Haven’t jumped on the bandwagon for the adventures of Seer Jordan Amador and her archangel companions? Have no fear! The Black Parade novel boxed set is here! That’s right–all three of my urban fantasy/paranormal romance novels in one place for one great price. Scurry on over and pick up a copy today!
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09CP6KV96
Happy New Year, everyone, if I haven’t said that to you yet!
One neat thing to kick off this year is Smashwords’ new Affiliate Program. With every ebook sold using the affiliate link, you get 11% commission! I figured it would be prudent to post links in case any of my fellow authors, bloggers, or fans wanted to sign up and snag some commission money this year. Details below.
Want 16 bestselling romance novels for only 99cents? Then check out Without Limits!
Love, Passion and Desire.
All powerful and often times uncontrollable emotions. Not knowing when they will strike or the depths that they’ll reach, it can be scary, exciting and in some instances completely consuming.
Exciting and scary all at the same time, love takes hold when least expected, proving that love is colorblind.
Including stories from:
Cinderella’s Prince by Stacy-Deanne
The Baby Bargain by Stephanie Morris
The Descendants by Angela Kay Austin
Fort Knox by Tiana Laveen
Highland Jax by LaVerne Thompson
Bad Boss by Lolah Lace
The Colors of Love by Breanna Hayse
Hierarchy by Lori Titus
Securing Mika by Sydney Aaliyah Michelle
Scorned by Donna R. Mercer
Back to Black by Kyoko M
Love’s Taken Over by Michelle De Leon
Forever Mine by J.L. Campbell
Lucas by Siren Allen
Never Walk Away by Dahlia DeWinters
Law of April by Suzanne Jenkins
Yep. That was my 2017.
In summary, I have enough perspective to say that 2017 wasn’t as bad as 2016 by default because 2016 was nothing but a continuous stream of suckerpunches to everyone’s ‘nads, and since 2016 set the precedent that everything was going to be awful from now on, we knew to expect nothing but awful things in 2017. That’s pretty much what we got, to be honest. It wasn’t all bad, but it was pretty much mostly bad, imo.
Still, I was able to snatch just a few happy moments in this dumpster fire of a year that followed up what I considered to be the definitive apocalypse. I was able to go to Los Angeles for a week and run around being silly and doing whatever I wanted. I attended Dragon*Con and met Nathan Fillion, whom I’ve been crushing on since 2009, as well as Ming Na Wen, Michael Rosenbaum, and Steve Blum. I’ve managed to sort of dig my book sales out of its shallow grave and nudge it back towards the direction it needs to be in. I wrote a sequel to my science fiction/contemporary fantasy mashup and published an all new novella for The Black Parade series, Back to Black. I was also accepted into an anthology of black sci-fi/urban fantasy based out of Atlanta that’ll be hitting your bookshelves later this summer. I moved back to my hometown of Atlanta, GA and have been happy to remember what it feels like to be somewhere comfortable that’s also more conducive to my career.
It hasn’t been easy. I’ve been through some stuff this year that I never anticipated and I’m unsure if I’m the better for having endured these kinds of hardships, but I’m happy to have made it out alive. I’m happy that you guys survived it as well and I hope that 2018 treats you even the tiniest bit better than 2017. We still have a hard road ahead for us, but if we stick together, I think we can survive another year of metaphorical ‘nad punching by life.
As for the future, 2018 is going to be a weird year. I’ve got another Of Cinder and Bone novel on the docket for this year, though it will depend on how things go with Of Blood and Ashes in terms of if I’ll write and publish the third novel (working title is Of Scales and Shadows, but it’s subject to change) this year. Technically, I do one book a year, sometimes two if the situation calls for it, and Of Blood and Ashes came out January 2, 2018 in the Sirens and Scales boxed set, so I’ve already met my goal for 2018 publications. The third book will still get written, but I guess we’ll see what happens throughout the year to determine if I’ll publish it in 2018. This year and next year are probably the most flexible years in my writing career, as I have the room to decide what I want to do and where I go from here, since The Black Parade’s main novels are done (might do another short story collection someday, stay tuned) and this new series is about to hit its third book.
All I can say is hang in there. I’ve got some moves to make and I hope you want to be around for the ride.
See you on the salt mines, friends.
