Alyson Kent's Blog

Huzzah, Book 1.5 of the Goopsverse is LIVE!  Once again the very talented Tomoka Murakami designed and illustrated the gorgeous cover, and I can’t wait to get through the revisions of Book 2 to see what she comes up with for it.  :D

Job hunting has me bogged down, though.  It’s just so over whelming sometimes and so difficult to find something that sits up and speaks to me.  But I shall continue to plug away at it.  Yep.

I’m not too sure what to make of the whole battle between Amazon and Hachette publishing over the price of ebooks.  On one hand, I did complain about the price of ebooks in an earlier posting (and I still think it’s ridiculous to charge over $10 for one), but on the other hand, Amazon should not holding Hachette authors hostage and keeping them in the middle of the fight.  In the end?  It’s a no win situation and the loser will always be the consumer/reader.  Which is why I’ll continue to self publish most of my works because that way I have full control over everything from the cover design to the content.  Downside?  I’m responsible for EVERYTHING, including editing (which gets sluggish after you’ve stared at the same paragraph for three weeks straight) and revisions (which are migraine inducing).

Still, I do the best I can to put out something that’s decent, at least, and most of my works go through no less than five rereads and revisions before I force myself to hit that “publish” button.  And even then I have to tell myself that once it’s out there, it’s out there, and let it go already.  Otherwise, I’d never publish.  Which some folks might think is a good thing.

My opinion about that?  Whatever.  XD

Time got away from me, I didn’t realize I hadn’t updated in a while.  Whoops.  Good thing I’m only doing this for fun.  :D

Like most bibliophiles I find it difficult to travel anywhere without a book. I always have one with me, whether it’s the short walk to the office where I work, a drive up the street to get gas, I always have a book because you never know when a chance to read might crop up.

That’s pretty normal and not too “weird” for a book quirk, right? Well, here’s where it gets a little strange. This last Spring Break I had a grand total of four days off from work (I teach horseback riding as a gym for a school) and spent it where I usually do when I have a chance to get off campus. I went to my parent’s house. Along with clothing and a few DVDs that I felt I might want to watch while there, I lugged home four books of various genres, my two Nooks, and my iPad which has both the Nook and Kindle apps on it. So between the physical books and the ebooks, I had over 100 books with me.

But I went even further. There isn’t a bookstore near where I live, so as soon as I got to my parents where did I go? Their local Barnes and Noble, where I proceeded to buy three more books. It’s almost like they’re my safety blanket, I don’t feel protected unless I’m surrounded by books and I don’t feel fulfilled until I’ve bought one more. Just one more when I have about 300 in my house that still need to be read. I joke that it’s an illness, but it’s an illness that I embrace fully.

As my main character, Jane, once said, “that’s what books are, possibilities, the chance to get away, even if it’s only for a little bit. To visit somewhere new, somewhere exciting; to meet new people, run with werewolves or fly with dragons, the adventures [are] endless.” (Collide, Kent).

I love the possibilities, the strange and wonderful that books hold. The chance to learn something new (I just added a few upcoming nonfiction titles to my amazon wish list) and the ability to visit new places without leaving my house fills me with excitement. One day I’ll be able to see these places in person, and when that day comes I’ll be filled with memories of the books I read, the characters I enjoyed and the adventures we shared.

As much as I love writing and working with my characters as they tell me their own stories, I love and appreciate the gift of reading because it allows me to explore outside of my own internal worlds a little bit and experience someone else’s vision.

That’s why I lug hundreds of books with me wherever I go, and can never resist the temptation to stop in at a new or used bookstore whenever I have the chance. I never know what new adventure might be hiding around the corner waiting for me to find it.

Hiya!

I have another “Weird Book Quirks” post planned out, but I wanted to do a quick little hop through and say I feel all legit and stuff, cuz I now have a Goodreads page.  XD  Check it out and learn a little more about me!  But not too much, I like to pretend that I’m secretly a samurai warrior in hiding, so I can’t give too much info out about myself at any given time.  https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7992842.Alyson_Kent?from_search=true

Keep reading, my friends!

