In February 2020, I released the first book in the City of War series, City of Light & Steam. It was an amalgam, and such a mashup, when I wrote it, I was terrified of how it would do. The book was actually written in late 2018, but I needed time in my release schedule, so I'd held onto it.

Apocalyptic? ✓ The world was destroyed by a virus
Dystopian? ✓ The world was rebuilding/trying to function after the illness swept through it and failing miserably with it incredibly dangerous to step outside after dark.
Steampunk? ✓ Takes place in Victorian London with steam and electricity as the main sources of power long before they belonged in existence. 
Vampires? ✓ The term for those affected by the illness that destroyed white blood cells causing them to need blood infusions to survive
Romance? ✓ Yup, the two guild leaders do, in fact, fall in love.

To my surprise, readers were in love with it, many messaging me days after release. I'd already had the second and third book covers, so I immediately sat down to outline. As often happens when I'm fresh out out of a world, the outline came quickly and I was ready to roll!

The pandemic began and life as a full time social media agency girl, mom, and author came to a halt as I could really only be a mom at that time to my 3 year old. My days were spent figuring out playtime, how to keep him from missing his friends, and how to stay safe because I originally didn't think COVID was a big deal - I was in New Orleans at the time, and the city taught me better.

Shortly after at the end of April, my mystery illness began. For 4 months I was in and out of so many surgeries, imaging sessions, and doctor's appointments I couldn't write, there was no time. Not an iota. 

What happened next? A military move which means driving across the country, cleaning the new place, getting the new place ready, and starting life again. All during a Pandemic - which at the time, New Jersey was a dangerous place to be. From September 2020-September 2021 I worked more than 50 hours a week at the day job AND hand my son home with my full time. If you have been a long time reader of mine you know that between city of war and the end of 2021 I released 3 book in total - 2 Christmas Fairy Tales and Land of Flames.

In fall of 2021, my son started kindergarten and I quit my horrible day job in favor of a much calmer business opportunity - still in social media, but not for a giant agency that didn't give a shit about it's employees work hours. The words began to flow and I very quickly had written a Christmas story, a Monster Romance (accidentally because I didn't know it was going to be a thing), 2 In Service shorts, and began The Race. 

The juices were back! I was vibing. But, the more I thought about City of War the harder it became for me to write. I love Ben and Raven so incredibly much. I love their world and how far they take things.

But, I can't focus on a world destroyed by an airborne illness that failed not because of the illness, but because of how the people within the countries around the world couldn't play nice in the sandbox. It's too very real right now and while some people can write that way, I want an escape from the drama America is going through every damn day.

Readers, I apologize. I know this has been a favorite series already, and I'm here to tell you that they will be out - likely late 2024. While things are still rough, they are getting better and with every escape I read and write, it's getting easier to believe I can distance myself from the crap around me.

​I want to know, how do you feel about reading a story with so many accidental parallels to COVID?

​We did it! We're on day 31. Not only did we do the first month of 2022, but I completed my first ever challenge. Just in case you weren't following along on social media, I thought I'd drop the challenge here by day as well!

Each year - pre COVID and even in 2021 - I attend a variety of book signings and book conventions. I love getting to meet readers in person and chat books. I especially love getting to meet readers who’ve read the books and want to talk details! In some instances, I’m able to reconnect with readers year after year and it’s wonderful!

While I love attending all signings and convention, there is one that I cherish most of all. This is because out of all conventions, the authors and readers at this one are my family.

First and foremost, LLS is about allowing readers and authors the ability to connect. It’s 3-5 days of pure nerdy, literary bliss. It’s a time to chat over meals, lose yourself in playful craft time and enchanting readings.

For me, it’s something more. It’s a group of people who fill my soul with joy. They push me to be better every single day.

from readers who support me throughout the year to readers who are dear friends - these are not just people popping by my table to grab a book and a photo. These are men and women who are by my side, in my inbox, at coffee dates with me, and being part of my life.