-Kyoko M
“What’s it like to be a self-published author?”
Boy, you’d think by my fourth year I’d have less trouble answering this question, but believe it or not, I think it’s actually gotten harder to answer.
It’s no surprise that 2016 was a brutal year for everyone on the planet. Half of us didn’t survive it. 2017 is infinitely better just by comparison, but 2016 really did leave us with a lot of scars. I lost my furry best friend of twelve years, for one thing, and I had such a rough year that even my book sales slid into the trashcan (probably so they could be close to me). I’ve been struggling for the past year to drag my poor book series out of the landfill and start pushing the boulder back up the mountain. It’s a long, miserable, lonely trip.
But it ain’t all bad.
For instance, recently I was lucky enough to save up my hard-earned, retail-slave-labor cash and move back to Atlanta, Georgia, my city, my hometown, my turf. I always knew I wanted to move back and it’s not just because Florida is God’s rubber room. (Seriously, what is with you, Florida? You scare me.) If I have even the slightest chance of advancing the Black Parade series and possibly even the Of Cinder and Bone series, I need to take a page out of the Little Mermaid’s book: “I wanna be where the people are.” No man is an island and I need to network, to fellowship, and to grow as an author in a metropolitan city almost as big and diverse as New York. I want to do more than shill my books to online audiences. I want to put down some roots and start collaborating to reach a wider audience and get the Word of Mouth going eventually, even if it takes years.
Here’s what I’ve learned so far:
It’s okay to change your mind. For instance, after I wrote The Holy Dark, I didn’t really think I’d dive back into Jordan Amador’s insane life again, at least at length, but an irresistible opportunity presented itself and I decided to explore a story that I felt was interesting without retreading too much ground that we’ve already covered in the trilogy. After all, that’s why I didn’t make it into an ongoing chronicle. I felt that Jordan’s story is the kind that’s best told with a finite number of books. It’s not nearly as large and sprawling as something like the Dresden Files or the Kate Daniels series. However, many people asked me how Myra Bennett and Jordan Amador met before The Holy Dark and I felt like it could be a good jumping off point into a novella.
Additionally, I was misguided with the first cover to Of Cinder and Bone. I thought that going for the sci-fi romance/interracial angle would draw in some readers, but it didn’t. The book tanked. It’s still tanking, but to be fair, it’s very niche and it’s long as hell. It’s going to be a real struggle to tread water, and so that’s why after Of Blood and Ashes is on digital bookshelves, Of Cinder and Bone will become a permafree title just like The Black Parade. It turns out that I overestimated my “fanbase”—which of course is not a jab at any of my fans. Rather, I got arrogant and assumed that those who had read the Black Parade would crossover and read this new series when that isn’t the case. I’m not that big of a deal and I needed to be humbled by struggling yet again to even get 10 sales a month for the new title. Well, mission accomplished. I’ve been eating humble pie for dinner every day for the past eight months. Coincidentally, that leads me to my next lesson.
It’s okay to be wrong. I was wrong about the cover for Of Cinder and Bone. I was wrong about how I thought it would do since I had an established readership before it came out. I was wrong about advertising and marketing. I was wrong about a lot of stuff. It sucks. It hurts. But as Lonely Island says, “I’M AN ADUUUUUUUUUUUUULT!” and I will push past it and get better at what I do. This business isn’t the forgiving kind, and it’s not very patient. You work or you die. That’s the way it is.
Be open to changing gears. Even though Of Cinder and Bone is in the dumps right now, I’m still hella glad that I gave it a shot. There is something almost perversely satisfying about taking something you’re really excited about and sharing it with the world, even if not that many people care about it. I haven’t broken through to the right demographic yet, but when I’ve given the elevator pitch to the novel to people, they actually seem genuinely interested in it, as it smacks of Jurassic Park, which everyone loves. If nothing else, I’ve really come to be fond of my off-kilter premise because it feels so uniquely mine. This isn’t to say that The Black Parade isn’t as well, but I am delighted that people acknowledge that it is a cool idea even if they’re not quite ready to dive into it yet. I still have to rebuild that readership from the ground up, but at least I know there is a demand for this type of mashup. It’s definitely a risk and it’s a loss for now, but I know that if I try hard enough, I can cut through the jungle and find the right readers. I think that’s one thing that the (very, very small) success of the Black Parade series has helped with, actually: giving me the confidence to go with my gut and keep writing even if the target audience is the total opposite of what I have previously written for. A few years ago, I wouldn’t have even dreamt of writing this monstrosity, let alone publishing it, but now I’m excited to talk about it and see where it’ll lead me. Even if it never reaches the level of fans that the Black Parade series has, I still feel like it was the right way to go, to explore something I find fascinating even if I’m one of few. I think that’s something everyone should do—chasing after the thing that gets their heart racing and makes their eyes all bright and shiny, in spite of its unpopularity.
