In which the excitement falters for a moment

Things have been happening. I shall sum up.

Celebrations first! I am slightly behind in congratulating my colleague Tim Akers on the tenth anniversary of his first professional sale. In celebration, he's giving away stories! And critiques! And -- but go on over and congratulate him yourself.

* * *

In the way of celebrations -- I am pleased to announce that Surfside and Moon's Honor are now available at Smashwords. Technical Details ought to be available by the end of next week.

Regarding the above, please note!

The only flavor of file available from Smashwords, for Surfside, Moon's Honor, and (coming soon) Technical Details is EPUB. This is because converting into All! The! Formats! requires a specially-tuned .doc file that I am incapable of producing. (As a further note, I am also incapable of producing the EPUB files; those conversions have happened through the goodwill and expertise of Roseanne Girton, who, in addition to being proficient in these matters, is a saint.)

I do apologize to those folks who want to read their books in their special format, but that's just not possible with these books, from where I'm sitting. All of our eChapbooks are DRM-free and can be read on a variety of ereading apps (and your Nook). Thank you for understanding.

* * *

Today's mail brought several pleasant surprises, including a new bag that is Significantly Smaller than the red backpack, and which will hopefully curb my tendency to carry All The Things, All The Time.

Also in today's mail was the last check from Audible Author Services. This was a nice little program where authors were paid one thin dollar for everyone of their audiobooks purchased from Audible, via quarterly checks. We've sold something over 7,000 audiobooks in the last year, which is nice to know for reasons other than those having to do with dollar bills, though of course dollar bills are very nice of themselves.

I'm going to miss this program.

* * *

On the outgoing side of the page, signed bookplates are speeding on the Wings of Eddie to Forbidden Planet in London. Which reminds me to say that we received bookplates to sign, yesterday.

* * *

That gets us more or less caught up, I think. I did spend a good chunk of the week changing out my head, which isn't really as much fun as you'd think. The time involved made me even happier that I didn't say, "Oh, sure, we'll just write a Liaden novel in-between the two Carousel books" -- because omighod, whiplash.

On the other hand, if I hadn't written two Carousel books back-to-back (and then two short stories based in the same universe), my head might not have gotten Quite. So. Stuck. I don't know how my colleagues who have several series going simultaneously do it, frankly.

All of which reminds me to say that...

I started writing a novel.

So! How was your week?

* * *

Progress on One of Five

2,398/100,000 OR 2.4% complete

"Is there some trouble?" Luken asked her, and almost she sighed again. Such a sweet man, he couldn't be any more attentive to her if she was paying him. The fact that she wasn't paying him had the power to surprise her, as did the notion she held of him, as a friend.

But, there, she'd left the man without his answer, and she'd already seen what he was capable of, when he decided that something needed fixing.

So, she smiled at him, and shook her head.

"No trouble. More like I haven't had enough breakfast to weigh me down to ground, yet." She broke a roll onto her plate, and reached for the jam pot.

"What were you dreaming, then?" he asked, spoon arrested over his cereal bowl, his eyes on her face.

#SFWAPro