R.J. Blain's Blog, page 5

Opening Scene of The Prince of New York (also now available for Kobo Preorder!)

You can preorder Prince of New York at Kobo here. Reminder: preorders at Kobo are delayed until final file due to technical issues with Kobo’s preorder system. (I apologize for the inconvenience!)

The Prince of New York releases on Friday May 16, 2025! (YAY!)

His Royal Highness Prince Ian Ambrose of New York longed to fade into the background and vanish following the supposed deaths of his parents and the rise of his sister to Queen of New York. While serving as his sister’s advisor create...

A Small Change to Bonus Material Moving Forward…

Greetings,

It is 5:30 PM on Friday, May 9, 2025. I’m facing the wire for Prince of New York, and due to its length (just under 150,000 words), I’m going to be working until midnight getting this book loaded and prepped for release.

Simply put, with the move, I’m behind schedule, and I haven’t had time to do the bonus material I typically include with non-Amazon books. So, I’ll be doing some changes to how I handle bonus material moving forward.

1: not all books will have bonus material;...

State of the Blain: April 29, 2025

Tomorrow, we turn in the keys for the old place. The nightmare is almost over, hooray! I really feel badly for the poor folks who end up renting that apartment. They cranked the price to over $3,600 a month base… and the utilities range, but can get up to $200. That apartment is not worth $3,800 a month to say the least.

… and they have zero intention of replacing the carpets that just turned five years old… (Yes, we were there for four complete years.)

But onto happier things. I have a fu...

Campfire Book Sale~

Greetings, folks! I just wanted to drop a quick note to mention that some of my catalogue is on sale over at campfire until April 13, 2025. If you’re new to the campfire platform, it’s a writing and sales platform for indies, and it might offer a solution for those of you who are looking to diversify where you purchase your books.

Happy reading!

I’m returning to the moving and writing gauntlet now. Please don’t worry if you don’t hear from me for a little while.

With a little luck, we’l...

BYOK (Bring Your Own Keyboard), Part I

I recently posted that I had acquired a pomera for myself, which I hugely love. It’s slick, it’s sexy, and it’s fun. But there is another device that I’m hella looking forward to receiving, the BYOK. (Yes, it stands for Bring Your Own Keyboard.)

Note: image blatantly lifted from BYOK’s website.

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I mean, look at this cute little thing. It fits in a pocket! I can literally just take this teeny tiny wretchedly adorable processor and shove it into my pocket while flinging a portable keyboar...

The Economics of Books (Part II)

As I have gotten more than a few comments expressing gratitude for the education portion of my posts, I’m going to do a somewhat deep dive on the Lowrance Vampires series. (You know, to celebrate the upcoming release of Death Dance.)

So, let’s do some math!

As I mentioned before, approximately $33,000 is my “I need the book to make this much to earn back the time, investment, and so on” value for a novel. That essentially covers my living expenses, taxes, and fees to produce the book.

I...

Death Dance is Now Available for Preorder

Death Dance releases on March 24, 2026

While Pepper plans on having an eternity to spend her happily ever after with Emerick Lowrance, getting to the wedding is proving to be a problem. Between numerous women rising from their graves into their second lives and a surge of miscreants attacking innocents on the street, she has her hands full with brood business.

While Pepper plans on having an eternity to spend her happily ever after with Emerick Lowrance, getting to the wedding is proving...

Grave Affairs now in Audiobook Format on Kobo

After a battle and “unknown” errors, Kobo kindly eradicated the original audiobooks from orbit, which allowed me to reupload them. The reuploaded files worked. So, here you go. Please enjoy listening to Grave Affairs, narrated by Keira Grace.

Also, because I enjoy being evil…

… Death Dance (Lowrance Vampires #3) will have a March 2026 release date. You may thank Bookbub for selecting Blood Bound for a featured deal, which means there will be a sale on Blood Bound in mid April.

Please do...

The Economics of Pen Names

I went to bed human. I woke up with a sinus infection on just one side of my face. I love sinus infections. My absolute favorite. I can 100% tell you the cause of this.

My neighbor, who so very much loves to crank her heat and put my apartment into the upper 80s to the 100s. (It was 100 degrees in my kitchen the other day because of her. Yes, I have a thermometer, I checked it. It was registering triple digits in my fucking kitchen.)

I am going to be so happy when we get moved.

Anyway, ...

General News, Updates, ETC (Cross-Posted with Patreon)

Good morning, folks!

First, I’m cured. Hooray! I started getting back into the saddle yesterday, and today, I’m pleased to report I have obtained actual human status.

I’m going to hammer out as much as I can in as short of a period of time as possible.

In case you missed it, Booked for Theft is available in the Patreon store and at all major retailers.

Audiobooks:

Hearth, Home, and Havoc is now available in the Patreon store.

Serial Killer Princess is now available in the Patre...