At Blade’s Edge is the first book in Doranna Durgin’s Demon Steel series. She’s republishing them through her own publishing company. Yes, she’s very much an indie author, so keep that in mind if you prefer reading indie.
Since Doranna is also an author whose books I tend to just one-click even without reading the description (she is that good), I also grabbed these the moment I learned about them. And they are so good.
Today, I’ll talk about the first book in the series, At Blade’s Edge.
At Blade’s Edge – Book 1 in the Demon Steel Series
Ignore the man chest. This is not steamy, although there is one (very sweet) sex scene, and yes, it’s paranormal romance.
However, this novella is also full of action.
Alex Donally finally gets the attention of Deb Marchant who works in a store for car parts. He doesn’t know that trouble lurks in her past, just as she doesn’t know he invites trouble for a living. And yes, there is mutual attraction, but both know better than to pursue it.
When their worlds collide, however, everything changes. Alex vows to protect Deb, with the help of a blade that is much more than it seems. And they ride directly into danger…
What I love most about this book is the amazing, crisp language. The description of Alex goes like this – and it tells you almost everything you need to know about him. It is also the very first sentence of the book.
Sharp dark eyes, sharp jaw, black leather and habitual stubble, definite bad-boy attitude.
Of course, there is much more for him that you’ll have to fund out yourself.
The characters have depth and a history that goes far deeper than necessary for this little novella and their interaction is clearly influenced by this history. That gives their world much more substance – and it will get even better in the next two books which are full novels.
What I don’t like? That cover. Dear gods, that’s just so not Alex and so not this story. I wanted to share the review in a group that does not allow steam – and a bare chest does indicate steam, even if it’s not just a man chest. So I couldn’t share it there, which is a shame because there is nothing crass in Doranna’s bed scenes.
(Here’s a secret. I must have re-read this book five times already. I love it that much – and it still manages to hold all my attention. I’m weird like that.)
Go read this book. Let yourself be drawn into a tight, fast-paced, sweet story that will leave you wanting more – and then continue with the series.
I haven’t done a progress report in way too long, so I’ll let you know what I’ve been up to in the last few months…
Twin Worlds Progress Report
I spent most of my writing time with Sara, Judy, Crash and Krighen.
Book 1 is mostly finished, I’m getting feedback from beta readers and that means tweaking. I’m also getting a lot of ideas for books 2 and 3, which means more tweaking of book 1. Even so, I’m quite happy with it.
The funny thing is that I’m writing books 2 and 3 simultaneously. And yes, I am being mean to all of them (Sara gets away with the least pain – for now), but they also find out so much more about the villain and themselves. And yes, the relationship between Judy and Krighen remains volatile.
The image above is another Artbreeder creation. It could show a location from book 2.
Wolves Print Progress Report
Alas. I haven’t found the energy to look into this. At least Atticus seems to have stabilized a little, and they did something amazing about curly quotes. And June is already full of things to do (editing jobs, admin work), so don’t expect progress with that just yet. Apologies.
If you haven’t read my “Wolves” yet, you’re missing out on my best-selling series. In it, you’ll find Wolf shifters, Wolf bikers, a Wolf doctor, Wolf bodyguards and generally a lot of action and adventure paired with a sweet romance plot (no steam – they refused to go that route).
The book to start with – for free! – is “A Wolf’s Quest“, and it’s up on all major stores, including Amazon, Apple, Google, Kobo and Tolino. You can even borrow it from your library through Overdrive. (But I’m not telling you that I think books 3 and 4 are my best ones…)
Winds of Destiny Progress Report
Now, I have awesome news for you here! Because the Winds of Destiny are coming out soon, which is a new series for my Joanna pen name (because it does have some explicit scenes in it). The first set is called Winds of Destiny (four books, already written), and the second set will be called Pillars of the Empire (five books, struggling with the first of those but I’ll get there).
Those books are back in my control and I just found a cover designer willing to work with my ideas and inside my budget. All I have to do is a final, final edit and then run the file through Atticus to create the ebook and the print – and I have a self-imposed deadline to get it all done before the July Newsletter.
That means you can look forward to a new book by yours truly next month!