The authors I have met over the years are some of my closet friends. We don’t just see one another at LLS. We plot books together, we create box sets and co-author sets together. When we’re down, we call one another. When we need help, we’re a message or call a way. When we need someone to tell us not to buy the new cover…we’ll, we’re not there for that :)

I cannot think of a day that has gone by since joining these events that I’ve not spoken to at least one of my LLS family. Most days, it’s wake up to bed time in chats, on the phone, and pretending we don’t have hundreds or thousands of miles between us.

In 2020 when my mystery illness prevented me from attending, a reader made a photo of me that was passed around. And of course, my author bestie took me everywhere.

Going to conventions is a grand event. It can also be scary if you’ve not been to it before. That’s where I’m coming in now. If it’s your first year at LLS as a reader or author, comment on the blog and I’ll have something special for you as a way to say hi and like to my favorite group of people.

I can’t wait to see you all! There’s less than 6 months to go!!

If you’ve read a few of my books or have perused titles on my site or Amazon you’ve probably realized one thing - a good chunk of them take place in New Orleans. What you might not know is why.

Yes, 95% of my New Orleans books are supernatural and there are arguably maybe two places as comparable as the Big Easy as settings for the things that go bump in the night.

While the ghosts and lore are a wonderful reason to unleash witches, warlocks, vampires and more on the city in my worlds, it’s actually not the main reason.

When I write, I want to transport the reader to the setting. When it’s a fantasy world, this is actually much harder. When it’s a place I love, it’s like cuddling up in my favorite sweatshirt.

I live and breathe New Orleans. From the dark corners to the food, and the true Mardi Gras spirit to the areas of the city that don’t often make it into stories, I want to explore it all.

A book set in New Orleans is more than booze and darkness. It’s gumbo weather warnings and teasing national news people who can’t come close to pronouncing the crazy rivers and towns down there. It’s making sure the local voice explodes on the page from small details you can’t get without immersing yourself in every section of the city from the West Bank (that is, yes, on the East bank) to the constantly flooding Mid City and fancy Upper Garden District Plantations sitting in plain sight.

The pure magic when you eat your first spoonful of gumbo, or crush a beignet in your mouth while watching people wander down Decatur is blissful. The accidental find in the French Market that leads to the perfect necklace or knick-knack is one you should always experience in your life. The unadulterated rush when a float rider locks eyes with you and tosses you anything is joy-inducing. Those feelings, those emotions, come out in stories when they're set in New Orleans.

Yes, admittedly whenever I write In the real world I use places I'm fond of, but there's no place like home, and to me, New Orleans is home. It's the place where I find myself, again and again. It's the place where my characters find themselves, and their forevers, as well.

And just in case I haven't gotten to sappy with you, here's a random slideshow of some of my all-time favorite New Orleans moments.

What's your favorite place to read about? Bonus points if it's New Orleans!

Let me start by saying thank you to everyone for trusting me with your stories - I can assure you, none of us are alone. Unfortunate as that is, there is some solace we can take in that.

Throughout the last two weeks countless authors have gone down for reasons both similar to mine, and utterly different. There is still no admittance from Amazon on a bot issue or change in anything regarding rules. There is no admittance of fault, but many apologies.

Now, onto what I've been looking in to. Let me start by saying that I am in no way leading a charge, and I was looking into options so authors as a whole could learn what's going on. There will be no screenshots because this was a call - so apologies for that.

In terms of seeking legal representation: Due to Amazon's ability to terminate essentially on the spot and give no information, there is very little that can be done.

A damages claim can be filed by any author who lost significantly, but keep in mind Amazon knows you're earnings. Someone like me didn't lose a lot on Amazon royalties because they reinstated everything. I lost about $200 in earning on the new release, but it's impossible to calculate the backlist since sales vary so much month over month, plus around $400 in booked promo. It wouldn't be in my favor.

This is not to say it's not the benefit of other authors, but ensure that if you seek legal representation, that all earnings and expenses are on the table before going through with what might cost you instead of earn you (and that's if you get anything because Amazon could win if it goes to court)

In terms of a petition: Petitions are wonderful, but they're just a share of voices. For petitions to work, the entity receiving the petition must care. AKA, authors banding together isn't going to change anything. It would take readers - and millions of them - to maybe, just maybe open any sort of change.

