She Writes With Love

So yesterday marked the final day of NaNoWriMo 2012, the insane novel writing competition that I was coerced into participating in this year. Okay, it was a completely voluntary act of torture on my part, but I was still somehow talked into doing it and proceeded to spend the entire month of November scrambling to write as much as I could each and every day. I tossed aside any and all other projects, I gave up my evening workouts to spend that time writing instead, and my fingers hate me for making them type so much. My eyes are even sore from staring at the computer screen, and I swear my left eye looks redder than normal.

Unfortunately, there were hiccups along the way. One week I got sick, another week was Thanksgiving, and countless days were wasted near the beginning of the month when I was just “not in the mood” to write. Though by the time the last week and a half was upon me, that excuse died a swift and tragic death. I had no time left for excuses, and still 20,000 words to go before that golden finish line. It was so down to the wire that in the last two days of the competition (technically the last three days, as I finished one day early) I wrote 10,000 words. I’m shocked it happened, and am almost scared to read over whatever it is I wrote for fear that it’s going to be mindless dribble (haha).

Needless to say, the sequel to my family saga novel When Empires Fall is now 50,000 words further along (resting at about 73k right now) and it looks like I may met my January 1st deadline of completing the novel in its entirety! So thank you NaNo, for giving me the push I needed to at least get something down on paper for my novel, even if the sentences aren’t perfect and the grammar isn’t all squared away. You can’t fix what you haven’t yet written, so at least I’ve gotten somewhere!

And a big special thanks to all my fellow author friends who participated and cheered me on every day! Your encouragement (plus a healthy dose of competitiveness) helped me reach this insane milestone.

Alright, so enough about NaNoWriMo…I have a fantabulous announcement to make!

“Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.” -Forrest Gump

On January 1st, 2013, I will be releasing a special edition of The Dryad Quartet. It will be a compilation of the entire series in one gigantic book (and when I say gigantic, I mean gigantic…this thing is going to be 8 1/2″ x 11″, a big book!) and will also feature beautiful illustrations of special scenes within the books. And, my favorite part, there will be an Epilogue scene included in this edition (extra special thanks to Audra for the idea!), which I can’t wait to share with all of you!

The special edition will be available in both print and eBook format, PLUS it is being designed by the AMAZING crew at Blue Harvest Creative, who are my official book designers. Just wait till you see what magic they have cooked up for this book! And you will adore the illustrations, drawn by my good friend (and one of the first readers of The Dryad Quartet), artist Alli Kappen!

Here’s a sneak peek of the cover! I can’t wait for January 1st so I can share this with all of you!