I’m happy to welcome back award-winning author Kathy Bryson. Today, Kathy shares her evolving second act and Feeling Lucky, Book One of the Fayetteville Fairies Series.
Here’s Kathy!
Act Two, Scene One of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer’s Night Dream was the catalyst for my book Feeling Lucky. And Act Two, Scene One is probably a good way to describe where I was in my life and career when I wrote Feeling Lucky. I’d left corporate America and moved to teaching which left me time to write. But six years later, that second act had moved on to a new scene.
I wasn’t particularly planning to move on, but the thing about new acts is that while they usher in change, they don’t stay put. They keep changing. By the time my publishing contract ended, my second act had moved on to a new job, a cross country move, and the loss of two close family members. I gave myself permission to slow down, but that writing break was stretching into its second-year.
So why take on relaunching a book in the middle of that much change? Well, re-reading the book was wonderfully refreshing. I really enjoyed revisiting a story that I had enjoyed writing even though, yes, I still found typos and other errors! And after six years, you can see awkward spots and undeveloped places that you missed the first time around. Time is wonderful for editing, and it was just too tempting to do a little polishing now that I had more writing experience.
The part that was the most fun was creating new covers. After six years of pitching Feeling Lucky, I’d gotten a really clear picture of where the premise needed clarifying to readers. So, I had the great good fortune of finding and working with Dina Arakcheeva through Upwork.com to draw that exact picture. And they came out gorgeous!
The other factor that played into this decision was how much the industry has changed in six years. Amazon is still a big player, but there’s also iBook, Nook, Kobo and many other e-book distributors including Overdrive and Scribd for libraries. There are also many overseas distributors and easy ways to access them through services like Smashwords and Draft2Digital. Going wide is a personal decision and a fair amount of work, but if you’ve built up a selection of books, it can bring attention to your whole collection. You can also experiment with placing your book in new categories or trying out new keywords and phrases. And with new channels, you might reach new readers, bloggers, and reviewers!
Ultimately revisiting my book was very regenerating. It got polished, and going through the steps of re-editing and re-releasing helped me get back in the swing of writing regularly. Your second act is usually a little easier than your first because you’ve got some experience, but you still have to cope with change. If you can embrace and use it to create new stories while sharing old favorites, all the better!
About Feeling Lucky
A madcap fantasy of money and magic and making the most of your dreams!
Megan O’Malley was mortified when she got drunk and pinched the bandleader’s ass at a cousin’s wedding. But she was astonished when he turned out to be a leprechaun! Seems they’re not the little, green men of fairytales after all. They just say that because they like a good joke and what better way to hide the gold? Oh, that bit’s true – as is the part about not sharing.
Fergus O’Reilly cannot figure out what he did to upset the Queen of the Fairies. He was playing a wedding when a drunken lady pinched his ass and the Queen declared him caught. Now he’s broke, homeless, and hustling to stop the lovely lady with the wandering fingers from spending his money!
Available at your favorite online retailer – https://books2read.com/u/3kvq9W
In Feeling Lucky, we meet a different kind of leprechaun–a sexy one! And in an inebriated state, Megan O’Malley cannot resist pinching his attractive buttock. Having inadvertently caught the leprechaun, Megan must now deal with the unexpected consequences: an inheritance of five million dollars and an angry, money-obsessed Fergus O’Reilly camped on her sofa. What follows is a contemporary fantasy, reminiscent of William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Kathy Bryson has written a delightful tale filled with witty dialogue, romantic tension and enough plot twists to keep you reading well into the night.
Enjoy!
About the Author
Kathy Bryson is the award-winning author of tongue-in-cheek fantasy that ranges from leprechauns who play the stock market to zombies who hang out with and harangue med students. She’d like to say she’s climbed tall mountains, rappelled off cliffs, and saved small children, but actually she tends to curl up and read, is a life-long advocate of Ben & Jerry’s, and caters to 2 spoiled cats. She works regularly with student writing, so she can claim to have saved a few term papers.
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