Whispers of a secret project

So, secret project? Yes, you heard right! I have an entire writing schedule planned out, but sometimes I am hit with certain ideas that I have to, have to, HAVE TO work on. So, when Runaway Mortal is released in April, I will start working on this secret project.

What is this secret project about? 
All I can say is that it will be a New Adult Contemporary Romance novel about a girl named Jessica or Genevieve or Gwendolyn who meets a guy at a bar and things don't exactly go as expected. It will be a fun read, I promise!

Does this "secret project" have a title?
It's working title is I Just Met You. That could change or it could stay the same.

Why are you being so vague about it?
Because I won't start working on it until next year and that's still a long way away. Maybe I'll start writing and realise that something's not working. I promise I will talk more about it in the new year.

If anyone has any comments, suggestions, questions or answers, send me an email!

<3

An interview, a giveaway & upcoming releases

Hey everyone! I have a couple of links for you, some information about my blog tour and my upcoming releases.

Let me start off with the links. The first link will direct you to an interview that I did over at the wonderful, awesome Samantha Durante's blog. If you haven't heard of Samantha, she is also a debut author and wrote the novel, Stitch. Ya know, the one with the gorgeously intriguing cover? Here is a link to that interview.

This next link is about a giveaway over at Fire Star Books. Ashley is celebrating her one year blogoversary and will be holding a massive giveaway to celebrate. Congratulations on your milestone, Ashley! You have two weeks to enter to win an e-copy of Impossible, so don't miss out! Check that one out here.

My blog tour starts tomorrow! I am incredibly excited for this! Arianne from Romantic Maidens Book Tours has been helping me organise this since early October, and I'm so thankful for everything she has done to put this together. The blog tour runs from November 26th - December 16th, so don't forget to visit, comment, and enter in the tour-wide giveaway! I will be linking to each post every day on my Facebook and Twitter, and will post a weekly round-up of the tour every week right here on my blog.

As you know, I have two releases in early 2013: Runaway Mortal, and Falling for Hadie. I have decided to literally switch the release dates around. What does that mean? Well, it means that Falling for Hadie has a release date of February, 2013, and Runaway Mortal has a release date of April, 2013. I am so sorry for those of you who were looking forward to Runaway Mortal, but the readers who wanted Falling for Hadie released earlier won me over.

I have some news about my super secret writing project, so check back in a few days to find out more!

Talk soon! <3

I'm thankful for...

Even though we don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Australia, I still wanted to do a Thanksgiving related post because I am so thankful to everyone for everything that they have done, and continue to do, for me.

I am so thankful to my critique partners, Erica and Michelle for all the help and advice they have given me for my debut novel. They continue to support me and my book, and all the future projects I have coming up. I am so lucky to know them and have them in my lives.

I am thankful for my husband and my parents for always being there for me. When you have a family like them, who love and support you unconditionally, it's hard not to succeed in life because they make even a failure seem like a success. I am also thankful for my furry babies (and the scaly one too) for keeping me company in what is a pretty solitary job.

Most of all, I am thankful to my readers who have made me laugh, made me cry, sent me the loveliest messages ever, and told me that they enjoyed my book. Because of you guys, my little book is currently sitting at #157 on the Amazon Kindle Best Seller List. Whatever happens from here, whether IMPOSSIBLE moves up in rankings or goes down, I am so thankful that your support has brought me this far. I will never be able to thank you enough. <3

Finally, I am thankful for this Captain America bobblehead my best friend got me when he went to a games convention and I couldn't go because, as usual, I was sick. So, I am thankful to have amazing, weird, crazy friends like that in my life who buy me Captain America bobbleheads.

Let's face it, we all need a little more Chris Evans in our lives.

Cover Reveal: Runaway Mortal

I am so excited to share the cover of my next release, Runaway Mortal!!! It was designed by the lovely, amazing, awesome Eden at Eden Crane Design. She is seriously the best and she did a wonderful job with the cover.

I was amazed by how perfect the model on the cover was and kept gushing about it. And you know what Eden told me? Her mum had picked out the model...Eden's mum is Julia Crane! Yes, THE Julia Crane! I had the biggest fan girl moment ever!

Anyway, I'm totally freaking out over the cover! I hope you like it!

Seventeen-year-old Katerina Lyrille is one of several mortals given the privilege to attend Esteré Academy alongside powerful angels and demons. Big stress on the “privileged”, because most of the supernatural beings look down in disgust at mortals like Katerina and want nothing to do with them.

When the Headmistress of the school—a powerful angel—is found dead, Katerina is accused of her murder. Desperate to prove her innocence, Katerina runs away to seek the help of a seer who can tell her the true killer’s name, but the information comes at a price. Katerina must find an all-powerful, mythical Triad object for the seer, and in order to do so she must return to the very place she ran away from: Esteré Academy.

Now, back at school, Katerina not only has to keep her promise to the seer and find the mysterious object, she also has to deal with the arrogant, yet sexy, supernatural agent hired to guard her until her trial for the Headmistress’s murder.

The closer Katerina gets to finding the answers, the more danger she puts herself in because someone is out to stop her at all costs.

Even if it means her death.

Isn't it beautiful?

I really can't thank Eden enough for the fantastic job she did. I am so, so, so happy with the cover!

The blurb might change before the release, so I will update it if/when I make changes to it.

Also, if you'd like to add Runaway Mortal on Goodreads, you can do so here.

Have a great day!

Let's talk Ashton and "mean girls"

The first person to ever raise concerns about Ashton was my husband after reading a few chapters of my first draft.

"I like Luca, but I don't like Ashton," he said, "She's pretty mean."
"Good," I responded. "That's how I want her to be."

