R.R. Campbell's Blog, page 14
April 19, 2019
This Monday: an Imminent Dawn Ebook Giveaway!
Remember, starting this Monday, April 22nd, I’ll be giving away ten ebook copies of book one in the EMPATHY series, Imminent Dawn, to commemorate the launch of Mourning Dove!
How to Enter
All you’ll have to do to enter is add Imminent Dawn to your “want to read” list on Goodreads. You’ll also be able to earn bonus entries by adding Mourning Dove to that same Goodreads list and subscribing to my author newsletter.
And that’s it!
When Can I Enter?
The raffle will go live on Monday, April 22nd and run through Wednesday, May 1st. You can enter at any time during that window.
Where Can I Enter?
I’ll post the official entry form on this site, my author site, my Twitter feed, and my Facebook page, so there will be plenty of places to submit your entries.
How Many Entries Do I Get?
You can enter up to three times, once each for both Goodreads options, and once for subscribing to my author newsletter.
In which formats will the ebooks be available?
Winners will be able to choose between either a .mobi or .epub format.
When Will Winners Be Announced?
Winners will be contacted on or before Sunday, May 5th, 2019.
Questions?
Let me know through my contact page.
Not interested in the giveaway? Want to start reading Imminent Dawn now? You can find it as well as Mourning Dove preorders at the below links.
Imminent Dawn
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | NineStar Press | Kobo | Smashwords | Goodreads | Author Website
Mourning Dove
(preorders)
April 17, 2019
Reminder: Accounting for It All eBooks 50% Off! (Free Preview in Post)
“She has the looks, but now it looks like she cooks the books.”
Now’s the best time to get your hands on the story of Robin Whethers, the adult-film-star-turned-accountant who finds herself mired in an IRS audit of a money laundering scheme she didn’t know she was part of. Why?
Accounting for It All ebooks are 50% off through the publisher’s site and on Amazon! But act now, this deal is only in effect for a limited time.
Find it on
NineStar Press | Amazon
Not convinced yet? Here’s the first full chapter from Accounting for It All to give you a little more!
CHAPTER ONE
Miami, Florida – April 2017
Thursdays are my favorite days at Pornucopia.
For starters, it’s payday, and second, it’s in-house filming day, which means after a whole week of waiting, I finally get to work as a talent consultant again.
But it’s the simplest of things that make Thursdays the best of days, and there isn’t anything more predictable than the Thursday morning safe-looting operation.
Before I make it to the safe, though, I stop in the doorway of Jerry’s office for our routine Thursday conversation. “Morning, Jer.”
“We’re still doing this, huh?” He says it with a grin, so between that and me being—in his words—“a prized former starlet,” I know he doesn’t mind my teasing.
“I’m betting we only have a few thousand in the safe this week. Still want me to—?”
Jerry throws his hands up, pretending to look all exasperated as his double chin wobbles around. “Always. Go. To. The. Bank. Every Thursday. No matter how much or how little is in there. Always. Go. To. The. Bank.”
I repeat “always go to the bank” with him as he says it for the second time. “Right. How could I forget?”
“Never forget.”
“I won’t,” I say. And I never have.
I keep moving my way down our skinny, second-floor hallway and enter my office through the last door on the left. After I plop to my knees at the base of the filing cabinet, I ease out the bottom drawer. It slides with a terrible squeak—Jerry still hasn’t lubed it up with WD40 like he promised—and I lift the half-rusted safe from it, my palms running along its cool steel.
I throw in the combination and the safe clicks open, revealing the fat stack of cash inside. If Jerry’s makeshift receipt can be believed, we’re a tick under sixty-two hundred bucks.
As I double-check Jerry’s count, the graininess of each bill wears on my thumb. It’s probably my least favorite part of the safe-looting scheme, what with how tedious it can be. Honestly, for as much as I love the Thursday morning charade, I’d much rather be back talent consulting full time. Or heck, even acting.
It could be worse, I suppose. Really, Jerry’s not bad where supervisors are concerned. He may be a ham-sandwich-pounding son of a gun, but since he’s the only person actually doing any accounting around here—and because he’s the only one who knows he’s the only person doing any accounting around here—I’ve got no plans to betray his trust.
After all, getting paid for five days of work a week when I really only have one? That’s a pretty sweet deal, if I do say so myself.
