My life seems to always be an all or nothing kind of thing. Last year I was struggling to write my own books as I was working on promoting the two I already have published, writing short stories for anthologies by award-winning, best-selling westen author Scott Harris, and teaching more English as a second language classes.
I never seemed to find the time or inspiration to get past the first few pages of the third book in my Into the West Saga Serial. I felt like I was spinning my wheels most of the year. I still struggle to get a set writing schedule. I make a plan, something new pops up, and the plan gets dropped.
This year has already gotten off to a better start. I'm about halfway through writing book three, Into the West: Sharon Springs (thank God!), I've written a short article for another anthology with Scott Harris, and I'm about to be interviewed for the third time in three months. Links to the first two interviews are on my News page.
This time the interview will be a podcast with Wichita Life ICT. Watch their page for the interview to be posted or better yet, subscribe to their podcasts and never miss an interview. If you do miss their post, be sure to check out my webpage, Facebook, or Twitter for an announcement and link when the interview is live.
I was interviewed twice in November but they were not recorded. They were for blogs and the interviews were conducted through emails. That was a bit easier to manage. The fact that this next interview will be recorded live presents a bit of a problem for me.
I should mention, I have been keeping a secret. Not really well, but I'm sure there are still some people who have not caught on yet. However, when I do the podcast tomorrow, I will not be able to keep the secret anymore. It will be nice to not have to worry about slipping up and accidently giving it away. It's been very difficult not to give it away before now. The pressure will finally be off if I should slip up in the future.
I recently had my books added to the library here in town and they even set up a display table for a few weeks. I hope to take in some contest flyers and have a special prize give away here locally to go along with the one on my website for the release of Into the West: Sharon Springs.
I've decided to add a box a chocolates to the gift bag and make it a Valentine's Day Book Lovers Grab Bag Giveaway. I will get the contest set up this weekend! No excuses! There will be a video advertising it online when it's ready to begin. Keep watching here or on my Facebook and Twitter pages for more information.
I think that is more than enough for now. I need to go finish my edits for chapter two and get it back to my Beta Readers for another once over before it goes to my editor, Greg Wood. My goal is to have this written by the end of the month and ready for release for Valentine's Day. I want to have a free book giveaway on Amazon for my ebook version of Into the West: A New Home, the Special Edition which includes books one and two to help promote the release of book three. I plan to set up a presale before the release date for Into the West: Sharon Springs. But all of that is for another day.
Thank you for following along with my crazy life. If you check out the podcast, you will realize just how crazy it really is behind the scenes.
Stephen