Regarding Class Action Suits: This could not be taken on by any author who received access back into their account and all earnings. This would need to be only by those who've lost their accounts permanently. 

The number required for a class action suit is (25 is sufficient), but given our "injuries" are not medical, a larger group would be needed. A lawyer would need to be found, and then the process could begin to see what could occur.

This part is easy to say, but of course, not as easy to do.

Authors: Go wide. KU is sexy, I used it for a lot of my earning, but you are beholden to Amazon and this danger then. If you're concerned about making it wide, I understand as I'm terrified.

Start saving. If you say "I can't save any money", then you're likely at a point in your career where Amazon isn't help too much.  I say this because I've been there. marketing is essentially and even $50 a book goes a long way.

Begin campaigns - newsletters, blogs, social posts - letting your readers know the end of KU for your books. That will get those who only will read on KU time to read, and prepare them to purchase on other platforms. 

Launch slowly, grouping series together as best as you can. Treat it like a new release. Find bloggers, find newsletters, share on social. Getting an entire series up will help with read through.

It will not happen overnight. For most of us, Amazon was not overnight either. It sucks to start over. I've been wide for almost 8 days and I've made 1 sale...1. It's exciting and depressing all at the same time, but it is a start!

Authors with account issues: keep making noise. Focus your efforts on Twitter. No more than 2 hashtags per post to keep their algorithm feed working and tag @amazonpub, @jeffbezos and @Amazonkdp.

I am still working on getting answers and accountability with the nice man who called and emailed me. While I can't reach him via email, I can callback that number and will be doing so weekly. I might not post updates if there's nothing to post, but I am not letting this just vanish into thin air.

Readers and Bloggers: If you are interested in being part of a review team for wide books for me, please fill out this form :) I'm sure other authors will have similar requests. 

Readers: While buying outside of KU may not be possible, know that authors understand. We respect this and understand as we're all readers on budgets, too. 

If you are in the position to buy new books on a different platform, support your authors and their new releases on other platforms. It will help them build things back up.

If you are super able to help and buy the old books on a new platform, that can help launch algorithms and backend metrics that I won't bore you with.

Lastly, reviews. If you can post reviews to new platforms you would do authors an invaluable service. I know it can be a pain to post in multiple places, but reviews unlock promotions and sales - because most people want to see what they're getting in to :)

If you're still with me, I wanted to let you know there are a lot of fantastic resources for going wide. Admittedly, I do nto have approval to share these, so my apologies to people running these groups if you get an influx of join requests :)

Wide for the Win
20booksto50k
Fiction Writing and Book Marketing for a Six Figure Author Career

If anyone is aware of other resources, please share in the comments. I will update as I can!

I will always be here to help in any way I can. What I've learned could be useless in a month, but I will try! We've got this. It's not going to be an easy road for those of us without agents and housing, but we should never give up on our dreams. <3

It's official, we've survived another year. Whether you kicked 2021s butt, survived nicely, or possibly took a little beating (like I did), you made it through! You're here, I'm here, and it's time to have fun <3

My favorite moment was seeing my kiddo realize we were driving into Disney World as a surprise for his 5th birthday. Drop me a comment with your favorite moment from 2021 so we can celebrate together!

2021 was a rough year for me personally. My mystery illness remained undiagnosed, but I spent so much of the year on medication that altered my mood and alertness that finding motivation to write was hard - even with the stories screaming. Add in a 70-hr a week job and a toddler home full time thanks to COVID and the fingers weren't tapping away on the keyboard like I would have liked, but I am fortunate enough to have still released!

