The 15th Is At The End Of The Week!?!?

Found out the 15th is at the end of the week, and it blew my mind. March will be halfway over next week. Like damn, and I'll be going to Pittsburgh on the 16th to watch PWHL Toronto take on Montreal on the 17th. Hopefully their streak will be alive and well by then. Because of that, I have this month's newsletter rearing to go, and if you haven't signed up for it, well, you will get your chance to at the end of this post.

If you haven't been lurking around on my Mastodon profile or Facebook page, the first two chapters of Outside The Game are available to read until the end of this month. So, if you want to see how E.J.'s story starts, head on over to Bookfunnel and read those first two chapters. I also encourage you to sign up for my newsletter while you're there because release date and pre-order information will be announced to newsletter subscribers first and everyone else a week later. Maybe later. I sometimes forget to do things.

I'm 5 yards and goal to finishing my second round of edits. As soon as chapter fourteen is edited, I'm going to hit the ground running in finding an editor. There are a couple of editors I had my eye on, but I have completely forgotten their information. I'll put an APB out on Mastodon and also ask around. Being in this post-Twitter life is such a mess because I have to rebuild most of my connections. Just like I'm rebuilding my reader base. I know there are some people who are still aware of me as an author, but I also haven't published anything in six years. So, like a newborn foal, finding their legs, I'm going to have to put in the work and rebuild my little publishing fiefdom.

But fear not dear blog reader, I've got some things planned to get this ship back on course, and to be quiet honest, most of it is centered around just putting out the books, short stories, and serials that I have been working on these last few years.

Next up on the docket after Outside The Game is done will be Grisly Politics, which is book two of the Detective Miller series. In between, I'm going to type up a quick short story, which will be an exclusive for my newsletter peeps. If they want more of it, then it's going to become my first Ko-Fi exclusive. So, if you want to get your hands on this newsletter subscriber exclusive, then make sure you sign-up for my newsletter.

Speaking of my Ko-Fi, last month, I set up a goal on there to get a copy editor for Outside The Game to make sure it's as good as can be for publishing. If you want to help out with that, just go to my page, and donate. Easy peasy, and you don't have to sign up for anything I don't believe.

Lastly, I'm going to go on a quick Bookfunnel rant because I love the site. I do, but using it for self-promotion has left me a bit jaded. They have a features where you can sign up to join a group promo to giveaway books or do a book swap with another author, and I get a bit annoyed with it because I don't find categories that my books fit in, and when I create my own promos they get little attention, which I will take the blame for because I don't promote them as well as I can, however, at the same time they are listed on the public Bookfunnel promo page. I'm tempted to switch over to StoryOrign, and see if I have any luck there. I need to mull it over a bit more.

Oh! Before I end this if you're interested in becoming a beta reader for me, please fill out this form on my website, and I'll get in contact with you about being one.

 That's it for today's post. Sign up for my newsletter here. Contribute to my Ko-Fi goal here, and learn about pterodactylus here. Full disclosure, not my favorite dinosaur. That would be the stegosaurus, which you can learn about here.

March's newsletter will be out on the 15th folx! Remember to review and rate the books you read, especially those written by indie and self-published authors.

Until next time...

-DJ Small

August is almost over...whoops.

The month has completely passed me by and I feel like September will do the same. Oh, boy. Thought I'd make a quick blog post before the month finishes out.

Tomorrow, August 26th, Murderous Profession will be out on Kindle and Smashwords! I'm still working on the paperback formatting, but that should be out in a week or two. Between life and work, time just got away from me. Lame excuse, but it's surprising how busy I was in August. But anywhoo, grab yourself a copy of the book and tell me what you think about it. I found it to be a quick read and entertaining, as did my editor. Of all the characters, I have a fondness for Dax and Billy. I had a fun time writing them.

I know some of you are waiting with bated breath for the next Avery Lawson book, and I am actively editing it as we speak, however, I'm taking the tortoise route with it--slowly but surely. I don't want to miss something that should have been mentioned in this one, or I mention something that shouldn't be in this book and is actually meant for the next one. Writing this story is funny because I'm working off of the original manuscript I had finished in 2015, but I'm basically re-writing the story and making it more involved as well as making sure it makes some kind of sense. I know we're working with supernatural creatures and magic and all, but I feel like there needs to be some logic to it.

With all this being said, I don't think I'm going to make the December deadline, but I'm confident in believing that the story should be set for a January release. Everything else has been taken care of. I made the cover a couple of months ago, finally figured out a title, and wrote up a blurb. All that's missing is the inside stuff.

As I'm editing the second book, I will be making my outline for the next book in the series with the hope that it will result in the third book coming out in the fall or winter of 2020. We shall see. I'm sort of getting to a place where I can balance multiple projects and put out two books a year. I failed this year because Murderous Profession was an unplanned project that came to me suddenly and took root, and I couldn't let it go.

I'm sure you all have this question floating around in your heads, which is: How long is the Pureblood series? Six or seven books, depending on where the story takes me. Material from the original manuscript is the blueprint for these first three books. After that, I have to look at my notes, but I can come up with fresh material for the series since I won't be working off of that source material anymore. The rest of the series will probably go pretty quick because this isn't supposed to be long and drawn out story. When I was young and foolish, and by young I mean like four or five years ago, I thought I could have the story told in three books, but the world of publishing works differently than the world of fanfiction.

This is where my head is at on the Last Pureblood series. I hope to have to some teaser chapters up on my Patreon in October.

Speaking of my Patreon, Fate Unseen, also known as the 3rd Avery Lawson book, will be the first book where I will start releasing four teaser chapters, but that 4th teaser will only be accessible by subscribers. Non-subscribers will have unlimited access to the first three like always. You can subscribe as much as a dollar on my Patreon.

This brings me to my next point, granted I'm busy with Fate Unseen, but I will be rolling out my first serial The Adventures of Swift in January on my Patreon. The first episode will be accessible by non-subscribers, and the ones after that will be accessible by subscribers. I'm counting this as my second project for 2020 since I plan to focus on book 3 of the Pureblood series.

The Adventures of Swift is a superhero serial with some fantasy elements. It follows Isabella Delgado, who is the vigilante known as Swift who protects the city of Whitevale from crime. When a jewel thief comes to the city, with some high-powered gadgets, Swift's life gets more interesting, and so does Isabella's, but her interesting comes in the form of the stunningly attractive Ainsley Breckenridge. How Isabella will balance Whitevale's newest villain and a new love interest who happens to be her boss's boss's ex-wife will be something you will have to find out in January. I highly recommend subscribing.

This blog post actually got away from me, and I'm glad it did. I hope we're all stoked for everything I have planned because I know I am. Either way I hope everyone enjoys getting back into the swing of things, may it be going back to school or getting the kids ready to go back. Don't forget to take some time out for a good book, and don't forget to leave a review for it.

Until next time....

-DJ Small