I wrap up counting Jerry’s stack of bills—a bit under six thousand two hundred, just like his scratch-paper receipt says. No need to count again; they’ll do that at the bank anyway. I wad it all up with a rubber band and exit my office.
Out in the hallway, I figure I may as well tease Jerry one last time before slipping downstairs and out the door. “Hey, Jer?”
My eyebrows knit up when I hear nothing from him. I could’ve sworn I heard him shuffling around hardly a minute ago.
“Hey, Jerry.” Again the only response I get is my own breathing and the soft pad of my ankle-cut Chuck Taylors on the tiled floor.
I step into his office. “Hey, Jer. Looks like we only have a few thousand—”
There, facedown on his desk, rests the motionless body of Jerry Chalmers.
I drop the chunk of cash and rush to his side. “Jerry. Hey.” I shake him. He doesn’t stir. My fingers fly to his neck, then to his wrists in search of a pulse. Nothing.
After dashing back to my office, I fumble through my purse for my phone and dial nine-one-one.
Thursdays are normally my favorite days at Pornucopia, but this Thursday might change all that.
And there it is! What happens next for Robin? You’ll have to read on to find out!
Find Accounting for It All on
NineStar Press | Amazon
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Mourning Dove – Launch Day Livestreams!
Coming on Monday, April 29th, I’ll be hosting two unique readings and author Q&A sessions on Facebook and Twitter, respectively.
So join me on Facebook here at 1 p.m. ET and on Twitter here at 4 p.m. ET to help celebrate the release of book two in the EMPATHY sci-fi saga!
If you haven’t yet read Imminent Dawn or still need to submit your preorder for Mourning Dove, you can do so at the below links!
Imminent Dawn
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | NineStar Press | Kobo | Smashwords | Goodreads | Author Website
Mourning Dove
(preorders)
April 16, 2019
Revise, Resub, Rewrite, Rihanna – r.r. campbell on Casual Misfit Radio
Recently I had the chance to talk about writing, editing, and impostor syndrome on Casual Misfit Radio with host Kyle V. Hiller, and fellow RevPit editors Carly Hayward and Editor Cassandra.
If you want to work with an editor but find yourself afraid of the how, when, and why to approach one, we cover all of this and more in this podcast episode. We all also open up about our own struggles with impostor syndrome and the Dunning-Kruger effect, which makes this episode a must-listen for writers at any stage of their writing journey.
So have a listen to this episode here!
Interested in having me on your podcast or radio program? Let me know.
April 15, 2019
Tax Day Special: AFIA Now 50% Off!
You survived the tax man. Will she?
There’s never been a better time to get your hands on Accounting for It All, the story of the porn-star-turned-accountant who finds herself mired in an IRS audit of a money laundering scheme she had no idea she was part of.
Why? Because not only have you survived the 2019 tax season, but the ebook is now 50% off through the publisher’s website and on Amazon!
So what are you waiting for? Bask in the relative simplicity of your taxes! Gloat about your incoming refund! Laugh alongside (though mostly at) Robin, our poor porn-star-turned-accountant protagonist!
You can take advantage of this limited time offer at either of the links below.
Find Accounting for It All on
NineStar Press | Amazon
Coming Soon: an Imminent Dawn Ebook Giveaway!
It’s been a minute since I’ve done a giveaway, but to commemorate the launch of Mourning Dove, I’ll be giving away ten ebook copies of book one in the EMPATHY series, Imminent Dawn!
How to Enter
All you’ll have to do to enter is add Imminent Dawn to your “want to read” list on Goodreads. You’ll also be able to earn bonus entries by adding Mourning Dove to that same Goodreads list and subscribing to my author newsletter.
And that’s it!
When Can I Enter?
The raffle will go live on Monday, April 22nd and run through Wednesday, May 1st. You can enter at any time during that window.
Where Can I Enter?
I’ll post the official entry form on this site, my author site, my Twitter feed, and my Facebook page, so there will be plenty of places to submit your entries.
How Many Entries Do I Get?
You can enter up to three times, once each for both Goodreads options, and once for subscribing to my author newsletter.
In which formats will the ebooks be available?
Winners will be able to choose between either a .mobi or .epub format.
When Will Winners Be Announced?
Winners will be contacted on or before Sunday, May 5th, 2019.
Questions?
Let me know through my contact page.
Not interested in the giveaway? Want to start reading Imminent Dawn now? You can find it as well as Mourning Dove preorders at the below links.
