Please give a very warm welcome to guest blogger Zoe Winters, author of the Blood Lust series and passionate advocate of independent/self-publishing, and check out how you can enter to win a Kindle

Thanks to Kel for having me on her blog today to promote my new release, Blood Lust (my first print release, yay!) I met Kel about two years ago when I was weighing the pros and cons of going indie. Needless to say, despite some stigma still existing, it wasn’t nearly as cool to digitally self-publish then as it is now.

And Kel did it before me. 🙂

Originally the idea was that I was going to start an imprint and just do my thing and not be really “vocal” about being self-published. But me not being vocal about something is about as likely as a cat going swimming.

I couldn’t help myself. I was so excited! So being me, I ran around and started talking about the stuff I was learning about self-publishing and about marketing. Even in the beginning before I’d released a thing, I seemed to get into little cat fights on the Internet on the validity of self-publishing. I think this was how Kel found me and stalked me back to my blog. 😛

I’m glad she did. Kel and several other indies I’ve met along the way have been like Dorothy picking up all these friends on the yellow brick road. And I’m not saying I’m Dorothy and they’re my sidekicks. Sometimes they’re Dorothy and I’m the sidekick. We all learn from each other. The point is, the community feeling of going indie and the journey has been one of the coolest experiences ever.

Becoming indie has been like stepping into technicolor with singing munchkins after my house fell on the Wicked Witch of the East. Before going indie, it was all black and white and fairly depressing. At least for me. Okay, if you know me, you knew I was going to just drag that metaphor kicking and screaming as long as I could. I think it’s dead now. We can continue.

I love my indie peeps. And I love being indie. And now, finally, after releasing only digital books (which isn’t a bad thing), I’ve got my first print book in my hands that I can hold. I recently had the experience of signing my first books and that was really cool, too!

And now we’re to the marketing portion of the program. This week I’m doing a book blitz with giveaways. Each day I’ll update my blog showing where I’m guest blogging and I’ll give away a signed copy of Blood Lust to commenters at each guest blog location.

The big part of the contest can be found here at my blog, where I’ll be giving away an Amazon Kindle.

And oh yeah… I had a book to promo… Here’s the description for Blood Lust, I hope you’ll check it out!

It’s all about the blood…

Comprised of three novellas, Blood Lust gives readers a snapshot look at the world of the Preternaturals Series. (Future installments of the series will be novels.)

KEPT:

As a cat therian (shifter), Greta’s blood is already sought after to enhance spells and potions, but due to a quirk of her birth, her blood is potent enough to kill for. When her tribe plans to sacrifice her, Greta must ally herself with Dayne, the dangerous local sorcerer, and the only person strong enough to protect her.

CLAIMED:

For a vampire, Anthony isn’t a picky eater, but he’s drawn to Charlee’s blood more than any other. Like a fine wine saved for a special occasion, he’s denied himself this pleasure. But one night, high from the potent magical blood of another, he claims his prize and loses control. Ashamed of almost killing the one woman who means anything to him, he wipes her memory of the event. When Charlee awakens with complete amnesia, Anthony is the only one who can clean up the mess he’s made.

MATED:

Because of the vampiric blood that has run through her veins since birth, Jane has been a target for vampires who resent a human being “kindred.” She’s forced to disguise herself as a vampire groupie to appease them and safeguard her life. When she’s abruptly given to Cole, the leader of the werewolf pack, to satisfy a gambling debt, she discovers the blood running through her veins has a far greater impact on her destiny than she ever imagined.

Print and ebook copies are available at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. (other retailers coming soon.)

Buy links are available from my blog (The top stickied Amazon contest post.)

You can find me here:

Author Website

Author Blog

Twitter

Poet, and Paper Rats’ fan, Joe Glasgow posted a poem about “Inside The Writers’ Studio” on Facebook. Naturally we pestered him until he turned it into a song. Then we pestered him some more until he recorded it. Because that’s how we roll.

(CLICK HERE to watch earlier episodes of Inside The Writers’ Studio.)