Right now, I have two active projects and I finished a third one last week. It’s a weird mixture of fun and work, to be honest – fun because I get to read good books and work because I can’t just relax and enjoy them.
I also finished a proofreading job for an author I love (and would like to call a friend) in April. And she just published the book, so I’ll send you there because it is so absolutely awesome.
You may also know that I am a teacher at heart, and so I want to share a link with all my author friends. You see, the most difficult thing to get right in all this writing craft is punctuation. Especially punctuation around dialog – even more fun is the fact that this differs wildly across languages. Be warned!
Anyway, here is a link I have been sharing around because on that website they explain all the intricacies of dialog punctuation in American English. Yes, it must be that specific.
The King’s Swordsman is a fascinating saga by Becky James, one of my author friends. And right now, she’s getting ready to publish Book 3 in it, The Limit of the Lonely Man. Release date is June 9th.
I’m sharing the cover here, simply because I love Thorrn, the main character, and all the friends he makes. I love those stories and yes, I have re-read the books, which I only do with the ones I really, really enjoy.
Now, Thorrn is a very good swordsman. He’s fast, strong and swift with a blade. He’s also very loyal, caring, determined and stubborn.
He’s not necessarily smart.
And that gets him into a lot of trouble, especially since he also ends up having to deal with the weirdness of the United Kingdom on Earth on top of all the problems he has in Oberrot.
Yes, this is a series that uses a fantasy world, magic, sword-fighting and portals. It’s not quite a parallel world to Earth, but Earthlings play an important part in the whole universe there.
In addition to this fully-fleshed world, you get almost non-stop action, amazing plot-twists, portal fun and heartbreaking love. Well, and Thorrn gets beaten up a few times, poor guy.
I absolutely adore what Becky created and I want to encourage you to read the entire series. Of course! Because it’s that good. Here are the universal links through Books2Read:
Go and read those books now, so you’re ready for Book 3 when it releases.
More about Book 3 of The King’s Swordsman:
The Blurb:
Evyn is running out of time. A princess could have a solution–or be her downfall.
Newly made Rangers, Thorrn and Aubin race to find the cause of Evyn’s strange illness, seeking out Princess Sabatha of Rush. Aubin’s self-doubt threatens the outcomes of the mission while King Gough is making political moves, hoping that Evyn continues her betrothal to Prince Gerlay of Dinahe rather than choosing anyone else.
But destiny weaves around them, drawing the multiverses and their hearts together. What is Evyn’s calling as the Spirit Shaper, and what does it mean to be the Lonely Man?
Take a look at the The Limits of the Lonely ManHERE.
Let’s start this progress report with a kind of bang. Or rather, this bang will come in the second half of 2022.
The above picture is how my month started out: I received mail from Susan Kaye Quinn, who has organized the Writers on the Moon project.
It literally means that my books will be on the moon, in the shape of epubs and PDFs, and what you see is the cargo manifest and the flight ticket. If you look closely, you’ll also see a little chip on top of the book (on Sidren’s body). That’s a mockup of the data chip that will be send to the moon. With any luck, the lander will take off later this year.
I think that’s so cool!
The Twin Worlds Progress Report
Right now, as I’m writing this progress report, I have some beta-readers going through the first version of Book 1, Steps of Courage. I’m also working on Book 2, Paths of Control, fleshing out the plot and giving my heroes a lot of trouble in the shape of an extra guard sent with them to make sure they don’t break any rules.
Which is not working… as you might expect.
In addition, the villain will take a much more active role in Book 2. You’ll get a better look than just her fleeing backside, and no, that won’t be fun for some of my heroes.
Oh, you want to beta-read, too? Let me know!
Dragon Pawn Progress Report
Yes, I have picked up the story of Marick, after stalling out on the dragon fights that I still need to write. In fact, I’m giving you a sneak preview of the first couple of chapters HERE, outside of this progress report.
I’m almost done with this book, set in the Cloud Lands Beginnings series. You’ll see a few familiar faces eventually, but it’s all about Marick – and of course, survival in a world where dragons still eat people.
