I’m very excited to be part of Amazon’s new venture, and have published my story The Vampire Diaries: Tabula Rasa through the Kindle Worlds program. This lets authors “borrow” the characters from specific shows they’ve obtained permission from and spin their own realities. The authors retain ownership of any new characters they bring to the table, but we can build on each other’s worlds and the show could even decide to use our ideas if they like it enough.

I’m giving it a shot to see how it pans out, mostly to try and reach new readers, and also just because I love, love, love writing Damon in The Vampire Diaries. It’s a fun change to play in their world every now and again instead of my own, and with Tabula Rasa in particular, I had a lot of fun winking at established canon through my own eyes since it’s an amnesia story, the name inspired by one of my favorite episodes of Buffy.

Here is the blurb:

Tabula Rasa means blank slate, hence a perfect name for a fic about amnesia. The premise is this: Elena, Katherine, Caroline, Bonnie, Damon, Stefan, & Mason all wake to find themselves trapped in an abandoned warehouse with complete amnesia. Stripped of their past histories and all the baggage that comes with it, how will they interact with each other? Who can be trusted? And who has betrayal in their heart? Will we end up with canon pairings? Or will other true feelings be revealed? This story takes place after episode 2.5 Kill or be Killed, going completely AU after that.

Okay, wasn’t meaning to get all philosophical on you guys, really just reporting that I’m days away from publishing Nine Steps to Sara and starting in on the sequel to Wake Me, Meet Me When the Sun Goes Down. I’ve pretty much got the plot all laid out and I can’t wait to get started!!! I had a lot of fun re-reading Wake Me and getting back into Anja’s head.

I couldn’t resist getting in a little fanfiction oneshot in there before I get started on the new book though, so I posted a Vampire Diaries Delena fic Hate to Love You. Holy crap I missed writing for those guys! It’s so tempting not to take them on another epic adventure, but I’m trying to stick to my timetable and still get another two books written this year.

The third book of The Fallen series is now available for sale on Amazon.com
and BarnesAndNoble.com! It’s out as an e-book for $3.99 but you don’t have to have a Kindle or Nook to read it, they have free downloadable apps so you can read it on your PC, or even your phone. It’ll be available in print as well in a couple of weeks through Amazon.

Mercy’s saga continues with Mercy for the Damned, Book III of The Fallen. When a new prophecy predicts a great evil if a fallen angel is allowed to remain in Midian, Mercy will move heaven and earth to free Adam from his deal with Raum. The trouble is, it’s far easier to get into Midian than it is to get out, and Adam is perfectly happy to serve out the remainder of his sentence if it keeps Mercy safe from harm. Throw in some pressure from the police who suspect Sam and Mercy of eliminating Ben, and the race is on to rescue both of them before it’s too late.

In celebration of the release, I’m running a $.99 promo for the first book in the series Angel of Mercy. What else can you buy for a dollar? You can find it on Kindle or Nook.

Now I get to enjoy a four day weekend before getting back to my Push fanfic and then I’ll start working on finishing my outline for Let Sleeping Ghosts Lie, a paranormal/ghost thriller.

In other news, I’m close to releasing Mercy for the Damned, it’s in the last half of edits then off to proofreading. So, hopefully that’ll be out in the next couple of weeks. I’m hoping to finish my Push fanfic before I start on my next book Let Sleeping Ghosts Lie too so I don’t stretch myself too thin. Balance… must learn balance…

In other, other news… okay this isn’t really news but I am so ready for spring to get here! It’s been in the 30′s this week with the car icing over every night. That’s crazy! I can’t wait for a little warmer weather so I can put my heavy winter coat away. What about you guys? What’s your favorite season?

I could always start another book, I’ve got another stand alone novel idea all prepped and ready to go.  Okay so it’s not fully mapped out, but I have the basic premise in mind.  Or I could do a sequel to one of my other four books, each of them can definitely work as part of a series, especially Angel of Mercy which ends on a definite cliffhanger.  I am enjoying the lazy pace of posting to fanfic though, I am addicted to the instant feedback for one (hey, it’s been an hour since my last update, where are my reviews?!) and I love, love, love writing Damon, he’s gotta be the most fun to write for, hands down.

I do intend to get back to finishing the Vampire Diaries recaps too, it bothers me that I didn’t finish them, even though everyone’s probably seen them by now.  I’ll tackle the next one this weekend, I’ve got them all on Tivo.  We’ve also got some private ventures going on, working on setting up an online store of all kinds of interesting, eclectic gifts and that’s taking up some of my time too and on top of that some home remodeling stuff we’ve been putting off for far too long.  So… just a little to keep me busy these days. �

Work has been crazy busy lately and all of my writing has taken a hit because of it as I’ve been more braindead when I get home and less productive, but it’s a huge weight off to have the 1st draft done of The Touch and find that it came out alright. 

