S.J. Pajonas's Blog, page 88

CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD Now Available Everywhere!

I’m happy to report that CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD, the second book of the Hikoboshi Series, is now available outside of Amazon, on iBooks, Nook, Kobo, and Google Play. In case you missed it, I let everyone know in December that this series would not continue on in Kindle Unlimited. I had a sales benchmark that I felt these books had to meet to continue to remain exclusively in the program, and that benchmark was not met. I’m looking forward to publishing the rest of the series wide as the story progresses.

Want to purchase CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD today?

It’s available here…

Amazon iBooks Nook Kobo Google Play Books2Read

Want to learn more about this book?

View the cover, blurb, read an excerpt, and purchase CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD via my website…

Check out CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD now!

Want the next book in the series?

Guess what? I’m working on it right now! It’s quite the roller coaster of events in the third book of the series. I’m having a lot of fun writing it.

Sunday Update – February 11, 2018

I was thinking I might skip this week’s Sunday Update since not much has happened since I was sick but I’ve been so good about doing my Sunday Update every single week for the past few years that I didn’t want to miss it.

A Week Of Rest Thanks To The Flu

Well, this week didn’t go as planned. If you caught my Sunday Update last week, then you know that I caught the flu that pretty much everyone else in the US has had. First my husband had it in early January, then both my kids had it during one week, and I feared the worst. Of course, I then caught the flu a week ago today.

To tell you the truth, the flu itself wasn’t so bad. It was a fever, aches, and chills, but with ibuprofen, I was managing well. Then I started to cough. Ugh. I hate coughing. It’s so tiring and it causes so many other issues as well. Like spreading germs to other parts of my body!

By Sunday night, I knew things were going downhill. My head was congested and I couldn’t breathe through my nose. My face hurt and my fever was higher than normal. My ears were clicking and stuffed up too. On Monday, I realized that not only was I dealing with the flu but also a sinus and ear infection. Great. I used my neti pot and all my usual at-home natural methods, but nothing was working. Monday night, I didn’t sleep AT ALL. Like, not one bit. Double ugh.

Tuesday morning while my husband was taking the kids to school, I was the first patient of the day at the local urgent care. I was right. Flu plus ear and sinus infection! The doctor told me the antibiotics would help with the infections but the flu symptoms would probably stick around until the end of the week. Thank goodness for antibiotics, folks, because yes, they have been working and my nose and ears are slowly returning to normal. The antibiotics have caused other issues but I’m dealing with them. I’d much rather have the side effects than the main illness.

It’s now been a week of the flu, and I’m still running a slight fever this morning. We were supposed to go on vacation tomorrow to Saint Kitts, but we’ve canceled it. If you know me, you know I’m severely bummed about this. I love the heat, love summer, love the beach. I was looking forward to a week of sun and good food and reading, of course. I’m mourning this vacation loss pretty hard.

What have I been doing all week? Pretty much nothing but watching THE CROWN. Have you seen it? Gosh, I just love it. I love all the history, the palace intrigue, the family drama. It’s so good. I may finish watching it and watch it again from the beginning.

via GIPHY

I’ve also been reading and doing a little writing too. Not a lot, but I managed just over 600 words yesterday and I’d like to accomplish the same today. I’m on the mend so I might as well get back to work.

I hope to get back to regular blog posts and business next week. THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE is still on sale and I’m hoping to see some new reviews for it soon so we can have that bonus sale. I’ll be publishing the Kami No Sekai box set with its paperback too. I have to pick last month’s paperback winner (there won’t be a giveaway this month, but it’ll be back next month), and keep on writing on FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. Lots to do! This flu has to move on!

Hope you all had a great week. xo

The post A Week Of Rest Thanks To The Flu appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Featuring MIND RAIDER By P. K. Tyler And S. M. Blooding

I’m still awfully sick so it’s nice to have someone else on the blog to give me a break! Today, P. K. Tyler is here to talk about her science fiction novel, MIND RAIDER.

I asked P. K., “What inspired you to write this series?”

