Cover Reveal AND Book Blurb AND interview!!!

Ah, it's been an excellent day!  I have much news to report!

First off, my Author Page hit 300 likes, and you know what that means:  COVER REVEAL!  But, not to stop there, I've improved upon my book blurb for Ghosts of Demons Past.  Will it change between now and publication?  Who knows, but I think the one I will post here sums up the story pretty well.  Thirdly, Belinda Frisch not only read and liked Words With Fiends, she's featured me on her blog, complete with a review AND interview.  Go check it out.  While you're there, take some time to nose around her blog.  She's got lots of great information for writers and links to her fantastic backlist of books.

Now, what you've all been waiting for.  The cover and blurb for my upcoming novel, Ghosts of Demons Past.

“Well, Mr. Gabriel.  What do you know about…demons?”

For most people, that’s a question that never comes up.  Medium Seth Gabriel isn’t most people and for him, it’s another normal day in an abnormal life.

 

It’s bad enough that his love life has seen better days but his personal problems are only the half of it.  Seth’s ghost hunting business, SG Cleaning Services hasn’t seen a client in weeks and he’s desperate for a paycheck.  Things look up when two potential clients seek him out.

Courtney Reeves hires Seth to investigate a paranormal disturbance in her home.  On the surface it’s a run of the mill cleaning job but when you deal with the dead for a living, there’s no such thing as routine.  The close of the case is the start of even bigger problems and Seth will find that, while there’s nothing to fear from the dead, the living are another story.

When the nervous and persistent Evan Gallagher enters his life, Seth sees the promise of a big payday.  There’s only one catch.  The wealthy lawyer thinks his wife is possessed by a demon.  Seth doesn’t believe in demons…not anymore, but the money is too good to turn down.  Is Evan crazy or is he one hundred percent sane?  As Seth digs deeper, he’ll ask the same question of himself.

For a guy who’s coasted through life on not much more than Greek takeout, tequila, and attitude, Seth’s going to have to dig deep to survive what will turn out to be a very bad week. 

Cover Reveal and Interviews coming soon!

Evening!  This post should be pretty short.  Underly Verbose, I guess you can say!  

So, first off, the cover for my urban fantasy/paranormal novel is completed and it's sexy as hell!  I mean, it looks like a real frigging book!  Roy Mauritsen, once again, proves to be a master of cover design.  Can't wait to share it with everyone.  And I'll do just that...once my Facebook author page gets 300 likes ;)  Yes, there's a catch.  You knew there would be!  So do me a flavor.  Head on over to my Author Page and click the 'like' button if you haven't already done so!  I'm telling you, the cover is FAN-FRIGGING-TASTIC!  

Second off, a friend and fellow writer, Gary Vanucci  will be posting an interview of yours truly on his site this Saturday!  Once I have the link I'll postify it here for your reading pleasure. 

Oh, almost forgot.  I have it on good authority that my very good friend and horror author Belinda Frisch is currently reading Words With Fiends and is not only liking it but is going to interview me on her blog when she's done!  I really enjoy her novels and it's flattering beyond belief that she's enjoying my first self-published effort enough to feature me on her site.  RAWK!  More on that as I know more.  

See?  Told you it would be short.  Only took a few precious moments of your life to read this!  Now, go click on those links and give the aforementioned people some love.  

Until next time, be good!  But not too good.

Anybody interested in a snippet?

Afternoon!  Yes, it's me again.  I have to say that lest someone think my evil doppelganger has hijacked my blog.  Then again, this could be the very doppelganger pulling a clever ruse.  You may never know.

So, we're nearing the time when my editor will get her hands on my upcoming novel.  To say that I'm excited in the extreme would be an understatement.  The book entering the final editing phase means it's just that much closer to being put out into the world.  My first full length book!  I can't friggin' wait.  I'm also awaiting a cover which is in the works as I type this.  Based on other covers my artist has done previously and the image we're running with, I think it's going to melt some faces...in the best way possible of course.

So, where's that snippet I promised up in that there subject heading?  Here it is!  It's very short so you may consider it a teaser.  If anything, it'll give you a glimpse into my writing style (or lack thereof..HA HA!).  Who knows. If enough people leave some replies to this post (HINT HINT!) I may just let a few more teasers trickle out as the book's release date (as yet to be determined based on how long the editing back and forth takes--I'll give a more solid date when I'm confident of when it'll be) nears!

So, without any further ado, here's the tail end of a scene from my Seth Gabriel novel:

“It’s been a hell of a day,” I said, offering her my hand. “Do a shot with me?”
Jamie took my hand and stood up next to me. She wiped the tears from her eyes, brushed the hair out of her face, and shook her head. At least she was smiling.
“Is tequila your answer to everything?” she said.
“It’s worked for me so far.”
“Really?”
I paused. “No. But hey, when life gives you lemons, may as well drink tequila.”
“Or Corona.”
“The stuff’s piss water.”
“What makes you an expert?”
“I’m a dude which makes me an expert on two subjects: alcohol and porn."

