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And, of course, happy May Day/Beltane, however you're celebrating it!

I decided that I was long overdue for addressing some chronic pain issues from some old injuries and am dabbling my toes in the waters of acupuncture again. This time around, I'm going to a community acupuncture clinic where the acupuncturist sees multiple people at the same time rather than to a setup where they are focused on one person. So far, I'm two sessions in and seeing some improvements and I'm not having a huge "Oh god! Needles! I hate this reaction!" which I've had in the past. I'm not phobic about needles but I don't like feeling like a pin cushion so I wasn't sure if this model would work for me. Going to give it a few more treatments and see how I'm doing then.

I was asked to fill in for a guest who cancelled on the If This Goes On Podcast yesterday and had a delightful time chatting with the hosts and with author Matthew Kressel about hopepunk, running green business and our current projects. The link should be going up soon here and elsewhere. And last week's anthology class at the Rambo Academy went really well - good questions, lots of engagement and I'm inspired to get off my butt and start dealing with the next anthology project. Edits on Michael Merriam's Last Car to Annwn Station are off to the author and the cover for the German translation of my novel Silver Moon (coming from Ylva Publishing in October!) looks amazing.


Other stuff: Everything, Everywhere, All at Once really is that good and you should see it as soon as you can.

More other stuff: I looked at some options for Jana and since the evaluation didn't go particularly well (it upset her and annoyed me) AND what she'd get from Disability, even if we can get her on it, would be minimal, I'm working on getting her set up to apply for regular Social Security early. Currently awaiting a copy of her birth certificate so I can (hopefully) get the application in before her 62nd birthday at the end of this month. Beginning to look for a PCA as well; right now, our former neighbors are taking her out on shopping expeditions every other week or so when they have time, but I'd like to get someone/an organization in place for when I need to be out of town as well as for future care needs. If you're in the Twin Cities area and have recommendations for PCAs who work with folks with dementia.

Otherwise, off to revamped In the Heart of the Beast May Day with friends today, enjoying Our Flag Means Death, planning for more events and doing a bit of writing. May be picking up another short term side project soon and will be looking for more editing, coaching, etc. in a month or two. Also writing and editing my own stuff and getting caught up on Queen of Swords Press Projects. So, lots of stuff, quite a bit of it good or benign.


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The family health issues have been confirmed and are worse than I had thought, but I need to have some discussions with other people before talking too much about it. The next few months are going be very hard and likely very expensive in the bargain. I'm already looking at picking up side gigs and rearranging deadlines and such. It continues to be a good day to buy something from the Etsy or Queen of Swords Press, or both.

Apart from that, I have been to an online, interactive play (Reboot: Walking Shadow Theatre Company); seen Death on the Nile (lordy, but that was some scenery chewing. And so much emoting. ALL the emoting); and been to the MN Opera for the first time in years. The Anonymous Lover was a lovely bit of fluff and now I have a crush on the Chevalier de Saint-Georges, the composer.  Seriously, absolutely fascinating man and there needs to be a movie or three and some romance novels about him, stat.

We also went to see the snow sculptures in St. Paul, which were impressive, and the Como Park Conservatory, which was lovely and warm and green. I am enjoying "Around the World in 80 Days" and Vienna Blood: Season 2." "Gilded Age " is silly, but good to watch while working on things. I have started the next werewolf novel, a new chapter of my serialized novel for my Patreon and a new short story. I am also addicted to Wordle.

I just finished loading up the next Queen of Swords Press title, The Language of Roses by Heather Rose Jones (coming in April!) for preorder. It is a glorious retelling of "Beauty and the Beast" that goes to many unexpected places. And Heather is a terrific author so I'm excited to be publishing her.

Otherwise, it looks like a friend of a friend will be buying our now "extra" car, so that's good. I'm getting better at making keffir (the yogurt is just not getting solid) and dehydrating things in the dehydrator I got us for the holidays. The day job is survivable most of the time. And I'm looking forward to some fun events and such this year. More soon...


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As noted in yesterday's post, I came down with a hellacious cold early last week and only recovered my voice completely yesterday, so productivity has been a gradual thing. I did manage to talk to a couple of recruiters (before I lost my voice) and sent in a resume to a local company via a friend's referral. I'll knuckle down and do more applications next week. I also managed (before I got sick), a trip to see actual in person theater for the first time in a year and a half (MORLS - highly recommended) and a trip to a movie theater to see "In the Heights" (which we enjoyed). Since recovering (yesterday), I've also been to see "Fast & Furious 9," which was ridiculous and fun. Plus a couple of outdoor meetups with friends and one gaming night before I got sick. Jana also got to go to Utah to visit friends and family for a week, thanks to a friend's generosity.

