Marching into Spring

There may still be snow on the ground but at least the sun is shining now and then. Soon enough yard work will be back on the weekend agenda. Until then, I'm busy working on Seeker : Book 4 of The Narvan. The fine tuning edits are going slowly but I'm nearing halfway done. The final book in the main series is shaping up to be a long one, but hopefully also fulfilling for all the characters and wrapping up the series plot. 

Spindelkin is leaving Kindle Vella as I type this. The YA Fantasy novel is next up for going to print once I get Seeker out to proofreaders. 

Frayed, a YA urban fantasy (work in progress) will be hitting Kindle Vella as soon as I have time to get the first chapters edited and uploaded. Here's the cover so far. I'll be playing with it for months, I'm sure. I'm still playing with the cover for Spindelkin, for goodness sake. Nothing is set in stone until it goes to print. 

Upcoming book signing events:

Hall of Heroes Con in Elkhart IN - March 5-6

Grand Rapids Women's Expo in Grand Rapids, MI - March 18-20

Grand Rapids Spring fling Comic Con in Grand Rapids, MI - April 8-10

Tulip City Comic con in Holland, MI - April 24

Whitestown Viking Festival in Whitestown, IN - April 29 - May 1

And speaking of the Viking Festival, I finally finished sewing my new garb.  I had to relearn how to weave. It's been a long time since the fiber arts weeks of art class in high school. All the trim is tablet woven, which, in theory was going to give me some time to kick back and watch Netflix while I worked on it, but it turns out you have to have to actually pay attention to what you're doing. (My first strip has a about five different patterns in it because I kept losing count.)Well, crap. I ended up switching to an easier pattern for the rest of it and still had to keep flipping a paper to remind myself whether I was going forward or backward. Short term memory and I are not great friends. 

Lots of layers for all weather. 

Squeezing out the last wavering inches of tablet weaving.
Its is professional? No. Will it suffice? Yep.

If you're not familiar with 

the Insecure Writers Support 

Group, check it out here 

and find links to all the other 

participating writers.

Which brings us to this month's Insecure Writer's Support Group question: 

Have you ever been conflicted about writing a story or adding a scene to your story?

The short answer: Yes, but I almost always write them anyway. It's just whether I let anyone else ever see them. 

But seriously, I'm just gonna go ahead and overthink that question. Long answer: Sure. But for multiple reasons. 

A. The story or scene is too close to home. I'm pretty sure I touched on this one in a previous IWSG post. Writing is a good place to work though difficult emotions or situations, like therapy, able to distance ourselves a little and see it through a character instead of ourselves. But sometimes those things are too private or sensitive to share or might offend family members if they see through the thin veil of fiction.

B. I'm just not ready to tell that story. I don't have enough experience or knowledge of a topic or lifestyle to accurately covey what I want to show. Or it's not a genre I'm comfortable writing yet. There are a few stories lurking on my hard drive that are waiting for me to do research/gain life experience.

C. The scene might not fit in the book as a whole, but I'm jonesing to write it anyway. I almost always give into to this urge and see where it goes. It's about 70/30 in favor of ending up in the book, often with major edits to make it mesh, but these are usually great emotional moments or add depth of character.

And if you've made it this far though this month's blog post. You deserve chicks. Meet the newest additions to my flock. 

Olive Egger

Midnight Mystic Maran

Blue-laced Golden Wyandotte

Congratulations, you made it to the end. :) What are you up to this month?