Tag Archive | writing process

Under the Harvest Moon: A Bluestocking Belles Collection with Friends

Celebrating the Belles’ latest project: Release Day has finally arrived!

As the village of Reabridge in Cheshire prepares for the first Harvest Festival following Waterloo, families are overjoyed to welcome back their loved ones from the war.

But excitement quickly turns to mystery when mere weeks before the festival, an orphaned child turns up in the town—a toddler born near Toulouse to an English mother who left clues that tie her to Reabridge.

With two prominent families feuding for generations and the central event of the Harvest Moon festival looming, tensions rise, and secrets begin to surface.

Nine award winning and bestselling authors have combined their talents to create this engaging and enchanting collection of interrelated tales. Under the Harvest Moon promises an unforgettable read for fans of Regency romance.

Check this five-star review from N.N. Light Book Heaven.

Order now at $0.99 before the price goes up to $5.99!

It’s a Long Process

You might not realize how much effort it takes to create an anthology such as this, where tales written by very different authors share the setting and characters all come together to form the overall panorama of the event. In a nutshell, it involves:

rounding up authors
determining a project manager, promotion manager, proofreaders, cover manager, and formatter.
setting up a schedule: deadlines for first drafts, two rounds of beta reading for and by each author, cover, blurbs, media kits (with excerpts, tweets, and memes), review requests, etc.),
brainstorming ideas (authors)
building a consensus on: setting, time, events, plot, characters, background information, etc. (In essence, creating a story bible for the project)
writing the story (frequently referring to the story bible and also a Facebook page for the purpose of conversing with other authors)
reading and commenting on the work of other authors (the Belles do two rounds, so that authors end up reading all of the stories by the end of the second round)
discussing and coming to a consensus on the cover (cover manager)
forming a media kit from the individual marketing collateral sheets created by each author (promotion manager)
uploading a “dummy” file to enable preorders (formatter)
proofreading the entire Word document (proofreaders)
formatting the entire document (formatter)
proofreading the entire formatted document (proofreaders)
correcting the formatted document (formatter)
requesting reviews (authors)
participating in promotional activities (Facebook, etc.)
uploading final version of project at least ten days prior to Release Date (formatter)

Of course, things don’t always go according to plan. Deadlines don’t always get met because Life interferes. Somebody discovers that something doesn’t fit in with the historical setting, so a Plan B must be created. Things like that. But the more you can keep people on schedule, the easier it is to get the job done with a minimum of stress and anxiety.

It takes time. For the Belles, at least 15 months. Because let’s face it, we’re working on our own stories at the same time. And Life, you know.

But the Belles have become really, really good at this sort of thing. Storm & Shelter (2021) won a RONE Award. Under the Harvest Moon has just become a finalist at N.N. Lights Book Heaven. The Bluestocking Belles do anthologies quite well indeed. And we’re just getting started!

Find out more about Under the Harvest Moon here.

Winners! We Have Winners!

We’ve given away nine weekly prizes, which included a Bluestocking Belles pouch, an Under the Harvest Moon amulet, and a choice of one of the Belles’ books. Congratulations to all the winners!

M.S. Funderburk
Catherine Maguire
Glenda Martillotti
Cathy French
Merysa Rios
Peggy Salkill
Lysette Lam
Annette Prejean
Susan Heim

After compiling every entry from all nine Rafflecopters, the Grand Prize Winner was randomly chosen. And it’s

Lysette Lam!

Congratulations, Lysette! You have won a $100 gift card from the store of your choice!

You Can Be a Winner Too!

A random commenter on this post will win an Under the Harvest Moon Amulet. Contest ends October 18, 2023.

The Maumee Valley Romance Authors, Inc.

I’ve even got my local writing group involved in an anthology project for December 2024. Which will be a bit different because we all write very different sub-genres. The only connection between the stories (besides us) is that they will be Christmas stories. (I used the Belles’ basic scheme to come up with a schedule similar to the above outline.) I think the excitement of getting everyone published will keep us all on task for the next year. One member has already completed her first draft, and it’s not due until January!

Check out our Book Lovers Facebook page! Twitter: http://twitter.com/MVRAIInc

Who’s Tagging Whom? Authors Discuss the Writing Process

Mar17

Beverley Eikli

I was tagged by Beverley Eikli to participate in this meme. I met Beverley at the Romantic Times Convention last year in Kansas City. A fellow Ellora’s Cave author, she writes historical romance, although hers are spicier than mine! I invited her to join History Lovers, a Facebook group started by a few of us who participated in NANO in 2012.And so we’ve kept in touch by exchanging blog posts and helping each other get the word out about our books.

Beverley Eikli is the author of eight historical romances.

She has worked as a journalist, magazine editor, a safari lodge manager in the Okavango, and an airborne geophysical survey operator on contracts around the world.

Beverley wrote her first romance at seventeen, but drowning her heroine on the last page was symptomatic of the problems she grappled with during her 23-year journey towards publication.

Recently she received her third nomination from Australian Romance Readers for Favourite Historical Romance with her suspenseful Napoleonic espionage Romance The Reluctant Bride.

Beverley teaches in the Department of Professional Writing & Editing at Victoria University, Melbourne. She also teaches Short Courses for the Centre of Adult Education and Macedon Ranges Further Education.

