N.R. Walker's Blog, page 29

Okay so this one is gonna be the quickest, shortest update ever!  I’m supposed to be walking out the door LOL.

What happened last week?  After my pre-readers input, The Weight Of It All is now with my editor. Yay!!  It is looking more and more likely that I will release it before I leave for the US. I was aiming for Sept 14th but it might be a day or two before that, to save my sanity, as we leave for Sydney, U.S. bound on the 15th.  Fingers crossed I don’t have major rewrites to do…

I also revealed the amazing cover and blurb!!  For those that missed it, don’t fret. Here it is again[image error]

Blurb:

After being dumped by his long-term boyfriend for being overweight, Henry Beckett decides to make some drastic changes. In a vain attempt at getting his boyfriend back, Henry does the most absurdly frightening thing he can think of.

He joins a gym.

Reed Henske is a personal trainer who isn’t sure he’ll ever be ready to date again. He’s sick of guys who are only interested in the perfect body image, never seeing him for who he really is.

As Reed tortures Henry with things like diet and exercise, Henry enamours Reed with recipes and laughter. As the friendship lines start to blur, Henry is convinced there’s no way Thor-like Reed could ever be interested in a guy like him.

Reed just has to convince Henry that life isn’t about reaching your ideal bodyweight. It’s about finding your perfect counterweight.

❤

I love love love Henry.  I hope you guys do too!

What’s on this week?  I’m heading to our flight consultants to finalise the visas for Canada this morning! Yay!!  Boy, it’s getting close now and I’m still in denial about being woefully unorganised.

I will have first round edits at some point later in the week, and I will be working on some promo etc.  I may pick a date and see about doing some kind of blog tour, now that I’m more confident the book will be released before I leave. I also need to finish off my accounts (yes, don’t fall over. I actually started them lol)  And I’ll be organising the GRL signed books to be delivered to the US this week.

I’m feeling better this week, and even went back to Crossfit on Friday. I had two weeks off and thought I may possibly die, but I survived. Woot! Go me.

Oh!!  And super excitedly!!  My new website is coming along fabulously.  There should be a reveal before I leave for the US!  You guys don’t need to worry – everything will transfer over and the address will stay the same. And I’ll still be posting my Monday morning drivel.

And that’s it!  I think…   Until next week!

❤

It’s one month until we leave for the US.  This holiday has been coming for months, and I’d put it in my “it’s ages away” brain basket and now, as my daughter just reminded me, it’s only four weeks away.

For the most part, I think I’m organised.  Doing a four-person family, five week trip across the US is a bit daunting, but exciting for the most part. But not only do I have all that to plan/organise/do/try and enjoy, I also have GRL to plan for. So whatever I need to organise for GRL, also needs to happen in the next four weeks or it doesn’t happen.  So while I remember…

I will then order the book/s required and will organise shipping to the US to have them at GRL for you. I can’t/won’t have any other books with me.

Now, what was I’m saying. Oh, that’s right… I’m getting through my to-do list, slowly but surely.  I’ve been mowed down by some horrid headcold flu type thing that has knocked me for a six. But, I did manage to finish my WIP.  Hoorah!!

The Weight Of It All came in just under 64K words, though no doubt after pre-reader feedback and edits, it will go over that.  My sister, who is a pre-reader of mine, said the MC, Henry, is “the most me” character I’ve ever written. In other words, there is a lot of me in Henry, and I’ve quite often said in my Facebook Reader’s Group, that everything Henry says to his fitness instructor is something I have said to mine. LOL

I love Henry to pieces, and Reed, his new love interest is just adorable. He’s a big sweetie, and is completely perfect for Henry.  

Speaking of fitness instructors, I’ve been just too sick to go to Crossfit this week. I did Monday night, then woke up Tuesday and felt like I’d been hit by a bus and I feel a bit slack for not going this week. I’ve also had a houseful of guests all weekend, which hasn’t helped at all. Here’s hoping things get better this week.

My to-do list this week includes: a thousand non-work related things, writing two blurbs (one for The Weight Of It All, and one for Perfect Catch) finalising the cover to The Weight Of It All and showing it off to the world.  I will also have some pre-read edits to do, then will send the manuscript to my editor so she can commit commacide to it LOL.  I don’t know if I’m crazy, but I am going to try and get this book out before I leave.

I think (and this is a very big leap of faith) that Sept 15 will be the release date. I’ll be cutting it fine. That’s the day we actually leave for Sydney to fly out, but I figure I can upload it the day before if need be. In saying that, there might not be pre-orders for this one… it will depend on how I’m going for time.

That’s all for today.  I hope you all have a great week!

