Category: Anna’s Thoughts

wasn’t great. For me, it was a year of breakdowns and things beyond my control. Sure, there was a lucky break or 2, 3 vacations, and more than a couple of warm fuzzy moments with other living beings… but the bulk of it mostly just left me frazzled. It didn’t help that I had stupidly laid out challenging career/financial goals for myself at the beginning of the year, which meant I set myself up for year-long sensations of failure when the chaos of the universe demanded more from me than I had visualised myself giving.

This year, I’m not going to be that guy. The theme now is to become the kind of person who never gets frazzled or angry. Like that girl with the bloodied nose, bruised eye and scratched limbs who never appears bothered by anything you might do. Career/financial goals are still important, but no longer the most important. This year, I am making space for fun and chaos.

2024, let’s do this.

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Working on: Business #2 and Business #3 which have been on some kinda roll since the beginning of the year for reasons I don’t fully understand. Unfortunately, due to that, I’ve got to pause work on Those Strange Women #4 for a bit to roll with the rolls while they still do roll, ya know? I’ll resume Those Strange Women #4 as soon as I can work out how to fit in some regular writing time in between. 

Playing: Judgement (PS4). Universal Studios’ Halloween Horror Nights!

Reading/Read: Travel guides. When the world began to reopen, my partner developed a passion for revenge travel and has been dragging me along since. (To the dismay of our very beloved and most precious will-always-be-my-baby fur baby to whom I am giving loving mushy faces to as I type this.) (But hey, we got to eat Racoon City Police Department Emergency Rations!) Also read: Empire of Pain—The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty, A Woman In Berlin, Nazi Wives, The Making of Second Life—Notes from the New World. 

Watching/Watched: Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (loved it before, was so happy to see it available on the flight I was on last week). Superintelligence. A whole bunch of true crime flicks on Netflix like the Most Hated Man on the Internet; Our Father; Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey; etc. Little Women (the Kpop version). The Lost City. Bullet Train. That cheesy set-in-Bali comedy starring Julia Roberts and George Clooney. Those are just what I remember. There’s prolly much more but yea, doesn’t really matter at the moment. Also watched: Uncensored Itaewon crush videos. (Yeah 🙁 )

Thinking a lot about: Business #2’s growth. Business #3’s projects. How is it the year is already coming to an end? And oh man, did I just totally forget about my new year’s resolution to play the IHL Reading Challenge and Jae’s Sapphic Book Bingo challenge? (Yep, I think I did.)

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Working on: Those Strange Women #4. Business #2. Business #3. 

Playing: Siberia 3. SimCity 2000. 

Reading/Read: Acts of Contrition by Elena Graf. Research for Those Strange Women #4. My new year resolution to do both TB and Jae’s lesfic challenges has already been forgotten. 

Watching/Watched: You Me Her, Death On The Nile, Uncharted the movie, Love On The Spectrum, The Principles of Pleasure, Jane The Virgin (leslove parts only, and I love Sin Rostro), Mindhunter (leslove parts only), Tinder Swindler, Fyre Festival, Snowpiercer, I cannot remember what else. 

Thinking a lot about: Those Strange Women #4. Business #2’s project. Business #3’s projects. That seaside vacation I may be going on in June. Nothing else. I’m quite a boring workaholic these days. 

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Last year, my choice of hobby was wandering the land aimlessly with my partner and lounging lazily with our pet. This year, I’m going to give my free time more structure and play both the IHL Reading Challenge and Jae’s Sapphic Book Bingo during it so that… you know, achieve something, connect with new people, yada yada. 

Since 2022 started, I’ve read:

• Breaking Character by Lee Winter (Fake Relationship bingo box / challenge category)

Faltering by Jennifer Lyndon (POC character bingo box / challenge category)

Next I’ll read either The Delicate Things We Make by Milena McKay or Acts of Contrition by Elena Graf (for the Age Gap challenge category). I’ll post more about this new hobby of mine here (and I suppose reveal my taste in books). Lemme know if you’re playing too.  

