Tag Archives: young adult

FINAL CHAPTER of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

August 9, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 41, chapter forty-one, dance, fantasy, final chapter, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, wattpad, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

Illustratoin courtesy of Ally Grosvenor.

The final chapter of The Gold in the Dark is finally out, with the last, brilliant chapter illustration courtesy of Ally Grosvenor! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad. It’s hard to believe that all the chapters are finally posted–it’s been a very long time coming! Oddly enough, I received another offer a week or so ago to sign a contract for the book with another one of these Wattpad competitors, this one run by Chinese corporate giant Tencent. A Google search quickly helped me decide not to sign, but it’s funny that that’s the second offer I’ve received for the book in one month. I must be on a list somewhere. Rest assured that, at least for the time being, The Gold in the Dark is going to remain absolutely free. In fact, I’m putting together the ebook edition right now with the plan to release it for free in the next week on Kindle, Kobo, and all the other usual suspects.

As for what else is going on in my life–well, I will be honest and say that this past week has been very difficult for me personally. I had to put my dog down, which was incredibly hard. That was then followed a few days later by Tropical Storm Isaias, which knocked out our power for fifty-something hours.

However, there have been some happy moments as well. I learned that Specter is a semi-finalist for the BBNYA 2020 Awards, and in my senseless quest to read all the Beauty and the Beast retellings I’ve discovered a new-to-me indie author who is just fantastic called Katherine Macdonald. Check out her book The Rose and the Thorn–I can’t recommend it highly enough!

With the last chapter of The Gold in the Dark now posted, let’s talk a little bit about the state of this blog. Umm… I’ll just say it: updating the blog in the wake of COVID-19 has been challenging, to say the least. I love blogging when I do it, but I haven’t managed to get into a proper routine of it while working from home. But I really don’t want to stop blogging, so my immediate goal for the rest of this month is to fix that. I want Short Tuesday to be a thing again. I want to post reviews again, and fun blog posts, and bookish thoughts… So I’m going to be pulling out all stops to meet that goal.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy the final chapter. Or, if you’ve been waiting for the whole book to be posted before jumping in, get started with Chapter One right here. ❤

Chapter Forty of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

July 26, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 40, chapter forty, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, wattpad, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The fortieth chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

There’s only one more chapter of The Gold in the Dark to go after this week! Like I mentioned a few weeks ago, I’ve been spending a bit of time thinking about what I want to do with the book after all the chapters have been posted. One really interesting thing that happened a few days ago was that I was actually approached by a competitor to Wattpad, asking if I’d be willing to sign a contract with them to have the book on their service. The indie author in me balked at signing away rights to the book (including not only the ebook rights, but also hardback, print-on-demand, game rights, etc.), and the company’s business model didn’t seem like it would prove successful in the long term, so I didn’t sign–but still, it was a nice ego boost. 🙂 I figure even if I don’t have plans to make money on this book right now, I still want to have full control over the book in the event that the book does prove valuable to me sometime in the future.

I’m still hard at work on Beauty and the Beast and Aliens. We’re at the 70k mark, and… somehow there’s still a lot to go. Ah well, such is life. It will be out sometime, lol.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Forty. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Nine of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

July 12, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 39, chapter thirty-nine, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

Illustration courtesy of Ally Grosvenor.

The thirty-ninth chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

I’m going to keep it very quick this week! Not much has changed–I’m (still) chugging away at my WIP, and the story just seems to grow and grow and grow. I’d initially envisioned this project as a short book–no longer! Now I’m wondering if it might come in close to 90k, or maybe even higher. I’m also starting to get that writer fear that nobody’s going to like it–too long, too weird, too rambling, not enough plot. Specter wasn’t a book where I had that concern, since it so related to the Stranger Things zeitgeist and had tons of forward plot momentum, but my untitled problem child is turning out very different from Specter.

Oh well. Time will tell, and at least I’m proud of it. It definitely felt like one of those stories that needed to be told, as opposed to the random story ideas you can get that might not be deserving of a full book treatment.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Nine. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Eight of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

June 28, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 38, chapter thirty-eight, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-eighth chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

Well, it’s the same old story these past two weeks–I’m still working hard on my problem child WIP, Beauty and the Beast and Aliens. It’s the type of story where I’m forever realizing that there’s something else I need to add to the narrative, so I go back and do that… then realize there’s something else I missed too… Rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat. Is this an exhausting way to write? Yes, but it’s just the way I work, and on the positive side of things, this way of working normally means that my first draft are normally quite clean and don’t require major changes. So let’s cross our fingers and hope that this WIP needs minimal editing.

The Gold in the Dark is also in the home stretch of having all chapters posted! This has been a real marathon, not least for Ally, my illustrator extraordinaire. I’ve been trying to think of what I want to do with the book once it’s fully illustrated and posted. I definitely don’t want to sell the book for money, since its story arc demands a sequel and it doesn’t have one yet. I’m not sure if I will complete a sequel since I’m pretty devoted to other projects right now, but I do have about 30,000 words of one done, maybe more… It’s been a while since I took a look at the Scrivener file.

