The Burning Through Pages charity is a Denver, CO group that donates books to kids in the city in an effort to get them passionate about reading. Their theory is that, while the classics are classics for a reason, their often outdated concepts and prose are just not something kids today can really relate to, thus the low levels of reading for pleasure in today’s youth.

So BTP gives kids books. If the kids like them, awesome. If not, they can return them and get a different one. But the basis is free books in an effort to help kids discover the joys of reading.

It’s an amazing message.

I recently did a charity for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital by donating all proceeds from my book to them, and I’ll be doing another one of those charity drives for BTP next June. Stay tuned.

In the mean time, please look for ways to donate and support them. I’d love for them to be able to expand to other cities.

Check out Burning Through Pages

Website | Facebook | Twitter

The Short Version

Dark Mercy is a short work of paranormal vampire fiction that can easily be read in one sitting. It’s sexy, dangerous, thrilling, and while the word “dark” is used a lot, it fits too. I really enjoyed reading this, but beware that it’s rated R and is full of, well, sinful pleasantries. Dude, even I felt kind of like I needed a confession after reading the sex scene. The characters were flawed and realistic, the story magical and real, and the subtle (and not-so-subtle) themes had me thinking about the book long after I finished. This is on my favorites shelf and I’ll be reading the rest in this series.

The Details

So Dark Mercy actually starts with what I thought was a bit of a spoiler. Winters has this disclaimer in her Acknowledgements:

Maybe I’m the odd one out, but I had to Google “HEA.” For those who also don’t know, it stands for “happily ever after.” Huh, I thought. Spoiler much? We know from the get-go that there is no lovey-dovey resolution to the story. We’re almost guaranteed a cliff hanger. This disappointed me at first, but now that I’ve read it, I have to say that it adds to the end. I want to see how any couple can survive this sort of, er, tension. It makes me even more curious to read on, knowing that this isn’t the end of their story. So even though it was off-putting at first, the “spoiler” actually left me completely surprised at the end. It wasn’t what I was expecting at all. I love that.

The narration switches between our two main characters: Hadrian and Angeline. We see sex, vulgar language, sin, demons…it’s all there, so be prepared. Still, it’s great to hear their contrasting voices and to see the way they effect each other. Through them, we see life, death, lust, and the hope for redemption; it’s wonderful. I really enjoyed the way the story was balanced between them, and I think it would have been weak without the vacillating perspectives. The themes Winters slips into the story are also wonderful, but I won’t hit you over the head with them.

There are also moments of wonderfully vivid imagery, where I could hear and taste this paranormal world Winters talked about in Dark Mercy. You’re transported from place to place, and each setting was crystal clear. I settled right in and never once questioned Winters’ style or voice.

Winters’ take on the vampire world wasn’t entirely new, but both the look into the death/transformation and the way she described the taste of blood was. She describes drinking blood as being able to taste emotions, rather than literal taste. I thought that was great. You also get an insight into the other paranormal creatures of the Preternaturals series, from cyclers to witches to other magical creatures about which we can only speculate.

All in all, this was a great read. I slipped right into the story and didn’t leave until I ran out of words to read. I definitely recommend you pick this book up — as long as you’re okay with a bit of sin and a naughty sex scene. I think the depth of the rest of the story will outweigh this for anyone made uncomfortable by lightly described sex in novels, but it’s going to be your call in the end.

Snag Your Copy:

Amazon (US) | Amazon (UK) | B&N | Goodreads | Smashwords

Okay, champagne and strawberries aside, you still have to make your book for sale. To do that, you want to pick which websites to upload to:

• Amazon: the beast. Pretty much all indie books are also published on Amazon.
• Barnes & Noble: good place to be, though they don’t offer a lot of help with marketing or rankings. In terms of sales, many people look here.
• Apple eBooks: Need I say more?
• Smashwords: popular because of its willingness to list books free. You can also create discount coupons or award prizes by giving people codes for a free book. Tracks rankings by genre and has good notification options.
• Monkeybars.net: Up-and-coming distribution site with a really cool strategy. Instead of paying a distribution fee like with the first 3 sites, you pick how much you want to award people who recommend your book and make sales for you. So instead of paying 30% to Monkeybars, you can pay 30% to the person who refers your book. It’s free to list on Monkeybars. Cool idea. You can read my review of them by clicking here.

