Krystle Jones's Blog

And here it is!

Hi, everyone. It's been a while since my last post, so I thought I'd give you all an update.

I'm sorry April came and went without releasing CMH. The book is finished, but it's not where I want it to be. It's not even ready for beta due to the amount of holes I've found. I think that's one of the hard parts of writing a series piece; you have to make sure everything lines up with previous content. So I'm working on fixing it, and I'm honestly not sure when it will be ready. Soon, I hope, but I don't want to rush it out either before it's ready. I love these characters so much, and I don't want to muck up the last book in their tale.

As for SSD, I'm working on the cover. (I already have a mock-up. Now I'm designing the final piece.) I think you guys will really like it. I still need to rewrite the synopsis, and I don't know when I'm going to get to that because I have other books I'm focusing on right now. One step at a time, slow and steady and all that. I think the book will be relatively quick to write because it's been stewing in my mind for some time now, but I probably won't get to it until later. So the summer release might actually be more of a fall or winter release. We shall see.

I'm sorry I keep missing deadlines. I'm trying to set full-time goals when I'm only able to give a part-time effort to them. At first, it really frustrated me because I felt like a failure since I wasn't accomplishing what I wanted to. I see the people around me producing X amount of books in a year, and I feel like I have to keep up. So I set goals that look good on paper, and I stretch myself thin trying to reach them. In hindsight I see those goals were unrealistic from the start, so I was really setting myself up for failure. I've learned to accept what I can and cannot do for now. And I have to be okay with it until I have more time to devote to writing and doing the other things I love, like music and art. Realistically, I'm not going to be able to go full-time until my bills are paid down, which won't happen until the end of next year. That feels like forever, but I know it has to be done if I have any prayer at staying self-employed for very long. I don't want to make the leap and then have to turn around and get a day job again three months later because I can't pay my bills. So I'm trying to do what I can with each day, and not feel guilty about it because I'm not moving as fast as I would like.

I'll try to post a chapter from CMH soon as I have something I feel is ready (or close to it). Same with SSD's cover, which shouldn't take me that long to finish. If you have any questions about anything, let me know and I'll do my best to answer.

Krystle

I've giving away the last 3 paperback copies on my shelf with the old cover! You can enter for a chance to win one over at Goodreads by clicking the link below. Open to U.S. only.
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Goodreads Book Giveaway The Scarlet Dagger by Krystle Jones Giveaway ends May 04, 2013.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter to win

Here are the paperback covers! Good news is since they're 8.5x5.5, I can keep the price down. Meaning TSD paperback will be $7.99 and the DH paperbacdk will be $8.99. I'm waiting on the review process to complete at Createspace, then I can order proofs, see if they work, and make the paperbacks available.

* Correction 4/6/13: I just realized the first paragraph on DH got cut off because I didn't extend the text box far enough. Fixed now!
 CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO ENLARGE
 
 

So here they are! I'll be switching them over on the retail sites, as well as Goodreads, soon.

       

So the two-column thing is something I've been wanting to try for a while now. "Make the site work harder" and all that. Plus, it gives me room to pin more things, which I'm going enjoy doing over the next few days.

What do you think of the header? I've been playing around in Photoshop, and am having A BALL! It's fun cutting up stuff and making it look pretty. =3 (Not that it didn't before.) It amazes me how flexible and powerful that program is. I'm also finished redoing the covers for the entire Red Sector trilogy, plus Dark Knight, my Aden Knight novella. The trilogy covers will be revealed here soon. I figured I'd go ahead and switch them over so people can get used to looking at the new covers. I'd like to have the new one up when I release CMH. This is probably the last time I'll touch these covers or do anything major to the site, so I'm excited to let things chill for a while and see what everyone thinks. I think you guys will like the new look of the series.

I'm not sure if I'm doing paperbacks for the series or not. Probably, but I'm focusing mainly on ebooks right now because overhead cost is lower. (And money's tight this month thanks to two sick kitties =( and car tags that are mega-$$$.) I do have a few stray copies of The Scarlet Dagger with the old cover I'm probably going to give away here soon to clear off my bookshelf. Details to come.

Smile So Dark will be getting a new look too, and I'm really liking that cover. Haven't redone the synopsis yet, but it's on my to do list for my days off this week.

I'm thinking about opening up a site to do book covers, headers, bookmarks, etc. for authors. Right now I'm tentatively calling it Luminosity Designs. It might be another few months though before I can build up a beefy enough portfolio to make this viable. All I know is I'm glad I bought Photoshop, and I'd like to keep rolling with this book cover making thing.

 I'll post the new covers to the vampire series tomorrow, so check back if you'd like. =) Right now, I'm off to watch the season 3 premiere of Game of Thrones. <3

When something's broke, you have to figure out how to fix it. And since SSD isn't doing a good job atm of getting on people's radars, that's exactly what I have to do.

One of the "problems" I think is that there are a gazillion books being published - which is awesome. Readers and writers have a lot of freedom now to choose what they want to read and write. But it also means it's harder to get noticed with the deluge of books coming out. So I have to figure out a way to make the book "pop".