Marick loves horses, which both helps in dealing with dragons and gives him a lot of heartache. Here’s how he sees them:
Marick had loved horses all his life. Their scent, their grace, their willingness to partner with humans… all of that spoke to his soul. Horses had always talked to him, through their movements, their looks, and sometimes, their sounds. It was almost like reading minds, he thought.And now, they had been reduced to food. They would never know the kind of partnership that was possible. They would never learn to balance a human on their back and race with the wind.
I’m fairly confident that I can get Dragon Pawn published around the end of June. So stay tuned (and sign up to my newsletter if you haven’t already) so you won’t miss it when it comes out.
Wolves Progress Report
No, sorry. I still haven’t managed to set up the print versions. Apologies.
Instead, I’ve done something completely insane: I have created the first draft of a screenplay for the first episode of the first Wolf book, A Wolf’s Quest.
You see, my sister introduced me to the series when I visited them on my vacation before Easter. And my nephew lets me watch on his account. Let me admit it right here: I have binged the episodes. More than once. Ahem.
The story-telling just blew me away. Yes, it’s obvious that one person wrote it all and that a lot of thought went into the whole thing, including incorporating as much canon as possible. What I really enjoyed, however, was putting little hints and teasers into the series that really only made sense after a while.
I loved the way they built a main character we don’t ever see face to face (well, almost never) into someone we can care about, someone we relate to, someone we possibly might even love.
Simply through the story, through posture, action and his voice (and what a voice it is!).
Which got me thinking very hard about visual story-telling. And I remembered a friend of mine telling me that some of my dialog is practically screenplay-ready. So I asked him, and he generously shared two of his screenplays and pointed me to text books.
Which got me started on writing my own, which is a huge learning curve.
Now I dream of creating a Wolves of the South set of miniseries, one little series for each book. The first one, A Wolf’s Quest, will be divided up into three episodes, and I’m working on the first one. Definitely more to come in the next progress report.
It’s utterly insane because I have almost no contacts in the industry, I’m not a huge fan of movies and well… let’s be honest, most screenplays never sell. And yet I can’t get that image out of my mind, and I really, really want to see Ben’s eyes shift on screen. And yeah… I want to see Nick on his motorcycle and how Connor kisses Ashley.
If you know people in the streaming industry, would you introduce me?
Let’s start this progress report with an image from near where I live. This is the Eckernförder Bucht, an inlet of the Baltic Sea. And it stands for the first two weeks of April, which I took off work for vacation.
My sister (who is visiting me this week) and I walked there with two friends who provided transport (I don’t own a car). It was windy and we weathered a couple of showers with hail and snow. And I found a special rock – yellow sandstone with bog iron wrapped around it.
That fallen tree is still alive, btw, it has leaf buds. And just like that tree, my writing is still alive: I have been writing every day, just not as much as usual since I spent a week with my sister’s family. And I got to see my Dad, which was very good.
The Twin Worlds Progress Report
I’ve made substantial progress with the Twin Worlds since the last progress report.
Book 1 is almost ready for beta readers. I need to fill in one or two more chapters and then clean it up (taking out all my writing dates and comments).
I’ve started writing Book 2, and I have some fun coming up when Sara and Judy are reunited with their families. Happiness and heartbreak will go hand in hand there, before things will get really difficult.
I’ve also written a few chapters for Book 3 already – Writer Brain insisted on sending me scenes with such intensity that I had little choice except writing them out. Master Pentas will have quite a role in that one, and I have a neat little secret for Crash to find out there.
I finally made a decision on the series title. It will be known as “The Mages of the Twin Worlds”, and it will feature portals on the covers, to convey that part of the world.
Wolf Print Progress Report
Sorry. I didn’t get any further – which was good because Atticus kept adding functionality. And I just remembered that I wanted to change the preview chapter in Wolves #1. So it is a good thing I didn’t make much progress, but I really, really hope to get moving on that next week.
Atticus is great for formatting books. And I am pondering adding a wolf graphic as chapter header. Would you like that? Let me know in a comment.
Atticus Recommendation
If you are an author and want to format your own ebooks and print books, I will whole-heartedly recommend Atticus. Yes, it’s not cheap (147 USD as a one-time payment), but still cheaper than other formatting software that includes print PDF. And unlike Vellum, it’s available for all OS, including Linux. It works in almost every browser, too.
