Category: Blog

First Cup of Coffee – March 15, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.14
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. Oh that’s so good. Today is Tuesday March fifteenth if you’re on video you will see that I actually have a latte if you’re on audio only you probably heard how much happy I have that made no sense. How happy I am to have my latte I am um, doing things slightly out of bounce today because I am in my health marathon finally getting all of these things handled like a responsible adult. Ah, usually don’t go in for the adulting thing but this feels very much adulting. So um I get to have a colonoscopy tomorrow afternoon a girl never forgets her first colonoscopy. um yeah it’s um I don’t know if it’s even a funny story but I feel like it’s a funny story I may tell you guys this story? Um, but it’s not writing related but the the short the tl tl deal. Tiol didn’t listen. Is that I um have to do the fasting for the colonoscopy these rituals of getting older. It’s just one of those you know you’re supposed to do it when you hit a certain age and. So I can’t eat anything solid after 10 a m today and my appointment’s not till three o’clock tomorrow afternoon. So I figured id better go ahead and have my breakfast if I were doing my sixteen eight fasting thing I wouldn’t get to eat till like noon. So I figured well. Last solid food for more than 24 hours I’ll take advantage so I figured that means I get to have my latte small reward make you sure I didn’t smear my lip pencil. There. So.

02:30.88
jeffekennedy
So I’ll I’ll tell you this this story because I think it’s funny so I’m seeing this new general practitioner he had ordered you know all these things I had to do mammogram bone density colonoscopy you know, joy joy and. Yeah they’d said the physician’s assistant when she gave me in New Mexico we get doctor’s orders you have to have like an order from a gp to go see a specialist. Maybe they do that everywhere did we did not have to do it in Wyoming so it was a real adjustment when we came here that was like you have to have a doctor’s order to do anything. So when she handed me the order she had said um I guess they’re not very good about getting back to people so just keep calling I was like oh okay so I call get their voicemail and I’m you know ready to leave a message and. Their voicemail is incredibly long. You know and they say leave a message with your you know referring physician and your name and your date of birth and the reason for the procedure. It’s like gestural enterology associates and. And they said do not leave more than 1 voicemail only leave one voicemail and we will call you back in within five business days I was like wow five business days okay so I leave the message with all of the information as instructed. And Mark it on my calendar for like five business days later and I even went business days took out the weekend and any relevant holidays to tag back reader. They did not call me back. So I even gave them a couple extra days I think because I didn’t feel like. Calling you know how that is right? and it’s like oh I do and can’t make phone calls today. So then I called them back and I get the same message. So I say I left a previous message. No I’m not supposed to but nobody called me back in the five business days and I noticed they also had something on there when they said or you can stop by our offices at reader. They did not call me back so I was like okay yesterday afternoon I had to go in for my fiscal and I thought since I’m going to be in that kind of general neighborhood. It’s not a big town I live outside of town but it’s still only like fifteen twenty minutes but you know I treat it like I’m going on an arctic expedition once a year coil are out there this morning. So.

05:21.31
jeffekennedy
I Go to the doctor and actually everything’s great. My blood work is great. Everything is wonderful. Much much Physician Love which surprised me because I thought I was I don’t know.

05:40.78
jeffekennedy
That’s actually another story off to decide if I’m going to tell you guys that so he says you know any trouble with any of the other tests and I said well I said to gastroenterology people. I left them a couple of voicemails and they’ve never gotten back to me and and he’s kind of a serious gentle guy and I could see behind him the I don’t know what to aid I’m not sure I don’t know if she was a p a or what but she said she was very sweet but she was in there because I had to have a. You know pelvic of the examined papin stuff so she was she was like I’ll be your chaperone today. But so I could see her behind him when she kind of closes her eyes and shakes her head a little bit and I I just know that this is a thing right? They’re just never calling anybody back ever and he’s like oh. Yeah, he says you know they’ve had trouble since the pandemic and I’m thinking this is not pandemic. This is like something else and he says but you can’t stop by in person and I thought and I said actually that’s what I’ve planning to do today I had my order in the car and I’m just going to stop by there. So. So I do I stop by there and step in the door and there’s a sort of a receptionist and there’s 1 guy gal talking the receptionist and she says um, hi ma’am do you have an appointment and I said ah. No, and she said are you here to schedule an appointment and I said yes and she said okay, sit here behind the divider and you know so like our mask mandate is lifted this place acts like we are you know, major height of pandemic thing. They sta the dividers up they have the. Caution tape across the every other chair. It’s not that I’m against it. But it’s sort of like everybody every other place has opened up a lot more. You know like the the doctor’s office I was just in doesn’t have the social distancing on the chairs anymore you have to. There’s a little screaming machine that you have to like verify that you don’t have covid and haven’t been around anywhere from that covid and you put a sticker you know, verifying that your visitor for the day but you know and they have some of the dividers but this place is like crazy right? so. So I go and sit behind the divider in my chair next to the caution shape take chair and displaces like tomb. You guys. It’s empty and and they have big signs like on the outside too saying procedures are not done here and I’m like what do they do in this office. So the receptionist this other gal comes out.

08:20.90
jeffekennedy
And she said do you need to schedule an appointment and I said yes and she said I can help you with that so she takes me back so we sort of wents through this cubicle farm which is empty. She’s sitting at her desk and there’s a gallot another desk and I can’t there’s like There’s not phones ringing because clearly it’s all going straight to boysmail ah guys I I don’t know what anybody in this office is doing right? I mean this might be a cream puffed job if you need a job in Santa Fe where you don’t actually have to do any work. This is the job. So but so she like gets in the computer and she gets my information and she said how soon do you want to do this procedure and part of their voicemail message has this whole thing about if this is an emergency procedure ordered by your doctor. Have your doctor call directly and all this kind of thing and I said well whenever you know I don’t really care and she said well she said we could get you in this week I have openings on Wednesday Thursday and Friday afternoons this is when I stare into the camera. They have openings Wednesday Thursday and Friday afternoon I was like okay and she offers me like 6 different times 6 different openings now it’s occurred to me now that I’ve read the instructions and it’s like no eating after 10 a m today for my 3 Pm appointment tomorrow I can have clear liquids broths that sort of thing nothing purple or blue and you know you have to do the purging and all of that I was like well I’m sure most people don’t want to do those appointments in the afternoon because you know people want do it in the morning so they can eat but still I mean. It’s not like they’re so slam jam packed that they can’t be scheduling people right when David had his ah difficulties stomach stuff before Christmas. Had suggested that we also go to the gastroenterology people. So I I kind of left out that bit of backstory that I had heard this voicemail was before and they had never called back and David decided he didn’t need it so you know we didn’t pursue but ah so I was like well let’s do it Wednesday afternoon because this is a. Ah, much more relaxed week for me might as well get it done with I just I just can’t even but ah so um, you guys aren’t here to hear here to hear about my um.

11:03.64
jeffekennedy
Antics with the medical establishment. Um, yes, so yesterday I did get my 2000 words it felt it felt really good to only go for 2000 words it felt incredibly relaxed. I did have it my head that I needed to get to this doctor’s appointment in the afternoon. Um, which is a really funny thing and I’ve I’ve talked to a lot of people about this who have you know we’re we’re very lucky and blessed and privileged to have these. Kind of unscheduled lives where we work from home where we work for ourselves where we don’t have a really structured schedule and some people do fine with a really structured schedule. Other people do not and you I think that’s part of. Knowing what your process is and owning it I I think you have to know what kind of worker you are some people simply simply do not self direct and that’s it’s not a. Negative I mean I think it’s so tempting to think of this stuff as a negative but it’s it’s just what it is. It’s like if you have brown hair or you know, maybe you can learn to color your hair but maybe you just have brown hair. You know, maybe your hair is so dark that it doesn’t bleach out when I got my mammogram back to medical stuff the hispanic gal or the nurse was an hispanic gal and she really liked my hair color and she was and she said i. She said I don’t want to be offensive but can I ask if it’s natural and I said oh no honey was my stylist. Thank you and she said my hair doesn’t bleach out light enough for me to get that color you know and it’s hard when you have that really really naturally dark hair. Although it’s you know I I colored my hair black for a long time and I really wanted that. Glossy, rich, black like the hispanic ladies have but it sometimes you just have to take the cards you’re dealt. You have to take what you’re born with and you learn to work around it I spent a long time in my day job. Being kind of mental management for a team of people who worked across the country all working out of their homes I’ve been working out of my home for a long time even when I had the day job I started an office and then they closed that office and moved me home.

13:46.55
jeffekennedy
And 1 of the great take-home lessons of this was that some people do great working from home and other people do not there was this one guy who had been in the military. He’d been in a couple of branches in the military. Very sharp. Um, really. A great dynamic worker in many ways except that you he could not deal with working from home. He would slack off and we found out much later like he would log on to our company chat and then. So it would appear he was there and then he would go take a nap and then he would come and if you messaged him and he didn’t answer. He’d come back and say oh you know I was not I wasn’t looking at the chat I didn’t have you know I’ve had my head down in this document he got shit done working from home. Um, he was great when he was with a group of people. He could not make him sit down and work. You know I found out later that he was like going out and having long lunches with people. He was just like fucking around all day but that was his kind of personality. He did really well in. A more military situation which is incredibly structured where someone is telling you what to do all the time and there are many many people like this who if you want to you know if you do better in an office environment. A lot of people prefer going to an office and being there and. Now we’re all working I think some of it has to do with you know, like how gregarious of a person you are if you’re an extrovert versus an introvert I think one of the reason that so many writers and other creatives are introverts is because. We don’t need to be around people if you want to be particularly a writer I think but probably other kinds of creatives too. You spend a lot of time by yourself in your own head and introverts are happy with that. Extroverts are miserable but you can also be an introvert and still need structure. So if you are finding that and this is something that lots of writers talk about you know, even if they have the time to write. Ah, somehow they just never quite. Do you know? There’s always something else. There’s a lot of procrastinating dread and procrastination. Ah, there’s there’s just a difficulty in creating that structure. So yeah.

16:36.44
jeffekennedy
If you are struggling with that and I know many many people who do then you have to find a way to create that structure. You might need somebody else to tell you to do it. That’s 1 reason why Darynda and I meet on Zoom and work together. Because she really needs that I have to meet jeffie at Nine o’clock and so I can’t screw around I have to get there and I need to be there and be ready to work. It’s just something she knows about herself and she’s willing to admit about herself. So you know again, it’s not a good bad thing. It’s knowing which things in yourself. Um are not optimal for producing what you want to produce and finding ways to correct for that.

17:31.16
jeffekennedy
so um so yeah it did make a difference for oh that’s where I started on all this was that 1 thing that we’ve noticed for those of us who have these kind of unstructured lives where we don’t have fixed schedules. Is if we have something in the afternoon and these days I almost always have some kind of appointment in the afternoon usually an online meeting but leaving the house is worse that it creates a sense of pressure. It creates this deadline I need to get my stuff done by then even if I’m normally done by them. You know because I always tell people. I’m available after like two o’clock mountain time which gives me plenty of room to get things done theoretically. But I’m also fighting with the clock right now because of daylight savings time. So I’m a little better today. It’s um, it’s just 8 53 right now. So. I’m ah I’m working it backwards. So hopefully I’ll get um, a little bit earlier. But yeah yesterday duinda and I didn’t start writing until like nine forty five which is latish but I did get the 2000 words it felt good. It felt more relaxed. I mean do that this whole week and then reevaluate so we shall see so on that note I am going to get this uploaded and get to work I hope you all have a fabulous Tuesday and I will talk to you all on Thursday you all take care bye bye.

First Cup of Coffee – March 14, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.39
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee which is actually green tea this morning see how I am just. Getting healthy all over the place today is Monday March Fourteenth Pi Day three fourteen three point one four I don’t know why people think that’s funny except that they like to post pictures of Pi which has nothing to do with pi pi but. Such is the internet. Ah so um, hope you all had a good weekend I had a um I had a very unstructured weekend I had 1 scheduled meeting counted one and. It only lasted like 20 minutes so I actually did not do a whole hell of a lot I was trying to figure out what I actually did with my time David was out driving a lot and I just kind of I don’t know I hermited. There were. It was not great weather I mean it was sunny and so it was nice inside the house but there was a ah sharp cold wind blowing. Um yesterday I did go out and start raking out on the east side of the house pulled out the dead getritus from the winter there. Consider doing it out in the secret garden because the daffodils are starting to come up but I did not do that. Um I did not have a a strong plan and so not a lot happened I read a lot I’m now on the fifth book of. Juliette Marillier’s Sevenwaters series and it was funny because David left yesterday morning I did laundry I washed all the clothes and David was very appreciative of that. Um.

