Annette Drake's Blog, page 12

What’s my legacy?

Last week, as I was leaving my day job after a particularly difficult shift, I shared an elevator with a fellow nurse. She asked me how my day went, and I told her it had been a rough one. I queried her in return, and she told me hers had been challenging too: one of her favorite patients died at the age of 48. I’ll be 48 on my next birthday.

Her simple words quickly reminded me of how lucky I am to have my health, a good-paying job and a clean, safe home where my small family waits for me.

I thought a lot about that elevator conversation, and it spurred me to think more about my legacy as a writer. Recently, I stumbled upon a website about Victoria Holt, a romance writer who died in 1993 and wrote more than 200 books. Her fans built the website as a tribute to her after her death. Can there be any higher praise?

As a writer, I spend a lot of time – dare I say waste? – looking for validation by either selling lots of books or collecting five-star reviews. But, really, is that what matters?

I write because I have stories I want to tell. I have characters whose voices I hear loud and clear, and if I don’t share their stories, then those characters wane and fade away. And I believe each of my books has one reader it’s meant for – either to entertain or to reassure that they are not alone in their struggle. I don’t write about popular girls; I never was one. I don’t write about wealth; I’ve never known it. I write about working-class heroines who struggle to make ends meet and build a home for themselves and those they love. Not a lot of glamour in that.

There are certain things I can control on this journey. I control the quality of my storytelling. As an indie author, I choose my cover art and hire an editor and proofreader. I choose the actors who record my audiobooks, and I schedule the date my books publish.

But there are certain things I cannot control. I’ve queried numerous agents and editors and received many no-thank-yous. I’ve submitted my books time and time again to the biggest promotion site available, and I hear no. I refuse to pay for reviews, so my books will never be featured in Publishers Weekly or RT Magazine. None of that matters.

What matters to me is this: I want to be known as a writer who helps other writers. I want to be known not for the bucket loads of books I sell but for the encouragement and boost-up I give to my fellow wordsmiths.

So, with that goal in mind, I signed up to host other writers on Great Escapes Book Tours. On Friday, I share a post by Janice Peacock, who writes A Glass Bead Mystery series. She talks about romance and her newest book, A Bead in the Hand. On Sunday, I host Joyce and Jim Lavene, a husband-and-wife team who wrote Gone by Midnight, a collection of short mystery stories. If my meager efforts help these authors sell a few books, that’s great. If those sales encourage them to keep writing, that’s even better.

I can’t think of a better legacy.

Hands and arms inside the cart: Welcome, Janice Peacock.

 

2016 – what a year you’re going to be

Have you ever heard the phrase, “You get what you focus on?”

This is Stanton Hall, an antebellum mansion in Natchez, MS. I keep a photograph of this magnificent home by my computer. It’s how I envision Stratton House. Beautiful, huh?

I think there’s a lot of wisdom in those six words. And in 2016, I’m applying them to my writing career.

Ever since Celebration House was published by Tirgearr Publishing in August of 2013, I’ve been talking and blogging and blabbing on about the sequels to it. Well, this is the year. This is the year of Celebration House.

I’ll admit there are some hurdles. To begin with, I signed a contract with Tirgearr Publishing in April of 2013. According to the contract, they have exclusive rights to the book for five years. That means, I don’t have the right to publish my own creation via Baskethound Books in any form – audiobook, print or e-book – until August of 2018 unless I pay them $500. Okay. $500. Got it. Let us shake hands and wish each other well.

Then, there is the task of writing the two new books. I’ve started and stopped several times. I’ve had a few diversions, such as writing a novella, A Beautiful Day in Alaska, and my first cozy mystery, Death Goes to the County Fair, as well as the screenplay adaptation for Bone Girl. But those projects are done. Or perhaps I should say done enough for now.

But there are some structural problems with Celebration House. I wrote that book years ago, and I don’t write that way anymore. So, I’m adding new scenes and deleting the passages where I tell and don’t show. I’m reworking the book so it’s clearly a romance and not women’s fiction.

And I’m having a blast! I love revisiting my heroine, Carrie, as she fights to save a falling-down antebellum mansion that was built 100 years before she was born. I’m happy to be back among the cast and crew of that book, including my hero, Maj. Stewart, who still looks so much like Hugh Jackman; they could be brothers. I love catching up with the other ghosts who demand Carrie’s attention, like Col. Stratton for whom the house is made, and his wife, Virginia. Violet is still my favorite.

