Happy Halloween, Sailors!

In mere hours, the Geek & Sundry fantasy contest will be over. By tomorrow afternoon, the winners will be officially announced, and we’ll find out if Storm Song will have what it takes to remain in the top 3.

So I’m coming to you one last time while this contest is live to say thank you to the 324 individuals who have already pledged their support to my dream. No matter what happens over the next few hours, I am still blown away by the fact that literally hundreds of people have looked at my book and said "Yes, that should exist."

There are about 70 or so of you that are following the project, but haven’t ordered. Now, I know for a fact that sometimes you order and see a confirmation on the website, but the order doesn’t go through. So if you guys want to do me a solid, check your inbox to make sure that you got a confirmation email for your order. If you didn’t, email hello@inkshares.com right now to see if they can help you get it straightened out.

Even if that’s only one or two of you, that’s one or two people that wanted to order, but might not have just yet.

For those who are following, but haven’t ordered yet... The time is now!! I want  you aboard this ship, taking off on fantastic adventures with me!

I’ll be updating tomorrow once the results are official. I’ll be sure to let everyone know what has shaken out of this whole thing. Thank you again for all of your encouragement. I couldn’t ask for a better crew.

- Allison

Happy Monday!!!

Today is the last day of the Geek & Sundry Fantasy Contest. It is currently sitting at 9th. I’d really like to stay in the Top 10, but I desperately need your help to do it. If you haven’t already, please consider supporting the book by placing a pre-order. It would mean the world to me. This is a very important moment in my life and I’d greatly appreciate you support in making it a complete success. 

The Living God has crossed the Quill Goal, but if it stays in the Top 10 it could be featured in any contest publicity, which will greatly help with marketing it. Not to mention, it would be wonderful to say that it was Top 10 among 300+ contest entries!  

If you have a spare $10 bucks and want to make an author’s day, please consider throwing your support behind The Living God! 

Much love!
~ Kaytalin

Hail Bards!

Tomorrow the Geek and Sundry Fantasy Contest Ends on Inkshares. Clearly, The Lore of the Aos Sí is not in a position to win the competition, but we are well on the way towards our ultimate goal of publication. 

Overall the novel did finish in 17th place out of 500+ Submissions into the contest! To me, that is a fantastic litmus test for the quality of this novel!

There are Two Months left in this campaign to fund the novel and in order to reach light publication The Lore of the Aos Sí needs 174 more backers to take the leap. 72 of you have backed the project already, meaning if each one of you brought at least one more person on board this month the project would be sitting at 144!

Can you talk to your friends and family about the novel this month? 

If you haven’t ordered your copy yet, Pre-Order Today and let’s start out November with a huge boost! 

Happy Monday morning beautiful people (or evening depending where on the earth you reside!)

Thank you for joining me so early on this journey with Loretta of the Lamp, it has blown my mind how quickly you’ve all jumped on board and given me support so loyally and selflessly. To those who have told your friends and family and passed on the message of what’s coming; thanks too!

There will be more updates coming as things progress, but first and foremost I want to make sure you get connected with me. For those of you who know me personally you’ll know I’m a fairly relational human being and the only reason I write and do what I do is because I believe we all have different gifts and talents that are waiting to be utilised, and we all have the ability to do some pretty amazing things in a world where people are looking for others like them, for people who understand them.

If you follow me on social media you may know that I’m inspired by a vast collection of quotes that I collect a little obsessively and pin to my wall (I have black sticky notes with a white pen; muahaha), and one of my favourite thoughts is from Abraham Lincoln, who famously said "He who writes the nation’s songs, shapes the nation’s souls."

I’m not a song writer, but I do tell stories, and I’m on a quest to tell stories that will be read by the ’nation’ and like so many writers before me, will inspire us to dream, to hope, to imagine, and to take action with the skills we have.

There’s my cheesy inspirational moment for the week, done and dusted! ^_^

Actions for you to take now; connect with me on facebook, instagram, twitter or wordpress if you haven’t already (go for which ever platform you use more), and let me know that you are connecting as a reader of Loretta’s story so I know who you are. I’m not looking for bumping up my numbers in social media, I’m looking to make sure I have the connection with you to keep you in the loop.

If we are connected already, don’t worry, I know who you are (insert scary laugh here).

Facebook.com/jrmanawa | Twitter @jrmanawa | Instagram @jrmanawa | Wordpress www.thissideofdarkness.com

With love from this side of darkness, J R Manawa (You can call me Jo, by the way).

Friends, Readers, and Sorcerers All --

WE’RE AT NUMBER 7! I am beyond amazed. We entered the Geek and Sundry contest TWO MONTHS after everyone else, and within less than a month we shot to the top ten, and now seventh place, all thanks to your amazing support.

I know there’s only 3 days left in the contest, and I know the top three spots are many hundreds of readers away. BUT -- if we can hit 250 pre-orders, Inkshares will publish SORCERY FOR BEGINNERS regardless. That’s only 38 more pre-orders. We can do that, and I know we can do it by Nov 1st.

In the meantime, I will be posting another chapter to celebrate crossing the 200-sold mark. It’s one of my favorite chapters in the book, in which Owen enters a magic bookstore called Codex Arcanum and buys his copy of SORCERY FOR BEGINNERS. Look for that soon.

Remember, every book purchased between now and Nov 1 will result in $10 being donated to a breast cancer prevention fund, in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. So not only will you be helping SORCERY FOR BEGINNERS get published, but you’ll be helping an important cause.