02:18.18
jeffekennedy
And I cleaned up the kitchen but it was funny cause he came home I don’t know around 5 or so and he asked me you know he asked me if I had a good day and I said yes, it was nice and relaxing and he said what did you do and I’m like I’m not sure, but that’s sure what I did I got. A couple of things off of my to do list. You know those things that sit on your to do list and sort of gain gravity with every day that you slide it down the to- do list god I hate those things. Ah, ah, you know and then they don’t take that long to do I don’t know what is to deal with those It’s that dread and procrastination right? Just hard to get to that stuff I almost feel like I should have written down what I did all weekend but I’m also ah but. Since like my warring selves right? I’m also was trying to relax and forcing myself to relax. That’s an old joke David and I have from back when we taught Tai Chi classes there was this because Tai Chi you try to let go of force and you relax and so you. Get into these standing forms or postures and movements and you try to do them in the most relaxed way possible and so we would do a lot of exercises with like heavy arms. You know where you would try to you know, let someone else take the weight of your arm and give it out and you would give it up and it’s it’s really not easy to do. There are a lot of um, it’s part of that practice of of giving up control and relaxing letting things go and there was this one young guy who came to take the classes and he was just um. Not the kind of guy who gave up control easily and David was working with him and saying um and the guy is like oh a hair and David’s like okay you you you need to try to to let go you know? don’t don’t force it and the guy so says. Um. Says I’m forcing myself to relax, but not how it works reader. Oh my ts hot. so um yeah so I was definitely I was going back and forth especially yesterday because Saturday I was getting more things done yesterday I was thinking I could do an unplugged day and then I didn’t and I kind of regretted it I I should have stayed unplugged I was not sticking with my resolve very well.

05:04.95
jeffekennedy
And I have not been sticking with results very well lately. So I don’t know what my deal is I’m trying to ah I did a yoga class yesterday. Um, and that was funny because you know I did it on the the Vimeo at least it wasn’t zoom. It wasn’t live. My favorite yoga teacher and I thought okay I’m gonna do this in class and you know because I really need to get back into the in yoga and and she was talking about. Um you know, like settling into it and letting go and listening to. Yeah she’s my favorite yoga teacher. She’s great, but she was starting out with saying um you know to ask yourself a question you know to have a a question for your practice and I thought I don’t know what my question is so I’m like can my question be what is my question and I decided it could and. She was um, you know, just encouraging us to sit with it and stay in it and all of this and I was not doing a good job of staying in it and I thought and oh and she was saying you know to listen to our bodies and what. Bodies need and I got halfway through the class and I thought I must don’t want to be doing this so I stopped and I thought well you know at least half an hour you feel good was half an hour more than I had been doing. Um. So yeah, I’m just trying to listen to myself and figure out what it is that I need to be doing what makes me happy to be doing and sort of to restore this equilibrium I have been doing some financial stuff and that makes me happy to like get the numbers in order. Been moving some money around and doing a few things that I’m excited about that are going to put us in a better financial place and so that’s part of what I’m thinking about and I am excited to try this um lower word count goal and see how it goes. Um. Megan Ciana Doidge commented that that she does the wax and wane thing too and and I think that’s very true that um. And and I do I follow that same pattern when I’m starting a new book in particular, especially if I’ve had a couple of weeks off or I’ve been doing a lot of editing it does take a while to ramp up in those words again and so maybe reducing my word count goal.

07:49.92
jeffekennedy
Isn’t the right thing to do because when I was figuring out and I talked about this on Friday that you know my average is a little shy of 10000 words a week that is the average overall and it’s not um. And the thing to remember about averages math is that it’s a combination of the highs and the lows and so if I reduce my word count goal overall will that drop the average down. That’s the question or is it more sustainable and I think that the difference here is. Is that little birdie on the porch caught my attention that is looking at those weeks that I’ve actually gotten 15000 words a week um or ah, yeah, 15000 words a week so 3000 words a day and early twenty Twenty one I was doing a little bit better but still there are not that many weeks where I have actually hit 15000 words a week. So I think that’s the difference. I do think that there’s something to be said for yes at different points the the book will go at different rates of speed and Megan was saying that towards the end sometimes she’ll get four or five thousand words a day and. And I certainly have days like that. But I don’t I don’t do them I I don’t let myself do that unless I’m like seriously behind like I was with gray magic I don’t know it’s it’s an eternal push pull isn’t it. Trying to figure out the difference between what we the disciplines we impose upon ourselves and and when we need to listen to what we organically want to be doing um and I think that’s um, you know it’s pertinent today because. We just switched to daylight savings time in the us I think europe does it like maybe did it two weeks ago or does it in two weeks I forget I know there’s like two weeks where my assistant and I are off sync. Um, you know and so for me. It’s one of the consequences of having you know that I don’t wake up with an alarm clock I do not require myself to wake up at a particular time and that was something I decided a whole long time ago when I first went stopped doing the day job because a long time ago. Very long time ago now.

10:39.70
jeffekennedy
I did ah a writers residency at u crosss if you get a chance to do one of those things I do recommend it. It. It was um, it was extraordinary for me and a lot of voice. it was early on in my career and it was the first time. That anyone knew me primarily as a writer that introduced me as a writer like at the moment I arrived they took me around and introduced me to the other residents and they said this is Jeffe Kennedy she’s a writer and I was like I am? but um, but that’s amazing. Especially for you guys when you’re first starting out deb someone identify you as a writer first and foremost now I’m used to it is that sad that I’m used to it. Maybe it’s not sad I think it’s pretty wonderful. Um I’ve been reflecting on that how how fortunate I am um how you know my relative success. You know it’s one of those things where I’m not I’m always striving for more. But I’m really having to reflect on the fact that I do have a really robust career and that’s been growing and doing better all the time I don’t want to lose my train of thought but I do want to share and I put it on social media yesterday I went to look at the Amazon listing for gray magic. To grab the link or something I don’t remember why because I don’t normally go look at my reviews and I was startled to see that there were 108 reviews on Grey Magic already and it’s just been two weeks that it’s out I think that’s the fastest that any of my books has ever accrued reviews I remember this one time. And bank camp. Yeah sorry ah juvenile humor for the win. Grace Draven my bestie when we were early on when we were friends and radiance was still climbing the charts and all of that I remember her posting that. Radiance had a thousand Amazon reviews and she was so excited to pass that milestone and I was like that bitch Bitch! Ah but now Dark Wizard has like 350 something so I’m thinking I’m going to pass that milestone. And I’m gonna throw it in Grace’s face actually Grace is so generous. She’s always I said her my thing about my hundred and eight reviews that she was like that’s fantastic. She never says to me. Oh you, you poor sweet summer child. Ah so anyway, um.

13:23.27
jeffekennedy
1 thing about being on that writer’s retreat at Ucrosss was it was my schedule was totally up to me and so I decided that I would not set an alarm and that I would go by natural calendar. And just see what it was and I think it’s one of the first times in my life since maybe like summers and high school or something that I had not set an alarm clock and there’s really something to be said and and I’m sorry for those of you who have schedules where it’s not something you can do. But there really is something to be said for waking up on our natural rhythm because our sleep cycles are slightly different every night and the alarm clock disrupts that but waking up, you know at the natural cessation of a cycle is um, it’s so much more restful. Ah, so the downside of it is when daylight savings time occurs like this my sleep cycle is still attuned to to me to my natural place rather than of the clock. So I didn’t start this podcast till nine o’clock which is eight o’clock in real time and so now I’m feelinging a little behind and I’m having to work breathe through that I’m not behind the clock doesn’t matter. Although. My appointments in like the afternoons and stuff haven’t changed so in some ways it does matter I have a doctor’s appointment this afternoon. Oh Joy. So um, so yeah, that whole figuring out I remember when I was younger and I would like take the weekend off or something and I never thought of it that way but where I would end up screwing around all weekend. And the time would just kind of vanish and I didn’t feel bad about it in the same way. Um, but I was really kind of trying to do that really kind of. Do you hear me. But I’m I’m very torn I was I probably should have unplugged yesterday and just. Given myself over to not doing anything at all on the computer but I did do some things and then I started fretting about the things that I didn’t do so.

15:56.33
jeffekennedy
But yeah, what’s interesting during that yoga class and thinking I don’t want to be doing this anymore. That’s enough maybe that was a real thing that that was enough. Yeah, so I don’t know what else. It’s been interesting reading these books I’m reading Seer of Sevenwaters which the author puts at the front that she was writing this while she was receiving cancer treatments in like 2007 I’m going to sneeze. I’ve learned how to pause and not sneeze in your ears. Um, and it’s still very good. She’s an excellent writer and I love these stories. It’s interesting that this fourth book and fifth book have started kind of a new cycle and she. Says on the fourth book. Heir of Sevenwaters that she thanks her agent for helping her brainstorm the novel and it’s very interesting because it feels like the first three she had very definite ideas for and this next set. Um. Are much closer together in time which is what I’d said originally that I was surprised by book 2 that she did a generational leap and now she’s staying very much within a much shorter timeline I don’t know it’s almost It would be interesting to talk to her. Because I feel like she had an idea for the first 3 books that was kind of this epic sweep and these next books don’t have quite the same heft and it could be that she wasn’t feeling good. It’s hard to write books when you don’t feel good. But I’m still loving it and and to be fair. There are very few authors who can stand up to being glommed in this way to having one book after another read and it. You know and and especially when I’m reading with my writer brain because I do notice repetitions and 1 mistake and I always worry about people doing that to my books so so yeah today is the first day of trying for the 2000 words a day. And we’ll just see what we get and a noble experiment right? And yeah, but in that guess not a lot to report I think we’re just always trying to find ways to.

18:44.14
jeffekennedy
To be kind to ourselves and still produce the things that we want to do right? Um, special shout out to Meghan by the way who she posted to social media. So I’m sure it’s fine. Had a hysterectomy and I told her that. Every woman I know who’s had a hysterectomy says it was best thing they ever did so I hope it is for you too. Mehan and I hope you are at home now and recovering well um, yeah, suchha life right? but. Hope you recover and you’ll be back on your feet because Megan also uses walking desk walking in right and again and all the rest of you get out there on your feet, get some exercise, be kind to yourselves if you can get on your feet and I will talk to you all tomorrow take care. But bye.

First Cup of Coffee – March 11, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.30
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee.

00:15.75
jeffekennedy
That’s actually pretty wonderful.

00:22.59
jeffekennedy
So um, do you know what today is say it with me. It’s Friday whoo. Um, March Eleventh and snowy day here in Santa Fe a lovely snow. It’s like being inside of a snow globe kind of snow with the constant sifting. We got a fair amount of cuing accumulation I don’t know if we got the 4 to eight inches that they said that we might probably depends on how one measures it. Ah. Seems like we got a fair amount of moisture in it though. So that’s awesome and it’s um, very cozy weather very curl up and sleep weather then I slept a lot last night slept in this morning did not want to wake up so been moving slowly this morning. It’s eight thirty as I record this which is late for me and my mother must be still sleep because she has not replied to my good morning yet. So maybe it’s sleepy all around and I think that’s. That’s an okay thing I’m trying to let this be okay so that’s my um sort of what take home lesson from yesterday. Um I did go back and look and I I know I keep doing this so I’m sorry if you guys get sick of hearing me do this. But. I do think that you know what? I always say you guys could probably even say this with me figure out what your process is and own it and I think that that’s something that we don’t stop doing that’s it’s an iterative process. It changes over the course of our lives it changes with each book. I think that we are constantly learning ourselves and I mean that’s the point of life right to refine ourselves to try to become better at what we’re doing all the time become a better person. Strive for those goals that are important to us so I did I did a little better yesterday writing I have an open my progress count. Yeah, but I definitely. Got good words going yesterday. Um, and came out with a total of eleven fifty I mean not not anything to write home about I guess it’s enough to podcast about well.