And then there are my new heroines. Beth Kozera, the nurse who helped Carrie in Celebration House, stars in Volume 2. Beth, like me, knows nothing about running an event venue. She and I are going to learn together. We started by interviewing the manager of the Van Valey House here in Everett, Washington. That event venue is owned by the City of Everett, so now I’m querying owner-operated locales to ask my many questions.

The third, and last installment, stars Melanie, Carrie’s older sister. Melanie is the most complex character I’ve ever written. She’s the villain in the first book, so how I turn her from criticizing shrew to the heroine is going to be a writing feat. Fortunately, I’ve got a mighty tool: I’ve got grief. Oh, the things grief does to us. I’ve already written the prologue to Melanie’s story, and I still can’t read it without crying.

What? Tears? Oh, yes. Keep a box of Kleenex nearby. You’re gonna need them, my friend.

Can you hear how excited I am about this project? Honestly, it’s the best antidote to the winter grays that descend upon me every year.

I’ve got my cover artist lined up and my proofreader. I still need an editor who knows, really knows, romance. I haven’t found her (or him?) yet.

Any sex scenes in my books? Nope. Sorry. But I’m going to create so much sexual tension that the reader will wish there were sex scenes. I’m honing my skills. I’m joining a local chapter of Romance Writers of America, and I’m either going to find a critique group or start one. I’m busy!

And target reader, I know who you are. After almost three years since I first published, I finally know who my target reader is. How sad is that? You are my Aunt Mary Rose. You are my co-worker, Joelle. I’ll spare the demographics and just say this: Target Reader, you are going to love, love, love these three books.

So, when will they publish? I don’t know the exact month and day. I’m still working out those pesky details. But I know this: 2016.

Hands and arms inside the cart: Beth Kozera and I go looking for an event venue

Grateful: party of one

During the week of Jan. 4-10th, you probably saw lots of Facebook posts from me about my cozy mystery, Death Goes to the County Fair. You may have even read a review or two. All of this publicity is thanks to Lori of Great Escapes Book Tour. Lori and 10 bloggers generously agreed to help spread the word about my mystery.

I now have six reviews and lots of new Twitter followers. Thanks to the book tour, I sold a pleasing number of copies. The tour also featured a giveaway of a $10 gift card, which I will award at the end of this week.

I wanted to tell Lori and her blogging minions how much I appreciate the time and effort they put forth to promote me and my humble work. Thank you. Most of the bloggers are just that: they write reviews and post them. But a few of the sites belong to authors. So, in a small way, I’d like to repay their kindness with a little promotion of my own.

Amy Metz, who hosted me on A Blue Million Books, also writes mysteries. Please consider visiting her website: http://amymetz.com/. Her two-book mystery series, Goose Pimple Junction Mysteries, can be purchased there or at Amazon: Amazon

D.E. Haggerty, who blogs at Readsalot, is a fellow mystery writer and graciously reviewed my book. Here’s a link to her most recent work: Amazon

Thanks again to Lori and all of the folks at Great Escapes Book Tour.

Next: hands and arms inside the cart: remodeling Celebration House.

Welcome to Ogallala!

This photo was taken in May of 1988 when I graduated from Northeast Missouri State University, now known as Truman State University. My first professional job out of college was as news editor for the Pleasant Hill Times. This year-long stint provided much of the inspiration for “Death Goes to the County Fair.”

Today, I join the ranks of mystery writers. My novel, “Death Goes to the County Fair” premiers.

When I put this book together, I had to include a disclaimer. Mine looks like this:

“This book is a work of fiction. All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation to anyone bearing the same name or names. Any resemblance to individuals known or unknown to the author are purely coincidental. The town of Ogallala, Missouri does not exist. It is a fictional location.”

Most of that is true; there is no Ogallala, Missouri. Ogallala is a town in Nebraska that my husband and I drove through in May of 2014. I just loved the name of the town.

The main character, Joni Harte, is a recent college graduate who accepts the job of photographer and reporter at the Ogallala Gazette. She is a figment of my imagination. Well, sort of.

