One of my (unexpected) Christmas presents this year was a new computer. This has been a wonderful gift; my old computer left me wondering each time I used it if this was the last time before it died.
I’ve been sorting through all my documents saved up on the old computer, figuring out which ones I want to transfer over to the new one and which ones I can say goodbye to. It’s been an interesting experience, almost a timeline of me as a writer. Not just my skill level, but my style, my interests, the types of stories I write at different times in my life, the stories I started and never took anywhere … there’s a part of me that wants to save them all for posterity.
There’s the other part of me that remembers Emily Starr burning her outgrown stories and poems every time she sorted through her stack and heartily approves.
Right now I’m working on re-typing and editing my four short stories set in the Whitney & Davies world, which I will be releasing as a collection SOON (trying to help bridge the gap between Books 1 and 2, since it has been four years since I released Magic Most Deadly and at this point I’m concerned fans of the series have forgotten about it) and so have been able to put off the document-sorting for a little bit.
Soon enough, though, I’ll be diving in for real, figuring out which stories to metaphorically burn, which to save, and which, perhaps, should be set aside for the chance to grow them into something even more beautiful.
Well, exciting for me, anyway. I hope exciting for you all as well, as it means a new story by yours truly to read in February.
What’s that? A new story?
That’s right! My YA sci-fi short story, “A Spot of Orange,” will be published in the February issue of FrostFire Worlds, put out by Alban Lake.
I stumbled out of bed yesterday morning and checked my email on my phone without thinking too much about anything or expecting anything … truth be told I had almost forgotten the submission to FrostFire, done right before the bustle and hurry of Christmas and travel and all that. Once I recognized the email address and remembered the submission I thought, “oh, another rejection. Oh well, at least I tried–wait. What? An acceptance? Did I read that right?”
I rushed right back into the bedroom and stood there goggling until Carl woke up enough to ask what wrong. I mutely handed him my phone with the email still up on it and continued to stand there in shock.
This makes two (2) published short stories now, The Last Defense with Empyreome last April, and now A Spot of Orange with FrostFire Worlds in February. This seems like an auspicious start to 2018!
Today is the last day to get Candles in the Dark for free! It’s had a fantastic opening weekend, THANK YOU to everyone who has bought a copy and/or spread the word. It means so much to me.
The seed for this story was planted last September–I had finished a reread of Elizabeth Gaskell’s “North & South” and was thinking how rare characters like Margaret Hale are in fiction: quiet, strong-willed, filled with integrity, passionate about justice, willing to acknowledge when she’s made a mistake, fiercely loyal, yet still, and I repeat myself here because this is the rarest bit, quiet.
That mixed in with thinking about how fun it would be to read a mystery set in the Adirondacks with a scholarly protagonist along the lines of Harriet Vane. I grew up “in the foothills of the Adirondacks,” as we always described ourselves in Canton and Potsdam, two towns about ten miles apart with four colleges between them. So many mysteries–or indeed, stories in general–set in small towns focus only on the quirkiness of them, a la Gilmore Girls; or else portray the people in them as small as the towns themselves, narrow-minded and blindly prejudiced.
I wanted my story to show my small town as I knew it–warm, welcoming, open, accepting, full of hard-working, real people. I wanted my protagonist to have that same integrity and passion for justice that Margaret Hale had, with the scholarly mind and desire for honesty Harriet Vane shows. I wanted my story to show the real struggles of a rural, northern farming community during the Depression, which were very different from rural farming communities in the south and midwest. Above all, I wanted it to be a story where justice and truth prevailed and light shone in the darkness.
As to how well I succeeded in all those goals, only you, the reader, can tell. Pick up your copy of Candles in the Dark today, for free, and let me know what you think in a review!
The old Grist Mill I based Wharton’s Mill on, situated on the beautiful Grasse River.
This photo essay shows a little bit more of the Canton I know and love as it is today. It is indeed a beautiful little village!
