Cimwai's Bay, now available for download on Amazon

Look. At. This.

I've written a blog post. I know, it's been a while. Closing in on a year since I last posted. I never meant to stop blogging, I simply ran out of time.

Aside from having a active 20 month old, I've been working part-time from home, and I'm also an now an aerials instructor! Yes. As of May 2016, Brass Butterflies in north Waterloo, offers lessons in aerial silks and aerial hoop. I'll try to pen (type) a few posts about this new direction in my life in the coming weeks. If you have any burning questions about aerials you need to have answers to now, feel free to fire them my way.

The main purpose of this post is to announce my recently released novel, Cimwai's Bay for download on Amazon.

Ava is an average girl-next- door—albeit with a mane of emerald hair. Soon after her failed beauty treatment, which cannot be turned back to normal by dye, or remain trimmed at a shorter length for more than a minute, she is forced to flee her beloved home to escape the archaic anti-magic laws of her community. Ava doesn’t desire great magical power, even when she’s told she has the potential for it. Rather, she’d prefer to hide away in a quiet, clean kitchen where she can turn out perfect pot roasts and flaky apple pies. Half of her wish comes true when she finds work in the capital city of Korval as the housekeeper of the great magician, Jacob Baine. Sensing her magical skill, Jacob coaxes her, or perhaps more aptly infuriates her, along the path to taking control of her magical abilities. With all the stress of her new life, can Ava be blamed for falling for the mysterious Troy? Dashing and charming, treating her to cake and tea, she doesn’t realize the danger he represents. Only when it’s too late to escape Troy’s plans does she realize she’s the key to his plot to break the magical seal over Cimwai and bring himself to power.

This is a self-published title, and it's now available as an e-book. I've decided to use my pen name Peggy Fitz (a few readers once privy to my first attempt at a serial 'VoP', may recognize this moniker). Currently there is only one title featuring Ava Ravenscraft available, although a second is partially completed. It's my hope to release the full trilogy, but I can't tie down a timeline at the moment.

I have further self-publishing plans, which includes the release of my aerial romance, 'The Circus of Love,' before the end of the summer. Featured in this novel is Beth Witt, an aerials silks performer who finds herself caught up in a company scandal and romance. I still need to piece together a cover, but that shouldn't take too long.

Finally, I will be re-releasing my previously self-published title, The Cure, with a new cover at which time I will change it over to my pen name as well.

You'll hear more for me soon.

Ciao,

Andrea

What I'll be doing instead of NaNoWriMo

I'd like to think that I'll be spending the month of November in the exact opposite spirit of NaNoWriMo, but editing isn't really the opposite of writing. What would the opposite of writing be? Not writing? That's hardly any fun. At any rate, I made a firm decision last year that I wouldn't be doing NaNoWriMo again. This might be a strange declaration considering I am a writer, or a wannabe writer at least. I won't re-hash my reasons, but they can be found here, in my post after last year's writing marathon.

So, editing. I'm going to spend the month of November (and probably several more to come, really) editing manuscripts. I want to call this the opposite of NaNoWriMo, because the organizers encourage participants to write as much as possible and edit later (if ever...). I'm also going to send out a couple of manuscript submissions, both to the same publishing house. Putting my eggs into one basket? I don't think so. This is just the first step. I've decided to query Tor since they're one of the few large publishers I've seen that will accept unsolicited manuscripts. I'm sending both Nora (YA speculative fiction), and Ava (YA/adult cross-over fantasy) off.

Nora should be ready within a week (once my American stamps arrive--kindly supplied by a friend living in the US). I've tweaked a few more things in the opening chapter, but otherwise I'm to the point where every time I re-read it I just change a word here or there, but I'm no longer making substantial edits. Ava (who's story is entitled Cimwai's Bay) needs more TLC. I worked on her (which was also pretty much the last time I looked at it) three years ago. I submitted her to Luna, but well you can probably guess it wasn't accepted. After opening up the manuscript this week I'm actually pretty please with the writing. It needs cleaning up to be sure, but it's not the hot wreck I feared it might be. I should have the submission package for this manuscript ready by mid/late November.

Of course, my manuscripts are going to the Tor editors' slush piles and getting a response could take months. In the meantime I'll go through the rest of the Ava's story and then probably start taking a look at the second and third manuscripts of Nora's tale. They were both NaNoWriMo projects and need A LOT of work. I looked at The Cause (book 2) back in September, and in a matter of days hacked out almost 3,000 words from the first 3 chapters (want to ask me again why I dislike NaNoWriMo?).

And then? Well that will all depend on the response I get from Tor. Rejection will mean a return to querying. I've got a couple of Canadian YA Publishers I'd like to try with Nora. Ava, I'm not quite sure what I'll do. If I get a request for more? Well after the happy dance, I'll send more, then continue to wait. I probably shouldn't make any plans beyond that. One thing's for sure, even with an offer of publication I'll have to keep working. The average author doesn't get rich off their craft and I'd probably need to be checked into a mental health facility if I though I'd be any different. If I got two offers (now I'm really dreaming of heavenly pie)...I might be able/have to to keep my sanity reconsider the day-job thing.

That's all for now, I'll give an update of the writing situation at a later date.

Ciao,

Andrea