September 29, 2014

I Is Over There!

Greetings and Salutations to one and all!

As you can probably guess from the title of my blog post, I am not here today. Instead, I am over at Penny Estelle's blog, Penny's Tales, where I'll be pimping my latest release:

Buy Here

Please stop by to say "Hi!" and to read a nifty little blurb featuring Jeannie and Aissa Mitchell.


(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 26, 2014

Nowhere To Run

Today, I'm glad to give up some blog space to fellow writer Jeanne Bannon, who earlier had written a fantastic debut YA novel Invisible, to help her promote her upcoming romantic thriller novel Nowhere To Run, available everywhere on October 3rd.

Jeanne can be found in the cbyer world at Twitter, Amazon, Facebook, Goodreads and at her personal website

Nowhere To Run (The Blurb)


What’s a girl to do when she falls in love with the man whose mission it is to bring her down?

With the murder of her only sister, Sara, just a few months past, Lily Valier—a woman of beauty and substance—tops the sheriff’s list of suspects in small town Maine, and for a very good reason. Dear old Dad had willed his fortune to Sara and only Sara, leaving Lily to fend for herself. However, with no murder weapon or witnesses, the evidence against Lily is only circumstantial.

Enter P.I. Aiden O’Rourke, black-haired and blue-eyed, charged with gaining Lily’s trust and learning her secrets, all to finally get the goods on her. Things move fast and feelings run deep, yet when Lily discovers the truth about Aiden, everything begins to come apart.

Aiden’s torn. Despite his feelings for her, Lily is the most logical suspect, with a great big fat motive. Except something’s not quite right. Aiden trusts his instincts and they’re screaming at him to have a look at a former suspect with far more to hide than first appeared. With little left to lose, Lily decides to stand her ground, and staying put has its consequences when the murder weapon finally turns up—and it’s Lily’s gun.

What happens to love, when trust is betrayed?
 
click on the read more link for a tantalizing excerpt

September 24, 2014

This Is What You Want?


Welcome to Hump Day, where normalcy is lunacy, lunacy is always good with parmesan cheese, Romano cheese and beefy meatballs, and having a picture of an unbalanced Johnny Rotten great you when you click on the blog will make you spit out your coffee.

Boxer brief background: Back in the day, MTV would sometimes play a video that would inspire me to buy an album for a song. The above video was one such purchase.

With The Inner Sibling unleashed to an unsuspecting general public (so far, roughly a dozen sample downloads but no purchases yet), I'm now in the process of doing a few touch ups/marketing promos for the book. For instance, next Monday I will be stopping by at fellow writer Penny Estelle's blog to pimp my book. And I'll be adding yet another page to my book blog, this time to use as a temporary link to the original print version from Smashwords, which will last until next month, as that is the working plan to release the new and improved print version.

Speaking of books, I decided to sign up for a Tumblr account this past Monday. Now, we all know that I need another blog like I need to go to the barber shop, but hear me out on this one.

For those of you who don't know, Tumblr is what I like to call the dark side of blogging. Whereas you're somewhat restricted with Blogger and WordPress, Tumblr has no such restrictions. Whatever you want to write about or show (especially show), you can do it on Tumblr. So I figure with the type of stuff that I write and plan on publishing, a book blog on Tumblr might help attract a few readers here and possibly a few books sales as well (if you check out the tags for my book, one them says "adult actress"). So at the very least, I'll have another venue to pimp myself and my writings.

So my friends, that's my agenda for the week. What/s yours?

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 22, 2014

Now Playing, "The Inner Sibling"

As I previously mentioned about a week ago, I had to go through one last proofread of my novel before shipping it off to Smashwords. So that night, I sat butt down in chair and proceeded to go through page by page of said novel looking for any typos/misspells/faux pas that would/could be corrected.

Sad to say, I found exactly four.

Now the major headache was how to fix without compromising/jeopardizing what I spent my hard earned dollars on to begin with. I e-mailed the wonderful company that formatted my book and asked them precisely what I could and could not do in order to fix the typos. They did, so I did without doing what they said I couldn't do.

After having to save it under a another title (Word13 does not allow you to save an old version under the same name once you've performed edits), off to Smashwords I went. Even there, things did not go off w/o a hitch. I spent roughly 30 minutes writing the long and short synopsis, choosing the proper metatags, price ($2.99), etc., and as I got to the very end, I decide to refresh my memory on their T.o.S. Major mistake as the link did not open in a new window, but opened in the same and blew out all my hard work. Joy.