She replied…

My favorite thing about this series is the intersection of human and AI. I love playing with the various beings and how they approach problems. Is a sentient AI human or another kind of life-form all together? Layered onto that is the question of what rights are afforded to whom depending on their perceived humanity. Are humans grown instead of born less than people? What about born humans with enhancements? What about AIs? All of these questions come into play in Mind Raider and have been a lot of fun to work with.

I admit that these are questions I often think about as well for my own Hikoboshi series. Very, very interesting.

An engineered human, a missing weapon, and corporate greed.

Kalamara station: the center of four star systems rich in minerals and abundant food. Paradise to the elite class of the United Systems. But terrans and common spacers suffer under untenable work conditions and crumbling, radioactive stations while the Elite thrive. Now the commoners are on the verge of revolting.

The resistance’s covert intelligence network learns of an Elite weapon designed to alter the common people to their genetic core. The Elite are planning to test deployment on the mutinous Red Sky colony in the HUMP System and force their compliance.

Agent Keva was engineered by the elite military to fight their war. Disgruntled and disillusioned, she teams up with a renegade space captain and two sentient AI’s to settle a score. She must race to locate the missing weapon before they use it on the common people. Can Keva save her people from destruction before the Elite turn this weapon on the rest of the settlements? And will her decision ignite a revolution?

Check out MIND RAIDER on…
Amazon iBooks Nook Kobo

Find These Authors Online

Want to learn more about P. K. Tyler and S. M. Blooding? You can find them online here…

http://www.PKTyler.com

https://www.smblooding.co

What’s your favorite AI story?

When I think about AI stories I’ve already read or seen, I’m often reminded of HAL-9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey and then Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Both of these had a great impact on storytelling about AI and have influenced many depictions of AI in modern literature. Do you have a favorite AI story?

The post Featuring MIND RAIDER By P. K. Tyler And S. M. Blooding appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Sunday Update – February 4, 2018

I have one word for this week: FLU.

First my youngest got it last Friday night. Then my oldest got something similar on Monday morning. Now I have it. Mine started on Friday night with the chills, body aches, a scratchy throat, and fever. Now it’s morphed into a cough, chills and fever, and the beginnings of a sinus infection. I am fighting the sinus infection with my neti pot, per usual, but the cough is so horrid. I hate coughing. Even the prescription strength cough medicine isn’t touching it.

So that’s it for the Sunday Update this week.

Here are some photos to tide you over…

Sick people food in this house is grilled cheese and tomato soup, with slices of apple for me.

I keep these citrus candies in my coffee table drawer.

My brief moment of happiness on Thursday night when my kids were finally mostly well and I celebrated with a blood orange G&T. In hindsight, this was probably a bad idea.

100.7ºF and I went to bed not long after taking this photo.

I was super bored yesterday so I started coloring something new. Really, all I want to do is stare into space.

And that’s about it. There are some things I have to post to the blog this week, but my planner is in the other room and I’m under the electric blanket in bed. So you’ll just have to be surprised. Stay healthy, my friends!

The post Sunday Update – February 4, 2018 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE Is On Sale For 99c! Plus, Possible Extra Sale…

Happy February everyone!! It’s the shortest month of the year, yet usually the bleakest in these parts. So I’ve decided to have a sale! I haven’t put THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE on sale in quite some time, almost a year I think, so now’s the time to pick it up for only 99¢.

Purchase THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE

On sale for the entire month of February!

Amazon iBooks Nook Kobo Google Play Books2Read

Or you can…

Read the blurb and an excerpt on my website

Want to get THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE BRAVES THE WINTER at 99¢ too? More on that below…

I have a proposition for all my readers…

In general, I almost never put the later books in my series on sale. As I’ve explained before, these books are my bread and butter. Sales of later books in the series help fund the rest of my writing like paying for covers, editing, and advertising, so I rarely mark them down.

But I’ve had an idea. THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE has 95 reviews right now on Amazon. I’d really like to see that number reach 100. So here’s my proposition:

If THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE reaches 100 reviews before midnight on February 28th, I will put THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE BRAVES THE WINTER on sale for 7 days for 99¢.

