A new adventure begins

Hello friends - it's so long since I posted and so much has been happening!
Hubby has resigned from the college he used to work for  - and we've been advised to start legal action against them. I'm not saying any more about that, apart from the fact that because he's free of them, we are free to follow a long cherished dream.

We are moving further into the country!
We'll be surrounded by green fields and good friends. It's so exciting!
Of course I'll be off line for a while whilst the technical bods do what they have to, with phone and wifi .. but as soon as I'm back, I'll share some pics.

There's one pic here, and it'll give you a taste of what we'll be enjoying.

I'm looking forward to exploring, plus getting back to grips with my third novel.
See you all soon.

Win a copy of All in the Leaves!

Today, I am a guest author on Erin's Choice Blog.

You can read all about my writing - and there is a Giveaway too.

A chance to win one of two copies of All in the Leaves.

This giveaway is open internationally...

Here's the link - and GOOD LUCK



http://erins-choice.blogspot.co.uk/

All in the Leaves is OUT for sale!

Here we are, All in the Leaves is out for sale.

The first store to list it is Apple's iTunes! Well done Apple :)

and this is the link!

HERE

https://itunes.apple.com/gb/book/all-in-the-leaves/id751048942?mt=11&uo=4

as soon as it appears in Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Sony, Waterstones - I will let you know!

STOP PRESS! Now on Amazon UK and Amazon US .. direct links on my website http://www.patelliott.co.uk
The live links will be added there, so please, keep checking!

 All in the Leaves

A tea-leaf reading.
A prediction of a fabulous life to come.
Can your future really be told in a cup?

Anna is feeling down in the dumps. She's nearly thirty, painfully shy and has no boyfriend. She's still living at home and has a boring job. Can this really be all there is?

A chance bout of tears leads to a tea leaf reading which predicts a wonderful future for her.
A future which promises a new career, a new home and a husband. All by the following Christmas.

Join Anna as opportunities arise, calamity strikes and the battle for happiness begins.

All in the Leaves Launch Party

My novel 'All in the Leaves' has been distributed to all the ebook stores, by the fabulous ebook partnership. Now it is a matter of waiting for catalogues to be updated and show the book for sale!

I've been told that this can take anywhere up to 4 weeks.
Some places are quicker than others. As soon as I see it in an online store, I will post the links here. If you see it before I do, please send me a note!

To celebrate the fact that 'All in the Leaves' will soon be out, I decided to have a book launch party.
Because the book deals with a tea leaf reading, it will be an afternoon tea party.
With cake. Lots of cake. Biscuits and crisps too.

I'm truly blessed that a good friend at Sparkling Jewellery has given me some goody bags for all attendees. There will be a piece of jewellery, discount vouchers and more!
She's also donated a two coin necklace to help raise some funds for Battersea Dogs Home on the day .

When I know more about the book, it'll be on here - and when we have the party at the end of November, I'll take some pictures to share.

  All in the Leaves

A tea-leaf reading.
A prediction of a fabulous life to come.
Can your future really be told in a cup?

Anna is feeling down in the dumps. She's nearly thirty, painfully shy and has no boyfriend. She's still living at home and has a boring job. Can this really be all there is?

A chance bout of tears leads to a tea leaf reading which predicts a wonderful future for her.
A future which promises a new career, a new home and a husband. All by the following Christmas.

Join Anna as opportunities arise, calamity strikes and the battle for happiness begins.

Latest news on Sanctuary's Gate and All in the Leaves

Good morning friends,

I'm pleased to say that after a brief spell of being 'not currently available' in the Kobo bookstore, 'At Sanctuary's Gate' is now back on sale! (here)

All self published books had been removed by Kobo, after it came to light that there were some very unsavoury books that would have displayed on an innocent, everyday search term, such as 'daddy'. Until each book was checked for content, all self pubbed books were removed.
Mine carries no such content, so is now back on sale!

In other news, All in the Leaves went off to the ebook partnership earlier this week; now they will work their magic in converting and distributing it. All in the Leaves will be available across all reading devices. I'll let you know when it's out there! You can all come to my virtual launch party :)

June Paintings and a shift in Focus.

