11.29.15 - Sunday Smatterings

I hope you’re well on this fine Sunday, chickens! It’s been a quiet week at Casa Ellison, with more time spent working on Thanksgiving prep and baking than writing. I don’t know what sick person decided November would be good for NaNoWriMo – cruel, man, cruel. I’m only at 18,000 words for the month, but since I lost a week on my mom’s surgery, I’ve decided to extend my NaNo to December 4, so I have a few more days to catch up to my original goal. Wish me luck!

On to the interwebs:

I was absolutely tickled by this piece by Jessica Hagy called “Caring for your Highly Organized Person” If you’ve ever wanted a glimpse inside my personal life, this is it. There is something to be said for organizational OCD! 

You know what? Taking Action Is Better Than Having The Perfect Plan. I feel this applies to writing as well. If you wait until everything is perfect, plan and plan and plan, you’ll never get it done. 

Want a fascinating and accurate look into writing personalities? I was startled by a few of these insights. I’m an INTJ, but you can click through to all the Myers-Briggs types.

Margaret Atwood (whom I was honored to meet a few weeks past – what an incredible lady!) mentored a young writer for a year. Look what happened

Kristine Kathryn Rusch shares some excellent insight in her blog this week about writing to the market. Here's the deal. You try to write to a trend, you'll get left behind. Be the trend. Write from your heart. As she says:  "Write well. Write often. Write what you love. Have fun. That’s the secret to a long career.Writer friends, read this, right now.

And from the homefront:

It was book release week for WHAT LIES BEHIND! If you haven’t gotten your copy yet, help a sister out and grab it from your favorite retailer.

In exciting news, WLB was nominated for an RT Reviewer's Choice Award for Best Thriller of 2015. What an honor, and what a list! THE END GAME was also nominated, in the Best Suspense category. I am in LOVE with RT right now!

I did a couple of blogs about the book. One was for Fresh Fiction on my love of mass market paperbacks and how to pick the best ones, and the other was at Writerspace, a look behind the scenes on the book’s creation.  

Both Chapter 16 and She Reads did lovely articles on A WORD ON WORDS this week. Couldn’t appreciate it more!

Over at The Wine Vixen, Amy explains why she's a marketer's dream target -- moo!

We ran a big Black Friday sale at Two Tales this week, and (shhhh....) some of the prices haven't been changed back yet, so sneak on over and grab yours while they're still discounted!

And in honor of the Thanksgiving holiday, I did my 2015 list of things I’m thankful for. Trust me when I say, YOU are #1!

And now we head into the heart of the holidays. Gird your loins, get those cards sent and the tree up and decorated, and have a wonderful week! 

J.T. Ellison

J.T. Ellison is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than 25 novels, and the EMMY® award winning co-host of thJoss Walkere literary TV show A WORD ON WORDS. She also writes urban fantasy under the pen name Joss Walker.

With millions of books in print, her work has won critical acclaim and prestigious awards. Her titles have been optioned for television and published in twenty-eight countries.

J.T. lives with her husband and twin kittens in Nashville, where she is hard at work on her next novel.