Month: November 2018

How Was Your Holiday?

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Did everyone have a good Thanksgiving? 😊

I hope so. I only messed up one dish (I think) but who says too many marshmallows in sweet potatoes is a bad thing? (not me)

Batman and I drove south to see my family and we ended up staying in this really fancy hotel that I found on hotels.com because we are third-class passengers who sneak up to first class any chance we get. Seriously, this place came with a bathrobe, impressive square footage, and a rounded window view out to the commercial lobby across and below:

Right? Like, how did they let us in? Oh, because I paid them. That’s right. I found a deal and provided legal tender. They had to let us in. 🙂

Seeing my parents/stepparents and sister was wonderful, but we were too busy eating and drinking to take pictures. So, other than the one above, it’s all pictures of Appa on my phone (like always). I wish I had more to say, but we already talked about Crimes of Grindelwald, and my release the other week. I feel like you’re pretty much caught up on my wild and crazy life over here.

What about you? How was your holiday? What’s new with you?

Don’t forgot to hop over to my Patreon page for in-depth posts on what I’m doing writing-wise 😊

I’m Going To Have To Read My Book Over Again

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Now that BTY’s been released into the wild, the next thing I should do is suuupppeeerr market it, right? Meh. I’m going to do another stupid thing and jump into the fifth and final book of my Arizal Wars series because I *literally* cannot wait to get back to it. 🙂 🙂

My two-year break with the BTT Series was awesome, and just the refresher that I needed, but it’s time I return to my first baby. My love. My girl, Fallon, and her present & past and what it ultimately means for the future of her family and friends. YES. It’s going to go down, baby. All the battle scenes and prophecy reveals and character deaths—Er, I mean, uh…nobody dies….

Thing is, I’ve forgotten half of what I wrote. Mind you, I think the last one (Crusade Across Worlds, book 4) was published in 2016, which means I was probably writing it the year before, so some things are a little…muddy. I remember…the gist of what happens, but after flipping through the thing and being like, “who the hell are you again?” I realize I’m going to have to read my whole book over.

Totally fine. I like what I write. I like what I write so much that I wrote it in the first place, so hopefully, I won’t fall asleep during this read-through. And for those of you who’ve read Arizal Wars, I think you’ll be excited. Just glancing at some of the scenes in Crusade Across Worlds, I felt the electric zing of excitement, and was like, “oh yeah! That’s right! Shit’s totally going down in the next book.”

GUYS.

This may pull me out of my you’re-not-going-anywhere-funk because it’ll be something new to focus on. I’m still only agreeing to the writing aspect of this self-publishing thing, but that’s the most important part to focus on. No product, no marketing, right? And besides, I was put here to tell stories, not to tell you about them. And if I was, well…we all can’t be superstars all the time, can we?

Happy Thanksgiving! 🙂 Batman and I will be making the rounds down to my hometown neck of the woods. And…there might be some black Friday shopping involved. Maybe. What about you? What are you doing for the holiday? Whatever your plans are, I hope you spend the day being happy 🙂

P.S. I will still market the Better Than This Series. I owe it to myself and my characters, so I’ll figure it out.

P.P.S. Crimes of Grindelwald. Does. Not. Disappoint! Yeah, I pretty much fangirled the entire time, clapping and hooting and hollering at the intro music. Hogwarts alum got to represent!

Today Is The Day: Better Than You Release

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Well, here we go. The day we’ve all been waiting for. Today is the day that Crimes of Grindelwald comes out 😊

And also the last book in my series: Better Than You

I can’t believe today is here. I can’t believe I didn’t quit halfway in when I realized publishing three books three months apart was the opposite of smart. But hey, lesson learned, right? And I feel like I learned a lot this go-round. 😊

I most likely won’t publish a book next year, unless it’s late next year, because I haven’t started writing the fifth Arizal Wars yet, and those books are bigger and fatter than this skinny little series. And that one will be the last in the series which means even more needs to go into it. But that’s next year and today is all about Crimes of Grindelwald. And Better Than You. And it being a glorious Friday.