They have recently added much functionality to their print PDF creation process, giving us a full PDF preview before you download it.
It’s still not a program to write in – unlike Scrivener – but the formatting side of it is now extremely useful. It’s also getting more and more beautiful, with added templates and the ability to create your own unique look for your books.
This book is the first in “The Light of Darkness”, an epic fantasy series by Catrin Russell. And as it behooves such a series, the ago-old battle between good and evil, literally between light and darkness, is at the front and center of it.
Here’s my review:
The story revolves around two main characters who are polar opposites: The Priestess Ayana and the demon Prime Samael.
Ayana lives in the Temple of Light and fighting demons is her everyday life. Those evil creatures keep attacking humans, stealing children and robbing crops. And the Head Priest has decreed that all demons must be killed in an outright war to rid the world of them.
Samael is the heir and prime defender of a large demon tribe. He is expected to marry and secure his line, to keep the tribe alive and safe. But none of the potential mates shoved at him stir even a flicker of interest. Instead, he keeps watching and baiting a certain priestess, with no idea why.
Soon, it becomes obvious that things are not as clear-cut as they seem. And not much later, convictions are beginning to be tested.
In addition to the two main characters, there is quite a team of supporting characters who all bring their unique personalities and experiences to the story, from the sweet, talented healer to the scarred war veteran. And love blossoms in many different ways.
I invite you to step into this epic world where Light kills, where Darkness creates fear, and where people strive to hold on to their convictions. And where, as you know, opposites attract.
You can find “The Power of Conviction” in these stores.
The Entire Series by Catrin Russell is for Sale for a Limited Time (April 17th – 21st)
The first 3 books of the completed Light of Darkness series by Catrin Russell are on sale between the 17th and the 21st of April! The series is perfect for readers who enjoy visceral, gripping high & epic fantasy tales with dark undertones and romance! As humans engage in a sweeping war against demonkind, a Priestess of the Light is forced to choose between heart and duty. Fate, prophecies, and an impossible love will blur the very line between good and evil.
Hoo boy, that is a loaded question. Because Hannah isn’t reading what she writes…
In fact, I am a bit embarrassed to reveal what I’m reading. Which is exactly what I want to talk about today.
Because, you see, I’m reading steamy Alien Abduction Romance. *takes a deep breath* And that, as I will do my best to explain, is a good thing.
Reading for Escape
We keep talking about reading for escape as if that’s something bad. As if wanting to escape is a sign of weakness, of giving up or of being unable to cope. A sign of failure.
Let’s be honest for a while here, though.
We are in the third year of a pandemic that has killed millions of people world-wide. We still don’t know all the factors for Long Covid and how people can recover from that, but I’ve seen claims that about one quarter of all the people who contract it are still battling symptoms months after their official recovery. And that’s in mild cases.
Pandemic fatigue is setting in now, which means measures are being relaxed even as a new variant is burning through all continents (yes, Covid has even reached Antarctica) and numbers are higher than ever.
We are still dealing with the economical fall-out of everything the pandemic interrupted, with massive changes in life-style (home office, anyone?) and life will never get back to the normal we knew until early 2020. Never. And we’re still adjusting to that.
On top of all that, we’re in the third week of a massive war in the middle of Europe, a war that might still lead to World War III and potentially a nuclear inferno. A war that might – in a best case scenario – turn to guerilla warfare in an occupied nation and continue to simmer for years to come. (Yes, I dream of Ukraine being restored to full sovereignty, but let’s be honest…)
I’m not dealing well with this, at all. I envy those who do, but I need breaks and time-outs from constant worrying and stress. I need this in order to function and so I can keep creating my own worlds.
Escaping into a fantasy world where guys are perfect mates (even if they are growly and possessive) and women get all they ever dreamed about (the teddy bear beneath the growl), where the happy ending is guaranteed, no matter how dire the situation gets – all this is very soothing. And it’s what I need right now.
(Read this if you’re an author or if you want to know the secrets we authors use.)
Yeah, yeah, I know. And no, it’s not entirely an excuse.
