News, Updates, and Minor (Major) Ramblings

It's November, which means food and it's also the point in the year where everyone at work starts disappearing for holiday festivities. I cannot wait for Turkey Day. The PWHL also returns this month, so you all need to mentally prepare for me to talk about hockey in future posts until about June or July. New to the blog, TL:DR . Click the link and you'll jump to a summary of the blog post. Not AI-generated. Just me calling out the important things in the post.  I don't plan for this to be a long post, just trying to get back into the habit of posting. Still working on  Grisly Politics . I've only been able to work on this book in the mornings on the weekends due to the course I'm taking and work, but once I finish my course in the next week or so, I'll be able to dedicate more time to it. I'm actually getting close to the first inciting incident of the book. If you know me, I like to have a couple or a few of those depending on the book. This is excludi...

This post has gone through multiple iterations since I've come back from the GCLS conference back in July, and it's only because I'll think of something while typing, and I either get distracted or hold off on posting because my idea is a good one, thinking I would use the post to announce it because I'm always working on something. Usually that's not the case, but this time, I have a couple of things to announce lol. Uh...since this is going to be a recap of my summer pretty much I'll put this under a cut so it's not a freakishly long post. I hope you all had an enjoyable summer, and I hope the next few months are a complete nightmare. Onto the good stuff!

Another blog post yay!!!! I've been bitten by the author/publisher bug, and I'm diving head first back into publishing. This was brought on by my recent therapy session and re-reading the fucking 2nd  Detective Miller  book. It really is such a great read. Like what Dax and Eliza go through is just....everything. I want to talk more about it, but I also don't want to give too much away. Here, let's see if I can write out a horrible, on-the-fly, blurb for it. If there were two things Detective Eliza Miller can count on,the first would be murder happening in the city, and the second would be her inability to have a stable relationship. Having just wrapped the case of a councilwoman with mayoral aspirations, Eliza wanted to spend an inordinate amount of time with her boyfriend, Dax Collins, and recover from spending every waking moment of the last week in trying to get justice for the councilwoman. Unfortunately, her big mouth and the city had other plans for her. In the m...

It has been a while. I know it seems like I've vanished off the face of the Earth, but like most USians, I had a hard time processing the election, and that coupled with my normal depression and some family things, made existence painful. Now with the coming of Spring, well, Summer at this point, and a move, I'm hoping I'll be able to get back into the writing and publishing game. Before I jump into what this post is truly about, I wanted to say I went to Queers and Quills over the Memorial Day weekend, and it was an interesting event to be at since the only writer events I've been to has been GCLS, which is about sapphic books and the authors that write them, who are primarily women identifying folx. So, going to an event where all of the queer community represented was interesting, but also a little refreshing. The queer community isn't a monolith, but sometimes we fall into the pit of putting ourselves in cliques, especially now and in the US. You can see it in t...

No blog post or newsletter in August. Or maybe there was a newsletter. Hang tight. There was one! So I'm not doing tremendously horrible. There won't be one in September. I'm actually contemplating on shutting down my newsletter, and starting a Discord server to distribute news, new releases, and the like. It's much easier for me to maintain that, and I don't have to come up with content. I'm shit at coming up with content. I'll probably make a final decision on that at the end of the year. Still chugging away at re-writes for Outside The Game. I lost all motivation to work on it or anything for that matter, but I'm going to get back into it this weekend, and try to get out of this fifth chapter and get into the sixth. A part of the lack of motivation is due to work. Going into the office 3 days a week and then staying until 5 or 6P and dealing with traffic is just exhausting. Miss the work from home days. With all this being said, will this book come o...

I guess I could arrange to have a small newsletter sent out this month, but I still don't have much to put in it. So, blog post it is. I needed to do one anyways. Got the edits back for Outside The Game, so I'm off to do some rewrites to address the issues my editor pointed out. Not sure how long it will take, but I'm going for it. This means the edits for Grisly Politics have been placed on hold for the moment. I also started another course for school, so my plate is looking a little full. But I'm going to manage by golly! Lats weekend, I went to the Golden Crown Literary Society's conference, which was held in Downtown St. Paul, MN. The hotel was right next to the Mississippi River, which was nice and my friend and I had a great view of it from our room. The conference, like last year's, was fun. My friend and I actually went to the awards banquet this year. We went exploring in the mountains of Colorado last year and missed it. It was a good time and defini...

(If you're reading this on Facebook or through my Goodreads page, I recommend visiting my actual blog so you have access to the links) I have this issue where I do something, and another thing is effected by the thing I'm doing, but I don't realize the connection until it's too late or like minutes before the thing I'm doing takes effect. In this case I'm talking about my newsletter dropping on the 10th, and me needing to post a blog post before it does. Fortunately, math irritated me into doing something else and I realized I needed to make a blog post before it does come out. Reason for the early newsletter is because I enrolled Murderous Profession into a group promotion event on Bookfunnel, and it doesn't go past my preferred newsletter sending date of the 15th. So it's coming out on May 10th. If you're in the market for a new book and/or looking for a new author to check out, click on this link to peruse some books featuring queer characters. ...