Let’s do this, everyone. Let’s hit that 250!!

mh

The Geek & Sundry fantasy contest ends on November 1st. Eek! Though Witherfist is a good 100 readers shy of reaching the top 3 - and the prize of guaranteed full publication from Inkshares - I am so thrilled and humbled by the amount of support the book has received.  While the contest is active, I want to push the book as high as possible in the top 10.  At the time of writing, Witherfist is tantalisingly close to the number 7 spot in the top 10, thanks in part to all of the new readers who have joined the campaign this week.  

I shared in a previous update some work in progress art, and now I’m happy to present the finished piece. Here is Karaben the Imperial interogator in all her glory. 

~ Jenny

Happy Friday, Sailors!

This week has been a wild one for me, and the weekend doesn’t look to be slowing down one bit. Anyone else got a Halloween party to go to this weekend? I’m super jazzed to be going as my favorite (and the unquestionably best) ninja turtle, Donatello.

I’ll also be continuing to try to get the word out about this contest and my project! Nothing says party time like chatting about your hopes and dreams over a spooky punch bowl, right?

In all seriousness, the final days of the contest are definitely upon us, and that means digging deep for a final push of orders. Holding third place will be enough to earn Storm Song a win, but second place is within reach and I don’t know about you guys, but I always like to strive for that one extra achievement. I think it’s the gamer in me.

We’re also at 296 backers! So just four more and we’ll hit 300 total people standing behind this book. Which is just...

Guys, I don’t know how to thank you all enough for helping me with this project. When I entered back in August, I did it on a whim, figuring that it could at least help motivate me to keep working on this story. I didn’t expect this sort of support to come pouring out from so many different avenues.

My family has been unbelievably supportive and encouraging. My friends have helped me plug at every opportunity. I’ve made new friends (shout out to the Ohana crew) that are so important to me that it’s really difficult to imagine a life without them in it now. My boyfriend jumped into this with both feet and has kept my chin up when I’ve had a hard time doing it myself.

I love you all. And from the bottom of my heart, I thank each and every one of you for all that you’ve done to help me with this campaign.

It’s not over. We’re not done. Nothing is a sure thing. I’m going to keep pushing and finding new people to convince to buy my book, and I hope you’ll all do the same.

Land is in sight, sailors. We’re almost home.

- Allison

Updates, Faoii! Listen up!

I promised you all that I would do an audio version of Chapter 2 if we made it to 270 pre-orders. We’ve done that, so I’m upholding my end of the bargain. You can listen to it on youtube by clicking HERE.

Other than the audio chapter, I’ve been doing everything in my power to bring you perfection. I want us to take that hill-- I want us to stand at its summit with our war cries on our tongues and our victory in our hearts and for everyone to know that all of this finally came to fruition. That there’s some sort of karmic justice in the universe that repays hard work and determination. That at the end of next week we’ll know that The Last Faoii had finally earned mass publication and that maybe my health would finally improve and my heart wouldn’t be so tired all the time. Because dreams keep us going when other things don’t.

But we’re warriors. We need contingency plans. Realism. I don’t know how to produce miracles-- I don’t know how to inspire you all any more than I’ve already tried to. I was never able to get us featured in the Inkshares blog like many of the other authors we’ve fought (and in some cases, overcome). I was never quite able to get us to 4th place in this contest, much less to the top 3. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop trying. You’d think after submitting The Last Faoii to 200 agents during its initial run 18 edits ago, I would be used to rejection-- to falling short. But I don’t, because it’s just not something I do. 

I don’t know how to get us to the top of that hill. But I do know how to give you the best I can, no matter the outcome of the contest. Even if we fail at parts of the war, the victories we have will be perfect. There are no half measures here.

So I’m editing again. I’m going through The Last Faoii a 19th and final time since its completion--looking for any errors, any sentence, any word that doesn’t add to the story. That doesn’t prove to be absolutely worthy of your attention. I’ve sent it out to two more beta readers (numbers 13 and 14 if that matters to you) with instructions to make it perfect. 

If those that are following this army now are the only ones who are ever going to know how hard we fought to win this war-- if we will be the only ones to see the forces that Kaiya overcame just to exist, then I will make sure the reward at the end is worthy of the battle fought. 

Shield up, Faoii. The end is coming and we will not meet it lying down.

-Faoii-Tahani

Friends, Readers, and Sorcerers All,

Good morning! (At least, it’s morning here in Los Angeles. The sun is just peeking over the backyard fence and the kiddos are stirring. This may have to be quick.) 

We here at the Codex Arcanum had a nice surprise last night -- Daniel Hashimoto, one of our first readers and creator of YouTube’s amazing Action Movie Kid -- posted a shout-out video for SORCERY FOR BEGINNERS on his channel! Check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjXq49iHNMs&feature=em-subs_digest

It already inspired someone from halfway across the world to pick up a pre-order. If you squint you can even see a couple shots of Yours Truly trying to look like a film director.

Huge thanks to Hashi, Mandy, and their kids for taking time out of their busy schedules to help promote SORCERY FOR BEGINNERS. Take a look at the video, share it with friends on social media, and let’s keep racking up those pre-orders! Once we hit 200, I’m going to post a new chapter, and it’s maybe my favorite in the whole book. Stay tuned for that here:

https://www.inkshares.com/books/sorcery-for-beginners

Also, check out Action Movie Kid if you haven’t already! They have tons of great videos. One of my favorites is a recent one they made about the Tooth Fairy: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8-U4aigvsw

Only FIVE MORE DAYS left in the Geek and Sundry contest. Let’s do this!

mh