03:10.20
jeffekennedy
Whether it is or not is debatable but I was happy to get the eleven fifty and I looked over you know I’ve really been trying to take a good look at what I do over time. And actually I’m gonna check something here and I won’t make you guys listen? Okay yeah I just wanted to check some math on that um from having been pushing pretty hard in the first couple of months first few months of 2021? Um, and not so much in or at least trying to find different ways to back off in 2022 I haven’t I’ve actually written more words so far in 2022 so someone that was pushing hard with gray magic. So we’ll see but. Going back over my productivity over all time I decide to go and look at and see how often did I really hit 15000 words a week because I always say that I figured that out a long time ago that I thought 3000 words a day was pretty sustainable for me. So I went and looked to see if this thing that I’m always spouting 3000 words a day five days a week how often do I actually hit that and you know what I haven’t hit it all that often I’m somewhat chagrined to report that I really don’t. Get that? Um, every once in a while I do but for the most part I don’t and if I look at my overall averages since however long it’s been. We know how? well it’s been. Jeffe. It’s 2012 so 10 years now right we’re looking at 10 years of data. Um I write about look at this I wrote it down Nine Thousand two hundred and forty six words a week and this shouldn’t come as. Ah, big shock because I had previously determined when I was looking going through this before that and I’d even put this in my planning schedule for this coming year that I was writing closer to 1500 words a day. Spread over 7 work seven days a week so I could calculate it on a weekly basis. Um, and yeah so I am officially you heard it here first. Um I’m revising down.

05:56.91
jeffekennedy
I am going to try to write 2000 words a day that’s slightly higher than what my average has been but I’m going to see if I can write 10000 words a week and see see if that’s sustainable because. I’ve been kidding myself about the 3000 words a day clearly, it has not been sustainable because the average is so much lower than that. So um, that feels a little scary because I feel like I should. Pushing for more than that. But those of you who have been listening to me for a long time know that I always think I’m going to scale up and push for more and it doesn’t work and I think it’s been making me um I think it’s been draining me. Over the long term so I’m going for for that which seems kind of luxurious but I’m feeling like last year was a good year I’m met a lot of goals. We’re doing much better financially and. I’m a big believer in that we must reward ourselves for effort because if we constantly push ourselves then it can be um, well have the a negative effect. It has the opposite effect of what we want I don’t think I’ve talked about this. Recently but I feel like we have to treat our our internal selves. Our creative selves are so creative. Subconscious however, you want to think of it as um, as like a puppy puppy or a kitten and it. Puppy analogy works better because people go to a lot more work to train dogs I think you can train to cats. But most people have experience with trying to teach dogs to like pee outside and that sort of thing and if you’re training your puppy to do the work that you want it to do. You can’t be constantly. Pushing it. You can’t be haranguing it nonstop. You have to let it play you have to give it treats and I feel like we have to do that for ourselves too. Ah, you know, especially if ourselves you know delivers the book on time like we want then we. Then we need to give it a treat. You can’t just um, be working all the time and yes I am talking to myself I I do have a tendency to to work all the time and I know that’s um, not always a positive can be useful but I’m working on.

08:45.54
jeffekennedy
This year seeing if I can get a little bit better at figuring out what my actual creative sustainably creative output is um and I don’t even remember I should have I have to ask grace because you know we we do talk regularly and we strategize and for. 2021 our mantra our plan was to work smarter not harder and I don’t remember now what we said this year’s was gonna be isn’t that funny I’m gonna message her. Okay, we’ll see if she replies. Um, it’s funny cause I forgot. We’re we’re on slightly different schedules. She tends to be more nocturnal than I am so I forgot that I had sent her something last night something gossiping that another author was doing I was like look at this What do you think of this and she sent me back a bunch of messages later last night when she got around to looking at it. So I had to go down a bit of a rabbit hole and read it and of course she totally agrees with me so this is the the core of our friendship but ah so we’ll see if she answers she may not be around right now. But. I think that’s funny I’m I’m gonna bet you guys I bet you? Well I can’t bet you actual money. We’ll just bet virtual point with a bet bit coin ha n fts um I bet she won’t remember either. Maybe she will so anyway. Um, I am trying to back things off and it’s funny because I spoke with Megan the other day on Wednesday and I texted her in the morning and said I’m jonesing for our Las Vegas cabana because we had so much fun doing that that was last April a year Agoapril and I said I’m joing for that and she says I’m actually um oh I can’t say this nope sorry I can’t tell you because I can’t get hurt in trouble. But anyway I was saying how i. Said you know it’s funny even though I have total freedom to take the day off anytime I want I I don’t I almost never do and she said that she actually understood that because it’s hard when you work for yourself because it’s like stealing from yourself and I thought that was a really good insight. so um so yeah that’s that’s my plan. We’ll see how it goes um, it sounds um, luxurious, vaguely hedonistic to only go for 2000 words a day which I know don’t ah you know don’t measure yourselves by that.

11:34.96
jeffekennedy
Some people do way more. Some people do way less. Um, we’ll see how it works. It’s all about figure out what your process is your process and own it no reply from grace yet. So. Um, the other thing I was going to mention is one of the younger writers messaged me yesterday younger being a um younger in the career. Not necessarily I’ve never been her in person I think she’s actually younger too. But she referenced a um article that was a daily dot about someone being sexually harassed by a guy at a self-publishing conference which I had read. She asked me if I’d read it and I was like yeah I thought it’s been passed around. I’ll link to it so you guys can read it and it’s kind of funny because here’s another one of those consequences of the pandemic because we haven’t been going to conferences this kind of thing hasn’t come up for the last couple of years and like now that people are going out and about it’s like yeah. Just a long just like people are getting in car wrecks and getting murdered again turns out when we leave our houses. We also get things like sexual harassment and she wanted to know what I thought about it and I asked her if she was familiar with the concept of the missing stare and. She was not so I sent her a blog link to that and I’ll I’ll link to that for you guys too just in case but the missing stare was coined and the article will say who coined it. But basically it’s the idea that there will be lots of people in a community who know about problematic people and. Very often. It’s creepy guys and it’s the analogy is that like you go to a house party and that everybody who’s familiar with this house knows that on the staircase there is a stair that’s missing and everybody is so accustomed. To navigating around this missing stare that they don’t think to tell new people about it and then the new person falls to the missing stair and and they’re like why didn’t you tell me the stair was missing and everybody’s like oh yeah, yeah, that missing stare. It’s a real problem. So. This is what happens in communities like writing communities and the sff community has long had a real problem with it because it’s interesting my theory and this is just Jeffie’s theory of why this kind of thing happens is a particularly in this community.

14:27.72
jeffekennedy
Is that the people who write science fiction fantasy are usually not the people who were the popular kids at school there’s exceptions but you know mostly we’re nerdy people we’re into fandoms, we’re smart, we’re into reading. Books um, you know and in general the people who were glomming star trek and Firefly and reading all of Lord of the rings were also not the people who were playing football or on the cheerleading squad. Oh Grace is typing back. We’ll see if she remembers so when corollary to this is that a lot of the guys who become successful in writing books are also guys who did not get. Laid by the pretty girls in high school and of course I’m making generalizations. Ah she is so funny. She says considering how shitty 22 her 2022 has been for us so far I think my mantra will will be head down carry on.

15:44.10
jeffekennedy
I’m going to just say I love that you don’t remember what we decided.

15:54.51
jeffekennedy
Decided either. Okay I won’t make you guys pay attention to me. Um, messaging with Grace so maybe head down carry on is a decent mantra for the year I know we decided on something. Clearly it did not stick so probably wasn’t useful then if we didn’t so anyway, um, this guy up. Okay, we regain my um attention for this. She says I can barely remember what I said last week I center a heart okay I’m gonna I I’ll take her off the window here so that I won’t be distracted so um and i. Read a very interesting article that this happened in Silicon Valley also because a lot of these guys who are the computer nerds are also not the guys who got laid by the pretty girls in high school. So these guys finally get to a place where they are. Successful within their pond. They are finally a big fish and a small pond and whatever it is in that biological boy nature that affects some of them and I will you know, not all mend this because you know there are a lot of really wonderful men in this. Science fiction and fantasy community. They’ve been great to me. In fact, supportive and appreciative of my work in ways that I never expected them to be but there are these other guys who see this as finally this is their chance to be the big fish to be the herd bull. And they start hitting on the girls and a lot of them and it’s not an excuse by any stretch of imagination but they are not always with the best social skills and they do it badly and they. Sometimes do it. You know with twisted maliciousness. So what’s the solution to this and that’s what this gal was asking me. How do we know which guys are the missing stairs I mean that’s that’s really the question. And it’s something that we’ve gone round and round about because a lot of people have suggested that we keep lists and some women I know do keep lists of who are the creepers and the problem is is then the guys start getting upset saying that there should not be secret lists kept against them.

18:33.65
jeffekennedy
So it ends up being a whisper network thing because that’s the only way you know is by talking to other women. It’s like okay who do you need to avoid in the bar who has the grabbby hands at the publisher party who is going to try to get you alone in a corner. Um. And and we have to let each other know. So that’s 1 thing is talking to each other. You can always ask other women. Um, you know come to you know women like me established women in the field and if you’re going to be working with some guy. I mean you can’t really ask us for a list of everyone who’s creepy. But if you’re gonna be on a panel with some guy you can always say you know is you see a good one and we will tell me we may not know but sometimes knowing nothing is is a good sign because it means that nobody’s ever had. Cause to talk about them. So um, the other thing that you can do and I told her this and it’s a remarkably effective trick. Thank you internet is you can Google them and I’ve discovered that one of the easiest things to do is to. Google say Jo Shmo controversy and you will get hits and ah if there’s a bunch of hits that’s much more likely that you know it’s more than 1 person has been talking about it so you will find and I gave her 1 person that you could you know look up. What had happened with them. There was one that was a while back with Myke Cole Sam Sykes and Paul Krueger and if you google those names and controversy. You will see exactly what happened and what people were saying about them. So. It’s um, some people will counter. Some guys will counter and say well that those are smear campaigns and so forth. But you know if if it’s coming from several different points in a community then you know I mean we’re not, we’re not gonna take them to trial. We’re not gonna prosecute them but like. Those particular guys. Um, ended up getting dropped from their publishing houses and dropped by their agents which is the um the hammer that we have to deal with problematic guys like that you know it’s like well. You know, nobody’s gonna take you to court for being an asshole in the bar but um, but yeah, you also don’t have to be celebrated by the community and that’s the answer we have and I’m going a little along today. So sorry, but um.

21:23.56
jeffekennedy
In the indie space in the self-p publishing space. It’s still a problem and will probably continue to be a problem until we selfpolice the community because selfp publishing sphere is still kind of the frontier. It’s like the frontier town where there’s not. Not a sheriff and a lot of the people who are drawn to self- publishing are drawn to it because there are no rules. No leash on what they’re doing and some of them come into it particularly because they are of the. Nobody can tell me what to do kind of attitude which is true in self- publishing nobody can tell you what to do? It’s all based on you know, can you sell the book to anybody and so I think we’re going to continue to see problems with these people because there is no. You know what are we going to do get Amazon to remove their account because they’re an asshole on the bar. It’s not gonna happen. So all we can do is self police and 1 thing that a lot of the really upstanding guys in the community have done is. To really take it upon themselves to be the ones who say no I don’t stand back and you know let this guy be an asshole that they have to you know stand up for the women in the community too and not tolerate the bro behavior which you know is kind of that code. Sometimes and a lot of these guys are being really good about that and saying no, we’re not going to be complicit in letting these guys do whatever they want that if we’re going to have a safe and welcoming community then then we will stand up and we will call it out the bad behavior. So I think that’s what we have to look for is um, the more established members in the community who don’t care about whether or not Joe Schmo is going to somehow um damage their career if you don’t. Let him fondle you in the bar or be an asshole. Um, and you know you look around and you see who the the good guys are and and go to them for help and and that’s what you do is you know who who will have your back because. The majority of people will have your back. it’s it’s um we’re we’re just trying to get a lot better about acknowledging those missing stairs and repairing them so that’s me going on a little bit long today but that’ll hold you over the weekend.