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Last year, I set 3 goals for myself but met only 2. This year, I set myself 8 goals… one of them being “Finish and Publish Those Strange Women #4”. So off to work we go…

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So I saw some readers wondering/asking if I’ll finish the Those Strange Women series. Short Answer: Hell yes. Long Answer: It will take a while because firstly, I’m writing the last 3 books all at one go for efficiency so this phase will take 3x longer than normal. Secondly, because book writing doesn’t pay the bills (for me at least, lemme know if you have tips and tricks to turn that around), I have 2 other businesses I work on to stay fed and grow my portfolio of stocks with so book writing is something I do a little bit at a time, slowly but surely. But, as someone coming from a place that treats LGBT content and honest expression like disease, I swear I will always treasure writing and publishing books online and I promise you I will finish Those Strange Women if it’s the last thing I do. So, everybody, please grab a magazine and a disposable cup and I’ll call your number when it’s time to read. Happy Holidays!

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Mega project is done and now in the ongoing forever stage. I have vacay-ed and rested. And this week, I resume work on Those Strange Women #4… by first re-reading Books 1-3 all over again because even the most excited of authors can forget what they once wrote (old age is going to be so fun).

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Hello! It’s been a long while, i think, i don’t know, for me, this year has been whizzing by at the speed of light because i have been building something mega for my other business and behind in deadlines and scrambling to get it done while fending interrogations about when on earth it’s going to get done. But then I realised you might think Covid-19 got me or something (i think that a lot these days) so here i am to report that I’m safe and well and still somewhere out there making fun stuff for the world. 

In other news, i am now vaccinated against Covid! First jab, my arm hurt for about a week and I developed a mild fever 24h in that lasted for 12h. Second jab, my arm hurt for 36h only but 12h in, I got really sick with a high fever, crazy full body aches, breathlessness, chest pains and a strong desire to vomit which lasted for a full day and slightly more. 12 days after my second jab, i developed BPPV which lasted 3 weeks and although the authorities won’t admit it, I’m pretty sure it is a consequence of the jab because I’ve never had BPPV before this and i don’t believe that much of life can be made of coincidences. But, all that’s over now and i’m back to what I was before, i think. In any case, I’ve no regrets getting the jabs because where i am, you can no longer enter any public or commercial establishment without being vaccinated so my not-a-nurse partner would have likely vaccinated me in my sleep with vaccines from a dodgy ebay-ripoff just so we could go out to dinner. 

Okay that’s all the jokes from me today because i have to go right back to that all-encompassing project which is really all i do these days but hopefully the next time i say hi, it’ll be done and I’ll be on a short vacation at last, getting ready to charge ahead with my quarter-done Those Strange Women #4 instead. Take care you and have many nice days ahead!

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Working on: Those Strange Women #4. And also that major project for my other business that I was supposed to have finished last month—but have not… 

Playing: Resident Evil Village, Hitman 3, Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, Until Dawn

Reading/Read: The Story of the Human Body, The Nazi Doctors, The Private Lives of the Auschwitz SS, Anthro-vision

Watching/Watched: Fear Street Part 1, Snowpiercer, A Tale of Two Sisters (love this!), Year Million, Origins, Black Summer, Eli, Night Stalker, The Ripper, I’m sure there’s more but you know, movies come movies go… 

Thinking a lot about: Which vaccine to get? Will mRNA give me cancer in a decade? How to work faster? How to keep your brain sharp? Is having not had a long holiday type of break since 2020 burning me out? Should I just take two weeks off to do absolutely nothing to recharge? Why do I keep getting migraines? Are you sure mRNA won’t give us all cancer?

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The Woman Who Was Normal (Those Strange Women #4) is next (those who have been asking for it: yep heard you, on it). But before that I’m going to release a book that isn’t like my other books… isn’t something I enjoyed writing or want to read. This book isn’t even fiction and honestly I don’t even feel like talking about it.

But release it I must, because it‘ll do more out in the world than in my head (I think, and hope). Also because I’ve been working on it since 2018 and I really just want to be done with it. 