Reading this is teaching me a lot about series, even if I may never write in this exact genre (but never say never, there is Joanna, after all, and I may have a steamy story with growly shape-shifters on the backburner).
The worldbuilding in this series is fascinating. Every story – even if it’s the same story over and over and over again in structure – adds more to the world. We learn about the alien culture, we learn about their capabilities, we learn about history, we learn about the state of Earth in the future. And I find it fascinating to see how it’s all “casually” woven into it.
The “butter”. (You need to read “7-Figure Fiction” by T. Taylor to understand that expression. Get it if you’re an author and want to learn about Universal Fantasies.)
Oh, gods, the “butter”. These stories hit a ton of fantasies, including chocolate cake that’s not fattening. And I’m not joking here at all. This stuff is what keeps people reading. These bits that make your heart swell with longing will keep you coming back for more in a series. Even if you blush admitting that to yourself.
I am taking notes. Kind of, anyway.
And finally, the series hooks. They are done quite masterfully, even if it’s a simple technique that I used in my Wolf books for the first time.
The trick is to introduce likable side characters. Give them something to do, make them memorable in a way, make the reader like them. Make the readers care about them.
And then give them their own book.
It’s as simple as that, but it’s done so well that I’ve been reading book after book after book in this series. If you write series and people love your world, find ways of doing that. Give side-characters their own book. It will be worth it.
What are you reading?
So yeah. What are you reading this month?
I’m asking because I’m always looking for more books to read. Don’t be afraid to share even if you think it might not be my favorite genre. Or did you expect me to enjoy Alien Abduction Romance?
Tell me what you’re reading and what you like about it. Would love to hear from you.
Here’s the one good thing for my progress report: I have been writing every day, just as I have since January 1st 2019. Today (3/13/2022) I’m on day 1166 of writing every day.
Keeping track of this is one way of making sure I do not skip even a single day. It makes it possible to keep that promise to myself.
Having said that, I’m still not back to writing 2k every day. I miss that speed. I miss being that deep inside a story, but it is just not working with what I’m writing now.
The Twin Worlds Progress Report
“Twin Worlds” is my shorthand for the new series I’m working on. It’s challenging me on several levels.
First, I’m writing four focus characters instead of one or two like I used to. I’m still not sure this is the right way to go for this story but they are insisting.
Second, this story has been coming to me in bits and pieces, not at all in the order they will be read in. So I have chapters that will stand and am writing chapters to fill the gaps. Talk about a Frankennovel, seriously.
Third, it’s easily double the size of any Wolf book or even one of the Zell books. This is huge. A massive storyline to keep track of.
Fourth, Writer Brain is already throwing more plot points at me, for books 2 and 3. Even so, I’m worried about being able to create another book with a similar size because for now, the ideas are not enough for 100k. I actually bought Plottr for a year after a recommendation from a friend, and I am very happy to have a place to dump those plot points in.
Fifth, I have come up with titles for the first three books. I really hope I can get all of that published this year, but … well, you see items one through four. Anyway, here are the titles:
Steps of Courage Paths of Control Trials of Power
Wolves Print Progress Report
Yes, I promised. I know I have at least three friends waiting for the print versions, and yes, I started the process. And then I stalled out checking the print interior of Wolves #1 for more typos (if you find any, please let me know).
Yesterday, I found out that being stalled out was a good thing. You see, Atticus, the program I started using for the Wolves, has revamped their PDF creator and previewer, and it’s become much better! Waiting paid off!
Except now I have to go in and redo all the formatting settings. But since I have to do that anyway – would you like a cute wolf graphic as chapter headers? Let me know in a comment.
ArtBreeder Progress Report
What? ArtBreeder? What’s that?
It’s a very neat website with an AI that “creates” images from “parent” images that you can “breed”. I looked at it first quite a few years ago and created an image of Zell that really inspired me to keep writing his story. (But in all honesty, it was rather… gruesome.)
I returned to it last year and found it much improved. I played with more Zell characters and turned the gruesome version into a much better one.
Finding myself extremely bored at some point late last year, I went back once again. It has become amazing. In fact, it’s so much fun to play with now that I went and created images for my Twin World characters. Hop on over if you want to see how I envision Sara and Judy, Krashanaris and Krighen.
