I've been able to publicly share the cover for my debut novel, Beneath the Surface, and suddenly this whole thing seems so incredibly real. The book was accepted for publication by NineStar Press in May and then came a time of waiting to see what would happen and how the whole process would work. Thankfully I've been blessed with a very patient editor and an equally patient publisher who have been nothing but communicative and forthright with all of my queries. 

As someone who has seen Mean Girls far too many times, I need to confess to you all that "I just have a lot of feelings."  Being a writer has been an ambition of mine since the age of seven, so there's some extensive excitement at play here. But then there's also a heck of a lot of fear. What if everyone hates it? What if I accidentally wrote something that offends a group of people? What if people think I'm a complete hack? Printing this book that took me a year and half to write is seriously exposing. It's as though I've replaced my skin with glass and you'll all be able to see right into me, there's nothing that can be hidden away. 

That said, I still can't wait to see this brain-child of mine out there in the world. I've already warned my partner that I'll probably be unbearable the closer we get to release date because I'm likely to revert to a five-year-old-at-Christmas style of insanity.  

Now. Time to get to work on Book II. 

It's been an amazing few months! I must say I feel incredibly blessed right now, and I plan to enjoy the euphoria for a moment. I've found a wonderful home for my recently completed writing projects, with NineStar Press having accepted three pieces of work, all with F/F story lines. For anyone who may be interested, here is where my writing projects currently sit:
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FINDING AURORA
This is a 20,000 word fantasy novella. It will be published in the anthology Once Upon a Rainbow 2 in mid-January, 2018.  I really enjoyed writing this one! It's an appropriation of Sleeping Beauty, following the attempts of Talia (a caster of magic) and Amir (the prince of Grimvein) as they try to rescue Aurora from the curse that's trapped her and her entire village for almost a century. This is very much in the style of a classical fairy tale, but with a few differences - of course.

BENEATH THE SURFACE (The Outsider Project, Book I)

This is my debut novel, a sci-fi story of about 87,000 words. It is also the first of the projects to have been completed, and then accepted by my publisher. It'll be released in late January, 2018, in both electronic format and print. This book asserted itself in my head and absolutely had to be written. I'm so in love with this particular cast of characters, and I hope some of you like them as well.
RIDING THE TRACK 
This is a contemporary western romance novella of about 30,000 words and it will be published as an e-book at the end of April, 2018. It has a completely different tone to the other two, with some steamy scenes that my partner was shocked I even managed to write. I actually wrote it as a bit of a 'writing hang over' cure. When I finished Beneath the Surface, a novel I put all of my love, energy and creativity into, I felt a little bit lost. I didn't have the energy to start Book II just yet, but I wanted to keep writing, to keep learning.
So I chose to write something completely unlike what I normally watch, read, and write. A straight out romance? Not quite my thing. Cowgirls? Again, not really my thing.  Writing a story about a (female, bisexual) American tourist who comes across a pretty seductive Australian cowgirl worked out much better than I anticipated. I challenged myself to write in first person, to write romance scenes, and to leave out the aliens and mages.
 
TO BE WRITTEN...

​The Outsider Project, Book II

It'll be my second attempt at a full length novel, and there's a lot of work I need to do with it.  I'm very much a planner. Book I had about 12,000 words of plot overview before I started writing the chapters. I'm still in the planning stages of this one, as I need to re-read Book I and make sure I haven't missed any important details. My goal is to finish planning by the end of August and have started writing.  Life is so busy (full time work, three kids etc), but I'll do my best to have this one done within six months of Book I going to print. That way, it shouldn't be too much more than a year or so that Book II would come out (provided it is accepted for publication).

No title - Sci Fi Novella

I'm not sure if this will need to wait until after Book II, or if I'll work on it at the same time. I had so much fun writing Finding Aurora that I have an idea for another appropriation. It'll be a gritty, futuristic story set on a space station.