Lexa Cain: July 2016

Friday, July 29, 2016

Celebrate: Goof Off Success & Giveaways!

Since everyone liked the LOLDogz I put up last week, I’ll try to find one really funny vid or pic to put up every week to try to add a smile and chuckle to your day!

Enjoy – it’s only 17 seconds and will definitely make you laugh!

I succeeded in goofing off for a whole week and it felt great! I watched lots of TV including the DNC, which touched me and made me tear up a lot. I think only older women who've suffered in the business world and at home for many years, who've worked incredibly hard but gotten little appreciation, and in many instances been treated unfairly, get how the nomination of a woman for president makes us feel.

I'm hoping I can buckle down now and get back to my Alaska WIP. Wish me luck!!

What are you all doing this week? Goofing off or buckling down?

My kind and wonderful co-hosts of Celebrate the Small Things are:
L.G. Keltner @ Writing Off The Edge
Tonja Drecker @ Kidbits Blog

Celebrate The Small Things Linky:

Grab the Linky html-code here:

** To see who’s posted for the hop look at my Celebrate The Small Things Blog Roll, left sidebar bottom **

Celebrate the Small Things. To be part of this blog hop, all you have to do is visit the Celebrate page on Lexa's Blog for the rules, and then post every Friday about something you're grateful for that week. It can be about writing or family or school or general life. This is the funnest and easiest blog hop ever! (Originated by VikLit)

Foxy's Friday Freebies!

Foxy has been nosing around the net.

When she finds great FREE STUFF, she'll feature it on Friday Freebies posts -

Free short stories, novellas, and novels
Giveaways for books and swag
Free services for authors

Here are Foxy's suggestions for July 29, 2016:

Free for Download Paranormal eBook – Download Tattered Loyalties by NY Times and USA Today bestselling author Carrie Ann Ryan, about wolf-shifter enemies who must mate to mend a divide in their clans before a war breaks out. (For more book info visit the Romance Giveaway Book blog.)
Download FREE at: Amazon B&N Kobo iTunes

Free YA Gothic Romance Novel – Win 1 of 5 ecopies of Sentinal’s Tear by Christine Fonseca, about an elite warrior angel who vanquishes fallen angels but when she encounters Aydan the teen girl whos body she’s using knows him and demands he be saved not vanquished. Enter via rafflecopter on the Mythical Books blog. Very few entries = great chance to win! (ends Aug 12)

Free $10 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Vavaun: The Shadow of the Revenant by Paul E. Horsman, about the heir to the throne of Vavaun who must defend her land from evil sorcerers and beastmen, is giving away a $10 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Mythical Books blog. (ends Aug 14)

Free $10 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Secret Dream by Lindsay McKenna, about a Navy Seal who has fewer troubles on the battlefield than when meeting his girlfriend’s parents, the author is giving away a $10 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Romance Novel Giveaways blog. (ends July 31)

SCI-FI SUMMER FLING

Free Science Fiction eBooks and Print Bools and $50 Amazon Gift Card – Win many SciFi ebooks and print books from Hugo and other award-winning and bestselling authors plus a $50 Amazon card. Details on entering on the Timothy C. Ward blog and others. (ends Aug 7)

For Foxy's other Freebies, go to the Freebie page.

If anyone has a FREE short story (for download or online at a free ezine), novella, novel, special giveaway, or author service, please let Foxy know so she can plug you here! Write to: laura.6eg(at)gmail.com

Friday, July 22, 2016

Celebrate: Card Deck Winner, LOLDogz & Giveaways

The winner of the BLOODWALKER card deck is:

Lily Wolfe

Congratulations!

I've decreed this week as my official Goofing Off Week. I need a break from social media and writing and promo-ing and all that stuff. Sometimes, I think all of us just need to laugh and enjoy ourselves, so here are some cute LOLDogz for you!

THE SENSUAL LAMBADA DANCE!

My kind and wonderful co-hosts of Celebrate the Small Things are:
L.G. Keltner @ Writing Off The Edge
Tonja Drecker @ Kidbits Blog

Celebrate The Small Things Linky:

Grab the Linky html-code here:

** To see who’s posted for the hop look at my Celebrate The Small Things Blog Roll, left sidebar bottom **

Foxy's Friday Freebies!

Foxy has been nosing around the net.