Each site requires different formatting. Here’s the run down:

• Amazon: Word DOC file or HTML File (HTML file enables linked TOC and other links throughout the book for touch screen Kindles).
• Barnes & Noble: ePub or HTML. In my experience, the HTML is converted oddly. Just upload the ePub.
• Apple: ePub.
• Smashwords: Word DOC file. It’s not possible to preserve HTML formatting, and thus, I’m not a huge fan of Smashwords’ “meat grinder” formatter. They also have incredibly strict requirements for their expanded distribution network
• Monkeybars: PDF, ePub, and MOBI file (for kindle). You can upload all three, and it all depends on what you want for sale. I recommend uploading all of them, since you have them all anyway.

Uploading to Amazon

To start, go to Amazon KDP and create an account (or sign in if you already have one. This can be the same login info for your normal Amazon account).

Logging in takes you to the dashboard, which looks like this:

Click for a larger image.

Go to the “Add new title” button at the top of the books grid (blue headers at the bottom of that image). The wizard will walk you through all the steps you need, and you’ll be published! Once you hit “agree and publish,” you’ll have to wait anywhere from 12 hours to 2 days, but then it’ll be up. It all depends on Amazon’s traffic at the time.

Uploading to B&N

Head to Barnes & Noble’s Pubit  feature for indies. Create an account or use your bn.com account to login. Here’s what the Pubit dashboard looks like:

Click for a larger image.

You can see the “Add new title” pretty easily here. It’s just as straightforward as Amazon, though the fields are in a different order than Amazon’s. You’ll breeze through it.

Uploading to Apple

I frankly haven’t messed with this. From what I can tell, you have two choices: use a paid seller account to list your books for sale, or offer your book for free via the free seller. You can read more about it in the Apple FAQ . I might deal with this later, I might not. If you want to throw in your two cents in the comments, feel free. I’ll update this section as the comments come in.

Uploading to Smashwords

Head to Smashwords, create an account, and go to “publish” in the menu. Smashwords is different in that you don’t actually upload your book in the same place that you would track sales later, as is true of Amazon and B&N. Here’s what the site looks like:

Click for a larger image.

It’s pretty straightforward. When the book finishes going through their “meat grinder,” which churns out pretty much every possible format for an eBook (you can pick which ones you want if you don’t want it to churn out all of them).

They’ll send you an email after your book finishes the eBook formatting, and this email will list concerns that their manual reviewers might have with the format for the extended distribution network. If you’re clear of issues, you can submit the book for review via the dashboard. Then, Smashwords will look at your book and accept or reject it for those networks. Many of these networks, particularly Sony, prefers you go through Smashwords’s network instead of through them.

Smashwords, as I said before, has some specific formatting requirements. So specific, in fact, that they wrote a book about it. They recommend you read it before uploading. I recently unpublished from Smashwords to experiment with Amazon’s KDP Prime program, and I’m not really sure I’ll go back to Smashwords. It was always a headache to deal with their formatting requriements, and I rarely sold there. That’s me, though. You should still try it for yourself.

Uploading to Monkeybars

I like Monkeybars a lot, primarily because you get to upload whatever files you want to sell. Complete freedom with both your format type and your selling structure.

Go to Monkeybars  and create an account if you don’t have one. Don’t forget to add me as a friend! I love connecting on that site.

So after you’re set up and you add me, head over to “Upload to sell.” This will walk you through the uploading process and publish you instantly. Here’s a screenshot of the market site:

 Click for a larger image.

Congratulations, you’ve graduated formatting boot camp!

Well gang, that’s it! Of course, you can get into the friskier HTML editing and add images to your books, but that’s more advanced than what most writers need for their novels. Happy formatting, and as always, let me know if you have questions.