Almost 30 years ago, I worked as a journalist. My first job out of college was for a weekly newspaper in Pleasant Hill, a small Missouri town south of Kansas City. I did all of the things Joni does – I covered city-council and schoolboard meetings. I took photos of toddler beauty-contest winners. I had two amazing co-workers – one named Nancy and the other Ed. And like Joni, I was late for a parade and threatened with the loss of my job. I struggled to learn the intricacies of small-town life.

As in my novel, many of the town residents reached out and welcomed me. The small convenience store next door started stocking my favorite beer: Lowenbrau. Do they even still sell Lowenbrau? A couple I wrote a feature article about invited me to be a judge at their BBQ contest. And like Joni, I lived next door to my landlords: Barry and Ann, who fed me dinner on more than one occasion. Barry used to call me a “greenhorn.”

Any murders happen while I was the news editor for the Pleasant Hill Times? Nope. Not a one. House fires? Yes. Two. Including one house fire in which the old woman who lived there did not escape. I still remember standing by the remains of the house, sick with the sadness of it. That’s likely what inspired the book’s prologue.

What about Sheriff Cletus Butane? He is, I admit, my favorite character in the book. I don’t remember the Pleasant Hill police chief’s name in 1988, but I do remember he was gracious and patient with me. I know. I know. We’re not supposed to like our police, but I do. I like to think Sheriff Butane is a mix of Andy Griffith and Marshall Matt Dillon.

There was a small restaurant across the street from the Times office. It wasn’t named the Wagon Wheel though. That’s actually the name of a small restaurant that my aunt owned in Linneus, Missouri. And yes, her pies were amazing. My fictional protagonist, Joni, loves the banana cream, but I loved my great aunt’s chocolate cream pie.

Like Joni, I made a few mistakes, including writing a feature article about a disabled woman and not getting her guardian’s permission to publish it until the day we went to press. I also misspelled a name or two. This is very frowned upon in the journalism world.

No, sadly enough I did not drive an AMC Gremlin. I drove a 1970-something Pontiac Grand Am until the day a man rear-ended me and totaled it. Then, I bought a very old and beat-up Chevrolet Impala from my landlord. Like Joni, I longed for a car made in the decade in which I lived.

This book is the first in a mystery series. I have lots of ideas for sequels, including titles like “Death Goes Spelunking,” “Death Goes Antiquing,” and “Death Goes to College.” Lots of ideas. Now to turn those ideas into books. Therein is the challenge.

What’s next for me? Completing the two sequels to Celebration House. The trilogy will publish in 2016.

Meanwhile, I wait to hear what readers think about Joni Hart and Sheriff Cletus Butane. It’s my strongest hope they will love these two characters and the others who live in my fictional town of Ogallala, Missouri.

Hands and arms inside the cart: Next, learning how to manage Celebration House.

Chapter 1 of Death Goes to the County Fair – An Ogallala Mystery

Dedication: This one’s for you, Aunt Mary Rose.

Chapter 1

July 30, 1988

The swaying of the small wooden boat rocked the dead man’s head back and forth on indifferent shoulders. His blue eyes bulged from their sockets in his mottled face. His thick tongue hung halfway out of his mouth.

“Turn this damn ride off!” Sheriff Cletus Butane shouted before spitting thick brown tobacco juice onto the dying grass.

A carnival worker scurried to the control panel of the Love Moat amusement ride and hit the off switch. With the power cut, the corpse stopped rocking. His ride was over.

Joni didn’t even think about what she was doing. The auto rewinder whizzed as she took picture after picture with her Nikon 35mm camera.

Sheriff Butane narrowed his eyes and glared at her. Joni ignored him. As the sole reporter and photographer for The Ogallala Gazette, Joni felt that she’d taken more than her share of photographs of prize pumpkins and toddler beauty-pageant winners. Now, at last, a news story.

“Joni, you do know I could confiscate that camera, don’t ya?”

This did get her attention. She jerked her head up and stared at the huge bulk of a sheriff. On this July morning in Ogallala, Missouri, the thermometer read 95 degrees with humidity to match. At nine in the morning, the sheriff was already drenched in sweat. Dark circles underneath the arms of his uniform gave testimony as to why Sheriff Butane spent most of his work day in his air-conditioned office.

“Freedom of the press, Sheriff,” Joni answered.