Tell you more about it next week…

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Working on: Notes On Parental Estrangement (non-fiction) 

Playing: Resident Evil 3 2020, Bitlife, Until Dawn, Monopoly

Reading/Read: Keep Hold by Michelle Grubb, Elements of Game Design by Robert Zubek, The Woman Who Made Me Feel Strange & The Woman Who Pretended To Love Men by myself, Mengele: The Complete Story by Gerald L. Posner, The Nazi Doctors by Robert Jay Lifton  

Watching/Watched: CNN & Fox News for US election gossip, American Horror Story 1984, The Haunting of Bly Manor, American Murder: The Family Next Door, Sisters Who Make Waves, Start-Up, Wonder Woman 1984, 8 seasons of Wentworth (Ballie! Mallie! Rallie!), History 101, Sex Explained, High Score, probably more than I can’t remember at this particular moment

Thinking a lot about: Work. Being productive. Improving myself. 

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Working on: Snow White and Her Queen 2 (Done. Now crawling through pre-publishing chores. I foresee a Dec 2020 release date.) 

Playing/Played: The Last of Us 2 (terrible, terrible game, despite having lesbian protagonists), Resident Evil 6

Reading/Read: Nothing. Only the news these days. I’m not proud of this.

Watching/Watched: Into The Night. Many Zoom meeting videos. 1 Zoom interactive theatre play. Locked Up (I love Zulema!).

Thinking a lot about: Work. Work. More work. My country’s government is a b*tch when it comes to accepting or even acknowledging LGBTQIA+ matters but they’ve been surprisingly generous throughout COVID-19. So despite the pandemic destroying lives and ruining economies all around the world, my other business has been getting more opportunities than it’s ever had and I’ve been more preoccupied than ever grabbing those while I can. Life is bewildering sometimes.  

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Hullo! It’s been a while! And that’s because ever since my partner began working from home with me, we’ve been having logistical issues, particularly because we share a study, with my work desk right behind hers, and because she’s in a people-centric job role and needs to be on video calls almost all the darned day long. The reason you’re hearing from me now at last though is because I finally decided hopping from iPad to computer 10x a day was no longer sustainable and moved my desktop computer out to the dining table. Yes, you heard that right. Dining table is now my work desk and I can now use it all the livelong day like before without having to shift in and out of the study just so the back of my head won’t be visible during a video call. Phew. Anyway, just want to tell you I’m thrilled as hell to be having 100% access to my computer again and I hope you’re feeling great these days too. And for Robert Jenner and all who might have been biting nails in wait of this—yes, Snow White and Her Queen 2 is almost done. Almost, though not quite yet 😉 Maybe next time I post again, or next next time, I’ll have the big announcement for you. Stay tuned.

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Working on: Snow White and Her Queen 2 (58% done), my cooking skills 

Playing: The Sims 2, Tomb Raider 2013

Reading/Read: Pages For Her by Sylvia Brownrigg

Watching/Watched: Lots of coronavirus news on various local and international channels (thanks cable), Trump: An American Dream

Thinking a lot about: Fresh air and sunshine and how this lockdown/pandemic thing is getting real tiresome.

In other news: LESBIreviewed reviewed The Woman Who Made Me Feel Strange here.

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Hello! How’s everybody doing? Is everybody okay out there (or should I say in there)?

I was sick a few days ago and quite convinced I had the coronavirus but today, it seems the the fever, urge to cough and breathlessness is gone. Was it just a mild case of the coronavirus good old garden-variety influenza? Who knows? Ever since a couple of my neighbours contracted the virus I’ve been too creeped out to leave my apartment. Even to get checked. Especially to get checked.

Anyway, amid all this doom and gloom, I told a funny story over at I Heart Lesfic’s blog. I don’t normally do funny and honestly I am not even sure if I can do funny properly, but after all that’s happened since the beginning of this year, I thought it’ll be good to try.

You can read it here. Lemme know if you laugh. Or don’t. Either way, stay home. And always wash your hands.