Imminent Dawn
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | NineStar Press | Kobo | Smashwords | Goodreads | Author Website
Mourning Dove
(preorders)
RevPit Editing Discounts!
As a way to say thank you to the RevPit community, I’m proud to offer the following editing discounts to any RevPit participant who books these services on or before April 24th, 2019.
Query and First Five Pages
Take $10 off this package
Includes two passes at query, one pass at first five pages
First Fifty Pages
Take $10 off this package
Includes one detailed pass at your novel’s first fifty pages
Developmental Edits
Take up to 30% off when combined with other discounts
Includes full developmental edit of entire manuscript
To lock in these discounts, you must contact me and book your package on or before April 24th, 2019.
You weren’t selected for RevPit. Now what?
You weren’t selected for RevPit? Me neither.
No, seriously, I wasn’t—and not because I was an editor as opposed to an entrant.
I, too, submitted to the annual RevPit event in April 2017, and, much like you, walked away with nothing.
Except that’s not true. Not even close to it, in fact.
It can be easy to dwell on that feeling of rejection, on the notion your work just wasn’t good enough, but there are a million reasons why your pages might not have been selected that have nothing to do with your talent as a writer.
And I would know—as an editor for the 2018 and 2019 RevPit main events, I can tell you firsthand how difficult it is to have to take a pool of 100 entries and select just one from those submissions. To prove it, here are some comments I left on entries I didn’t choose as my RevPit finalist.
This could be the one.
Wonderful voice.
Literally said “Oh, cool” to concept.
I’ve got a good feeling here.
Writer’s talent is apparent.
Again, these are submissions I didn’t choose as my winner. There’s so much subjectivity involved in this process, and much of it comes down to fit, where I have to ask myself whether I’m the best editor for a particular project.
In some cases, the submission is already in such pristine shape that I’m not sure what feedback I can offer. For example, just last year, E.L. Rowe submitted a wonderful manuscript to me that I knew almost immediately I couldn’t work with. Why?
Because it was already beyond query ready. Only proving my point, E.L. went on to secure an agent mere months after I sent her a feedback email to let her know how much I adored her work, but that I couldn’t choose it as my winner.
Still not convinced? Take me as a second example. I submitted to Sione Aeschliman in 2017, and though she didn’t choose to work with me, we ended up working together outside the RevPit event on my manuscript’s first fifty pages, its darkest moment, and its ending.
With her help, I was able to bring a new vision to my manuscript, which I went on to sign a contract for with NineStar Press in early 2018. And, wouldn’t you know it, Imminent Dawn was then published in January 2019.
All of this brings me back to the question posed in this post’s title. What now?
Keep on keeping on.
It’s what E.L. and I have in common, and it’s what so many other now-published or agented authors have in common with the two of us as well.
Sure, you might want to take a break after the emotional roller coaster that is RevPit, and that’s okay, too. You wrote a book because you love writing, and that love will always be there for you when you’re ready to receive and share it again.
And don’t forget—success is more than publication. It’s more than signing with an agent. It’s more than being selected as a winner in a single online pitch event.
Success is finishing a manuscript. It’s getting words down on the page. It’s brainstorming while you’re in the shower. It’s leaving it all behind when you know you need a break.
You’ve already proven so much to yourself simply by submitting, and I encourage you to never lose sight of that. Your work is valid. It’s good enough. You’re good enough.
And you don’t need anyone else’s approval for that to be true.
Thanks for reading. For more content like this, you can follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, or sign up for my newsletter.
April 12, 2019
On Finding and Embracing Community
Back in 2013, I attended the University of Wisconsin’s Writers’ Institute for the first time as a bright-eyed, self-styled savant, ready for agent pitches and the success that would surely follow.
Things didn’t exactly work out as planned.
Though I walked away from every pitch with a request for pages, nothing ever came of those requests. How could the agents go from extraordinary enthusiasm during my pitches to radio silence over the course of mere weeks?
I let this plague me for months, with thoughts of what a waste it had all been pecking at me any time I returned to my chair to write.
It wasn’t until a year(!) later that I realized it had not, in fact, all been a waste. In my time at the Institute, the real value had been in meeting dozens of other authors and creatives, every one of them in some way a vibrant member of the greater literary community.
After attending some smaller writing events in the area, I trained myself to focus less on the almighty goal of securing an agent and more on forging friendships with writers at every stage of their journey to publication.