What else has been going on?
  • Wrapped up this year's Pride StoryBundle, which looks to be the best one so far in terms of most bundles sold and most $ raised for Rainbow Railroad since this started (Melissa Scott kicked it off in 2017 and I came on as co-curator 2 years later).
  • Applied for an IT job that looks interesting and promising.
  • Got our latest title, Foxhunt by Rem Wigmore, up for preorder. This is a great new queer climate fiction/hopepunk science fiction novel featuring a transwoman protagonist by another terrific queer author from New Zealand and it will be out on 8/20/21!
  • Got a bunch of stuff out for reviews, etc.
  • Kicked off a Smashwords sale on Queen of Swords Press titles.
  • Started working on a new on demand version of one of my classes for Cat Rambo so I'm learning Teachable now.
  • Finalized a couple more readings, panels and classes and an event table in the next month or two.
  • Did an author reading and interview at a new to me romance group, Romance in Her Prime, which features older heroines and was a lot of fun.
  • Picked up another story rejection, which was less fun.
  • Got a new chapter of my novel in progress posted for our Patreon.
  • Started a new short story.
  • Sold some of Jana's tools and unused equipment and did some giveaways to start decluttering the house.
  • Started work on a new publishing/editing resume to sue for those kinds of job applications.
  • Did some job networking.
  • Made reservations for tomorrow night's drag show at our local coffee house (the drag queens perform on the street while people watch from the patio).
Next week, follow up and finish up more of same, plus get some more stories and article pitches out the door and go blueberry picking.
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Well, it's certainly been lively. The end of March into the beginning of April and very much a mixed bag. In a single week, we had my birthday, the first year anniversary of my mom's death, an invitation to do a Small Press AMA on Reddit (a Q&A like this one), a request from a European publisher to release a new edition of Silver Moon translated into German and a request from the American Library Association's Stonewall Book Awards to submit Blood Moon for consideration for this year's awards. The blog tour went off well, then we had significant issues with both cars,I had to get a story pitch sent in, do multiple readings and for today's adventure, am now hearing that the client I'm at may not be renewing me at the end of the month (issues on their end, not with my work) so I may be interviewing soon. I'm also still waiting for the tax Sword of Damocles to drop; our income can be highly variable from year to year so we have tax "surprises" and I'm dreading this one.

Anyway, here's what's coming up (and Flights of Foundry and our second shots next weekend):
  • Steampunk CommuniTea Weekend – April 9th-12th. Look for Alex Acks and Catherine Lundoff at this fun new online event! They’ll both be on panels as well as roaming around on Discord. And Alex’s titles, Murder on the Titania and Wireless are both on sale this weekend when you buy them direct from us!
  • So You Want to Put Together an Anthology? – Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers, online. April 10th, 9:30-11:30 AM PST. Catherine Lundoff will be teaching this class. What goes into creating an anthology? How do you find authors? Decide to pitch it to a publisher or indie publish? And what do you do with it when you’re done?
  • Publishing Basics for Genre Writers – April 14th, 6:00-8:00 PM CST. Zoom, Springboard for the Arts. Catherine will be teaching this interactive online workshop for Springboard, a Minnesota nonprofit.

I also wanted to mention that Elise Matthesen is selling a lovely pair of earrings to benefit Queen of Swords Press. Look at the pretties! More soon - I need to go sleep for a bit.

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Which often feels like my entire life, but wow, has this month been full!
  • I did the blog tour and multiple events (see promo post below for links).
  • Queen of Swords Press got offered a Reddit AMA in June, just at the start of the Pride StoryBundle kickoff. We also got an intern for the summer so I can finally tackle that Kickstarter I've been pondering. We'll also open for submissions.
  • I'm in talks to have one of my books translated and sold in an overseas market. More bulletins when I have them!
  • I landed a reading slot at StokerCon, 2 panels and a Dealer's Room table at Flights of Foundry, a reading at virtual Outwrite and who knows for other venues. I've applied for the Nebula Weekend programming as well as for GCLS, so we'll see how it goes from there.
  • This week included my first vaccine, my birthday and the first anniversary of my mother's death so it's been a LOT.
More coming soon - I need some sleep!

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Last week's adventures included going to the MN Orchestra for a Pride concert featuring classical music by queer composers (quite good), going to see acclaimed Kenyan lesbian romance file Rafiki at the MPS Film Society (still there for a few more days), one 14 hour work day at the day job, seeing Captain Marvel a second time (it still rocks), going to the Midtown Farmer's Market and Rain Taxi's Print Matters mini book fest, and catching the visually striking The Vikings Begin show at the American Swedish Institute. Also, several migraines, one mangled knee, a completed short story submitted for American Monsters: Volume 2 (really hoping this one gets accepted!), work of various kinds on Queen of Swords Press and my new forthcoming collection, Unfinished Business: Tales of the Dark Fantastic and planting edible things in the yard. The latter include cherry tomatoes, chives, more raspberry bushes, a service berry bush and kale.

This week is the beginnings of furnace replacement, including asbestos abatement and the breaking up of the old furnace. Next week is removal of the old furnace and installation of the new one.

In between those is 4th Street Fantasy, which I'll be at this weekend. I'll be on the "Monster Mash and Smash" panel on Saturday at 2PM and otherwise hanging out a bit on Friday night and all day Saturday. Sunday will likely have to be a "catch up on other things" day, but we'll see how that goes. And now back to work.

Progress!

Jan. 27th, 2018 04:59 pm
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At some point, I planned on posting at least once a week. *Checks calendar* Well, that's blown. So, what have I been up to? I spent last weekend at a friend's house on a writing retreat while they are traveling. This netted me final edits to Alex Acks' awesome new book, Murder on the Titania and Other Steam-Powered Adventures, coming soonish from Queen of Swords Press, several thousand words on new stories and on Blood Moon, the sequel to Silver Moon, and some sundry other things. I'm back in seclusion this weekend, trying to get one story done for an upcoming deadline, plus traction on other stuff. Blood Moon is about a third of the way through first draft, FYI, so progress.

I'm going to be interviewed on Hannah's Bookshelf, a North Manchester FM radio show hosted by Hannah Priest, who does a ton of great work. It will go live on the web next weekend, barring technical difficulties.
The week after that, I'll be recording an episode of the Cocktail Hour Podcast, which is always fun. I've also confirmed that I'll be on programming at OutWrite in D.C. in August so I need to plan for that. Got a party request in for WisCon in May and a table request in for St. Cloud Pride in September. Gonna be an exciting year! Other confirmed events include ClexaCon in Vegas in April, Anderson Library at the U. of MN in March and then, we'll see. Hoping for World Fantasy in Baltimore in November!

Other projects: new book needed for a multiauthor promotion this year, which will probably be Emily L. Byrne's erotic sf romance Medusa's Touch, since that's the only one that can be done by early May; a pirate anthology currently in the planning stages; another short fiction collection, either romances or historicals. Oh yeah, and planning for 2019, which will require me doing something about finding another book and author to get on the schedule. The big Queen of Swords Press plan has always been to build up gradually: 4 book a year (at most!) while I have to work full time, with the first year being all titles by me, the second being 2 titles by me, 2 by other people and year three being 3 titles by other people and one by me. So we'll see how that goes.

Work put toward finding a new day job: none, so far. Except for feelers, which may turn out to be the best idea. In 4 months, I've torn a ligament, gotten mild stomach flu, gotten Norovirus and had a concussion. Oddly enough, it's not inspiring a lot of job hunting mojo, go figure. I've got a few more months, in any case, and may yet get a short extension in 2019 so things are by no means urgent yet. Back to the grindstone for a bit now.


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My new book, Out of This World: Queer Speculative Fiction Stories, is out in ebook formats now and will be out in print on 5/1.  That translates to:
Amazon
Smashwords
Kobo
Barnes & Noble
IBooks - search on my last name in the iTunes store.
Overdrive for Libraries - Hennepin County Library has copies available for check out and your local library can order it in too!

Queen of Swords Press info:
Note that Queen of Swords press now has 2, count 'em 2 titles out! With a first print edition and a new version of Silver Moon on the way!
Website
Twitter - @qospress
Facebook
Queen of Swords Press has a monthly newsletter that you can sign up for on the website.

Me:
Website
Twitter - @clundoff
Facebook (as me), also as Author/Editor Page
Goodreads
Google+
Pinterest

Me, as Emily L. Byrne, AKA erotica and erotic romance writing Me:
Facebook Author page
Twitter
Blog
Emily's booklist is also available on my Goodreads profile above.

Most of Queen of Swords Press blogging will likely be out here for a bit. I'm still getting my proverbial ducks in a row.









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