Pauline Gray, journalist by day and novelist by night, discovers anonymous letters are being sent to a young widow, insinuating that her husband did not die by accident. Pauline’s compassion and journalistic instincts combine to help her to seek an answer to who is sending these letters, and why. Was Bob Ferris really murdered, and if so, by whom? Before long, Pauline is uncovering evidence of a local smuggling ring and stirring up secrets some people would rather remain buried along with the dead. Despite the danger, Pauline won’t stop until she has shone a light into the hidden places of the past and seen justice done for the grieving widow and her son. No matter what the cost …
Candles in the Dark is set in my hometown of Canton, NY, during the 1930s. It does not feature any of my family members, or friends-and-acquaintances, not even borrowing any last names. Nevertheless, it is as true a representation of that town as I could write. For the first time in any of my stories, I understood how the setting could become another character. Even the parts of the town that have changed since then—the Town Hall burned down long before I was born; the Hotel Harrington has been replaced by a Dollar General; the train station is now a bar—came alive in my imagination as I wrote the story. My dad was always available for all my “Canton in the old days” questions, and I pored over the old photos and memories shared on the Historian Town and Village Canton NY page.
Yet this story was not just a tribute to my home and roots. As it developed, a fine sense of justice for the oppressed, and light shining in the darkness came through. Which is why, as I said in my last post, it is so fitting that this story comes out during the Advent season, the season of coming hope, of promised justice, of peace triumphant, the season of knowing light is returning to the world even if it is not here yet.
So here, as a gift from me to you this Advent, is my mystery novella. I hope it brings as much light to your hearts as it did to mine in the writing of it.
The 99¢ sale for Magic Most Deadly and From the Shadows is ending today … but don’t despair! A BRAND NEW work is coming in the next couple days!
Remember me talking about that mystery novella set in my hometown of Canton, NY in the 1930s? The one that was going to get published in June?
Well, it hit setback after setback, but at last it is ready, and it will be available on Kindle tomorrow, and in paperback soon after!
The timing has turned out beautifully appropriate after all, as the idea of shining a light in the darkness and justice interceding for the broken is so fitting for Advent.
Candles in the Dark, by Louise Bates
Pauline Gray, journalist by day and novelist by night, discovers anonymous letters are being sent to a young widow, insinuating that her husband did not die by accident. Pauline’s compassion and journalistic instincts combine to help her to seek an answer to who is sending these letters, and why. Was Bob Ferris really murdered, and if so, by whom? Before long, Pauline is uncovering evidence of a local smuggling ring and stirring up secrets some people would rather remain buried along with the dead. Despite the danger, Pauline won’t stop until she has shone a light into the hidden places of the past and seen justice done for the grieving widow and her son. No matter what the cost …
In a near-future post I’ll talk a little more about the inspiration for this story and some of my reasons for writing it. For now, I’ll simply tell you to stay tuned! It’s coming soon.
In honor of the second edition of From the Shadows, I’m sharing a short story I wrote about Tyler and Sapphira’s first meeting. I love the friendship between these two, and I wanted to explore how that friendship began–was it always so easy and comfortable? Has Tyler always had that protective streak? What was Sapphira like as an ensign? How did an enlisted man and an officer get to be such good friends, anyway? And just what is Tyler’s full name?
This story, First Contact, answers all those questions and a few more. Check it out, and if you haven’t read From the Shadows yet, I hope this whets your appetite! You can follow the links on the “Books” page to purchase a copy of From the Shadows, free everywhere except Amazon, where it’s 99¢. (Or $9.99 if you want it in paperback)
Need a break after the holiday (and possibly the shopping following the holiday)? Escape with Magic Most Deadly; an Agatha Christie-esque mystery (with a dash of magic); or From the Shadows, a light-hearted space opera. Both on sale at Amazon for .99¢ right now!
From the Shadows is still in the midst of the “being released” process, BUT you can get the new edition on Smashwords for FREE right now! It’s also free at Barnes & Noble. It’s $0.99 at Amazon and the more people who share links to Smashwords and B&N on the Amazon page to report a lower price, the better chance there is of them letting me drop it to free there, as well. (And that is, alas, the only way it will get to free on Amazon, so please please please, report those lower prices!). My goal is to have it free in ebook form everywhere by the end of the month, but I do need your help with that.
Also, reviews are desperately needed in order for the book to show up in search algorithms and the like, so after you pick up your free (or less-than-a-dollar) copy, please leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads or both. This Indie author thanks you!
Once all the sites are aligned and everything is officially in order, I’ll update here again. Consider this your special pre-sale deal, offered to faithful blog friends before going out to the general public!
UPDATE: It is the old edition, but it is now free on Kobo as well, as my dear friend A.M. Offenwanger pointed out in the comments! Which made me check iBooks, and sure enough, it’s old but free there as well. So while you might want to hold off getting it from either of those places, you can at least use them to request a lower price from Amazon!