Heads up indie authors: For the low, low price of $149, you and your book may get a mention in a Publishers’ Weekly quarterly self-publishing supplement. Or, uh, you may not. Agents and others in the publishing industry may take a look at your book! Or, uh, they may not. (ie, Be smart, people. Think. Do some research. Please do not let yourself be taken advantage of.)

For more words of wisdom, please see:

Self-Publishing Review

Zoe Winters’ blog

Joe Konrath’s blog

POD People

Presenting the cover for my upcoming novel, The Wendy House (coming spring 2011). Much thanks to Kristen Tsetsi for bringing my vague idea to life so beautifully.

Same photo, but brightened up a bit, and a cleaner font.

Coming soon: The Wendy House cover reveal.

…of my blog’s Indie Author Appreciate Contest is…

LuvMyKindle!!!

Congratulations, and thanks to all participants! (“Luv”, please email me at rjkeller.wfs@gmail.com so we can work out the details of the gift certificate exchange.)

Paper Rats’ newest episode of Inside The Writers’ Studio is now ready. Entitled It’s Not Hemigway, episode v was written by Holly Christine (author of The Nine Lives of Clemenza and Tuesday Tells It Slant) and the winning entry in our Very, Very, Very Short Script contest. Enjoy!

Episode V. In which Kris and R try to improve their writing the old fashioned way.

I have a humble request for my fellow indie writers. I want to not be a bitch about it. I’m not sure it’s possible, so I’m just going to say it.

When we’re posting about our books, or our writing career, on a public forum, could we try to act as though there are people reading our words? People who buy books and tell their friends about them? Could we try to act as though there are self-publishing naysayers reading them, too? Because there are.

It’s natural, for example, to be excited about a positive review and to want to draw attention to it. It’s smart marketing, as well as affirming for fellow writers and our readers, when we share them. It’s also natural to be bummed out about a bad review. But when it comes to posting about that kind of thing on an open, public forum, we need to act like the professionals we claim to be. Let’s save the unrestrained excitement and impassioned disappointment  for private conversations. Because when any one of us posts something that is obnoxious or unprofessional it makes us all look that way, and too many of us have worked too hard for that. There are too many people out there who think of self-publishing writers as little kids who delight in stealing the crumbs from underneath the grown ups’ table at Thanksgiving. Let’s not act like it.

Please?

Thank you.

I don’t post a whole lot here about the business end of writing, nor about the ins and outs of self-publishing. This is partly because I think the business end of writing is boring as hell. I mean, I have to worry about it because the IRS might wonder where the extra income is coming from, but it’s not something I particularly enjoy dwelling on here. Also, I said pretty much all I’ll ever have to say about the pros and cons of self-publishing when I wrote for Publishing Renaissance, and I hate repeating myself. Repeating myself.

But the biggest reason I avoid those subjects is that there are a slew and a half of other, much more knowledgeable, writers talking about it already; for example Zoe Zoemeister Winters and Mr. J.A. Konrath (whom I don’t know well enough to -meister). I’m usually hanging out, doing my writing thing, and by the time I’ve thought about the possible ramifications of literary agent Andrew Wylie publishing his clients’ ebooks on his own or heard about Who said What about self-published books over at So-and-So’s blog, it’s pretty much been talked to death.

Recently, though, a fellow indie author told me that it was my responsibility, as a successful self-publishing author, to add my voice to the indie chorus once more. To help to dispel the notion that self-published books suck, that self-published authors do well to sell a total of 25 copies to their friends and family members, or that they might – if they’re very lucky – reach 150 sold if they truly bust their ass. My first thought was, “Dude! You think I’m successful? Rad!” Because I truly don’t know what, exactly, being successful entails. That is to say, I know that it means different things to different people, but it wasn’t an adjective I’d ever applied to myself. My second thought was, “Oy! People are still spouting that crap, aren’t they?” Then it was, “Do I have enough coffee to write about stats and sales and crap?” The answer was, I guess so (I love my Keurig) because here it goes.