The Full Formatting Bootcamp Syllabus:

1. Creating Your Source File
2. Customizing & Editing Your Book’s HTML
3. Finding a Conversion Software & Converting Your Book
4. Uploading Your Book for Sale

Choosing a conversion software

Converting your book to PDF

Converting your book to ePub or MOBI

Choosing a conversion software

All formatting software is not created equal. Some of it sucks. Some of it’s grotesquely complicated. Some of it will make you cry. Just kidding. Mostly.

My personal favorite is Calibre because it’s free and (mostly) simple. I couldn’t get the auto-generated TOC to work, here, so aside from converting my pre-made HTML file to ePub, I don’t use any of the program’s frills. You don’t really need to. It gets the job done.

You can also use it as a library, but any books with DRM will not open in the program. Just a head’s up.

There are more conversion programs, of course, and you can check out Media Bistro for a pretty good list of the top 6. Of course, Calibre is at the top of that list.

Converting your book to PDF

This is pretty easy and a good place to start. Why bother? Good question.

What with all the kindles, nooks, and other assorted eRedaers, it almost seems like you would never need a PDF. However, some readers prefer to read on their computers, or just don’t have and don’t want to download the Kindle for PC app or the Nook for PC app.

No matter what you do, you should have something for everyone. It’s good to be prepared, and even if you never give out a PDF (you will, but what if), it’s best to be prepared for that one person who might ask.

PDFs can also be read on any eReader that takes an ePub (correct me if I’m wrong on that, darlings). Though they don’t auto-adjust to the screen (which means they can be harder to read), they can be read.

The Conversion Process

Create a separate Word file and save it as a PDF source file. You’ll be making changes, so it’s good to have a separate copy so that you don’t tweak with the original.

Make the file exactly as you want it to be read — down to spacing, font, everything. The nice thing about PDFs is that they, essentially, take a snapshot of the document. Whatever fonts, images, etc. you have in the file will be preserved in the PDF, no matter if the reader doesn’t have the font or image source. To that effect, PDFs are awesome, don’t require any HTML editing, and are a very easy-to-navigate file type.

And voila! You have a PDF. But now you want to go on to the harder stuff, right? Nah, I’m kidding. It’s not that hard to get an ePub or MOBI file either as long as you have the source HTML ready.

Converting your book to ePub or MOBI

This process differs for each program, so I’m going to walk you through what I know: Calibre. The others will have similar processes.

Remember, the ePub is for most readers (like the Nook) and a MOBI can be read on a Kindle. That’s why it’s good to have both.

Here’s what the Calibre Dashboard looks like when you open it (click for a larger image):

The menu at the top is pretty straightforward. To add a book, go to the first button, or “Add Books.”

From there, you’ll browse to the HTML file we talked about in the last post. Make sure you’ve already tested this HTML file in your browser to save yourself wasted time. Any errors in a converted file are usually from the source HTML file.

Once the book adds, select it and go to “Edit Metadata” in the menu. You’ll see this screen (click for larger image):

You’ll notice that this is a completed book. When you open yours, it’ll be blank: no series data, no cover, no author data, no synopsis. Add all the items until you’re happy with how it looks. Click OK.

By now you’ve probably guessed that we’re working down the menu from left to right. The last step is “Convert books.” Click that, and you’ll be given a screen that looks like this:

There are a few changes you’ll have to make:

1. Go to “Heuristic Processing” on the left. Disable this feature.
2. Go to “Structure detection” and delete all fields. This detects chapters for the TOC (even though I’ve never actually gotten it to work), which is unnecessary since you’re TOC is manually made.
3. Go to “Table of Contents” and delete/disable everything here. Your TOC is prepped and waiting.

Once this is done, look at the top left. It should say “Input format: ZIP” This is your HTML file that you uploaded when you added the book.

At the top right, you’ll see “Output format: ePub” EPub is the default. You can leave this, since you do want an ePub. When you go to make your MOBI, just repeat the other steps but change this output format.