As it turns out, this more than anything else has helped me improve as a writer. How?
Those connections led me to my critique group, to mentorship programs, and, eventually to the founding of the Writescast Network. Even the opportunities I had to simply grab a cup of coffee with people I viewed as mentors meant the world to me, building my confidence and expanding my knowledge base.
After four years away, I decided to return to the Institute in 2017 to catch up with many of these newfound friends—and to pitch a new manuscript, one I’d been working on ever since the Institute in 2013.
This time, however, I focused more on striking up conversations with those seated near me in sessions, during lunches, and in the halls. In the end, I had a blast at this conference and managed to secure a number of requests from the agents I pitched! What a time to have been alive.
Oh, but nothing came of those pitches, either.
This was a bummer, but far less so than when the same thing happened in 2013. Instead of letting it get to me, I kept writing, incorporating input from the beta readers and other trusted confidants I’d met over the years. 2018 was going to be my year to get an agent at the Institute, dangit!
But guess what? It wasn’t.
Because I signed two publishing contracts before the 2018 Institute even came around, and I can confidently say this never would have happened had I not gotten myself more involved in the writing community online and in real life.
Even though I had nothing to pitch in 2018, I still attended the Institute to further my craft, and by 2019’s conference—which came and went this last weekend—I was an invited speaker, leading four sessions and speaking on its success panel.
Brag, brag, brag, you might say, but that’s not what this is about.
This is about how one’s journey will take a number of unexpected turns, sometimes leaving us feeling as though we’ve fallen off the map entirely.
These feelings are normal regardless of the approach one takes to writing and publication.
The important thing to know is we don’t need to go it alone.
Had I opted to sulk in silence for years and years, I’d still be shuffling words around on that first manuscript, which, if I’m honest, could have only ever gone somewhere if I razed it and started from scratch—something I never would have had the courage to do had I not been empowered by trusted members of my community.
So where is your community?
They’re out there waiting, I promise. Many of you are perhaps already actively participating in the writing community on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. Some of you might even be attending local events put on at your community centers or nearby universities.
The point is there are so many ways to find folks who will support you—and whom you can support—both online and in real life. Writing a novel doesn’t happen in a day, and neither does building a community.
But you can begin building the first bridges to connect you to that community today. All you have to do is start laying planks. The rest will surely follow.
Thanks for visiting. For more writerly content, you can find me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or my newsletter.
Thank you to author Kristin Oakley for this post’s featured image, which was taken before the 2019 Writers’ Institute success panel event.
r. r. campbell at WisCon 43 – Schedule Now Available!
We’ve got a schedule, folks! Plan accordingly.
In between tabling throughout the conference, I’ll be at WisCon 43 participating in a panel about writing a series, as well as leading two sessions on the craft of writing in general. The full schedule of my time at WisCon is as follows—
Plotting Past Book One (Panel)
Friday, May 24 – 4:00 p.m. – 5:15 p.m.
The internet offers a wide array of writing advice, but a real shortage of advice on pacing, plot, and character arcs for a multi-book series. Come hear advice on managing these and other challenges of series writing from authors who have been there.
Solidify Your Scenes with the Five Core Components of Scene Structure
Saturday, May 25 – 7:00 p.m. – 8:45 p.m.
In this session, writers will learn how to inject goal-oriented storytelling into their pages in order to keep scenes tight. After this exploration of scene at the molecular level, writers will leave this session ready to put the five core components of scene structure to work for them and perfect their pacing!
Why Are We Yelling? Conflict as Fuel for Momentum
Sunday, May 26 – 10:00 a.m. – 11:45 a.m.
A lack of conflict can be a common critique from beta readers, but what do they mean by this, exactly, and what are they really after? In this session, attendees will do a deep dive into conflict: what it is, why it’s important, and how we can use it to fuel our stories. Writers will leave this workshop with a greater understanding of goal-oriented storytelling and its role as the origin of conflict along with mystery, suspense, and dramatic irony.
Aside from the above, I’ll be tabling at the conference near the vendors’ area, and will be able to chat all things EMPATHY, science fiction, and writing! Come say hi and grab a copy of a book in the EMPATHY series while you’re at it.
If you’d prefer to get your copies of the series’ books before this Memorial Day weekend event, you can find them at the below links.
Imminent Dawn
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | NineStar Press | Kobo | Smashwords | Goodreads | Author Website
Mourning Dove
(preorders)