When she finds great FREE STUFF, she'll feature it on Friday Freebies posts -

Free short stories, novellas, and novels
Giveaways for books and swag
Free services for authors

Here are Foxy's suggestions for July 22, 2016:

Free YA Supernatural/Thriller Novel – Win a copy of How to Hang a Witch by Adriana Mather, about a girl moving to Salem, Massachusetts and discovering she’s related to a witch hunter and then becomes the enemy of a group of girls called The Descendents who are related to witches killed during the Salem Witch Trials. The author is giving away a copy of the book via rafflecopter on the YA Book Central blog. (ends Aug 2)

Free YA SciFi Novel – Win a copy of The Seige by Mark Alpert, about a boy whose new cutting-edge digital mind was programmed by the government to enable him to fight the deadly AI program determined to wipe out the civilization of a new planet. The author is giving away a copy of the book via rafflecopter on YA Book Central. (ends Aug 1)

Free $10 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Bottled by Carol Riggs, about a girl cursed to be a genie in a bottle, the boy she loves, a villain who wants to use her powers for evil, and the new boy protecting her who she might be falling for, the author is giving away a $10 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Medeia Sharif blog. (ends Aug 6)

Free $100 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of The Last of the Firedrakes by Farah Oomerbhoy, about a girl who’s kidnapped and taken to a new world where magic reigns and evil awaits, the author is giving away a $100 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Mythical Book blog. (ends July 30)

For Foxy's other Freebies, go to the Freebie page.

Friday, July 15, 2016

Celebrate: Fixing Things & Giveaways

In the US, when we turn on a tap, water spurts out with plenty of pressure. I never really questioned how that happened, but I guess we have water pumping stations that keep the pressure up.

In Egypt, it's not so simple. Instead, every home, restaurant, and apartment has a huge water tank and a water pump engine, especially important when the apartment is far above the water tank.

And I hear you asking, "What is that weird blue globe thing on top of the engine in the picture?" At least that's what I wondered when I first saw one.

Inside the blue globe is a plastic balloon, just like a birthday balloon, but of much stronger plastic. The 1-horsepower engine sucks water from the tank and fills the balloon, expanding it until it fills the metal globe and can expand no farther. Then the "automatic" turns off the engine and the strong elastic balloon shrinks, pushing the water up to an apartment and keeping the water pressure steady.

OK. Now that you know way more than you wanted to know about how I get my water, I'll go on with my story...

You know how when you have an old car and first one thing breaks, then another thing, and suddenly it's one thing after another like all the parts of your car have the same expire date? Well, the same thing happens to water pumps.

-- A month ago the elastic balloon broke. A plumber opened up the globe and replaced the balloon.
-- Then the "automatic" broke. It was replaced.
-- Then some kind of ball-bearing thing broke (don't you love how technically knowledgeable I am?). We got a plumber in to fix it while congratulating ourselves that we didn't have to buy a new engine.
-- Then we noticed a lot of air in the pipes, and spitting and sputtering. Uh-oh. One of the seals on the engine had broken and was slowly leaking our tank's 3 tons of water out and turning the dirt floor of the building's basement into mud! Ack! It took us a while to get a plumber 'cause of a holiday (doesn't everything break on a holiday?), but eventually we got one.

Everything's fixed!

(Until something new breaks.)

Now you can all feel very grateful for the luxury of just turning on your tap.

You're welcome.

Have you had a car or appliance that just kept breaking down?

New Member for Celebrate – Update Your Blog Rolls:
Yvonne Ventresca http://yvonneventresca.com/blog.html
Welcome Yvonne!

Removed From the Celebrate List – Update Your Blog Rolls:
Project Why (Anuradha Bakshi) http://projectwhy.blogspot.com
Eclectic Ali https://eclecticali.wordpress.com/

My kind and wonderful co-hosts of Celebrate the Small Things are:
L.G. Keltner @ Writing Off The Edge
Tonja Drecker @ Kidbits Blog

Celebrate The Small Things Linky:

Grab the Linky html-code here:

** To see who’s posted for the hop look at my Celebrate The Small Things Blog Roll, left sidebar bottom **

Foxy's Friday Freebies!

Foxy has been nosing around the net.

When she finds great FREE STUFF, she'll feature it on Friday Freebies posts -

Free short stories, novellas, and novels
Giveaways for books and swag
Free services for authors

Here are Foxy's suggestions for July 15, 2016:

Free for Download Fantasy Novella – Download Blood Song by Robert Mullin (a prequel to his novel Bid the Gods Arise), about a girl whose pickpocketing lands her in a slave auction and sold to an arena-fighting group. Will she stay a servant or become a fighter?
Download FREE at: Amazon B&N Kobo Smashwords

