On that crazy TREADMILL called Life!

Well, I'm a bit tuckered out and the "summer" sort of just started. The kids have been home for 8 days. There are 62 days left of summer vacation for them and then it is back to school. It goes TOO fast if you ask me! They missed too many days over the winter because of snow in Maryland so I think they might have had another week of vacation. oh well. It was fun at the time.

With summer though, comes summer gymnastics schedules! It seems like I am constantly driving to the gym! (and not to workout.) My daughter goes 4 days a week, 3 of which are 12-4. RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF MY DAY! I am also trying to schedule fun things to do for the younger daughter because she is home alone (with me) often. I want her to see her friends too. Everybody's summer is busy it seems. My son is 18 and pretty self sufficient.

So how do I find time to write? THAT is a good question.

It is hard to find the time to write. I am not good at sitting and concentrating fully on one thing for hours on end. My mind wanders and I need to get up, spey away, and think about what I am writing next. In the last three weeks I have done well. I wrote over 10k one week, 11.2k the next week, and 7100 last week. Good totals as far as I am concerned. THEN, I got the galley proof for NAMES and the writing screeched to a halt. Do not get me wrong, I AM SUPER GLAD got the galley because that is one step closer to publication! The LAST TIME I sent the Galley back (with The Cost of Loving) I had a publication date several dates later and TCOL was on the DSP "coming soon" page by that weekend. Thing have gone slower this time so I am not holding my breath. The elapsed time between 3rd edits and the galley was twice as long as last year. I am attributing this to a busy publishing house. (I hope.) I'd like to think that Dreamspinner Press (DSP, MY PUBLISHER) is very busy and growing rapidly in the industry. With busy people things take longer. I hope that is it.

It could also be me. I am not a huge selling author. I write about one book a year. It doesn't help to calm my fears of being forgotten because I write too slow. THIS is why I rely on you, my readers and fans, because I can not keep up with prolific authors. My stories are different (I think). My stories are layered with deeper meaning and issues people face in life. I can't rush that. I strive to create characters who have different voices and unusual ideas. I reflect my own morals, beliefs, philosophies, and dare I say "preaching" in my characters. I want them to reflect something of ME. Don't forget me while I take longer than most to write. Please tell friends if you like my books.

Names Can Never Hurt Me (NAMES) is the one I have coming out this year. HELP me make a statement by showing DSP I have loving, loyal fans who will wait a year between publications and are still interested in buying my books! As soon as I have a buy link, I'll tell you. As soon as I have a date, I'll tell you! I have a sort of Blog Hop planned. I have 5 dates so far to be on different blogs around town to advertise my book. leave me a comment and tell me YOUR favorite BLOG and maybe I'll contact them for the circuit. :)

One things I want to say about NAMES is that it is DIFFERENT from my other stuff. I am ME and I can't write the same style all the time. The is not what I consider a "Wade Kelly Special" because for one, it is all one Point of View! ONE. That's right! The entire story is told from Nick's point of view! Very unlike me. And number two, NAMES is written in chronological order. NO FLASHBACKS or time jumps. ALL of it is one day after the other. (Very unlike me.) And thirdly, NAMES does not have a large amount of angst. No one dies. Even though JOCK was also low on the angst scale, it had flashbacks and multiple POVs. NAMES is rather tame. What does it off you? A very sweet romance between two very different men. This is a story of growth, and trust, and falling so deeply in love when you couldn't see it coming. It is about change and growing up. I HOPE you will love it as much as I do.

I finished the galley today and I did cry a little. I did. It was so touching. I love my characters. Nick, RC, Corey, Paul, Nick's mom, M-L, and Marcy, even Tara and Dawn as the mean girls. (NOT that I always write mean girls because I do not.) The really good part about finishing this story and getting ready for publication very soon, is knowing I already started writing the sequel! That's right. I have a sequel planned. Only Skin Deep is about Corey, so when you finish and you can't wait to find out what happens next (I hope) you can be comforted to know I will have another book coming. Probably next year. IDK. You know I take forever to write and DSP takes time to process my work.

On another note about writing, Misplaced Affection is coming along nicely. I guess it is around 80k. That leaves technically 30k to write since my goal was 110k. I will probably run over that, but I like to have a goal. It is lacking detail and needs to have completed parts before I will consider it done. Plus, I will have to do more drafts even though I edit as I write. With this book, compared to NAMES, I WOULD consider it a Wade Kelly Special. Multiple POVs, some flashbacks, LOTS of angst!, lots of tears. Some of it is painful to edit so you will most likely need tissues. Since regular publishing takes so VERY LONG, I was tinkering with self-pub for this one. It will help get my feet wet for self-pub should any of my sequels get shot down. The Cost of Loving was turned down several times. So, if book 3 in the Unconditional Love Series gets passed on, I will self-pub it (Once I have written it.) But what do you think? Is self-pubbing a good idea, or a bad one? I WILL have a professional cover, and I will hire and editor.

JOCK in German I think is doing pretty well. I am not completely sure. You can log on and create an account with "Novel Rank."Novel Rank dot com was referred to me by Lynley Wayne. On this site you can set up an account and basically track the sales of any book as long as you have the ASIN # from Amazon, or the ISBN #. I can track MY sales in several countries, or sales of any book I want. I am not completely sure how accurate it is, but it does tell me I have sold books in German so I am pleased.

Jock on the German Amazon. Sitting at #57 today on one list. :) and tomorrow it might be #87… always changing ;)

So I guess that is all for today. I am busy driving all over town. I read for several days trying to get the galley all proofed over. I could 16 mistakes/ typos. I hope the finished product is acceptable and you will find it very clean. But hey, let me know! I'd like to see what you find that I missed. Help me improve my editing eyes!

If you are a fan, join the Wade Brigade for more excerpts than I list other places. They get the news first! If Facebook doesn't let yo see the group in order to ask to join, leave a comment or massage me. (Although you do have to have a FB account to join that.)

Over and out gang.

:) Wade