Working Wednesday Update

Happy Wednesday, everyone! 

Thanks to those who've dropped by for my recent posts - Memorable Mondays: INDIESTRUCTIBLE by Jessica Bell and Curiosity Quills Press Borderlands Anthology Competition, More Than Just A Kiss blogfest and Cover Reveal: Sacrifice HER. I really appreciate the support you're showing not only to me and my WiP, but also to other awesome writers in the blogosphere who've got exciting news to share!

I hope everyone is having a happy and productive week, whatever you're up to!

Quick shout out to Kyra Lennon for completing the edits on her novel, Nobody Knows! 'Grats, girl!

Work at CQP is still going well. Very much enjoying the organizing of blog tours for authors, and getting to know them better. It's so great seeing them getting their books out there, receiving positive reviews or climbing Amazon charts.

Also excited about what we've got coming up in the next few weeks. This week, to promote new-adult, paranormal-romance, urban-fantasy Sweet Dreams are Made of Teeth by Richard Roberts, we're running the Catching Coy campaign. Coy is the female character from Sweet Dreams are Made of Teeth, and often appear as a goldfish, who friend and lover Fang has to find. Some of the CQP team have hidden little papercraft versions of the elusive Coy around their hometowns, including; Louisville KY, DC, NYC, Houston TX, New Zealand,  Seattle WA, Ohio, Birmingham UK, London UK and Sheffield UK. If you find Coy, there's a code on the bottom and entering it could snag you a prize, including a $25 Amazon gift card. So, if you find one of these little fishies hidden in one of the for-mentioned locations, snap a picture and share it on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #CatchingCoy. 

October 1st sees the launch of the first, annual, Curiosity Quills anthologies; Prime Time and After Dark. Bringing some of their bestselling authors together in a quirky or paranormal way. Authors included feature names like: JR Rain, Aiden James, Nina Post, Eliza Tiliton, James Wymore, Sharon Bayliss and Jade Hart. And, as an additional incentive, 10% of every purchase will go straight to animals in need, with CQP donating to humane societies. 

To tie-in with the release on the anthology, we'll also be holding a Pet Halloween Costume Contest, where you get to dress up in cute outfits with your little furry (or scaled) friends, and pose for pictures, all in the name of charity and trying to win Amazon gift vouchers!

More details on the anthologies will follow soon, with a cover reveal coming shortly.

Editing my new-adult, paranormal-romance is ticking along nicely, albeit a little more slowly this week due to work and personal commitments. On my own read-through, I'm about 70% done, and on my read-through with Hubby, we're about 40% through. I hope to have it finished fairly soon, so that I can send it on to some others for critiques, and then get started with act two. I think writing in acts like this is still working well. It breaks it down into smaller, more manageable portions, at least.

Monday's More Than Just A Kiss blogfest snippet gave me some idea how much readers like my main character Roxie, and her love interest Sol. I had a couple of people swooning over him! YAY! So, in that spirit, this week's except is another Sol-centric one. For Alex Tanner and Cecilia Robert, who like drooling over my fictional boyfriend almost as much as I do!

Enjoy ... 

I was just checking my emails on my phone when Sol stepped out of the shower cubicle wrapped only in a towel. His long black hair was untied and still wet, leaving trails of water down his chest, which glistened off the array of tattoos he had. The ones on his arms actually extended all the way up, and then across his collar bone and front of his chest, meeting in the middle with a wild boar just over where his heart would be. There was script under the boar, though I couldn’t make it out from this distance. 

Realising I was gawking at him, I returned my gaze to my phone, and then heard a low chuckle. With my cheeks burning I looked up to see Sol smirking at me. 

“I wasn’t checking you out … well not much. I was looking at your tattoos,” I said, standing and taking a step towards him. Up close I could read the inscription, it said: ‘Conquer or Perish.’  

“That’s cool. Has it got a specific significance behind it?” 

“Yeah, it’s in memory of my parents. It’s from our family coat of arms.” 

“Oh,” is all I managed to say. Well, that answered the question I’d been wondering about – who he’d lost. Realising I was still staring, I added. “I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay, it was a long time ago now.” His eyes didn’t match his words. 

“I’ll … erm … take my shower now and leave you to it.” 

Trying to hide my awkward embarrassment, I ran for the cubicle, threw my clothes off and dived under the stream of hot water.

Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed the snippet, and please check out The Life and Loves of Clare Dugmore later this week, for Favourites Friday!  

Working Wednesday: Back in the Saddle

Hey everyone!

As I mentioned in the recent Memorable Monday post, I'm back from my blogging break, and resuming with not only my regular blogging schedule, but work on my new adult, paranormal romance.

But before I get onto that, an update about how my job at CQP is going, and a little bit of cross promotion. 

