Category Archives: When Darkness Falls

We interrupt this broadcast…

This week has not been a good week. First it took me a while to get back into the swing of things after my trip to Istanbul, Turkey. The muse went AWOL, which isn’t like him, and when I eventually dragged him back, he just wasn’t interested in writing Masquerade.

Or maybe that was me not interested in writing it.

It’s not so much that I’m not interested, just that I feel there are problems with the story and some things just weren’t clicking for me. I felt it wasn’t going to be a success as it was. I did get up to around 30,000 words of the story written this week, and with them came a few revelations that have led me to re-think the plot and the story, and the characters involved. Not a bad thing. Better I put it on the back burner now so I have time to think about it and get it perfect rather than having to rewrite huge tracts of it at a later date when a deadline is tight.

The trouble is, I had planned to get this story written and released on September 10th this year. See the problem there. Very short deadline in which to write something to fill the gap. Not sure yet what I’ll do but I do have another story in mind for release this year as my second Vampires Realm story. I’ll think of something to release in September, but it might be a short story or novella rather than a novel. I’m going to crunch the figures in my schedule and see what comes out. It might be that I shift the release of Heart of Darkness to September 10th from October 22nd, and then write something new in time for the October 22nd release date.

You’d think being an indie author it would matter what date I release stuff, but I have a whole year’s worth of guest blog dates in place and I refuse to disappoint the people who have kindly offered me a slot on their blog. I also have advertising in place too.

If I can’t get anything written in time, then I will probably use those dates to promote my first two releases this year, because I didn’t have the tour in place then and they could do with some promotion.

It wasn’t just Masquerade not quite feeling right that has put me behind. It’s my main computer too. It upped and died on me recently during a Windows Vista Service Pack 1 upgrade and I’ve had to reinstall everything. Thankfully, I had backed up all my files to my external hard drive before upgrading to the piece of poop that is the Service Pack 1. Why Windows allow this SP to still be used when they know it has faults is beyond my comprehension, but I think it just goes to show how crap Microsoft is.

Needless to say, I’m mightily miffed at Windows and it’s eaten up my whole day fixing the cursed computer in question. There goes my writing time. Got to reinstall lots of drivers, programs, devices, and put all my files back on my computer now. Bleh.

I had really hoped to get Masquerade written but perhaps it’s a good thing that my release order has changed. Heart of Darkness features a guard as the heroine, and hunters as the enemy. Masquerade has the hero and heroine as guards, and vampires / vampire hunters as the enemy too. Might be too similar, even though the stories are quite different.

I think that I will probably keep Heart of Darkness as my October 22nd release, and then have When Darkness Falls, which is a Vampires Realm novel, as my December release. Masquerade will have to wait until next year before it’s released.

My other option is to write Descent, the second story in my Shadow & Light Trilogy for release in December.

Choices, choices. It’s difficult really. I guess it will all come down to if I have enough time. I picture When Darkness Falls as a novel of around 65,000 words, while Descent will likely reach 90,000-100,000 words. Obviously it takes me longer to write, edit, polish and proof a novel that length.

Maybe this is all just fate telling me that I’m a crazy lady to want to release 8 full novels in the space of just a year. It’s saying “slow down, chillax, follow the flow” which I could happily listen to!

Back to work for me. For a change it isn’t writing that’s beckoning me rather it’s the techy stuff of reinstalling and rebuilding a computer. It’s been a while. I’ve had this one for two years or so without it giving me hell. My previous one required a fresh Windows install everything few months!

I’ll keep you guys posted on what I decide to write for when.

🙂

Posted in 2011 releases, Heart of Darkness, Masquerade, Shadow and Light Trilogy, When Darkness Falls, writing | Comments Off on We interrupt this broadcast…

Her Guardian Angel second draft and blog tour

It’s been another mixed week for me here in castle Heaton. I started the week with a schedule for each day, and I’ve stuck to it for the most part, but there has been a little shift here and there between my set times for thing. I haven’t been spending as much time editing Her Guardian Angel as I should have been as I have so many guest blog spots coming up in my blog tour and I wanted to get ahead of the game and get lots of them done now.

I have another 6 or so to write and then I’m clear until the end of June. I’m hoping to get some of them written this weekend and then sent out. The crazy thing is I have around 18 blog dates for promoting Forbidden Blood and now I have to think of 18 unique things to do for them!

Monday and Tuesday was spent catching up on admin stuff and also addressing comments that I had made during my initial read through of Her Guardian Angel. I started out with 106 comments, mostly notes on improving areas, adding new stuff, repetition, and other things. I worked my way down to 13 major comments (generally layering more stuff into scenes or adding new stuff) and prepped for starting the full edit. I was meant to start that on Wednesday, but wound up writing blog posts and doing other stuff related to writing. I did start my edit again today, and have reached page 27 of 220. It doesn’t sound like much, but at this stage it’s good progress. I’m pleased with the story so far and it’s in good nick, so doesn’t need heavy editing, just polishing and tweaking, and paying attention to the details.

I also signed up to participate in Six Sentence Sunday, so watch out for my first one this Sunday, and sorted out my blog tour schedule, including adding new dates.

I think it’s been quite a productive week, and my muse is enjoying my new structured approach to my days, although I think he’d like a bit of a break for a few days. I think I’ve worked every day for the past couple of weeks, so I need some downtime and some rest. I did manage to get another book read this week. It was a Kindle freebie, Her Vampire Husband by Michele Hauf. Much better than the previous freebie I had read by her, Kiss Me Deadly, which I only gave 2 stars to and that was a push. This one gained 3 stars from me, and I would have given it 4 but I was a bit irritated by the heroine and the authors blatant attempts to make her sound young. I like a more mature kick-ass kind of heroine in my stories.