That’s right. I’ll give you a sale on a book that’s never been on sale ever! But only if we reach 100 reviews on THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE. Can we do it? Here’s how we can…

If you haven’t reviewed THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE…

You can review it right now and contribute to this endeavor to reach 100 reviews! Please leave an honest review on Amazon by clicking the button below, choosing a star rating, and leaving a few sentences of how you felt about the book. Anyone who has read the book and has an Amazon account can leave a review.

Leave a review for THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE

If you have reviewed THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE…

Now’s the time to urge others to purchase THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE at the reduced price and encourage those people to leave reviews. I have two things you can do to make this easy on you.

You can share a Facebook post

On your FB profile, tell people you enjoyed the book, and encourage them to purchase and review this book soon!

You can Retweet the sale on Twitter

And hopefully your Twitter followers will see the tweet, purchase, and review. You can make that a little more obvious by saying something about THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE when you retweet.

You have until February 28th at midnight to make it happen!

Reaching 100 reviews could happen tomorrow, next week or right up at the deadline! We’ll see! But if we reach the goal, I’ll lower the price of THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE BRAVES THE WINTER and then update the blog, Facebook, Twitter, and my mailing list. As long as you follow me at these places, you’ll hear about it.

Thanks everyone! I hope you pick up THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE and I hope you leave a review too.

February 2018 Goals

Wow. January was a beast of a month. Sickness, sickness, a birthday, and more sickness. Yuck.

What Happened With January’s Goals?

Publish THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE RETURNS A FAVOR. Done! And despite Amazon have troubles with updating sales ranks and therefore pretty much screwing me out of making any lists, it went okay. I didn’t really get a chance to enjoy the day though due to other family obligations.

Write more on FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. This is going well enough. I did read the first half, edit it, come up with some ideas of what to do, and start working on the second half. TWICE. Yes, twice. I wasn’t sure what I was doing the first time and I did much better the second time through. I started the month at 50,000 words. I’m now at 63,000. I wish I were further along, but I’ll take it because I’m making forward progress.

Write a BONUS SCENE for CHAOS IN KADOMA WARD. This did not happen. First my husband got the flu and messed up all of my home writing time. Now both of my kids have the flu too. I fear I am next. This means that every available moment was put toward writing FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. It was all I could do.

Upload all the Daydreamer books. Done! I updated all the books and added first chapter excerpts to the backs of each. Uploaded and done.

Celebrate my birthday on January 18th. My birthday was pretty boring and THAT’S OKAY. I had the day to myself at home but went to Panera that day to celebrate with my buddy, Amy. I made pasta for dinner that night and then the following Saturday we went out for all-you-can-eat lobster buffet. I give it two thumbs up.

Fight off these recurring sinus infections. So far so good. I fought off the second sinus infection with my neti pot and grapefruit seed extract. Continued daily net pots are keeping me from getting another infection.

Keep walking. I did my best this month and it wasn’t much with all the sickness in my house. Total of 66.1 miles.

Keep reading, listening to audiobooks, and knitting. I only listened to one audiobook this month. I ran into a bunch of crappy books except for those I read from my critique partners. And I haven’t knit a stitch all month. Sigh. January was hard. Hoping for better next month.

A Look Back at January

Business Goals For February

Finish FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. I have about 30k more to write on this. I’m going to set the goal in Scrivener and hit it. Please, let me finish this book!

Sale on THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE and possible sale on THE DAYDREAMER DETECTIVE BRAVES THE WINTER. More details about this in tomorrow’s blog post.

Plot out the first book in this new scifi series I want to write on the side. I have this series I want to start writing. Let’s see if I can get my ideas together for it.

Personal Goals For February

NOT GET SICK. People, my husband had the flu in early January. Both my kids have the flu and a virus currently. And now my husband is sick again. I’m the last one standing in my family, though I had multiple sinus infections in December and early January. Also, we were supposed to go on vacation in 10 days. We’ve decided to cancel and move it, despite needing the vacation really badly. Sucks.

More of the same: walking, reading knitting. Self-explanatory.

Hope you all have a great February!

