Lies and Letters in paperback and Uneasy Lies the Crown on sale

Hi All,

 

Quick news before I rush off to tackle my never-ending to-do list. (A word of advice: Never remodel a kitchen and try to train for a marathon while writing a novel. The number of hours in a day are finite.)

 

Lies and Letters is out now. I LOVE doing this series because it allows me to create some really fun characters in a humorous way. More Sam and Bump adventures are planned for the future.

 

Meanwhile, I've begun the next Faderville Novel, Say Something. I'm not entirely sure how it's going to unfold yet, but there's a runaway teenager named Beam, an older guy making a trek across America named Buzz, and of course his Australian Shepherd, Hush, who happens to be a seizure alert dog.

 

Lastly, if you're a fan of my historical fiction, my story about the 15th century Welsh prince, Owain Glyndwr, is on sale on Kindle for a limited time. Info. about Lies and Letters and Uneasy Lies the Crown is below.

 

 

 

Lies and Letters (A Sam McNamee Mystery) is now available on Amazon for Kindle and in paperback.



 

There’s a drug lord corrupting the youth of sleepy Wilton, Indiana — and he’ll get rid of anyone who stands in his way, including an innocent witness. Even a drug-sniffing dog.

When Sam McNamee decided to chuck her dreams of living in the Florida Keys and instead settled in rural Indiana to raise her daughter and look after her aging father, she didn’t expect to be caught up in the middle of a drug ring investigation. But someone has it out for her. Or to be more precise, her dog, Bump. And they’ll stop at nothing to run her out of town — including framing her daughter.

All Sam wants is to give her relationship with veterinarian Clint Chastain a chance. But matters get complicated when Clint’s ex — sexy humanitarian Dr. Danielle Townsley — invades Sam’s territory. Clint keeps reassuring Sam that she’s the one he wants, but his actions leave room for doubt. Meanwhile, firefighter Archer Malone is the one constant in Sam’s roller coaster life. And he’s looking better all the time.

Then, Bump disappears — and the one person who could help her find him is the same one she’s trying to avoid. 

 

From now until January 8th, you can get Uneasy Lies the Crown, A Novel of Owain Glyndwr, for just 99 cents on Kindle. It also comes as an audiobook!

 

 

Book Signing - Springfield Writes Author Fair - April 26th

      

Hey All! I'll be at the Springfield Writes Author Fair, with signed paperbacks of all my books available. 

Hope to meet some of you there!

Date/time: Saturday, April 26th, 2014 / 1:00-4:00 PM

Location: Clark County Public Library—201 South Fountain Avenue, Springfield, Ohio

Until later,
Gemi

100,000+ E-books Sold!

(Nala the Once-Feral-Cat with my seven novels to date.)

It's official! This past month, I surpassed 100,000 e-books sold. I completely missed the momentous day, since life beyond the keyboard keeps me busy. Thankfully, my husband is obsessed with Excel spreadsheets, because I stopped checking daily sales months ago. On bad sales days, I'd begin to spiral into a funk, sure that the glory days were over. On good sales days, it was too easy to just keep clicking 'refresh' on that KDP report page to the detriment of time spent productively. So I now let him do the bookkeeping and every 2-4 days I check totals, just to see what the recent trend is.

The majority of those sales were through Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing program, although I also distribute to Nook, Kobo and iTunes via Draft2Digital. Paperback sales have exceeded 1,500 units total and I've recently launched my first audiobook, Uneasy Lies the Crown, narrated by Kyle McCarley.

In June of 2012 I blogged about my journey to 50,000 Kindle Books Sold. The next 50,000 definitely came quicker, but this year has had its ups and downs. I released two more books in that time. Uneasy Lies the Crown was my 6th and sales out of the gate were lower than any of my previous releases. After I slapped myself around a bit and chose a course of action, I tried putting it in the KDP Select program, which meant withdrawing it from other digital book sales channels. I've since given away over 60,000 copies of that Kindle book and the exposure has helped immensely with other sales, as well as with sales of the audiobook.

It took longer than I expected to write and publish In the Time of Kings, book #7, because ... Well, because I was having a mental meltdown. After putting out six books in three years, to say that I was burnt out was an understatement. Researching historical fiction and then checking, double-checking and re-checking facts is very labor intensive. In fact, I'd compare writing each of those books to completing a master's thesis. Or all six to three PhD dissertations.