Anyhow, after all was said and done, I now present to you my new e-book, exclusively at Smashwords in all the major formats:

Buy It Here
For a free five page preview, click here. For a longer sample, click on the Buy It Here link. For the now removed Amazon reviews of the original version, Line 21, click here. For the classic print version on sale now, click on the classic banner caption.

Buy It Here
My friends, this is but just the first page in a brand new chapter of my writing journey. Please join me for what is sure to be a very creative and invigorating journey.

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 19, 2014

A C.M. Classic: Post #1022

Time now, for the redundant portion of Father Nature's Corner, where we produce another post in the occasional series entitled "Cedar's Mountain's Classics", in which we take an old post from the original five year odyssey that was my first blog and retool, revamp, regurgitate, reactivate and simply reanimate to something very new and very shallow.

Today's classic post is #1022, dated July 8, 2013, entitled Medical Update.

The subject of said post was my lovely wife Joanne, who while camping last year, managed to fracture her ankle. Which in turn necessitated her having screws and a plate to hold things in place. The funny thing about this injury, if you can call a fractured ankle funny (g'wan, I dare ya), is that this is 2nd serious malady (besides giving birth) that she had to have surgery performed in the 27 years that we've been together.

Now me, I am not what you would call to be in perfect health by any stretch of the imagination. In the 27 years we've been together, I've suffered the following injuries: cracked rib, bruised sternum, lens implant, fractured knuckle (twice), tendonitis, cyst removal (twice), kidney stone, and knee drained. Add all of that stupid crap with my very permanent medical malady (no, not the sugar, the other), and I possess a body that even Burke & Hare would not touch.

So basically, I came in first for a race I did not care to run or win. Being first with most broken body parts in a relationship is definitely not what it's cracked up to be.

Nevertheless, I need to put a new twist on this post, so instead of a medical update on myself, which would be duller than dull, I give you instead, Tom Lehrer. Have a Happy Friday everyone, and make sure you turn into Monday's post for a very special announcement!



(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 17, 2014

I'm A Guy, So....


I'm a guy, and as most you gals know, us guys rarely, if ever, admit defeat whenever we happen to be doing something that is far beyond our capabilities to handle, like running a washing machine. So the usual rule of thumb is to ignore warnings like those in pic because, hey, we're guys and know it alls, so reading a how-to manual to do something is way out of our comfort zone.

So as much as what I'm about to say pains me, I must reluctantly turn my back on my frat bros and say with the utmost sincerity, I am admitting defeat for Wednesday.

That's right, Wednesday has delivered upon to me a major ginormous whipping of my buttocks with a slimy wet noodle. For all intents and purposes, I must skulk back to my den and whip out from it's hiding place, the manual for blog writing. With shaky hands and a blend of a Bill Clinton quiver and a Billy Idol sneer, I must spend some time reading this all important manual, because you know, if I want to know what's in it, I don't have to vote for it first.

So my friends, with eyes wide shut and brain closed loosely, I shall partake and digest the verbiage of said book, 'cause you know, a sniveling Marvin is a dead Marvin. Except in my case a confused G.B. is an easy touch G.B.
 
(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 15, 2014

More Suite Than Short, But 5' 5" Will Do For Now

Yeah, I know, major disconnect with blog title and blog content. It's Moanday, so please fasten your safety belts.

Life does indeed revolve around me, or in this case, revolve around this:


To whit, the following was either done or on the TBD list for this week.

1} Got manuscript back from formatter? Checkmate.
2} Proofread one last time before moving on to Smashwords? Not yet.
3} Got promo postcards for distribution? Yes, but performed a faux pas. Reorder was completed.
4} Got a few ideas for marketing? Check-o-roonie.
5} Update your book blog to let the half dozen or so people who decide to check it out that you have new product coming out? Absolutely!
6} Ready to pull your hair out with a pair of zircon encrusted tweezers because you have to proofread your novel one last time? What do you think?

