We’ve only just begun

When I was a teenager (eons ago) I worked at the local power company one summer. My boss was this amazing super-cool girl boss who I totally wanted to be when I grew up. She taught me many insightful things about writing and the corporate world. Then I went back to the boring world of high school. Next summer, I came back to work for her and showed up to find my shero sporting a huge belly. She saw the shock on my face and laughed and said “We are doing new things.” I have loved that phrase ever since, and today I get to use it.

We’re doing new things over here!

And by we I really mean God. I’m just along for the ride. But it sure is exciting and not that different from making a baby. I guess it could be called, making a book baby. After several submissions to several publishers and several polite and sometimes detailed rejections, there is finally light at the end of the tunnel for my most recent Work In Progress. It is a story I started writing long ago therapeutically that I finally finished late last year. And while I haven’t gotten “the call” yet, I have gotten through the first round of selection. It is enough to make me hopeful. Something new may be coming around the corner, and when it does I will let you know more.

In the meantime, if you haven’t seen any of my previous books, you can view the list here. And if you want to same one, check out Morgan’s story, on sale for $0.99 at Amazon.com.

“Forget about what’s happened; don’t keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it? There it is! I’m making a road through the desert, rivers in the badlands. – Isaiah 43:19, The Message

New Decade, New Release

It’s my birthday month! Yes my birthday was earlier this month and just like I have done around every birthday for the past four years, this year I am releasing my fifth novel Under Covers. This one is more of a novella and a shorter story but it is packed with real life, real love and real faith which is all I am about when it comes to writing.

I invite you to meet my girl Naomi. She is about to get married to Jordan Lennox, the son of a former governor of New York and a successful businessman in his own right. And to top it off, he loves her like crazy. Sounds perfect right? Well it is, until Naomi faces a crises with her missing sister Camille. And when the search for her sister sends her back ‘home’ to the island of her birth, the real drama begins. Suddenly a lot of things that she had carefully packed away, things that she neglected to tell her husband-to-be are now coming to the surface. Will she be faithful to God and the man of her future or will she succumb to the security of her past? You got to read it to find out!

I really enjoyed writing this story. I actually finished it late last year then I lost the document and had to rewrite half of it. But I think all things happen for a reason and you have gotten the best version of Naomi’s story. I invite you to take the journey with her. Pick up Under Covers on Amazon, Kobo, iBooks or your favorite ebook retailer. And of course you can get the paperback on Amazon. And please let me know what you think!

Happy reading!

Happy Release Day!

My third novel GET YOU GOOD releases today from Kensington Books’ Dafina imprint! It’s been more than a year but at the same time it feels like it happened so fast! Anyway, here’s what its all about:

Get You Good Virtual Tour

The virtual tour for my newest release GET YOU GOOD starts this week! Be sure to stop by the blogs listed each day for reviews and interviews. You can also listen in live and call in to ask me questions of your own at my radio stops. Look forward to seeing you there!

Monday, March 18, 2013

• Black Authors Network with Ella Curry (RADIO SHOW) – 8:30 pm EST
  http://www.blogtalkradio.com/black-author-network
  Call in at: (646) 200-0402
• All the Buzz Reviews (BLOG STOP)
  http://www.allthebuzzreviews.com

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

• Sharvette Mitchell Radio Show – 7:00 pm EST
  http://www.blogtalkradio.com/mitchell-productions/
  Call in at: 347-945-5907
• Paulette Harper Johnson (BLOG STOP)
  http://pauletteharperjohnson.blogspot.com/

Higher Thoughts: Just Stop

I woke up this morning feeling restless. And if I am honest it didn’t just start this morning. In fact, the past couple weeks I have been simmering in a low level of anxiety as I bob from one life drama to another. At the start of the year it was school/work issues. Those kinda got handled and then it was friendship-relationship issues. Then those sorta got dealt with and then came author issues. And these definitely have not been dealt with. In fact, as I sit her typing this I am trying to ignore the unease that comes from knowing that I am less than 6 months from the deadline for my fourth novel and I haven’t even written a chapter yet. I certainly hope my editor doesn’t read this.

The First Cut is the Deepest on TWOTS

So it finally happened.

I submitted my manuscript to my editor a couple months ago and then on Friday I opened up my email and saw it. 129KB in size and plain as day.

My edits.

I hate getting edits. Not because I don’t like being critiqued, but because it gives me that excruciating feeling in the pit of my stomach. The kind you get when you you’re fourteen years old and your mom reads your diary behind your back and then gives it back to you.

But edits are a necessary part of the publishing process and after the initial cringe-worthy moment of opening the document,  it gets better. To see what else I have to say about the process check out my post at the Toronto Word on the Street Blog.

Happy Writing!

I’m finished. Now what? …on TWOTS

Getting to the end of a book is usually satisfying. For the writer, the feeling of completing a manuscript is even more satisfying. But now that you’ve done it, now that you’re sitting there with this 87 000 word long document, you must be asking yourself, what next? If the spotlight is what you seek then it’s time to get published…

Are you sitting on a finished manuscript, unsure of where to go next? I talk about a few options for unpublished writers on my latest post on the Word on the Street Blog. Find out the important things you should be doing as you seek to get your book from your computer hard drive to a book store shelf. I can’t possibly address everything in one post, so send me your questions and I will be sure to help however I can!

Hitting The Wall, on TWOTS

“It’s that dreaded moment we all fear. You try to deny it, but after hours staring at a blinking curser you’re convinced: you have writer’s block. It’s as unavoidable as the flu and almost as unpredictable, lasting anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks. Symptoms include, lack of inspiration, insipid paragraphs, and an addiction to the delete button. There is no foolproof cure, but here are a few remedies that may work….”

On the Toronto Word on the Street blog this month I talk about strategies for fighting writer’s block. Read the rest of the post at The Word on the Street blog and let me know if any of these worked for you. Or better yet, tell me, what do you do to deal with writer’s block?

New Season, New Things

It’s finally here! Spring. And in a few weeks it will be summer. With these new seasons come a lot of new things. Like warm weather, too-short shorts, and visits to the beach. I’ve also been doing some new things this Spring, particularly blogging about my experience as a writer. For the next few months I will be sharing my experience as a new author on Toronto’s Word on the Street blog. Here is a snippet from my first post:

The Journey of a Thousand Pages
I guess if I should talk about writing I should start at the beginning. But what is the beginning? Is it that January morning when I excused myself from my meeting to answer the first ever phone call from my would-be-editor? Or was it several years earlier when I sat in a cubicle working my dead end job and decided to start writing for real so I would have something sensible going on in my life. Those were beginnings of sorts.  But I think the real beginning was with a girl named Simone, a boring Geography class, and a $1.25 notebook….(Read more here)

Be sure to check it out and let me know what you thing. And while you’re there check out the other things going on in the writing community in Toronto.

Happy Spring!

Book signing @ Chapters – March 2012

I had my first ever book signing event at the Chapters Bookstore at Kennedy Commons, Scarborough, on Sunday March 11, 2012. It went better than I expected and I met a lot of great people. Special thanks to everyone who stopped by, chatted with me and bought my book. I can’t wait for the next one!