And in fact, I created that landscape image above on that site, first “breeding” one and then playing with the sliders to give it a sunset feeling. I can totally see that one as background on a cover, too.
I will absolutely recommend playing with ArtBreeder, especially if you’re an author or a cover designer. It’s fun and fascinating.
Newsletter – Progress Reports and much more in your Mail Box
I do send out a newsletter every month, on the 13th, called “Ember Alert”. That’s because it features an exclusive story about my little dragon plushie Ember. And no, I’m not even posting it on this blog. You can only get it in the newsletter.
A little over three years ago, I made a promise to myself: I wanted to keep writing every day. Because I wanted to be a productive writer. You see, being an indie author means you have to keep publishing books.
I started keeping track of my word count in a simple spreadsheet a few years earlier, but there were huge gaps, often spanning months.
At that point in time, I wanted to know what I can do as a writer, I wanted to be able to gauge my productivity. And I kept hearing my coach say, “What you measure, grows.”
So yeah, I chose to write every day on January 1st, 2019. And I have been doing it ever since.
Yesterday, I reached Day 1,111 of Writing Every Day.
Of course, there is a trick to this.
“Of course,” I hear you say. “It’s impossible to write every day like that.”
No, I didn’t cheat. I really, truly wrote every day. But if you look closely, you might notice I didn’t specify how much I’d be writing every day.
My worst day was only 11 words.
That was on March 20th, 2019. And I had plenty of two-digit days. Why do I count that as writing?
Because even writing one sentence means that I opened the file, that I thought about the story and that I added to it. I went to that world in my mind. I lived there for a little bit.
That keeps creativity flowing. It keeps the story growing.
Of course, writing more would be better. But there are days when you can’t do it. When all you can do is open the file, type out one half-hearted sentence and call it writing every day done.
I can’t tell you how often that simple promise to myself has kept me going. Because yes, there is pressure not to break that spell.
Who wants to break a 1,000 day spell of Writing Every Day?
Nobody.
So that’s the trick that keeps me writing. Even if it’s just a few words.
But you see, those few, reluctant, hesitating words are often just the beginning. They tune my mind into the story, and if I allow this, the words often begin to flow. Of course, this is easier once I get to know my characters and the story picks up some momentum. That’s when I get a thousands words or more a day.
But the actual number doesn’t matter for the promise.
The trick is setting yourself up for success. And even writing one word – one single, stupid word – is good enough for Writing Every Day. Everyone can do one word.
I would even allow sick days, but fortunately, it hasn’t come to that yet. And the whole Covid situation has helped, since I got to work in home office, giving me even more time in a day. 2021 was my best year so far, I wrote 600,000 words. That’s 12 NaNovels, if you wish.
And it started with writing every day.
Should every writer go for Writing Every Day?
No. This works for me, first and foremost.
Can it also work for you?
Of course it could. But that depends on your situation and how your life is structured. It depends on how much you want to write, how many deadlines you have, and how you create inspiration.
I like and need the daily contact with my stories. It keeps the characters alive and interesting for me. And they often enough throw me curveballs when I start writing with the mind not yet fully engaged. I love it when that happens.
But if you need silence, the kids or dogs taken care of and no urgent demands on your time before you can enter your world with a clear conscience, then writing might be something you can do best on Monday mornings.
I would still encourage you to try writing every day. Even a little amount of words adds up, and if you even manage a thousand words a week, you’ll have a 50k novel at the end of the year.
Want to try the Writing Every Day Club?
Join my Facebook group The Write Mindset, where I run a bit of accountability every day. It’s free. And I think it’s fun. Oh, and if you don’t like Facebook, I have a similar group on MeWe, called Authors and Editors.
Want to get writing news? Sign up to my newsletter.
Looking back at the year – in this case 2021 – seems to be a fashion on New Year’s Eve. And yeah, I’ll share my thoughts and accomplishments here.
Have an image to illustrate my year 2021 in books.
That’s right, I published a dozen books in 2021, one per month. That has been quite a ride, and it certainly forced me to get things done. I even used pre-orders and set them up a month early, which probably wasn’t a good idea in hindsight. They didn’t capture any emails for me.