I recently found out that a book I thought was the first of a trilogy is, in fact, the first of six.  I’ve been alternating between extreme excitement (I love the characters, the setting, their interactions) and flat out panic.  You’d think that I’d be over the moon finding out that a world I love will be around for a while, but I can’t help but be rather freaked out about it all.

One reason is because it’s been my experience that the longer a series goes on, the bigger the chance that VERY BAD THINGS will happen to characters that I have come to love.  I also HAAAATE it when I settle on a romantic pairing (even if it’s not a major focus of the story) only to have someone else show up/horn in on/make the characters (and readers) question their choices.  It’s just a major pet peeve, being an author myself I know that things like that add drama and character interest, plus it serves to test the character’s resolve, but still, I can’t help but find it extremely annoying.

Then there’s the potential of watching my favorite character die a painful death (or just die in general).  Considering that I’ve been dealing with the “Curse of Losing Favorite Characters” for a while now, this is a VERY likely scenario.  Hell, it happened in another series I was reading and that was in book two!  And it was a damn stupid death, too, and I’m STILL upset over it (not telling details or the book series because spoilers) and not too sure what’s going to happen when book three comes out.

Then there’s this weird little habit I have of refusing to start the first book of a series until the second or even the third book is out.  If I know it’s a trilogy, I’ll wait until I have the whole shebang in my hands before I even crack the cover of book one.  This impulse is so ingrained that the few times I picked up a book and read it thinking it was a stand alone only to find it the start of a new series had me sulking for about a week.  On one hand I was glad the story wasn’t over and would learn more, on the other hand . . . . yeah.  I guess I should get used to it, I mostly read YA now with some fiction that catches my attention tossed in, and it seems that the majority of YA books are now part of a series (or a greater whole sometimes). 

I guess I need to try and revise my book hoarding tendencies; I was able to read “The Last Apprentice” series as it came out up until recently, but still.  Habits are very, very hard to break.  XD

I love being a part of Smashwords.

March 2 – 8 is read an ebook week, and they have promotions and the like running all over their site for their participating authors.  You can go and get an ebook for 25 – 100% off if you use the coupon codes that they provide.  I opted for the 100% version because, you know, why the hell not?  It’s fun and exciting!  :D  Here’s a link to my author page, if you’re interested, use the coupon code RW100 at check out to get my books for free (YAY!) and, you know, HAVE FUN WITH IT!  Support your Indie Authors!!!

https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/AlysonKent

Yeah, I suck at blogging.  I admit it, half the time I can’t concentrate because of job happenings around me that pull me away from my computer, other times I sit down, look at my keyboard, and fall asleep.  It’s been a very, very long winter.

But I was browsing through my facebook when I saw a link to a blog where the writer was blasting a well known, and well loved, author saying how they thought that said author should quit writing because she didn’t like the single book she read by this particular person, despite the fact that Madam Writer had several other highly popular bestsellers under her belt.  Needless to say, the blog author was blasted with comments calling her out, etc.  In fact, it’s still going on, I just checked the number of comments and it has gone up ten more in five minutes.  People are livid, and I honestly can’t blame them.  I won’t link to the article or mention the author being blasted here because that’s not what the point of this post is. 

No, the point is that I can’t help but wonder if, even though the blogger might truly feel the way she wrote about the author, I can’t help but think that she wrote what she did in an effort to garner attention.  Duh, right?  It’s no secret that negativity and negative opinions/publicity brings in attention.  Everyone has an opinion, and everyone wants to put their opinion out there and argue with people who don’t agree with them, etc.  That’s human nature.  But I find I get a little irritated (ok, a lot) when someone writes or says something in a majorly negative way just to get attention and comments.  Some people call it good marketing ploy, I call it more negatively being spewed into an overly negative world.

