Meet the Book Blogger

Hey Bookdragons! It’s my 30th birthday! Since I was away from blogging for a while and I’ve interacted with a lot of new people since being back, I thought I’d do a “meet the book blogger” post so you could get to know me or get reacquainted with me! 

1. Where are you from? 

I’m currently living in Clintonville, Wisconsin, about 30 miles north and west of Appleton. 

2. When did you start your blog? 

I posted my first book review that started my blog in July 2016. 

3. Would you rather be an author or a publisher? 

Being an indie author, I’m a little bit of both. I definitely like the writing end of being an indie author over the promotion and business end of publishing. 

4. Do you prefer standalone’s or a series? 

Definitely standalone’s. When I was younger I could binge long series, now I just don’t have the attention span for them. 

5. What author is your biggest inspiration? 

Horror Genre - Dawn Kurtagich 

Fantasy Author - Danielle L. Jensen 

Indie Author - Stacey Rourke 

6. Cats or Dogs? 

Cats, definitely! 

7. Whats your favourite movie? 

Elvis & Anabelle 

8. If you got stuck on a island, which three books would you want to be stuck with? 

The Dead House by Dawn Kurtagich, Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie, and a book on safe plants to eat on tropical islands 

9. Did you always plan your blog to be a book blog? 

No, originally it was going to solely be an author blog but I found I enjoyed talking about other people’s books more than blogging about writer’s block and publishing woes 😆 

10. Whats your dream job? 

I’d love to own a small bookstore. 

11. Which authors, dead or alive, would you like to meet? 

Edgar Allan Poe, Dawn Kurtagich, and all of my amazing writer friends! 

12. Favourite Adaption? 

The Great Gatsby (with Leonardo DiCaprio) 

13. Happy Place, Food, Song? 

Place - Charleston, South Carolina 

Food - Reuben Egg Rolls 

Song - Do Not Disturb by Halestorm 

14. Perfect Night In? 

A stack of horror movies, a glass of Numbskül and lemonade, and maybe Chinese takeout. 

15. Something no one knows about you? 

I really love smutty books 😆 

16. Something you hate? 

Winter 

17. Something you love? 

Halloween, fall, horror movies, traveling 

18. My self care routine: 

Days off binging horror movies and favorite tv shows. Listening to loud rock or metal music when I’m feeling upset. 

19. Go to genre? 

Thrillers 

20. Best book from this year? 

I’ll do a best book from what I read in July - Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan 

LAST ONE 

21. Dog ear or bookmark? 

Bookmarks, receipts, anything flat I can shove in the book 😆

An Open Letter About Depression: The Darkness Behind The Writer

In light of the recent losses of Kate Spade and Anthony Bordain to suicide this past week and the recent talk about mental illness in the media I'd like to open up about my struggles. 

The Darkness Behind the Writer

Sometimes I feel like the media doesn't have the required empathy when talking about people with depression or people who have taken their own lives, like they're trying to minimize things. Yes, maybe Kate Spade fixated on Robin William's death. Maybe it caused her to plan for her own suicide for four years. I don't know. Sometimes when you're in a dark place you just want all the pain to end. I understand that. 

I've struggled with what I now can admit to myself is severe depression and anxiety for years. Different things stick out to me now; being hysterical and not wanting to go to school because of bullying, the winter I used the excuse of Seasonal Affective Disorder when I didn't want to get out of bed for weeks after a break up, the times after I'd argued with my now ex-boyfriend that I remember standing in the middle of the grocery store wanting to burst into tears. I put on a brave face for so long so nobody would see how I was really feeling.

These past few years haven't been the easiest. My grandmother, who raised me and whom I've lived with almost all of my life, began having mobility issues in 2013. At first she walked with a walker, then when we had to go long distances she'd use a wheelchair, then after a fall she was in the wheelchair full time, and finally in the past 9 months transfers in and out of her wheelchair became extremely hard due to a diagnosis of Spinal Stenosis. During all of this time I was more than her granddaughter, I was her 24/7 caregiver. 

During this time my mood plummeted. I was irritable and argumentative, I was frequently in tears because what I thought of as a lack of freedom to live my life as others in my life got to do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted, and genuinely stressed out from the physical requirements of being a caregiver. I felt alone. I felt like I was screaming out for help but nobody could hear me or nobody was willing to help me. 