I'm done re-outlining it. As I said in an earlier post, one of the things to be axed is the love triangle. I think the trope has worn out its welcome, at least until it comes back "in style" again. Plus, the whole fact one LI was her boyfriend I don't think set well with people, and it was starting to make me uneasy as I was writing. So the boyfriend is becoming one of her best friends, which still works out incredibly well.

The love story's also going to be the main focus, which is something different for me. I've started writing romance under an alias (which I'm keeping private for now), and it's been fun learning the ropes of the genre. It's definitely a different animal because the growing relationship between the H/h is the main focus rather than all the action and the general plot. I'm looking forward to applying what I've learned with my pen name toward this book.

I've also been learning my way around Photoshop, and I'm freaking addicted. I'm currently in the process of redesigning all my covers, and I'm having a LOT of fun. I probably won't reveal them until I have all of them done, but I think you guys will really like the new look. (Note: This has NOTHING to do with not liking Robin's work. She is 100% fantastic to work with, and she produces nothing but the highest quality covers. But since the 'Krystle Jones' brand in general is going in a different direction with the feel of my books, the outward appearance has to change to reflect that.) And yes, that means the layout and appearance of the site will change again, but hopefully this will be the last big change for a while.

SSD's release date isn't finalized yet. In fact, if anything, it's a bit ambiguous right now. I really want to finish the vampire series (companion novellas included) before moving on with my faeries. This helps me keep one story world in my head, which I think helps me write faster. And I'm all about writing faster.

Well, I'm off to work on CMH. Getting close to the end now, which is such an awesome feeling. =)

Ttfn,

Krystle

Every night before Amelia falls asleep she makes a wish to dream of him – the man who calls her to their beautiful private oasis, her sanctuary where she is free of her greedy landlord’s threats. But tonight, he will not call Amelia to him. Tonight, another man will step into her world to claim her. Tonight, Amelia’s shattering reality will crumble - and disappear into the Dreamscape…along with her freedom.

When Amelia dreams tonight, her nightmare becomes her new world where Seth is her captor and anything is possible…except escape. Seth needs Amelia to break the curse that binds him to the Dreamscape. He must convince her that she was made to free him, that she was made to join him.

For if he fails, he will never escape his prison, and he will lose Earth to the Netherworld where the evil Erobos wait to consume the human realm and everything in it. If he fails, Seth will lose the one thing that matters to him: Amelia.
 
Christie Rich

Biography
I grew up daydreaming about fairytales, and my love for discovering new worlds has never died. I am not one of those writers who always knew I would write. I thought that was what other people did until one day a few years ago, I took a challenge from a friend and typed my first words. My journey has been wonderful, and I cannot imagine a day where I would ever give up writing. My love for reading is what fueled my imagination in the first place and still does. When I am not writing or reading, I am enjoying family time with my husband and two children. I also dabble in painting but writing has taken over my creative time right now.  I hope to get back to it at some point in my life, but I'm not sure when I'll have time for it.  My family and I live in a quiet community  in Northern Utah, and I am so thankful for the rich life I have been blessed with.Where you can find Christie:
Website  l  Blog  l  Goodreads  l  Pinterest  l  Twitter  l  Facebook
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Doesn't it sound awesome? And I love the cover. *_* Can't wait for its release!

Since I saw from my site stats many of you are looking for the last book, I thought I'd post an update. I'm over halfway done with CMH. Depending on how smoothly things go in the second half, I should still be able to do the April release like I planned. I think I'm also going to include Dark Knight in there as a bonus, since I won't have a way of uploading it to Amazon or Barnes and Noble without attaching a price tag to it. I will upload it to Smashwords and Kobo, though, since I do have the ability to make it free there.

I think I'm going to try to start leaning away from love triangles, simply because you run the risk of pissing off one party or another depending on who the heroine ends up with. They might know she's going to end up with so-and-so, but that doesn't mean they're any happier about it. Thus, low ratings. I like pleasing readers, but I also like creating art, and I think of stories as art. They're subjective. There are books out there I've loved that have some really low ratings, and vice versa. That's just how things are. But still, the love triangle is a trope I'm going to do away with for a while after the banshee series. It will be a little watered down from where it was, simply because I decided to take the story in a different direction I think better suits it and reflects what I've learned as a writer these past few years.

I've also decided to redo the covers for the banshee book and the vampire books. I love Robin's, but as I evolve as a writer and my voice becomes truer, everything else has to evolve along with it. The stories I've written won't change, but the synopses for some will be rewritten. Personally, I think the synopsis for DH and SSD are way too long. I'm definitely going to work at tightening those up when the new covers go live. I already have images picked out, but I have to figure out what I'm doing in Photoshop first before revealing the "new look." Photo manipulation is something I've been really interested in, so I'm excited to learn more about it. (Art was my first creative love, BTW.) I might also do my first tour for the series when the vampire trilogy is complete and the new covers are live. Who knows? We'll see. A lot of it depends on time and money.