Now for the good stuff! While I'm trying not to set release dates for 2022 just in case my muse works in a different order than anticipated, I do have a freaking awesome lineup that returns me back to my productivity level pre mystery illness in May 20201

The Race - Steampunk
To Love a Guardsman - Military (in Cupid Wore Dogtags)
Life in Reverse - Paranormal 
Slay Bells Ring - Paranormal Christmas
Trapped in Wonder - Fantasy
Magic Cursed - Dark Fantasy
Double Linked - Paranormal
Christmas and the Lamp - Christmas
Surprise YA Fantasy (in a mythical creatures boxset)
The Christmas Suit (a Christmas at midnight short in Suit Porn only available at LLS!)
Surprise Fantasy RH

Then, if there's time, I'm hoping to get to release:
Cost of Magic - Fantasy
​The Flames they Found - Fantasy 

I know what you're thinking - how is she going to do that after 1.5 years basically not publishing? Well, the good news is 4 of them are already written and just waiting for their time in the sun...err ereader library.

So let's survive and thrive in 2022 together!

Let me start this post off with the best news - after 8 full days, my account on Amazon has been fully restored. However, for the last 3 days, I've fought an entirely separate battle where Amazon attempted to not pay me after allowing my books back.

My personal fight has not yet ended, as I will not back down, and I have every intention of getting this process fixed, and thankfully, now I have a contact to continue to fight.

Before I get started, I wanted to say thank you for your voices during all of this. You see, it was social media that got an Executive to call me, not my emails and phone calls. It was everyone banding together - in some instances, for someone you don't even know.

Christmas night, I was checking my email when I saw it, a different subject line from KDP not attached to any case number.

I will not lie. I screamed. I screamed at the top of my lungs and nearly jumped into the air.  I was back. My career had come back after 17 total people on the content review team telling me no. What's more - I was answered by an American and not a bot. (I have since confirmed the content review  team is overseas so I am not being rude).

I thanked them so quickly and rushed to the next step. I quick search on Amazon did indeed show all my titles.

Being overjoyed, I immediately went to check and see if they truly paid back my royalties as well. Imagine my surprise, when I saw this.

I politely emailed asking if there was a mistake. 

Meanwhile, I had two friends buy books - 1 bought ebooks, 1 bought audio. I waited three hours and checked. It hadn't triggered the account reopening in full. I'd already emailed, and I didn't want to piss the nice people off so I waited.

​Next day I got this email.

Four three more days I would explain, send my screenshot and get this exact same email back, sometimes from the nice Luis, sometimes from someone else. Each time, I checked my dashboard.

Stressed, I went to Twitter again and tried tweeting about possible stolen royalties. 

I also noticed a glaring issue. The book that got me banned had reviews...reviews from January 2021. Had the backend crossed their wires and the content really appeared misleading? I thought so, but wouldn't know until I could speak to someone.

I emailed back (notice they still don't give you a way to get to them?) and got a call within a few short minutes.

Tony was wonderful. He assured me nothing was taken from me, and even agreed that there was no suspicious content, but that he has no access to the content team notes. He told me I was back in full and I confirmed with a quick check into my dashboard - I was also surprised to see I somehow made sales three of the days I was totally missing.

To everyone who has sent messages, left comments, and shared their stories. Thank you. This has been nothing short of the week from hell. I am not backing down. I have this man's direct phone number because he used a phone registered with CallerID. I will be following up. I will be consulting law professionals on the best next steps for us all.

As you've probably imagined, not only have I not stopped trying just because it's the holidays, I've also had a bit of a strained holiday because my dream and career are in tatters. If you're seeing this first, part 1 is here.

That said, I will not be kept down, and I've got a few updates in the case and what comes next to share with  you. While I'm not trying to cram information at people, I do want to share timely updates as timelines and to keep things from snowballing into giant updates.

At last count last night, I had 17 different "we're not telling you more, your count is over, bye" emails from 6 people total. All overseas, no supervisor, and none responding to my request for a phone call.

Last night, it also occurred to me that with them completely locking me out of my account, I've lost access to my 1099 - which, with my earnings, would put me in legal trouble in about 30 days when it's time to file. Keep in mind, it's possible they will automatically send me it versus the standard "1099's are in your account" email that is standard. I'm not certain, since it wasn't stated, so I'm not condemning them for that just yet.