24:10.91
jeffekennedy
Hope you all a wonderful weekend I hope you get to do some things that are relaxing and restorative and I’m planning to do the same so I will talk to you all on Monday you all take care bye bye.

First Cup of Coffee – March 10, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript

00:01.30
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. So full confession. Um, first of all today is Thursday March tenth. That’s not the confession. But I’ve already been sipping on the coffee. So I sat down here once already to start the podcast. Staring at my face and the video screening here and I was thinking I look so tired I look so tired and washed out. What’s you know What’s wrong him? Well I feel a little droopy this morning but well I look really washed out and then I realize I forgot to put my makeup on I’d like totally skipped. Putting on makeup somehow so I had to like go back and actually put on the the up how is your day going but I don’t know why I’m spacey today I slept a long time last night. And woke up about 20 until 6 didn’t get out of bed until after 6 because I was just so sleepy I was kind of you know when you wake up and you kind of do the dozy thing kind of dreamy thing which I really enjoy. But um, yeah, feeling sleepy this morning and then. Like forgetting to put on the makeup. Don’t know how that happened the coffee is definitely pricking me up. We have a big winter storm coming in. It’s like this is we’ve had more winter in the last couple of weeks and we have all winter. Um, ah my bath is also kind of stiff I might have a little bug That’s what I get for doing things like going into movie theaters and being around people here. We are like figuring out the whole being around people thing again. Without masks because New Mexico lifted the mask mandate a couple weeks ago I don’t know if I mentioned that so yeah, everybody’s running around exchanging germs again of all varieties now. So. So it goes. Um I I don’t feel terrible just um, clearly not all together with it today. So yeah, we’re supposed to start getting snow around five o’clock tonight and it’s already pretty overcast I thought we were gonna have a kind of a nice day until then. But.

02:44.67
jeffekennedy
Yeah, the storm’s really coming in and they’re saying we’re going to get 4 to eight inches of snow which will be lovely and David is cooking cooking us vegetables. He’s playing with the the new. Food processor that we were gifted. It’s um I don’t know if I mention it’s this very fancy breel food processor and so like 1 of things has has on. It is an adjustable slicing blade. David’s been watching Youtube videos and making all kinds of great things. He make chicken pot pie. So now he’s slicing like cauliflower and broccoli and sweet potatoes very thin and roasting them so that we have healthy snacks to have around what a good man huh. So he’s been busy doing that and it smells good in here. So but I don’t mind the snow but I wonder if it’s making me a little bit. Um hibernatory that my friend Kelly Robson asked me the other day if I was hibernating. Ah, because I said I’d slept a long time like over the weekend and she said are you hibernating and I so I don’t think so because it actually feels like spring here. But now I’m having to walk it back because yeah, maybe hibernating. So. I did not have a very productive day yesterday writing wise I kind of tapped out early on. Um, it could be just still the ramp up because I’ve already written twice as much. Um, so far this week in the first 3 days this week then I wrote all of last week or the week before I mean you could see it’s like doubling each because I was editing and so forth. So you know like the I had um, 1392 and then. 33 17 and so far this week I have 65 16 so I suspect I’m in that phase of building up my writing flow again. That’s a thing about taking time off. I I recognize that it’s good for me to take that time off and refill the well and all of that kind of thing. But um, it sure does break up that flow.

05:30.64
jeffekennedy
I should like look at some of the athletic stuff some of the exercise physiology stuff when I was in grad school I there were a couple of people in our department one in particular who was very interested in exercise physiology it Was a zoology and physiology department was one of the great things about the department was that there were people working on all kinds of different stuff and so you learned the smatterings of things so I know a lot about like reintroducing endangered species and like managing wildlife populations. And so you know evolution of kidneys and also exercise physiology and this one grad student worked a lot with the olympic athletes down in Colorado springs and I learned a lot. From that you know this whole you know how do you deliver peak performance at the time that you want to? how do you manage the training and I think that there’s a lot of metaphors that are adaptable to that I think it works in the same way. I think that the creative flow works very much in the same way as the as the physical stuff. It’s never clear to me how much of what we do as writers or creators. Is directly linked into the physical but there’s definitely parallels. So so I know that I really pushed hard to finish gray magic. Broke some of my own rules and you know like rode over the weekend and did all of those things and got it done and maybe I didn’t take enough time off between because you know I’m definitely feeling this week like I had I thought okay I’m coming back this week and I’m coming back strong and I did come back strong Monday I got over three thousand words Tuesday I only got 24 23 but I still met my milestone goal so I was still on track for the date I wanted to do. And I’d had to stop early on Tuesday and then yesterday I don’t know yesterday I was distractible I did not have the focus again and I only got five seventy six so I’m just kind of wondering do I need to like take more days off just and not do stuff.

08:15.88
jeffekennedy
Or do I need to like maybe maybe I just need to start doing little bits. You know, um, like today go for a thousand words maybe I’ll try that. That’s something that I often recommend to people doing something like nanorimo national novel writing month. Instead of going immediately for like that 16 67 per day that you need to make it for all thirty days of the month start slow and ramp up and then go to more than the 66 16 67 I don’t know if anyone’s ever taken in my advice so I don’t know if that actually works we need to do a study. We really need to do some actual controlled studies. That’s the scientist in me wouldn’t that be fun just to see and and it’s hard to tell because everyone’s so individual. You know like my mantra find out what your process is and own it. Um yet I feel like I’m constantly reworking what works for me while finding out what my process is and so forth. So but clearly I’m not back to my. 3000 words per day schedule and I’m kind of revisiting and I’m sorry if I do blather on about this a lot because I think I do talk about it. You know how often do I really sustain 3000 words a day well de kuiller here. Bunch of them out there blue scaled coils what we have here 1 2 3 4 5 six seven and there’s the lookout coil. There’s always one that’s gets up on something high and plays lookout. We just bought a coil block but we haven’t put it out there yet. David picked that up yesterday. It’s like a block of compressed seed that we put out on the ground for them so need to get that out there for them. So anyway, um, I’m wondering how often do I really do I’ve been talking about that a lot this year how often do I really do 3000 words a day and maybe I need to revisit that that maybe I thought that that was a sustainable productivity for me 3000 words a day five days a week but I’m I think I’m actually not sustaining that level very well. And maybe I need to ratchet it down which um, nobody wants to decrease their productivity. But if my productivity decreases itself then I’m in the same place right.

11:00.80
jeffekennedy
So um, yeah, so we’ll see we’ll see um, it’s hard to tell like how much is refractory period and how much is just needing to build up endurance again. I kind of like this idea of doing maybe just sort of reframing my goals I think I’ll try that and report back see what you guys think because 1 thing that happens like a lot of people can do the 50000 words in in November for Likech. Na no rhymo. Ah, but then they crash and and that’s what I’m looking to avoid is is the crash I want that sustainability. No, so so let’s see what else is going on. Oh I should so back up a little bit and say that I’m also groping a little bit trying to find the threads for this fourth book of the series and that’s another thing too is that writing. The final book of an ark is just always harder. You’re just pulling all the threads together instead of spinning the threads out you’re bringing them together and I’ve heard somebody else’s you’ll use the metaphor of landing the plane you know that like taking off is. A lot of work. But then you’re flying flying and flying and that’s like relatively low of investment of effort. So says we who do not fly airplanes so we don’t really know but landing the airplane. There’s a lot involved in landing landing the airplane and getting everybody safely there. And you know like George R Martin very famously has not finished his series of um, a song of ice on fire and I don’t know if he will. Everyone’s well somebody asks me? Well I’ve talked about this before when I when I see George. Ah, at events here in town. No I do not ask him about it nobody does because we’re his friends and we don’t want to torment him. But when people ask me if I think he’ll finish I have to say I don’t know I mean I I do not know if he will. I think there are a lot of things in the way I think that there are reasons why for instance, some Brandon Sanderson very famously recently put up a kickstarter because he wrote like 4 novels during pandemic and put up this video about it which i’m.

13:43.38
jeffekennedy
I have complained in other places given my thoughts on on how he chose to do that and I will not say it here but I did have problems with it. No what I I am going to say something because he went. At it in this I think well intentiontioned way where he was kind of playing a joke and he was saying you know you know pandemic’s been hard and people have been asking how he’s been doing and that he’s been very close mouthed about it at. That he finally wanted to come clean and he pulls out this big stack of paper and says I wrote 4 novels since pandemic started and he does give some interesting data where he shows like what percentage of his time was devoted to various activities before the pandemic and. How much sense and like well for me, it was certainly true I’ve talked about it here that without traveling to conferences without doing all of that stuff I did not get tired from traveling and I had a lot more. Concentrated time just being here at home and focusing on writing and it did make a difference and and it did for him too. He ended up spending more time with family and you know a miniscule bit on conferences and stuff and he was able to write these novels and fantastic. Great for him and he is so popular that from this you know he said he was doing a kickstarter to publish these 4 novels this entirely new series I didn’t watch the entire video because I did get irritated with him and I’ll tell you why in a moment but you know he’s. Made something like $15000000 from this kickstarter to publish these novels. Ah, he hasn’t made it yet. That’s in pledges so you know with kickstarter you only get the money once you deliver the product. So but I mean he’ll probably deliver. And I wanted to add the caveat that Brandon Sanderson this is how I got there in the first place got his start because he finished Robert Jordan’s fantasies series wheel of time. So Robert Jordan had started the series I don’t remember how many books in he was. He was getting old I don’t remember if he had a chronic disease or whatever. But at any rate Robert Jordan picked Brandon Sanderson to co-author I don’t I’m I’m talking about something I don’t know tons about I don’t know how it worked I don’t know if Jordan had it outlined and Brandon.

16:29.35
jeffekennedy
Wrote it or whatever. But anyway, that’s oh graish bird hit the window ah startled me the cleaning ladies are so good about cleaning the windows. But now the the birds are hitting them It’s always this kind of light this time of year they get so um. The birds are so restless you know, excitable huh sorry about that hope it’s okay, I’m sorry act to check. Well it was alive but it’s really stunned so i. Wrapped it in a towel to keep it warm while it recovers and put it up out of the way. So a predator won’t get it. We’ll see if that makes it I need to get some of those window decals there I put it on my list to buy some I set it up on the. Bench outside the window here see if it’s gonna be okay, it might not I think it’s a Jubi too ha the cycle of life as my mother says the cycle of life is killing me. Okay, so sorry focus. Um, so yeah, that happens where people you know hire someone to finish their series for them and I kind of wonder if George won’t get to that point. Although I kind of don’t see George doing that. So anyway, ah my problem with the way Brandon and Sanderson went about that and I think that it was just not ill intentioned I don’t think it occurred to him how this would come across. I think it was just he was excited to share this thing and he thought it was a funny joke to play this way but it really fell flat for many of us because there are so many creators who have really struggled during the pandemic have struggled with the anxiety and the difficulty. Of dealing with all the things and there are a lot of people who have not been able to create and so for him to very smugly throw down his stack of paper and be like I wrote 4 novels was um, it was a little much. And so so yeah I thought that that displayed a um, a distressing callousness towards other authors. Um you know and that was probably just oh birdie’s gonna be okay.

19:11.92
jeffekennedy
It’s sitting up now. It’s sitting looking out at the little hood of the tall there. So yea. Yeah, all right must’s just been stunned a happy ending. We love happy endings excellent. So yeah, that was probably a lot of different stuff I’m feeling per year now. Coffee helps. Maybe maybe it was just ah, still sleepy. So anyway, I’m going to see about getting some work done I hope you all have a fabulous Thursday if you have interesting. It doesn’t have to be interesting if you have data on like what how you think this works with like getting back into producing and refractory periods and so forth I’m I’m interested send it my way. Yeah. So yeah, have a happy Thursday and I will talk to you all tomorrow take care bye bye.

 

When It’s Time to Put New Covers on a Series

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

This week at the SFF Seven we’re discussing Cover Trends. We’re asking “What was, is, and will be “hot” in cover art/style for your sub-genre? If you have a say in your covers, will you chase the trend or will you stick with the image in your mind?”

