Mason's Point of View

I have been asked to write a sneak peek into the mind of Mason Lowe (from my story Price of a Kiss), so there is a short excerpt of the first moment he sees Reese at two different blogs today!  You can go to either  True Story or A Life Bound by Books to read it!!

In other news, I'm up into the eighty thousands on word count for Granton University's book two!  I wasn't sure if I'd have enough to say to make it up to 80,000, but I still have a few chapters left, so I might possibly get up into the nineties now! It's starting to get so close to the end I'm beginning to rush from the anticipation of being able to write those two beautiful words: the end! Hopefully I can go back and make it feel naturally paced after I'm  done, though!

And since we're talking about the Granton University books, Monday starts a book tour for book one: FIGHTING FATE.  My publisher has gotten AToMR Book Tours to set up a week long promo for it!  There should be reviews, guest posts, and all kinds of fun facts about Fighting Fate!  So, if you want to check out a few stops, THIS LINK will have daily updates about what's going on and where.

Everything else in my life is going okay. No one in the family is sick at the moment...er, okay, except for my sister who got a brown spider bite late last week and has been in the hospital since Wednesday. She had about 100 cc's of infection drained out of her during surgery on Friday and will be there until at least Monday. To heap onto the complications, she had diabetes, so that has to be closely monitored as well. She was in good spirits when we visited her, but still...many prayers going Cindy's way.

But, yeah, other than that, things are okay here! My kid keeps amusing me with things she says, and I keep making more pre-made covers for my Cover Design page. Seriously, it's a sickness.  But I knocked down the price to a nice even $25 per pre-made cover, so maybe I'll actually sell one some day!

And that's what's been going on in Linda Kage world. How are things with you?

Introducing KAGE COVERS

Thank you to everyone who had input on which cover for To Professor with Love you liked best!  As I suspected, most everyone seemed to prefer something different!  Oh, and I totally forgot to tell you what the story was going to be about!!   As a spin-off from Price of a Kiss, I'll introduce a bunch of new people  in this one who I hope will start a whole new series, as well as bring back Mason and Reese for cameo appearances, and eventually tell Eva and Sarah's stories! So, here's a little intro for Noel:

During the football season, I'm used to the crowd chanting my name and worshiping me as I throw a ball into the end zone for a touchdown. While back in my hometown, I'm still just Noel Gamble, trailer park trash, son of the town tramp, and older brother to three siblings who are counting on me to keep up my scholarship so I can take them away from the same crappy life I grew up in.

These two different sides of my life never mix until one woman gets a glimpse of the real me. And it feels nice to open up and relax around someone I can trust.

Problem is Aspen Kavanagh is my literature professor.

If I start anything with a teacher and we’re caught together, I might as well kiss my entire future goodbye, as well as my family’s and even Aspen’s. But sometimes, love is worth risking everything. Or is it?

But until then, I'm still--yes, STILL--working on Tess's story for the Granton University series. We're up in the 70,000's on word count, though, so it IS coming along.

In other writing news: last week, I received an email, telling me my story, The Color of Grace, became a finalist in the young adult category for The 2014 EPIC EBOOK AWARDS!! That's make Miss Linda Kage a finalist for this competition three out of the last four years. I've never won, but it still feels pretty cool to final!

AND NOW FOR MY BIG ANNOUNCEMENT!!

I decided I love making book covers SOOOOO much I created a little business for it!! Ergo, Hello KAGE COVERS DESIGN!  I have a few pre-made covers already made (check 'em out!! I really love some of them; Others I might tweak a little more!!), and I'm willing to try customizing a cover for any willing author.

You can check out my pre-made covers on my covers page http://www.lindakage.com/covers.html or I'm starting a Facebook Page, which I'll start uploading covers to soon (and you can totally like my page, if you like)! So what do you think: I've completely lost my mind or people might actually like some of my covers and order them??

Okay, then!  I'm going to get back to work on my Granton story!  Have a great week.

Here's What's Been Up with Me This Week (yeah, not much!!)

I’ve made it to 65,000 words complete on my Granton University Book #2!!  Yay, me. I’m hoping to have a rough draft done by the end of October, but we’ll see. Fingers crossed.

And you said you wanted to see a couple covers I’ve done with my new photo editor, right?  (Or maybe I’m just thinking I heard that!! But, whatever.) I’ve been playing around trying to find something I like best for the next self-published story I’m working on.  And I think I decided on one I like best.  But I’ll show you my top six because I’m curious to see which one everyone else likes best too!

I’ve been cover-making crazy obsessed lately. But I just got my new copy of Duke of Midnight by Elizabeth Hoyt to read this morning, so maybe I’ll calm down for a while...and get some reading on instead.

Meanwhile, my kiddo has been sick with pneumonia. I know, poor thing. But she’s getting better and is back to preschool. She took her last dose of medicine today, and I am SOOOO relieved. I mean, SHE’S relieved. Yeah, she's relieved. But seriously, I’m so relieved, too. Trying to get medicine down that child is like an act of God or something. But we finally figured out a method that semi-works for her, and it only—yes, only—took her three swallows this morning (when it should just take one) to get it all down!  Woot.

And I need new shoes. BADLY.  I’m not a big shoe person.  I have three daily wear, a pair of flip flops for summer and around the house, and then of course a bunch of uncomfortable only-wear-on-special-occasions shoes.  So the sole blew out of two of my everyday shoes, I mean, completely BLEW OUT. You can see daylight through one of them and the heel on the other one flops around like an extra tongue. 

Thus I’ve been stuck wearing one pair until I get my lazy self to a store and buy new shoes.  But then it started raining this week, and raining, and raining some more.  Somehow I got water in my last good pair of daily shoes. So, now whenever I walk around it squeaks and sloshes. It’s annoying and annoying shoes just...annoy me.  NEED TO GET TO THE STORE SOON!

So, what’s been up with you?

Thanks to all the Voters!

Thank you to everyone who voted on my boy Logan for the Men of Omnific Smackdown!!  He actually made it to Round 2!!  I was so shocked, and happy.  So, yes definitely thank you!!  You're amazing. What's even better, I don't have to drag him through a Round 3 (since he lost in Round 2)!!  I've decided I'm not much into entering competitions like that. I always feel so pushy begging people for votes.

And more good news, I'm at 50,000 words on my book two for my Granton University series.  It's reached a sadder part of the plot, though, so hopefully I can keep plugging along.

I also have starts on a couple more stories that will turn Price of a Kiss into the first book in a series. I'm kind of excited about that!!! Okay, really excited. You'll never guess who stars in book two...probably because you haven't met them yet (man, aren't I evil?!)!

And for my birthday last week, my wonderful, amazing husband got me a photo editing program.  I've been trying my hand at creating books covers.  And I'm totally addicted.  Once I get my next self-published story finished, I may have you all help me pick out which cover I should use. Would that be something you'd like to do?

On the home front, my little Pre-schooler is not getting enough sleep. Her nap time, falls during the hours she's now in school. So every day when I pick her up, she's crabby and demanding.  Then she takes a huge, long nap late into the evening and wants to stay up later at night because she's all rested up by then. What's worse, I have to go into work earlier these days because I adjusted my times so I can get her to pre-school. And that makes her night time schedule even shorter since she has to leave the house when I do.  I hope we can get her sleep schedule worked out soon, because most days the kid drives me cray cray! And I can't handle being cray cary!! But she's still loving school, so that's a plus.

And that's all I have to report this week! What's been up with you?