Sales-wise Waiting For Spring is doing pretty well, particularly on Kindle. I haven’t been able to quit my day job yet, but when my hours at said job were recently cut, the ebook sales made up the difference (and then some), which eased the hit to the checkbook somewhat.  For the boring stats part, this year I’ve sold nearly 7000 copies of Waiting For Spring on Kindle alone. I’ve sold about a quarter of that number in other places (print, Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, etc). See? Sales figures are boring.

Other good stuff: Reviews keep coming in, the mostly positive kind, and I continue to get emails from people who say kind things about my book (although there are enough readers at Goodreads who think I suck to keep my hat size from increasing), and that’s cool, too. Inside The Writers’ Studio – the video show created by fellow Backword author, Kristen Tsetsi and myself – is doing very well (Episode V will be coming up shortly!), which thrills me to no end. Also, some of my holy-shit-I-can’t-believe-this-happened-at-work! blog stories are being incorporated into a screenplay that’s being written, as we speak, by Robin Altman and Carole Carlson. That is pretty damned exciting. There are other things going on as well – positive public mentions of my book by other writers, interviews, co-hosting Book Chatter – that make me think I must be doing something right.

But when it comes to considering myself successful…well, I guess it boils down to this: I’m having more fun than should be legally allowed. I love writing. I mean, I love it. Creating people and worlds, then tearing those lives and those worlds apart, and then putting them back together again…damn, what’s not to love? I’d do it if nobody else ever read my stuff. I’d do it for free. Hell, I have done it for free. But the fact that there are so many people who do read it, and who are happy to pay for the privilege of reading it – so that I can spend even more of my time doing the thing I love – is a neverending cause of amazement for me. And I hope that success continues for many more years to come.

The updated release date for The Wendy House is April 2011. I know that’s six months later than originally scheduled, but I want to make sure the book is absolutely the best it can be. I promise it will be worth the wait. In the meantime, as a peace offering, here is chapter one.

 

Chapter 1

MARCH 10, 2007 3:58 A.M.

 Rick rubbed his eyes wearily and reached for the Marlboro reds, soft pack, on the kitchen table beside him. He ran his thumb along the cellophane wrapper. He liked to feel them in there before he lit up. It was comforting. His own band of silent soldiers, ready for battle. Stephanie’s pack of menthols sat neatly on the small, battered table beside the sofa bed where she lay sleeping. She preferred her cigarettes in a box. They looked, to him, like a coffin.

He set his lighter down hard, hoping the noise would wake her up. It did. She sat up quickly and croaked, “What time is it?”

“Four,” he said, then took a long drag from his cigarette. He blew it out with, “A.M.”

She nodded and lit a cigarette of her own. She was only twenty-three and still looked it, but he gave her another five years, tops, before the smoking and booze caught up with her face. The almost-white blonde she used to color her hair wouldn’t improve matters any. Not that it mattered to him. In five years she’d be long gone, probably with a couple of snotty noses to wipe. And none of the noses would look like his.

“Rick…you’re sure you’re ready for this?”

“Yeah. Everything’s packed.”

“That’s not what I meant.” She regarded him for a moment, but didn’t give voice to her fears. She didn’t need to. Instead she chuckled and pointed to his head. “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that.”

He ran his hand over the stubbles where his hair had been. She’d shaved it off for him the afternoon before. “You won’t have to get used to it.” He crushed his cigarette out, half-smoked, then noticed her hurt expression. He managed a kind smile. “I mean, it’s gonna grow back.”

She smiled back, relieved. “Oh.”

He waited until she finished her smoke before he walked over, flopped down beside her and pulled her on top of him.

“Rick, you know we don’t have time for that.”

“Sure we do,” he said, slipping off her night shirt.

“Rick—”

“Steph, just…come on. I need it this morning.”

He really did. He was already starting to hear Wendy’s voice, as early as it was, as relatively sober as he was. He had a feeling she was going to be with him all day and he wasn’t sure, yet, if that was a good thing.

