Tag: pnr

What I did on my Summer Vacation

Posted on August 21, 2017 by - Uncategorized

The short answer is . . . write.

You guessed it. I’ve spent most of my summer finishing off the “Felix and Rose” project which is now titled Love Like Blood. It’s a full length novel in my brand new paranormal series, The Night Kind, and it will be available exclusively this year in Other Worlds: A Limited Edition Collection of Science Fiction Romance and Paranormal Romance releasing on October 17, 2017.

If you haven’t pre-ordered your copy, you can do so from Amazon. It’s only 99 cents for 20 books from some awesome paranormal and science fiction romance authors. It’s also available for a limited time for iBooks, Nook, Kobo, and Google Play.

So right now, Love Like Blood is with Amanda and I’m in a holding pattern while she starts her editing magic. I’ll be back in the hot seat in a couple of days, but at the moment, I’m kinda suspended in limboland. It’s a weird feeling and not one that sits well with me, but I’m trying to be grateful for the downtime because it’s not going to last long.

But as I sit here listening to the band Pink Turns Blue, my brain keeps returning to Tybee and my beloved Shining Ones characters. I have mixed feelings about starting Destroyer if I was honest. I know everyone is waiting and I’m only one step away from open revolt. I hear you. I just, well, I’m not sure I’m ready for it to end. This last book is going to be hard. In more ways than one. To say good bye to Poesy, Birdie, Haylee, and Adam will be extremely difficult for me especially knowing where it’s going to end. I’ve known since Book One how this thing was going to play out, but I’m not sure I’m ready for it yet, but the show must go on, right? That’s the reality of the situation. The Shining Ones was always planned to end after four books. So it’s time to pull up my big girl pants and get on with it. Happy thoughts, happy thoughts, happy thoughts.

What else?

I’ll be at Penned Con in St. Louis September 29th-October 1st. It’s rapidly approaching and I’m soooooo not prepared, but it’s going to be a stellar event. If you’re thinking about coming, I still have some FREE tickets so email me or PM me on Facebook if you’d like one. You’re not going to want to miss this one – last year they had over 1,000 attendees and that’s not counting the authors and their assistants. It’s probably the biggest signing of my career to date. Yeah, no pressure, there. You can read more about Penned Con on the website.

I think that’s it for now. 

See you on the other side.

xo shawnee

 

 

Sultry & Sinful made it to No. 1

Posted on April 25, 2017 by - Uncategorized

Hello gang,

I’ve been meaning to write up this blog post for over a week now. Unfortunately, I was rather stupid on Friday last week and picked a fight with a tree in my yard. Sadly, I lost. Big time. And ended up in the ER with a partially herniated disc in my back. So I’m struggling along at the moment on a sea of interesting drugs and ice packs still trying to stay on top of things. It’s not really working, but the drugs make it so I almost don’t care. Hahahaha.

I’m mostly lucid. Mostly.

But while I’m still upright and awake, let me share the news. After many struggles and some resistance for the romance community, The F/F Sultry anthology made it to No. 1 on Amazon and we’ve stayed pretty high in the rankings in the LGBTQ categories. We also got our BESTSELLER RIBBON. Hurrah! So thank you lovely readers for taking a chance on us.

Here’s a snapshot.

 

 

 

 

 

No other news to report right now, but I’ll be back on Friday with another round up. 

xo

shawnee

 

 

The blog post I didn’t want to write . . .

Posted on April 17, 2017 by - Uncategorized

 

Hi guys,

So. This is a blog post that no author ever wants to have to write, but unfortunately, sometimes things happen in our author world that is beyond our control. And this just happens to be one of those times. And more often than not, it involves the hand that feeds most of us . . . Amazon.

The upshot is this – the pre-order for Sultry & Sinful will release tomorrow and everyone who has ordered it to date from Amazon will get the WRONG file. Yep, you heard that right. You may be asking, “Well, how does this happen?” and I’m going to tell you how:

When a box set or an anthology is set up up, often the person who is running the set will put a placeholder file in place on Amazon. The reason why this is done is that we can’t make a pre-order live without a file and traditionally pre-orders are available three (3) months prior to a book being released. 

This is standard practice for lots of box sets and multi-author books. I know it may seem weird to the outside world, but there’s lots of reasons why the final file isn’t ready until closer to release date. Authors are still trying to get their stories edited and formatted. Sometimes authors have to drop out last minute. Having a final file ready to go three months out is rare. There are so many things that can change before release date.

But again, uploading a placeholder file is common practice.

The thing is this. Lately, Amazon has been questioning box set owners (and individual authors as well) about their validity to publish a book especially if it includes the work of someone else. And when that happens, the box set owner is left scrambling trying to email Amazon all the contracts, emails, correspondence, etc. to show that they do indeed have the right to publish what they say they are going to publish. The problem is that Amazon has been waiting until the last minute to do this. This is problematic due to Amazon’s own rules about pre-orders, which is that the final file must be in place and locked down three (3) days prior to the book’s release date.

In our case, the final file was uploaded a week prior to release date and Amazon didn’t question the box set owner until four (4) days prior to our release date (which is tomorrow). By the time our box set owner got all the documents together, she got locked out of the release window and the file couldn’t be updated.

We are not the first group to have this happen to us. And we won’t be the last either. And it sucks, believe me. Every author in Sultry & Sinful has already lined up their fans, promos, parties, etc. hinging on this file.

And now we’re likely to get slammed with bad reviews because the file they are going to get at midnight tonight is not what they paid for. And there isn’t a thing us authors can do about it.

If you’re one of my fans reading this then I would like to say I’m sorry. Amazon will fix the problem, you WILL get the right file, but it might take twenty-four (24) hours or more for the right one to appear. It’s not fair and I completely understand the frustration. Right now, you have nine (9) authors who are desperately trying not to freak out. By the way, it’s not working – we’re all freaking out.

This is my personal appeal for you to have patience. We are doing everything in our power to get the problem rectified. If you have personally pre-ordered the book and are disappointed, email me shawnee@shawneesmall.com or PM me on Facebook and I will personally send you a free gift in the way of apology.

Again, I’m sorry that this has happened and I would move mountains to get this sorted before it gets to you, but my hands are tied right now.

If you did pre-order Sultry & Sinful, thank you for supporting us and for standing behind indie authors. I know it’s not a lot, but we really do appreciate everything you do for us. Sometimes bad things happen. We will get through it.

xo

shawnee