So, there it is.  As I said, just a little peek into the life of one Seth Gabriel during his maiden literary voyage.

Hope you dig it and that it leaves you clamoring (yes, I said clamoring) for more!

Until next time, stay frosty and be well.  Or be frosty and stay well.  Either works! 

Harper Voyager--I'm still alive??

Hello all of you out in the blogosphere!  Been a while.  I'm sure you've all missed me.  It's ok to admit it.  Your secret is safe with me!

I've probably mentioned it before (I'm too lazy to go back through my post archive and check) but my Urban Fantasy novel that should be coming out this spring has been around for a while.  I'd finished it sometime last spring and let it sit for a while before I pushed it on, I mean, asked some people if they'd like to read it.  It was in the hands of a few friends when I caught a blog post by the awesome Kim Harrison on FB.  She's published through Harper Collins and as it turned out, their e-book division, Harper Voyager, was having some type of 'unprecedented' open submission event.   Basically, it was open to anybody and everybody who's either self published or not published yet but felt they had something to put out into the world.  The guidelines were pretty simple:  you had until October 15 (I think?  Can't remember the exact date) to send your manuscript to them at which point, they'd have editors look at your product and ultimately decide if it was good enough for them to publish.  The deal wasn't a golden ticket.  There was no advance and it was only for ebooks, not physical copies.  But still.  Published?  Discovered?  Not having to pay for editorial services, cover art, formatting, AND having their advertising department behind your work?  It was worth a shot.

The friends who'd read it got it back to me about three weeks before the deadline with comments.  I decided that I was going to bust a gut to clean it up as best I could based on said comments and send it in.  What's the worst that could happen, right?  So, I fixed it and submitted it on October 13, 2012.

NOW, in the FAQs section, one of the questions was 'Will I hear back if my book has been rejected?'  Their answer was no.  "With the volume of submissions we expect, we simply will not have time to reply to every applicant.  Therefor, if you haven't heard from us in about four months, you can assume that your manuscript wasn't what we are looking for at this time."  Or something to that effect.

It's now roughly five months after-the-fact.  They haven't called me or emailed me saying that I blew the editors' knickers off and they would lie, cheat, steal, and kill to have me in their bullpen.  I sort of expected it.  The way they made it sound in the guidelines, it almost seemed as if they wanted super duper uber polished products that they could hit the ground running with.  Being I relied on a handful of comments from buddies and myself to fix any issues, I assumed a couple months ago that it wasn't for them.  That of course is why I sent it to more betas and went over the whole thing again, making it much more awesomer (I wish I could rewind time and send them the book as it is NOW back THEN.  But what can ya do?)

K.  We're all caught up!  

Anyway, last night I was talking to a buddy of mine who's an author.  She'd also submitted her self published book to HV during the open event.  Somehow, we got on the topic of it and she told me that they ARE sending out rejection letters.  I was like 'say whut?' and she was like 'like, really!'.  Turns out, despite what the guidelines said, they are sending out rejection letters and have been for a while now.  Something to the tune of 3200 or so have gone out.

Guess who hasn't gotten one yet.  ME!  Here I was thinking that no news is bad news, based on what I inferred from their website (it was pretty explicit, so I don't think I misunderstood) and it still may very well be.  I forget the exact figure but my buddy said the latest HV update said they still have about 700 that are in the process of 'not having been read yet or already read once and are to be  revisited'.  

So, what does this mean for me?  I'm sure they're going in the order the novels came in.  Not sure where I fall in there.  I got it in only a couple days before the deadline so it could just be a matter of mine being near the bottom of the stack.  If there were a lot of Johnny Come Latelies, it could be that they've already read it and are still considering it.  Either which way, it's nice to know that I WILL hear from them eventually, either way.  As of now, it's on the periphery of my consciousness, but I'm still moving forward with the betas, my cover guy, and the editor I hired to look at in about a week and a half from now.  My book WILL see the light of day not too far from now, that much I promise.  Whether it'll be under the HV imprint or self published on Amazon and Smashwords is another story.

In the meantime, I ain't banking on it but it's nice to know that out of those 3200 or so rejection letters, I ain't been one of them.   So, no news is just that: no news.  We'll see what we'll see ;)  

As an aside, I almost pulled an April Fool's joke on my author page in which I screamed from the rooftops that Harper Voyager liked my novel and brought me into the fold.  (I didn't do it because I thought it would be kind of mean to those still waiting or who've been rejected.  I'm not that much of a dick, although it probably would have been funny to poke some fun at myself when I revealed I was just spouting bullshit. ) 

Coincidence??  Most likely.  Self fulfilling prophecy?  A jinx on myself?  I don't believe in that shit, so I'll go with coincidence. 

Ok, you're blinded by my babble by now so I'll stop right here and now.  As always, thanks for dropping by!