This week has also seen me thinking about my release schedule for next year, and also writing notes for the next book in the Shadow and Light Trilogy. The first book, Ascension, has been getting great reviews, so there’s all this pressure to make the next novel just as good, if not better, than it. I don’t mind a challenge, and I think the story I have in mind will appease readers and reviewers. There’ll be plenty of action and passion in this one too, and a very kick-ass Taig and Lealandra, and yeah, they might just go to Hell to find out what happened to Taig’s parents.

Other books I’ve been writing up notes for are When Darkness Falls which is a Vampires Realm story I’ll be writing for next year, and also my Hades’ Boys series. I’m really hoping to start writing that series this year and to get the first couple of books in it released next year. It’s going to be a kick-ass series and I think everyone will really like the heroes in it, and the heroines too because they’ll do their share of kicking butt, or at least assisting to kick butt.

I think next year is going to be as full of paranormal romance books as this year is for me. I wish I could find the time to write another science fiction romance, but I have to focus on what my muse is into, and at the moment it’s vampires, demons, and gods, with the odd angel tossed in for good measure.

I also think next year is going to be a year for series books. At the moment, I’m planning to release the Shadow and Light Trilogy #2.5 and Shadow and Light Trilogy #3. Book 2.5 in the series is a novella focusing on another two characters in the series. Alongside those two books, I’ll release another Vampire Venators story, as well as one or two Vampires Realm stories. I’m debating whether to write another novel or novella in the Her Angel series. I do have a character in mind for one, but I’m not sure whether it’s novel or novella material. He’s in the Her Guardian Angel novel, so you’ll get to meet him then. I’ll judge whether to continue the series when that one is released.

Last up for next year is my Hades’ Boys. I need to design a website for it, gather all my materials, and also prepare other stuff for it. It’s going to be a very big series of seven novels. I have the first three roughly planned, and their place in the overall arc that runs through the series. I think the characters are basically there now, with only a little more work needed on them. I’ve been working on this series in the background since 2007 or maybe 2008. It’s been years anyway. It’s probably about time that I wrote it, and I feel I’m in a place now where I can justify writing it and I feel I’ll make a top job of it. I’ve been reluctant before now because I wanted to write it when I was at the top of my game, and had learned enough about writing to produce something amazing with this series. All seven books will be linked, although there’ll be individual baddies for each hero to fight, but those baddies will all be part of the same team, and I’ll reveal little by little who the big bad is behind everything. Just talking about it makes me want to write it!

Back to work for me.

Don’t forget that tomorrow is the third chapter of Forbidden Blood on Sneak Peek Saturday. There’s only 21 days left before this book is released in e-book, and shortly afterwards in paperback.

Also, don’t forget to enter my 500 BLOG FOLLOWERS INTERNATIONAL GIVEAWAY if you haven’t already. Following the instructions on the giveaway page. Invite your friends too. We’re up to 375 followers now, so there’s only another 25 to go before we reach the next level of prizes!

Happy reading everyone.

Felicity

Posted in 2011 releases, 2012 releases, Ascension, forbidden blood, Hades' Boys, Her Guardian Angel, paranormal romance, Shadow and Light Trilogy, Vampire Venators, Vampires Realm, When Darkness Falls | Comments Off on Her Guardian Angel second draft and blog tour

vampire romance ficlet – When Darkness Falls

I’m not sure whether this is going to remain as a teasing ficlet, or whether it will become a full-blown novel or novella… I guess it’s down to the response it gets when I post this little scene.

When Darkness Falls

Darkness was a friend. A companion. A lover. It wrapped him in a blanket of midnight and stole away the pain, the emptiness.

The loneliness.

It drew it all out of him, shrouding him in thoughts more fitting to his kind. It brought dreams of death and blood, not the nightmares of loss and of life as the day did. It gave him a place to hide from himself, to escape this meaningless existence and embrace what he was inside.

He was death.

He was justice to those mortals beneath his feet.

And all deserved to die. For what they had done to him was unforgivable. It wasn’t only their own death sentence they had signed that day in her blood; it was the condemnation of all of their species. Eternity was sweet, bringing him the time he needed to complete his retribution and sate his thirst for vengeance, and each night he thanked his sire for giving him this gift.

Yet, he had not expected to feel so much, not for them, but for his own loss. Each night when he awoke from his nightmares, he grieved her again, as fresh and painful as the day that it had happened. He would never stop grieving her, not even when all was said and done, and nothing remained but his kind and the demons. Even then, his heart would not be satisfied. It would want more, it would want to tear itself out of his chest and end the pitiful life of its owner.

He would let it.

He raised the glass to his lips, drank down the remains of the wine, and leaned back into his chair. He stared through the tall window in front of him at the world below the castle, his hands resting limply over the arms of the chair and his legs stretched out in front of him. No light touched his skin. Darkness enshrouded him, giving him peace and clearing his mind of the visions that haunted his sleep.

His sweet love, bathed in her own blood, dying in his arms.

He closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose, and held in the sigh. Now was not the time to dwell on feelings such as these. Now was the time to use them against his enemy, against the world, to fuel him in this nightly battle with them.

Now was the time to take from them as they had taken from him.

In return for the loss of his most cherished thing in this dismal world, he would take that which they held dearest.

His focus narrowed on the town below, on a single warm window in the darkness.

He would take her.

So… what shall I do with it? Leave it as is, or turn it into a story? It’s likely to be a Vampires Realm story.

Posted in ficlet, free stories, vampire romance, Vampires Realm, When Darkness Falls | Comments Off on vampire romance ficlet – When Darkness Falls