The post February 2018 Goals appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Featuring SIGILS & SPELLS By Various Authors Including Amy Evans

Today, I’m very excited to feature Amy Evans on the blog. Amy is a super talented author and also a dear friend of mine. I see her about once a week in the flesh! So she’s important to me. Amy Evans is here to talk about her novel, CLICKS, which is featured in the SIGILS & SPELLS box set.

I asked Amy, “What inspired you to write CLICKS? And why did you think CLICKS was a good fit for the SIGILS & SPELLS box set?”

She replied…

I felt CLICKS was a good fit for the SIGILS & SPELLS box set because the people the book is about are indigenous to the United States. When I originally published, I was encouraged to leave out many details about tribal life, but this box set gave me an opportunity to rerelease the book with a focus on increasing those details about the main character and her tribe.

I love hearing about real-world communities that inspire works of fiction! It’s so interesting to see how an idea is born. CLICKS especially has a great surfing community with lots of mysteries to keep readers guessing.

Mystical Realms. Diverse Characters. Addictive Stories.

Cross through the looking glass into Urban Fantasy, Paranormal Romance, and Dystopian realms where you’ll meet valiant heroes, kick-ass heroines, and dangerous creatures waiting to unveil the hidden corners of the universe.

SIGILS & SPELLS includes more than twenty exclusive novels that roam the sands of Egypt, slip underwater in California, voyage to the mystical land of Mabi, and dare to traverse the stars.

This world is beautiful because it is so diverse, so celebrate with 24 unique books in SIGILS & SPELLS!

Check out SIGILS & SPELLS on…
Amazon iBooks Nook

Find Amy Evans Online

Want to learn more about Amy Evans? You can find her online here…

http://amyevansbooks.com

http://instagram.com/amyevansbooks

http://facebook.com/amyevansclicks

And learn more about this box set at…

http://sigilsandspells.com

Have you read any fantasy books based on real world communities?

I can think of a few I’ve read! Share yours in the comments.

The post Featuring SIGILS & SPELLS By Various Authors Including Amy Evans appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Book Chat #37 – SOMETHING JUST LIKE THIS, PERSEPOLIS RISING, Plus DNF Extreme

It’s the end of the month so it’s time for another Book Chat!

What I read…

SOMETHING JUST LIKE THIS by Tracy Krimmer

Another Krimmer book this month! I really loved this one. Krimmer takes a female Grinch and turns her world on its head when Juliette meets Landon. This was a cute, sweet story, and a fast read too. I devoured it in only a few sittings. Honestly, I need more books like this in my life. Well-written, believable books. Thank goodness for Tracy!

Because…

I’m sick of crappy books!

Guys, I don’t like to be negative here, especially about books or the authors who write them, which is why you only see the books I enjoyed reading and I don’t talk about the books I’ve set aside. But 2017 must have been some sort of record! I wish I had kept track of every book I tried to read and set aside (DNF, which stands for Did Not Finish). It was more than 20, I’m sure. And they weren’t all self-published either.

Just last week, I set aside a very popular YA fantasy series-beginner, traditionally published, that was a snooze-fest and so boring that at 33% no one had done anything in the story. What the hell? Where was the conflict? What was the motivation? No clue. There was none. And after reading the 1- and 2-star reviews of the book, I know I wasn’t the only one who felt the same way.

In December alone, I set aside 5 different books for various problems. One, I opened the book and it was a wall of text for three Kindle screen swipes. No line breaks. No dialogue. Just the main character doing something utterly boring after waking up. PASS. Another, I got to the 50% mark and had no idea what the plot of the book was. PASS. And another, the main character leaves her home in the rain and meets a strange boy and we hear all the little details of where he lives and then I fell asleep from boredom. PASS.

Lawd. I know I’m picky but this? There are a lot of authors that need to learn about story structure, inciting incidents, hooks, and ALL THE OTHER THINGS that make a good story.

I’ve given up on new books for now. I bought IRON GOLD, the newest Red Rising book by Pierce Brown, and I was totally hooked after a page, BUT with my crappy memory, I couldn’t remember anyone in the story. So, I’ve started RED RISING again from the beginning. Yes, I am re-reading the whole series. I loved all of these books and I know they will not disappoint me. The next few Book Chats will concentrate on audiobooks, I’m sure, and I’ll share any further thoughts about this series as I read the books again.

