Pack Supremacy Update

Photo credit: The copyrights for the images are held by Katie Little | Dreamstime.com, James Hearn | Dreamstime.com, and Michael Shevlin. The copyright for the cover is held by Patricia L. Miller.

Since it's now a few months past when I'd hoped to publish Pack Supremacy (THE CAPITOLINE HILLS CHRONICLES book 2), I thought I'd give a little update on its progress. I really have no one to blame for the delay but myself (ah, the curse of self-publishing). I gave the first draft to my beta readers last February, and they got me back comments by the middle of March, which was amazing of them. And then I looked at those comments and... did nothing. By the time I finally got myself back on track with my edits, it was August, a mere two months from when I hoped I'd be published.

Still, I sent a second round of edits out at the end of August, and again my fantastic beta readers came through, reading it within a week and getting back to me with in-depth critiques. Unfortunately, some of those critiques suggested I still had quite a bit of work to do before this book would be publication-ready. Which is fine. I'd rather the book be really ready than to put it up early and know it's not. But it did mean that I missed my deadline.

I took time off for NaNoWriMo and then the holidays, but for most of October and since the new year started I've been hard at work on another round of edits. I'm hoping to have those to my betas by the end of the month. I'm hoping some of the changes I'm making in this round will fix a few of the big problems that were pointed out to me.

In the upcoming months, I'll keep you posted on its progress, including a new publication date once I know it. If you haven't read Pack Mentality (the first CAPITOLINE HILL book) yet, you can buy a copy on Amazon or Smashwords.

PACK MENTALITY on Amazon

PACK MENTALITY is live on Amazon! Thank you to everyone who helped/supported me/encouraged me/didn't tell me to shut up when I was rambling about this book. I'm so excited to introduce Quinn and her Pack to all of you.

Buy PACK MENTALITY on Amazon here.

On that note, I'd love to do a blog tour to promote PACK MENTALITY at the end of the month (October 24-31). If you're interested in or would be willing to host me, please either let me know in the comments or email me at tobisummers@writeme.com.

And the winners of the PACK MENTALITY giveaway are Nick Wilford and Dave H. Congratulations, guys! I'll be emailing you to find out in what format you'd like your prize.

My cover! My beautiful cover!

My gorgeous cover for PACK MENTALITY is done! I can brag about it without reservation, since my amazing friend Patricia Miller did all the hard work. I'm so in love with it.

The copyrights for the images are held by Michael Shevlin, Jose Antonio Sánchez Reyes | Dreamstime.com, and Iakov Filimonov | Dreamstime.com. The copyright for the cover is held by Patricia L. Miller.

Reminder: PACK MENTALITY comes out tomorrow (October 8th), and you can win a copy of the ebook!

PACK MENTALITY Release - One Week!

Though I've done a horrid job of promoting it, my book PACK MENTALITY comes out in one week! So I am, predictably, running around like a chicken with no head trying to get everything set (including final tweaks on the cover, which is why I haven't done a big reveal). I knew self-publishing would be a lot of work--made more difficult by my tendency to get distracted from self-imposed schedules--but I'm really enjoying the freedom. Plus, I love this book and these characters, and I really can't wait to share them with all of you.

So PACK MENTALITY comes out on October 8th, and, in that spirit, I'll be giving away two copies of it (either .mobi or .epub). You can sign up below!

You can check out PACK MENTALITY on Goodreads for now, and I'll put up the links to buy the book when it comes out on October 8th. a Rafflecopter giveaway

Where Have I Been

I occasionally fall into long periods of introspection. I get so overwhelmed by everything that happens in the world and in my life that my brain turns off and I find myself unable to get motivated enough to write a birthday card, let alone a book. Like an attack of ennui, but less... depressed (because, I promise, I'm actually happy while this is going on, just sort of lazy).

That's at least partially to blame for my extended absence and complete lack of productivity over the last few months. As I mentioned in a previous post, I moved in April, which led to a downhill spiral of too much to do and not enough desire to do it all. Which led to five weeks spent vegging on my new couch (the comfiest couch in the history of couches, by the way) watching Buffy for the first time. Which led to two weeks of, "Why can't I write as well as Joss Whedon?" Which explains the half-unpacked boxes that are still cluttering my apartment four months later.

Plus, I got some more responsibility at work, which led to a few weeks of late nights trying to finish some projects.

But it's a new month, and I'm kicking my ass back into gear. Pack Mentality is so close to completion I can taste it. I pushed the release back a month, so it's expected publication is now October 8th. I plan to spend August finishing the edits, sending it out for a final proofread, and nailing down my cover, so the month of September will be devoted to promotion. I'm really excited about sharing it with all of you (and the rest of the world).

I hope everyone's had a good summer so far! Sorry I haven't been keeping up with blogs and book releases; I'll do better about that!

Big news!

OK, first off, I want to apologize for falling off the planet in April. I rather spontaneously moved at the beginning of the month/end of March, so the last few weeks have been a study in entropy. But I'm almost settled now, and I'm starting fresh in May. I'm refocusing on my writing and making more of an effort to edit Capitoline Hill (again).

Which brings me to my big news...

After a lot of thought (and a few long conversations with K.S. Lewis at varying levels of panic), I've decided to take the plunge and self-publish The Capitoline Hill Chronicles! I'm doing it for a variety of reasons: the timing seems right to publish a werewolf book, a speaker at the writers conference I went to in March really swayed me, there were several rather blatant signs from the universe, and, mostly, it just looks like fun. I always thought my pride needed a traditional publishing deal to make me feel like I was a successful writer, but having watched other self-published authors, I'm starting to realize that there's a lot more to it than that.

So I'm going to give it a whirl. I'll be posting more details throughout the summer, but right now I'm shooting for a late summer/early fall release. Which will mean mid-late summer blog tour, if anyone's interested in hosting me and/or my characters (more details on that as it gets closer as well). And I have a whole bunch of other fun things planned along the way.

How were all your Aprils? Looking forward to May?