This post is soooo late. I started writing it on the 8th, but now it's...whatever date I decided to post it, and boy is that a gap. I have no genuine concept of time. It's a social construct anyways. Newsletter went out on the 15th, if you're not signed up for it, you missed out on my "interview" with fellow indie author, Luc Dreamer . I use the word interview loosely because I just sent him some questions and he answered them. The interview wasn't long, but I wanted to showcase another trans masculine author who writes in the realm of Sapphic fiction. He was a great sport about it, and I had fun doing it. Will this be my only interview? Probably not. That newsletter needs something to go into it, and sometimes I run out of ideas. However, it's not going to be a monthly occurrence. I also have my question corner as well where people can email or submit questions to me. So, if you have any questions or comments for me, email me or you can submit one throug...

Found out the 15th is at the end of the week, and it blew my mind. March will be halfway over next week. Like damn, and I'll be going to Pittsburgh on the 16th to watch PWHL Toronto take on Montreal on the 17th. Hopefully their streak will be alive and well by then. Because of that, I have this month's newsletter rearing to go, and if you haven't signed up for it, well, you will get your chance to at the end of this post. If you haven't been lurking around on my Mastodon profile or Facebook page, the first two chapters of Outside The Game are available to read until the end of this month. So, if you want to see how E.J.'s story starts, head on over to Bookfunnel and read those first two chapters. I also encourage you to sign up for my newsletter while you're there because release date and pre-order information will be announced to newsletter subscribers first and everyone else a week later. Maybe later. I sometimes forget to do things. I'm 5 yards and goal ...

Greetings to one and all! We have made it to the end of January, and into February. Here in VA we had a wicked bad cold snap a couple weeks ago, and other than causing my electric bill to jump, I tried not to leave the house, but that thing I call a day job (insert depressed groan here) made me. Granted, there was one day where I had to work from home because the roads weren't the best. Looking forward to some warmer weather. Not Summer, but just mild weather. The kind of weather where you can open the house windows during the day, and burn a nice fire in the pit at night. That kind of weather. January also saw the return of my monthly newsletter. If you received it, what'd you think? It wasn't anything special, but I think it was a good way to re-introduce myself to my readers. If you haven't read it yet, you can head over to the archive on my website and read it. Do note, any freebies or coupon codes in archived newsletters have expired, so there's no point in cli...

That title is as far as I got in my Spanish Duolingo education, who I learned just laid off contractors to implement AI technology to do the work they were doing. While it's supposedly being framed as "no big deal" in this article, it's still something that goes against my morals. If the layoffs and AI integration meant an increase in wages for full-time and part-time employees without lowering the quality of the their software then I'd approve, but if neither of those are the case (which I'm certain it is), then I'll shame. Either way, I've cut ties with Duolingo because I don't like the taste this leaves in my mouth. That was not how I was supposed to open this post, but clearly I'm in my no-filter year--I did have a birthday in December--so I'm gonna go for it. On to business! Welp, I've just completed the final read through for my first newsletter of the year, which is also a dive back into sending it out. This January newsletter w...

Goodness, 2023 is coming to a close, which makes some people reflect on goals and hopes that we had wished to accomplish this year along with looking ahead to 2024 and figuring out new goals, hopes, and dreams as well as wanting to bring missed goals or hopes from 2023 to fruition. With all this being said, I hope we all accomplish what we want in 2024 and then some. With that out of the way, let me go into what I've accomplished writing and author-wise in 2023: Finished first-round of edits on the 1st book for my new short-novel/novella series. Started the 2nd book for that series. Moved my site from Wix to Webwave. Started editing Fate Unseen, the 2nd book for the Avery Lawson series. Outlined several new stories Went to The GCLS conference in June. And I'm sure I did other things, but I can't recall them. I'm thinking about picking up journaling in 2024 to help me keep track of things and feelings, but we'll see. It might help me when I'm in my pit of despai...

I know, I know. Black Friday isn't until next week, but I thought I'd get a jump on everything since I am off work the next few weeks. I tried to make everything align, but as usual, each platform does its own thing with Amazon being a pain in the ass. Sorry to say, there will be no sale on Amazon because none of my books are in their KDP select program. But do not despair, you can still get my books for cheap and they'll be compatible for whatever device you're reading on. If not, let me know and I'll rectify it. All right, onto the sales info. On Smashwords , all my ebooks are 99¢ with the exception of Pool of Lies, which is still pay what you want. The discount is public so no need to type in a coupon code. Over on Ko-Fi, all my ebooks are 50¢, with the exception of Pool of Lies, which is also pay what you on Ko-Fi. I wanted to make both sales match, but that required doing price changes, and this that and the other, so it's just 50¢ and bright reminder for m...