There’s a lot to be said on this topic, too much for even a week of blog posts. When I’m asked for advice on covers, which is a frequent request, I tell authors to keep in mind that a cover has two jobs: to attract positive attention and convey genre. This has to be emphasized because authors – both in trad and in self-publishing – tend to get caught up in wanting the cover to adhere to the story. One first-time author who was very upset with the cover her publisher gave her and came to me for advice said “but the cover doesn’t illuminate the story.” I had to tell her that the story’s job is to illuminate the story. The cover does different work: attract the eye and convey genre.
It’s that second that’s most relevant for this week’s discussion. Because trends change and a cover that accurately conveyed genre six years ago may find itself conveying something else entirely to a current audience.
Case in point: I love the covers for my six-book Sorcerous Moons series.

These were among the first book covers I ever commissioned and I particularly adore the cover for book one, LONEN’S WAR. It does come straight from a scene in the book – a pivotal scene that was, in part, the genesis image for the story – and the artist (Louisa Gallie) exactly nailed what I had in mind.

I will always be grateful for Louisa’s gorgeous art and I will always love this cover.

But, recently, people have been pointing out that these covers no longer convey what kind of story these books tell. The fantasy romance genre has moved on. If I want to tell readers that this IS the kind of thing they’re looking for, then I should consider updating to match current trends.

So I did!

Behold: The new cover for LONEN’S WAR!

I contracted with BZN Studio Designs to design new covers for all six books. Right now the series isn’t available, but once I have all six covers, I’ll re-launch the series with some fanfare. I’m super excited to see how they do with the new covers. I’ve heard some people (including my own assistant!) say scathingly that these look like all the other covers out there in this subgenre, and there’s truth to that.

AND THAT’S THE POINT.

The content is what makes the stories unique. The covers are doing the job they’re supposed to do. Caught your eye, did it? I hope so! And I’m hoping you also know exactly what kind of story you’ll get.

First Cup of Coffee – March 9, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.00
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I kind of put a comma there I’m here with my first cup of coffee today is. A very special episode of first cup of coffee because today is Wednesday March Ninth my mother’s birthday woo everyone say happy birthday Kathy’s to big birthday. We’re not saying which one. Um. And I am not with her today but I thought I would do instead a special podcast for her today. Those of you who listen regularly know that my mother is the reason I keep doing this podcast All of you are wonderful. You’re all amazing I like doing the podcast. Ah, there’s a lot of good reasons to keep doing it but my mom is the one who keeps me going at it because she would pitch a fit if I stopped in fact, she hates that I skip Wednesdays on the podcast. I’m supposed to blog on Wednesdays and so I don’t do the podcast on Wednesdays I blog at sff seven and on my own website I crosspost and so when I text my mama good morning on Wednesdays she will often if not always comment. Ah. Howsat today is Wednesday no podcast who knew that this podcast would be my mother’s favorite thing in the world and yet it is I think she thinks of it is spying on my life as all good mothers. Love to do and my mother is a good mother. She is um, a wonderful mother I am very blessed to have in my mother someone who is also a friend and when I say we’ve been together all my life which we have but I think we are unusually close because. After my father died when I was 3 plane crash we it was just the 2 of us for a long time and she remarried when I was 7 but for those 4 years although she dated some here and there a merry widow. Not so Merry. There were a couple of pretty bad years but I was young to remember it but she eventually remarried because my mother is a very resilient person. In fact I think that part of my belief in love comes from my mother although she and I do not agree on romance novels I have gotten her to read some over time.

02:50.53
jeffekennedy
And she does read my books or she pretends to she buys them all and that’s what’s important she sent me a photo last week on the release of gray magic showing. Ah the arrival of the print copy and she has a shelf of my books and her. Library and the guest room and so my mother has always been tremendously. Supportive. She from my earliest days told me that I could do anything I wanted to do and even though at times I think it was difficult for a. Widowed single mother to be ah saddled with a precocious child who learned to read when I was 4 from sesame street. She sent me to school a year early so that somebody else could answer my questions. It was a great call. Um, yeah, we’ve we’ve been through a lot together. She was married to her second husband for almost thirty five years I think that’s right and was widowed a second time she is now buried for a third time to a wonderful man. And I think it is partly my mother’s belief in in love in happiness in making a good life that has really informed my own life. She is someone beloved by many friends. Ah, source of joy to all kinds of people. And though I think the things that she has gone through would have made a different person more bitter less happy. She has never let anything get her down she ah she goes on. She keeps. A beautiful house with lots of art and she enjoys going out to dinner and she enjoys having her cocktail every evening. Um, we sometimes text each other at five o’clock do you have your cocktail in hand and it’s It’s a celebratory wonderful part of the day. My mother’s very good at making everything into a celebration. So although she was very firm about not wanting to celebrate today. Big birthday. They come.

05:24.90
jeffekennedy
And we say it’s better than the alternative but you know sometimes those big birthdays hitch a hard right? So I respect them I respect that she did not want to celebrate on this particular day but we will celebrate at other times in other ways. So here is a special podcast just for you mom coming out to you with love and with wishes for many happy returns. Love you home Take care and Happy Birthday Bye bye.

First Cup of Coffee – March 8, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.60
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee.

00:16.40
jeffekennedy
It’s not bad I’m going off lattes again I decided that I was disrupting the sixteen eight fasting alas and sharp viewers will notice I did not yet fix my chimes that came apart in my hands yesterday. Ah, get to that. So today is Tuesday March Eighth snowy day here in Santa Fe revving a very snowy spring which is great. That’s great. Lots of snow on the mountains which boats well for. Water reserves come summer. So yeah, it’s supposed to be snowy all week and it’s very pretty very picturesque. Good cozy day to be inside to write. Um I am delighted to report that I got writing done yesterday. Woo. I got my 3000 words I got it got them even in a reasonable amount of time. Um, 2 hours two and a half hours basically get my 2000 words 3041 um, 3 hours and a three and a half hours total elapse time ah put a relief. So um, yeah I apparently just needed the rest. So yeah. Um, you know cross fingers knock on wood. But um, it flowed reasonably well yesterday. So hopefully I can get keep getting back into the groove the groove as it were.

02:14.67
jeffekennedy
I am a little sleepy this morning though. Well but I’m still on my first cup of coffee. So um, so yeah, yesterday was productive that way. Um, and then it kind of got away from me. But whatever, somebody asked me 1 of the many emails I sent out on Sunday and reply to people 1 person asked me how inbox 0 had gone and I said inbox 0 achieved the problem with inbox 0 is that it does not last and. When I looked on yesterday afternoon I was like back up to 46 emails fortunately, a whole lot of them were people see seeing me on things and so I did not need to um, did not need to worry about them other than to file them. I file all my emails so yesterday um I did stop into a couple of the chats and checked in with people and stuff and so hi lizette and Stephanie. Asked me a question about because I shared some of my progress counts spreadsheets which you guys know are scary. Um, and I shared my gamp charts that I used to plan releases I used to use the gant charts I didn’t have a lot of time to explain because I did need to run out but i. Used to use the gantt charts to plan more of my drafting and revising I used to have them all plotted out on that. Um, for for those who don’t know a Gantt chart is basically it’s one those ones with the horizontal bars and it just shows you. Timelines of stuff now it shows where things are overlapping so when I first started making gantt charts I did make them for like drafting revising overlapping stuff of I used to have in. And want to say a more intense schedule but that’s probably not true. Um, it was a different kind of intensity look of the little wayward curl sticking up there because I had a lot of traad books going on at the same time. And I was for a little while there I was working with 3 different publishers and so stuff would come in from them that was you know they all like would want their one week turnaround or two month turnaround or you know what have you and so I would have to.

05:05.36
jeffekennedy
Stop working on what I was doing and switch over to the thing that had the most pressing deadline. Whatever just come in the nice thing about doing largely self publishing at this point and right now I’m out of contract and. But agent’s trying to fix that but you know I kind of like know she’s like I know you want to be back under your contract I’m like do I though know that I really do um there. There’s good and bad. There are things that are great about tried publishing. Getting a whole trunk of money up front is good having a team working with you is good, um, having other people worry about stuff like covers and the back cover copy and all of that stuff. That’s good. Um, but I definitely ah have a much more even paced life when I am primarily self- publishing because I I decide what I’m working on at any given time. They don’t have to be pulled into anybody else’s timeline or schedule. So anyway and I do use gantt charts to plan out releases to get a sense of how regularly my book releases are coming out and I have instead gone to mapping out. By day. Um I only showed you guys this really small part of my spreadsheets because I have this enormous excel workbook in which I plot out pretty much my entire life and what I’m doing at any given time. But this is not what you asked me what they asked me was and I wrote down your questions so I would know is how do you deal with having multiple series at once and the concern was is that. If they start a second series and they’re already feeling overwhelmed which is a thing and scared that they’ll enjoy another one so much more that they’ll forget about the other and then never finish any of the series. So how do you do all of this. Because I do show on my spreadsheet that I showed them a piece of all of the different series and books that I have working on and I have them in different groupings right? So um, you know like.

07:44.80
jeffekennedy
I have in my court in someone else’s court in the pipeline which needs doing on submission planned tabled potential. Um, there may not be a lot of difference between planned and potential. But. I also have one that’s interstitial. Oh I know what that was and that’s kind of gone away I think I’m I’m not doing the interstitial stuff. It was like that was like projects I was trying to work on like intermittently between other projects and that did not work for me I’m I’ll tell you what. I don’t know if it counts as a secret is this a bug or a feature. We don’t know. Um I I work on 1 thing at a time I and I do really well at that. That’s why I think it kind of counts as a feature. Ah 1 thing about me is that I’m good at concentrating and i. Do best if I concentrate on 1 thing and just work on that 1 thing and keep the whole book in my mind and that’s one way when people ask me how I’m able to write books as quickly as I do I think that’s 1 reason because I just work on that I don’t piddle around. Like I used to have this friend who used to like watch movies while she was writing and stuff and I was like how can you do that I can’t even listen to music while I’m writing I want it silent but that’s because for me bug or feature i. Don’t like any kind of destruction I want to immerse fully in that one book. So I would say that’s one trick to balancing multiple series is that whichever book you are working on you just think about that book. You don’t think about anything else you don’t think about the other series. So I did do this layering last year of releasing the bonds of magic books and the errors of magic books unrelated except that they’re both of magic that was a mistake. Um. Um, the only one who ever mentions it though I should probably stop mentioning you so I would release one book and then work on the next and I I interwove those 2 series the releases for them. Um, and I feel like it worked pretty well. I used to I think part of this is because I started out doing it this way because as I mentioned I was working for like 3 different publishers at the same time I was writing contemporary erotic romance and epic fantasy romance at the same time.

10:30.61
jeffekennedy
And 1 thing I discovered was that switching between the 2 worked really well is kind of a palette cleanser for my brain. So I would finish a big epic fantasy romance and then I would write an erotic contemporary romance which yes felt very different to write. And and I think I’m trying to figure out how to phrase this for me the contemporary romances the erotic romances always felt much easier to write part of that’s because I like writing sex scenes. Um. I think they’re also in some way simpler now arguably I’m not as good at this because those books have never sold as well. So it could be that I like am not putting the effort into them that I could be I always wonder that’s like oh maybe I should be writing them differently that they you know that they feel easy. Maybe I’m not working hard enough to be I’ve written one in a long time. So now. It’s hard to say so um I just thought of something hold on. Okay, sorry about that I am going to. Try to get rights for reversion on some of those old books and I was just thinking about something I needed to remember to do along those lines. Yeah I was gonna start talking about that. But I won’t because I’m gonna stay on topic for Lisa to and Stephanie. See how devoted I am so multiple series. Um, so I think that’s one way to look at it and I think even still even though both bonds and bonds of magic and errors of magic are epic fantasy romances. There’s. Enough difference between the world that it does work in a way to finish one obviously take my breather since I clearly needed a little bit of time to decompress and refill the well and then start in on the. Book in another series because it’s it does work. Well so one thing Deronda Jones and I talk about a whole lot is that we we have this this dream I dreamed a dream of. Writing an entire series like a trilogy probably we wouldn’t try to do more than a trilogy to write all 3 books at once one after the other um, revise them all at once be able to go back and tweak book one to match. Whatever.