Have a great weekend! And if anyone (randomly) asks for a book recommendation, you should totally toss out the third book of a series they’ve never heard of:

And what’s it about again? Well…

Alex Wolf should be on top of the world. He’s engaged to a popular Supermodel, about to head off on a world tour with his band, Better Than Decent, and he makes more money than he can spend—but he can’t stop thinking about the girl who got away. It’s been eight years, and Autumn Sommers still haunts him. He’d give anything to see her again, but with no contact after so long, it feels hopeless—until Alex is surprised with some news.

Autumn Sommers wishes she could forget the past. She hasn’t seen Alex Wolf since high school, but she hears his voice all too often. It’s hard ignoring the lead singer of Better Than Decent, but being a waitress in a gossipy small-town diner doesn’t help. Autumn knows that what happened between her and her old boyfriend ended a long time ago—until he walks into her restaurant.

It doesn’t take Alex long to break off his engagement, but once news of the split is leaked, a media frenzy erupts. Determined to clear Autumn’s name, Alex brings her to L.A., but things don’t go as smoothly as he’d hoped. Not used to the demands of a celebrity life, Autumn struggles to find her ground, especially alongside a former foe. With the world watching, she’s forced to face how she became the iconic A.M.S.—and if her relationship with Alex is going to last this time.

Buy it here 🙂

Even The Small Victories

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So….last week you guys were awesome with reminding me that everyone feels insecure and bleh at times, and it made me feel better. Honestly. So, thank you 😊

I’m still cruising through this fog, and probably will be for a while, but that’s fine. I think everyone has their own fog because life is life and not a utopia (sadly). But at the end of last week, something pretty cool happened, and since life can be shitty sometimes, I like to celebrate even the small victories:

I got updated covers!

If you remember reading last week’s post, I settled for purple font for BTY and that made me sad 🙁 But then, awesome Loni Townsend jumped in with an outline suggestion, and, ta-da! Now I can have yellow! Now the books can pop. And this is just in time for Better Than You’s release on Friday. And since that’s happening, I have (yet more) stuff to work on. So, I’m going to go do that. BUT, this Friday…CRIMES OF GRINDELWALD BABY.

…and Better Than You 😊

I’m Nervous About The Whole Thing, IWSG

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I’m kinda insecure this month.

And yeah, I’m also releasing my last book (as in a series. Not my last book ever. Let’s not get ridiculous), so that’s probably got something to do with it. But I’m not even scared of the release. I’ve announced it to practically no one and have maybe two or three people who are actually expecting/awaiting it, so it’s not like I expect any tidal wave of anything really. It’s just going to be another Friday and even more exciting—it’s the release of Crimes of Grindelwald 😊

So, I’m not nervous about chucking this story into the great internet void. I’m nervous about the whole thing. Insecure about the whole thing. I’ve been a Debbie Downer about myself lately, about my talent and progress. I told my sister (I ACTUALLY SAID THIS ALOUD) that I wasn’t certain I’d ever get anywhere with writing. It sounded horrible as I said it—especially because you can’t ever lose hope—but this very giant, logical part of my brain has been scoffing lately, saying, ‘Really, Caitlin? Still holding onto it? Still haven’t seen the signs?’ She’s a bitch, but after she makes her argument over and over, it’s hard not to take a serious listen.

I don’t know. I feel like my faith is dwindling, even though I’m doing better now than I ever have (which is saying something). Maybe it has to do with the season or full moon or because Mercury is in retrograde or whatever. Maybe it’s just a down season because everyone gets down from time to time—and doesn’t it normally circulate more around the holidays? Maybe that’s what this is. Pre-holidays blues. I hope so. I don’t want it to be the other thing. I don’t want the Grow-Up-All-Your-Dreams-Are-Dead-Sorrows. Those are a bitch.

Anyway, those are my insecurities this month! What about you?

Insecure Writer’s Support Group (IWSG) is a monthly blog hop for writers at all levels to share their fears and insecurities in a safe and encouraging place. Please drop by and say hi to Alex Cavanaugh who started this nifty concept in bringing us all together.