So when I decided to transition to something with a modern storyline, I fretted that readers might be disappointed. Or that it would just plain suck. For months, I distracted myself with any activity at hand - re-organizing the basement, cleaning off my husband's desk (that was frightening!), training dogs, training for a half-marathon, gardening ... Eventually, I ran out of things to do. So it was either write again - or get a 9 to 5 job. How sobering. I love to write. What was I afraid of? Failure. Hmph. I've been there before. So what?

It took me awhile to work out the kinks in the plot for ITOK, but in the end it was a matter of just sitting down and thinking it through. The best part was that I got to write my own ending. The depressing part about writing epic biographicals is that the hero always dies at the end. This time, I was in control. That was both daunting and liberating.

Happily, I can report that In the Time of Kings is selling well and getting a warm reception. It's a new twist on time travel romance. Will there be a follow-up? I haven't decided yet, but it's possible.

I couldn't have gotten here without the thousands of readers that have bought, downloaded, and reviewed the books and recommended them to others, as well as my beta readers, cover artists, editors, proofreaders and a husband who has supported my dream for well over a decade. So a great big, super, wonderful, fabulous, ginormous THANK YOU!!! to everyone who has helped me get here.

Until later,
Gemi

The Paperback Is Out!

 Deals and announcements:


It's here! It's here!

You can now purchase the paperback version of In the Time of Kings at the following online retailers:


Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Barnes and Noble

• Over 1200 people entered the giveaway for a signed copy of ITOK at Goodreads! The winners have been selected and your copies are on their way.
  
• If you buy the Kindle version of Uneasy Lies the Crown, you can get the audiobook for just $1.99!
  
• The Crown in the Heather (The Bruce Trilogy: Book I) is just 99 cents on Kindle through Oct. 5th.

Until later,
Gemi

Free on Kindle - 9/8 and 9/9

 #free #Kindle



Uneasy Lies the Crown: A Novel of Owain Glyndwr is FREE on Kindle through 9/9!

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Amazon.ca


Happy reading,
Gemi

The Audiobook of Uneasy Lies the Crown

It's here! It's here! It's here! The audiobook of Uneasy Lies the Crown: A Novel of Owain Glyndwr is now available on:

Amazon.com and Audible.com.

(Updated 8/28/13 - if you run to Amazon or Audible, both sites have the audiobook at a HUGE discount right now. Don't wait!)

A few months ago, ACX, the audiobook arm of Amazon.com, extended a very generous offer to me to help fund production for this audiobook. It was something I had wanted to do for a long time, so I didn't hesitate to accept.

The process was glitch-free from beginning to end. I opened up auditions and had one within the first day. While I was truly impressed with the narrator, I kept sampling from the ACX-approved narrators who had English/Welsh accents listed and stumbled upon Kyle McCarley's profile. When he sent the audition piece, there was just something about the quality of his voice that brought to mind Iolo Goch, the Welsh bard who tells the story of Owain Glyndwr.

There was lively debate in my house over which narrator to use. I even recruited friends for their opinion. The verdict was evenly divided. So I did that thing my husband can't quite understand, but has learned to trust me on: I listened to my intuition. I hired Kyle.

I can't sing his praises enough. He kept me apprised of his progress at every step of the way. When the chapters started coming in, they came quickly.

There were numerous names that were tricky to say, but he took the extra time to work out the proper pronunciation on every one. Let's just say I've been saying a few words wrong in my head for years. Now I know better. Spelling Welsh words like Treffgarne or Aberystwyth, or even English ones like Beauchamp is far different from knowing how to say them.

My thanks to Kyle for being so easy to work with, to Sarah Woodbury for helping with the pronunciation guide, to ACX for their generosity, and to my liaison at Amazon who connected me with ACX.

Until later,
Gemi

E-books now available at Apple, Kobo, B&N

I'm happy to announce the Uneasy Lies the Crown, A Novel of Owain Glyndwr is now available on iTunes, Nook and Kobo!

A few weeks ago I decided to switch distributors for all of my e-books to Draft2Digital. The transition went very smoothly. A couple of minor hiccups were immediately addressed by D2D's excellent support team and fixed within a day each. I can now view my sales at Apple, Kobo and Barnes & Noble as the occur daily, instead of waiting weeks (months, actually) to see how many I've sold and helps me keep my records organized.

The only downside is that not all of the retailers have made the connection that these are still the same books, even though the books still have the same ISBN (identification) number. So I'm posting my author pages for those retailers here to help readers find the books.