So I thought I'd share the book love and tell you a bit about what I've been reading. I always try to make time to read a lot because I feel it helps me as a writer. Thankfully, we have a fabulous public library system that gets in a ton of new titles. I've currently checked out
Girl of Nightmares by Kendare Blake, Rift by Andrea Cremer, My Life Next Door by Huntley Fitzpatrick, and Wake by Amanda Hocking. I'm also excited Melissa Marr announced she'll be writing another Wicked Lovely book based off her Desert Tales graphic novels. I have scores of other books I want to read, the pile of which keeps getting higher. Some others that have caught my eye this week are Teardrop by Lauren Kate, Freak of Nature by Julia Crane, Unbreakable by Kami Garcia, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea by April Genevieve Tucholke, Icons by Margaret Stohl, Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo, Spellcaster by Claudia Gray, Crown of Midnight by Sarah J. Maas, Gameboard of the Gods by Richelle Mead, Scarlet by Marissa Meyer, Of Triton by Anna Banks, Death's Awakening by Sarah Cannon, and Let the Sky Fall by Shannon Messenger. That's just a few that have caught my eye because of the storyline, I loved the first book, I'm a fan of the author, or the cover snagged my attention. ;) You'll have to check them out to see if any interest you.

Let's start with the bad news first so we can get it out of the way. (If you want to start with the good, it's clearly labeled below so you can jump to it, then spring back up here if you want.)

The Bad News

In a nutshell, I'm scraping my draft of Smile So Dark and am starting over. I've grown a lot as a writer these past three years. SSD was one of the first books I attempted to write, and now that I have more writing mileage under my belt, it shows. I'm not saying that what I have isn't good. It's just not the type of book I want it to be, and I think it no longer reflects on where I'm currently at as a writer. I want it to go deeper. I want a more mature tone for it. And I want the romance to stand out more. In short, I want more. I don't think rewriting it is going to take that long because the story I've outlined for the rewrite has actually turned out to be a much shorter book. A lot of the original material is there, but the story itself is tighter with a clearer image for me. So the original March release date is gone. I don't know when I'm going to get it out. I think probably sometime this summer, either May or June. We'll see how things go with the vampire books.

I also have to rewrite the synopsis to accurately reflect the new tone. Right now, it hints at more thriller/mystery with some romance, and the rewrite has the romance as the focus with a more mature heroine. Valerie, my banshee, was the original inspiration for Sloane's personality. In order to not have her copy Sloane, I needed to turn Valerie into something else. I like the thoughtful, passionate girl I've come up with, and I hope you guys will too when you get to meet her. I'm also changing her boyfriend Zach to just her best friend Zach. Her attraction to Julian, the competitor for her love, is grounded with a good reason that I think readers will understand by the end of the novel, but I think a lot of people are turned off by the fact she'd be leaving/betraying her boyfriend, and I can't blame them. It's not how traditional romances work. And since my target is romance readers, I have to make it work for them.

The cover might also change to reflect the new mood, but I haven't quite decided on that yet. I adore the cover it has, but again, it was created with the original synopsis in mind. I don't want to give the wrong impression and attract the wrong type of reader with "false advertising". So, I have my work cut out for me here. I apologize to anyone who was looking forward to this book's release in March. It's just not going to happen. I have to give you guys a better book because I believe I'm capable of a better book than what I've written. You guys have stood by me and sent me encouragement, and I owe it to you to do my best. On the flipside, if you've been following my other series, I think you'll like the good news.

The Good News

Since SSD is being pushed back, that means Cross My Heart is up to bat. I doubt I'll have it out any sooner than April since it's the last book in the series and will be fairly long because it's tying up loose ends, but I am comfortable with the material I have now, and that's a good third of the novel. I'm really looking forward to completing the series. I think you guys will approve of the ending. I've had it in mind since I wrote the first book. CMH will have a lot more depth to it and be a little less high-octane from what DH was like. It calls for it. There's a lot of emotional upheaval left over from book 2 that needs resolution, so it makes sense IMO to make the third and final book delve deeper into the characters' inner motives.

Will it be the last book in the series? Yes, as far as the main trilogy goes. I'm also planning on releasing two companion novellas from Arika's point of view. I'd been planning to for a while but couldn't talk about them until book 2 was released and you actually knew who she was. I decided on the companion novels because I felt it was important for the readers to gain more insight into her character, and I couldn't fully give that to you in the main trilogy because then she'd take over as MC, and Sloane wouldn't like that very much. I don't have covers or synopses yet, but the companion to DH is titled Bloodrose and the companion to CMH is titled On Scarlet Wings. Arika has a lot of emotional scar tissue (as you'll learn why in CMH), and I think her side of the story is important enough to tell from her perspective. Since these books will be shorter (novellas tend to run between 35-50k), I'm guessing it won't take me long to complete them. I hope to have them out pretty close to CMH so I can lay the entire Red Sector world to rest and give my full focus to my faeries.

So that's it. If you have questions or comments, let me know, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. (Please know soon is a relative term. 2013 is turning out to be pretty packed.)

Happy reading,

Krystle