"Hand it around first, and cut it after."

Happy New Year!  I admit to having rather high hopes for 2014.  First of all, for those who are still unaware, my husband and I are expecting a baby sometime around the end of January.  And yes, in spite of my less-than-pleased reactions to unwanted belly-touching and overly personal questions from near-strangers, i am extremely excited about this.  Secondly, yesterday evening I completed the manuscript for By Water and Blood!  Huzzah!  Now on to the editing, formatting, etc.  My goal was at least to have the story finished before the baby arrived.  Writing pregnant is a weird experience for various reasons, mostly involving concentration, but I fancy writing with a brand new mini-person might be even trickier...just a guess.

So one of the major issues I'm confronting now is the question of genre.  It may seem backward, but I never start out writing a book saying, "I'm going to write a fantasy novel" or, "I'm going to write a mystery" and I try to avoid the words "chick-lit" and "paranormal erotica" altogether.  Nothing against the people who write those things, they're just not so much my things.  Silly or not, I feel more freedom in my writing if I don't categorize it from the beginning but give it the freedom to become what it is going to be in its own time.

In Through the Looking Glass, Alice is put in charge of cutting the cake after the fight between the lion and the unicorn.  She tries to cut it into slices, but the slices always join on again.  This, we find out, is because the cake is looking-glass cake, and therefore backwards.  When she hands the cake around first and cuts it after, it works like a charm, dividing itself into the perfect number of pieces, although Alice is left with the empty platter and no cake for herself.  I always feel that is how the genre thing ought to work.  As the story unfolds it should show you what it is, rather than you calling it something first and then checking the boxes as you go to make sure it fits the requirements.  Also, it's my birthday today, so apparently I have cake-brain.

Of course, the downside to this method is that I then end up with a finished piece of work that I have no idea how to categorize.  Ashford and Violet Shadows, as clearly historical works, were fairly simple in that respect.  By Water and Blood, however, is a different matter entirely, and refuses to fit nicely in any box I try to put it in, thus resulting in strange dilemmas, for I must call it something.  It has elements of mystery, but it is not a "mystery novel".  It involves the paranormal, but is not populated with an endless string of vampires or werewolves or demi-gods as one might expect of a "paranormal" novel.  It has its romantic moments, but is certainly not a "romance" and it goes to some (for me at least) very dark places, but certainly would not qualify as "horror" or "thriller".  The closest I can come to an apt description is to call it "contemporary fiction with paranormal elements," but...there really isn't a genre for that.

So...we'll see what happens.

Wishing you all an amazing 2014!

Oh, and P.S...or the blogging equivalent:  January is Human Trafficking Awareness month.  Among the other elements listed above as being part of By Water and Blood, I also delved into human trafficking as part of my research, and it has become a truly important issue to me.  A portion of the proceeds from my launch week for By Water and Blood will be donated to an organization called Shared Hope International, based in Vancouver, Washington.  Their mission is to end human trafficking, particularly the sex trafficking of minors, in the US and around the world.  They provide safe housing and job training for victims, and they work on raising awareness and educating communities to recognize the signs of trafficking.  Go look them up.  I command it.

"By Water and Blood" teaser!

So here it is: a little taste of By Water and Blood, for the curious.

***

       Five years ago, Sophie Durrant surprised herself and her friends by dropping out of college and taking a job as a bartender on a tiny island at the end of the world, knowing only that for once in her life she felt that she was home.

Now, a cryptic note in her mother's handwriting leads Sophie to delve into the mystery of her past, a mystery which points to the old legend of the Selkies: the seals who could set aside their skins and walk on land as men and women.

Her heritage calls to her, by water and blood.

...but there are other secrets, darker than any legend, and their keepers are not forgiving.

***

As a bonus, my very talented mother, whose illustrations some of you might recognize from our children's book, An Amazing Alphabetic Anthology, has agreed to tackle the cover illustration, as well as pencil sketches for the chapter headings.  As a sampling, here is a puffin!

Some Tasty News!

Violet Shadows has been chosen as the novella category winner of the Next Generation Indie Book Awards!  There, I blurted out my big news right at the beginning of the post and now have nothing more to say...but I will say it anyway.

I received the email last week.  I saw who it was from, clicked on it with trepidation, and there it was: I am writing with some fabulous news! Your book has been named the Winner in the Novella category of the 2013 Next Generation Indie Book Awards.  Congratulations!

After I realized that my mouth was hanging open at an alarming angle, I got up, bolted around the house a couple of times, and sat down again...then sent several gleeful text messages to various friends and family members.

Anyway, the winners will all be listed on the Indie Book Awards website by the end of May, and meanwhile I get to revel in the nice, cozy lap of validation for a while...there's also a nice little check coming in the mail, and a gold medal, which I'm guessing is not really "gold" so much as "gold-colored" but which I shall treasure nonetheless.

So I'm sending out a huge thank you to the lovely judges and everyone else involved with the Indie Book Awards.  You made my year.

In other news, By Water and Blood is on the home stretch.  I'm hoping to finish the first draft by July sometime.  Then on to editing, rewriting, formatting, and, if all goes well, publishing in the fall.  My fabulous mother (those of you who have read our children's book, An Amazing Alphabetic Anthology, will be familiar with her work) has agreed to do the cover illustration, as well as sketches for the chapter headings.  I am really enjoying the prospect of working with her again.  I hope to release a bit of a teaser for By Water and Blood within the next several weeks, so be looking for that.

That's all I have time for now, but I will try to post more regularly...and yes, I know I've said that before.

Cheers!