Yes, we were impacted by Hurricane Helene. My primary residence is not far north of Clearwater and though the storm was hundreds of miles from our shore the winds, rain, and storm surge did plenty of damage to our area. Thankfully we were blessed and only lost our power for a few days. We have a generator to run a fan and keep the fridge and fish tank going, no fish died on our watch. Despite our good fortune, many of our friends and family weren’t so lucky and they had up to four feet of water in their homes. All of our friends and family outside of Florida are also safe but have suffered wind and water damage and may be without power for a very long time. Our future residence is in a tiny gulf town between Cedar Key and Steinhatchee and the landfall seems to have been somewhere in Steinhatchee. Last year our little town was decimated by Hurricane Idalia, and this year it may have been wiped off the map. We haven’t been able to go check on things yet because of road closures and debris, but it doesn’t seem like we'll find much left when we’re finally able to make it up there. Because of the storm and lack of power I wasn’t able to post a blog last week. This blog is a combination of some of last week's events and some from this week. Please support those in need by donating to the Red Cross.
This has been an interesting week. My efforts signing up for things have started to pay off. I’m registered for a few book signing events: Feel the Heat Tampa July 2025, Flirty in Tampa August 2025, Nugget Con August 2026. I’ve also filled out interest forms for one in Orlando and a few different podcasts. I've submitted an interview for a podcast as well, I’m excited to see what the host does with my answers.
The VioleNt paperbacks finally arrived, and I got them shipped off to the ARC readers who purchased them at the extreme discount. It was much better than me paying for all of it myself. It makes me feel like we’re in this together and I’m more confident that those who purchased the books will definitely post reviews. I’m a little disappointed with Amazon, one of the VioleNt paperbacks were damaged in shipping and one of the Origin of Violet paperbacks were defective from the printer. The cover was not trimmed properly, and the spine wasn’t aligned properly. I’m going to report it to Amazon, but I doubt they’ll be able to do anything about it, I'll let you know what happens.
An author named Peter Lancellotti reached out to me and let me know he wrote an article about me in his World Newsletter. He has several hundred subscribers, it’s pretty cool. I gave him a special discount code for his newsletter readers to purchase Violet’s Tales at a discount. I'll let you know if anyone decides to use the code and purchase my books.
A PA who does PR Boxes to influencers has offered to send out indie author books to the influencers for free if the author is willing to donate the books. I sent her Force of Corruption and Force Majeure with some swag. She has my books scheduled to ship to influencers in March and April next year. I have some of my original Force of Corruption books left from before I revised it so I’m sending her more copies. My plan was to send 10 but with the swag I could only fit nine. She'll have them available to go out to influencers for all the rest of 2025 and maybe into 2026. It will only cost me to ship them to her. I’m probably going to have the host of Reader's Break the Internet ship any leftover swag to her as well. Reader's Break the Internet is closing down after the Horror Edition. It’s a lot of work for the host and fewer and fewer authors and readers are signing up. I thought the horror edition would be extremely popular, but it’s not so she’s discontinuing the events.
I’ve come to the conclusion that finding free services with fellow authors is ideal. Like with Peter Lancellotti, he wrote an article about me and asked for nothing in return. I will mention him in my upcoming newsletter as a courtesy. This is usually considered to be a “Newsletter Swap” you may have heard that term in author groups. The idea is you promote each other in your newsletters. I’ve never done one because I don’t have that big of a subscriber base and I feel like it’s not enough to offer to other authors who have hundreds or thousands of subscribers. I know I shouldn’t be negative about it and I should work on increasing my subscribers. I got most of my subscribers from an author takeover event I participated in at the very beginning of 2024. I could certainly reach out to some groups and participate in my own takeover, but again, imposter syndrome tells me, “Who would want to talk to you on a group?” I’m working on it, but it’s been winning my battle with confidence lately.
I’m working on Vile; the final piece of Violet’s Tales and I’m enjoying it very much. I love the dual point of view, or POV if you remember your acronyms. The first two are narrated by Violet alone but this one is dual with Violet and Pierson. He’s a new guy thrown into the mix, and it’s been fun writing their story because they’re my first enemies to lovers and it’s one of my favorite tropes. I find it difficult to write some of the angry arguments between them because I’m not an angry person who fights with people. But its fun stretching my writing to do things that make me uncomfortable, just like the spicy scenes. I’m not one to talk about spicy topics usually, but I like reading and writing them which is a big part of why I use a pen name. People can’t believe I write smutty books, and I don’t want to talk about it with those people. Years ago, my husband was in a rock band, and I supported him by attending his shows, managing their bookings, and collecting their income. I was also a full-time children’s librarian at the time. There were a lot of jokes about how I was the sweet and innocent librarian by day and the big haired rocker by night.
I hope all of the people affected by the hurricane are getting the help they need. I'd love to have some kind of fundraiser for the victims of the storm. I might talk with the host or Readers Break the Internet and she if she would be interested to work on it with me. I’ve donated signed books to other events, and they went well so perhaps we could put something together. I'll let you know if we’re able to do it, maybe my friend Shelby, who is putting together Nugget Con would be willing to help as well. Hmmm…
As always, thank you for reading! Have a storm free weekend!
RBTI Horror Edition registration link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdfdK684r5E44PaD6rmw9kXC7AQVr9Unx7EkLb1gfN_QZ1jpQ/viewform
Peter Lancellotti Author extraordinaire: https://www.PeterLancellotti.com https://preview.mailerlite.io/emails/webview/1075092/133689754162038542
Find my books at discounts and subscribe to my newsletter here: https://www.enchantingauthor.com
Donate to Red Cross Hurricane Helene Relief: https://www.redcross.org/about-us/our-work/disaster-relief/hurricane-relief.html