She gave in, of course, just like she always did. Just like they all had. But even as she took him inside of her, he knew. They were marking time. He gave her a month, probably less than that, before she was gone. And he didn’t care. She was just another body, just another face, just another cunt. Just like all of them had been. All except for one.

So he held her close, buried his head between her breasts, and dreamt of dark, soft, chocolate-colored eyes.

~~~~~~~~　

6:03 A.M.

 Rick shivered, then flipped the collar of his jacket up against the biting wind as he stepped outside. He didn’t look around him, just followed Steph’s boots. The high wooden heels clink-clonked against the cold asphalt as they crossed the street toward the liquor store. Neither of them spoke until they reached the door. He tilted his head down, away from the security camera, as he asked, “Are you ready?”

“Yeah.”

She didn’t sound it. “It’ll be fine, Steph. Just like we talked about.”

“Okay.”

He pulled the door open and followed her inside.

The place was empty—it was a Saturday morning and most of the regular customers were still sleeping off last night’s revels—except for the store’s owner, Shannon Kinney. She was standing behind the counter, arms crossed, scowling, waiting for them. She was lean and tough, in her early-forties. Her hair reminded Rick of old pennies. She studied his face for a long moment. Then she moved on to Stephanie’s and shook her head.

“Look, doll,” she said. “My cameras don’t pick up any sound, and they aren’t exactly state-of-the-art. But if you look scared—like you do right now—instead of pissed, they’re sure as hell gonna pick up on that.”

Steph sputtered something unintelligible, then looked to Rick for reassurance. She was always looking to him for reassurance, for approval. It’s what he was counting on. He nodded and said, “She’s right.”

Shannon snickered. “Come on. Don’t tell me you’ve never been pissed off at him before. You can play off that.”

The truth was, she’d never been more than mildly irritated with him. Or at least not that she’d ever shown. He sighed and put his hand on the back of her neck, rubbed it gently. It was something he knew she hated. She shuddered at his touch and flung it off.

“That’s more like it,” he said. He replaced his hand, squeezed a little harder this time, and turned his attention back to Shannon. “I need a pint of Senator’s Club. And a pint of Allen’s for my girl here.”

Steph’s shoulders tensed up at his words, and his stomach gave a brief, sickening roll, but he kept his eyes focused firmly on Shannon’s. He noticed, not for the first time, that they were more grey than green. He wondered if there had ever been a time when they’d been happy. He couldn’t imagine it.

She bagged up the whiskey and coffee brandy, then turned her attention once more to Steph. “When you run out of here—hey! Don’t look at me. Look at him. Remember? You’re mad at him right now. Okay, that’s better. You’ll be on camera until you’re about halfway across the street. But keep acting like you’re pissed anyway. Even after you get to your car.”

She nodded up at him almost imperceptibly. “And remember,” he told her, “when you drive off, you need to keep on going until you hit the apartment house two doors down from the intersection. The empty yellow one. Pull over there and wait for me.”

“I know. You told me a hundred times already and—”

“Steph, come on. You gotta do better than that.”

She gave him a good scowl. “Well you shouldn’t have woke me up so early. I’m still a little hung over from last night and now I’m tired, too, and—”

Shannon laughed loudly. “He got you up early to fuck you, didn’t he?”

Steph started to turn toward her, but Rick grabbed her by the arms and said, “No! Look at me. At me.”

“You know he wasn’t thinking about you when he was doing it, don’t you? He was thinking about her. About his wife. At least that’s who he was always thinking about when he was fucking me.”

She was enjoying this, he could tell. Even without looking over at her he knew it. “Shannon,” he said, without turning away from Steph. She was staring up at him with pale, hurt eyes. “I think that’s enough.”

“You fucked her?”

“Steph, no, I—”

But Shannon wasn’t going to let him get away with the lie. “He ever call Wendy’s name out loud while he’s coming?”

She’d pushed the right button. Because, of course, he had. Steph wriggled away from him and let out something that was almost a screech. Then she slapped him hard across the face.