More on uploading eBooks to the distribution networks tomorrow, with how-to specifics for anyone stumped by the sites or who just needs a direction with where to start.

The Full Formatting Bootcamp Syllabus:

1. Creating Your Source File
2. Customizing & Editing Your Book’s HTML
3. Finding a Conversion Software & Converting Your Book
4. Uploading Your Book for Sale

Before you edit your HTML at all, back up your file. Never edit the source without having a backup in case you make a mistake.

Fair warning: this can get a little complicated and won’t look pretty. If you just want a basic book and don’t need a linked TOC, I’d recommend skipping to the next lesson (converting your book). However, if you are massively stubborn (like me) and want to learn so that your book is beautiful and flawless, carry on.

Click here to jump to the lesson:

Embedding an Image | Creating a Linked TOC.

Embedding an Image

This is something I personally haven’t tried yet, but that I will be trying in the future. In lieu of a walk through, then, I’d like to recommend a great formatting series by Guido Henkel. He covers this in pretty through detail.

There are also some great tips on creating “enhanced books” over at eBook Architects.

Creating a Linked TOC.

Most of you clicked the link up there to jump down to this header, and that’s exactly what you’re going to be doing when you create a linked TOC: you’re building a list (the table of contents) that will enable the reader to choose from the list and automatically jump down to the chapter in question.

Some conversion software programs will automatically make your TOC for you. I’ve never made this work, as stubborn as I’ve been and as hard as I’ve tried. Thus, I came up with another approach. It’s the same technique I used in the mini TOC at the top of this post, but you insert it in your book.

So let’s start with the first chapter.

When you first open your HTML (remember, right click on the file and choose to open with Notepad), you’ll see a bunch of messy formatting stuff at the beginning. You can ignore that. Instead, hit ctrl+f (or go to Edit>Find) to open a search dialog. Then, search for chapter 1.

First, this will take you down to the TOC entry for chapter 1. Let’s do a before and after to keep things simple.

Before:

After:

So, you added <a href=”#ch1″>

That up there is the link, and has to be exact, right down to the spaces. This will make the words “Chapter 1:” linkable in the TOC, since that’s what’s within the <a> link tags. When readers click this, they will jump down to the name attribute that you’re about to make in the next step.

The next step is to write the name attribute into the code. So pull up your find box again and search for the second instance of “Chapter 1″ which should be your actual chapter heading in the book’s body.

This HTML will look something like this:

Before:

It will be different depending on your personal font and formatting choices, but most conversions will render this code irrelevant. The important part is the bit that says “Chapter 1.” Now, you need to add the name attribute, like this:

After:

Look closely. The only difference is the <a name=”ch1″> and the closing </a> tag. This makes the title an anchor, which means the link from the TOC will now jump down to this bit of text.

Congratulations! You now know how to create a single entry in a linked TOC. Now, you have to repeat that for any chapter heading or bonus material (dedication, copyright, etc) that you want the TOC to jump to. It’s time consuming, but the end result is nice. Just remember to be patient with it as you go along.

Once you finish the entire thing, save and close your HTML. You’ll be able to right click the file again, knowing that it’s the most current, and open it in your browser. Do this and test all of the links to make sure that they take you to the appropriate place. Once you’re sure they do, you’re ready to convert your files.

I learned most of my HTML knowledge through the free lessons on w3Schools.com, and this is no different. If you want to see the page that taught me these basics, you can head here. They’re generic to HTML code, though, and not specifically to eBooks.

I think that’s more than enough for today. Tomorrow, I’ll have more on picking your conversion software and preparing to do the conversion.

The Full Formatting Bootcamp Syllabus:

1. Creating Your Source File
2. Customizing & Editing Your Book’s HTML
3. Finding a Conversion Software & Converting Your Book
4. Uploading Your Book for Sale

Remember to always back up your work before you edit it!!

