Alana Melos's Blog, page 9

Villainess #2: The Prince of Cups is LIVE on Amazon!

I was so busy running the event for its opening that I forgot to post here that it was live! Yes, Villainess #2: The Prince of Cups is LIVE on Amazon. Now that I'm calming down from meeting the deadline, I'm going through and actually reading it and being kind of amazed that it came out so smoothly. I don't know if other authors have that sensation? Of course, now that I'm not trying to be critical, I see things I want to change as I'm reading, heh. I just make note of it, and move on.

The cov...

Running Your Event on Facebook

Boring title. Ah, well.

Now that I've come down off of the high and madness of getting The Prince of Cups released, I can share some of my observations from this whole self-promotion thing from both sides of the event thing: attending an author takeover at someone else's event, and running your own.

Author Takeover
Bryce has a blog, and he's listed a lot of the tips and hints there that I will repeat.


Invite everyone. Even if it's just for an hour... invite them. That's why you're friends with th...

Independent Publishing Vs. Traditional Publishing

It occurs to me that there's really one or two big differences between indie publishing and traditional publishing. In traditional publishing, you of course, submit your manuscript and they, the publishers, decide if they want to publish it. You have less control over your book, but you also have access to editors, which help to polish and shape your book, giving it a smooth, professional read, as well as a professionally done cover. But as a book reader? You wait forever for them to come out...

Finding Your Character's Voices

This is inspired by a fellow writer's words to me, upon reading the first edited draft of The Prince of Cups. I'm going to quote part of what he said here, so that we're all on the same page.

What I find fascinating is that your characters are so different from mine, yet they're very real. Just as you're a very different person from me even though we get along well.

It's not just because they are born from separate heads, though of course that's a lot of it, but because our character's voices a...

Cyber Monday Sale!

For Cyber Monday, I am having a sale of 22 different erotica titles! Just go to my profile and click the one your heart desires. :)

Just remember... Sexy as fuck for under a buck!

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Talent Versus Popularity

It's been a while since I wrote (and these are words which will count towards my Nano total! Nyah!) and this post has been lingering in the back of my mind for a while. When it comes to success, what is better? Talent or popularity?

Obviously, the key here is to define what "success" means to you. If being successful means making lots of money, then it's hands down popularity. If you're not popular, you will not make money. Ergo... popularity wins.

If being successful means being fulfilled pers...

New Naughty Book Snitch Review ~ Sorceress of Desire

Yes, finally I have gotten back on the reviewing kick after a little while of being absent. Not really absent, but I was concentrating on finishing Operation: Deep Nine and now I'm concentrating on finishing Prince of Cups. It's at 52,000 words so far... officially novel length! In two thousand words, it will officially be double the size of Queen of Swords. I'm ... really happy about that. End result? Not much time for reviewing.

Here is the review on the Naughty Book Snitch site. Check it ou...

Rock Hardin: Agent of A.S.S. Operation: Deep Nine is Live on Amazon!

I'm a bit late in announcing it here on the blog because it was my anniversary weekend too. Yes, I got married on Halloween. Plus, with all the hours I was working lately, I was pretty beat. But yes, Rock Hardin: Agent of A.S.S. Operation: Deep Nine is now live!

Jotham, so excited by the sexy spy series, has made like nine covers for it already. Nine. This is a tough series for me to write, so I will poke at them slowly and when they are done, they will be done... but I can't waste nine of his...

How I Plot My Novels (Part IV of IV)

The last thing I want to talk about for novel plotting deals mostly with a series of novels. As I look this up on Wikipedia, I'm rather shocked the idea of a "metaplot" is only linked to role-playing games! If you look around, metaplots are everywhere. As before, this contains spoilers for The Queen of Swords, and the upcoming The Prince of Cups, and in general the Villainess series. They won't be too bad, but I would highly recommend reading the first book so you know what I'm talking about...

How I Plot My Novels (Part III of IV)

There's an actual number now associated with these posts! This one will deal with the climax and denouement, and the last one dealing with what I call the "metaplot".

Act III: Climax
The climax is pretty easy to explain: it's the climax of the book, the big O, the main event, what everything else in the book was leading up to. In this case, it's confronting Harry about the betrayal. Being Caprice is who she is, she at first wanted to see if she could sleep with him again. It wasn't just because...