13:18.64
jeffekennedy
Book 3 ends up being and not have that the breakup of time in there. The main reason we don’t do that. Actually the only reason we don’t do that is money because you really have to be swimming pretty well. A good income to take that long off between releases right? Whether it’s for your traditional publisher or self-p publishing but that’s the that’s the ideal is to be able to do it that way and then I wonder. Would we really like it. We’ve never gotten to do that. So maybe it wouldn’t work so now focusing back on on the question scared that you’ll enjoy one so much more than you’ll forget about the other this is a thing it really is um. And I think it’s inevitable also regardless of enjoying one more than the other like I really enjoy the airs of magic books I have a lot of fun writing them It’s it’s fun getting back into writing this one I’m also glad it’s the last one because this series hasn’t sold as well. As bonds of magic by like like 20% of sales for errors of magic compared to bonds of magic I mean it’s it’s remarkable the difference and that was something that. Megan Sienna Deutsche and I were talking about because I did ask her I’m like is did I do something weird on these books. Another friend of mine told me that she thought maybe the titles weren’t right and she’s not someone who self-publishes and she doesn’t know a lot about bookmark and she only tre publishes and then it’s more on the artistic. Literature is hard and she’s like well maybe the titles don’t convey enough tension because it implies the two are equal so like right now I’m writing the storm princess on the Raven King you know she’s like maybe it needs to imply more conflict I’m like I don’t think that’s it. But I’m got a second opinion for Megan. And she had some good suggestions for just how I can set up the you know marketing the complete series there. There is a very distinct arc and errors of magic that is set up from the very beginning daddy is um, it’s not going to be. Finished being told until the end and there are readers who will wait until they know that’s going to end because they know we do this you guys they know that we start a series and then we get bored and we go running after the new shiny plot bunny which is a mixed metaphor but who cares and that we may not finish it.

15:59.70
jeffekennedy
So 1 thing that happened to me is sorcess moons. My six book series which I am is going into audio now and I am putting new covers on I have a new cover felon and swo and I’m waiting on the rest. Should probably start rereleasing these soon but I don’t have all the new covers and I’ve been going back and forth should I like just start releasing book one and then release the books as I get the covers or should I wait till I have all 6 feel free to weigh in. So. What happened with sorceers Moons was I originally thought it was gonna be a trilogy. It wasn’t I always do this. My series are longer than I think they’ll be I also this was the first series that I selfpublished from the very beginning and so I didn’t entirely. Plan out what I was doing I didn’t have I wasn’t working with a tread editor who was sort of guiding my steps on it I didn’t have a contract where I had like book 1 2 3 so that you know that I I ran wild with that freedom. So I ended up writing the first 4 books and then. A traditional publishing contract got in the way I got I sold 2 3 book deals at the same time rebel base and st martins and I ended up putting off writing those books 5 and 6 for a fucking year. You guys an entire year. Before I got back to writing book five and it was a problem and I confess freely that if I did not have a lot of readers saying when are you finishing this series I probably would not have so. That is a consideration. Um, if you don’t have the readers clamoring for you to finish the series then you might not do it. Another example cautionary tale as these contemporary romances that I wrote missed connections. Really love those books last dance with the prince since last christmas and it’s about 5 girls living together after college young women. And yeah I totally planned on books four and five in that series and those books if not sold well and. Every once a while somebody will ask me now. It’s been long enough that like nobody asks me anymore. But every once while someone would ask me saying are you gonna write books 4 and 5 in this and I only recently earn out these are self- publishled too I only recently earned out my investment on those books.

18:51.54
jeffekennedy
So at least now I’m making money on this series. Ah not much but so I’ve like 0 incentive to finish it and I don’t sell well in contemporary romance. So I don’t know well ever finish it. Maybe not so the reader pressure helps. It was really really hard for me to go back and finish books 5 and 6 of sorceress moons not only getting my head back in the world but I had written so many books in that interim that I had changed as a writer and so how I approached the story. And how I thought about it characterization world building everything I’d I kind of moved past what I was doing in that series. So I would say be very wary of taking a long break between books in a series because. The odds that you will not come back to It are very high. Yeah and so Stephanie said what if I can’t make my brain behave and I mean some of that’s the writing habit some of that’s being ritualized and I think that having my schedules and my charts and so forth. Make a difference there because like I’ve known that storm princess and the Raven King was coming next for a long time I had that set up with my cover artist. The covers already. Um, put on the show notes today because I haven’t shared that widely yet because I got the cover right? as gray magic was coming out and it was It’s hard to promo a couple of things at once and I’m trying to get better at staggering my my promo. So. I don’t know does that answer the question gals. Um I think really having a schedule. That’s why I love excel you know I’ve got my dates figured I know releases. Um, it’s not something you can control but having people. Really wanting that next book makes a difference I would say with series keep them short. You know plan short series to begin with until you know you can commit to longer ones ah like with bonds of magic I was really planning to do 3 but then that world is so big that by the time I was writing book two and people were loving it so much that I realized I needed to expand that and keep it going and and I’m loving it so much so all right? So those are thoughts ask me more questions. Sorry i.

21:37.68
jeffekennedy
Be on typing all this out but it was much easier to talk it out. So um, hope you all have a fabulous Tuesday and a fabulous Wednesday too because I will be back to talk to you all on Thursday morning take care bye bye.

First Cup of Coffee – March 7, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.14
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee.

00:15.39
jeffekennedy
Ah, that’s good. That’s delicious. It is Monday March seventh if you’re on video you’ll see. It’s kind of cold gray light here. We’re just like in for snow. It’s very spring snow lots of squalls. But young guy lost snow yesterday supposed to get more today. It’s sticking in places but otherwise melting again very springy. Some of you have asked about my chimes and what is. Figure on the chimes and I realize it doesn’t show up. Well if you’re on videos even if you’re on video. So I’m going to show this to you if you can see. Yeah, it’s it’s subtle. It’s um. Was a gift. It’s from Ireland and it is a celtic dog and it sort of turned back on itself wrapped up in different celtic knots. Um and dark brown if you haven’t ever seen the visual on it. It’s um. Made of clay and so oops and now I just my church just came apart my hands. That’s why I get for messing with it out to restring it? Um, maybe I wasn’t supposed to reveal the secret nature of the chimes. Set that there. It’s um, it’s got a nice bit of potent magic for those of who are aware of such things.

02:02.56
jeffekennedy
Ah, all right? So um, busy weekend Saturday was crazy was funny because one gel that I was in a meeting with was ever so slightly testy and she said well. Ah, you know that she was at a conference that she said I am in my fourth meeting of the day and I wanted to say well I’m in my sixth meeting of the day I did not say that but I was. I think that’s one of those things that’s like never assume that other people are like having it so much easier than you do. Even if they are not being testing. Um I was fine. Ah. A lot of good stuff. Got done on Saturday ah sort of the upshot for the whole weekend is I’m like totally caught up on serfo stuff. Um, that was really the big thing and there was a lot to get caught up on I don’t know what happened but I got back. Inbox 0 on all of my email. um I did a lot of that yesterday I was um I sort of did a split I did not have an unpuggged day I have not been able to do that for. Well, it’s moved around because like when I was in Los Angeles I was able to unplug because I was out doing things right? So yesterday morning Sunday morning I was able to um, hang out. It was really nice because I I was not. Feeling great on Saturday I think I got overserved on Friday evening. Although so Friday evening I had drinks and dinner with my friend Megan and a couple of her friends and didn’t. Saturday morning I was just feeling really kind of rough and I was like you know maybe I drank too much wine. You know, like with the with the sixteen eight fasting that I’ve been doing wine is hitting me harder. But then I saw me get again last night because we went to see a movie That’s my big news is that we went to see. Cyrano with Peter Dinklage and Haley Bennett in an actual movie theater and that was really fun. That’s the first time I’ve been in a movie theater since I was trying to decide when it was it was like.

04:34.49
jeffekennedy
January of 2020 and I was trying to remember what movie it was so two years since I’d been in a movie theater a little bit more and so that was really great but she mentioned she was not feeling good on Saturday morning. So maybe. Maybe the food wasn’t great. The people. It’s a local place that I’ve always really liked but the owners are selling and you know it’s like so anyway Saturday night I went to bed pretty early and slept a long time I woke up Sunday morning even earlier than I expected to. But um. Everybody was up the the cats were up and wanted fed and David was up and grumpy because the cats had been but bugging him because they were up and wanted fed and mourning is my feeding time so that banished my ideas I was gonna lie in bed and read for a while. But. Thought wow I’d get up and feed the cats. So we got up and fed the cats and then they all went back to bit all 3 of them the cats and David and I made my latte and I made a fire in the fireplace because even though it was it was really pretty when I first woke up because. 1 of the things I love about the cells. One of the many things is that when I wake up I can see out my window and I don’t think the camera’s gonna show this now. It’s just gonna look like a blur of light but I can see this view down the valley I could see the sky from the bed and there were these pink clouds. Being lit up by the Sunrise Cotton candy pink and rose gold and it was just gorgeous and so by the time I finished making my latte and feeding the cats. Ah the clouds had come in and it started snow very heavy snow. So I put a fire in the fireplace. And I sat in my favorite reading chair by the fire and I read Juliette Marillier a which transcript is going to hate. So I’ve finished book 3 of the 7 water series. Child of the prophecy and now I’m on book 4 air of 7 waters. So yeah, definitely continuing my kick on this particular author whose name I show not repeat because transcript. Um. Yeah she’s really amazing. She’s so good. It’s very interesting that she’s done this on all 3 books so far that from about 80 to 95% of the book because I’m reading on Kindle so I can see she has built up so much dread.

07:30.30
jeffekennedy
Of the possible terrible awful outcome of the story that I almost can’t bear it. She has her characters struggling so hard against the things that are happening and. That I am just dread is the best word I can come up with I am just full of dread that they’re not going to succeed that and even though I know even though I know that they’re going to succeed that I know this is the promise. She does kill some of her characters and that creates more of a sense of peril for me as a reader because it’s like sometimes I worry about which characters might die and some do but their happy endings as far as the protagonists. But i. It’s unreal to me how much she drags out this dread at the end and I feel like I could learn from this because I know that I think I’m too nice. Sometimes do you guys think this I mean sometimes I think my perception actually I know I know my perception of my own books is different than. Perception of the reader because it surprises me when people say that I write dark things because they don’t seem that dark to me. Um, but I feel like I resolve difficulties too easily like on. Um. Fiery crown was thinking about grabbing a copy but I won’t I have so many copies of the fiery crown you guys because pandemic because we’re gonna have this huge launch event and now um so like in the fiery crown. If you haven’t read it close your ears for like half a minute but at the end when they are doing the the rescue from the citadel um, my editor said that she thought they got in and out too easily and so I had to go back and we that in so I worry about this somewhat it. If you have your hands over your ears. You can come back I worry about this sometimes with my books because especially the self-published ones I know I’m often coming in under the wire which I hate I I want to get back to where I’m not doing that and hopefully on um, storm princess and the Raven King I will I will do this Um Meghan Snna deutsch I’m like and I know she listens sometimes made a really good suggestion that I just go ahead and set a new preorder date a new release date and just make it well out from.

10:15.54
jeffekennedy
When I think I can finish and I think I probably will do that? Um I’m just I need to get like into the book a little bit more because I did not I took the day off on Friday I’m still empty brained I’m hoping I’ve got the juice back today. So. Yeah I feel like I maybe need to go back and spend more time on these endings and like draw out the dread and the peril of resolving the conflict thoughts. What do you guys? think of course I might be preaching to the choir there here because the readers who think that I resolve stuff too easily um me not. Be reading my books anymore I can’t believe how long Julia here we are transcript how long Juliet Marillier is able to draw out that final conflict. Ah, and it’s I was telling Megan. About this over drinks week drinks before the movie and she was saying well it sounds stressful and I was thinking well it is kind of stressful but at the same time. It’s I don’t know it’s It’s also really satisfying in a way I don’t know we had an argument about something else and I realize I’ve lost my initial topic. Maybe I’ll think of it and went back. Oh I think I will um. Because she was saying that she was watching that she didn’t do much over the weekend you know because it was very snowy. It was really good weekend to tuck in and she did not have her son or son was with her ex and her guy Charlie was out of town. So she said she ended up doing a lot of you know. Had her fire going and lolling on the couch and binge watching stuff and she said she was watching Vikings Valhalla on Netflix and she asked me if I was watching it and I said no I don’t like the vikings show shows I said David likes them but I don’t and she said well why don’t you like them. I thought you would love that stuff and I’m like no ah brutality violence. Just I said I don’t like vikings in general because they are um, it’s said you know like they killed my ancestors I just there’s just not much about the viking viking. The viking mythology that is appealing to me David likes it I don’t I don’t like how they just go out and like ravage and brutalize people and she said but did you like game of thrones and I said yeah I did like game of thrones and she said well they’re the same thing and I was like what? Okay so.