But negativity gets attention.  I checked the other blog posts, and her positive themed ones had one, two, three or no comments.  The blatant, blasting negative one?  Has over 600 comments and counting.  Which I honestly think is sad that someone feels the need to stop writing a positive themed blog in order to blast negativity everywhere in order to garner attention/views/comments.

But negative press sells, too.  Look at “The Da Vinci Code” and all the other books that were challenged by churches, challenged in libraries, etc and got attention because it made the public curious, so they bought the book/checked the book out themselves which in turn equaled sales for the author and a climbing up the best seller list.  Did these books deserve the attention?  Some yes, some no, some whatever, but it happened and I’m happy for the writers and I’m happy that people are reading.  I just hate some of the tactics that are used to gain the attention.  And I was hesitant to write this very confused (and confusing) post because I didn’t want it to seem that I was doing the same.  I’m just generally baffled and trying to work my way through things.

Part of business, I guess.  Someone could probably say I did the same with my ebook price rant, but honestly, I was (and still am) very baffled by how publishing houses think charging the same for an electronic book as they do a paperback/hardback is ok.  But then again, doesn’t always stop me from buying them, plus it doesn’t bother me if people comment on my posts or not.  I just write, to write.  If people get things from my words, great!  If they don’t, great!  That’s what makes this world a wonderful place.  :)

At the start of this year I made a goal to eat healthier and work on breaking my addiction to fast food.  People with addictions, no matter what type they are, know full well just how hard it is to break them.  Especially when, if you’re like me, you’re still really new to the whole “cooking for yourself” concept, and my problem is that I get really, really bored easily with just soups and sandwiches.  I will say that I make awesome chocolate chip cookies, and will be FINALLY making some green tea cookies tonight (can’t wait! I love my Stand Mixer!)  But when it comes to actual meal planning, I suck worse than a kid sucks on their favorite lollipop.

Sometimes this isn’t so bad, and if I eat up on campus I don’t have to worry about it at all, though that poses its own problems as my stomach sometimes has issues with their cooking oils/spices.  But up until last week when I had a major emotional stress break down and grabbed a pizza, I had gotten much better about my immediate reaction being “go get fast food” whenever I was hungry.  It was kind of nice not going to snag something quick and feeling kind of gross afterwards, and I noticed that I also started to move away from gnawing on my finger nails whenever stressed, as well.  And then the deep freeze happened, followed by a stressful week of horse show prep, followed by a stressful weekend of horse showing.  I back slid like crazy, though I did manage to keep from biting my nails off too badly, and I kept the urge to indulge in Bojangles down, the pressure continued to built until I finally gave in today and grabbed some fries and a sundae from Micky D’s.  Do I feel bad about backsliding?  Yeah, a little, but at the same time, I feel good that I kept it to a minimum of fries and a sundae where as before I would have gotten an entire McNugget meal or something even though I had just had lunch two hours ago.

While it might not be ideal, I have found that, with my little backslide, I’m a little happier about working on my goal because now I’ve indulged, and I can back off again and start to ignore the craving.  Will I back slide again?  Yep.  But that’s ok, I accept that it will happen and sometimes I have to indulge in that vice to get me through another rough patch.  Honestly, I’m more upset about gnawing on my fingers than I am the fast food because that took weeks to heal.  But I shall just pick up and continue to move forwards in my own fashion as I strive to better myself and my health.

Also, along with my stand mixer, my magic bullet nutrition extractor is my favorite kitchen item at the moment.  Morning consists of a blending of baby spinach, red, seeded grapes, frozen mixed berries, toasted coconut and vanilla greek yogurt, and ground flax seed.  Yum!

It seems so unfathomable to me that this past Monday I was running around in a T-shirt, and the rest of this week has been spent steadily watching the watering system out here freeze and trying to stay ahead of it to keep our animals going.