In March 2018 my grandmother ended up in the hospital with a blood clot and I just couldn't do it anymore. She ended up going into a nursing home and I ended up moving in with my mother and sister. Since that time my depression and anxiety has gotten increasingly worse. I was crying nearly every day, sometimes for no reason at all. I feel guilt for my grandmother having to be in a nursing home and feel even worse when things aren't ideal for her there which makes me feel worse. On top of that I feel like I have to manage everything for the both of us which has had me near my breaking point on more days than I want to admit. That combined with my new living situation, where it feels on certain days I'm living with strangers - at least one of which has severe anger issues and I often wondered throughout these past months whether I'd make it through to the other side. I felt - I still feel at times - hopeless.

Because of these feelings my writing has suffered. I know I *should* write, I have ideas to write down, but frequently I just have no desire to write. Depression has slowly stolen the things I enjoy. I have either no desire to read on certain days or can't concentrate when I do. I used to enjoy taking pictures for bookstagram and talking to friends about books but lately it's been a struggle to keep up with it day to day and even when I do post I'm not very talkative.

I finally had to admit that I needed help. Though I know with 100% certainty I would never take my own life, I've had my fair share of days where I walked across the foot bridge in town and thought to myself it would be so much less of a burden if it all just ended and other days where I wanted to crawl into bed and never wake up. So I made an appointment with the doctor on June 1st. 

I'll admit, it was more than a little embarrassing to talk about the way I've been feeling. But with a sympathetic third-party who has no involvement in my current situation I was able to admit the truth. I'm not happy. There are days when I can't even remember happy. And it's not "normal" to have three panic attacks in 24-hours. 

I'm not a great pill taker, but the doctor placed me on a medication for the severe anxiety and severe depression and gave me a referral for counseling this coming week. I've only been taking the medication for 9 days so I don't know yet how well it's working, some days I feel no different at all but it's not as often as before so perhaps that's a start. I'm a little nervous about starting counseling, unsure of the unknown, but it's something I've known I've needed for a while and I'm willing to try anything to make life more tolerable. 

Someone said the other day that Depression is a life-long disease and it's true. I'll have good days and bad, but it's about learning how to cope with the bad days that's important. I'm hoping that my story can help someone, at least to tell them they're not alone. There are others out there going through the same things you are. Don't keep it bottled inside. Talk to a friend, a family member, a doctor, or call the suicide prevention lifeline if you need to. Your life is worth living. It's not your time to go. 

The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline:

1-800-273-8255

#BookTag Saturday: The "Aside from Books" Tag

I'm way behind on my tags over on Bookstagram so this week I'm doing a book tag that I recently caught up on over there...

1. Favorite Hobby

Baking

2. Favorite Drink

Iced Tea

3. Favorite Food

Pasta of any sort

4. Favorite Color

Black & Lime Green

5. Favorite City I've Visited

Sioux Falls, South Dakota

6. Where Would You Dream Home Be

Somewhere in the south, maybe New Orleans?

7. Favorite Accessory

My Ouija board planchette necklace

8. Favorite TV Show

Vikings, Midsomer Murders, and Criminal Minds

9. Marvel or DC

Neither, I don't read comic books

10. Last Movie Watched In Theaters

My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 (yes, that long ago!)

Me, Out of Darkness, and Lizette in 5 Words or Less

       Out of Darkness goes on sale thirty-one days from now! I can't believe my third book is already about to come out. In honor of that, I'll be doing a four-part blog series to introduce you to Out of Darkness (the first book in the Eternals Trilogy), the overall theme, a few of the characters, and a few topics important to the book. To start it all off, this week I'm going to describe myself, my book (Out of Darkness), and the main character, Lizette in five (5) words or less. Are you ready? Good, me too... mostly. 

Me (in a nutshell)

I am:

-Insane :P

-Creative

-Shy

-Observant

-Forgetful

Out of Darkness

is:

-Thrilling

-Romantic

-Full of Secrets

Lizette

is:

-Brave

-Strong-willed

-Witty

-Mischievous

Have I whet your appetite yet?

Out of Darkness is available for pre-order:

Amazon

Smashwords

Barnes and Noble

Kobo

iBooks

Coming Tuesday April 5, 2016! 

(Paperback Edition will also be available on April 5th)

Five 4 Three 2 One

          Every now and then I like to do a fun 'get-to-know-me' blog and since the next four-five weekend blogs will be devoted to Out of Darkness, here's one carefree blog coming up...

5 Items I Would Buy With A Million Dollars: 

1. All the books on my wishlist. 

2. A Duplex in Nashville, Tennessee, so I could live on one side and my grandmother could still be nearby in the other half of the duplex while still giving me privacy. 