In addition to all of those bullet points (note, bullet point #2 will be the death of me this week, so forewarned is forearmed) I'm also having a devil of a time trying to outline what I want to do for the two novellas I want to rewrite. Let tell you something, it ain't easy trying to figure what to keep and what to use when your rewriting something. It's almost enough to make me want to pull out my father's vast collection of music featuring this country artist.

In the meantime, please entertain yourself by either clicking on Door #1, Door #2, or Door #3, and please keep this one thing in mind: the writer of this blog was born in '65, came of age in the 70's & 80's, thus has a most peculiar sense of humor.

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 12, 2014

Shameless Promoing 101

Greetings and Salutations to one and all!

I thought for today's post I would use this blog to shamelessly promote me, myself and I. After all, it was almost some 6 1/2 years when I'd started blogging and the original intent was not only to pimp myself, but to pimp my adventures in writing as well as my writing.

So starting today, we'll shameless promote our writing at least three times this month in the good hope that you will find me and my writing interesting enough to investigate further. The first item on our action packed agenda, is my e-book trilogy:

Available @ Smashwords
Published in August of last year, Broken Promises was at the time my re-entry into the world of self-publishing. The main premise behind this trilogy was basic economics: I wanted to keep my name out there amongst the general public while I was deciding on what my next writing move should be. The stories that make up this trilogy not only were previously published in my defunct short story blog, but are what I believe to be the best unpublished work (non-blog related) I had at the time. All three stories were tidied, tweaked and polished to such a high glossy finish that I was blinded by its brilliance.

So, if you were ever curious about what I write or seriously intrigued about my definition of quirky fiction, then please consider giving Broken Promises a spin in your favorite reading device, because you know I got you covered in all the popular formats (save Kobo). You won't be disappointed.

Plus, now thru the end of September, if you purchase a copy of Broken Promises, you can save $1 off the classic hard copy of my soon to be re-released commercial debut novel. Just shoot me an e-mail copy of your receipt at the time of purchase. Details about how to purchase the original print copy of The Inner Sibling can be had by clicking on the link.

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 10, 2014

Who Are You?

Ever have this problem?

You're standing at the counter of your favorite c-store (or any kind of small retail outlet for that matter) pulling out your wallet (or purse) to pay for your schtuff, when someone at the next register says, "Hi G.B.!" You look up, give them a puzzled look and either ignore them or acknowledge them with the kind of response that speaks volumes about the fact that you have no clue on who they are.

Or, say you're at work and a colleague that you barely know calls you by your first name and asks "how's things?" You can't simply give them the brush off, because quite frankly you have no freakin' idea on who it is that's talking to you, but you know damn well if you have a snappy comeback it will come back to bite you in the ass times ten. So you give them a rather neutral answer and hope like hell they leave you alone.

September 8, 2014

Uggh! It's Moanday....



A lot of work related stress that started on Friday is still chugging through my veins today, so I thought this video would be serious compliment to my state of mind.

The drummer is Meytal Cohen, and she made this video as an audition video for the show "America's Got Talent". She is a phenomenal hardcore metal drummer. Her website can found by clicking her name and she can be found on Facebook as well. Oh, and the song is Toxicity by System Of A Down (Armenian hard rock band).

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 5, 2014

I Gots Tagged For Writing!

Greetings and Salutations to one and all!

For those of you who are just passing through, I am your most excellent host (shades of Bill & Ted) G.B. Miller, and today's post will feature a four question writing meme that I was tagged with by the ever popular Debbie from The DogLady's Den. So if you're ready, willing and smartly able, let's begin at the beginning.

1} What am I currently working on?

Well, I was working on a short story, but since that's done, I will pull another one out of my slushy pile of verbiage. In all seriousness, I've just started work on a prequel to a medium length novella that I wrote some years ago. The prequel itself is pretty average, but I think with some moderate gutting, splicing and rewriting the characters in my unique style, this could turn out to be a moderately above average novella. No writing yet, but I plan on re-reading what I got so that I can create a good outline in which to start from.

2} How does your work differ from others in the same genre?

Good question. I've always had problems trying to properly "label" my writing. Other than calling it paranormal/fantasy, the way it differs from other is in two unique ways: women who use sex as a weapon of power, and the fact that my female MC's are not WASPish by any stretch of the imagination. In other words, they are proverbial colors of Benetton (examples, the characters in my debut commercial novel and my short story trilogy).

3} Why do you write what you write?