“Un, huh. We’ll just see about that, missy. Earl! Where the hell is the coroner?”

“On his way, Sheriff,” said the lone deputy, Earl Tatum. Everybody, except the sheriff, called him Tator because his head was shaped like, well, a potato.

A crowd began to gather around the carnival ride. Early morning fairgoers mingled with the carnival workers who huddled around their boss, Ben Boggs. He explained to the sheriff what he’d found this morning when he arrived at the Love Moat ride.

“I knew something was wrong, Sheriff, when I counted the boats and saw two were missing,” Boggs said. “I thought maybe one of my workers forgot them inside the ride, so I turned it on, and sure enough, here come the boats. But that came too,” he said, pointing at the corpse.

“I want to talk to the carny who closed down this ride last night.”

“That’d be José. Go get him,” Boggs barked.

One of the workers left the crowd and ran toward the lot full of old campers and Army surplus tents where the workers lived during the 10-day event.

The sheriff swiped the sweat from his face one more time before yelling, “Move the hell back, people. Mercy! I can’t breathe. Earl!”

“Right here, sheriff.”

“Get on the horn and find out where the coroner is.”

“Yes, sir.”

Joni continued to circle the boat where the dead man lay, snapping pictures. Bringing her camera down, she saw a multi-colored 2-foot long piece of thin nylon rope encircling the dead man’s neck. She stepped closer and took a picture of it. Then Joni stepped back and snapped a frontal picture of the corpse.

“You know Jerry won’t run that picture on the front page of the Gazette, don’t ya’, Joni?” the sheriff asked.

She looked up at the him. Son of a biscuit! Butane was right. Jerry wouldn’t.

“Un, huh. Just sinking in, is it?” the sheriff asked. “You may be the college graduate, but I’m the one who knows how things work in Ogallala.” He accentuated this last word with a splash of the tobacco juice near her tennis shoe. “So go on. Take all the pictures you want. I think that’s a fine idea. It saves me the money of having someone else do it. And then, after we get this John Doe on a stretcher and covered with a clean white sheet, I’ll stand next to him, and you can take my picture. ‘Cause that’s the one Jerry’s gonna print on the front page, and we both know it. Don’t we, Joni?”

“Sheriff, Doc Moreland just got here,” Tator yelled.

The crowd parted, and an ancient thin stooped man with glasses perched on his forehead ambled onto the scene. Behind him, two local ambulance volunteers pushed and pulled a stretcher through the same parting of the crowd.

“Sheriff,” the coroner said in greeting.

“Doc,” the sheriff answered. “Sure is nice of you to join us this morning. Damn sorry we had to interrupt your golf game.”

The coroner glowered at the sheriff before he growled, “I was making rounds at the hospital, Butane, and you know it. Well, what have we here?”

Joni watched as the deputy and the ambulance workers pulled the boat into the concrete docking area and lifted the corpse out. They laid him on the ground, and the coroner, on creaking arthritic knee, bent down to examine him. After donning white latex gloves, the coroner began his cursory inspection. The multicolored string Joni had noticed earlier was embedded deep into the skin of his neck.

The coroner gently unwrapped the cord from the man’s neck. A thin maroon-colored line marked its success.

“Well, shouldn’t be too difficult to determine the cause of death,” he said, looking up at the sheriff. “That only leaves the question of who this is and more importantly, why he died.”

Chapter 1 of Death Goes to the Ogallala County Fair

Dedication: This one’s for you, Aunt Mary Rose.

Chapter 1

July 30, 1988

The swaying of the small wooden boat rocked the dead man’s head back and forth on indifferent shoulders. His blue eyes bulged from their sockets in his mottled face. His thick tongue hung halfway out of his mouth.

“Turn this damn ride off!” Sheriff Cletus Butane shouted before spitting thick brown tobacco juice onto the dying grass.

A carnival worker scurried to the control panel of the Love Moat amusement ride and hit the off switch. With the power cut, the corpse stopped rocking. His ride was over.

Joni didn’t even think about what she was doing. The auto rewinder whizzed as she took picture after picture with her Nikon 35mm camera.

Sheriff Butane narrowed his eyes and glared at her. Joni ignored him. As the sole reporter and photographer for The Ogallala Gazette, Joni felt that she’d taken more than her share of photographs of prize pumpkins and toddler beauty-pageant winners. Now, at last, a news story.