(I’m also kind of thinking that it makes a lot of sense to get the sequel done and hopefully bring the story to a close so that I could have a complete series and a reader magnet… But the idea of doing that is a little exhausting, so we’ll place that on the back burner for now. :P)

But to go back to the original question about what to do with The Gold in the Dark in the here and now… well, it would be nice to have it available in mobi/epub format and also to get it listed on Goodreads. Kindle Unlimited is out of the question, since that would mean I would have to pull it down from my website and Wattpad, so I’m considering offering it as a free download on Amazon. Amazon technically doesn’t allow authors to list books as free, but there’s a workaround where you can list the book as free on other marketplaces and wait for Amazon to price-match (which they will eventually). So that seems like the best option right now.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Eight. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Seven of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

June 14, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 37, chapter thirty-seven, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-seventh chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

Not much is different these last few weeks–I’ve just been working more on my WIP. The plot and character realizations are coming fast and furious now; I love that happy stage when everything seem to start coming together into a cohesive story. Is there a lot of editing to do? Yes. Is it going to be a good book in the end? Also yes, I think.

I know my posting on the blog has been (extremely) scarce–I’m okay with that, as long as I’m drafting. I miss doing reviews, but I know I’ll get back into them again once I’m done drafting. Lord knows I have thoughts aplenty about the books that I read, but one only has so much capacity for creative attention, and I feel like I’m putting all of it where it counts most, which is in finishing my next book. So no excuses from me–I’ll settle back into blogging soon enough.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Seven. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Six of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

May 31, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 36, chapter thirty-six, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-sixth chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

I’m so happy that these past two weeks I’ve been continuing to plug away at my WIP. I’ve reached the 60k mark, but somehow feel there’s so much more to go. (!!!) I can’t believe that I once thought this would be a short book; it seems like it’s turning out to be anything but. One thing that’s been a big help to me creativity-wise has been the easing of quarantine here in Connecticut. I can’t go write in coffee shops or at the library yet (even Barnes & Noble is only doing curb-side pick-up), but I’ve been going to my writer friend’s house a few times each week so that we can write together. We’ve made Zoom calls work these past few months, but it’s such a nicer experience to be together in person. ❤

Another notable thing that happened recently is that I found another writer who did a take on a Beauty and the Beast retelling with an alien framework! Or, at least, Amanda Milo’s novella Contaminated claims to be a retelling of the classic fairytale; I did think that claim was a bit looser than most.

It can be a bit alarming as an author to hear that another book has a seemingly similar premise to your own. It stands to reason that I’m not the first one to think that an alien-human romance is ripe for a Beauty and the Beast take (the idea is kind of obvious if you think about it), but I hadn’t been able to find one on the market until now. Fortunately it turns out that Contaminated, while a very cute story, isn’t at all like my WIP. And that’s the thing: a similar premise approached by two different writers is bound to end up being different, because every writer brings their own creative lens and background to the table. That’s why my writer friend wasn’t at all concerned when she told me her plans to write a cozy cat shifter book–and then she encouraged me to write my own as well when I told her it was one of the best ideas I’d ever heard. Here’s something else to consider: if a reader really likes a book, they seek out other books that will scratch that same itch. So it can actually be a good thing if your book has some similar elements to other works, because readers are often on the hunt for more of the same. How many times have I picked up a book hoping it will be like my beloved Sookie Stackhouse books? The answer is a lot.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Six. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Five of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

May 17, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 35, chapter thirty-five, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-fifth chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

Not much different these past few weeks, though I did finally get out a new Short Tuesday! It’s not much, but I’m considering it a win. I have another few blog posts planned for this coming week as well. Work-wise our season is finally slowing down again, so I’m hopeful that I’ll have more energy to devote creatively. I’m also going to be working from home until at least July, which I think will also be helpful in terms of creative output? Hard to say, since the wrecking of my normal schedule and routine due to COVID-19 has really hampered writing for me; I know a lot of other authors feel similarly. Even Mark Dawson has been saying that he’s lucky to get in just a few hours a day right now.

In terms of other small victories, I’m also reading more than I have been–I was in a bit of a slump through April, but I’ve finally broken through that and now feel very motivated to read… which is always great for my general creativity as well. I’ve been loving the Beauty and the Beast retellings by Robin McKinley. (She has two.) Just such a pleasure to read fiction by an author who really knows what she’s doing.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Five. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Four of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

May 3, 2020Uncategorizedchapter 34, chapter thirty-four, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-fourth chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

It’s been another one of those two week periods with not really anything happening on the blog. 😦 I’ve been writing my WIP and reading, but motivation for blogging has been low for me, both due to the quarantine and the fact that it’s crunch time at my job. I know I’ll get back into the swing of things, but it’s just not happening right now. I think I’ll try to get a Short Tuesday post up this week; that would be a nice, achievable victory. I also have an ARC review to write, so maybe I’ll try to get that out for Thursday or Sunday.

