At long last, I have finally completed the final checks on the proof for Twilight of Lanar’ya. This is the cover, done by the awesome Keary Taylor, and a little promotional video that has the release date in it.

Download Twilight of Lanar’ya Cover



Unless catastrophe strikes, you will be able to purchase Twilight of Lanar’ya from Amazon.com for the Kindle or in paperback format on March 23, 2012.

I will be announcing the final price later this coming week so check back for more news then! Also, more news about Midnight of Lanar’ya in the coming weeks!

I just got the approval from CreateSpace to order the proof of Twilight of Lanar’ya on Friday. I will have the proof in my hands on Wednesday. I’m not quite ready to announce a release date (I need to double-check the proof, make sure nothing needs to be corrected, and then bask in the awesomeness for a day or two) but I have started putting together a little promo advert that I will release on YouTube once I have approved the proof.

So, I haven’t done much writing in the past couple of days. Sony Vegas Movie Studio is a tool that needs a lot of hand-holding (and a fair amount of playing the “Video FX finder Shot Game”). But, right now, I’m rendering the first draft for a full playback to see if it works out the way I want it. If it does, then I’ll just have this ready to go when I get the proof check finished next week.

And, since the render has just finished, I’m going to go run the check on it!

No, I haven’t forgotten about this place or forgotten my password or anything like that. I’ve been busy the past couple of weeks moving about 1,200 miles across country and starting a new job. Since I’m getting paid for my 10 am – 7 pm time block — and since I did not have the Internet at the apartment until yesterday — I haven’t been doing a lot of posting here. I’m still hard at work on Midnight of Lanar’ya and have plans to have the draft completed by the end of April. Twilight of Lanar’ya just had its final cover check today (thanks a bunch, Keary!) and I should be uploading the final cover and ordering the proof before the end of this week.

A while back, either here or over at Magisters’ Terrace, I talked about achieving a work-life-writing balance. I do fully intend to get my balance back but starting a new job does require a bit more of my time and concentration since I want to do an absolutely smashing job at work so that they decide they want to keep me. Once I get over the eggshells of being the “new person” and feel a little more secure on my feet (trust me, moving cross-country and starting a new job all at once may be fun, but it’s a nerve-wracking kind of fun. Imagine riding Space Mountain only without the adrenaline rush), I’ll relax more in the evenings and be able to write more. I’m also working on tying up the last bits of Alayne’s Story — a long World of Warcraft fanfic I started back in 2007 and am bringing to a close nearly five years later. Finishing up any piece of work that you’ve spent five years on takes a bit out of you. I know that, perhaps, one day, after the distaste of the next scheduled expansion has been purged from my being, I may pick up Alayne’s Story again. However, for now, I’m bringing it to a close and that’s taking a lot of the energy that I would otherwise be putting into Midnight of Lanar’ya.

And yeah, there have been a couple of instances of me goofing off playing Star Wars: The Old Republic to relax. I figure it’s better to do that and chill out a bit than to force myself to do a bad night’s worth of writing just to say “there, I worked on Midnight of Lanar’ya.” I may not get as much done right now as I’d like but, believe me, it’s much easier to catch up than it is to try to salvage pages that should never have been written to begin with.

But, for now, I’m going to go curl up with one of R.A. Salvatore’s Drizzt books (The Crystal Shard and no spoilers please!), relax a bit, and then do a little bit more work on Alayne’s Story and Midnight of Lanar’ya before I turn in for the night.

I just spent the day formatting Twilight of Lanar’ya for CreateSpace and Smashwords. Now all I need is the cover, spine, and back and I’ll be ready to roll everything out.

Formatting is probably my least favorite part of publishing a novel. I understand the necessity but there are times I wish I had the programming skills to create an application that would just take the raw output and magically render it into perfect formatting for where ever I’m publishing. Every service has a different way it wants things formatted and you’ll easily spend an hour or two getting your document redone along the lines they require.

Ah well. At least that part is over and done with and I have a better idea of how to format things in the future so it will go more quickly. For now, I’m going to go play Star Wars to unwind a bit. Tomorrow it will be time to get back to the grind. I hope to finish the first draft of Midnight of Lanar’ya by the end of April and have it ready for publication this summer. I also want to get some kind of commercial done for Twilight of Lanar’ya and a few print banners done to distribute around my home town and in bookstores in the area to try to get some more sales. Also, once I’ve approved the proof, I’ll need to start getting cracking on my online marketing presence. Books don’t just sell themselves, after all.