News and stuff

Damn I'm good with blog post headlines...

A few things: First of all, I'm in the process of editing one freebie short story (will be out at some point through Dreamspinner Press, I'll keep you posted) and Finnshifters 2 that now has a brand new title!

Finnshifters 2 was supposed to be called, or rather its working title was, Moving On. Then another book named Moving On was released by DSP last month (I think) and I had to come up with a new name for FS2.

The new name is Tiglon by the Tail. I love the name and I wouldn't have come up with it without some help from the editorial department, so thanks! Also, the release date is in September, which day, I don't know yet.

Secondly, I'm going to start the process of having a new website done! It will be easier to update (thank you for everyone who hasn't emailed me about the lack of updates on my current site...) and it will look really good, I bet. Can't wait to see what AngstyG comes up with!

Thirdly, on August 4th, next Saturday, I'll be hosting a Facebook chat on Dreamspinner's Facebook page. Now, a bunch of stuff will be happening there, but there will be giveaways and even a paperback giveaway (signed and delivered to you wherever you live!) So keep an eye out!

Fourthly (this is getting silly...) in September, there will be an event in Brighton called UK GLBTQ Fiction Meet and I'll be attending with plenty of other authors. So in case you're in Brighton on September 15th, please do come meet us!

That's about it for now!

I'm a wordy bitch, release date, and editing

For a while now, I've tried to find a home for two short stories of mine. I submitted them both to a certain publisher, because my usual publisher, Dreamspinner Press, doesn't take short stories at the moment.

It turns out their house style clashes really badly with my writing style. While I know I'm wordy, oh so wordy, it's how I write. The people who like my stories know this and they accept it. The publisher would have wanted me to make significant changes, which--especially with the shorter story--would have even changed the tone of the story.

There is such thing as artist's integrity. I know that if I'd changed the stories and offered them to this publisher again, they would sell a lot better than if I'd self-publish them. But I just can't do it. I can't butcher the stories I love just to get the published. I have an active schedule, plenty of longer stories, novellas and novels, coming out this year. I don't necessarily need these short stories to be published.

So I decided to self-publish them instead. I'll let you know when I do. They won't cost much, three or four bucks total, so don't worry. ;)

Secondly, the first part of my shifter series, Finnshifters, will be released tomorrow! I'll do a proper post tomorrow, and at some point soon I'll tell more about the series at Sue Brown's blog. The next two parts should come out this year too, so there will be plenty of these "cats and dogs" for you to love soon!

Third thing I thought I'd mention, is my next novel, Technically Dead, I'm editing right now. It's set to be released in July-August, I don't know the date yet. As the name suggests, it's a vampire story. As I edit it, I keep getting to parts that make me remember why I loved to write this book last November.

There's a soundtrack for the book, I'll release it as a whole at some point when it's been published. But the general main theme of the book is Lost In You by Three Days Grace. I'll attach the video for an acoustic version of it below.

Until I ramble at you, in my usual wordy style, again, see ya!

Finnshifters book one, Chuffed -- Coming Soon!

And here it is, on the Coming Soon page. :)

Finnshifters 1 - Chuffed.

Upcoming release and the rest of my schedule

Hello, everyone. It's now early March, and I'm looking at the release schedule I have and the personal deadlines that are looming and I thought I'd give you an update.

My next release will be out on March 28th. It's called Something New, and I really do love this story. I hope you'll like it too. In some ways, Something New manages to catch many things about my personal writing style and my "secret agenda" in my writing. That's why I'm so happy with it, really. Oh and the cover by Catt Ford is really lovely too.

After Something New, the next one in my preliminary list of things to come is a little story called Thank My Lucky Scars. It's also a novella and revolves around a London bike-messenger and an American porn star. It's a fun little story, so I'm looking forward to it as well. Tentative release is April-May.

Now, the book after the two aforementioned is called Chuffed. It's a shifter-book, the first book in a several books-series I've titled Finnshifters. The story arc revolves around a sort of "shifter sanctuary" in Eastern Finland near the Russian border, and the shifters who live on the little farm. There's always at least one main couple, and while the books are M/M romance, the stories are as much about the whole "farm family" as they are any given main couple.

