Friends! Thank you so much for all your wonderful support throughout the Nerdist Sci-Fi/Fantasy contest. At the end of the day, The Fable Hunt came in 9th with 367 individual readers pre-ordering a copy, and you are one of the great people who helped me get there.

The next step is a bit more daunting, but I'm feeling motivated again now that this deadline has passed. I have until November 17th to presell 505 more copies of the book to guarantee publication.

You'll hear from me less frequently now as I'm going to be focusing on writing and advertising via social media rather than updating all the time through Inkshares, but I promise to keep you up to date on milestone! 

And the basic ask remains - if you know someone super passionate about books, nerdy stuff or crowdfunding, definitely tell them to come order a copy of The Fable Hunt. I'm pretty darn proud to be the only girl in the Top 10 of the contest, and now I'm going to focus on actually pre-selling enough copies to make this book a real physical thing you can hold in your hands. 

In closing, check out the awesome drawing of Learid that my friend Jay Lugo created. I love getting a chance to see what my friends absorb from the words I write. 

Peace out awesome folks. I'm back to writing!

Rachael

Thank you all for your support! The final hours of the contest are here! 

Greetings Team Shaping Fate! 

Well, this will be my final dispatch here, because we have reached the end of the road for the Nerdist contest. Did we win? Well, not the contest, but I feel like the whole experience is a win. I met some really great fellow authors, got to read some exciting new fiction and got to share part of Shaping Fate with you; a project that I've been working on for a very long time. I know I've said it about a zillion times now, but I'm so grateful to all of the people who followed and pre-ordered the book. Putting myself out there in this capacity was hard, but when I was met with such amazing and unwavering support, it made me wonder why I ever hesitated! 

So what now? I'm going to keep going. "Shaping Fate" and it's follow up books, (yes, it's at least a trilogy) will see the light of day. Thank YOU dear readers for giving me that confidence. 

If you want to keep up to date and haven't already signed up for my newsletter, here's where you can do just that: http://vrleavitt.com/newsletter-2/ (Don't worry, I don't send frequently)

Not into email? Here's my website, Facebook and Twitter:

http://www.vrleavitt.com 

https://www.facebook.com/coffeeandakeyboard

http://www.twitter.com/vrleavitt

I also want to thank The Nerdist and Inkshares for putting on this contest and bringing attention to authors. It means a great deal! 

Lastly, congrats to the top 5. 

• Welcome to Deadland by Zachary Tyler Linville
• The Seventh Age: Dawn by Richard Heinz
• These Old Bones by Andrew J. Ainsworth
• It’s All Fun and Games by Dave Barrett
• Rise by Brian Guthrie
  

Very best of luck!

All of my gratitude, 

-V.R. Leavitt

WE DID IT!!!!  Congratulations to the other four winners as well.  Great race to the finish.  Stay tuned tomorrow for the Nerdist announcement.

• Welcome to Deadland by Zachary Tyler Linville
• The Seventh Age: Dawn by Richard Heinz
• These Old Bones by Andrew J. Ainsworth
• It’s All Fun and Games by Dave Barrett

Only a little bit of time left in the Nerdist Collection Contest and I can't believe I hit 600 readers! At each milestone I hit I'm continuously shocked by the outpour of support from everyone, and even saying 'thank you' 600+ times doesn't seem like enough to convey what you've all done for me. There is still some time to go though, and hopefully we'll be bringing Welcome To Deadland to even more hands.

As per tradition, I'm including another photo to celebrate, this time I wanted to show my writing space where Welcome To Deadland came alive. I've spent countless hours in this chair and at this desk planning, writing, editing, and rewriting to make Welcome To Deadland what it is, and I know I still have countless more until it's exactly what it needs to be for all of you.(Rick, I see your photoshopped mustache from 400, your abundance of dinosaurs at 500, and raise you a writing space and an abundance of mustaches.)

Shout out to my homegirl, JK Rowling, for giving me the courage to write and the inspiration for my creative space. Without the impact of Harry Potter in my life, Welcome To Deadland might not have ever come to be what it is. 

As we gear up for the final few moments of the contest, I say thank you once more. We're nearly there, but for now, we press on. 

-Zac

Morning all, another quick update for you…potentially the last before the contest ends. That’s right, the contest is almost over. 

This Wednesday at midnight the numbers are locked and it’s all done…the contest at least. I say that because, to be honest, it seems unlikely we’ll end up in the top 5 (unless something crazy happens). Right now we have 159 unique orders…at this moment we’d need 442 total, so 283 more, to break into the top 5. 

As I said, that seems unlikely but things are not over. We could still publish the usual Inkshares way. We’ll see what happens and I’ll have more info on that later. 

For now, I’m incredibly grateful for all the support everyone has shown…159 people have pre-ordered, 249 copies, that’s $2,490 put towards this story. I really can’t believe it and, from the bottom of my heart, thank you all. 

 And as always, if you haven’t pre-ordered yet, now is the time! 

 http://bit.ly/3p8novelS 

Hey Team Shaping Fate!

Last week I said that if we hit a milestone, I'd upload chapter 2. Well, thanks to YOU, that happened and chapter 2 is coming your way. Thank you all so much for the amazing support. I truly appreciate it. 

I'll cut this off here, so happy Friday and have an amazing weekend!!

Thanks, 

-V.R.