“Joni, you do know I could confiscate that camera, don’t ya?”

This did get her attention. She jerked her head up and stared at the huge bulk of a sheriff. On this July morning in Ogallala, Oklahoma, the thermometer read 95 degrees with humidity to match. At nine in the morning, the sheriff was already drenched in sweat. Dark circles underneath the arms of his uniform gave testimony as to why Sheriff Butane spent most of his work day in his air-conditioned office.

“Freedom of the press, Sheriff,” Joni answered.

“Un, huh. We’ll just see about that, missy. Earl! Where the hell is the coroner?”

“On his way, Sheriff,” said the lone deputy, Earl Tatum. Everybody, except the sheriff, called him Tator because his head was shaped like, well, a potato.

A crowd began to gather around the carnival ride. Early morning fairgoers mingled with the carnival workers who huddled around their boss, Ben Boggs. He explained to the sheriff what he’d found this morning when he arrived at the Love Moat ride.

“I knew something was wrong, Sheriff, when I counted the boats and saw two were missing,” Boggs said. “I thought maybe one of my workers forgot them inside the ride, so I turned it on, and sure enough, here come the boats. But that came too,” he said, pointing at the corpse.

“I want to talk to the carny who closed down this ride last night.”

“That’d be José. Go get him,” Boggs barked.

One of the workers left the crowd and ran toward the lot full of old campers and Army surplus tents where the workers lived during the 10-day event.

The sheriff swiped the sweat from his face one more time before yelling, “Move the hell back, people. Mercy! I can’t breathe. Earl!”

“Right here, sheriff.”

“Get on the horn and find out where the coroner is.”

“Yes, sir.”

Joni continued to circle the boat where the dead man lay, snapping pictures. Bringing her camera down, she saw a multi-colored 2-foot long piece of thin nylon rope encircling the dead man’s neck. She stepped closer and took a picture of it. Then Joni stepped back and snapped a frontal picture of the corpse.

“You know Jerry won’t run that picture on the front page of the Gazette, don’t ya’, Joni?” the sheriff asked.

She looked up at the him. Son of a biscuit! Butane was right. Jerry wouldn’t.

“Un, huh. Just sinking in, is it?” the sheriff asked. “You may be the college graduate, but I’m the one who knows how things work in Ogallala.” He accentuated this last word with a splash of the tobacco juice near her tennis shoe. “So go on. Take all the pictures you want. I think that’s a fine idea. It saves me the money of having someone else do it. And then, after we get this John Doe on a stretcher and covered with a clean white sheet, I’ll stand next to him, and you can take my picture. ‘Cause that’s the one Jerry’s gonna print on the front page, and we both know it. Don’t we, Joni?”

“Sheriff, Doc Moreland just got here,” Tator yelled.

The crowd parted, and an ancient thin stooped man with glasses perched on his forehead ambled onto the scene. Behind him, two local ambulance volunteers pushed and pulled a stretcher through the same parting of the crowd.

“Sheriff,” the coroner said in greeting.

“Doc,” the sheriff answered. “Sure is nice of you to join us this morning. Damn sorry we had to interrupt your golf game.”

The coroner glowered at the sheriff before he growled, “I was making rounds at the hospital, Butane, and you know it. Well, what have we here?”

Joni watched as the deputy and the ambulance workers pulled the boat into the concrete docking area and lifted the corpse out. They laid him on the ground, and the coroner, on creaking arthritic knee, bent down to examine him. After donning white latex gloves, the coroner began his cursory inspection. The multicolored string Joni had noticed earlier was embedded deep into the skin of his neck.

The coroner gently unwrapped the cord from the man’s neck. A thin maroon-colored line marked its success.

“Well, shouldn’t be too difficult to determine the cause of death,” he said, looking up at the sheriff. “That only leaves the question of who this is and more importantly, why he died.”

The mystery of writing a good mystery

For the past few months, I’ve been toiling away on my first cozy mystery, Death Goes to the Ogallala County Fair.