AUTHOR PAGES:

Apple (iTunes)

Barnes & Noble (Nook)

Kobo

Sony

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Until later,
Gemi

Blurb Blitz Tour for Uneasy Lies the Crown

Join me January 14th through the 25th on a Virtual Blurb Blitz Tour for a chance to win an Amazon gift certificate! Simply stop in at any of the following blogs during the tour and leave a comment regarding Uneasy Lies the Crown, A Novel of Owain Glyndwr:

January 14:  My Devotional Thoughts
January 15:  The Bunny's Review
January 15:  STOP 2  Welcome to My World of Dreams
January 16:  Oh, Chrys!
January 17:  Uplifting Reads
January 18:  Long and Short Reviews
January 21:  Books Are Magic
January 22:  Christine Young Romance Writer
January 23:  Lisa Haselton's Reviews and Interviews
January 24:  It's Raining Books
January 25:  Hazel West'sCharacter Purgatory

 Until later,

Gemi

A Fractured Wales

(Offa's Dyke)

As my next historical novel nears completion, I'll be bringing you some history on medieval Wales. This book features Owain Glyndwr, the last Welsh Prince of Wales, and also includes: Harry Hotspur, Richard II, Henry IV and a young Henry V. Owain's life bears many similarities to that of Robert the Bruce, and it has been speculated that he emulated the Bruce and patterned many of his military practices and diplomatic policies on those of the King of Scots. In many ways, however, his story is markedly different.

The working title of the book is Uneasy Lies the Crown, A Novel of Owain Glyndwr, and its expected release date is the end of 2012. For now, here's a little background on the Wales before Owain's time:

*****
A Fractured Wales

During the Dark Ages, both of what are now present-day Wales and England were fractured into numerous, smaller kingdoms.  In the late eighth century, King Offa of Mercia built a dike extending approximately 180 miles from the estuary of the Dee River, down across the Severn, and on south to the mouth of the Wye.  Whether undertaken to thwart raids by the hill-inhabiting Welsh into pasture-rich Mercian lands or as the result of a mutually agreed upon drawing of lines is unclear, but Offa’s Dyke defined the limits of the general Welsh border for centuries on.

East of the Severn, the divided kingdoms were eventually melded into one when Althelstan became the first King of all England in the tenth century.  Well into the thirteenth century, Wales was still divided into four main principalities: Gwynedd in the north, Powys in the central lands, Dyfed in the southwest and Deheubarth in the south.

Perhaps one of the greatest contributors to this ongoing fragmentation of medieval Wales lay in the practice of fostering out the sons of noblemen.  Being raised in separate households, blood-brothers often had little personal knowledge of each other and consequently less likelihood of developing any affection for or loyalty to one another.  Also, in much of medieval Europe the eldest son would inherit his father’s titles and thus the bulk of the lands, a practice called primogeniture.  In Wales, however, inheritances were divided amongst sons – a practice called partible succession or gavelkind – thus weakening centers of power, furthering divisions and setting the stage for bitter sibling rivalries.   

Welsh princes sometimes sought out and accepted the overlordship of English kings in order to gain protection from neighboring chieftains or even their own kin.  In 926, King Athelstan exacted tribute (payment in return for peace) from several Welsh princes, including Hywel Dda of Dyfed who eventually became the ruler of three-fourths of Wales through inheritance.  He aligned himself closely with the English king, visiting the English court frequently, and later standardized the laws of Wales – an act for which to this day he is still remembered.  Upon his death, though, his kingdom was split amongst his three sons and for yet another century Wales remained divided. 

Homage (a formal acknowledgement of allegiance) given to English kings became routine for Welsh lords and costly tributes were doled out regularly, but later the Welsh were often even required to supply troops to the English to support military campaigns elsewhere.  Welsh archers, renowned for their skill with the longbow, and Welsh pikemen were routinely employed in English armies in campaigns in France and Scotland.

In the middle of the eleventh century, the ambitious Gruffydd ap Llywelyn of Powys united north and south Wales for a brief period before Earl Harold of Wessex had him pursued into the wilderness and killed.  Earl Harold later became King Harold of England, until William of Normandy defeated him at Hastings in 1066.  Norman keeps were then constructed throughout Wales and were garrisoned with English soldiers to keep the locals in check.  English lords, many of Norman descent, increasingly controlled the civil administration of Wales. 
*****

Next up - the uniting of Wales.

Until later,
Gemi