Janice Lee's Blog

Thank you and coming clean

To my faithful readers,

I feel like I should thank you all for your patience with me. I know that you’ve all been waiting with baited breath for Veiled Mystery‘s release. I have been trying to work on it, I honestly have.

However, for the past year or more, like Brenna, I have been battling demons. Unlike Brenna, however, I can’t just beat my demons with a sword or a dragon. I have, in all honesty, been battling these demons for many years, but in the past year they’ve become far worse.

You see, I have been battling depression, anxiety, and PTSD. I was first diagnosed back in 2011. It was then that I tried medication for these issues the first time, unsuccessfully. The side effects at the time caused me to fear the medications, and to avoid seeking treatment a second time. Instead, I worked with therapy and going down the spiritual path.

I wrote Mystery when things weren’t too bad. I was in a fairly decent place in my head at the time. Since then, though, things have gotten bad.

I’ve gone through and abusive marriage, and gotten out, and am now working on healing from that. I am now facing my depression head-on, and working to get my head straight. Due to the issues, though, I’ve had a very difficult time getting back to Mystery. I appreciate your patience with me, and thank you all for still waiting and supporting me in this time.

In the meantime, you can feel free to join me over at The Yarn Therapy Project, and know that I’m slowly working on Veiled Mystery as well as Finding the In-Between.

I’m still here, my friends, and I’m still fighting.

Yours faithfully,

Janice

Insanity is coming

That’s right, my friends, insanity is coming. National Novel Writing Month, better known as NaNoWriMo, is right around the corner. I have chosen this year’s project, and unlike previous years, I am not going to be (completely) pantsing it (or flying by the seat of my pants). This year, I’ve got notes started, and am (sort of) working on an outline. I’ve got several notebooks started, and even have my cover art created well ahead of schedule.

This year’s project is also going to be something completely different than anything you’ve seen come from me before. It’s not fantasy, nor is it romance. It’s not even, really, a novel. It’s a personal story, and a real one. This year’s NaNoWriMo will be more of a challenge than any of the previous five years I’ve participated.

How many of you will be participating in NaNoWriMo this year? Will you be pantsing, or have you already started your planning? Let’s hear it!

And on that note, here is the cover art for NaNoWriMo 2015 from my corner of the world.

More announcements, some apologies, and potentially exciting news.

Alright, so it’s probably a good thing that many of you do not know where I live, as I’m pretty sure that I’m about to get a lot of “What?!” comments from ya’ll. The release of Veiled Mystery has been put off again. This is a *good* thing though!

The main reasons are as follow:

1) Welcome to Mystery is currently part of a Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off contest. This means that until the contest is over, Welcome to Mystery cannot be picked up by a publisher. Which brings me to…

2) Welcome to Mystery, and the series, is being considered by a small publishing company. I’m not going to name names, but I am excited to get a response from them. Until I do, Veiled Mystery‘s release will be on hold.

I very much appreciate everyone’s patience as you wait to find out what’s in store for Brenna and the gang. I promise the second book is just as jam-packed full of adventure, magick, and romance as the first, and that the wait will be worth it!

My Beliefs

This is something I wrote a little over five years ago, and may have changed slightly since then, but is still fundamentally the same.

I still believe in fairy tale love, and love at first sight. I believe in the good in all people. I believe that everyone is deserving of trust and respect, until they prove otherwise. I believe that people can change. I believe that everything happens for a reason, even if we don’t know what the reason is right away.

I believe that history repeats itself if we forget it. I believe that good things come to those who wait, though sometimes that wait seems far too long. I believe in karma, and the three fold law. I believe that you can choose your family, and sometimes blood really isn’t thicker than water. I believe that the opposite of love isn’t hate, but fear. I believe that jealousy is a form of fear, and trust is the foundation of love. I believe in paying it forward, helping your fellow man, and being kind to all creatures, big and small. I believe that if you truly fall in love with someone, you can’t ever fully fall out of love with them, and that there will always be a place for them in your heart.

I believe that love is the most powerful emotion in the world. It can build us up, and break us down, bring us together, and tear us apart. I believe that there is no limit on how much you can love, or how many people you can love, because your heart isn’t a cup, it can’t be filled, it can only grow to encompass more love. I believe it takes far too much energy to hate, that it is easier to forgive, but that doesn’t mean you have to forget.

I believe that we all create our own reality, because no one can see the world through another’s eyes. I believe that seeing is not believing, but that believing is seeing. I believe we are all put on this earth for a reason, a purpose. I believe that we all change the world in some way, if only to make one person smile for one minute on one day. I believe that a smile has the power to save a life. I believe in the power of positive thought, and on the flip side, the power of negative thought as well. I believe that you really can speak something into existence.

I believe that no job is beneath you if you really want to work. I believe that if you want something, you should work for it. I believe that anything that is really worth having is worth working for. I do not believe in having anything handed to me on a silver platter. I believe that love has many faces, and that none is more important than another. I believe that no act of kindness is a waste of time.

I believe in dancing in the rain, and singing along to the radio. I believe that music and art of all kinds are gifts from the gods. I believe that everyone should learn to read and write. I believe that you should watch at least one sunrise a month, and as many sunsets as you can. I believe that when one door closes, another really does open up. I believe that death isn’t an ending, but just another beginning. I believe in waking each day with the thought that today will be better than yesterday, and worse than tomorrow. In this way, I believe that every day will be better than the last and that my last day on earth will be my very best.