I read the most popular cozy mysteries. I spent way more time than I should perusing websites, like http://www.cozy-mystery.com/. I took an online course in how to write a mystery novel with Steve Alcorn. I’ve been busy, sometimes so much that more often than not, I failed to make my daily quota of 1,000 words. And here it is, one week from the deadline when I’m supposed to send the completed manuscript to my editor, Les Dunseith, and the book is maybe 50 percent finished. This is not good.

So, what’s the problem? Well, I thought it was because I don’t enjoy killing off people, specifically my characters. But to be honest with you, all three men (and yes, they are all men) who die in my book aren’t nice people. The world is perhaps better off now that they are gone.

I thought maybe it’s because my main character, Joni Harte, isn’t as talkative as other characters I’ve written about. If you’ve read my novella, A Beautiful Day in Alaska, then you know Charlie Land. Well, Charlie is a chatterbox. He talked to me (and still does) a lot. Or if you read Bone Girl, then you know Josey Miller. I’m closer to Josey than my own children. That’s how often she and I converse.

The main character in my mystery, Joni, has a lot of insecurities (she’d hate me for telling you that) and a secret or two. Painful ones. At least to her. So, she’s been more reluctant to talk with me. But, we’re making progress. I know her deep, dark secret and discovered some important details about her, like that she drives a 1976 AMC Gremlin and has an older over-achiever sister named Monica who is super annoying.

I know what I don’t like in a mystery novel. I don’t like it when the author doesn’t give any clues, and then somehow, when the book is 85% done, oh, here’s the villain. It was him all along. Really? Wow. Okay. Who knew?

Or, also my least favorite, I don’t like it when at the end, the antagonist turns out to be crazy. He or she did all of these evil deeds because they were mentally ill. No other reason possible. I don’t like that. I feel like it’s a cheap way out. Like, the author says, “Oh, I’ve got to make my deadline, so the murderer is Professor Plum, in the library, with the candlestick, because he’s a paranoid schizophrenic.” Fail.

So that’s what I don’t like in a mystery. What do I like? I like it when the main character (and there should only be one) has fun, quirky friends. I like mysteries that take place in a small town. Maybe I should start there, working with the things I do like:

I want my book to take place in a small town where the reader would want to live.
I want my main character to have warm, funny, forgiving friends who I would want in my life.
The villain – and I know the identity of that person – is not crazy. She (oops!) has a specific purpose, and for her, the end always justifies the means.
I want to grab my reader. I want to hold onto them so tightly that putting my book down is an impossibility. I want to own my reader. (That kind of sounds weird, doesn’t it?)

Okay. Those are my goals. But there’s one other thing very different about writing a mystery than the other four books I’ve written: I have to keep secrets. And I stink at that. No, I do. I cannot keep a secret to save my life. I’m as obvious as the nose on your face. But if I give away my secrets, then I’ll lose my reader, right? Ugh! No wonder I’m not done yet.

Okay. Enough excuse making. I must write 1,000 words today. Now. And send an email to my editor, asking to push that deadline back two weeks.

Hands and arms inside the cart: Next: Baskethound Books proudly presents the first chapter of Death Goes to the Ogallala County Fair.

Guess what happened today?

I don’t know how likely this is to ever happen again, so I’d like to share it with you.

Today, after being featured on Ereader News Today and Indies Unlimited, my contemporary romance, A Year with Geno, has sold more than 225 copies, putting it at #58 and #60 in the military romance categories. This is the highest I’ve ever climbed in the Amazon rankings. My sincere gratitude to everyone who helped make this happen. Thank you!

The good, the bad and the amazing of 2014

As the final hours of 2014 tick down, I take a few minutes to reflect on the good, the bad and the amazing of this year.

The good.

I published two books this year via my small press, Baskethound Books. The first, Bone Girl, is a middle-grade novel that tells the story of a young girl and a rescued stallion who together, save their world. The other, A Year with Geno, is a contemporary romance about two single parents who find romance amidst the chaos of single-parenthood.

Both books have sold tens of copies. I haven’t broken even financially, but I still have the delicious pleasure of going to my local library and seeing my books are available to be borrowed, but are checked out.

Also, much to my delight, both stories found their voice: they are available as audiobooks via Audible. Many thanks to Darryl Hughes Kurylo for narrating Bone Girl and Julie Kerr for her tireless efforts on A Year with Geno. You are both amazing. Thank you.

The bad.