Free Horror/Adventure Short Story – Download the short story “Tsantsa” by amazing author C. Lee McKenzie. “Forbidden. Cursed. And Deadly. When the “gift” arrives, Matt’s sure his anthropologist cousin has sent him another exotic find. But inside the box is the unspeakable." The short story is free when you sign up for Lee’s newsletter. I already get her newsletters, and she always has great info about places she’s visited, her books, and how to market effectively.
Download C. Lee’s short story “Tsantsas” HERE. (scroll down the page for the sign-up & your free short story! Ends Aug 1st)

Free 2 SciFi/Fantasy eBooks, 1 MG Fantasy eBook + Swag – Tara Tyler is giving away 3 great books: Pop Travel, Simulation, and Broken Branch Falls and some swag too! Enter via rafflecopter on the Tara Tyler Talks blog. (ends Aug 1st)

Free Online Serial Novella – Read Libby Heily’s free serialized novella Our Beloved Dictator, which will be posted in short chapters every Monday over a 25-week period. “George is pulled over for speeding on I-95 in Virginia. Instead of a ticket, he is sentenced to 6 months of mandatory citizenship in Greenville-a small town run by a dictator. The government isn’t the only surprise George finds. Greenville is the place where reality meets abnormality.” The first chapter is up and will be followed by more HERE.

Free $15 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Tainted (Paranormal Romance) by Ginna Moran, about a girl chased by a demon that wants her soul and protected by an ex-demon hunter who’s determined she won’t meet the same deadly fate as her parents, the author is giving away a $15 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Mythical Book blog. (ends Aug 10)

Free $20 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Roman Rescue (New Adult Romance) by Michelle Gilliam, about a girl who leaves college and goes to Italy to fix her military officer brother’s life never expecting his best friend, a Marine Sergeant, to be so determined to insert himself into her life, the author is giving away a $20 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Mythical Book blog. (ends July 20)

For Foxy's other Freebies, go to the Freebie page.

LAST CHANCE TO WIN

A BLOODWALKER CARD DECK!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Friday, July 8, 2016

Celebrate: Card Deck Giveaway & More Giveaways

This week I'm celebrating a generous and fun offer from my publisher -- a giveaway of a Bloodwalker card deck from Dancing Lemur Press!

Just put your contact email in the rafflecopter below as a "Free Entry" to be entered to win. If you want to increase your chances, do the tasks listed.

The contest ends midnight Wednesday, July 20. Winner announced on Friday, July 22. Dancing Lemur Press will contact you for a mailing address and ship the card deck to you. Open to US residents only.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

My kind and wonderful co-hosts of Celebrate the Small Things are:
L.G. Keltner @ Writing Off The Edge
Tonja Drecker @ Kidbits Blog

Celebrate The Small Things Linky:

Grab the Linky html-code here:

** To see who’s posted for the hop look at my Celebrate The Small Things Blog Roll, left sidebar bottom **

Foxy's Friday Freebies!

Foxy has been nosing around the net.

When she finds great FREE STUFF, she'll feature it on Friday Freebies posts -

Free short stories, novellas, and novels
Giveaways for books and swag
Free services for authors

Here are Foxy's suggestions for July 8, 2016:

Free Online Short Story – Celebrate’s own D.A. Cairns of Square Pegs blog has posted a short story, called “The Darkness of Light,” part of the new Square Pegs Ezine he runs and edits and has opened to submissions. Read D.A.Cairns’s new short story “The Darkness of Light.” Check out the Submission Policy for his ezine HERE.

Free Paranormal Thriller eBook – Win a Kindle copy of Shadowed by Ken Hughes, about a guy with enhanced senses hiding in poverty to protect himself but learns you can’t hide forever, sometimes you have to fight. The author is giving away Kindle copies to 2 winners via rafflecopter on Mythical Books blog. (end July 13)

Free SciFi/Fantasy eBooks – 20 people will win the ebook Children of Swan by Coral Walker, about two siblings chasing their mom and dad, to another planet where they are secretly Prince and Princess, and being captured by enemies of the royal court. The author is giving away 20 digital copies via rafflecopter on Mythical Books blog. (Few entries = Good chance to win! ends Aug 1)

Free $20 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Welcome to Sortilege Falls by Libby Heily, about a town where nothing is as it seems and new arrival Grape befriends some beautiful models only to have them fall ill with an incurable disease. Can she solve the mystery and save the girls? The author is giving away a $20 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Mythical Books blog. (ends July 25)

Free $50 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of In the Absence of You by Sunniva Dee, about a star-crossed romance forbidden by differing cultures between a hot young rock star and the girl who helped him forget his broken heart, the author is giving away a $50 Amazon card via rafflecopter on the Romance Novel Giveaways blog. (ends July 12)

For Foxy's other Freebies, go to the Freebie page.