No, I didn’t write all of those in 2021. I started working on Zell (my hero in the Franssisi Four Chronicles) in 2016, I believe, and I finished Flux in NaNo 2020. But the Wolves all but took over earlier this year and dominated my thoughts for several months. It has been hard to let them go.
If you want to take a look at all my books, here is my Author Page on Books2Read. From there, you can get to every store that has my books available, including Amazon, Apple, Google and even Smashwords (although I need to finish uploading there, let me know if you’re missing a book in a store).
The Franssisi Four Chronicles – First Series of the Year 2021
“The Franssisi Four Chronicles” are an SF series taking place on a human colony planet that was taken over by aliens. The humans were turned into pleasure slaves, for reasons that are explained in the books.
My young hero Zell is a “Wild One”, growing up in the wilderness in a hunter/gatherer society before being captured. He befriends his new owner and things get interesting and dangerous from then on… changing not just their lives but the lives of everyone on that planet. Epic, but also quite steamy. (Which is why it has my Joanna pen name as author.)
Wolves of the South – Second Series of the Year 2021
The “Wolves of the South” are the opposite in many ways. Making love happens behind closed doors, it’s okay for YA. It’s urban fantasy, set in the early 2000s. And the monsters are human, rather than alien. It’s a werewolf adventure/romance/family saga with a new set of main characters in every book, although the others have cameos.
My Wolves are simply humans with extras – they can shift into wolves. Good-looking ones, very similar to real wolves. I don’t like the werewolf hairy monster trope (although mine do have a few features like some extra strength and fast healing), and I really despise the alpha-wolf trope. There is actually one of them in book 3, and he is not an ally, at all.
Okay, that is a loaded question, considering we’re in the second year of a pandemic. I’m one of the lucky ones – work sent me to home office in March 2020, and with the exception of November 2021, I haven’t had to return. And even in November, it was only on two days a week. I’m also fully vaccinated and I have a comfortable apartment with a studio where I work and write.
I do miss meeting friends and family, but as an introvert, that is something I can deal with better than others. I like being at home. I like being on my own and do my own things. So my social year 2021 hasn’t been too bad, despite the isolation.
The best part are my online friends, of course. I am so grateful for the internet and that’s where I spend most of my time. Writing groups on several social media cannot replace direct human contact, but they are a close second. Also, Zoom calls are wonderful. Yes, I said it.
What does 2022 hold?
Will I repeat that in 2022? That is unlikely. I’m writing in several projects, and I have some series in the pipeline, but I want less pressure and more fun. Not that Zell and the Wolves haven’t been fun, but… I also need to write more on brand. If I ever find out what it is, of course. Right now, I’m leaning towards Hannah doing more Young Adult books while Joanna gets the ones with some spice.
The biggest news is that I signed up with a lovely small press company for two of my series that I simply haven’t found the time to edit and publish. There are seven books waiting for you through them already, and more to come.
One a is an epic fantasy tale of mages and shamans who escape being sacrificed – more of a Joanna series there, with four books already written and five more planned. I’m splitting those up into two different sets, one is the “Winds of Destiny” and the second is called “Pillars of the Earth”. I can’t tell you how much I love South, West, East and North, the main characters of the ones I’ve already written. some of them early in the year 2021. Yes, those are their names, for reasons.
The other is a fun fantasy adventure romp with characters almost straight out of RPG systems, and I have three books written for that already. I’m calling that series “The Mengarian Conspiracy”, and it features an old female fighter, a burly inn keep, a busty bard and a dark, handsome assassin. Oh, and a giant spider, a cute little goblin and of course, evil mages and druids.
There’s also at least one new dragon book from the Cloud Lands coming, although there are more characters raising their hands, and you know what that means. I might put out some of my early German work, as well, and yeah, there is a sequel to Konrad that’s also waiting in the wings. I’m not done with writing, at all, I wish I had more than 24h in a day!
Anyway, here’s to 2022! May it be a good year.
PS: If you want to know what I’m up to, I do send out a monthly newsletter. Sign up and get a dragon story for free!
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