Thanks to someone's suggestion, I was able to back door into the extinct author central going through the old link - which was supposedly no longer useable per an email from KDP awhile ago. The better news? When I hit "contact us" the ability to call comes up! I haven't tried it because it was the middle of the night and I truly want to speak to someone stateside with a firm grasp on what I'm trying to explain and why I care so deeply. That is in no way meant to be rude. I managed an overseas team for 5 years, I love the working around the clock method, but know first hand how tricky communication can be since I'm not cool enough to be bilingual any longer (not important but I was in Spanish for a few years until I stopped using it in college).

So, starting on 12.27, I'm going to see if that button works and if I can't back my way into a phone call. I truly feel with a phone call, the error will be obvious. Regardless of whether I will or won't use KDP again, my larger dream of finding an agent and joining a publishing house is likely impossible without an amazon presence and I still don't know if I can upload new titles through a third party or not.

Today, around 3pm, I received two more rejections for more information, both slightly polieter and from the same person (though this was a brand new person in general).

To which, I'm taking a slightly harsher response because now it's been going on for ages with my request for more information and a phone call not working. Did I get a little emotional? I did, but I remained polite and relevant. Some people won't agree with what I did, but this is my journey and I'm sure I'll make mistakes.

All drama aside, I'm going to keep fighting for my backlist, but begin to move forward with new releases. First, I want to share my very first published novel with everyone as a thank you. This book was wide to be permafree on Amazon, but I doubt anyone knew that, so here's a link to all retailers! *note it is not free on audible, but I have gift codes should someone be interested.

While I normally like to give each book it's own "cover reveal" and blurb announcement, I'm going to do things a little differently. So, I'm happy to present 3 of the 12 releases I have planned for 2022! To see the rest, consider joining my street team. Since Christmas & The Lamp was in KDP, I'm afraid to put it up wide presently.

These may end up on amazon via D2D In the future if It turns out I can place new titles I just can't replace or place via KDP. For now, I'm staying away.

While I'm fairly certain an author who has self published for 3 years and been attacked by amazon isn't appealing, if anyone know any wonderful small presses with a focus on romance and unagented submissions I'd be forever grateful for any tips as I've learned being out on my own has some disadvantages.

Let's keep the momentum going - I want this procedure changed so badly for the next author to suffer at the fate of "the content review team". Please comment if you have any suggestions for next steps or contacts you have!

12.25.21
Two edits were made for clarity.
1. I had 700 reviews and ratings, not reviews only. I apologize for not realize you could rate without reviewing on Amazon until it was brought to my attention.
2. updated verbiage on the review notice to avoid semantical conversations or confusion based on policy.
3. A link to part 2 that includes more of the process and my fight.

 The last 30ish hours have been very hard for me. Somehow, I offended Amazon's KDP system and my entire career has been taken down. This blog is my attempt to share only the facts, while leaving out any opinions and emotions. At present, 43 books have been unpublished, over $300 in advertising dollars on a new release from 12.20.21 are wasted, and over 700 reviews & ratings are now gone. All of this occurred just 24 hours after my latest release, which was the first release I've had since last Christmas, due to fighting a mystery illness and COVID parenting a toddler - writing took a backseat.

Please consider sharing this blog on your social media. I want to effect change within Amazon more than I want my career back. If enough of us make noise, it's possible this can all be changed.

This post might be lengthy, but I promise, It's not extraneous information.

To set the stage about me for what it might be worth, I am a 2x USA Today Bestselling Author. I began publishing through the fantastic confidence of CHBB Publishing in summer of 2015 before branching out to self publish in summer of 2017. Since 2015, over 54 novels were written and published. Many were shorts in anthologies. Some of those shorts were republished when the anthologies ended and rights returned, but not all. While my review count was a modest total of just over 700, they were still reviews.

I write across the bulk of romance subgenres, with a focus on paranormal romance, steampunk romance and Christmas romance. My works are not all under 18 friendly, but some were.