Until then…

❤

I’m happy to report it was a productive week on the word count front. Yay!!  My WIP, titled The Weight Of It All is now at 52.5K and, all things going well, I should finish the first draft this week!!

I can’t wait for you all to meet Henry and Reed.  I just love them to bits.  

A little insight into the story and the characters might be in order, yes?  LOL  Okay, here it is:

Thirty five year old socially awkward Henry suddenly finds himself single after eight years, when he’s told it’s because he’s let himself go. He’s overweight, unfit, unwanted.

In a mad attempt to get his ex back, he joins the local gym where his new personal trainer, Reed Henske, will change his life in ways Henry can’t possibly imagine.

Henry is adorkable and sassy, with no social filter. Reed is a sweet character, who is shaped by his backstory, and he is the perfect counterbalance for Henry.

I still don’t know have any clue on a release date yet. I’m hoping it will be out before I leave for the US but given that is now less than 40 days away, and I still haven’t finished the first draft, it’s not looking likely. I have seen the prelim cover (done by the amazing Sara York) and I just CAN’T wait to show you all.  It’s so utterly perfect for Henry, and it really suits the tone of the story.

And just so you all know, Henry and Reed don’t even kiss until the 45K word mark, so while this book is heavy on the  character growth and romance, there isn’t much heat.  But as always, I let the characters drive, and their story is theirs to tell.

This week I’m hoping to wrap up the first draft and get it out to my betas and pre-readers. It will be my main and only focus this week. And nope, I still haven’t touched my accounts… sshhhhh, don’t tell my accountant. LOL

In GRL news, I have put together my bookmarks that I’ll be giving away and will be posting them off this week to my friend in the US who I’ve dubbed my “swag manager”.  LOL  Here’s a pic of how many there are and it’s not even half the swag I’ll have there… ugh. It seemed like a good idea at the time LOL

I’m also working on having my website updated and more professional. I’ve seen glimpses and it looks amazing so far.  Can’t wait to show it off!

Facebook kindly reminded me yesterday in their “here’s your memory” thing, that it was FOUR years since I submitted Blind Faith to Silver Publishing.  Wow. Four years.  It’s a bittersweet memory, given that Silver Publishing turned out to be a nightmare. It’s also bittersweet because while I learned a lot from whole experience, apparently I didn’t learn enough because four years later I find myself, all over again, waiting for publishing contracts to expire.  Believe me, it’s not a mistake I will make again.

In happier news, in case you missed my last post, here’s the gorgeous cover of the Anthology the M/M Daily Grind authors are doing for charity.

It’s called It Was Always You, and all proceeds from this anthology will be donated to the LGBTQ youth organization ONE.N.TEN: http://onenten.org!

PRE-ORDER is available now for only $0.99 and is EXCLUSIVE to iBooks:http://apple.co/2aup8hL!    **Please Note – Regular price one release day will be $2.99!

It will be released on all sites October 4th, and you get SEVEN stories for the price of one, while helping out a great organisation.

Okay, that’s it from me today.  I will have house guests next weekend, so whilst I will try and do a Good Morning Monday post, I can’t promise it.

Until next week…

❤

I am so so SO excited to show you all this amazing cover… Isn’t it just gorgeous??

★ ★ ★ COVER REVEAL + AMAZON GC GIVEAWAY ★ ★ ★

It Was Always You by Cardeno C, Ella Frank, Riley Hart, Lane Hayes, Christina Lee, Felice Stevens & N.R. Walker

Release Date: October 4th, 2016

Genre: M/M Contemporary Romance

Cover Designer: Hang Le

IT WAS ALWAYS YOU charity anthology will be released on October 4th!

It’s the collaboration of seven MM romance authors who also run the private Facebook group called The MM Daily Grind. We’re pumped to bring our readers SEVEN BRAND NEW NOVELLAS and to help raise money for a worthy cause.

All proceeds from this anthology will be donated to the LGBTQ youth organization ONE.N.TEN: http://onenten.org!

PRE-ORDER is available now for only $0.99 and is EXCLUSIVE to iBooks:http://apple.co/2aup8hL!

**Please Note – Regular price one release day will be $2.99!

I hope you help us support this wonderful organization.

**You can also help these LGBTQ youths right now by buying back to school and camp items on ONE.N.TEN’s AMAZON WISHLIST: http://amzn.to/2arygA5.

★ GIVEAWAY: If you would like a chance to win a $5 AMAZON GIFT CARD all you have to do is go to our Facebook pages    Ella, Christina, Riley, Felice, Lane, Cardeno & N.r. Walker find the COVER REVEAL POST (mine is pinned to the top)   and share the cover & TAG a friend and each of us will choose ONE winner at random! That’s SEVEN chances!!