Now, MS Word has a lot of formatting built in, and some of this can actually distort your text in the later conversions you’ll need to do. So I recommend making sure that the regular text is written in the “normal” style. Whenever you need to italicize or bold, it’s also best to use the styles available in the style list, which looks like this in Office 2010:

Italics, bold, and chapter headings should be adjusted using these styles, rather than manually changing the font, size, etc. because the styles add html tags to the file. Let me explain that a little bit more before we go on.

HTML Tags and MS Word Styles

Later, when you convert your book to an eBook, these html tags will automatically adjust based on an eReader’s settings. The text looks like this:

However, manually adjusting a Word document’s formatting makes the file look like this:

Messy, huh? The difference between those is that the latter has a lot of unnecessary html, some of which can become corrupted in the conversions. When you see eBooks with random symbols or odd spacing, that’s typically what happened: somewhere, someone messed with the source html such that it was converted improperly.

So that’s why you need to focus on these keys in your original document:

• Use the specific styles for italics, bold, and chapter headings.
• Do center text if need be using the typical means, but aside from alignment, you shouldn’t use the typical font/paragraph options.
• Don’t bother with crazy fonts. The Kindle overwrites all fonts anyway, and the uncommon ones are washed out of the ePub file. The only format that preserves fonts is a PDF, and that’s the least common format. You can, however, create a separate Word file that saves all your crazy fonts. You can later convert this one to PDF. More on that in post #3 (Converting Your Book).

Saving as HTML

The next step is to save your word file as a “filtered web page.” This will preserve the tags you just painstakingly created. You’ll need to make it HTML if you want to customize the formatting, which is necessary when adding a linked TOC. It’s not necessary if you’re only uploading to Smashwords or Amazon without a linked TOC, so you can skip straight to the last step if that’s all you’re doing. However, ePubs come out cleaner if you convert HTML, rather than a Word document.

To save as a filtered web page is as easy as it sounds. Make sure your Word document is open and hit F12 (or go to File> Save As). At the bottom where you have the option to choose the file format, choose “filtered web page” as shown:

Ta da! Your file is now an HTML-accessible file. To test this, right click on the file and choose to open it with Notepad. If Notepad isn’t available, you can search for it by browsing to the program, which is (by default) in C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe.

Don’t worry, because the file will undoubtedly have a lot of formatting in the beginning that looks like nonsense. This is normal. If you scroll down, you’ll see the rest of your book. Hurrah! Step one is completed!

More on customizing the file as HTML tomorrow, which is the next step towards getting your eBook ready.

The Full Formatting Bootcamp Syllabus:

1. Creating Your Source File
2. Customizing & Editing Your Book’s HTML
3. Finding a Conversion Software & Converting Your Book
4. Uploading Your Book for Sale

I read a quote once that was something along the lines of, “writers have several careers because they can’t admit to themselves that they are, in fact, writers.” I can’t for the life of me find it now (so if you do, please pipe in down in the comments), but man, is it true.

In my employment history, I’ve done everything short of joining the CIA…and I’m pretty sure that’s for everyone’s benefit because you don’t want me to have a gun. I’ve been a software tester, barista, jewelry sales associate, bartender, marketing intern, wedding planner, BeautiControl saleswoman, assistant to a nosy stained glass artist, manager, waitress, Yankee Candle sales associate (those candles smell like heaven)…I’m probably missing about seventeen jobs, but you get the idea.

The weird thing? I wasn’t fired from any of them. Not one. I moved on because it just wasn’t what I wanted to do anymore, and I’m not a fickle person or anything. I worked hard, even if I hated the job, because my parents taught me to always do my best, no matter what. No, I quit because the jobs just didn’t make me happy. I wasn’t passionate about any of them. The only problem was I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life. Who does, right?

Throughout it all, I scribbled plot outlines and character sketches in the corners of napkins. I escaped from the stresses of life by creating my own worlds, with complex people that had problems of their own but always found some crazy way to overcome their obstacles. It made me jealous, I tell you. Yes, jealous of fictional characters. I know. Hush.