12:59.43
jeffekennedy
You guys viking stuff and game of thrones. She said well didn’t you think um, like the the people in the north those north people. Um I said the the starks and she said yes the starks they were basically vikings they were running around with you know, wearing furs and stuff. Now now upon consideration now I’m wondering if she was thinking about like the wall and the wildwalkers maybe but anyway she even asked our waiter reviews because he like brought our drinks right? then and she said don’t you think that like vikings and game of thrones out. There’s a lot of crossover. And he kind of looked confused and then finally he said well maybe you know like the gray choice because they had chips and I said you know the thing about vikings. 1 of the things that defines vikings is that they go of viking they go out and they go a viking and nobody in game of thrones was going out a’viking. We got nowhere with this argument but I did think that it was a funny conversation. She was like well what do you like about game of thrones because she said I thought the same thing about that. It was all violence and dirtiness and brutality and I was like no, it’s because there was all of that political maneuvering. Right? Anyway, doesn’t matter in the grand scheme. Not but that was sort of how we were going round and round. Um and I confess I don’t really know how I got there but it was a funny conversation. so um so yeah it was I guess with ah what the books that I’m reading and so forth. Um, getting back to work today going to see the movie in the movie theater. So I want to talk about Cyrano and um I was just looking at my notes and thinking about I don’t know if I want to talk about this though I still have times for some reason this is bugging me. And I wrote it down and I was thinking about it again this morning. Um, so maybe I’m I don’t know the fact that I keep thinking about a thing comes back to me I know one thing I had didn’t mention earlier from one of the many things I did on Saturday was I got to interview Julia Quinn who turned out to be absolutely delightful. She was lovely during the interview. She spotted the Rita behind me and asked about it. It was really fun talking to her I think they’re gonna post that video I will share it when it comes up. But yeah, that was really a great.

15:50.75
jeffekennedy
Great thing to get to do so my thing that’s been bugging me is I was just remembering a friend that I had a long time ago and why this is coming back to my mind I don’t know but maybe because I’ve been thinking about friendships and thinking about jealousy and. Things you like sometimes people who are ostensibly our friends say things to us that come across funny and I remember saying something to her and I can’t remember exactly what it was but I was talking about. You know, like everyone’s while you have something that you love to wear. Some outfit that you love and probably this is for the girls sorry guys. Maybe you guys have this too a favorite t-shirt I’m sorry that’s that was wrong. Um, but everyone want to like you have something that you feel super cute in and that you just love. And nobody ever compliments you on it. Nobody ever says anything about it and my mom and I have talked about this It’s like it’s a funny thing and then there’s other things that people always say you look great in and so if you want to you know like have a power thing. You know, be powerful that day you wear the thing that people say. You know it’s like do where’re the thing that people say you look great in that people always compliment or do you wear the thing that makes you feel good, but an an ongoing conundrum so I had said something to my friend about this and Yll I was like oh you know. Whatever this is you know I always love this thing but nobody ever says that I look nice in it and I wonder why and she said well you know sometimes we just shine too brightly and I even wrote this down and this is like I don’t know twenty years later I’m still thinking about it sometimes we shine. Too brightly and that’s like okay so I guess I guess it’s incumbent upon me not to shine so brightly. The funny thing I don’t know why it’s been coming back to me so Cyrano. Um, want to talk about Cyrano and I’m going to talk about the ending. So if you don’t want to get spoilered on the ending tap out now. Um I enjoyed Cyrano I did not enjoy it as much as I wanted to Peter Dinklage and Haley Bennett were great. They did a wonderful job acting it was beautifully filmed. Its Joe Wright.? Unfortunately, it was Joe Wright Anna Karenina, not Joe Wright Pride and Prejudice or Atonement and I do think that this is something that happens with creators is they start.

18:38.85
jeffekennedy
Getting enchanted with themselves and what they do and they go over the top Joe Wright cut off hauled this back a whole lot because it was like over the top in places. It was also incredibly gorgeous Megan and I were both trying to figure out where it was filmed and it turns out it was Sicily. The set was amazing. There was the trademark Joe Wright sense of like 360 degree ambiance the way he builds the world I feel like he’s unparalleled. It’s just amazing. The costumes were gorgeous. There were these wonderful. Um, you know he leaned into the fact that it’s a musical and there were these wonderful scenes where like the the guards are practicing with the swords they’re doing the fencing practice in the background but it’s like a ballet. Um, and. Various other scenes where they’re talking about love and people are kneading the dough and lifting the bread and it’s like a ballet gorgeous Roxane Haley Bennett played Roxane Roxane outfits are beautiful. They went with these amazing very Filmy Fabrics played with color these colors. Gorgeous um dialogue is scintillating Peter Dingklige I thought did an amazing job of being emotionally torn I thought almost too much at times a little over the top I thought. Roxane did not come off well in this story and now I kind of want to go back and watch other versions of Serrano I know that there’s the the Steve Martin 1 roxanne and then there’s Cyrano de Bergerac from the early 90 s with Gerard Depardieu. I do not remember who else was. In that one let’s look up and see I’m gonna go long today. Do guys care makes up for the date. So I can’t think of anything to say who played Roxanne in that one – Anne Brochet who’s Anne Brochet? you guys know who she is? Maybe she’s just not on my radar same age as me born in 66, she’s known for Cyrano de Bergerac. So maybe that’s why I’m not sure anyway and of course in. Steve Martin version Roxanne that was and Im blanking on her name. The girl who was in splash oh my gosh you guys are all shouting it at me I know what’s her name with the long blonde hair. yes yes I can’t hear you.

21:27.30
jeffekennedy
That that was 87? Yeah oh Darryl Hannah. Yeah, why couldn’t I think of that and I remember liking that one so now I want to rewatch those because I want to see how it ended because this one leaned much more into war. Um. I assumed it was napoleonic war although they didn’t say you guys know me I’m not great on history. Um, but it had a tragic ending. Um and in a way that I felt like was not earned. This was a not earned tragic ending. So. Here I’m very explicitly talking about how it ends at the so Cyrano and Christian who is you know her love you guys know the story right? Christians the very handsome soldier who’s inarticulate Cyrano is. Well he’s Peter Dinklage in this movie so it’s more than him just being uglyglier having a big nose. He’s actually it’s in income. Well little person right in the movie they said Midget and which I thought was interesting because it might have been more within the time because I I think now the preferred. Language is little person so it was much more even says you know a tall beautiful woman is not going to be with the midget and so they both go off to war Christian and and Cyrano and Christian. Like gets very upset when he discovers that Cyrano is in love with Roxanne and has been writing to her every day and and all of this and that Roxanne doesn’t actually love Christian she’s because he because she’s written that she’s in love with his soul and. So he like goes running screaming up and stands there and gets shot. It’s like he doesn’t even do anything noble or useful in their ah losing battle just like so that was much I did not like that. Um. Because he’s like a soldier’s son in all of this anyway. So then Serrano gets shot but he goes home and then if they do this thing three years later it’s like wait what three fucking years three years Cyrano’s back in Sicily he’s with Roxanne. He’s dying and I mean it’s like three years later and then a day you know it’s like one day even a couple hours and it shows him like all this time he’s been pining after her and he sees her every week and finally he confesses his love and she says that she loves him.

24:12.96
jeffekennedy
And he dies what were they doing for three fucking years I mean what is the point of this. What? why? What? Why do we have this 3 year lapse where they’re just suffering. Um I don’t understand this storytellers. Don’t tell me that they spent 3 years not talking to each other about these very important things and then just so you can produce your tragic kiddding. Um I can’t even I’m done with him and Ram. Um, so. You all have great money. Have a great week if you’ve seen sir and know if you see seranal. Let me know what you think um, you know what? and all of you who want to shine brightly go out there and shine as brightly as you want to all right I will talk to you all tomorrow. Take care bye-bye.

First Cup of Coffee – March 4, 2022

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog, Podcast




Transcript
00:00.10
jeffekennedy
Good morning everyone this is Jeffe Kennedy author of fantasy romance and romantic fantasy I’m here with my first cup of coffee. Ah, that hits the spot. Ah, but all right there we go. Let’s get this day started today is say it with me friday. Um, March fourth March Fourth into Friday all ye brave soldiers. All you warriors of words and other things. Ah so I apologize that I had no podcast yesterday I had a um, kind of a busy morning and I had to go get my blood drawn. That’s wonderful, ah annual. Actually I haven’t had it done in a long time. I’ve been very bad I’ve been neglectful of things physical but I’m seeing this new general physician and he’s fine. Whatever I won’t go into detail I mean he’s okay David really likes him so that’s it’s harder to get David to like people. Um, he’s a young man. And in some ways I don’t feel like we speak the same language. For example, when I said something about dealing with being post-menopausal. He asked me how long ago I had gone into menopause or finished you know. It’s funny because men always think menopause just means the period you know it’s like when did you last have your period and I told him it had been a few years and he’s like well then you’re not. You know you’re done. You’re not postmenopausal anymore and it’s like um, okay tell me honey. Ah. Speaking from experience there so otherwise but he’s fine. So I’d go get my blood drawn 4 tubes of blood. Um, do I didn’t miss it and yeah it was kind of. Interesting. The phlebotomist was an older guy very experienced and so he was talking about my veins that um like I have these veins that are very close to the surface of my skin. You know the blue veins I thought like everybody had them. He even asked me he did this arm.

02:38.56
jeffekennedy
And it’s ever so slightly bruised but not too bad. He did a really great job and he was like are you sure I’ve been drawing your but before your veins look very familiar but he said that a lot of phlebotomists don’t like to use those veins that are very close to the surface which are called verriccose veins which I immediately want to be like. And do not have variricosetains. But obviously I do but um, but it’s always has such a negative connotation right? but he said a lot of them won’t a lot oflebotoists or nurses. Don’t want to draw from those veins because they’re so fragile and he said but they’re great veins to use it. You know what you’re doing. And he knew what he was doing. He was very gentle and efficient and did a great job. So it’s something I’ve been putting off for a very long time something that I needed to get done and I was gonna go to writer coffee yesterday. It was just me. Jim Sorensen and Jack Mitchell and so I thought okay I would go there and you know get my blood drawn first because I do get the fasting draw you know and and then meet them for breakfast. And I ended up sleeping in yesterday I’ve been sleeping so much I mean I think I’m just still recovering from that push on gray magic um I slept long today too. So yesterday I’d had this bold plan that I was going to be like up by 5 and would you know get. All of my things done exercise and podcasting get some writing done and then be at the lab by 8 kind of happened did not happen instead I woke up at like 156 and I was moving pretty slowly I did exercise did to did to my Thursday weightlifting did not get to the lab until like eight thirty did no writing got no podcast done. Um, yeah. What was I doing in all that time we don’t know I have no idea lifting weights feeding cats. So I am get my mother I sometimes I think about this because my mom once asked me what do I do when I wake up so early. You know she’s like what do you do with all that time and it’s like you know it never feels like that much time probably if I like really tried to keep myself efficient I would do better but I don’t I go back and forth because I sometimes.