Vacation is coming up all next week and we’ll see if I end up taking a vacation from writing too or if I let myself do some fun writing as relaxation… we’ll see.  I just got the new Sookie Stackhouse book to read too so I’m looking forward to delving into that.

Sorry I haven’t updated the Vampire Diaries recap but I just haven’t had the time and based on web traffic I’m not convinced too many people were really following it anyway, so it became lower on the priority list of what to work on.  I’ve got all the eps on Tivo, so if I get the time I could still write them out, but right now I’m not making any promises. 

Well off to start the first of many rewrites before Justified is on tonight!  10pm on FX, don’t forget to watch!

Into Every Life A Little Rain Must Fall

It happens to the best of us but I’ve had a pretty serious derailment for the new book over the past couple of weeks.  As I was writing, I had a realization that it was really splitting apart into two books; the story of my MC coming home and dealing with past issues with his family and friends and the ghost hunting storyline.  So, I’ve stopped the writing and I’m planning on pulling them apart into two separate books.  I haven’t made a whole lot of progress in this respect because I’ve been going through some health issues and diagnostics for that.  The good news is I don’t have a brain tumor or stroke, but the bad news is, the search continues to figure out what’s going on with me. 

As such, I’ve been taking it easy, not really pushing myself as much as I might normally do with my writing and I’ve just got the one True Blood fanfic going at the moment as well as the Vampire Diaries recap.  Hopefully I’ll get some answers soon and I can focus on getting better and moving forward again.  I really am looking forward to working on the next Vampire Diaries fic, but for the moment that’s on hold.

In other news, I saw I am Number Four last weekend and it was better than I thought it would be.  The main kid wasn’t as annoying as the commercials would have us believe and there was a lot more Timothy Olyphant in it than I was expecting which makes it Olyphantastic!

Oh and don’t forget, Justified is on tonight 10pm on FX!

I finally wrapped up my fanfic Wake Me When the Sun Goes Down!  It came in at a whopping 47 chapters!  I’m sad to see it go, it really turned into an epic tale, but at the same time I’m happy to move on to something new!  I’ll probably be starting up the next fic in a week or two so I can get a little more done on the book before I start.

Something strange came to my attention on fanfic.net the other day, I found out that someone had literally copied and pasted my work, added a bit to the end and called it their own!  I know imitation is the sincerest form of flattery but come on!  I reported her and sent her a note demanding that she take it down immediately which she did.  She had the nerve to tell me that she thought she had my permission! 

Pretty much her inquiry went:  Hey are you gong to complete this story? Because I think it is a base for a lot of good branches and if you wont complete it, others can gladly.
Anyways LOVE your writing…..

my reponse: I really hope to get back to this one at some point, but I keep running out of time! as always, so many projects, so little time to write!

So… where exactly did it say she could copy my work and not give me credit?  I wouldn’t have cared if she took the basic concept and rewritten it, lord knows I don’t own the market on crossover ideas, but damn… it was disconcerting to see my work under someone else’s name.  She even changed the POV from third person to 1st when she started writing without batting an eye.  Strange…

So, how is your week going?

And if my brains don’t leak out of my ears (as I write this, I have a really bad headache, so it’s a possibility), I’ll also be working on wrapping up my two current vampire diaries fanfics and starting a new one as well as the VD episode recaps when it starts back up this week again!

Wish me luck guys!

Before month’s end I hope to:

Submit my revised novel Pretty Witches All in a Row to the agent who asked for the changes late last year. 

Finish editing down Moonsong, because it is just too damn long at present, and get it out in its new incarnation.

Finish up at least one of my vampire diaries fanfics, so I’m not spread quite so thin.

Get some notes down on the next vampire diaries fanfic before the ideas fall out of my head.

Finish watching season one of Deadwood because I have become addicted to this show!  Actually I’ve become addicted to all things Olyphantastic, and I can’t wait for Justified to come out on DVD so I can finally get a look at that show too!

Make some reservations for our anniversary weekend coming up.  Twenty years of wedded bliss!  Damn, time goes by fast… (love you baby!)

Start brainstorming on the next novel!  Hopefully to start writing in the month of February, even if it is a shorter month than most.

I figure posting it here makes me sorta accountable to get at least most of these done, right?