Hope we're all fattening up and getting ready for a long winter's nap. Ha! Wouldn't that be fantastic? Just be like a bear or a chipmunk and get fat over the course of fall then sleep my way through winter. Ugh. Such a good life. The closest thing humans get to hibernation is the food coma we fall into after a big meal. Speaking of big meals, Turkey Day is coming up for USians, so I'm excited to stuff my face and the 2 weeks I will be off during November. It's much needed. A couple of weeks ago, instead of editing the first book of my novella series, I read the second book in the Detective Miller series, which is titled Grisly Politics . I hadn't meant to do that, but I completely forgot how the story ended since it has been a year since I finished writing it. I opened it up, and I was cool with reading just the ending, but when I did that, I was like what happened here? So, I ended up reading the whole thing. I am really happy with how that story turned out. L...

Welp folx we are in that time of year where the next few months either blow by really fast or they go really slow, and you end up spiraling. No? Not you? Hmm. Maybe just me then. At least we're easing into my favorite season of the year. Anyway, on to why I'm here. Edits for the first book of my novella series are going fantastically. Fingers crossed that I will have them completed by the end of next month. After that, they'll be heading to my editor. Hopefully it will be a quick turnaround time frame from them. Doesn't look like it'll be ready in time for publishing this year, but I feel as long as I'm on the right path to publishing at the beginning of next year then I'm not going to sweat it. I've been enjoying editing this story and writing the next book for it, so I can't wait until I'm in a good place to finally talk about it. September is when people start looking to the dreaded holiday season, and I think this year, I will be doing sales ...

 Another test. I'll delete it, but it'll be in RSS feeds forever lol. What's weird is no automation service is supporting Mastodon except Beehive.

August is almost over, and I had this post in my drafts since the beginning of the month and did not post it. Love how my brain operates. Just a quick check in this time around. I have paused on my Fate Unseen edits to do the edits on the first book of my new novella series IFL Tales. I definitely just made that up since I don't have an official name for the series. I currently have a name for the book, but I might need to change it because there are a number of books titled with same thing, and that's a sure way for my lil ole novella to end up buried even though it's not going wide for awhile. Anyway, I created a cover few weekends ago, and got a two thumbs up from one of my favorite people who I can trust not to bullshit me, which is exciting. I'm not sure if I've gone over what IFL Tales is about or what this first novella will be about, but I'll hold off on going into them because I want to be in my third round of edits before I do that. By that point, I k...

Oooh a second blog post for the month. I really must be getting back into this author thing, huh? We'll see. This post is more of a housekeeping/update post. I realized there were a lot of inconsistencies with my branding, so I've decided to eliminate the DJ Small Books, and just be DJ Small - Author. For the most part, it doesn't really change anything. I'm going to be updating my logo and the titling on some of my pages, but there shouldn't be any disruptions. If you run into any issues, let me know and I'll get it fixed. Work wise, Adventures of Swift will not be happening this year. While I was doing some editing, I realized I put myself in a hole with that one, and as I learned with Avery Lawson: The Last Pureblood, I don't want to leave things in a state where it sort of just ends and leaves people hanging. I got the message on that one lol. So, with that being said, I'm going to work on my novella, which I'm hoping to have out by the end of ...

It's been 9 months since I've posted anything, and my goodness am I sorry. I've been in such a hole and have been trying so hard to dig myself out of it that I've completely let everything slip away from me. Which, in all honesty is a disservice to the people who are out there waiting for me to come out with something new or pick up on one of my series. While I know I have no obligation to put out stories and what not, it does make me feel shitty. At least from a reader's standpoint. As a writer, I know I can keep writing for myself because I've been doing that for decades now, but as a reader to get invested in an author and have them just vanish is a little upsetting. So, I want to apologize for the vanishing act and I will try to get better at it. Let's talk about a huge thing though. I didn't realize how many people followed my author pages on Goodreads, Amazon, and Smashwords. It's not a big number or anything, but there are a number of people f...

And here I am late with posting, but vibing out to Beyonce's "RENISSANCE" This is a no-skips album for me, but her last couple albums have also been that for me. I love me some Bey. I know you all didn't wander over to hear me talk about Beyonce. Anyways, this might be the last blog post of the year. Between real life obligation, holiday ruckus, and me plain old forgetting I might not update the blog. I'll try to, but just know it is a possibility. Have you been to my site? Well, if you haven't, there isn't much happening there. In fact, it has been brought offline. I had originally taken it down to do some changes, but then I was like, "Y'know what? I'm just going to take it down for the rest of the year." It's one less thing I have to think about and I can do the updates and changes at my own pace without having an imaginary clock ticking in the back of my mind. I've provided a link on the landing page to buy books and to contac...