CM Simpson: Writer & Gamer

Last week was busy as I tried to get myself back on track and incorporate the catch-up with getting the writing back on track. It started out rough, and didn’t really pull together, until I decided to submit some work elsewhere. It’s interesting to find that adding people to the mix adds to the ability to get things done, because you just don’t want to let anyone down. I may need to have a talk with myself about that. I also did a tonne of learning about newsletters and marketing and will be putting some of what I learned into practice over the coming week. The first title to have its back matter updated, a quick re-edit and re-format, and a new cover was Shadow’s Rise . Progress: August 19-25, 2018 New words produced: 12,451 Outlines and Notes: 3,860 Words compiled: 0 Works completed: 1 Works edited: 1 ( Shadow’s Rise) Covers created: 1 ( Shadow’s Rise) Works formatted: 1 ( Shadow’s Rise) Works published: 1 ( S...

DSDU = Dark Side Down Under : A group of Australian writers of romance and other paranormal genres has kindly hosted me today on their regular Magic Thursday blog spot. Today I thought I’d share a little about the importance of world-building in general, and creating the magic of Tzamesch in particular. Feel free to come over and join me.

The Theory When I wrote my goals for the year, I tried to make it so I could cover each genre I wrote in, at least in passing. Because I write in so many genres and under so many pen names, I realized I had to plan my time carefully. In doing that, I also realized it was not physically possible for me to have four releases a year in each genre for each pen name… at least, not while holding down a full-time job. So, I came up with a set of tiered goals and wishlists. Tier 1 is the minimum of what I think I can do. At the end of the first week, it seemed to be holding. At the end of two months, not so much; I’m way ahead of schedule, but I’m not producing new words <sigh>. Tier 2 was what I hope to achieve in good conditions. Tiers 3-4 were my dream tiers, the projects that I really wanted to do, but couldn’t work on, due to time constraints. So, every week, I planned to advance Tier 1 by a revised chapter or 1,000 words a day, Tier 2 was the same progression, if I could...

While Fisherpriest was C.M. Simpson's first full-length published novel , Shadow's Rise was her first novel, taking almost ten years to complete and undergoing several rewrites before being allowed out in public. It is a slightly different story to what it used to be, but the main tale remains the same. When the gods discover an ancient power has suborned a king, and now menaces their domains, they must find agents to act on their behalf. Will a goddess’s temper over losing a favorite to the cause stand in their way? Or the capture of one of their chosen mean the attempt is doomed to fail before it has begun? Shadow’s Rise is the first in a dark fantasy trilogy, containing strong elements of horror. It describes the rise of a group of heroes, chosen by the gods to bring down an emerging dark power. Shadow's Rise is availab le from Smashwords , Kobo , Kindle , CreateSpace and DriveThruFiction.   Chapter 1: Freedom's Price Gilzereet caught the car...