Publishing a book had always been a dream. I loved to write and tell stories, but it didn’t seem like a feasible way to make a living. For starters, didn’t authors eat paper and warm themselves by burning their returned books? That’s what it seemed like, at least. Plus, I’d always thought that it would be too stressful to turn my passion into my primary means of making money. Wouldn’t deadlines and expectations take all of the fun out of it? I’d heard so many freelancers tell me so that I was hesitant to make the leap.

I’m not sure what snapped. Not sure what changed my mind, but I eventually told myself that enough was enough. I’d been developing and planning a rather intricate book series since 2005, and I was going to write the damn thing. I sat down, and in six months, I’d written my first rough draft of my first book. I did Nanowrimo one year, but I don’t count that. My Nanowrimo book was only 50,000 words of impromptu plot. But this…this was 130,000 words of oh-my-god-I-did-it.

Of course, editing was a beast. I cut the word count down to what was appropriate for young adult fantasy. I changed names. I rewrote the ending three times. I erased two characters completely because they just didn’t need to exist. I cut, cut, cut. I polished. I slaved over it while my husband patted my back and let me do my thing. Goodness, is he a trooper.

My book was released in October of 2011, and I can now write full time. I’m a full time author. Haha! And I love it. I realized that all those hourly and salaried positions were just J-O-Bs: the means to an end. But now, I finally started my career. And I’ve never been happier working overtime.

I guess the snuggly-hug-fest moral of the story is to keep going. I wrote Lichgates at nights and on weekends, and largely sacrificed much of my personal life for it. But now that the book is out there—now that it’s real—it was worth every ounce of caffeine I consumed to keep me going.

Thanks for having me here today! And to everyone interested in a fun comments discussion: what was your craziest/oddest/most-fun job ever?

Hello, my darlings!

I have two awesome things to tell you:

1. I’m in the Children’s Week Blog Hop, and as such, I’m giving away a signed print edition of my debut YA epic fantasy novel, The Grimoire: Lichgates.
2. All proceeds from the eBook sales of The Grimoire: Lichgates will be donated to St. Jude Children’s Research Hosptital between May 7 – 9!

See? Good things abound!

The Charity Drive!

Between May 7 – 9, I’m lowering the price of The Grimoire: Lichgates to just $0.99. To boot, all profits from these sales will go right to the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, which as most of you know is a fantastic center that gives children a new hope at life. I love what they do, and I figured this is a great way to support them.

So grab yourself a book and do good at the same time, knowing that the profits will go to St. Jude’s.

Make a second donation to St. Jude’s

The Giveaway!

This is a blog hop, after all, and what’s a blog hop without a giveaway? Well, not a blog hop, I’d reckon.

Enter below for a chance to win an autographed, print edition copy of the young adult epic fantasy adventure, The Grimoire: Lichgates. This one lucky winner will also get a book swag bundle filled with Grimoire Trilogy-themed goodies!

Remember, you can tweet once per day for extra entries. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Make sure you check out the other links on the blog hop!

Hey everyone! My name is S. M. Boyce, and I’m the author ofLichgates. It’s the first novel in a young adult fantasy adventure trilogy that was just recently published, and I’m here to stand on a box and throw copies at random passersby. Just kidding. I only do that on Tuesdays.

Today, I’m honored to have the keys to “Thoughts from a Yodeling Goatherder.” I won’t lie. Half of my excitement stems from the fact that it’s a freaking amazing name for a blog. Just saying. It makes me want to go out on a mountain and try my hand at it. I bet V. L. Locey is much better yodeler than me, though.

I love the caption contests that Locey does, too, though I must admit I’m not the best captioner. I usually come up with something days later, when the joke’s over, and laugh quietly to myself in my little corner of the café. People leave me alone there. Not sure why…

Anyway, I’m here on my Lichgates Hidden World Blog Tour to offer you some fun freebies and talk about the wonderful world of pets and all things fuzzy. This is my little bundle of mischief:

Oh, he looks cute. But that’s his greatest weapon. It’s hard to be mad at him for eating the legs off the coffee table when he gives you that face. 

