It's been a while

It's been a while since I have done anything even remotely close to writing, or editing or anything to do with my book or books, or writing for that matter.

I've had a personal bumpy ride and writing has taken a back seat, in fact I would go as far as to say it has jumped off the tracks and ran the other way.

I am trying to lasso it in and bring it on back. But how do you get motivation when you don't feel like doing anything?

I am really close to finishing the second book in the Crystal Hart series and I know you've probably heard it all before, because I feel like a record that keeps going around saying the same thing, it's nearly finished.

Well it is finished, I just have to go through the process of editing and sometimes I feel that is most probably the hardest part. Sending it out, waiting and then going back through it and then sending it out again, and quite possibly all over again and again.

My creative side of me has turned to cooking and while I should have a lot of pictures for you, I don't. My camera has decided to pack up and leave town. Cooking has been very therapeutic where I haven't really had to think much, just create. Profiteroles have been my thing, I have made bucket loads of them to the point where I am giving them away.

Hopefully I am back in the writing/editing seat on Monday. Fingers crossed.

Maybe I will write some short stories instead.

We shall see

til next time
Happy Reading.

New Website

I have been trying to work on a new website.

To be honest with you, it is not my forte and I really should hand it over to the professionals, they would do a much better job.

But of course, true to being a Capricorn I am being stubborn and I will persist.

When I lost everything on my computer a while back I also lost the upload mechanism for the website as-well, (I am sure it has a technical name but since I am not much of an IT technical person upload mechanism will suffice.

So I have been tinkering away and I probably should be writing but my website is lacking and it really requires my attention.

I think I shall dedicate this week to it.

What do you think?
Do you care? (probably not)
I value your opinion. You take the time to swing on by and read it so why not listen to what you think.

Anyways, I think that is enough rambling.

til next time

Happy reading
Valissa
xx

School Holidays

The school holidays are here.
(Well actually they have been and gone)

And this is where I usually cringe. The boys get bored. They want to do things that usually cost me a fortune. Of course this holiday is no different. But I thought that I would plan ahead on this one and have hopefully fun, interesting and random things to do.

Pinterest helped, (LOVE PINTEREST) thank you for saving my sanity.

I got a heap of ideas and when it came to doing something random although it was random I had the idea to start with. Having the idea I flew with it when I woke up.

So here's a few of the things that we have done.

Mentos in a bottle. (Boys love this stuff)
We each had a bottle. I went first, as this was the first time I had done anything like this, I wasn't sure if it would work (it did).
So I was first up, the boys loved it, they thought it was a great hoot that for something so small into a bottle of coke it could explode, and then of course they both had a go at it with their own bottle. Afterwards we enjoyed eating the leftover Mentos.


 






We went for a walk along some wetlands whilst visiting my Dad in Numurkah (killed a few good hours). Got some great ideas for Book three in the Crystal Hart series.

We went to the movies (ok this cost me $$$$) but I was okay with that.
The boys wanted to see Man of Steel, I wasn't comfortable with that, so Despicable Me2 it was. Funny movie.



We had a stay in movie day. This was fun, the boys loved it. Loads of homemade popcorn.


Whilst visiting a friend, they pronounced that they had a visitor in the house for the holidays, Okay cool.
Jnr friend then went onto explain that it was a snake. Son 1, got really excited and wanted to see it, what they failed to mention was that it was an eight foot python. Great!
(I have to admit it was pretty cool.)
I stayed my distance.



The local shopping centre had a day where they could build Lego. Perfect for Son no.2

Great time killer.





 
 
 
 
Daniel and I took some selfies with Daisy our cat. This wasn't a great picture but funnily enough it was the best picture. Love my cat.









Well for a winter holiday we really didn't do much, but it was nice to spend time with the boys.

And so they go back to school and I go back to writing.

til next time
Happy Reading
Valissa

It's a little nerve wracking!

I'm not sure why.

I have been putting it off for a long time and I think it's because I really didn't know how to go about it.

Please let me explain.

For a while I have accumulated enough sales (which I must say thank you to you people out there for purchasing my books) to be entitled to payment. Woohoo!

The only thing is, without the proper paperwork Smashwords and Amazon wont pay. So I have been procrastinating for such a long time. Please don't ask me why. Because I can only come up with that I am chicken shit.
My nerves have been on edge for the last week as I finally said yep I am going to do this. I am going to get this ball rolling. For the last two nights I have said oh maybe in the morning I will call, maybe tomorrow night. But tonight, I did it and I feel elated.