“Jesus Christ!” He rubbed his cheek, surprised. That hadn’t been part of the plan.

“That’s a good girl,” Shannon said. “Now get the hell out of here.”

She did, without another word. Rick watched out the window as she ran across the street and fell into her car. The tires squealed as she took off down the road. It was possible, he knew, that she’d just keep on going, and then what would he do?

“You know something, Shannon? You’re a real bitch.”

“Yes I am. But I’m gonna keep your ass out of jail, aren’t I?”

“Yes. You are.”

Probably.

“And she wasn’t doing her job. She needed to cause a scene for the camera, and I got her to do it. A girlfriend who’s pissed at you is a much more reliable alibi witness than one who isn’t.”

“And a girlfriend who’s too pissed off to lie for me won’t do me any good at all.”

“She’ll be fine, Rick. She isn’t going anywhere. Right now she’s sitting right where you told her to go and she’s gonna tell the cops exactly what you tell her to say. She’s got it for you too bad, poor thing.”

He sighed and handed her a twenty, then grabbed another ten from his wallet. “Throw in two packs of cigarettes while you’re at it. One of mine and one of hers.”

“Already taken care of. There’s a bag in the back seat of her car. Cigarettes, a fifth of cinnamon whiskey and a couple packs of cinnamon gum.” He stared at her blankly, so she continued. “I put it in there last night.”

“What?”

“You know won’t be able to make it there and back without something strong inside you. The cinnamon will hide the smell of the whiskey if you get pulled over. Just pop a few pieces of the gum in your mouth and—”

“How did you—”

“This stuff—” she slid the bag across the counter at him “—needs to make it back your apartment if this alibi is gonna work. They’ll need to find the empty bottles. So don’t forget to drink it or dump it by tomorrow morning. And for God’s sake, don’t forget about it and leave it in her car. Or in that other woman’s truck.”

“Fuck off. I’m not an idiot. Now, how did you get into her car?”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re kidding…right?”

That got a quiet chuckle out of him. She gave him a hint of a smile. It had been awhile since he’d been with her. Maybe a year? More than that? He could only remember that it was a week after her daughter died. She just showed up at his door, unannounced. They spent the weekend drinking and fucking. Then she left. She didn’t talk about it the next time he came into the store, which was just fine with him. And she hadn’t been back. That was good, too. But he could tell she was thinking about it. And he wondered if there was a chance…

“Don’t even think about it,” she said. “Especially not now. You know you have to stay with that girl after this is over. At least until she decides to bail. You can’t be the one to send her packing. Not this time.”

He only nodded. He knew that much. And he didn’t think it would take her long to leave. She was already getting weary of him. There was a guy at the diner where she worked who wanted her. If he could start gently pushing her in that direction in another month or so, he might not have anything to worry about. Her guilt for leaving him could keep her quiet about what was going to happen today.

“And you’ve got the gun.”

“Yes.”

“Just drop it in the—”

“I know where to drop it, Shannon. It’s my goddamn plan. Remember?”

“Yeah. I just want to make sure you do.”

“Well, I do. And I really gotta go. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Tomorrow’s Sunday. Can’t open till nine.”

“But I’ll show up at six. Just for the camera.”

She nodded and watched him silently as he picked the bag up off the counter. She waited till he was almost to the door before saying, “Rick…”

He had to clench his jaw to keep the irritation out of the “What is it?” he threw back at her.

“Make sure you get this asshole. Okay? And I mean get him good. None of this shooting-him-in-the-head bullshit. ”

He nearly dropped the bag at the words, but managed to grab hold of the bottom in time. He didn’t turn back to look at her, though. He couldn’t. The queasiness was back. Even his head was swimming with it. And for the first time he wondered if he’d actually be able to go through with it.

“I want him to suffer, Rick. I want him to suffer. Do you hear me?”

But he said nothing. He just walked out the door. Out into the cold. Out to face the day.