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Working on: Snow White and Her Queen 2 (25% done) 

Playing: Hitman 1&2, Death Stranding (kinda gave up halfway because it’s the most tedious game I’ve played in a while)

Reading/Read: Fairytales, Coronavirus News (and nothing much else because I’ve been trying to keep my brain in fairytale narrative mode for Snow White and Her Queen 2, which has already made me miss reading fiction terribly)

Watching/Watched: Gypsy, Crash Landing On You (one about an unrealistically psychopathic romantic partner and the other about unrealistically perfect romantic partner; I binged on the former last weekend, 1+9 hours straight and I’m horrified it ended that way.) 

Thinking a lot about: Washing hands and staying away from people. Why this year seems to be full of bad luck with the coronavirus pandemic killing businesses and travel plans, leaving people stuck at home afraid to be social, and on top of that my 11-year-old hardy computer dying on me. Whether or not to go big on buying stocks now or to hold out lest share prices drop even further. 

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I invited a woman I’d met only less than a month ago back to my apartment to hang out and watch DVDs (this was before the days of Netflix and chill). She had been introduced to me at an underground lesbian party by an acquaintance of mine (and friend of hers) who thought we’d be great together.

At that point, I had just come out of a long period of dating multiple women in an uncommitted manner and she had just ended a 2-year relationship. I told her I was tired of dating and just wanted stability from then on and she told me she had always been a very stable person. 

We spent the rest of the party smoking together and after having to cross a “dangerous” road to purchase cigarettes on the other side, ended up holding hands till we went home. 

When I invited her to my apartment that Valentine’s Day 8 years ago, we’d already gone out a couple of times but I still wasn’t properly sure if she liked me as much as I liked her until… she made very sure I understood that was so. 

We promptly became “girlfriends” after that. 

2 months later, I ended my lease early and moved in with her. 

3 months after that, we bought each other rings, said vows to each other with only our stuffed toys in attendance and swore to be with each other till the end of our days. We began referring to each other as “wife” from then on. 

A year later, I quit smoking. 5 years after me, she quit smoking. 

It is now 8 years after that first Valentine’s Day we spent together and I… despite being the rare lesfic author who enjoys NOT having HEAs at the end of every book… am going to be spending this Valentine’s day with that very same woman.

What this means is that the same could happen for you too. Also that horror writers are indeed always the sweetest people you’ll ever meet in real life 😉 

Happy Valentine’s Day, dear readers. Have a good one.

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Since it’s the season for new resolutions, I thought it might be helpful to mention that Amazon Kindle is not available in my home country. Meaning I cannot buy Amazon Kindle books directly or view my own Kindle titles on Amazon.com (they don’t even appear in search). Nor can banks in my country receive direct payments from Amazon. Nor can foreign currency cheques be processed for cheap.

It’s even worse with iBooks, where all I ever see in the app store is a permanent collection of about 50 free titles from the Dickens era. 

And yet, I’ve been self-publishing and earning from both those platforms for almost 3 years now. 

My point is: Life always finds a way. 

So think bold, dream beyond your boundaries and may you all have a brilliant and very exciting New Year ahead!

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If you didn’t win any Anna Ferrara books in the Women & Words Hootenanny event this year, here’s another chance for you to buy one at a discount: I Heart Lesfic’s Mega New Year Sale where over 100 lesfic authors (including me) do Boxing Day sales from 26-30 Dec. I’m going to busy myself with ingesting the ton of chocolate in my fridge and boiled wine now. See you again next year!

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I’m that kind of person. I like to build, rebuild, and rebuild all over again. It brings me joy the way cleaning brings some people joy. I don’t know why, but here I am, in the midst of doing it, just because. I’ll only be done in a couple of weeks though because I only have a couple of hours every weekend to work on it.

In the meantime, The Woman Who Made Me Feel Strange, the first book in my Those Strange Women series is on sale this week (5-9 Aug) as part of I Heart Lesfic’s new Monthly Sale! $3.99 from now till 9 Aug, along with many other exciting-looking discounted books! Click here to see the sale before it ends!