★ If you are a blogger and would still like to sign up for the release day blitz you can do so here —> http://bit.ly/2atYrWB

Thank you all for sharing!!!!

❤

Boy these Mondays keep coming around fast!  Today is the first of August which means it is now less than six weeks until we leave for the US… which I am so unbelievably not ready for.  LOL

So this week has been yet another busy one. I’ve managed just 8K words on my WIP, but have had some RL issues to deal with. In light of everything, 8000 words is pretty damn good. Of course I’d like some more, but any words are good words and I’ll take them. LOL     It is, however, looking more and more likely that this book will not be ready (or even finished) before I leave for the US.

I’ll still try though. It’s just that these boys are chatty, and of course there’s thing called plot and secondary character development that gets in the road every time.  ;)

Some exciting news!!  It was announced this week that I will be taking part of an anthology to help raise money for the fantastic organisation called One n Ten.

The M/M Daily Grind is a Facebook group, consisting of seven fabulous authors, which I am lucky to be a part of.  Cardeno C, Ella Frank, Christina Lee, Felice Stevens, Lane Hayes & Riley Hart (and myself LOL) have all contributed, which is SEVEN brand new short stories to be released as an anthology, and the proceeds are going to One n Ten.

Pre-orders will go up soon, and the anthology goes live on October 4th.  I am so excited about this, and I can’t wait to show of the amazing cover very soon!!

My short story is titled Perfect Catch, and its the tale of Cal and Troy.  It’s a sweet friends to lovers story, and is almost 19K words long. They’re Aussie boys who like to go fishing, motorbike riding, and camping together, and they’re the only two who can’t see how perfect they are for each other.  *cue the squishy feels*

I will be posting the gorgeous anthology cover asap.  And each addition to the anthology will be released as a separate title by the end of the year, which I think I’ve found the cutest stock photos for that cover too.   Will share as soon as I have it made❤

This week I will be writing like a crazy woman, trying to get this WIP closer to being done. I also have some family stuff that this week that will cut into my work/writing time, which means I need to be extra focused when I write.  I dare say I’ll be spending a few days at the local library this week, because I tend to write more when I’m there rather than being distracted by things at home.

On a completely related note, why is it, when someone works from home, other people tend to assume they do nothing?  I’m seriously half tempted to rent out an office somewhere so me being “at work” is a concept they’ll understand.  *deep breaths*

Anywho, I still haven’t touched any of my accounts/taxes, so I’m only getting further and further behind on that front as well.  *exhausted sigh*  One day I’ll be ahead of myself, I promise. It just looks like that day won’t be any time soon LOL

Okay, so that’s all from me for now. Until next week…    

I’m a bit late today, sorry… And this is just a super quick post. It’s been another busy week and weekend for me. I swear I need an eighth day in the week just so I can slow down. Or have a day off. It’d be nice

Good morning guys!!  I’m finally home after two weeks, and it’s seriously the best feeling ever. My bed, my shower, my house, my TARDIS coffee mug… Sure, travelling and visiting is nice but nothing beats the feeling of coming home.

I have SO much to do. My to-do list resembles a phone book, and I’m starting to panic about not getting everything done before we leave for the US in eight weeks… eeeeeeeeeeek.

So this week, the only writing I got done was the plot points for the rest of my WIP. No actual word count but an outline, so that has to count for something. I rarely use an outline, but I was on the plane and jotted down some plot points to get my characters to the finish line. They probably won’t stick to it anyway LOL

Now I’m home, I’m hoping to kick-start a promo tour for the audio of RDH. Will post more on that when I know more.

In more RDH news, the German Translation is now live!!

For my German readers, it’s available at Amazon.de.   I will have it up on Smashwords, ARe, iTunes etc in the coming days.❤

Because I don’t have much else to report on, I’ll share a little snippet of my current WIP.  Tentatively titled The Weight Of It All (though that may change)  I did share this same excerpt in my Readers’ Group on Facebook and in the Grinder’s Group on Facebook, so some of you may have already seen it.  It’s the story of Henry Beckett who joins a gym after his boyfriend Graham left him for being overweight   

Sorry for the lack of post last week – I was away and had no chance (or wifi) to post anything. I’ll also be away this week, so by the time you guys read this I’ll be in Sydney. I have four days there, then finally come home for three days before the kids go back to school. Hopefully life will resume to normal then. I’ve been so absent on social media as well that I feel a disconnect with my writing life.  IDK. It’s been such a busy and bizarre month and I miss that daily interaction with the wonderful people who have become not just online friends but real friends as well.  Fingers crossed everything settles down soon.

My writing last week was very minimal. I think I did 4K words all up, which is nowhere near my usual quota. My current WIP, which I’ve tentatively titled “The weight of it all” is at 22K words. I have no clue how long it will be but I’m estimating around the 40K word mark.