What I listened to…

PERSEPOLIS RISING by James S. A. Corey

This was another strong book in the Expanse series. Finally, someone has learned how to use the protomolecule to build spaceships and alter humans. Unfortunately, it’s not the good guys that have made this advancement. Lol. It’s always the bad guys! They left a major plot line hanging at the end which I hope will be resolved in the next book, but it wasn’t a cliffhanger. Plenty of other plot points were wrapped up. I was sad to see the end of a character I had grown to like, but the death of this character was satisfying. All in all, I’m still very pleased with this series and I recommend it to everyone who loves really good sci-fi.

Do you always finish every book you start? Or do you set aside books you don’t like and move on?

The post Book Chat #37 – SOMETHING JUST LIKE THIS, PERSEPOLIS RISING, Plus DNF Extreme appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.

Sunday Update – January 28, 2018

This is the standard OH MY GOD WHERE DID JANUARY GO THANK THE BABY JESUS IT’S ALMOST OVER Sunday Update. Lol. January always feels like the longest month EVER and then I get to the end and think, “Hey, it wasn’t that bad.”

Anyway, this was a fairly uneventful week. My husband went to work and my kids went to school all week, so right there we have a winner. BUT my youngest was cranky Friday evening so I took her temperature and yep. She has had a fever ever since then. I don’t know what it is. Flu is going around her school, so it could be that, but she’s not too bad off right now. Maybe the fact that she got the shot made this less of an event? I’m not sure. But regardless, I don’t think she’ll be going to school much this week.

It was really cold here most of the week, too, which made getting out and getting exercise a little difficult. Still, I waited for the late morning, bundled up, and got outside several days this week and I’m glad I did. It’s important for me to get fresh air on a regular basis. It really helps keep my spirits up.

Only one annoying thing happened this week and that was my attempt to get remote-start installed on my husband’s car. It was going to be my Christmas present to him, and OF COURSE, it was a total nightmare to arrange. None of the car shops around here install remote-start, so eventually, after much digging around and calling our local Ford dealership, I found a place a 40 minute drive away to do it. So I drive all the way out there only to find out there are chips in the keys of this car and I had no idea. My fault, entirely, as I should’ve done the research on it ahead of time. A $199 job turned into a $450 job plus extra time involved to replicate the keys and my husband decided it was too much work and money for a car he really wants to get rid of soon. So I drove back the 40 minutes and wasted all of my writing time that day. Sigh. At least I got to listen to podcasts on the drive.

I’ve been working slowly on FUKUSHA MODEL EIGHT. I wrote a scene earlier in the week that I realized actually made a great transition from the second act to the third, but that I still needed more second act to get there. So I moved it forward in my Scrivener file and made notes on what was missing. Now I’ve been writing those scenes. I’ve passed 60,000 words and I suspect I have another 30,000 to go. I’m hoping to get close to finishing by February 10th. We shall see. Otherwise I’m happy about this book and where it’s going. I think you all will enjoy this one! Plenty of twists and turns for your reading pleasure.

What else happened this week?

The lake in my park is looking interesting this time of year!

We celebrated Taco Tuesday this week. It was one of the first real meals since all the flu went through this house.

It was cold enough to wear the hand knits this week.

I enjoyed a few tasty treats from my Bokksu Japanese snack box. This one was good! It tasted like an ice cream cone with chocolate filling.

So I saw a video Facebook this week about jackfruit and really wanted to try it. I posted it to my personal timeline and a lot of my friends jumped on to say that they like it! Then I got this fortune from my Chinese food on Saturday night and joked on Instagram that I need to try the jackfruit now. Then today, my husband went grocery shopping and came home with this prepared jackfruit! I laughed and laughed. It was fate. I’ll have to try it this week.

Coming up this week on the blog: a Book Chat, another featured author, and February goals.

The post Sunday Update – January 28, 2018 appeared first on S. J. Pajonas.