We're in July - and normally I would publish a post showing you all of my June Paintings, in case you missed them on my painting blog.

In June, I took part in a Challenge to paint every day - and I produced a painting a day for the whole of June. If I post all thirty paintings, this post will go on forever! If you'd like to see the paintings, take a look at my other blog HERE
There are five posts with June paintings, one post each week.
The post a week taught me its a good schedule, so that will continue, there and here. Art on Monday, Life on Friday. 

Now that the Challenge is done, what's next for me?
Now my focus is more on my novel, All in the Leaves. Two days after finishing the June Challenge, I finished the first edit of the whole novel. The second edit is quarter of the way through. The third and final edit is one fifth completed. Second and third are not being done by me - all I have to do is rewrite any mistakes that are found.
For light relief, I am visiting your blogs and leaving comments. I need to be out there in the blog community again. Thanks for bearing with me.

Missy is doing well. She's fifteen and a half now, thoroughly enjoys her walks and meeting new people. She does sleep a fair bit too, but at her great age, she's entitled. Here's a recent pic of her for you to enjoy.

A professional book cover.

I am jumping with excitement!
I've seen a rough copy of my book cover. The illustrator is doing a wonderful job. I wanted to share it, but was advised to wait until the colour version is ready... and guess what, I actually listened to the advice!

Would you like to know a little more about the illustrator?
Her name is Teresa and she lives in Spain.
Not only does she illustrate, but she produces the most divine watercolours.
She has a website HERE and a blog HERE

I'm the proud owner of this painting of hers, which I absolutely adore.

Of course, that's nothing like my book cover, but you'll love it when you see it.

You might ask why aren't I doing the cover myself, given that I paint?
When I was writing the book, I became very engrossed in it. So much so that it was difficult for me to see it objectively. When I ran the different colour teacups past you all, it was the only image I could conceive of, but yet, there was a nagging doubt that it didn't do my book justice.

So I spoke to Teresa and asked for her help. She took a sample of the book, looked at the genre I was writing in and went away to think.
Then she came up with seventeen options, all drawn out. Seventeen! These we whittled down to three. The more we looked and discussed, the more one stood out from the others. From that line drawing, she developed the idea until it became a cover image to be proud of.

Yet, she doesn't want it shared, because the work is not yet complete. Colour has to be added and type too. Teresa knows, as I do really, that the choice of colours and typeface can make or break an excellent drawing.
The amount of work she's put in to this cover is nothing short of phenomenal, so in respect to her professionality, I'll hold off until you get to see the finished article.

Every blog I follow on writing says  "good book covers sell books."
That was another reason for going with a professional. The people who know me would buy my book whatever it was covered with. The people who don't know me will be entranced by this beautiful cover, I hope!
Not long now..  All in the Leaves will be out, definitely before Christmas, this year. Thanks to you all, for cheering me on.

My novel - an update

Good morning friends.

What's been happening here? While my painting self has been taking part in a painting-a-day challenge for June (see HERE) my writing self has also been busy editing my novel, All in the Leaves.

Firstly, I edit a chapter, then it passes over to hubby for a continuity check and then it goes to the proper editor who scours it for all anomalies and sends it back to me, marked up in colour, ready for me to change again.
Honestly, it does feel as if writing was the easy part and this is the perfectionist slog.

The exciting news was that I spoke to Matt at ebookpartnership, who was as helpful as can be - and he gave me a quote for getting my novel formatted as an e-book,  and distributing it to all major retailers.
All in the Leaves should be available to purchase before Christmas - as long as we three keep plugging away at the edit.

How do I fit all this in? Honestly, I've given up watching the tv!  I've read lots of articles from other writers, talking of the anti social element of writing. I can see how easy it would be to become aloof from friends. Writing and editing is so very time consuming. I hope when you all get to read my book that you think it was worth it. I hope I think it was worth it!

Have a great weekend, whatever you're doing.