Wednesday, July 6, 2016

IWSG: Getting Twitter Followers

It took me a long time to join Twitter -- until April 2015 -- but after a bunch of missteps, I now have 15,000 followers. People ask me how I got so many. I'm no Twitter Queen or Twitter savant, but I figured I'd share the things I did that worked for anyone who's interested.

Why do you need a lot of Twitter followers?

The more Twitter followers you have, the more people see your tweets and can retweet them to their followers. Also, you can meet people who have the same interests as you. They may retweet you on Twitter or even connect with you on your other social media sites. I’ve gotten a bunch of free books from authors because many of them are giving away books if you sign up for their newsletters. I’ve read good stuff and bad stuff and gotten to know some very fun writers.

Here are the steps that helped me get 15,000 followers in the past year:

#1 Your Twitter Bio. Make sure your bio has your main interests in it and doesn’t sound snobby (I’m the soon-to-be bestselling author of brilliant novels) or doesn’t sound too humble (I’m a wannabe writer who hopes to have my stories published some day). Personal info like spouse’s or children’s names should probably be left out. Names of TV shows you love can be included as hashtags, like #TWD (The Walking Dead) or #GoT (Game of Thrones). And put your blog address in the space provided in your profile.

#2 Make Lists. Some people don’t want to increase their followers because they have 500 friends and that’s all they can keep track of on the twitter feed. They think any more will just confuse them. This is wrong. You can keep people separated into small 100 member (or so) groups if you put them in lists. Want to see what your friends posted? Just click your list to see them all in one feed. In case you don’t know how to make a list => Hit the thumbnail of your pic on the top right of your page. A drop-down menu will appear. Click “List.” Look on the right side of the new page and click “Create New List.” Name each list so you can keep your personal friends, blogosphere friends, fellow writers/hobbyists, genre specific writers, work buddies or whomever separate and easy to find. When you follow a person who you want on one of your lists, click the gear next to the “Follow” box and choose “Add or Remove From List.” When the pop-up appears, just click the list you want them on.

#3 Go forth and follow people!

*Hint* Do NOT click Follow on Twitter suggested accounts listed on the right sidebar or the ones that drop down when you follow someone new. Twitter may find people who fit your search criteria, but many aren’t active and haven’t posted in a long time. They will never follow you back, which defeats the purpose of increasing your followers.

#4 Ways to Find People to Follow:

a) Blogger Friends. They often have their twitter links on their web sites. Follow them and mention it in a blog comment, so they know to look for you. (And don’t forget to add them to a list if you want.)

b) Twitter Search. Put your genre or your hobbies into the search box (with a hashtag like #fantasy or #crafts) and go see the people who’re tweeting about what you’re interested in. You can see a Top feed, Live feed, and accounts with that hashtag or word in the bio.

c) Ask Friends. If you’re on Facebook or another social media site, post your Twitter page address (like https://twitter.com/LXCain) and tell everyone that they can post their twitter address or handle (like @LXCain) in the comments, and you’ll follow them.

d) Grab the Big Dawgs' Followers. If you know or happen across someone in your genre/hobby who has a LOT of followers, click their Followers list and do a search via your browser for what you’re interested in, like: author, writer, fantasy, photography, etc. It will locate all the followers on the page with that word in their bio. If they've followed the Big Dawg recently (the first 100 or so accounts in the list), chances are they're active, like to follow people, and will probably follow you back.

Here’s where it gets a little tricky.

Twitter will only allow you to follow over 2000 accounts IF you have 2000 accounts following you. Some people are slow to follow back. Others don’t follow back at all. If your account gets frozen at 2000, you won’t be able to follow any more people. Then you must unfollow people to drop your following number below 2000. Once you do that, you can follow new people and wait for your follower number to catch up.

The best way to decide who to unfollow is to use an online “unfollow” app/site so you can see who hasn’t followed you back or who has unfollowed you.

Here are two free and good ones:

https://web.crowdfireapp.com

http://www.unfollowspy.com/

When your followers pass the 2000 mark, you can follow whoever you want as long as you don’t go over more than 10% of your followers. In other words, if you are following 3300, but your followers haven’t reached 3000, Twitter won’t let you follow any more until you have more followers. Again, the online apps are the easiest way to find and unfollow people who didn’t follow you back.

Getting followers is labor intensive. It requires time -- sometimes months, sometimes a year or more. The good news is that after you hit 10,000 followers, it starts feeding itself. People will follow you every day. They want to follow someone with a high follower number. You’re a “star” and they think if you retweet them, their tweets will be seen by 10,000 people. At that point, you can stop looking for new followers – they’ll find you.

