January is almost over and I have some accomplishments to share!

fireworks

January has been a surprisingly busy month for me and resulted in a few interesting news that I am happy to share with my readers.

1. New site.

First of all, I finally took the plunge and moved the blog to my own site. I must admit that the endeavor had seemed daunting and almost impossible at first. After all,  I know virtually nothing about web hosting, or web design, or site building and maintenance. Plus I managed to build a small following for my blog on wordress.com, and I didn’t want to lose it. I wanted to keep my blog theme and migrate my posts and try to accomplish all that without pulling too many hairs and having a screaming match with the computer screen.

I googled several web hosting providers that had so many options with so many different price plans that I got instantly lost. Thankfully, the excellent people on #myWANA channel on Twitter pointed me in the direction of Jay Donovan from Tech Surgeons, who had been more than helpful. He walked me through the entire process, and moved the entirety of my blog, theme, posts, links AND followers to my new domain in the space of a single evening.

So I am now the proud owner of elenalinville.com and I don’t have to worry about my blog disappearing if anything happens to WordPress. As long as I pay for my web hosting, my blog isn’t going anywhere.

For everyone following me through WordPress, there is nothing you need to do. WordPress will automatically redirect you to my new site (another neat little feature I didn’t’ know about).  Those who subscribe to my blog should also still receive updates.

2. Of Broken Things on Wattpad.

Of Broken Things

I have heard about Wattpad before, but I have never looked at the site myself. Well, this year I decided to do a little experiment and created a profile. I decided to put the first major edit of my first novel, Of Broken Things, on Wattpad.

First of all, I wantto share it with a larger readership than just a couple beta readers, but I also want to see if there is an audience for this story. It’s my first novel, after all. I  know it still needs a lot of work and the version I’m posting is by no means final, but if you are interested to check it out. Here is the link for it.

I will be posting one scene at a time twice a week, on Tuesdays and Fridays until the whole novel is up there. You are more than welcome to read it and leave me some feedback. In fact, I would love feedback!

3. The Choices We Make is finished!

Finish what you start!
Finish what you start!

Today I have officially finished the first draft of my second novel The Choices We Make (and I have already celebrated with a glass of wine  or two, so pardon me if most of this post doesn’t make sense). So as of today, I’m not only a real writer who can finish her s@#t, but also a serial finisher! (or a repeat finisher? Not sure, confused now. As I said, much wine has been had)

I must admit that the feeling that you get once you finish something as big as a novel is absolutely exhilarating. I was on could nine when I was done with Of Broken Things, and I’m back there right now as well. Of course, I will be back into editing hell soon enough with both, but for now, I’m celebrating.

I have also realized something else while I was working on the first draft of Choices – this is by no means a stand alone book. This is the first book in a series, and I even already have the main idea for the next book.

A year ago, if you had asked me if I would ever write a series, I would have laughed at your face. I thought myself incapable of sticking with a story for longer than a single book (heck, before last year, I thought myself incapable of finishing a story at all).

Now I KNOW there will be at least one more book based in this world and telling the story of these characters, and maybe even a third one. The plan is to get to work on it for NaNoWriMo 2015.

4. I’m on The Indie View Reviewer List.

Last but not least, I have joined the Reviewer list on The Indie View, a site that helps indie authors find bloggers willing to read and review their books. I have joined this list because I know how important reviews are for book sales. Reviews (and word of mouth) sell books better than any expensive advertising campaign ever will. I always read a couple reviews on Amazon or Goodreads before I decide to purchase a book. I also know how difficult it can be to get those first few dozen reviews, especially for an indie author.

I have received a surprising amount of email since I joined the list. Some books weren’t really in the genres I am interested in, but a lot are books that I am very excited to read and review. So to all the authors who contacted me and whose books I agreed to review, I want to say, thank you for giving me the opportunity to read your book! I will post a review, I promise, I’m just a bit overwhelmed with the demand right now. I’m slowly working through my list though.

 

Well, that’s all the news for now, folks. All in all, it’s been an exciting January. Hopefully the rest of the year will be full of great and exciting things as well.

9 thoughts on “January is almost over and I have some accomplishments to share!”

  1. I had no idea WordPress would automatically redirect readers to your own site. That is a really cool feature! (And it makes me more inclined to move to self-hosted sooner.) Thanks for the tip and congrats on all your progress!

    1. It’s a paid feature called Site Redirect, but it’s only $13 per year. I’d say it’s well worth it to keep the readership.

  2. You’ve been busy! Congrats on finishing the book–it’s a great feeling, isn’t it? And also on your successful migration. I moved from blogger to my own site not too long ago, and it was very scary, so I know how you felt! I also knew nothing about web hosting, etc, but so far (touch wood!) everything seems to be working okay. Your new site looks good.

  3. Sounds like 2015 is off to a great start. I’ve been hearing more and more people talking about Wattpad, so I might have to check it out. Congrats on finishing your second novel!

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