But really, I’m just happy that I’m making progress on my WIP. This has been a slow book from the start, and I’ll definitely be happy to be done with it! (And let’s hope that day comes sooner rather than later!!) I’m not sure what I’ll be working on once I finish–there are a couple possibilities. I might swing right into a sequel for Beauty and the Beast and Aliens, since I can see the potential of this book developing into a longer series… or I might work on a different sci-fi retelling… or maybe even a cat shifter cozy that’s been bouncing around my mind for the last month and a half or so. That idea was gifted to me by one of my writer friends–thanks, Dawn. 🙂

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here, and I will try my absolute hardest to see you all again on Tuesday!!! Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Four. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Three of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

April 19, 2020Uncategorizedcamp nano, camp nanowrimo, chapter 33, chapter thirty-three, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-third chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

In writing news, Camp NaNo is going… okay. I’ve definitely been adding words to my manuscript–not as many as I’d like, but what’s new? 😉 I’m continuing to do Zoom dates with my writing buddies, which has been really fun. And I’ve added a new character to my story; this book has a very small cast thus far, so it’s always nice to add someone new into the mix.

I thought it might be fun this week to give some shout-outs to a few new bookish things! The first is Dabble, a writing service that I think I’ve mentioned before once or twice. I’ve been drafting on Dabble for the past nine months or so, and I really enjoy it; it has a similar layout to Scrivener, but everything syncs to the cloud and you can write from a browser if you want to, so that it’s easy to write from multiple computers. What’s nice is that they’ve added mobile support just a few days ago! I’m sure other writers out there will relate to how it can be really annoying to get an idea for your book while you’re out and about and not have anywhere to write it down–I normally text myself in those situations, but now I can just use the app to jot the idea down in my actual story document. Hurrah!!!

I also want to shout out Self Publishing Formula, which is Mark Dawson’s company that offers courses and webinars for indie authors, as well as an excellent podcast. Most indies probably know Mark Dawson; he’s a giant in the industry. Anyway, his company has been running lots of promos on courses for indie authors due to COVID-19, and now they’re working on a BookBub competitor called Hello Books. It’s not up and running yet, but you can get on a waitlist. Given Mark Dawson’s success in the industry, this seems like an interesting opportunity to grow your list and get exposure.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Three. ❤

Chapter Thirty-Two of The Gold in the Dark and a Writing Update!

April 5, 2020Uncategorizedcamp nano, camp nanowrimo, chapter 32, chapter thirty-two, dance, fantasy, katie j gallagher, katie jane gallagher, new chapter, serial, the gold in the dark, update, writing update, YA, young adultKatie Jane Gallagher

The thirty-second chapter of The Gold in the Dark is out! New chapters, complete with brilliant chapter illustrations courtesy of Ally Grosvenor, release every other Sunday at 11 AM EST (and many times earlier)! You can get started on the series with Chapter One right here or on Wattpad.

These past few weeks I’ve really upped my word count on my Beauty and the Beast and Aliens WIP–I’m finally feeling like I’m making some progress story-wise! We’re also officially past that interminable kayaking scene. 😛 A lot of the progress I’ve made is down to writing with friends virtually, since, you know, social distancing. I’ve been doing a lot of Zoom sessions with writing buddies, sometimes even multiple times a day. Over the years, I’ve found that my most effective habit for getting words in is to write with friends–we usually rotate coffee shops or sometimes write at each other’s houses, about one to three times a week for two hours or so. These are not critique sessions; it’s just butt-in-chair time with other people. So I’ve been happy to discover that virtual writing sessions are about as effective for me as in-person sessions, and it’s nice to be keeping up with all my writing friends as well.

Something that’s been another small help to me is Camp NaNoWriMo. A lot of people know about NaNo, but not necessarily about the “camps” that take place during April and July. In the camps, you get to pick your word count and you write in virtual “cabins” with other writers, to help with accountability. This year’s Camp NaNo is an afterthought for NaNoWriMo as a company, in my opinion; with the gutting of the NaNo website last year, it seems that there’s hardly any support for camp this year in terms of online functionality. As far as I can tell, there’s no way to be sorted into cabins; you have to join writing groups yourself in the forum. There also doesn’t appear to be any fun new graphics or merch for this year’s camp, different from years in the past where each camp had its own branding. I’m not really sure where NaNo is at as a company (they’re a 501(c)(3)), but I wish they had made camp a bigger priority than it seems to be. Nevertheless, I’m in a couple cabins, and we’ve been using Discord for chatting while we’re getting words in. So it’s been kinda fun… but also a letdown. Anyone else doing Camp NaNo? I’d be curious to hear other people’s opinions about the changes NaNo is making as a company.

Anyway, I’m going to wrap it up here. Have a great (and healthy) rest of your weekend, and enjoy Chapter Thirty-Two. ❤