Beverley writes under the name Beverley Oakley for more sensual stories.

You can visit her website at: www.beverleyeikli.com and her blog at: http:www.beverleyeikli.blogspot.com.au.

Click above to read a recent post featuring Beverley on Susana’s Morning Room.

Susana’s Writing Process

What am I working on?

My current WIP in a time travel romance that includes my time-traveling Regency lady, Lady Pendleton. It’s about 50K so far and I’m currently working on Chapter 13, with about six more to go. I’m hoping to finish it by the end of the month so I can work on the story I’m planning for this year’s Cotillion Christmas anthology. For more information, check out my March 10^th post, “Lady P in Florida and a Sneak Preview of “A Home For Helena.”

How does my work differ from others in the genre?

This particular story is unique (I think) because I’m using my blog character, Lady P, as a secondary character. Readers of my blog are familiar with her antics through interviews and discussions about Regency England. Lady P, who bears an uncanny resemblance to my mother (LOL), is an eccentric widow, an empty-nester, who somehow discovered time travel and amuses herself by popping into the future every now and then. Hmm…just got an idea. Someday I’ll have to write about how Lady P got into time travel in the first place. (Hint: it has something to do with a gypsy lady who seems to possess the gift of immortality.)

My traditional Regencies thus far tend to focus on rural England and the financial and marriage difficulties faced by the gentility. No dukes so far, but the hero and heroine of Treasuring Theresa are both titled. While balls and social events do show up occasionally, my protagonists aren’t social butterflies. Whether titled and wealthy or not, they have responsibilities in life beyond shopping and gossip.

Why do I write what I write?

From the time I discovered Georgette Heyer and Jean Plaidy, I’ve been fascinated with history. Not the sort of thing we had to study in high school with battles and dates, but the way people lived.

What was it like to be the oldest daughter in a household of daughters and feel like you have to sacrifice yourself in marriage in order to secure the future of your sisters? Marriage was pretty much the only future for a woman in the Regency; Jane Austen and her sister were able to remain single through the kindness of family members, but many women were not so fortunate.

Financial hardship is another common problem. In A Twelfth Night Tale, Lucy’s grandfather gambled away nearly everything, and her father has had to work hard to build up the family’s small estate. In Treasuring Theresa, Lady Theresa’s father was victimized by an embezzler, and he had to use her dowry to run the estate. He thought he’d have time to build it back up, but then he became ill and realized that when he died, the entailed estate would go to a distant cousin and his daughter would be homeless.

I’m fascinated by these situations. And yes, I love the gowns and the balls and the scenery and just about everything else associated with this period, but to me, it’s the characters and their dilemmas that really make a story.

How does my writing process work?

A good question. After two years of calling myself a full-time writer, I think I am finally beginning to understand what that means. It doesn’t mean I write all day long, although I tried that. The problem is that I need time to let ideas and scenes percolate in my mind. I might get 3,000 words done if I write for six hours straight, but they are not pleasant hours. I feel too much pressure, and then there’s the guilt when something interrupts and I only get 1000 words done and I feel like I have to do 4000 the next day. After awhile, I realize I am miserable, and hey, I didn’t choose this career because I wanted to be miserable.

And then there’s promotion. Once I had Treasuring Theresa to promote, I had blogs to write, ads and swag to create, and social media to tend to. I enjoy these things—almost too much—and it’s easy to spend hours doing them rather than moving forward on my current WIP. Just about every author I know has the same dilemma, even though we know for a fact that the WIP is far more important!

They tell me it takes three weeks (21 days) to form a habit. I’ve made it a priority to write at least two hours every morning. At first I had to push myself. There were many other things I’d rather be doing, but I just keep telling myself to keep writing and do the other stuff later. If I have a meeting or doctor appointment to go to, I don’t beat myself up about it. That’s life. And believe it or not, it’s worked! These days I just sit down in front of the computer and start working. I don’t whine about it. And when I’m done, whether I’ve written 800 or 2000 words—usually it’s around 1000—that’s it for the day. I can write blog posts or play Candy Crush all I want, and I don’t have to feel guilty. I can LOVE writing again!

But, you say, how can you call yourself a full-time writer if you’re only doing it two hours a day? Because I can, that’s why. 🙂 And because a good chunk of the rest of the day is spent doing writing-related work.

Have you ever tried to make or break a habit using the 21-day method? How has it worked for you?

Now…I’m Tagging…ta da

Nancy Levine

Nancy Goldberg Levine sold her first romance novel, Tempting Noah, in 1999. She is the author of more than sixty short stories, and published her first e-book, Mr. Short, Dark…& Funny in 2012. She writes humorous sweet contemporary romantic comedies. She lives in Cincinnati, Ohio with a spoiled cat who is named Jay after the hero of Mr. Short, Dark…& Funny.

Mr. Short, Dark…& Funny

Mr. Tall, Tan…& Tasteless

Sweeter Than W(h)ine

Three Strikes You’re In Love

Vivien Jackson

When I was eight, I wrote a story about Han Solo. The next year I read Tolkien and Barbara Cartland. Romance and science fiction and corsets and blasters and Balrogs have been muddled in my brain ever since. Once upon a time, I married a charming scoundrel who may also be a nerf herder. Still like him a whole lot.