Over the summer I was offered a promotion at CQP. So now, in addition to my social media management duties, I'm in charge of web curation - i.e. making sure guest posts, and the weekly column by Irving Podolsky goes up correctly, complete with images etc. - and organizing review and blog tours for our titles. 

I'm really loving the new duties. Handling web curation just makes my social media duties all that easier, as I'm not waiting on others for links etc. and working with the authors, helping them organize blog tours, is nothing but a pleasure. Everyone I have contact with is so friendly, and it brings me so much joy helping other authors get their work out there.

CQP have a lot of big things coming up in the next couple of months, including the launch of their anthologies Primetime and After Dark; which I CANNOT wait to share the details about when everything is finalized. 

And I'd like to invite anyone who is interested in what CQP are doing to join us to, by either signing up for our reviewer and blog tour host mailing list, or signing up for our monthly newsletter which contains exclusive details about releases, contests and giveaways. 

So, as I mentioned, over the summer I took some time off. When I wasn't doing my CQP work, I was hanging out with my boys - more about that on Friday - and not thinking about my novel(s).

I'm SO glad I took a break.

Before the break, I was very unfocused, and unsure what I wanted to be doing. I was starting to fall out of love with my paranormal romance, because I always find editing the hardest part, and I was questioning what I wanted to be as a writer.

Part of that was inspired by my sense that I haven't done enough. In the eighteen months I've been blogging and taking my writing more seriously, I haven't published ANYTHING. Yet people who started out around the same time as me are on their third or forth novels. Added to that was the pile of novels I've shelved for the time being.

I was really feeling like I needed to get something out by the end of the year, and was toying with the idea of self-publishing an old, shelved, contemporary romance as a serialization online. 

That led to a lot of confused thoughts, with me wondering if I should be writing PNR at all, or if my focus should be on contemporary.

After lots of back-and-forth and a little bit of time redeveloping my contemporary romance, Hubby had some words of wisdom for me. He said, I shouldn't be rushing to get a book out this year, just for the sake of getting a book out, because the quality will suffer. When I publish something, it should be the best I can make it at the time. 

He's so right.

My first published book has to mean something, because this is what the literary world will base their initial opinions of me on. 

So, what do I want to known as?

Well, my blog title says it all, doesn't it? Clare Dugmore Writes Romance with a Twist. While I love romantic plots, and my stories always contain them, for me to be happy as a writer, I have to also appease my supernatural loving side. The world of paranormal and fantasy creatures fascinates me, and I'm happier when I'm writing about those things.

So, yeah, it took me the whole of the summer to figure out I should continue what I'm doing! LOL Typical, eh?

But the time away, and the chance to be introspective, was what I needed to fall in love with my PNR again. I've recently picked it up, and gotten back into editing what I've written so far. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, as they say.

So now the kids are back at school, I'm trying to get back into the habit of working on my novel every day, with the intention of finishing it in a timely manner, but also finishing it to the best of my abilities, so that it represents me well.

I'll keep you posted on how it goes ....

Thanks for listening to me ramble. Knowing you guys are here to listen to my thoughts, and maybe offer a comment, means a lot to me. And I cannot wait to get caught up with your blogs again, and see what everyone else has been doing over the summer.

And if you're so inclined  please check out The Life and Loves of Clare Dugmore, on Friday to see what I've been up to with the family. 

Working Wednesday: More Like Musings Wednesday.

I'm here for another instalment of Working Wednesday; where I update about my current work in progress, and whatever other projects I have going on.

But first of all, thanks to all those who stopped by my Memorable Mondays post - featuring free books by Kyra Lennon and Mary Pax. 

This week's post is a little different, because honestly, I haven't done much working since I last updated. 

Things at Curiosity Quills are ticking along nicely now, I feel as though I've gotten into my stride, and I have a nice little routine for my work. I'm really enjoying it there. 

Writing wise, I've done very little for a couple of reasons. Firstly, ITS.TOO.DAMN.HOT.TO.BE.SAT.AT.A.COMPUTER.ALL.DAY! Seriously, summer, can you go away now? I miss autumn. :(

Secondly, as the end of the school year approaches for both my boys, I've got a lot of activities with them going on - like Teddy Bear's picnics, sports days and school productions.

Though I have given more thought to re-writing the old story I mentioned last week, with the aim of publishing it as a serialization. I've redrafted the plot, and spruced up chapter one. Now I'm just weighing my options about how and when to publish it. 

My main question being, do I hold off publishing it until it's complete? Or get a certain amount ahead - say four chapters - and then begin publishing, writing as I go? 

It's something I'm going to give thought to over the summer ... 

Which leads me to taking a blogging break.

For the month of August, I'm going to take some time away from the computer, so I can enjoy the summer with my boys. Though, if I've agreed to do a blog tour, hop, cover reveal, etc. for you, I'll make sure that's scheduled in. 

