If you buy a book with my name on, I promise I WROTE EVERY WORD OF IT.

I feel like I talk about my writing enough here that most people that see this will know this, but after the #copypastecris scandal of late …

Anyway, the words are mine. Good, bad, ugly, indifferent. They’re all mine.

P.S. If you need to catch up you can see Courtney Milan’s original post here.

P.P.S. Nora Roberts is a QUEEN and I love her and she also terrifies me a little, but like, in a way that makes me want to have a cup of tea with her but also use my very best manners. Read her thoughts on this disaster here.

P.P.P.S. This was my favorite quote from Queen Nora:

Because the culture that fosters this ugly behavior has to be pulled out into the light and burned to cinders. Then we’re going to salt the freaking earth.

Yes, she’s talking about the scam trolls in KU. Yes, she acknowledges in way that I have not seen many trad-pubbed authors do that legitimate self-pubbed authors are being damaged by scam trolls. I love her. My little self-pubbed heart loves her so much.

When last we heard from our conquering hero …

In my last update I told you about how I worked so terrifically hard to catch up to my production calendar and everything was awesome?

It’s even better now.

This never happens, so I’m writing it all down for later this year when (possibly) everything has gone off the rails and I wonder why I ever thought this was a good idea.

I finished Star of Storms. I even finished it three days early.

Long story short, I had one glorious day in a hotel room by myself and I powered through to the last scene. Then I binge watched Surviving R. Kelley and the first part of season one of The Good Doctor (because I needed to remind myself that there is good and hope and wonderful-ness in the world).

Side note: The overwhelming message I have been receiving for 2019 has been that if you are a man and either have a lot of money or make a lot of money for other me you can basically do whatever the heck you want and get away with it. My hope is that the tide is shifting on this, albeit slower than it feels it should. IMO, Surviving R. Kelley should be required viewing for all Americans because where have any of us been in this? I can make excuses all day long, but let’s be honest – he would not have made it past the first offense if any of his victims had been white. Don’t @ me.

Moving on.

I finished SoS on Tuesday, took Wednesday off, and woke up Thursday ready to write. Like, the schedule demanded words and I was all, “well, I could go back to rewrites on SoF, or … ?”

And then I remembered that I had written a skeleton plot on another try at the ding-dang-dadgum romance novel that I’ve been banging my head against for over a year now. I “finished” it before, at the end of 2018, but as I read back through it, I just … it wasn’t hitting the right notes. I set it aside. AGAIN.

This time though, I know it’s working. I went back to the drawing board and reread some of my favorite contemporary romances. (Look. I KNOW that’s what all the advice said, but I’m basically a teenager in publishing years and YOU’RE NOT MY REAL MOM!) I paid close attention to when and what was happening. I took notes. And I sketched out a plot between Christmas and New Year’s. I scheduled time to work on the book – after SoS was complete, but booked February 18 through March 1 to work on plotting. ONLY plotting. Any word count would come from that.

Only, when I re-read through the plot I loved it so much that I just jumped right in and the magic started happening right away.

It’s been a week and I’ve written over 12,000 words. I mean, don’t get me wrong. It’s still a first draft, and yeah, I had to go back and rework a couple of things that weren’t conflicty (*not a real word, but it’s mine now if Webster’s comes knocking) enough. But that’s a landmark in production for me. I have it penciled in at around 50,000 words. But according to my production calendar I’m not supposed to be here, where I already am, until (checks notes) sometime in the middle of March.

All that to say, I am going to keep working on this one. I may finish way earlier than predicted and then I will probably move to editing as I’ll have three completed first drafts that will need it. I’m not holding my breath or anything, but y’all. This is exciting!