My other short story, titled Perfect Catch, is back from proofreaders and will be ready for release in October as part of an anthology. I’ll be posting more on that later, but I’m really excited and can’t wait until I can share more news.[image error]

I’ve just approved the proof of Blood & Milk paperback and the full wrap cover is just gorgeous.  You can buy the paperback at Amazon or Createspace.

Excuse the dodgy lighting and bad photography, but here are some photos of the paperback proof…

I’m still waiting on final proofreading of my German translation of Red Dirt Heart. I was hoping to have it released already but with me being away it just couldn’t happen. Hopefully it will be out very soon!

But the audio for Red Dirt Heart went live!!!   I’m so excited about this!  And there has been some GREAT reviews already! Joel did a fabulous job bringing Charlie and Travis to life! And again, a huge thanks to RJ Scott and Love Lane Books for making it happen.

You can find the audiobook on Amazon  and iTunes  and Audible

Sooo, what’s new this week?  Well, I’ll be away for four days of it.  We leave early Monday and get home late Thursday, so I doubt there will be much writing done at all. I’m really behind on my schedule and can’t see any hope of catching up, let alone getting ahead. But I’ll just keep going with all I can because as all writers know, even a few hundred words a day helps to add up. My lack of word count isn’t writer’s block, it’s just lack of time and real life being crazy, which is truly frustrating because ALL I want to do is write and I can’t.  For now, the characters in my current WIP are being patient, however my next books’ characters are already starting to talk in my head, so I definitely know who I’m writing next LOL

I also have accounts/taxes to do this week which I’ve been a total fail at. I seriously need an assistant. Or a clone. Or an extra day in the week. Or more coffee…  Actually, all four would be great.  :)

So that’s all I have to report on just now.  I hope everyone is well, and with all the craziness happening in the world right now, I want to take this opportunity to wish all my readers peace and love.

Until next week…

❤

I am so thrilled to announce Charlie and Travis are finally on audio!  Joel Leslie did a fabulous job bringing Sutton Station to life in my first ever audio book.  I’d love to thank Nic Starr for introducing me to Joel, and I’d love to thank RJ Scott and Love Lane Books for providing a platform for this little self-publishing Aussie to use ACX.

You can find the audiobook on Amazon  and iTunes  and Audible

❤

Can you believe this year is literally half over?  That means we’ll have to start thinking about Christmas soon… *head desk*  Not to mention I have six week overseas family trip in September/October to plan and organise.  Man, I am so not ready for that. LOL

Okay, so this week has been super busy.  Blood & Milk is out and the reviews on Amazon have been wonderfully positive and heartfelt.  I would like to thank everyone who took a chance on reading.  I have also received more emails from readers about this book (in the first few days of release) than any other book. Your messages of love and support truly mean a lot to me, so thank you everyone, from the bottom of my heart.  ❤  

In news of the charity fundraising, I estimate by the end of the first week alone we will have raised about $400USD for the African Human Rights Coalition.  I will be sure to keep you posted with updates.

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I also have some exciting translation news!  Red Dirt Heart is coming out in German!!  I’m just waiting on proofreading, which hopefully won’t take long, then I can format it and get it live asap. Rote Erde 1 will be out soon, and I’m super excited about this!

Something else I’m ridiculously excited about is Red Dirt Heart in Audio is due out any day!!  This is my first ever audio book and the narrator, the wonderful Joel Froomkin has graciously held my hand throughout the entire process[image error]

The lovely RJ Scott and Love Lane Books will be releasing it asap!  I can’t wait for you guys to hear this book. Just listening to it, I laughed and cried – hearing my own words is an amazing thing. And man, I have missed these boys – Charlie still means as much to me now as he did two years ago.

❤

In other news, my WIP (not sure on the title yet…) is at 10K. I estimate it will maybe be around 40K words, but we all know how characters do whatever the hell they want and I, being the lowly writer, have no say in such things. LOL  My main character (it’s first person pov) is Henry Beckett and his love interest is Reed Henske, and it’s set in Balmain, Sydney.  And I’m aiming/hoping for a release in early September. More details on that later.

What’s happening this coming week?  Well, another busy one (no surprises to those who know me lol)  It’s EOFY here in Australia (end of financial year) and I haven’t done ANY of my accounts yet, so that needs to be a priority. I also need to write as much as physically possible, as school holidays start on Friday and I’ll be away for all of the first week and half of the second week, so my writing time will be almost zero for the two weeks after this one. Not to mention the RL stuff I have going on…

That also means there might not be a post next week (as I won’t be home) and my online time will also be very minimal, but I will try and schedule something.

Until then…

❤