Chuffed should be out in May-June, and I have a submission deadline in about a week for book 2 which doesn't have a title yet. While the book is already almost done, I'm still feeling slight pressure from the deadline I've set myself (so that you guys would have the next part to read in a few months time from the release of the first book, see, I'm thinking about you here!)

My next novel-length story is a vampire-story I've felt like writing for a long time. It's called Technically Dead and it's going to be released in July-August. I'll tell you more about it later.

Once I have Finnshifters 2 written and sent, I need to figure out what to write next. I feel like writing a few separate stories but I also know I need to concentrate on one. So I'll figure that out soon, since after all I should be done with the current story in a week. Ugh. Well, here's to making my deadline and for a nice springtime for everyone!

The Weirdly Miraculous 2011

Everyone is doing these end of the year-posts, so I decided to look back a little too. Yeah, I'm a regular sheep following the herd...

This time last year I was waiting anxiously to hear from Dreamspinner Press about my anthology submission. It was nervewrecking, mainly because I loved the story, Auld Lang Syne, and it was my first foray into what I knew I wanted to write: original M/M-fiction.

As some of you know by now, the story didn't make it into the anthology, instead Dreamspinner wanted it separately, and the novella is out there on it's own. I still remember the feeling of getting that email, by the way, early in 2011, saying they wanted it. It was all so worth it...

Incidentally my first published work was a M/M/F-short story for another publisher, Summerhouse Publishing. An online acquaintance had founded a publishing company and I had a story. It ended up published, and even though I've since fallen out with Summerhouse, I don't regret sending them The Double Ds.

At the end of the year 2011, I have met the goal I set myself way back in ancient history: I have had a novel published. By Any Other Name is a decent first try and I know many people have liked, even loved it. It's not my favorite thing of what I've written and I see faults in it, but it is a decent book with a LOT of things in it that I still managed to make mine. I wanted to write a different book about abuse and a menage-relationship, and I think those boys pulled it off just fine.

I'm also pretty happy with the other things I have out there by now, all of which you can see on my Goodreads page in case you're wondering. :)

All the while I've been writing, all through 2011, I've been also battling some personal issues, the main one has been depression, the "friend" that has been following me for most of my adult life.

During 2011 I've made a lot of new friends, resurrected some old friendships (to a point) and I've certainly erased some people from my life (some of them repeatedly, because I'm a sucker for punishment...). I've learned that your time is limited, you'll not life forever, and so you should try to surround yourself with people you actually like. If someone makes you feel bad or evokes negative feelings, they should go, no matter who they are. Nobody is worth making you feel bad.

All in all, 2011 has been a decent year. I feel like I can maybe learn from my mistakes and failures or things I perceive as either, like selling my beloved stallion who was stressing me out and going to waste being a yard ornament, or having a person I once considered a friend make me feel like crap all the time because of their social inaptitude and general obliviousness to other people's feelings. Oh and never mind the so called gay porn "star" and his antics, that was "fun" too.

Getting into those situations and letting them bother me as much as they did were failures and mistakes for sure. But I think I've learned from them. Now I'm tougher. Again.

The positive of 2011 is that I'm an author now. If I die tomorrow, the people left behind can call me an author. That's what matters to me. This is what I always wanted to be, This is what I didn't think would happen, or at least I needed a miracle. Well guess what. Miracles do happen. ;)

I think that my usual "I will not make New Year's resolutions!"-mantra will be effective this year too, but at least my first thought when the year is changing won't be "I will survive one more year." like it has been for so many years. I have some living to do, surviving won't cut it anymore.

Happy New Year and have a much better 2012, everyone!

(Oh and keep your eyes open, because there will be more stories out there from yours truly soon enough, starting from January 25th. I'm not going anywhere.)

A little update

So, I've been writing and writing and reading and reading....aaand signing contracts!

I am happy to report that at the moment, the first half of 2012 brings you at least three stories by yours truly, all published by Dreamspinner Press.

One is a short story called Lucky. The genre is contemporary M/M, though one of the main characters is FtM transsexual.

Second one is called Something New, it's a novella, and revolves around a YA writer called Frank, who makes decisions about his life and ends up moving, finding a new life and a new love (a hunky, younger fireman called Conner). This is essentially a family story.