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Working on: Eritis Mea

Playing: Cordless VR shooters by Zero Latency, The Sims 2

Reading/Read: Unicorn Tears by Jamie Pride, My Warren Buffet Bible by Robert L. Bloch, Oprah by Kitty Kelley, 96 Hours by Georgia Beers

Watching: The Avengers, Avengers Infinity War, Avengers Endgame, Captain America, The Feels, Bao Bao, We Are Gamily, Greta, Hotel Mumbai, a ton of Asian LGBT documentaries on the GagaOOLala app

Thinking a lot about: The game of life. Next moves, next next moves and next next next moves…

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Working on: Eritis Mea

Playing: InstLife (Android), Shadow of the Tomb Raider (PS4)

Reading/Read: 90 Minutes in Heave by Don Piper, The Art of Power by Thich Nhat Hanh, The Eleventh Day by Anthony Summers, Toxic Parents by Susan Forward, The Emotionally Absent Mother by Jasmine Lee Cori, The Art of Disappearing by Ajahn Brahm, The Teaching of Buddha by ? (was a free book I got from a hotel room in Myanmar), Grieving the Loss of a Parent by Silas Henderson, The New Testament by ? (was a book on a shelf at the hospice my mum was warded at). 

Thinking a lot about: Business building, quitting coffee, religion, life.

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I can tell because my dreams have changed and my thoughts have gone back to being the ones I used to have before everything went to hell. I think I’ll resume writing Eritis Mea tomorrow. I’m quite looking forward to it really. In the meantime, I’ve been updating my Long List of Lesbians on and off. Have you noticed? Talk again soon.

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to do a Q&A for Women and Words:
https://womenwords.org/2019/01/27/author-qa-with-anna-ferrara/
Going back into hiding now. Later.

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Working on: Eritis Mea

Playing: Far Cry 5 (PS4), Daisy Chain’s Superstar (DOS), haunted houses (in October)

Reading/Recently Read: The Woman In Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware, The Fall Girl by T.B. Markinson, The Morning After by Jae, Psychology Made Simple by Alison Thomas-Cottingham, The Spiral Notebook by Stephen Singular, The Psychology of Romantic Love by Nathaniel Branden, A Dark Night in Aurora by Dr. William H. Reid

Thinking a lot about: How differently the same story can be perceived by different people, how life is constant hardship, the workflow for the Long List of Lesbians, all sorts of stuff related to my other business.

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So, I’ve this thing where I like to build and tweak and build and tweak and tweak and tweak and tweak things to perfection, and recently I did it to Annaferrarabooks.com too… So, if you have the time, please poke around my self-made upgrade. And yes, I did it myself because I really do have this thing for building things from scratch. Brands, businesses, rooms, stories, systems… Once I get started I just can’t stop… Anyway…

What’s New:

• More content is now directly visible on the main page.
• You can now read all book blurbs from the main page.
• Latest blog posts are also on the main page.
• Upcoming book is also on the main page.
• Privacy policy and terms of use now on the main page.
• Blog page has been revamped.
• Contact page now has social media links and the new book subscription box within it too.
• About page has been rewritten as a Q&A.
• I have a new feature called the Long List of Lesbians on it now.
• I now have ads on the site. (Well, capitalism… rising cost of living… millennial… no retirement in sight… sigh.)

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I don’t write them because I enjoy seeing them happen. Rather, I write them because I have seen them happen and don’t quite know how to discuss them other than through fiction. It’s not quite the same thing. Also, the opinions of my characters do not reflect my own.

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Working on: The Woman Who Tried To Be Normal
Playing: This War Of Mine (again)
Reading: S by Koji Suzuki (author of The Ring), Area 51 by Annie Jacobsen, NeuroTribes by Steve Silberman
Watched: The Meg (cos Ruby Rose!), Disobedience (Rachel Weisz + Rachel McAdams = very hot), Titanic, A Quiet Place
Thinking a lot about: The revamp of my other business, the story I’m going to write after Those Strange Women 3 and its format, how to improve my typing speed.

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14 months. That’s how long it took me. I’m not exactly a marketing genius though, so maybe you could get it done faster.

