Dial that phone!

Today is a day of phone calls.

I have a conference coming up Halloween weekend and today I called Dawn, my hairdresser, to get tint and highlights and a cut so I don't look shaggy and gray while on panels. So that's scheduled. I also need books for the conference, so I called my publisher and bought books, 15 of Ghosts, 3 each of Valley and Threads. They should arrive well before the conference.

I also want to take SPORE - Summer 2015 buttons, so I made a few calls to track down a local button-making source. So far, no luck there.

Our local Lions club is hosting a pancake breakfast in about 3 weeks, and we're in charge of the pancake mix, so I called the smaller grocery store to get that ordered in since I'd much rather buy from them than WalMart. I'll be picking up fifty pounds of dry pancake mix on Friday.

I contacted my Weight Watchers leader because I can't attend either meeting this week - life logistics simply won't allow it. Then I called my doc to schedule my annual exam.

That's everything on my list, but I really feel like I'm missing something. Not sure what, but something. Hopefully I'll remember before it's a crisis. ;)

The madness begins

With the contracts signed, I can now officially tell folks that SPORE sold to Samhain Publishing for release next summer.

I am utterly DELIGHTED and still swooning after more than a week. Wooohooo!!

However, with a book scheduled for release next summer, I now have roughly fourteen gazillion things to do ASAP.

I need a real website, something more google-able than this blog and my Facebook page, but I'm dropping Siler from my name, and there are already folks using TamaraJones dot com and dot net. I need a new site name idea. Not sure if I want to expand upon my actual name or go with something completely different, ala Chuck Wendig's Terribleminds. I'd better decide soon, though. Within the next week or so, at least. Get a domain name, find and pay for a host, get it designed, up, and running. Whee!

Marketing. Holy crapbuckets, there's a lot to do there. Like conventions/conferences. I've already contacted ICON (it's in Cedar Rapids Halloween weekend) and I'll be on at least two panels there. ComicCon is coming to Des Moines next summer, and I've contacted them, too. Plus there's DemiCon in Des Moines, Archon in St. Louis, Bouchercon, Minicon, ConStellation, and anything else I can scrounge up within reasonable driving distance. I hope Michele is ready to travel!

Along with cons, there are web ads, tweets, posts, some printed things, contacting book fairs, reviewers, blog tours, writing group visits, setting up interviews, and surely tons of stuff I haven't thought of yet .

I did a small round of edits this weekend - easy peasy formatting stuff - have filled out forms and questionnaires from the publisher, wrote back cover copy, and I'm staring at June 2015 penciled in on my calendar with a mixture of excitement and exhaustion. It's only nine months away. Nine months! It's gonna fly past.

But it's going to be freaking amazing. Everyone will finally get to meet Sean, Mare, Mindy, Todd, and Ghoulie.

Go Ghoulie, and GO SPORE!!