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Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

I haven’t done this in a while, so I was determined to do it today, even though there hasn’t been a lot happening in my life, which makes it rather awkward! Still, here goes:

  1. I’ve been horribly unwell, but my family are being wonderful about helping out. I’m so appreciative.
  2. I happened to be on Amazon recently and noticed that The Sisterhood had a number of really positive reviews. It’s so nice that a book which I put a lot into is being appreciated.
  3. We have a Christmas tree! It isn’t decorated yet, but its existence is making me happy.
  4. I’m in discussions about cover design for Love Plus One, which is really exciting and makes it all seem so much more real and soon!
  5. Talking of which, I’ve passed on One Plus One, the second book in the series (which is, slightly oddly, perhaps, a prequel), to my editor and I’m waiting to hear what she thinks. Fingers crossed!
  6. I’ve read some really interesting stories recently. It does make such a difference to being ill in bed if you have something decent (or indecent, but good 😉 ) to read.

Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

  1. I am looking forward to the release of my erotica antho All About The Boy on Monday, and have been celebrating by chatting with the most amazing and talented JL Merrow about kink and writing it (there’s a Rafflecopter giveaway, too, if you’re interested in trying to get your hands on a copy of it!).
  2. All About The Boy is coming out with Nine Star Press, and I’m so very very excited that they’ve just accepted my novel Love Plus One for publication at some point! Lots of editing to do first, of course (isn’t there always?!) but this novel was a total labour of love and I’m so happy that they like it.
  3. And talking of novels, have I mentioned the most amazing reviews that The Sisterhood has been getting? There’s this one at Good Reads, this one at Amazon and this one from Rainbow Book Reviews. So, I’m feeling really chuffed about that.
  4. Splendid Son’s summer holidays have started. No more fussing about school and uniform and ‘have you done your homework?’ for six weeks!
  5. And to get the holidays off to a good start, my sister and family are down at the moment, which means I get to spend some time with them, too, which is excellent.
  6. And I’m still writing the new story. It’s 15k now, so it seems to be going well 🙂

Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

  1. I’ve started a new story! It’s going quite slowly at the moment, but it’s taking up quite a bit of my mind, which is always a good sign. Please cross your fingers that it works out for me – I’m always happiest when I’m working on something.
  2. The Sisterhood is up on UK Amazon as a Kindle release, though it’s not going to be officially released until 25th Jule, it seems. I’m not quite sure why that is, but at least that means there’s movement towards getting a UK release for the book, which has got to be a good thing!
  3. I also proof-read my story Something You Really Want for Xcite books. It’s due out in their Gay Romance anthology in August, which is very exciting. I love the characters in that particular story.
  4. I helped out at Splendid Son’s school fete yesterday, which whilst it has left me needing copious quantities of painkillers today and being unable to get out of bed, has also given me a pleasing sense of virtue. Which is something, right?
  5. And talking of Splendid Son, he has a music exam today, but Lovely Partner has taken the day off and will take him, which given the ‘unable to get out of bed’ thing is a great relief! Please to be sending good thoughts his way (SS’s, not LP’s!).
  6. Later today, I’m hoping to buy some coach tickets to go and visit some wonderful friends in the summer. It is great to have things to look forward to, and I appear to be going on holiday for three entire weeks during August!

Satisfied Sunday Six

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  1. MY NOVEL THE SISTERHOOD IS OUT THIS WEEK. I do not apologise for being in all capitals, either, because I am ridiculously excited about it. It’s a really good book, actually. I’m so pleased with it (though my beta reader, JL Merrow, and my editor, Amanda Jean, need to take some of the credit).

You can buy it at Bella books or at Amazon – but it does appear only to be available on American sites at the moment. Does this mean I can do further squee when it’s available in the UK?

2. I saw the ARCS (the final copies) of All About The Boy at the beginning of the week, and they’re gorgeous. Goodness, my work looks so good in it. I know that sounds silly, but it does. And talking about editors? Sasha Vorun is bloody marvellous, too.

3. Then yesterday I went on a course about marketing, run by Miles Allen. It was really interesting and useful: it doesn’t matter how well I write, I need people to read what I’m writing. And it’s difficult to know how to reach an audience. This helped. (Plus I accidentally sold a book in the car park afterwards to a man who had been somewhere completely different and did not look like the target market for a lesbian historical novel 🙂 He was also, incidentally, an extremely lovely man.)