When I return, I'm not entirely sure I should continue with my routine posts? Are people enjoying that I've got three distinct days for different post topics? Or did you enjoy my blog more when it was a little sporadic? 

I've been doing the regular posting schedule for a month now, and I'm not sure how it's working out. While I'm enjoying it, I'm wondering if the posts could be condensed into one or two a week? Plus, it's leaving me less time to visit all you guys, and I miss you all! <3 I want to know what's been going on in your worlds. 

So, I'd love your input on the topic? Would you like to see me continue with scheduled, themed, posts for a while longer? 

I'll be around for a few more weeks yet with the schedule, so until then, thanks for reading. 

If you're do inclined  don't forget to drop by my personal blog on Friday for Favourites Fridays ... And remember, on Monday I'll be taking part in the cover reveal for the second book in Carrie Butler's amazing New Adult Paranormal Romance series The Mark of Nexus, entitled Courage which you can mark as 'to be read' on Goodreads now!

Working Wednesdays: WiP Excerpt and New Idea

Afternoon all! Hope your week is going wonderfully so far.

I'm here for another instalment of Working Wednesday;   

where I update about my current work in progress, and whatever other projects I have going on.

But first of all, thanks to all those who stopped by my Memorable Mondays post - Curiosity Quills Edition.

After filling you in on the exciting things going on at Curiosity Quills, I don't have much more to say about work this week. Everything is progressing nicely, as it should be.

If you're interested, Curiosity Quills is holding a staggered summer sale throughout July, each week will feature books from a different genre. You can find handy dandy links to all the titles featured in the sale on this Pinterest board. 

Revisions on my WiP paranormal romance are also coming along well, and I'm working my way through the awesome critique notes from Kyra; she really is a superstar! 

I also had some thoughts about starting - or should I say reworking - another project. I have a contemporary romance collecting dust on my hard drive from a few years ago, and I'm debating revising it, then posting it for free on Wattpad as an serialised story, just to get my name out there a bit and give everyone a taste of my work. I love the story, and my brain is buzzing with thoughts about it, it's just working out if I can juggle a new project, along with my PR and work at CQs. 

I'll keep you posted if anything happens with the revived project, and for now leave you with another excerpt from my unnamed paranormal romance WiP.

I took another sip of water and tried to block the memory from my mind.

“Alright, love.” A guy staggered towards me, his words slurring as he spoke. He stood next to me, propping himself up against the wall, so his hand was right next to my head. His eyes raked up and down my body. He reeked of cheap booze and had no concept of personal space.   

“You look hot in that dress.” His hand reached out to touch the lace panel at my waist, then snaked around to my ass. 

I removed his hand from my butt, grabbing his wrist tightly enough to leave a red mark, and looked in the other direction, but he didn’t take the hint, and moved closer. 

“Back off pal, I’m not interested.” I thought at somewhere like Club Desire I’d be safe from perverts, but apparently not. Guys like that pissed me right off. They saw a woman alone and immediately assumed it was an invitation to come onto her.  Pathetic. What happened to getting to know a person first? You know, maybe buying them a drink and making conversation, before you tried to feel them up.

“Sure you’re not.” His hand groped out for my ass again, and my knee instinctively flew to his nuts. It’s what my self-defence teacher told us to do; always use the knee, if you kick them they can grab your ankle and pull you over.
If this guy wasn’t going to take ‘no’ for an answer he’d have to learn the hard way. 

Before I had a chance to do any real damage, my ‘admirer’ was hauled backwards and pinned up against the wall.

Thanks for reading, and please check out my personal blog on Friday for Favourites Fridays; I'm sharing photos of mine and Youngest's trip to Wonderland. 

Working Wednesday: No Longer an Intern and WiP Snippet, plus bonus pictures!

Afternoon all! Hope your week is going wonderfully so far.

I'm here for another instalment of Working Wednesday;   

where I update about my current work in progress, and whatever other projects I have going on; including my internship at Curiosity Quills.

But first of all, thanks to all those who stopped by my two Memorable Mondays posts - New Writer, Free Story, Author Relief Fund and New Soul Album and

The Thrill of it All Blogfest.

I am no longer an intern at Curiosity Quills ... because now I'm a fully fledged member of the team. I'm staying on in my position of social media representative, as well as taking on a few additional duties including updating the CQ Wattpad, Goodreads and emailing industry contacts. 

There's a lot currently going on behind the scenes at Curiosity Quills, including a really great contest, an awesome giveaway and a summer sale. Be sure to follow/ like the CQ Facebook, Twitter and Googe+ pages for updates, links to content and daily discussions. 

