Starships and Sweethearts!

Special.  I just found out that Smashwords counts basically every "page look" as an UNPAID download.... And that it's necessary to TURN OFF the adult filter to find To Sweep The Stars.  Why?  Who knows;  possibly the few cusswords or maybe the kissing.  Go figure.

My advice?  Just go to Amazon.... Easier to buy there anyway, it appears.

To Sweep the Stars

My current novel is now available!
To Sweep The Stars
A shuttle full of people disappeared without a trace.  Among those missing was the husband of Lt. Ea Cummings, Fleet Security Specialist.  Unlike everyone else, Ea wasn't prepared to shrug her shoulders and go on about her business.  She was determined to find her husband and get him back.  But time was running out....

Yes.  It's up.   It's available for purchase at Smashwords and at Amazon/Kindle.

The amazing cover art was provided by MerianMoriarty, and she also provided the editing.

The process for getting an e-Novel ready is.... Interesting.  In some ways, it's the same as a "legacy" or paper-book, in that it still requires writing, editing, submission to an agent, selection of cover art, re-editing, and so on.

The biggest difference is that you don't check "galley proofs" with an e-Novel; you check a file... and the second biggest difference is, it takes less than 48 hours from finished work to publication.

It's been a fascinating experience, and overall I think a better one.  Chances are good that I'll stick to e-Publishing from here out.

Here's hoping you all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Memo To Me!

This is a more comprehensive list of the stuff I plan to do sometime between now and midnight on 31 December.

We'll see how things go.

Aside from things like the work that goes into writing, editing, publishing, and marketing my novels, I have other stuff I really ought to do.

My list of around-the-farm projects includes:

• Hatching the bantam eggs, while trying to avoid buying pressed-foam incubators.  Pressed-foam ? Really? For animals that PECK the instant they shake off the last shell fragment?  Pressed-foam ... you know, the crap you throw OUT to recycle from packaging?  And yet two different farm-supply store employees looked at me as if I was daft when I asked about "bowl and bulb" incubators.  Go figure.
• Build a compost cage of leftover project lumber and leftover chicken netting or hardware cloth.  Have you SEEN the price on the "compost bins"?  Gooooood grief!
• Finish re-doing the overhead of the lanai, so that it can begin to function as a trellis for climbing roses -- specifically for a cutting I plan to beg from my brother-in-law -- a yellow John F. Kennedy that he and my late sister grew at their front porch.
• Fix the falling-through floor in Cat's bedroom, including replacing the sub-flooring, adding under-flooring (it looks like a cross between iron-on interfacing and vinyl flooring, it's neat stuff), and finding a neato vinyl remnant, or some neato self-stick flooring tiles.
• Rip out the living room carpet and the hallway vinyl (or what's left of it after almost 20 years of animals, kids, parties, and life in general) and check the subflooring for soft spots, fix them, lay under-flooring, find some remnant boxes of sticky-tile for the hall, and find inexpensive but actually NICE looking wood-grain or bamboo "hardwood" flooring.
• Force the people in my house to go through their clothes and sort out what can be given away (tee-shirts from high-school, anyone?  When the last person graduated more than 10 years ago?), what can be cut up into household rags, and what can be re-purposed into patches, other clothes, or memory quilts -- and what's actually wear-able.
• Find some kind of headboard/footboard cover for the guest-bed that resides in my bedroom beside my waterbed.
• Find some way of transferring a bunch of ancient VHS tapes to DVD, for space considerations, as well as keepability considerations.  I'll probably end up having to buy one of those converter thingies, as well as RCA-type cables to connect things and actually do that.
• Get some Reellee Cheep thin lattice, and more of the leftover lumber, and build a sort of "cage" round the ugly air conditioner units, the propane-regulators, the trash bins, and maybe, who knows, even round the ugly, needs-painted, propane tank.
• Continue my apparently permanent war on the honeysuckle, as well as kind of clean up various small junque heappes round the farmhouse area.
• And last, but not least, sort through my incredible mess of projects and things to do and recipes, and start, you know, doing them! and photographing them!  and posting the how-to-do-it instructions in here!

Well then! I think I have this blog in working order now, though I'm not sure.

I have all these awesome "New Year's Resolutions" to carry out this year.

One is to actually... you know, blog.

One is to post recipes, craft projects, gardening ideas, and bantam advice.

One is to tell stories.

One is to publish three Kindle-friendly novels.

We'll see what happens, eh?

Hardhats Required!

Please bear with me as I rebuild, reformat, and rethink the blog!

It's spring!

I'm pleased to say that I have the pool up... wow that was huge work, from everyone concerned.


We have a "wally world back yard" pool, and it's 12 feet diameter. But every year it's un-level, it seems as if it's rolling down hill (we live in a place that's the opposite of flat) or it has a "deep end".


Which is funny till you think about the fact that 2 inches is the difference between someone's chin being out of the water, and not! So, this year we built a giant sandbox out of 16 foot 2x8 boards... filled it with 5 tonnes of sand which we had to move basically twice, the truck couldn't get to the pool, so the guy dumped it as close as he could; we whell-barrowed it to the box, then had to move and spread it once there.


Then finally we leveled the sand, spread the tarp, and put up the pool! I'm slowly filling it, letting the wieght of the water completely pack the sand... but it's now knee-deep and of course, I'm in it, every day!


We also finally got the garden ready for the plants, which are sprouting in the living room at the south window and on the back porch. That's been an adventure, let me tell you... SOMEONE, not mentioning any person's names or anything... managed to mix all the pea seeds and bean seeds. It'll be an adventure eating later when they are ready to pick!