I work outside with horses.  My primary job is teaching kids how to ride, but along with living and working in a barn comes the responsibility of keeping said animals alive.  Usually we have an automatic watering system that faithfully delivers water to our stall bound friends, but this round of freezing temps has completely frozen the system so we went back in time to the old fashioned bucket system.  Problem is, we couldn’t run a hose because the water was freezing in it so fast that it kind of made dragging it around obsolete, so instead watering the horses has involved filling up a bucket from the faucet, going to the stall to fill up the water bucket, rinse, repeat thirty-nine more times throughout the day.

I freely admit I’m a wimpy Southerner, I start to whine about the cold as soon as it dips below 60 degrees, so this arctic blast has been rather interesting as far as how fascinated I am by just how bad the ice can get out here (and we’re not near as cold as our Northern neighbors).  Whenever someone comments to me about how wussy we are, I pretty much look at them and go, “Yeah, but the folks further north expect this kind of weather every year and prepare for it.  Us?  Not so much.  It’d be like a blizzard hitting the Florida Keys.” 

Anyway, originally I was going to write another book review (or rather, series review) but running around and chopping up ice in water tubs, blanketing ponies, teaching in the cold (the best was teaching while it was snowing, the kids REALLY loved that), I have no desire to try and even think of doing anything but reading more, sipping tea, and hoping the pipes don’t explode.  So I’m going to leave today’s blog with an image of just how I spent the last few days, and the tool that has now become my best friend.

I have a Nook.  Actually, I have two, a Simple Touch with Glowlight (what an awkward name) and a Nook HD+ that I got for my birthday last year (thank you Mom and Dad!).  I held out on the ereader revolution for a long, long time.  In fact, I can honestly say that these are the very first ereaders I’ve ever owned strictly for the purpose of downloading ebooks.  I consider this very different from reading things like fanfics online, but I digress.

The reason I even asked for the ereaders was simple.  A series that I was following and in love with had started to put out mini novels that took place within the world of the main novels, but they were only available in ebook format.  This royally pissed me off, because I felt like I was being forced to buy an ereader (this is also before I discovered Adobe Digital Editions and the Apps, but I digress) when I really.  Didn’t.  Want.  One.  I ranked it up there with all the Blu-Ray discs and how it sometimes feels like we’re being forced to buy a Blu-Ray player because the DVDs no longer come with all the awesomely cool extras that the Blu-Rays do.  But again, I digress.

So there I was, a happy new ereader owner who promptly hit the Barnes and Noble website to be confronted with something rather horrific.  Unless they have quite the sale going on, and it does happen, a lot of the ebooks that also have a print version cost the exact same amount as their physical counterpart.  I still wonder WTF is up with that.  I know that, unless they’re self published, authors have no real control over the cost of their ebook titles, but if I’m going to be spending $7 – $27 bucks on a book, I want the physical version with all it’s weight in my hands, thank you very much.  I’ll be the first to claim ignorance on how big publishing houses go about publishing the ebook version of their print titles, but I would think that printing something on paper would cost more and take more time than formatting something digitally and uploading it.

I would have figured that ebooks would have cost much less than their print versions, but I guess that’s not the case.  Phhhbbbbbttttttttt.

My friend, Paige, wrote an awesome blog about her 2014 goals, and her last one had to do with what her word of the year was going to be.  That got me to thinking, what would my word be?  If I could condense everything I want to do, be and accomplish in 2014, what word would encompass it all?

Many words ran through my head, success, free, independent, creative, etc.  I couldn’t really settle on a single thing, hence why it’s taken me this long to get this particular blog out.  Yeah, I did resolutions, but I just could not pick a single word.  And then I saw this little thing in my facebook feed, and I immediately went “that’s it!”  It encompasses everything for me and then some.  So, my word for the year?  Is Fierce.

And here’s a link to Paige’s blog that inspired me to pick a word of the year for myself.  http://diyfitnessblog.wordpress.com/2014/01/04/paiges-2014-goals/