I believe that family of all kinds, chosen or blood, is important. I believe that you should tell those you care about just how much you love them. I do not believe in going to bed angry. I would rather stay awake all night to resolve an issue than go to bed mad. You never know if you’ll wake up tomorrow.

These are my fundamental beliefs. This may be added to in the future, but these are the beliefs that I try to build my world around. What do you believe?

Blog off – SPFBO – Update

JLMcKonly:

So, not only is Lynn a fantastic blogger, but she’s also got my book, Welcome to Mystery, in her list for the Fantasy Blog-Off. You should check her out!

Originally posted on Lynn's Book Blog:

Just a quick update.  I’m taking part in an event details of which are over at Mark Lawrence’s blog.  These are my books:

Noel Coughlan – A Bright Power Rising
R.P Rigoli – Red
Jennifer Bell – A warrior’s legacy: Jamie
Andrew Rowe – Forging Divinity
Melody Taylor – In the Dark
Tavish Kaeden – The Weight of a Crown
David Pedersen – Angst
Adam Lee – Dark Heart
Kal S Davian – Naming the Bane
Patrick J Loller – Forged by Battle
T.C Pearce – Into the Aether
Will Kay – Requiem of Innocence
Benny Hinrichs – The Oneironauts
Neil McGarry & Daniel Ravipinto – The Duchess of the Shallows
Nick Marsden – The Light of Theolan
Janice McKonly – Welcome to Mystery Interior
Steve Thomas – Klondaeg the Monster Hunter
Wayne Miller – The Dung Ball Chronicle
Amanda McCrina – His Own Good Sword – review here

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Slacking

Hi! Hello! How are you? Yes, I’m back again, and I’m totally hanging my head in shame right now. I’ve been slacking, but I have to say this week has been insane. I didn’t even realize it’d already been a week since my last post until I came to add something to the site.

What did I add? I’m sure you’re wondering. Well, if you look to you’re right, you’ll see a neat column called “Visitors to Mystery”. That is the area where you’ll find some of my fellow writers’ websites, blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter, what have you. Most of the folks I’ll be adding in there are people I know personally, so don’t be surprised if you catch a guest post or two from them here in Mystery, or one from me on their pages.

I do hope you’ve all had a good week, and I’ll try not to be such a slacker next week!

Until then, I hope you enjoyed our walk in Mystery. Oh, and before I forget, check out some of my handiwork from today! (Yeah, not much work space there, but there will be once the husband gets home to help! Haha)

I built the desk today, and have the blisters to prove it.

Announcements

I’d like to start this post by congratulating the winners of my Goodreads Valentine’s Day giveaway. Without naming names, congratulations to all five winners! I hope you enjoy your signed copies of Welcome To Mystery when they come in. They are all in the mail, and you will receive them no later than Friday.

To all of you who entered the giveaway (over 300, wow!), thank you for your interest! Keep an eye out, because I’ll be doing another giveaway soon!

Now, for the big announcement:

*This is a tentative release date.

 

That’s all for now, dear readers! Come back next week, same bat time, same bat channel for another walk in Mystery.

Three essential tools for the young fantasy writer

I’m sure by the title of this post, you think I’m going to talk about faerie lore references, fantasy name generators, and several different editions of the dictionary and thesaurus. If this were an actual educational post, those things might actually get mentioned in more than the opening paragraph. Of course, this is not an actual educational post, so all of those important tools are being banished to the land of the opening sentence, where they will probably be forgotten over the next few minutes.

 

Coffee

Have you ever seen a writer going through caffeine withdrawals? My husband has, and let me tell you, it’s not a pretty picture. He’s actually told me multiple times that if I ever quit drinking coffee, he’s going to hide for at least a month while I detox. Almost any writer – fantasy writers in particular – will tell you that without coffee and caffeinated drinks in general, the fruits of their labour would never have made it past the idea-baby stage. The fact of the matter is, late night coffee buzz is the best writing fuel.

Insomnia

Even as I sit here writing this, insomnia is a not-so-missed companion. Most of Welcome to Mystery was written on caffeine fueled insomnia nights. To be honest, most of my best writing has been done on similar nights, and probably will be for many more years to come.

Cats

The ultimate supervisors and distractions. They’ll ignore you while it’s time to work, and then they’ll tell you in no uncertain terms when it’s time to take a break. Oh, and by the way, they’ll also insist on being a distraction when you’re trying to work through a particularly exciting or important scene. My cat is fat and, in general, pretty lazy. He’s generally lazy, that is, until it’s time for me to work on the pivotal fight scene, or the first time the hero kisses the heroine. Then, he’s tearing around the house, running the circuit from the front door to the bedroom, bedroom to bathroom to kitchen, and back through the living room to yowl at the imaginary threat outside the sliding glass door. This, of course, allows me a chance to sit back, take a breath, and just laugh. Ask most fantasy authors, and they’ll tell you they’re managed by a cat as well.

So there you have it, my friends. For the first official post of JaniceMcKonly.com, I give you my three essential tools for the fantasy writer. Check in next Wednesday for another walk in Mystery with me, and in the meantime head over to Goodreads to sign up for the giveaway!

~Janice