've been thinking about shifter stories. My best selling story is a shifter story(Del Fantasma: Tiger Juice). The fan mails I've received have been about the shifter--more shifters wanted. So I've been thinking about ideas, waiting for something to churn up from the muse.

Most of my writing lately is in series that are familiar to me, so planning this shifter story is different. All new stuff. I know who my shifter is, I know she turns into mythological creature, and I know she is being exploited. When am I going to write it? I don't know. Setting--contemporary? Space western? I don't know yt It isn't on my schedule, but the schedules I make for myself are flexible--until I have a contract.

My muse has been churning out new ideas lately, so I've been making new files with three or four pages of a scene or back story--enough to capture the  idea.

I gave up on my contemporary for Harlequin idea. It morphed into a futuristic Harlequin Presents--something like  The Sustainable Vertical City CEO's Nanny's Secret Passion. Maybe not a marketable story.

The tangled web of series writing

As I work on my Sons of the Protectorate series I'm seeing things evolve quite  bit out of sequence and now I've added a sixth book, not the story one of the actual sons, but a secondary character.

A few weeks ago I had an idea, a visual, of a cybot waking deep in a crevice on an asteroid. She regains much of her memory. She knows they were on a military mission to take a base on the asteroid, she knows she's a cybot and she also knows that she was once a dancer. And she is stuck on this asteroids, left for dead. Some of the deactivated cybots still have energy packs that she can use when her's runs out. Later, a salvage ship arrives--out hero-- to harvest equipment and weapons, and rescues her.

In Galactic Game, one of my secondary characters is a pilot. Originally he was an older man, but I saw a picture of a cute blonde young man--think Ricky Martin with long blond hair worn in a side part-- and realized if HE was my pilot, then he could be the hero in the asteroid story. And he already has a ship!

Then in my final book of the series, Illegal Lifeforms (unless I think of a better title), everyone expected my Puregen heroine to be the dancer she was created to be--but her heart is set on law enforcement, specifically the Bureau of Illegal Lifeforms, which finds and closes down Puregen Labs that create human/animal forms which are popular as pets among the very wealthy. 

Del Fantasma : Tiger Juice is on its way!

I got my cover!

Writing-- Career or Hobby?

My writing is a source of both delight and frustration to me.

I think my biggest issues are time and indecision.

Time is obviously a problem since I'm a full time working mom. There are times where my priorities cannot be writing. Also my writing physical set up is not the best. In a small house with a family of five it is hard to find peace and quiet! Lucky for my writing I spent many years teaching preschool and am great at tuning out ordinary conversations.

But indecision is the bigger problem. What should i work on now? Who should I sub to? Should I invest more work into this publisher, or that publisher, or try to get in with Stupendous EPublisher? Should I go for that series? Would anyone buy that high fantasy with not really humans?

I think too much. Some things I just can't know. Sometimes I wait for a green light that will never come.

I do know there is no sure thing or magic formula to writing success. Yet still I hesitate!

I think this issue is what I really need to get to work on!

I have two new publishers and know I need to quit being so scattered! It is time to have a plan.

I do have another vampire story set in the same 'vampire world' as RBAV coming from Wild Rose.

And I have a fantasy novel in edits, plus two novella length futuristics in a series, and another futuristic which needs some rewriting, and a paranormal shifter for an established line... In other words, there are several WIPs in my files that could be ready for submission this summer.

And I'm fluttering around looking for a place to land.

This is why I am so good at deadlines. They help me focus. Without them, I flutter.