Chapter Seven!  Finally.  Read it for free here:

http://www.wattpad.com/story/4175311-testers

Raya’s getting deeper into the mystery.  Is she safe?  Read Testers to find out.  Chapter Eight will be posted next Tuesday.

So with the new chapters of ‘Testers’, going up every Tuesday on Wattpad, I decided my story needed a new cover design.  I came up with this:

I’m going for a gritty, warehouse feeling.  Does it work for you?  Any feedback would be appreciated.  Either way, I think it’s ten step above what I had up before (which I’m kind of embarrassed about now).

I made it!

Tales of a Redheaded Sea-Witch made it through the first round of the 2014 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards!  Oh, happy, happy day.  There is a long path ahead yet – the next round of entrants isn’t announced until mid-April – which means a lot of time to focus on The Other Writing Projects (TOWP).

Which leads to more good news!  The next chapter of Testers will be released today.  This afternoon my time, to be exact.  Once I find myself comfortably settled in a local coffee shop and get through a final round of editing with a large cup of tea.  Then it’s off on the rough draft of the chapter for next week.

Currently, I’m working on a short story draft that I’m going to get some help with from the local writer in residence – Thank you very much!  And I have a bunch of editing to do on my 2013 NaNoWriMo project.

And numerous other projects that I work on as the mood strikes.

The last thing for today is to celebrate the small achievements.  I’m thinking an extra donut at the coffee house.  Click the link below to see the list of complete round 1 winners of the ABNAs.  Congratualtions to everyone who made it, and to those that had the courage enter.

http://www.amazon.com/Breakthrough-Novel-Award-Books/b?ie=UTF8&node=332264011

Living in Saskatchewan means a lonngggggggg winter.  I always feel refreshed and happy when spring arrives and love nothing more than sitting outside, walking outside, and opening the windows in my house.  Today is a beautiful day.  The snow is melting and will hopefully be gone by the end of the week.  Soon, the grass will turn green.

With spring, comes spring cleaning.  And for my writing that means re-evaluating my goals.  I’m working on Testers, my Wattpad work, and have it scheduled to wrap up in June.  See the link in the previous post if you haven’t checked it out yet.  I promise a lot more excitement to come.  The first round of the 2014 ABNA’s is announced this week.  I’m hoping to make the cut.  And then there is my meeting with the local Writer in Residence coming up in a couple weeks.  Lots to do and lots to get ready for.  And I’m excited for it all!

It has taken a very long time but I finally have posted chapter 4 for my work in progress, currently titled “Testers” to WattPad.

Now I’m thinking I need a new title.  Any ideas?  What kind of cover art do you think a book like this should have?

There are many things in my writing life that make me happy.  One of them is finishing a notebook.  By finishing I mean filling it margin to margin with words, scribbles, and yes, even a few doodles.  I love buying empty notebooks, and even though I often have a supply of at least five ready to go when I need them, I have a hard time not buying one when I find a beautifully designed journal.

Currently, I’m waiting to see if Tales makes it through the pitch round of the 2014 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, and have many projects to keep me busy.  But one thing I’ve spent time working on is writing by hand.  So of course I have my new notebook ready to go.  It smells like leather, it’s imprinted with leaves, and it’s just the thing I need for spring.

It’s been a busy month.  I keep saying I will do this regularly.  That I will use the time I’m away from my regular job to try harder at the writing thing.  And I have – at least on the writing side of things.  But lately, what I’ve decided to focus on, is the marketing side of things.  The easiest bit of which is to blog more.  So I’m going to do that.

The latest news:

Tales of a Redheaded Sea-Witch has been entered in the 2014 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards.  I’m hoping for good things from this competition.  Step one of which is to make it through to round two – the list of which will be posted on March 18th.  Even if I don’t win, I’m hoping to get a bit of exposure – getting through two or three rounds would be nice.  Because after this competition, I’m pulling the pin on Tales.  I’m sending it out into the world of self-published fiction.  The countdown starts now.

Time really does fly.  Today I received a response from an agency I submitted a query to in July 2013!  That is the longest I’ve waited for a response, I usually assume I won’t hear anything after six weeks to two months, but I guess now I can bump that wait period further back.  The response was a no, unfortunately, but the letter was very nice and did mention showing the query to more senior members of the agency (so someone, somewhere must have liked it).  I am still waiting for some queries to come back, but while I do so I am prepping my manuscript for the 2014 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards.  I have a pitch to write, editing to do, an except to perfect, all things to keep me busy!  Meanwhile, I’ve also been working on other streams of writing, with a focus mainly on short stories.  All in all, with everything I write and read, I believe my writing is getting stronger.  But boy, what a long process.

Until next time.

Life has been rife with change over the past few months, which has left me with no time to blog.  But I’m back!  This week has brought me time to go back to writing.  My new small goal is one sentence a day, but I’m adding in revisions and soon I will hopefully be organized enough for a paragraph a day and then a whole page, up to the recommended 1000 words a day (so many professional writers quote this as their number that it has to be right…).

Here is today’s sentence.  It comes from the middle of a story so likely it won’t make much sense.  But where does it go from here?

She could easily slit his throat, she supposed, as the boy was little more than bone and skin that looked more like leather than flesh, but she needed more than he carried.

I actually put it up over a week ago, but I haven’t found the time to blog about it until now.  But finally there is a new piece by J.E.Hunter out there in the world for you all to read for pure enjoyment.  You can find the first chapter of my novel-in-progress, Testers, at the following link:

http://www.wattpad.com/story/4175311-testers

This is a science-fiction thriller, set in the present day with just a bit of romance.

Go.

Read.
Review.
And let me know what you think!