My relationship with the publisher of my debut novel, Celebration House, continued to deteriorate. My plan: buy back the rights to my novel, wish those folks well, and continue on my journey. Enough said.

As part of those plans, I launched a Kickstarter campaign. My goal was $2,500; pledges totaled $135. Wildly unsuccessful. But I learned how to make a promotional video, started a YouTube channel and began to brainstorm about promotional swag. Coffee, anyone?

The amazing.

Earlier this month, I spoke on e-publishing at my county library. During my talk, one of the attendees asked if I was comfortable making myself so public, so vulnerable to readers. I can’t remember my exact words, but I hope I conveyed this sentiment: “I LOVE hearing from readers.”

In May, a young girl reached out to me to ask a question about the setting of Bone Girl for a school book report. I wrote back and told her about Bennett Springs, Missouri. We made a deal. I would send her a Bone Girl T-shirt if she would send me a copy of her book report. Receiving this photo of her was the high point of my year.

A few days before Thanksgiving, A Year with Geno was spotlighted on Romancing the Book, a well-known blog for romance novels. I had all of my ducks in a row, sort of. I hadn’t made the time to promote the promotion. So, I turned to fellow authors who I had featured in my Author Spotlight on my blog and asked them to help me spread the word. Of the 20 or so authors I queried, nearly all said yes. They told their readers about my meager $25 Amazon gift card giveaway and about my book. Thanks, guys.

What’s next in 2015? I don’t know. My first novella, A Beautiful Day in Alaska, premiers on Feb. 1st. I’m working on the creation of a print and audiobook version of my picture-book manuscript, The Carwash Dragon. And I have aspirations of publishing the two sequels to Celebration House, but there’s a teensy problem: I’m spending most of my writing time on my cozy mystery, Death Comes to the Ogallala County Fair. I can’t help it. It’s so much fun.

Hands and arms inside the cart. Next: the mystery of writing a good mystery.

Is it too late to blog about Thanksgiving?

The leftover dressing and gravy are thrown away. The cornucopia is boxed up to make room for the ceramic village on the holiday shelf. All of the brown and orange linen napkins are packed away. Thanksgiving is over.

I love Thanksgiving. For me, it is the calm before the crazy of Christmas. It’s the silence before the noise of shopping and school concerts and worrying about what to buy whom and how exactly do I pay for all of this stuff anyway?

And for me, there’s just something enthralling about the idea of taking a day, just one day, to be grateful. Look around and think, yes, I have enough.

This year, amazing things happened with my little business, Baskethound Books. In March, I published Bone Girl. I never thought I could self-publish a book. I dreamed of it. Actually doing it? That seemed crazy.

And then, three months later, I did it again when I self-published A Year with Geno. It’s like this publishing of books is starting to be a habit.

Of course, there’s the promotion of my books. It can be the greatest little novel on the planet but if nobody knows about it, nobody is going to read it. Ah, there’s the rub. How do I tell people about my book?

So this Thanksgiving, I hosted a Rafflecopter giveaway. My first. I asked entrants to share their favorite Thanksgiving memory with me in exchange for a $25 Amazon gift card. You can see these stories on my website under “Thanksgiving 2014 giveaway winners,” including my own.

There’s one Thanksgiving memory I didn’t share because the fellow to whom it belonged didn’t enter my contest. When I told him about my contest, he told me that when he was stationed in Vietnam and enjoying a diet of C-rations, the army surprised him and his fellow soldiers with a Thanksgiving dinner – turkey and all the trimmings. He still remembers that meal.

The experts tell me Thanksgiving is not the time to run a promotion. People are too busy shopping and cooking to read blogs. I’m sure they’re right. But I’ve never been easy to dissuade once I set my course. My mom used to say, “Don’t confuse Annette with the facts; her mind is made up.”

So…Thanksgiving of 2015, I plan an even bigger promotion for A Year with Geno, this one involving my YouTube channel. Here’s the idea: a dance contest. Whose husband is the worst dancer? I thought maybe I’d call it something along the lines of, “He dances like an idiot but I love him anyway…” That’s just a working title. Entrants send me a 20-second clip of their sweetheart dancing. I award the most entertaining dancer a $50 Amazon gift card.

Hands and arms inside the cart: Next: the good, the bad and the amazing of 2014