Make yourself a schedule and stick to it. My God, this is one of the hardest things I’ve had to deal with over the past year. Between a full time job, a miniature social life, and a crazy cat, it’s been extremely troublesome to schedule writing time and advertising/marketing time. What I’ve learned mostly over my fourth year is that the only way not to plummet to the bottom of Amazon’s slushpile is literally weekly promotions that rotate about every 90 days. I hate it. It’s so stressful to have to plop down on my bed for an hour and pay for promotions, but it’s how I keep bread and Nutella on the table. (*sobs* I MISS BREAD I’M ON A DIET AND I WANT MY PASTRY BACK WAAAAH!) That old saying “you gotta spend money to make money” is 100% true of self-publishing.
You have to invest in marketing or you’re going to starve. You have to schedule time to write, edit, and publish or you’ll miss every single deadline you set. Authors often think we have way more time than we actually do. Life finds a way to screw you over. It’s Murphy’s law. You have to come up with crazy contingencies and have backup plans for your writing career or you’ll be doomed. (I mean, the last Dresden Files novel came out three years ago and I’m still waiting…just sayin’, Jim Butcher. Get crackin’ or I’m gonna pull a Misery on you.) At the end of the day, your readership doesn’t care how hard you work or how difficult your life has been. Make time. Literally just conjure it out of thin air or you’ll never get another word on a page.
I’ve banged my head on almost every damn hard surface there is in self-publishing. Oh well. Time to put my helmet back on and keep stumbling along towards year five.
Thanks for being here with me in the dark, readers.
Kyoko
Cover art by Marginean Anca of Brose Designz
Guess what? The all-new Black Parade novella Back to Black is out in just one month! Time to get you all frothing at the mouth for it, so here’s Chapter One. Please remember: if you haven’t read The Black Parade, She Who Fights Monsters, and The Holy Dark, you will run into spoilers here. Back to Black takes place between She Who Fights Monsters and The Holy Dark: the second and third novels in the series. With that in mind, please enjoy. Purchase info below the cut.
Well, I’ve been saying I had news for months and here it is: I’ve written an all-new novella for the Black Parade series!
Cover art by Marginean Anca of Brose Designz
Seer and demon slayer Jordan Amador has had it rough lately: separated from her husband the archangel Michael, hated by the angels who think she betrayed them, hunted by demons who want her dead or enslaved, and rejected by her friends and family for lying to them. Disgraced and miserable, she’s all but ready to lay down and die until another Seer named Myra Bennett saves her life. Myra gives Jordan a new mission: to wipe out a nest of demons that are terrorizing her family as well as the innocent people of Houston, Texas. Jordan goes undercover to infiltrate the demons’ nest and figure out how to eliminate them. Meanwhile, she’s locked in a deadly game with the archdemon Belial, who constantly visits her night after night in her dreams to convince her to give him her soul. Between the insanely gorgeous, but dangerous archdemon poking around in her head and the vicious creatures surrounding her, she’s not sure how much longer she can survive.
Back to Black is the fifth book in the Black Parade series. It takes place between She Who Fights Monsters and The Holy Dark.
Back to Black is exclusively part of the Creatures boxed set, which features 21 other New York Times, USA Today, and Amazon bestselling authors. Pre-order it today and get your copy August 15, 2017.
Yep. That’s my summary of 2016 in general, and also, my year in general.
I don’t think I can recall a single year in my entire life that’s taken so much from me in pretty much every aspect: my career, my day job, and my personal life. I lost my furry best friend of 12 years, my book sales tanked, and the entire country went absolutely insane in the meantime. I think like most of you, I would be happy to strike 2016 from the history books and pretend it never happened, although the damage that it did can’t be completely ignored no matter how hard we try.