Two years ago, I published my second novel, a short space opera titled “From the Shadows.” It was my first time doing my own formatting, and while the finished product was acceptable, I was never thoroughly happy with it. As time went by and I learned more about the craft of self-publishing, I began to see the errors I had made, and how to fix them. I wasn’t sure, though–was it silly to release a second edition only two years after the first? Would readers even care? Was it worth the effort?
In the end, the questions boiled down to this: did I care enough about this story to make it the best I possibly could, no matter how difficult or awkward it might be.
The answer, after a lot of soul-searching, was yes.
From the Shadows has never been a popular book. I get far more requests for the next Whitney & Davies book (it’s coming, it’s coming) than I do a sequel to From the Shadows. I doubted it had a fandom that would be at all affected by a new edition.
But I love this story. I love the characters, I love the theme that surprised me by weaving through it, I love the adventure, I love the world. This story meant something to me. It still does. I knew that I would always be unhappy about it if I knew I could make it better and didn’t.
So, I got to work. I reformatted. I went through and eliminated a few typos that had slipped through (there are always typos that slip through). I took out dozens of “justs” and “verys” and my other nemesis words that also always tend to slip through. I included a short story at the end, because if I’m already going to all this work I might as well include some new content, right? I kept the basic cover (because it’s gorgeous and I can’t imagine a better one) but updated the title and author font as well as the back copy.
It was tedious work, but I found I didn’t mind. In fact, going through the book with a fine-tooth comb was even joyful. It felt like getting reacquainted with old friends. I fell in love with the story all over again.
I received my proof copy in the mail today, and I’ve begun the process of retiring the old paperback so I can bring out the new one, as well as updating the Kindle edition (which will carry through to the other retailers as well). I’m hoping to have everything up and running by November 30, two years minus one day since the book first came out.
I hope it makes even more friends this time around, and that readers will fall in love with this world and these characters just as I did in writing them.
Some days it’s hard to believe we’ve been in our new house, new life for a month already–but most days it feels like we’ve been here forever. Which can make it tricky when we are trying to figure out why we’re so tired, or suddenly so cranky with each other. “Oh, right,” we remind ourselves. “We moved a month ago.”
People ask us if we miss the seminary life. No, not really. We miss our friends there, obviously–but we’re so close we can have them over for meals (in a proper dining room, huzzah!) or get together for tea or meet up at a park if we want to. Admittedly, we haven’t done much of that yet, but that’s more due to the fact that we’ve had house guests off and on for the last three weeks than anything else.
The girls and I have started our Thursday classes–they take Latin and Science in the mornings while I get writing done, and then I teach American Lit, then we have lunch and come home. It’s been marvelous. Not only are they getting a fun class experience and I am getting two straight hours of writing time out of it, I’ve discovered that I’m actually pretty good at teaching! Or, as Grace put it: “Your first class was really boring, Mom, but all of them after that have been a lot of fun.” What can I say, it took me that first class to figure out what I was doing.
We finished reading Johnny Tremain this past week and will be starting The Sign of the Beaver after break. The kids are all in agreement that parts of JT were interesting, but it started out too slow and none of them feel like reading it again for fun–“Not like the Harry Potter books,” one student said. (“Actually, I think Harry Potter is kind of boring,” said Joy. “But I might like them when I’m a little bit older,” she generously admitted.) I loved having conversations with them about the book and their impressions of it, and especially loved their responses to some of the assignments (the letters they wrote from book characters to someone outside the city about the events of the Boston Tea Party were hysterical).
As for the writing, that’s proceeding at a snail’s pace (when does it ever not?), but it does progress. I finished the major rewrite of Candles in the Dark (remember that? Remember the novella I was supposed to publish in June? Hahahahasob it’s coming, I promise) this past Thursday, sent it to my betas, and am now trying to figure out if I should start editing the short story collection I was supposed to publish in July (guys, I am SO BAD at deadlines) or get back to the next Whitney & Davies novel, which I had optimistically hoped to publish in September.
I think I need to stop planning on getting projects finished in the summer.
And mostly, we’ve been enjoying living life, instead of surviving it. We climbed Mt Monadnock recently, tomorrow we go apple picking, we’ve been able to have various family members out without them having to stay in a hotel, we’re working on the gardens out front, we’ve walked to the library once a week …
This was BEFORE Daddy said “We’re nearly at the top!” for the fifth time and Mommy threatened to push him off the edge.