While writing Impossible, Ashton did a few things that made me wonder if I wanted her to do them at all. But I kept the scenes because they showed what kind of a person she'd become. I made Ashton that way because I know from first hand experience how mean some girls can be.

As a teenager I have experienced mean girls and even as an adult I have experienced mean girls. In my head, I made a collage of mean girl behavior and I gave them all to Ashton. Some girls do know what they're doing, but recently I've had to deal with a mean girl who I am quite certain doesn't think she is a mean girl at all.

This puzzled me. How could someone not know that what they're doing is considered "bullying" or "mean"?

With Ashton, I tried to piece it all together. I wanted to take a look into WHY someone is like that and what causes them to be such a horrible person. Someone might not consider their behavior as bullying because they feel justified in what they are saying or they have gotten away with it for so long that they think their behavior is normal.

A lot of it does come from insecurities and the need to put someone down to make yourself feel better. I think once you fall into this habit it's a hard one to break, but Ashton does break out of it because Luca believes in her. And that's what the story is about. How Ashton overcomes her demons.

The great thing is that Ashton is a character with flaws; she isn't perfect. What I love is that readers can make up their own minds about her. Some readers will hate her or be annoyed with her and not be able to forgive her actions, and other readers will be like, "She's a teenager and she made a mistake, and she changed in the end."

Either way, her behavior and actions can be discussed and debated, which is a wonderful thing. And I totally heart my readers for it! You guys are amazing! <3

My expectations for Impossible

When I decided to publish Impossible, it was sometime in August. I'd written over 20,000 words in two weeks and I decided that I wanted to publish it in October because October sounded like a good month.

My reasons for wanting to publish Impossible were simple. I thought it was a good story and I wanted other people to read it and enjoy it. I didn't have any other expectations. I wasn't concerned about sales or rankings. I just wanted readers to be taken on a journey, enjoy it and have fun. That's the only thing I've ever wanted as a reader: to be taken on a journey and enjoy it, whether the story has ups or downs.

When I first published Impossible, it debuted around #24,000 on the Amazon Kindle Bestseller List and shot up to #14,000 in a few days. What can I say? I have great friends! It quickly went down in rank and kept hovering between #19,000 and #40,000 for the rest of the week. I was pretty happy with that. I was making a couple of sales every day and it was great knowing that people were buying my book. In Week one I sold 40 copies of Impossible.

Week two began and nothing remarkable happened until November 2nd. I distinctly remember my book being ranked #19,000 in the morning. Around 1 pm, my mum asked me to check the ranking, so I did. My book was ranked #9,467. At first, I thought my eyes were deceiving me, so I refreshed the page.

"What's wrong?" my mum asked from beside me.

"Um." I think I stopped breathing at this point. "My book broke into the Top 10,000 on Amazon, but I think it's a mistake."

*My mum looks over my shoulder* "How can it be a mistake? Check again."

So I refreshed the page again and the number stayed the same. I really felt like I'd accomplished something at that stage and rang up my husband at work and gushed. Then I gushed to one of my friends and we both smiled and thought it was cool. All day my book stayed around the #9,000 mark.

Around 9 pm it had reached #7,835. I actually gasped. There was no way this could be real. How could MY book be ranked that high?

A week later, Impossible is floating around the #1400 mark.

This post isn't to brag; it's just a post of disbelief, as if putting it up will make it seem more real. I know I haven't broken any records or achieved anything amazing, but I want to make my self-publishing journey as transparent as possible. I won't talk about money, but I will mention sales. Currently, I sell between 40-60 books a day. In the last 8 days I have sold 300 books. I don't expect this to last. I don't expect anything, actually. I went into this with no expectations at all, so anything and everything is an achievement for me.

What I will say is that I was happy the day I published Impossible. That's what I've always wanted. To have a published book and to publish a book that readers could enjoy. All this rankings stuff is you guys; the readers. Thank you for spreading the word. Thank you for reading. Thank you for enjoying Impossible.

I couldn't thank you enough if I tried.

What comes next

So, now that Impossible is out, I bet you're wondering what comes next. Actually, being the control freak that I am, I have my writing schedule planned out until 2014. Yep! Two years in advance! Crazy, right?

A lot of people have been asking me about the sequel to Impossible and I am more than happy to reveal a few details about Falling for Hadie. First, Falling for Hadie is NOT a direct sequel to Impossible. Yes, it will be set in the same world and you will get glimpses of characters that you met in Impossible, but Falling for Hadie can be read as a stand-alone even if you haven't read Impossible.

As much as I love Ashton and Luca, the second book will not be about them. Falling for Hadie revolves around two new characters, Hadie Swinton (who we met in Impossible) and Lincoln Bracks (who I promise you will love just as much as Luca). Now, I didn't say you wouldn't see Luca and Ashton at all, just that the book isn't about them.

Next question: when will the second book be out? I'm currently writing it for NaNo and hope to have it done by the end of November. However, it won't be out until March/April 2013. I know! I'm sorry you have to wait so long, but there's something just as nice coming up soon.

Which brings me to my second release, Runaway Mortal. Runaway Mortal has been in the works for a VERY long time. Since late February 2011!

Runaway Mortal is a Young Adult Paranormal novel and is the first in a trilogy. The first book will be released in January/February 2013. I promise I will have a more specific release date when I get closer to a finished product. And a summary. There will be a summary too.

I hope that clears up some of your questions. Feel free to send me an email, or a message on Facebook or Twitter if you have any questions. :)

P.S. Thank you so much to everyone who bought a copy of Impossible, added it on Goodreads or told a friend!! And many thanks to the bloggers who have emailed me, messaged me and supported me! I am overwhelmed by the interest in it!