Third one, which I call "that Twitter story" in my head, is another novella. It's  the story of Matt, a bicycle messenger in London. He collides with a "rich guy's Mercedes" and as a result ends up spending a lot of time online while he heals. On Twitter, he begins to stalk his favorite gay porn star aaand...the rest you have to read yourself. ;)

I'll update when I have more news about current submissions and other stuffs.

It's summertime alright...

I'm melting. Like...almost literally. And not because I saw something cute. It's WAY TOO HOT in here! I'm one of those people who are most content around 23-24C (roughly low seventies in Fahrenheit). Today, and for the last few days, it's been around 27-33C (eighties in F). I can't...just...no. At least I have a fan to keep me cool during the night. (Instead of a fan who would make the nights hotter... now that's a thought...)

I really have been a bad author with this blogging-thing. There are a few positive things though, that I'd like to mention.

I have my July novella's release date. Auld Lang Syne will be out July 20th, so that's SOON. Yay! It's also on Goodreads already and on Dreamspinner's Coming Soon-page.

My nerdy self is absolutely delighted over my new Bazinga!- t shirt (you get cookie points for knowing this reference).

I've been reading more than I've been writing, though a plot bunny swept me away yesterday and made me write about 1k words down before I forgot them. I still have two other stories as WIPs and much more started. Trying to work on those two first.

Oh! There's the Hot July Days-event in the Goodreads M/M Romance-group and it's already in progress! My story, Hawk's Sparrow, will be up eventually, so go join the group and take a look of the wonderful stories already posted! :)

That's about it! Until next time,

- Tia

Latest News!

I've been doing some promo-stuff and I've been featured in two lovely blogs and there's more to come too.

Here's the first one, the lovely Sue Brown had me over at her blog, and here's another one, First Timer Friday at Naughty in the Backseat-blog.

Oh and I also got the blurb for my cowboy-novella and I LOVED it... I'll share it with you guys later when I have a cover and a release date.

On with the latest news!

So, a few pieces of news and links and stuff.

Here's the link for my Dreamspinner Press author bio. I'm SO excited to see it there! :)

My first short story that I posted the cover art for a while back has now its own page on the Summerhouse Publishing-website. You can see the information, including the summary for the story on The Double Ds product-page.

Also, there's some news on my first full length novel sometime soon... Stay tuned. :)

Stress, stress and oh, look, more stress!

It's the time of the year when my darling horse gets all sorts of stupid and wild and realizes he's a stallion. Yes, he basically forgets he had gonads for most of the year and come February, it all comes back to him...and the stupidity begins. He refuses, adamantly, to stay inside his paddock and because of that, he's completely impossible. Not only is there a surprise factor every morning about where we find him, but the real problem is him possibly causing harm to himself or say, the family cars. If he's feeling very adventurous, he might trek in the snow and go into the neigbor's yard and... You get the idea.

So, when you take into notice that I normally suffer from depression and anxiety, these past couple of weeks have not been very easy for me, because despite being an insufferable ass, the horse is my baby. Because of that added stress, I'm going to escape next week for almost a week to go on a little vacation. Nowhere sunny or warm, sadly I can't afford that, but I'm going to go visit some extended family and get far enough away to not be bothered no matter what the stallion gets up to. Yay!

Now, if we're lucky, this might mean that I'll get some more writing done while I'm away... I certainly hope so, because stress doesn't equal good writing.

Speaking of writing... I now have one contracted novella (will be out around July via Dreamspinner Press) and I have a few other submissions sent around, including one M/M/F-short story, one M/M short story and my first novel, which is M/M/M. 

I'm sure I'll be updating the blog as soon as there are more news. Keep your fingers crossed!

More news! And this time it's good!

So, I'm happy to report that my short short story Waves was published in Dreamspinner Press' February newsletter.

I can also tell you, that I'm currently doing revisions to a novella length story that has been picked up by a publisher. I can't really tell you more until there's something more concrete, but you should be able to see something by yours truly out there soon enough. ;)

Here's a link to the newsletter, where you can check out some of my writing. I'm also going to put up some freebies to this blog, so keep posted. :)

-Tia