05:22.31
jeffekennedy
Think well I should try to be a lot more efficient and not drift about and burn up those early morning hours and then I think why am I always pushing myself so hard dead and it’s okay to drift about in the early morning hours I don’t know so. Um, yeah, so I got to the lab late and I had to wait a little bit and then it took a while. So then I didn’t end up meeting Jack and Jim until 159 and they’d been there for a while had already had a lot of coffee. It’s always bad when you get to the party late. You have to catch up. Ah, but we had a great time. It was delightful and I didn’t leave there until I left there around ten thirty five um and give my mom a calling way home. That’s what I was checking to see what time was it that I left. So. So yeah, um, it’s funny because I paused in order to check what that time was not that it matters. But you know, heck and then I saw that I had a text from my friend Megan about drinks tonight. So of course I had to answer in the affirmative. Yes, please. Yeah, so um, so then by the time I got home. It was like 11 and I was sort of waffling should I try to write and I have been thinking about my friends my concerned friends and all of you out there. Some of you comment to me. It’s like oh. You know if I’m feeling this empty maybe I should not be trying to write the next book already. And yeah, so I don’t know if this is just like brain drain some of it might be from traveling might have had like a little bug from traveling not covid I don’t have covid um. Yeah, so I slept again long this morning I didn’t wake up till like six thirty but I am feeling beach day a little better and so yesterday I did a lot of business stuff I caught up on a ton of business reader. I had over a hundred emails in my sifwa inbox. How did this happen you know and a lot of it is just because I get cced on stuff which is good. You know it’s like I have to get ccd on stuff. So I see it. But it’s like oh my god and. And I know that some of you this sounds like nothing but I am an inbox 0 kind of gal I tend to view my inbox as my to do list which I don’t think is entirely healthy. But I revert to it. Um I did answer an email yesterday that I knew I had been taking a long time to reply to and it was from January thirty first

08:11.40
jeffekennedy
How did this happen. It’s like February vanished vanished into the ma of writing so that’s where I’m at ah I did get my inbox down considerably I got it down to less than 10 I would have gone for total zero but a few of them take a little bit more time and and I by the end of the day I was kind of tired I was done I also had to go yesterday was the day of medical stuff so later in the afternoon I had to go get my mammogram and my bone density test. Ah, girl never forgets her first bone density test but it was actually pretty cool. It was kind of um you lay on the bench and they like do the scan up and down on all of this. So I am slightly shorter than I used to be she said sitting up straighter i.

09:10.77
jeffekennedy
I’ve always been 5 four maybe slightly over five four and I was um, 5 three and a quarter with I’m making a sad face. Um I suspect. It’s this curvature in my upper spine. So I really need to get back into doing yoga. The great news is is my favorite yoga teacher sent a thing yesterday that they’re opening a new yoga center this spring it was fake this spring. Um, so that’ll be wonderful because I do not like doing the video yoga. Just doesn’t work for me so I’m very excited to get back into in-person yoga. And yeah, get that see if I can reclaim that inch. She said sitting up straighter again. I do have scoliosis and kyhosis a relic of my adolescence. When I was um in middle school and early high school I actually had to wear one of those back braces you know, like from Deanni and Judy Bloom you know that went from my hips with the thing opening my tomb like that. So my back has sort of been the thing that I always have to take care of. So let’s that’s a good goal right? Reclaim the inch hashtag then we’ll see how all my other metrics come out even though I’m not post-menopausal I mean aren’t you like. Postmenopausal for the rest of your life right? You know it’s like you have menopause and then your post and then from there on but otherwise I think I really healthy I’m blessed with ah genetically blessed with usefulness that and lots of sleep and a clear conscience I think. so um so yeah will I try to write today I don’t know um I think I started to touch on this before. Yeah with some of my concerned friends saying what I was like but last week I did take the week off I mean I was in l a for. Monday and Tuesday and then Wednesday yeah I did do copy on its while I traveled and polishing and all of that and then I didn’t do anything on Thursday and Friday um, but it’s been pointed out to me that doing business doesn’t count as resting which I don’t know. It’s really pretty weather today I’m tempted to not do much but I also feel kind of guilty ish if I don’t work. It’s pathological. What? Ah what can I say.

11:56.53
jeffekennedy
Ah, so and Darynda has taken. She’s not taken this week off she’s gone into her fugue state of trying to finish this book where she wants no contact and I think she sort of spirals through the clock and so I really don’t have her to contend with either. So. Know I know you guys Laura Darnell you’re gonna be out there. You’re gonna say I think you should take the day on maybe I will um, definitely feel like I need some more will refilling. So but I do feel like a good kitty cat that I’m getting all of the medical stuff done I I really have let it slide for quite a while. Ah. I know. But maybe yeah now that I like like more or less like I do like the um the offices and all of that and I feel like the um I don’t know if this is true everywhere if you guys are experiencing the same thing but I feel like the offices are just much. Nicer now I don’t know if this is like a post covid thing but they’re much more efficient. They’re much better at getting me in and out I mean I couldn’t believe how fast the mammogram and bone density went yesterday I mean it was boom boom and you know from place to place and they were really. Pleasant and efficient and friendly and helpful in all of this and there wasn’t you know it just seems like even five years ago going to the doctor I felt like I was being chewed up by a machine or something and all of these places are doing so much better and they you know I’ll send surveys afterwards. How did we do. Um, yeah, so they did good. They did good I’ve got my windows open I don’t know if you can hear the birds singing Zoom’s pretty good at suppressing background noise. Oh this isn’t Zoom – Zencastr. But still yeah might be a good day to go for a walk and enjoy the sunshine. It was ringing when I woke up this morning that was lovely. It was um that might have contributed to the oversleeping. It was very overcast and a little bit of rain and then I went out to put. Water and the bird bath and the air smelled of petricore I love I that was like in some of my very very first essays that I wrote you know the center of rain in the desert and that was before I knew the word petroorps but.

14:35.89
jeffekennedy
It’s just one of my favorite sense of the whole world and maybe all the more precious for being fleeting. So I don’t remember if I talked about this the other day. So I’m going to talk about it again now that you’ve had to sit here and listen to all of my burbling on about. Medical stuff. Um, the maintenance of the human body right? Oh before I forget before I forget I should tell you guys I almost did forget didn’t I that dark wizard is a Kindle daily deal today. Who Amazon picks us they they send you an email saying. Do you want to be part of this and then you say yes and then they say okay, we’ll think about it and then they send it to you so they sent it to me and dark wizards on sale at Amazon ebook for two forty nine so if you haven’t bought it now’s a great time to buy it if um, we buy it for your friends buy it for your family. But um, yeah, feel free to share because yeah would love to kick that up sales for Grey Magic have been great. So I’m hoping that this will be an additional boost. 1 thing I did start doing yesterday was getting through my to do list I really feel like I need to put together a promo plan for my backlist. And I was mentioning this on a chat and one of the girls asked. Well, what do you mean by backlist. She said that’s confusing to me and I said well for me it means completed series because when you have active series for example, like bonds of magic and Grey Magic came out monday. And so that means I’m like you’re putting up stuff about hey release great magic. It’s out. It’s in the world and then that bumps that whole series right? You know and people are like oh it’s just like I’m doing today right? Dark Wizard’s on sale and then you get book 2 bright familiar and great magic. So that’s very active. But then I have other books that have you know like a completed series for instance like uncharted realms. Um, that have been out for a very long time that I like just forget to talk about and Carrie Anne Ryan gives a really smart seminar on promoting your backlist. Just having this regular schedule where you bring up these completed series and like hey did you know why I wrote these books? Um, and it’s it’s really very smart in something like the doctor’s appointments I have not been doing and it has felt like too much to think about.

17:19.50
jeffekennedy
And I did work on that some yesterday and I had the brain power for that so that was really good. Um, so then the other thing I wanted to talk about was from the pro writing aid panel that we did on Monday afternoon the online panel that I did. With Alexia Chantel and Mary Robinette Kowal one of the things we’re talking about process and and I did touch on this I know because I talked about me being an intuitive writer whereas Mary Robinette is much more analytical and she was saying. She was asking me if my books really do come out when I’m done because I like pants my way through a garden. Um, right for discovery. However, you want to put it if they come out that way at the end and she said because your books are very tightly plotted. Which gave me a little flutter of pleasure I was like well thank you I appreciate that I love that she thinks my books are tightly plotted and and what I wished I had said at the time was this is part of why I don’t like the dichotomy. Or even the spectrum I don’t like the names of plotter versus pantzer because you guys know I don’t like pantser because it’s like fly by the seat of your pants which to me implies a loss of control that I think reflects the other end of the spectrum sphere of losing control. But. It’s also that if you write for discovery if you pants if you garden. It’s not that you don’t plot which is why I always refer to it as being a pre-plotter I am not a pre-plotter I do have plots and. I mean there we have it Mary Robinette Kowal says my books are very tightly plotit I just don’t plot them before I write them and I think that’s the difference. That’s why I really wish people would adapt that term I oh wait. Oh I should show you guys look at this. Was gonna wave my wand and make it so but look at this what I have if you’re on video not on video. It’s a long box burgundy colored box and dorinda brought me this from Harry Potter World is a gift because she is lovely and it is. Ah, magic wand so it’s um, if you’re not on video. It’s a beautiful dark wood warrant with kind of like a tulip shape at the end and it’s um, it’s from Ravenclaw house which is I have done the test to find out that I’m Ravenclaw.

20:08.42
jeffekennedy
And I think she said she thought it was Lena Lovegood’s wand those of you who know better if you are a video you could tell me if that’s true. It actually doesn’t say anywhere that I see in the box. So no way I’m going to wave my wand and make it so in the world that we say preplloter at least i’m. I’m gonna give up on people getting rid of the word panter because a lot of people like it but can we just say preplotter because if you’re writing a book and it’s any good at all. Then it’s plotted right? a book without a plot is a problem. Words to live by I’m wishing and making it so all right? So on that note I don’t know what I’m gonna do today I just do where I feel like um so I hope that you all wonderful friday. And hope you have a wonderful weekend and I will talk to you all on Monday you all take care bye bye.

Grey Magic, Dark Wizard, and Storm Princesses – Oh My!

Jeffe Kennedy / / Blog

This week at the SFF Seven we’re sharing newsletter info and promoting work. For those feeling hesitant to promote their books during this terrible time, I’ll remind you – as I’ve been reminded – that art brings us joy and books open minds. When we’re dealing with close-minded bigots, hatred, and war, we need stories more than ever. We provide the counterbalance. Please share about your books, because the world needs them.

So: Promo from me! Book Three in my Bonds of Magic series, GREY MAGIC, released on Monday!!

      

This series is The Witcher meets The Selection.

His Darkness, Her Brightness… Together They Defy the World

Lord Gabriel Phel at last holds his dream in his grasp—and faces losing everything. He’s finally won the love of his wife, familiar, and mother of his child, and she offers him a heartfelt commitment he can truly believe in. Together they’re building a true house, one with a growing family of friends and allies that can help them stand against their enemies. And he’s learning to master his magic, to use it as the powerful tool and weapon it should be. But old and new enemies array themselves to take it all away.

Lady Veronica, now fully of House Phel, is doing her best to embrace happiness. After all, she has her hands full managing her mercurial and powerful wizard as he navigates taking his place as the head of their house, and with learning her own extraordinary ability. But she fears whatever peace they win won’t last long. When their enemies inevitably strike—including, perhaps, her own father—they must be ready to defend all they hold precious. It doesn’t help that her idealistic husband insists on making foolishly noble decisions that put them at even greater risk, nor that she loves him all the more for it.

As Nic and Gabriel struggle to put their household in order, giving ill-advised safe harbor to Nic’s runaway sister and risking their lives to save Gabriel’s sister’s sanity, their enemies draw the noose tighter on their well laid plans. When the unthinkable occurs, it’s up to both of them to trust in the nascent, unknown magic they’ve woven together.

      

If you’re into audiobooks, you can listen to the first in this series, DARK WIZARD. Books 2 & 3 will be out on audio soon! Comment on this post and I’ll pick one person to receive a promo code (US only, not my fault) for a free copy of the DARK WIZARD audiobook!

       

Finally, if you follow me, you’ll know that I canceled the preorder for THE STORM PRINCESS AND THE RAVEN KING, Book Four in the Heirs of Magic series. Several things came together to force me to cancel, alas. BUT, this neatly segues into our main topic, the newsletter! Subscribe to my newsletter for news on when this book will release. There are also regular yummy giveaways.