I still have some forms that I need to fill in but I finally got the EIN that I needed to fill in those forms. (EIN) is similar to a taxfile number here in Australia from what I can gather.
I can barely keep up with what we need on a tax basis here in Aus, let alone over in America. (Oh I hope I have done the right thing).

But I spoke to a lovely lady who helped me as I fumbled my way along, and after ten minutes I have my number. Now to fill out the forms. :) Hopefully I won't procrastinate as long on those as I did with calling for the number.

Its almost two in the morning and I am as high as a kite on self jubilance that I did something that I had scared myself into a nervous wreck over, I am going to celebrate with a wine.
Cheers to me!

Til next time
Happy Reading,
Valissa

It's Winter

It's Winter and there is nothing I love more than curling up in front of a warm and toasty fire sipping on hot chocolate (or a red wine) snuggled into my blanket to read a good book and perhaps nibble on a nice chunk of chocolate.

Now back to our regular viewing chanel.
Reading a book in the quiet in front of the fire doesn't happen that often, firstly I have children. My time is spent chasing after them, cleaning up after them, driving them somewhere or feeding them(hopefully not my chocolate). Not that I mind, that is what I signed up for when I became a Mum.

Oh dear I think I have veered off the road.

Lets get back to dreaming about wistfully spending the day, (or night) in front of that warm and toasty fire, with a good book.

Some people may enjoy reading a good book on a warm sunny beach, or by the cool inviting water on a hot summer's day. But here in Australia it's winter

I love to read about other authors, their books and also reviews of books, sometimes its hard to get a good review of a book. The other day I came across a fabulous blog that reviews books and interviews authors. Of course I am here to plug away at it because I think it's a really good insight into a book. I am tired of the reviews on Amazon as they seem...... I'm not sure what the word is that I am looking for. Fake would be one, biased, would be another. I know that you can buy reviews and I am sceptical about reviews especially when one says it fabulous with 5 stars and one says it's trash and wouldn't even give it one star.

 

So without further ado. Here's the link. (This is the link to one of the interviews and reviews I guess you could have a look at her main blog if you, like I, liked the blog on this review).
http://bookswithwineandchocolate.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/leave-of-absence-by-tanya-j-peterson.html

Books with wine and chocolate, you could not be more apt than this, especially in winter!

To everyone.
May you enjoy your winter, (Summer in the Northern Hemisphere).
And a big Cheers to great books.

til next time
Happy Reading.

Editing

Editing, Editing, Editing.

This is what I have been up to lately. Editing.

Do I like it? Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. It's a relationship that I have with my writing that I have a love/hate relationship.

Sometimes I find it tedious and boring whilst sometimes I love it, when I love it I get to fall in love all over again with my characters. I once put it out to cyber world whether people fell in love with characters in a book.
I was surprised to find a fifty/fifty split, and I guess it depends on the story and whether the characters are portrayed in a way for you to fall in love with them or hate them.

So at this moment I am editing the next in my Crystal Hart Series, "Stolen in Action". Re-reading it (editing) I get to mix and mingle with the characters again, and I enjoy it. I admit that I think my characters are great and yes perhaps a little bias in my perception. But I am enjoying it, there is a lot going on in the book with the most of the characters and most especially the main character Crystal.

Without giving too much away, I feel that she has grown as a person, or at least that is what I hope to project.

She is up against a tough situation and when we as a person push through those tough times we grow stronger more resiliant, if we learn the lesson.

So I look forward to getting this next in the series out there, and hopefully it is not too far away.

Til next time

Happy Reading
Valissa

In the land of............

Once upon a time there was a princess (everygirl wants to be a princess!). She wanted to write for a living.

Her dream was to be able to make up magical stories that would impress thousands of wonderful people in the kindom she lived. She lived in a wonderful place she liked to called Earth.
For many years the princess dreamed that one day, one day she would be a super star and adored by many who loved her stories and willed her to make up more magical stories.

She had written some and published a few, her few fans that had read her stories so far enjoyed them and she was eager to write more.
The words flowed onto the screen of the laptop before her, coffee was drunk and chocolate was consumed by the truckload.

Then along came an evil prime minister who bought along taxes to her land increasing the cost of living, so much so that the princess had to go out and help her prince plow the fields and bring income into the castle so that they could eat and sleep in a comfortable castle.

As she plowed the fields her neck ached, her shoulders burned from the tension of being hunched over all day as she earnt the few gold coins that would enable her family to eat. She kept dreaming of the day that she will be able to sit at her desk overlooking the mountains and write on her laptop with coffee in hand, spilling out a wonderful magical story that will entertain an audience.

One day the princess will get her dream, she is working on it, bit by bit. Day by day.

As we all know. Fairytales all have a happy ending.



Happy Reading