By C.J. West
Suspense. Creativity. Action.

This week I told L.J. that I’ll be leaving the blog as a regular contributor soon.

L.J. and I have been friends for years and it was a hard decision to make. I really enjoy reading the blog and I’ve certainly learned a lot from Hitch’s posts on e-book creation and from Tom’s posts on forensics.

Some things have cropped up for me recently and as I thought about my schedule I realized that while I enjoy reading posts about the business of writing, I don’t enjoy creating my own. Bookselling has always befuddled me. I get a lot more joy writing about family, psychology, and inspiration, which I do on my personal blog.

I’ll come back often to read the blog and chat with you all in comments and once in a while I’ll guest post when I’ve got something to say.

What will I be doing in the meantime?

I’m about 15,000 words short of completing the first book in a new series that explores the lives of two recovering heroin addicts. This will be my first traditional mystery and it hits close to home because it centers on the life and work of my brother. He’s never been an addict if you are wondering, but he does some great work employing people who might not otherwise be able to find a job.

At the same time I’m outlining the sequel to The End of Marking Time. Those of you who read the book will remember the ending. I’ve been thinking for two years about the series and finally I’ve come up with an idea that allows me to continue the storyline and deliver an ending as shocking as the original. I’ve actually got the inspiration for a third book and the evolution of the story world has me revved up to get writing.

I also have two short story projects that I’m committed to writing in the near future.

In the last two weeks I’ve also discovered the Audiobook Creation Exchange, which is an Amazon affiliated company. I’m working to create audio book versions of all my novels. I’ve been told by many readers that they enjoy my voice (from my Blog Talk Radio days) and that they’d like me to read my own books. I’m not sure I’ll publish versions that I read, but I’m going to give it a try and see what I come up with.

With all these things competing for my attention I needed to make some changes to focus my energy. I’m going to dedicate the next several months to writing projects and hopefully I’ll end up with two completed novels and maybe a short story or an audio book as a bonus.

I’ll look forward to seeing you here. Between visits you can always find me on my Facebook page or my blog.

What's new? Not much. Only everything.

By Gayle Carline

It's been almost two weeks since I went to Left Coast Crime, which is, like, a year in a dog's life, so I should be talking about the future instead of the past. So I'll do that, except that I first have to tell you all what a fun convention it was and how much I enjoyed seeing LJ again and meeting Marlyn for the first time.

This was my second convention - in 2009 I went to Bouchercon. Normally I go to writer's conferences, which are a lot different than conventions. Conferences are about getting fired up about writing and doing the work. Conventions are more about chilling and meeting people. After LCC, I finally think I know how to relax and be at a convention.

On to the future: I came back from the convention to shifting priorities. Before I left, I was writing three books, in various stages. I'm smack-dab in the middle of my third Peri mystery. I've started development of a new mystery with new characters. And I'm about 10,000 words into my horse's memoir (see his blog for an explanation). I was juggling these balls without problem.

Until I got my rights back to my first mystery, FREEZER BURN. Suddenly, if I wanted to keep it available, I needed to get a new cover, find the last version of the novel and put all the parts together myself.

Other projects? What other projects?

The good news is I'm not derailed, only detained (and a little deranged). I've got the cover, I found the file* and it should be up and rolling on Kindle and CreateSpace soon. Here's the new cover:

What do you think?

*After I found the file, I couldn't resist editing a few things. So it's the same book, only a little better!