Most of my writing is flavored, to a varying degree, with sex. I feel most comfortable writing about different kinds of sexual situations, ranging from innocent flirtation to hardcore debauchery. Over the years I've gotten better at tempering the amount of sex contained in a story, so that if a scene calls for hardcore, I write hardcore; if it calls for something milder, then I write something milder. I've always had a healthy respect for the wonderful of world of naughtiness and over the years (you should spend a day with me just listening to the double entendres and sly play on words that I perform).

4} Describe my writing process.

Yikes! Not that! Seriously though, my writing process is a bit weird. Because I work full time and have a house full of family to contend with in the evening, the only time I can get any writing done, regular or blogging, is on the weekends. Spring and Summer, the family goes camping so I have plenty time to get something accomplished. Fall and Winter is more difficult because I can't really do it at home much, so I go out to the public library to write (pen and paper). Sadly, because my hands are getting steadily worse, if I want to do a lot of writing (not blogging) I have to use Dragon Software in order to accomplish it.

I'm told that the rules state that I must tag three other people. Unfortunately, I can only tag one person, fellow blogger Riot Kitty. However, if you feel up to participating in this little meme, by all means, step in to take a good crack at it. Once again, my sincere thanks goes out to Debbie of The DogLady's Den for tagging me with this meme. It was a pretty cool thing to do.

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 3, 2014

IWSG Post Day Plus!

Check out the group page here
Welcome to the wonderful word of Father Nature's Corner! I am your most excellent host G.B. Miller, and today is my very first IWSG post.

The first Wednesday of the month is set aside for insecure writers across the blog-o-sphere to share all of our individual experiences, the gud, the baaaaaad and the plug ugly.

For me, I should say that my major insecurity is simply getting something published again. For those of you who are new here, I would like to say that I'm what you would call a "rare breed", in that I've been published in the three ways that currently exist: vanity, self-published and traditionally published. To refresh everyone's memory, the major difference between vanity and self-published is that while you spend gobs of money to publish your book, with vanity the money is being spent on things that you do not need (i.e. publishing packages that start at $500); and with self-publishing, you're spending money on what you do need (i.e graphic design, formatting, editing).

It's a rare thing nowadays to get a 2nd chance to make a first impression. While I was extremely happy to get a book published through a traditional publisher, missteps made by me along the way (i.e.bad title, poor cover choice, not marketing) doomed my book before it even had a chance to gain any traction.

This past June, I recently reacquired the rights to my 1st novel, and this time I was determined not to make the same mistakes the 2nd time around. I held a contest for a new title, as well as getting a kick ass cover that pays homage to the original cover. So the plus to today's post is a cover reveal for my upcoming erotic/fantasy novel, The Inner Sibling (to be published by Smashwords). And remember, it's not always you get a 2nd chance to make a 1st impression, but when you do, it's a great feeling to apply what you learned the first time around.



(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.

September 1, 2014

A C.M. Classic: Post #337

Time now, for the redundant portion of Father Nature's Corner, where we produce another post in the occasional series entitled "Cedar's Mountain's Classics", in which we take an old post from the original five year odyssey that was my first blog and retool, revamp, regurgitate, reactivate and simply reanimate to something very new and very shallow.
Today's C.M Classic is something that I think this time, you will all enjoy reading. Back in 2009, I had three blogs in which to play with: Cedar's Mountain, Books by G.B. Miller and It's Always Saturday In Suburbia. Only Cedar's Mountain got the lion's share of my obsessions, of which taking pictures was one of them. And back then, we were a serious Luddite when it came to photography.

Like using a disposable camera.

After doing what I usually do when something grabs my attention (aka going overboard), I ran into a small problem, namely, what to do with my photos. Now, this was about year prior to creating Shooting Suburbia, so my options were limited to using Google's Picassa Photo feature.

So creating I did go. And I would like to honestly say, I had a great time in doing it.

Since today's post is a trip down memory lane, I would like to share with you those four photo albums I created: Shooting Suburbia 1, Shooting Suburbia 2, Shooting Suburbia 3, and Shooting Suburbia 4. A small percentage of these photos did eventually find their way to my other blogs, but here they are in their innocent disposable camera glory. And like I said in the original post, you can do it as a slide show presentation.

Have a sparkling Monday!

(c) 2014 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved.