Episode 37: Audiobook Chapters, Headaches, and a Fantasy Cast, Oh My!

Hi there! I'm Lindsey Sparks, author of books featuring hidden worlds and twisted myths. Welcome to my weekly author's notes podcast! This episode was recorded live in my Discord on Sunday, 4/17/2022, and I would love to share some of my reflections from this past week with you.

CURRENT FREEBIES:
Echo in Time (free ebook through all retailers)
After The Ending (free ebook through all retailers)
Starter Library for newsletter subscribers (ebooks and audiobooks of my series starters, and more!)
https://www.authorlindseysparks.com/join-newsletter

CURRENT WIP:
Revising: Blood of the Broken (Atlantis Legacy, book 5)

READING:
Crescent City: House of Sky and Breath by Sarah J Maas
Echo in Time by me (for Read By The Author)

WATCHING:
Moon Knight
Snowfall
Sanditon (season 2)
The Gilded Age

HIGH:
First batch of recordings for the Song of Scarabs and Fallen Stars audiobook came in (from Julia Whelan)

LOW:
Headaches

LAST WEEK'S OBSESSION:
My garden!

GOOGLE SEARCH HISTORY:
Elizabeth Henstridge

BIG GOAL(s):
Revise 7 chapters of Blood of the Broken

LOOKING FORWARD TO:
Diving into the second half of Blood of the Broken!
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Transcript

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Hi there I'm Lindsey Sparks, author of books that include hidden worlds and twisted myths. Welcome to my weekly authors notes podcast today. Today is Sunday. April 17th. And I would love to share some of my reflections. From this past week with you. Okay. First off. Current freebies. Include Echo in Time on all retailers in ebook and also After The Ending in ebook on all retailers. And then if you sign up for my. Newsletter, you get a few other. Free eBooks as well as some audio books. So definitely go check that out. If you're not already a subscriber is totally worth it. And you don't have to like stay subscribed. You can subscribe. I get your freebies and unsubscribe totally up to you, but a couple you stick around. All right. My current work. And progress is still Blood of the Broken. I am still on the same draft, which is going from a skeleton draft to flesh draft. So. That's like draft zero to draft one or. You could call it draft one to draft two our rough draft, a second draft. Whatever terminology you use. So I am. I am on chapter 17. Of the flesh draft. Which was chapter 14, I think. In the skeleton draft. So, as always my books expand. As I go through each revision. Blood of the broken is the fifth book in the Atlantis Legacy book or series. And I am. I am loving this book. The story I am. Like in the very middle of the story where stuff starts to get crazy. And it's I think this week I'm going to be getting. Getting to the scene that is like the scene I've been seeing in my head. So. So much from this. Book Some really excited about that. And it's just yeah, it's been a really fun one to write and I'm really enjoying it. let's see. See here. I'm currently reading. Crescent City book to. Which is House of Sky and Breath by Sarah J Maas or Maas. I still don't know how you say that. And I'm listening to the audio. Audiobook. But I also have a physical copy to reference as well. And if you are on Tik TOK, And. And follow me. You should check out my. I've been posting a lot about Crescent City. I'm still posting about Crescent City. One. And then I'll be posting about Crescent City two probably in a few days. Yeah, so I've got some, some of my theories and reflection. Sections and just like funny, silly things about the series. I really. I really genuinely love these books. I think I'm gonna Maybe reread Kim Harrison's Hollows. Hollows series because I love it so much. And because. It's easier for my brain. To reread books that I have already read especially when I'm writing, after I finished. Just this one. And I want to like talk. Talk about those books on Tik TOK, because nobody. I never see anybody talking about them. So I want to talk about them because I love. So much and see if I can find other people who love them as much as I do. Because those are the smell. Like my favorite series, my favorite book series. The Hollows by Kim Harrison. You should read it. If you haven't. Urban fantasy, really, really, especially like. With Crescent City being so popular. I feel like if people like Crescent City. City, they would like The Hollows. So. Just throw that out there. I'm also still reading Echo in Time. By me for Read By The Author, the other. Podcast slash YouTube show that I do. And a. Yeah. Right now, we are watching Snowfall. Which is my husband's choice and it has been very interesting. It is not my usual thing because that doesn't have. Any scifi or fantasy. It is about the rise of cocaine in the eighties. In the U S. And it's. Kind of depressing. But it is a very dramatic. Dramatic and a very interesting. We're also still watching Moon night, which is still currently really since season one. I believe. We, I think we, we might be an episode behind. And. And I am. I think my favorite show right now is Sanditon. Season two, I am watching and I am just like having all of these theories. And thoughts about this. And then I'm also watching The Gilded Age season one. I want to say, I think there's only. Only one season. But Sanditon and The Gilded Age I'm. Watching on my own. So since I am taking, making an effort. And other than like my Sunday night recording nights. I'm not working on Saturday and Sunday. I'm not waking up. I'm not having an alarm, but I do still wake up early. So then I get to watch the shows that I want to watch. Which is fun. I feel I'm feeling rejuvenated. It's definitely still weird. Not working, not waking up early. Early to work for a couple of days. It feels strange. Like I. I definitely have, have some of the guilt or the. The. I should be writing guilt, I guess. So. But it is important to take a break. To just like, I remember that there are other things in life. And that is something that I have to remember now anyway, because it's warming. Up which means it's springtime, which means it's vegetable garden time. I love my vegetable garden. Garden. So I have to, I have to. Remind myself that there are other things in life besides writing. Writing. And sitting in my office at every possible spare moment. That I can get. So, My garden. At least makes it easy to remember that because I love being out there and out in the sunshine. Or even just in the non rain on the days that it is not raining, I try to be in my garden and just do something in there. So. Yeah. My hi, this. Week was definitely. Getting the first. Batch of recordings of the audio book for Song of Scarabs and Fallen Stars. I got the, I think it's five chapters of. That are in Kat's perspective, Kat's, POV. That. Julia Whelan recorded Julia Whelan. Julia Whalen is the amazing and extremely talented narrator. Who performed the. The Kat Dubois Chronicles, all six books. In the S. Series. Previous to the series. I'm currently really seen, which is the Fateless Trilogy, which is the series. That song of Scarabs and Fallen Stars belongs to. It's so good. It's perfect. She. Is Kat like her voice in my head is Kat. And she is an amazing narrator. She's won all kinds of. Awards and stuff. In his narrated books for people. Authors who are way. Way more. Just a huge, big, big name authors. And. So I feel very honored that she takes some time to Narrate some of my little stories. And because. I did like ad I adore her voice for Nik. So when Nik is in a Kat chapter, which is basically every cat chapter, let's be real. I. I just have always loved the way that she, I have a loved the way that she. She. Voices Nik from her first. From the first chapter of the first Kat Dubois book, Ink Witch when Nik comes in. It. It's in chapter one and it comes in to Kat's tattoo shop and he says, Hey, kitty Kat. And I just adore it. I just, I could. I just get like the biggest grid when I listened to that audio book. Book. And it's N it's. I have listened to those audio books and embarrassing. Cussing number of time for them to be my own books. So I don't. I know what that says about me. Okay. My low this week. Is that I've just been having some headaches. Just. Just like, had one day. That was. Pretty sure it was a migraine. I don't. So I get weird migraines. My migraines are usually visual migraines, so they don't necessarily come with a headache, but they come with weird. Wiggly's and visual floaters and just a general sense of like, Like. Distance. Mental distance. And no, this was definitely. Much more. Painful. In-full than that. And then I had that. A little. A bit of one today, too. So I'm hoping that as. My I'm hoping that that is just my body. Adjusting to five o'clock in the morning, wake up instead of six o'clock in the morning. Wake up. And that, that, that will be cleared up this week. So fingers crossed for that. That that gets all cleared up. My obsession this week it was like, Kind of hard to like pick something out. I didn't feel like I was super obsessed with. Anything that like really stood out. However, I would say my garden is probably the thing just because I'm really happy that I got. A bit, it's been kind of like a. Something that's been. Bugging me in the back of my head. That I haven't been able to really focus on it and get it started. And the weather has been so weird. Here we've had. It was warm for a little while. And then the last. A couple of weeks, it's been really cold. Unusually cold. Aye. I got. I had. Amended my soil in my garden beds. A week or two ago, and then I Aye. I had to buy a little bit more dirt. A couple of the garden. And beds. We're the raised beds were a little bit low on dirt. And I got. A few of my different. Seeds planted. Yesterday. And I rotated my well. W what was still in my garden. So I haven't. Garlic that was still in there from. Last year that had like re sprouted. So then I split those up and DeVito them out and moved in one box over in my little like garden rotation pattern. But as soon as I planted the seeds and. I went inside. Like got everything. Finished. I cleaned up everything. It started to snow, a kid. Did you not? It started to snow. It's going on. Anyway. I think it's fine. I don't think it harmed anything because it was just seeds and the seed had. I'd been in the pre in the freezer prior to that. So it's not like they. We're unaccustomed to being frozen. And it wasn't even. Freezing outside. It was just. Covered in a blanket of snow. Because it was just weird weather. It. It was like high thirties, but the, I also. Got my tomatoes and I did, I, I know I was thinking. To myself that I was not going to do any peppers because they did not do anything for me last year, but I did start a few. So I started my seed or I started my tomatillos. He says my tomatoes and my peppers. And I also ordered some of the seeds. That I wanted to replace or try different varieties. These of the plants. Like I have last. Last year I had the last two years. I've had issues with powdery mildew in my garden. Which really demolishes any kind of squash. Or pumpkin or zucchini that I attempt to plant and cucumber to. and two years ago it destroyed my tomatoes. So. This year, it. It seems. Both years, it seemed to start on. I did it. Didn't get the tomatoes. NATO's until late in the season last year. So that was better. That worked better, but I had. All of the squash on the other side of the house. So this year I know I'm. Like going to way too much detail on this for you guys, but I'm just going to keep going. Why not. I I ordered. Several different kinds of squash and pumpkins that are powdery, mildew resistant. So I'm hoping that'll help to hopefully prevent the problem. So we'll see, we'll see how that goes. Yeah. All right. So I'm excited about my garden. I bought some new Blueberry plants. And we moved our blueberry plants to. To what I think is going to be a much better location. And I've, repotted my strawberries, hoping that those will work. Out better. Yeah, so we'll see how it all goes. Okay. I have one item on my Google search history. And, but it's kind of a fun one to talk about. So the item is Elizabeth Henstridge. Who I actually my assistant tells. To me. She's from agents of shield. I believe. But the point that I'm talking about her. Because I have not watched that show and I don't actually know who she is. But although I did look her up. And see her picture. The point of. Me searching for her. Is so I could see her picture because in my Facebook group right now, we're doing. Doing a fantasy cast thing. So every week we're releasing two. Of the character portraits that I created using art breeder. Leader. So it's like the AI. Uh, Human Work together. To create art. App. And yeah, so I created character. Character portraits that are really. I think they're really beautiful. Beautiful. They're like, they're not like quite photorealistic. Maybe kind of. I don't know, they're not quite photorealistic, but they're fairly realistic. So I created. Character portraits using art. Art breeder for the characters. In the Echo Trilogy. Or in that culture, LG and the Echo World. So that includes. And focusing on Song of Scarabs and fallen stars. So we've got Tarset and Atum and like the, some of. The other side characters that are only in that series. But then we also. I have some characters, the main, some of the big, important characters. From the Kat Dubois Chronicles. And from the Echo Trilogy like obviously Lex and Heru. And then Kat and Nik and Aset and Mari. I didn't do Mei. I should do Mei. Actually that's, that would be a really fun one to do and Dom and Set and all that stuff. So. definitely it's really fun. And then. For the fantasy cast we're having people post pictures of. Or suggest names of people who they think. Would be a great. Actor or actress to play that person. If the series. Any of this, any of the books in the world were to be made into. Some sort of a visual adaptation on TV or movies. Or anything like that? I would love it. If you know anybody, let me know. Okay. So my big goals from last week, my. Big goal was to revise six chapters of blood of the broken. I did five. Which is getting better. So I figured. I improved last week. So. Hopefully I can improve this week too. So I'm upping my goal again. So my big goal for this week. It's to revise seven chapters of Blood of the Broken. And last week I. I had like a bunch of little annoying things that I had to do. I had to do some stuff for my taxes. I had to do Put. What did I do? I. I meant to do my newsletter. But I did not write it. So that's going to get written. What's going. Gonna go out next Monday instead. So that doesn't count other than that's hanging over my head. So I really want to. Do that. I need to do that. But I did. Oh, I got a bunch of paperbacks set. Set up for other distributors besides Amazon. Just a bunch. A little things that had been, that had needed to do. And it had been kind of hanging over me. So. All that stuff. Has done. And so this week I should be able to. Focus. All of my afternoons. Except for. Part of tomorrow. So part of Monday and part and all of Tuesday. So those are podcasts editing days, but Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Most of Mondays afternoon. And Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Are also. Also give me writing sessions. So that's nice. So seven chapters. Can I do it? We'll see. We are in the snowballs rolling down the hill. I'm really excited about the story portion. I have this book. So that makes it more likely that I'll be able to do this. I have. In my calendar allotted two more this weekend, next week, or this week and the week after. To finish this draft. So I need to like, Get her done. My husband hates. That phrase and I'm cringing internally at saying that. I need to. Finish it, I need to like buckle down. So come on, do it Lindsey. We do it. Okay. So this week I am looking forward to. Really diving into the second half of this manuscript. And this hall. I'm so excited about this part of the story. So, so, so, so, so excited. So, I don't think it's going to be a problem, but I wanted to get this done in the next two weeks. So that. I have another week to two weeks to go through the whole thing. One. More time and just make sure all of the emotions and everything, all. Of the emotions and the descriptions are really fully. Flushed. Flushed out. So. That's what I've got going on right now. So, thanks. Thanks for listening. I will be back next week to ramble some more. Hopefully I will be telling you that I have blown my goal out of the water out. Out of the part, hit it out of the park, almost said blown it out of the park, but that doesn't really make sense. So. So hopefully I have achieved my goal. So until then, Happy reading.