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Working on: The Woman Who Tried To Be Normal
Playing: Various real-life escape rooms
Reading: Dolly by Susan Hill, When Work Doesn’t Work Anymore by Elizabeth Perle McKenna, Women Aviators by Karen Bush Gibson.
Thinking a lot about: Who I want to be now that I’m one year older. How much life resembles a game. How to fit all the things I want to do into the limited time I have.

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Working on: The Woman Who Tried To Be Normal
Playing: Resident Evil 6 (PS4)
Reading: Memory Man by David Baldacci & Under The Influence by James Milam and Katherine Ketcham
Thinking a lot about: How to make more money? How to revamp my other business? If writing lesfic novels can really be my whole, sole purpose in life?

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My wife and I finished A Way Out (PS4 version) over the weekend and we both loved it since, for once, we actually got to play together, at the same time, on the same TV, while sharing snacks and mudshakes. The only other time we got to play that way was with Resident Evil Revelations II—months or maybe even years ago. Frankly, I miss how you could buy a game without having to check if multiplayer includes local multiplayer. Console technology may have gone to the moon since the 90s but it left out the best part—the part where two players could always play together on the same console right out the box. I don’t care about playing multiplayer with a ton of people from all over the world or about ‘sharing’ my gameplay or ‘trophies’ with ‘friends’; I just want to play with the person next to me, on the same TV, using the same console. Why is that so hard these days?

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Dear annaferrarabooks.wordpress.com, thanks for having been there for me when I first started publishing books, when I hadn’t sold enough books for a domain of my own. You will always be in my heart and somewhere in cyberspace. Lots of love, Anna Ferrara (who, from this day on, will blog only at annaferrarabooks.com)

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Hello, world!

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At last! After weeks of tweaking and troubleshooting, sandbox testing and deliberating all the things I wouldn’t even be thinking about otherwise, I finally got this website done and up! New and improved features: 1) You can now buy ebooks directly from annaferrarabooks.com. 2) I have, at last, a mailing list sign up widget like everybody else. 3) Bye awkward, boxy WordPress ads. 4) Hello stylish, monotone, ad-free interface! What I haven’t quite figured out is how to port followers and likes from the old blog into this one or how to get the WordPress follow or like button appearing properly, but, you know what, the weekend is coming up so I’m done for now. It’s beautiful as it is and it works great so I really hope you’ll take a look around and maybe play with what I made.

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1. Write more books.
2. Read more books.
3. Sell more books.
4. Get a proper website for my books.
5. Spend lots of time with my loved ones.
6. Get regular exercise, sunlight and fresh air.
7. Travel some.

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Still writing my second book, building worlds and relationships that aren’t in the least ordinary. Hope you’re living as courageously as me and my new characters are.

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“I create things out of boredom with reality.” That’s what Patricia Highsmith wrote in Plotting and Writing Suspense Fiction. Made me realise, me too.

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So I read my own book last weekend and found to my horror, typos. Yes. Obviously I freaked and wallowed in shame for days but good news is, amendments have been made along with a few other editorial and aesthetic improvements. So, if you bought Snow White and Her Queen before 1 June 2017, please do download the updated version for future reading or keeps. I  apologise for the imperfection with all my heart and pray you enjoyed the story anyway. The production process has since been refined so Book 2’s gonna be better from the get-go for sure. By the time Book 3 rolls out, I’m certain I’m gonna be so pro. Thanks for reading.

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Nobody in particular. Just your average woman like every other average woman out there. If you saw me at my day job, you’d see I have long hair, wear make up, smile when I’m supposed to. I say all the appropriate things. I accessorise. I wear womanly shoes, bracelets, chiffon. There is nothing about my physicality that suggests I am anything but heteronormal. If you – an acquaintance, a colleague, a relative, a male friend, an old friend from school – ask me why I’m not married yet, I might just tell you it’s because I haven’t found the right guy. If you’re lucky enough to be a perfect stranger, I might even tell you that I am already married and have been for a good few years now. Because that is just the type of person I truly am.

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