As I'm still navigating revisions land, I haven't really got much of an update about my WiP to share with you, so instead I thought I'd share a little excerpt from the first chapter instead. Enjoy.

    "I was having a great time, living it up in the VIP area, drinking Champagne and dancing with my new co-workers, but with every song, every sip of alcohol, my heart hammered a little harder. I could feel the beat pumping through my body, at first energizing me, but as one song blurred into another the excitement turned to panic. Where had all these people come from? Why did I feel like I was tripping my ass off and the room was tilting on an axis? Strobe lights flashed above, making my colleagues’ bodies flicker and judder, as mine moved of its own volition. My head reeled as the bass vibrated through me, making my chest ache and my breath come in ragged gasps. I was overheating and my body felt weak. My head swam and my vision became soft around the edges. 

    But I’d only had a couple of glasses of Champagne …"

Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it, and as a parting gift, here are some Polyvore style sheets I made of main character Roxie.

Please check back on Friday, where I'll be taking part in The Cephalopod Coffeehouse Book Club over on my personal blog, and discussing my thoughts on Spook's: Alice (Wardstone Chronicles #12) by Joseph Delaney.

Working Wednesday: WiP and Internship Update

Happy Hump Day! The rest of the week is down hill from here!!

Thanks to everyone who dropped by for Memorable Monday, and helped spread the word about Marta Szemik's free promotional offer of her paranormal romance novella Marked. 

I'm continuing the blogging schedule this week, and it's back to Working Wednesdays; for an update on how my work in progress is going, as well as how I'm getting on with my Curiosity Quills internship. 

The work in progress is going really well. Still working on revisions of the first 30k. Since giving it to a friend for feedback, I've also asked Kyra Lennon to critique it, and she's given me some excellent advice and notes throughout, so I'm slowly working through her suggestions.

I feel for the most part, the plot and world building is spot-on, but it's the character development and voice that's lacking. I think writing in first person - instead of third, which I'm more used to - is what's challenging me, but with Kyra pointing out where I'm lacking, I feel like I'm on the right track again and can add some depth to my MC Roxie. 

I now feel confident I can work through the revisions and them move onto act two.

As for my internship, things are going great there. I sent my proposal of ideas to my bosses, and they loved my suggestions, so I've been implementing them. My duties have been expanded a little too, to include contacting companies regarding sponsorship for things that Curiosity Quills can offer in promotional giveaways. I'm also working on a social media survey so that I can gain some user feedback as to how to improve what I'm doing.

Lots to keep me busy, but it's all fun stuff I'm greatly enjoying.

How is everyone else getting on this week? What projects are you working on? What are you goals. Tell me all about them, I'd love to hear. and good luck with whatever you're endeavouring to do.

If you'd like, check my personal blog for Favourites Fridays, where I'll be talking about what TV shows/ books/ movies and video games I've been enjoying this week, and what I've been getting up to with Hubby and our boys. 

Working Wednesday

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Thanks to everyone who dropped in and commented on Monday's entry,  Followers Blog Hop. It was great meeting all you new people, and I'll still be trying to hop round to all your blogs. 

I'm continuing with my new posting schedule, this time with Working Wednesday, where I talk about what I've been doing in terms of my WiP, and my internship at Curiosity Quills. 

The internship is going great. I've really settled in, get along well with my colleagues, and I *think* I have a good grasp of the ins and outs of social media. Things at CQs are expanding a little, with a lot going on behind the scenes, and I want to help with that. Which is why this week, I'm brain-storming ideas on how I can improve the social media aspects, and make a better, more personal, connection with our audience. Hopefully I'll have some ideas to suggest to my bosses later on in the week.

Writing wise, I haven't done much. I'm still trying to adjust to a new schedule that includes working for CQs. Additionally, I've hit the point in my read troughs where I feel I can't do much more on my own. I need someone to bounce ideas off. I've given the first act to a friend for her to beta read, and she's given me some excellent feedback, I'm just trying to work out how to apply that feedback. Revisions is the hardest part of writing for me. I don't always want someone to hold my hand, but at the moment, I like working with my Hubby so we can discuss ideas and he can offer me guidance. One thing he suggested is studying other books in the genre, not just reading them, but really studying them paragraph by paragraph and making notes. So that's what I've been doing this week. Hopefully looking at some of my peers, and studying how they do it, will help me improve my own story.

What has everyone been up to this week? What projects are you working on? Are there areas you're finding difficult or testing? What about areas you're really enjoying? I'd love to hear all about it. 


If you'd like, check my personal blog for Favourites Fridays, where I'll be talking about what TV shows/ books/ movies and video games I've been enjoying this week, and what I've been getting up to with Hubby and our boys. 

Also on Friday, here I'll be hosting Annalisa Crawford for the first time as part of her blog tour for her short story compilation That Sadie Thing.