However, as rotten a year as most of us had, there were some good things. For me, this tops them all:
Yes, ICYMI, that is indeed your friendly neighborhood author Kyoko M wrapped in the sinewy, perfect arms of Captain America himself, Chris Evans. Recap here. I won’t bore you with the squee-worthy details in the meantime. However, that was my Treat Yo-self 2016 trip, and the good things that happened for me in 2016 career-wise are actually still connected to conventions.
I was able to attend the State of Black Science Fiction convention in Atlanta, GA, where I was able to be on two different panels with some incredibly talented, smart, funny, dynamic authors. It was such a fantastic opportunity to break bread with people of a similar genre and just relax and talk about writing and making a living off of this crazy thing we do.
I also was able to be in an all-new boxed set, where I met other awesome urban fantasy and paranormal romance authors. I learned some new marketing strategies and advertising opportunities along the way, and started to realize that even though the writing world is highly competitive, a lot of authors have figured out that we can help each other up the ladder one rung at a time instead of always climbing over each other. I really have come to encourage new authors, or veteran authors seeking more readership, to collaborate and find their niche with people who are like-minded. Sometimes you can bust your hump as hard as you can, and still not meet your goals, so it’s great that if you search hard enough, you can find a way to break through the next barrier and find new readers by sharing the spotlight. I am elated to see that so many authors are willing to pull together and get ourselves out there. This is one of the most labor intensive jobs on the planet, so it’s nice if one can find a way to share the load.
I won’t be boring you with a calculation of how many copies I’ve sold this year. Frankly, all you need to know is “not enough, but at least I’m not dead in a gutter somewhere.” After all, it could be much worse, and the main reason that my book sales fell to rancor is that I spent so much time putting my energy into my new first-in-series Of Cinder and Bone that I sadly started to neglect marketing the Black Parade series. It’s hard to juggle two series at once and that is the goal I have set for myself in 2017: to learn how to adequately balance marketing and promoting both series to new readers.
I sort of forgot how hard it was getting any traction with The Black Parade, and so I’m going to take a good, hard look at the last two years that have been profitable and identify what works best to get OCAB into the hands of as many readers as possible. Sometimes when you have a good year, you take for granted what got you there and forget that it’s easy to slip back down to the numbers you were at before. Hopefully, 2017 will see us back up to where we were in 2014 and 2015.
As always, I couldn’t have done any of this without you, readers. I know it’s been hard, but there are 352 new opportunities to kick ass waiting for us and if we pull together, we can make our dreams come true again.
Thanks for everything. Stay tuned. We’ve got plenty of things comin’ atcha in 2017.
Holy crap, guys, it’s been three years since I published The Black Parade.
“What it’s like being a self-published author?”
Yeah. Dean’s got the right idea. I think if I could sum up the experiences I’ve had over the past year, since the last post, it’d be with the above image.
If you know any writers, personally or just through social media, most of us tell you the same thing if you ask us that question. Guys…being an author is hard. Like, really. I know it’s not as hard as being a heart surgeon or an astronaut, but people underestimate the fact that it’s literally–and I mean that, not in the overused Sterling Archer sort of way–hundreds of hours of our lives spent pouring our heart and soul into a book and then sending it out into the world, praying that it’s not a tiny garbage fire to be extinguished by the masses.
I suppose the funniest thing about being a self-pub author in my third year is that it simultaneously got easier and harder after I hit year three. That sounds nonsensical, but it’s kind of true.
For instance, the part that got easier is knowing where to search for help. Need advice about where to advertise? KBoards. Need help with research? Google yourself to death and then call someone who is smarter than you and ask them weird questions (in this case, I called an MIT post doc to grill her about her research project. It was as bizarre as it sounds, but she was more than willing to help and super sweet about it.) Need to find art for your upcoming cover? Stock photos. Need advice on how to not be a total piece of crap writer? Chuck Wendig. After three years, I have so many bookmarks saved to point me in the right direction when I get stuck.
On the other hand, the part that got harder is venturing out to try something new. I finished the Black Parade series (for now; there will be other additions to the canon next year, if things go well) and it took every bit of my will power to get it done and make sure it was the right way to end my debut series. It was by far the hardest thing I ever learned to do on my own.
Until this new novel came along.
Truth be told, Of Cinder and Bone is kicking my ass. Thoroughly. If any of you follow me on Twitter, you know I’ve been gnashing my teeth over it for months now, even though I started out super eager to begin a whole new series. Working on it is like pulling teeth. It’s exhausting and scary and awful and I’ve been faced with constant self-doubt as I am venturing into a totally different genre this time, away from my comfort zone of angels and demons and sarcastic loners with trust issues. Science fiction is a whole new animal, and it’s honestly trying to maul me.
But that’s probably a good thing. All writers need to evolve. Some of us can find our niche and stay there, but often authors are called away from their comfy spot to try something new because we bleed words and the words always dictate our actions. The story is bursting out of our chest like a horrible scene from Alien and no matter how much it hurts, we have to obey it.
To that end, here are a few things I’ve learned over the past year.
-To quote a catchy little song from the wonderful Zootopia, try everything. It might be cheesy and sung by an artist I honestly can’t stand, but the song really does ring true with what you should do as an author, especially a newbie. “I won’t give up, no, I won’t give in ’til I reach the end and then I’ll start again; No, I won’t leave, I wanna try everything, I wanna try even though I could fail.” Do that. Is something terrifying and you don’t want to fail at it? Try it anyway. Do your best and push through the failure, because you will fail at things, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t still give up on potential opportunities for growth. Do things that scare you. Do things that you would’ve sworn a year ago that you’d never be able to do, and then bask in the glow of being brave enough to try it, regardless of how it turns out. People give up on their dreams a lot in life, and you have to plant your feet and do your best if you want to be an author and share your stories with the world.
–Explore not only your own genre that you write in, but those that are similar, because you can stumble across diamonds in the rough, both the books themselves and the authors. When I was preparing for my panel at Geek Girl Con, I took recommendations for books with people of color in SFF, and I actually found one I really dig even though it’s in a genre I don’t usually read often. I actually love sci-fi and I have since I was a kid, but I’m a very visual person. I tend to like sci-fi shows and movies instead of novels, but I found Earthrise by M.C.A Hogarth and I really enjoyed the hell out of her series. Then I bumped into her on Twitter and I’ve never been happier chatting with her on occasion because she’s hilarious and interesting. It’s hard to find time to read when you’re an author, but it can be very rewarding to branch out and mingle with others who have similar tastes and mindsets. You can even eventually build friendships or mutually beneficial arrangements as a result.
–Allow yourself to be terrible. So I hit a low point about a week ago when I was about 89,000+ words into Of Cinder and Bone. I couldn’t finish Chapter 14 because I felt all this crushing self-doubt and my inner perfectionist was so convinced that my book was the worst thing ever committed to the pages and no one’s going to like it because it’s so atypical of the genre and I froze up every time I opened my Word document to write more. I started looking for a pep talk and of course found this fantastic article by the legendary Chuck Wendig that got me out of my rut.
Writing sucks. It’s the worst. It’s basically you sticking a huge needle into your chest and pumping your blood out onto endless pieces of paper. You’re exposing yourself, and not in a gross way. When you write, you’re putting yourself out there, and so every single author (no matter what they tell you) gets scared and thinks they’re going to be utterly rejected and thinks about quitting. I think I read that Neil freaking Gaiman did that with one of his most beloved books; he tried to 86 the whole thing because he was sure it wasn’t going to work, but then he got a big reality check from the experience and pushed through it. It’s incredibly harrowing to finish the writing process because it’s totally possible that your first draft is crap. However, another great quote I read once is that you can edit a bad story to be better, but you can’t edit a blank page. Allow yourself to write poorly at first. Just get the words down and then worry about making it better after it’s done. It’s easier said than done, but you still have to do it. Don’t give up if you really truly care about your book and know that it’s the story you’re dying to tell. You can always fix a broken story, but you have to finish it before you can save it.
Or, as Chuck Wendig puts it:
–Meet people. This sounds like a no-brainer, but a lot of authors are introverts like I am. A couple years ago, I’d have laughed snottily if you told me I’d be a panelist at a couple different conventions and that I’d cosplay as Lana Kane from Archer in full view of the nerd population. I’d have called you delusional. But I did that. I was on a few different panels where I was able to meet some incredibly talented people, and I’m really glad I did it. It’s not just for exposure, either. Nothing renews the fire in my soul than meeting other authors and sharing experiences in this crazy thing we call a career. You can pull yourself out of a rut by mingling with people from all walks of life and just talking to them about anything. You’ll often find something in common even if it seems like you’re total opposites. Whenever possible, get out of your own way and be with other people who are enjoyable to be around. You never know what can come from it. Life is often full of bad surprises, so that’s why it’s great when a good one comes along.
–Share your experiences, even if you feel like you have nothing to offer and no one cares. I’m guilty of this flaw a lot. I feel like I don’t know anything at all. I’m just a tiny awkward turtleduck floating on the pond. I feel like I shouldn’t give anyone advice because I’m floundering around and don’t know what the hell I’m doing. But here’s the big secret: all writers are like that. You could flag down Stephen King right now and turn the mic off and he’d probably be like, “Dude, I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. I’m just as clueless as you are.” All writers think we’re phonies, even super acclaimed bad asses like Stephen King or Neil Gaiman or Toni Morrison. We feel unqualified to teach people things, but you never know that the seemingly pointless anecdote can spark something in someone that helps them on their journey. It’s why I always keep my Inbox open to new authors. If you ever have a question, I will try my damnedest to answer it for you, and I try to tell people the best advice I can when they ask for help. Hell, that’s the only reason I write these yearly blog posts about my experiences. If even one droplet of advice is helpful, then my purpose on this planet has been fulfilled.
–Dumb luck has a lot more to do with this career than you think. I hate saying this, but it’s true. No matter how many books you read about how to be the best author and the best book marketer, no matter how hard you work to make your book look like the best thing since sliced bread and Nutella, sometimes it all boils down to luck. There is no set way to make your book a bestseller. At all. It’s the same as how sometimes Hollywood pours millions of dollars into a project and it bombs, even though they had one of those “surefire” formulas to make a hit. Sometimes it’s just zippity-doo-da dumbass random luck. You could have a runaway hit or your book can sink to the bottom of the slush pile right out of the gate, and it’s no fault of your own. That’s where the “Try Everything” lyrics really become important. Luck won’t always be on your side. That’s unfair as hell, but one of the biggest obstacles for every last author is getting back up after a juicy, painful faceplant into the asphalt. Sometimes the stars align and everything goes perfectly, and sometimes the clouds part and it’s Jesus taking a piss right on your head. Them’s the breaks, man.
…sorry about that last mental image there, my duckies.
For all the good times and the bad times, I’ve definitely learned a ton over these three years as a published author. I hope most of all that I’ve at least been entertaining as I flail around searching for the way to go. I’ve got a lot of adventures ahead of me, and I can only hope you guys still want to come along for the ride. Thank you for sticking around, readers.
To that end, don’t forget that in celebration of my third year anniversary, The Holy Dark (Book #4) will be FREE to download via Amazon Friday, July 22, 2016 and Saturday, July 23, 2016. Spread the word.
See you next time, true believers.
Good evening, ladies and gents! I have a brief announcement for you.
The Black Parade is almost always a permanently free (permafree for short) title, but a marketing opportunity has cropped up that asks for me to unpublish the novel on Smashwords, which subsequently will take it down from the Nook, iBookstore, Kobo, and a few other smaller retailers. Don’t panic! It’s temporary. The book will go back to being permafree November 16, 2016.
If any of my fans are referring their friends to this novel as being free, please contact me directly at theblackparadeseries@gmail.com and I can offer them a free copy myself. The title will be .99 cents on Amazon once the permafree drops when the title is pulled from other digital shelves. After November 16th, the title will go right back up as a free novel. No other permanent prices changes will be made to the other books. Keep in mind, it has also been entered into KDP Select, so if you subscribe to them, you can read it for free there as well.
Plus, we’re fast approaching my 3rd anniversary of being a published author, and it’ll be the one year anniversary of The Holy Dark. In celebration, it will be free to download all day long July 19, 2016. I’ll make another announcement closer to the date as a reminder for old and new fans.
Thanks for hanging in there through all my crazy shenanigans. I will post about the new boxed set in just a few days, so be on the look out for a fantastic opportunity for some new reads!
Kyoko M.