4. In non-writing news, Splendid Son got a trophy for ‘most improved player’ in his under 10s football club, so I’m very proud of him.

5. Lovely Partner also was part of a fencing group who came second at a tournament last weekend, so I’m proud of him, too.

6. I have written half of my article about women’s role in the Abolitionist movement in Britain (the abolition of slavery). This is for Jane Austen’s Regency World magazine, and I know a lot about it because slavery accidentally ended up as a fairly major plot in The Sisterhood. (This is entirely due – and this is a true story – to a random comment my mother made when I was ranting about the book when it was a quarter written. Something she said managed to change the entire course of the book. If you know an author and you make a random suggestion, please be aware that they may end up miles deep in research and cursing your name, even as they write the best book they’ve ever managed!)

The Sisterhood

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I’m so thrilled to announce that ‘The Sisterhood’, my historical lesbian novel, is out! And I have received my author copies and this is a picture of me looking suitably delighted 🙂

 

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“The simple fact was that Charity Bellingham should have been born a boy.”

 

But she wasn’t, and when she meets the beautiful, kind Isobelle Greenaway, she gets the opportunity to learn a lot about herself and London society, not to mention getting involved in the movement for the abolition of slavery and being introduced to ‘The Sisterhood’, a secret society of ladies…

Satisfied Saturday Six

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  1. As I think I’ve probably gone on about more than anyone needs to know, my health is not the best thing in the world. But I have been put on a new medicine recently, and it really seems to be having a good effect. I’m amazed and delighted, and suddenly back at the point of going “oh my goodness, doctoring is like *magic* sometimes, isn’t it?!”
  2. My next novel, The Sisterhood, is available for pre-order on Amazon.com, in all its “look, it has an amazing cover!” glory. I’m a bit self-conscious about this one, because it’s (by my standards) quite a grown-up novel and I’m rather proud of it. Which means that I’m terrified everyone else is going to hate it, of course!
  3. I had my hair cut really quite short a fortnight ago, and intended to colour it purple. However, I seem to have ended up with very short, ginger-and-green hair. Weirdly, it seems to suit me, and I want to keep it!
  4. I’m currently editing a set of three gay erotic stories for Nine Star Press. Whilst editing is never an entirely wonderful experience, I have always found (which says a lot for my editors) that it is a good and useful one, because my stories always end up the better for it. My stories are ending up the better for the editing. 🙂 And I tend to enjoy it a lot more than I think I will!
  5. I’ve spent time either by phone or in person with my close family this week, and goodness, it is a good thing! I am exceedingly lucky in that sense. Dear relations, you are all rather wonderful!
  6. I bought some new clothes this week. I am not inclined in that direction, which makes it worth a comment! But it is nice to have a few things which actually fit me 🙂

Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

This has been quite a difficult week for me, so forgive me if some of the six things are quite little things. But it’s even more important in the bad weeks to try and find the good, so…

  1. I got the first lot of edits of The Sisterhood finished and returned to my editor. With any luck, the second edits should be fairly minor, and all will be on target for publication in June.
  2. It looks like the cuts to disability benefits which were announced this week are going to be reconsidered after a lot of protesting, which is wonderful.
  3. I have been making arrangements for the Easter holidays, where I am hopefully going to be seeing various wonderful people. What’s more, they are wonderful people who also understand that my health is very poor at the moment and I know they will be supportive if I can’t do a lot.
  4. Splendid Son has not been having a particularly good week, either, but he has felt able to talk to me about it and I think I’ve managed to help him feel a bit better about it.
  5. He also informed me that lobsters can be hermaphrodites, with half of the lobster male and half female – and that the different sides can be different colours. This is immensely pleasing, and something I did not know.
  6. I got an unexpected bit of praise for something I wrote a few years ago, which was very nice.

Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

  1. Novella out today – hurray hurray hurray! My novella, Loving My Lady has been republished by eXcessica today. It’s the first long lesbian Regency story I wrote, and although it’s a few years old now, I’m still rather fond of it.
  2. I also signed a contract this week for an anthology of three stories to come out later this year with Nine Star Press, so look out for an interesting selection of gay erotica at some point. Lots of edits to do first, but I’m really pleased to be working with the company – they seem both friendly and very professional, which is an excellent combination.
  3. This week was lovely because I had a friend staying until Wednesday. I haven’t been as well as I might have been, so we didn’t exactly do a lot, but much fun was had nonetheless, and it was really excellent to spend time with her.
  4. I had a parent consultation with Splendid Son’s teacher this week, in which I was informed that he’s doing extremely well at school and on target to exceed expectations in his main subjects, which is very pleasing. Best of all, though, the teacher was very pleased about his love of learning, which I hope he will keep throughout his life.
  5. After a massive upset with my editing and computers last week (one broke, and the temporary replacements failed to allow me to edit my novel), I am back on track with a new-to-me laptop and am two thirds of the way through the first round of edits on The Sisterhood, which is excellent. (The fact that I am two thirds of the way through is excellent; I don’t speak for the quality of the novel itself, though I don’t think it’s too bad, actually.) And look – it’s being trailed on Amazon already 🙂
  6. I’ve finished the first draft of another of the novellas which have been occupying my mind since January. That’s two now completed, and I have quite a lot more writing on the subject of the characters as well. It’s a case of working out how to put it together which is occupying my mind at the moment – or those bits of my mind not taken up with everything else I’m doing, anyway!

Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

  1. I got an acceptance of a story/possible short anthology this week, which is very exciting. Still working on the details so I can’t say more than that, but it’s lovely news.
  2. Meanwhile, the edits have come through for The Sisterhood so I’m going to be working manically on that for the next couple of weeks. It looks like there might be a publication date of June or thereabouts – I’ll keep you posted on that one!
  3. Although I’ve not been feeling at my brightest and best, I’ve managed to get quite a lot done without leaving bed for all that long. Which has a pleasing sense of achievement to it!
  4. I also finalised arrangements with a very good friend about her coming to visit at the end of next week (hurrah!) and confirmed with some other good friends that Splendid Son and I are hoping to visit them over the Easter holidays as well. I find People-in-general a bit terrifying as I’m somewhat socially awkward, but specific people (who know about my weirdnesses and make allowances) are a very different matter so I’m feeling quite bouncy!
  5. Oh, still ploughing on with my contemporary gay threesome story. I’m still not entirely sure how it’s going to pan out in terms of whether it wants to be a novel, a set of novellas, or something else entirely, but I’m just going with it at the moment and writing what seems to need to be written. I’ll worry about the details in due course, I’m sure. (But they’re lovely. I do love these characters particularly much. I don’t know why, but I do.)
  6. I braved visiting the doctor to talk about medication woes. The brief version is that I’m going to have to continue for another month with my current medicine in the hope that things may improve. But I’m glad to have been and checked (he seemed to think it was reasonable to have done so, too). It’s not something I enjoy doing (I usually take someone with me because I find it that difficult, but owing to Reasons that wasn’t possible on this occasion) so I feel I can give myself credit for having done it.

Satisfied Saturday Six

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The SSS celebrates six things that have gone well, or at least okay, in the past week. It is the creation of Terry Egan, who is all things wonderful.

 

  1. I have been involved with Scope’s “End The Awkward” Valentine’s Campaign which owes thanks to Mills and Boon for their agreement to pastiche their covers, and it has been great fun.
  2. In fact, I wrote a little bit about it on the Huffington Post yesterday 🙂
  3. I also wrote a couple of poems this week, which is the first time for a while. I’m not very good at sticking to one genre.
  4. The first suggestions for covers for my novel The Sisterhood came through this week. OMG, there are brilliant cover artists out there! They are very and extremely talented, and apparently all working for Bella Books. It was very exciting.
  5. Meantime, I have been writing an article on ‘Kept Men’ in the Regency: I now know more than you do about marrying for money if you’re a bloke. And other things, but I haven’t got to that part of the article yet…
  6. Oh, and the ‘probably not wildly publishable but extremely enjoyable’ fiction writing is still going on. I have managed to write a disconcertingly large amount of words in the last month and have discovered that I am vaguely in love with one of my characters, which never usually happens at all. I am quite shocked by myself!

 

(It’s fairly obvious that I haven’t had much of an actual personal life this week, given that this is all about writing related things. This is slightly embarrassing, but you know – sometimes there are weeks like that. On other weeks, I’ve done practically nothing writing-related, so you gain some, you lose some!)