Tues. Nov. 12, 2024: TAPESTRY Release & “Effie Effect” Recording
Tuesday, November 12, 2024
Waxing Moon
Saturn, Neptune, Chiron, Uranus, Jupiter Retrograde
How’s everyone doing? Hanging in there?
Today is the release day for TAPESTRY, the first Nina Bell novel! It’s $4.99 from multiple digital channels. There’s a print version coming soon (I hope). You can read all about it here.
Blurbs and buy links included, and they will be updated throughout the week.
If you haven’t checked out the Community Tarot Reading for the Week, you can do so here.
Friday, I was puttering around. I got out an LOI, not for a job, but a town committee appointment that an acquaintance had encouraged me to ask for on Thursday. That took longer than I expected. I also did some other admin work while I was at it.
I finally got my act together. I went to the grocery store just for a few things. I got a clerk who’s always been somewhat grumpy every time I’ve interacted with her to smile and talk to me. It’s taken about a year and a half! I’m always nice to her and ask her how she is and wish her a good weekend, and she finally engaged in conversation. It was good.
I also went to the post office, and did a drop off/pick up at the library.
I noticed that almost all the students at the college across the street from me were wearing black. It looks like they were zapped in from Greenwich Village in the 90’s. And just makes me smile. A lot of people are masking. Most people were gentle and kind with each other. Taking time to say hello to strangers, hold doors open for each other, and the like. It helps all of us.
Came home, wrote and submitted the book review. Got the next two books for review. Since no scripts came in, I gave myself the afternoon off to read for fun. I finished Alyssa Maxwell’s latest Gilded Newport mystery, MURDER AT VINLAND, which was very good. I started this month’s Agatha Christie book club pick, THIRD GIRL. Interesting, but not sure how I feel about it yet. I’m not sure if I’m getting ahead of the story, or if I remember it from a past read.
Woke up at 3:30 on Saturday morning, instead of 2:30, an incremental improvement. Charlotte was being a complete pill, to me, to Tessa, to Bea. I think it hurt Bea’s feelings.
Got out a couple of LOIs. Wrote a chapter for VICIOUS CRITIC (a little over 2K words). Posted some of the TAPESTRY videos on TikTok, and created the TikTok and Wide videos for STRANGERS IN THE SNOW. Worked on the proofs of the print version of TAPESTRY, but I need to see a physical copy before I can approve it and send it through. Not sure that will happen before the holidays, but we’ll see.
Did a bunch of filing, in a 15-minute break from everything else. Does that count as a Pomodoro? 
Had to put on Real People Clothes and head out for a workshop at Wild Soul River. It was about techniques to use the tarot as a deep prompt for writing, and giving feedback. There was a big turnout, which was nice. It was good to see a lot of people from tarot, and there were even people I knew from other arenas of my life – someone from Word X Word, someone who’d been at my Farmers’ Market workshop. Ky, who led the workshop, did a lovely job. Had some good conversations afterward, too.
Home, exhausted. It was deep work.
Cooked dinner (pierogi, kielbasa, red cabbage). Read the next book for review.
Managed to sleep until 4 AM. I’m trying to wake up without feeling desolate.
Did the Community Tarot Reading for the Week. Finished the STRANGERS IN THE SNOW video in the Instagram format. Played with a holiday ad for all three holiday pieces. Worked on the print proofs for MURDER BELLS. They have to send me one now. Did a big marketing “introduction” to the various work posted on FB, Tumblr, Mastodon.
Should I do a video for all three holiday shorts? The thought is overwhelming. Maybe I’ll just post the individual videos throughout. I have a combo video ad, and that may be enough.
I need to start thinking in terms of videos for MURDER BELLS, too.
I did the promo calendar for the next few months, and it is WILD. And then I realized it was all wrong. I had to toss it and start from scratch again. But at least I know what has to post where and when. I realized I needed to do Instagram versions of the JUST JUMP IN AND FLY and THE GHOST OF LOCKESLEY HALL ads, so I did those, and then did the versions of the STRANGERS IN THE SNOW ad.
I still have to do the MURDER BELLS ad, the MURDER BELLS video, and the videos for both MURDER BELLS and both books.
The week before Christmas and of Christmas will have a lot of promos for the various books, but there will be a lot of promos. If the jerk who reported me on Mastodon pulls that again, I will switch to one of the other servers that supports writers.
Read the next book for review.
Managed to sleep until 4:30 on Monday morning, and not get up until 6. I felt depleted. This week should be joyful for me, with my show recording and a book release, but it’s hard to feel joy.
Charlotte was impossible during meditation. And she’s starting to get hissy with Bea, which I want to stop. It hurts Bea’s feelings, and they were doing so well until Willa started being a bully. At the same time, when Willa tries to bully Bea, Charlotte intervenes and chases Willa off. So I don’t know what’s going on in that feline brain.
It was a struggle to get going this morning. I spent about 3 hours on marketing stuff. I worked on the December newsletter. I have to come up with a heartwarming piece of flash fiction for it, and I’m not yet sure how to get there. I originally wrote “heart worming” and that’s more in keeping with my current mood.
It was a massive struggle, but I managed just over 1100 words on the next chapter of VICIOUS CRITIC. It’s a difficult scene. This may well be closer to novella length than novel length, which makes sense, since that was the first intention for it.
I’m perusing some older work that I did and put aside, because I was told it was too disturbing and radical. I think its time might have come. I have to think about it. A couple of pieces need some more work to them; I have to see when and how I can schedule them. There’s a large trilogy, where I have the first book and a half done, and it holds up. It would definitely fit in the “urban fantasy” category, and I’m glad I never listened to anyone about watering it down. I also have some shorts that would make sense – I’ve been wanting to get back to those, time travel fantasy pieces. The vision was to have three in one character’s timeline, three in another, and three in a timeline that was unfamiliar to either of them. I have the first done (it was up at one point, and has been taken out of circulation). I have part of the second – I could have sworn I wrote the whole thing, but can’t find it. I have to remember what I wanted to do with the third. Again, I don’t know how to fit those into everything else scheduled, but at least, when I’m stressed, I can blow off some steam with them.
Wrote and submitted both book reviews.
Today, I am tied up with the recording for “Effie Effect” for as long as it takes. Not sure if I’m ZOOMing into the recording, or just on standby for questions. It looks like I’ll be able to sneak out for a break to go gentle yoga, but I’m playing it by ear. I’ll be up late again, with the time difference, but that’s fine.
And hey, it’s release day for the first book in a series I really love!
Have a good one, my friends.