I haven’t actually had many dogs in my life; mostly horses, actually. It’s neat to see Locey talk about the hillside farm, since I get flashbacks to the farm where I grew up. We harvested hay one summer, but apart from that, it was just a horse farm. My mom always wanted a goat, and after reading this blog for a while, I’m starting to see why!

I actually came up with most of the plot and world development for Lichgates while on that farm. We had this open field in the front right of the house, which we never really used except for extra parking if my parents had a party. It was completely covered in clover – it was just a thick blanket of soft weeds that were perfect for falling into and staring off into space. I love the smell of clover —it’s warm, but kind of sweet, and always reminds me of peaceful summers where nothing matters except for hoping it doesn’t rain while you’re sitting out there. I also had a great view of my mom’s garden, with her azaleas and black-eyed susans. It was always interesting to me that those beautiful flowers were so well-maintained and yet never really appreciated as more than being something pretty to look at, while I actually enjoyed the clover more.

These clover-moments actually inspired a prominent theme in the Grimoire Trilogy. I won’t go into too much detail, but clovers are a frequent motif. Additionally, it inspired this line:

“Life requires balance. Though a dandelion is never as stunning as an orchid, we would never appreciate a flower’s beauty without also appreciating a weed’s simplicity. Therefore, we must accept that there is evil if we are to understand what it means to be good.”

It’s a little snippet, one that will be often overlooked, but it makes me smile every time I read it. It reminds me of the farm, my horse, and the time I accidentally mistook my mom’s prized ivy vines as weeds and removed them in a weeding frenzy one spring.

Oops. Sorry, Mom.

If you have a fond farm memory, too, I’d love to hear it. I’ll get us another round of coffee and we can settle in to talk in the comments.

Ah, and before I go, make sure you enter the giveaway that’s coming up here in a minute. You can win a free eBook copy ofLichgates (whatever format you’d like) and some pretty fun book swag. So enter the giveaway and let’s talk farms, pets, and other fuzzy things in the comments!

Snag Your Copy of Lichgates:

• Amazon USA

• Amazon UK

• Barnes & Noble

• Smashwords

• CreateSpace

Connect with Boyce:

• Main Site

• Blog

• Official Book Website & Encyclopedia

• Twitter

• Goodreads

• Facebook

• Google+

• Youtube

No, this isn’t a post about aliens. I’m talking about gratitude.

I wanted to take a moment to step back from the marketing ideas, plot developments, writing advice, blogs, Google Analytics, SEO…*takes a deep breath* You get what I’m saying.

So often, we lose ourselves to the busy, busy, business of life and forget that we can’t make it alone. We all need someone, whether it’s the book blogger who reviewed your book, the reader who tweeted you to tell you they loved it, the friend who let vent about a bad review (in private), or the spouce/significant other/family member who is just always there, always encouraging. No matter how hard you work, life isn’t something you can go alone. Well, I guess it can be, but it’s a lonely place.

Sure, I wrote The Grimoire: Lichgates. I designed and outlined the trilogy. The world of Ourea is my original idea, and the characters are quite often drawn from bits and piece of the people I know in my life. But my husband could have complained when I preferred writing to watching TV with him. Instead, he asked me how much further I got each night. He read my book. He brainstormed with me. Hell, the man knows the plots for every single one of my novels and helped me work through the rougher, more complicated kinks when I had trouble. He’s honest when something sucks. That’s huge! He’s amazing. I don’t think I could have made it here without him.

And then there are my beta readers: my parents, of course, and my writing friends. Darling authors like Rebecca Hamilton and my editor, Stuart Kirby. There were book bloggers like J. Scott Sharp, Rob Zimmermann, Jessica Fortunato, C. J. Listro, and too many more to name. My readers made a longtime dream come true: I am an internationally read author.

Thank you.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

If you want to make a difference, go thank someone today. Give someone a hug, or tell them how much they helped you.

It takes a second, but it’ll make their day.