3. A new tattoo (or two!)

4. A French Bulldog puppy.

5. A trip to Ireland.

Bonus Item: Give money to the ASPCA

4 Things I Love About My Favorite Book:

(Fav. Book: Texas Gothic by Rosemary Clement-Moore)

1. The Mad Monk Ghost / Legend

2. Amy's sister Phin

3. This line: Never trust a writer, they're paid to make up stories. 

4. Amy and Ben's witty banter.

3 Books I'd Bring to a Desert Island:

1. Play by Kylie Scott

2. Nash by Jay Crownover

3. The Queen of Babble Gets Hitched by Meg Cabot

2 Food Items I Could Never Live Without:

1. Cheese

2. Pasta

 1 Person Who Makes My Life Better:

1. My Boyfriend Josh <3

How My Writing Career Changed in 2015

        With 2015 being only twenty-seven days away from being nothing more than a memory, it is time to begin looking back on all that happened to me in terms of my writing career.
  
      I went from an unpublished author waiting for my first novel to be released to now being the author of not one, but two novels; The Haunting Love (WCP, February 17, 2015) and Finding Elizabeth (Self-Published, September 15, 2015), with the first two books in a new trilogy on deck for release in 2016.

       It's been a great year for me creatively and I continue learning more and more about the publishing world every day. It feels like I've grown so much in the past year, the seven months in between The Haunting Love's release and Finding Elizabeth's release in particular. 
  
     I've made mistakes and I've learned from them. I've been lucky enough to have experienced publishing through both a small publisher and self-publishing.
  
     Marketing didn't come naturally to me. I had to learn the fine line between promoting my book and turning people off by over promoting. It was shocking to learn it took more than my early efforts of promoting my novel on Twitter and *hoping* my publisher would promote my book to bring in sales. I guess it's true what they say: if you want something done right it's best to do it yourself.

       During the process of self-publishing Finding Elizabeth, I learned to make connections with fellow indie authors and bloggers. I can't emphasize that enough. Build a support group, make friends, and always help others whenever possible. It makes you feel so good when you can help other indie authors and it's good karma in your favor. 

        Another area of growth for me in 2015 was interacting with the public and my readers at book signings. I am quite possibly the shyest person I know. Talking in public terrifies me. I like to think of my book signing for The Haunting Love (May 9, 2015) as a trial run. It was held at a small coffee shop in a small town near where I live and 80% of my sales were to people I have known most of my life. I am grateful for their support and patronage, but I needed more exposure. My book signing for Finding Elizabeth was held at a bookstore chain I love in a medium sized city (See my blog post "A Great Place for Authors to Hold Book Events") and I thrived. It was such a positive experience. I connected with and sold to a broader group of people that I had no prior meetings with. I smiled so much I thought my mouth was going to be frozen like that forever, but I felt so empowered afterward.

       One of my favorite accomplishments of 2015 was participating in and completing NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month - November 1-30, 2015). 50,000 words in a thirty day period seemed daunting at first, but I am so proud that I reached and surpassed the goal and completed my novel.

        Fellow writers/indie authors: how did your writing career change in 2015? Let me know in the comments, I'd love to head what you got up to this year! 

Ten Things You Didn't Know About Me

1. I hate odd numbers
          I'm pretty obsessive about it because I'd rather have an even number of things (tattoos, facebook 'friends', shoes, etc.) than an odd. After all... one shoe wouldn't look right.

2. I wear reading glasses when I'm working on my computer or reading on a tablet. 

3. If I could have one magick ability it would be that I could have clean dishes at the snap of my fingers. 
         I love to cook but I hate the clean-up. 

4. I love old movies, especially old Hitchcock movies. 
          My favorite Hitchcock movie is Shadow of A Doubt starring Joseph Cotten and Teresa Wright. 

5. I'm a major New Orleans Saints Fan. 
          That lives in Packer Country :(

6. I love reading my horoscope and I tend to believe the one in Woman's World Magazine the most. 
           I also read Tarot Cards.

7. When I was a kid I went through a phase where I would only eat mac and cheese. True story. 

8. I am terrified of bees. And ice. 

9. My favorite reality shows are Naked and Afraid and Say Yes To The Dress. 
         If I had a choice to be on one it would be Say Yes To The Dress. I can't live without indoor plumbing. I also tend to call Naked and Afraid "Naked and Dead".

10. Before deciding to pursue being an author I wanted to be: a doctor, a veterinarian, a fashion designer, an attorney, a professional photographer, and a chef (to name a few). 

So there you have it... a little more about me than you knew before.  Don't forget... there's still 13 days to enter to win 1 of 3 SIGNED COPIES OF FINDING ELIZABETH

And I hope to see you at my book signing at Half Price Books Appleton, Wisconsin Saturday November 28 from 1-3PM! Mark your calendars!