If you have any questions, ask in the comments and I'll do my best to answer them. :)

This is a post for the Insecure Writer's Support Group, the brainchild of Alex J. Cavanaugh. It exists so the community of blogging writers can share and support each other, blog-hopping to cheerlead and commiserate. To find out more, visit: Insecure Writer's Support Group. Plus, check out the IWSG Website for lots of helpful info and links.

Friday, July 1, 2016

Celebrate: TGIF! & Giveaways

This week I'm celebrating:
1) It's Friday! TGIF! Woohoo!
2) My air-conditioner has been limping along, barely keeping my writing room cool although it's set on its lowest degree. I figured it was leaking Freon (a problem it had after it was first installed). My husband was just on the point of calling the repairmen when he asked me:

HIM: When was the last time you cleaned the filters?
ME: Uh...filters?
HIM: You know, the ones where you lift the top of the machine and take them out.
ME: Umm, but that machine is really high on the wall. I can't reach it like the window one we have in the living room. And besides this is a split one. Doesn't that mean only the fan portion is here and there are filters on the main part of it on the outside wall of the apartment?
HIM: No, they're on the inside part. Are you telling me you've never cleaned the filters? In the FIVE YEARS we've had it?
ME *sheepishly*: Noooo...

So guess what happened when I finally got on a chair and lifted the cover? I found the filthiest, most dust-covered filters known to man.

Now, the newly cleaned filters are back in and my room is colder than an igloo. LOL!

Am I the only one who has forgotten to clean the filters in their air-conditioner?

My kind and wonderful co-hosts of Celebrate the Small Things are:
L.G. Keltner @ Writing Off The Edge
Tonja Drecker @ Kidbits Blog

Celebrate The Small Things Linky:

Grab the Linky html-code here:

** To see who’s posted for the hop look at my Celebrate The Small Things Blog Roll, left sidebar bottom **

Foxy's Friday Freebies!

Foxy has been nosing around the net.

When she finds great FREE STUFF, she'll feature it on Friday Freebies posts -

Free short stories, novellas, and novels
Giveaways for books and swag
Free services for authors

Here are Foxy's suggestions for July 1, 2016:

Free YA Contemp eBook – Download Sudden Secrets by the amazing YA writer, C. Lee McKenzie. "One death. One secret. Then two. Add small town bigotry and you have Sudden Secrets." The book is free when you sign up for Lee’s newsletter. I already get her newsletters, and she always has great info about places she’s visited, her books, and how to market effectively. Get Sudden Secrets HERE (scroll to bottom of the page) (ends July 4)

Free Signed YA Dystopian/SF/Thriller Trilogy – Win the Legacy Trilogy by Ellery Kane, that takes place in San Francisco in the year 2041 where the populace is kept quiet and cooperative by a mood-altering drug and a military group called The Guardians. A teen, whose psychologist mother is one of the ones giving people the drug, joins a rebel force seeking to free the people. The author is giving away a signed copy of the entire Legacy trilogy via rafflecopter on the My Book Addiction blog. (ends July 7)

Free Signed ARC of the MG Contemp – Win I Am Drums by Mike Grosso, about a Middle School girl who wants to play the drums but can’t afford a set, nor can her school, nor can her parents, but she’s determined to find a way. The author is giving away a signed ARC of the novel. Enter via rafflecopter on My Book Addiction blog. (ends July 10)

Free $35 & $20 Amazon gift cards and 2 Paranormal Novels – To celebrate the release of Phantom Embrace (of the Immortal Guardians series) by Dianne Duvall, about an immortal who can see spirits and is falling in love with one although it can only lead to heartbreak. The author is giving away a $35 and a $20 Amazon card, plus two signed books in the series, Night Unbound and Shadows Strike, via rafflecopter on the Romance Novel Giveaways blog. (ends July 4)

Free $50 Amazon Gift Card – To celebrate the release of Gypsy Love by Angela McPherson and Lynn Vroman, about an immortal seeking revenge against the gypsy family that cursed him and the beautiful doctor of the clan who sees him in her dreams, the authors are giving away a $50 Amazon card via rafflecopter on Romance Novel Giveaways blog. (ends July 6)

For Foxy's other Freebies, go to the Freebie page.

Lexa Cain

Author

Pages

Friday, July 29, 2016

Celebrate: Goof Off Success & Giveaways!

Friday, July 22, 2016

Celebrate: Card Deck Winner, LOLDogz & Giveaways

Friday, July 15, 2016

Celebrate: Fixing Things & Giveaways

Friday, July 8, 2016

Celebrate: Card Deck Giveaway & More Giveaways

Wednesday, July 6, 2016

IWSG: Getting Twitter Followers

Friday, July 1, 2016

Celebrate: TGIF! & Giveaways