Eve Ocotillo's Blog

Con Lagrimas, the second book in my Book of New Life series is out at Smashwords (https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...). So if you are enjoying the story of Thayil and Dustin, pick this one up! The book is on a 'set your own price' structure, so you can feel free to pay what you can afford, or not at all if you are simply experimenting or using that hard earned cash for college (or whatever). Do know that proceeds so far have gone entirely towards supporting a favorite LGBT youth support program in my local community. I plan to continue that, though I may at some point also use funds to hire editors or cover artists for future work.

I have a solid working draft of the third book done (Con Sudor, is the working title) and I plan to make it my summer project (when I get most of my writing done, before the next semester starts in August). This book should keep us happy though. It ends in a fairly comfortable place, although we'd really like to see how their story resolves in III.

I know people ask about other, older work of mine. I do have those on to-do lists, unfortunately my 'day job' is pretty intense and keeps me from being able to keep up with this stuff as well as I could. I apologize for that and will try to do better.

I do hope all of you are doing well. There are so many friends I've made at LJ and GR and I'm so sorry that I've not been keeping up lately.

Whoa buddy, that was fast. I see that Con Sangre, the book I just last night published at Smashwords (I haven’t even had a chance to closely inspect the final product!) is up on Goodreads. So I suppose I should announce it. And I will do so in a singularly unprofessional way, I expect.

Con Sangre is part one of a three part series about two men, Dustin and Thayil, on Philos. Philos is a planet that has been colonized by religious factions trying to escape the sins of Earth and go back to a ‘simpler’ time. This part one is over 90K (yow!, though some of that is ‘interlude’ material that some ‘first-readers’ at LJ loved, some didn’t). The second book is written and on the table for the next ebook, so I hope to have it out soon. The third book needs some major overhauling, so may be a while. Each of the three have a complete story-arc, though the entire story of the men takes more than one book.

I’ve chosen a ‘set your own price’ pricing structure (meaning, you can download it *free* if you'd like), so I’d like to explain that for now, any funds will be used in some combination of the following: 1. Paying for pro-services for future ebooks, 2., donating to a local(ish) LGBTQ youth support group that I love and already support. Meaning, in short, that funds will be used to offset (some of) the costs of my writing habit and to support LGBTQ causes, not for profit. BTW: I can do this because I have a good day job that I mean to keep and I simply do NOT have the time to treat this like a business with major financial paperwork/incorporation/complicated IRS/DBA stuff, etc., so please don’t judge (or steal/pirate from) professional writers who need to make a living.

And oh hey, a warning. This book is NOT hardcore erotica (ala most of my writing to date). It is slow burn, long development. If you read primarily for the heat, this may not be your book. This was an experiment, in part, of seeing how long I could draw out unresolved sexual tension. You can decide if I succeeded.

As always, thanks so much for reading!

Rah. I guess that's a milestone. :)

So work is in full swing, but this year isn’t quite as bad as last (knock on wood) so I’m finding myself with at least some time to spend writing. Rah! I also kept busy this summer – mostly behind the scenes. But. I did finish up a novella, sent it to a group of ‘friendly readers’, and am now about halfway through a rewrite. I’m still considering sending this one in for publication, depending on how much I like it once I'm done.

I also wrote and had accepted a short story for Dreamspinner Press. :) Brazos Mud and Horn-Rimmed Glasses will be part of the anthology Higher Learning, and is due out October 17 (no GR entry yet, that I'm aware of).

For those familiar with the breadth of my writing, it is contemp, and it is a fluff piece – or as fluff as I get, anyway. Only the merest whiff of D/s in it, and no dark themes.

Oh! And through all of this, I had to finally come up with a pen name that sounds like a name. I’ve come to love the Ocotillo moniker, so am sticking with that. So Eve Ocotillo is who I is. And I even got me a spanking bright website (with not much more on it yet but a link back to here!), http://eveocotillo.com/. I’m happiest to still go by Oco anyway. By now, it feels like me. :p

Hope all are well! To my buds, sorry I’m not around so much these days.

-Oco

Well. I’m suitably flattered. Both Esperanza and The Violet and the Tom have been nominated for a round eleven (2011) SKOW award, in the category of Best Slash, Complete. This is a readers' award, of sorts, where judges choose from reader nominations, then put out a short list of choices for readers to vote on.

SKOW is designed mostly for romance published on FictionPress.com and mostly for het fiction. So. It’s an online (free) original (not fanfic) romance award. Interesting thing about online m/m. In my opinion, the best of online m/m is not nearly as good as the best of published m/m (others would disagree). And the worst of online fiction would never be published – not even by the most careless publishing houses. However, there is a lot of room for quality in the middle. To wit—the best of free online m/m is far and away better than a whole lot of published m/m, which makes me wonder what a good editor could do with this stuff.

So, yeah. I’m flattered to have been nominated and passed the judges approval. Twice. :)

If you’re interested in taking a look, go here to see and link to the nominated stories. There are three others which I haven’t (yet) read, but will. Also, five others in an ‘incomplete slash’ category. Then, if you feel so inclined, vote. For whichever you think deserves it. I’m glad to give SKOW attention; they are a het group acknowledging m/m, and whereas that only seems right, it is also more than many romance groups do. Voting closes March 9.

In other news. I had a reader of another of my online fics "The Book of New Life" point out a monster inconsistency. Not a terribly difficult fix, but the thing is, I looked for that problem! It arose from my changing the details in one part of the story, but I'd hunted for all of the places later that it needed to be changed, and specifically remember checking the scene that the error is now in. It's twilight zone-ish. Ugh. When I see published works mess up names or have these startling continuity errors, I don't get quite as annoyed as some readers do, and now I'm glad, because I've learned that dang if those can't slip past you, no matter how anal you think you are being. Whew. Humbling.

Just chatting.

I bet friends are getting all of these notices that they don't want. And I suppose it's possible that authors are wondering why I'm stripping their high rating.

Apologies for the mess.

I've long been uncomfortable with ratings, and finally started doing what I've been meaning to for a while. My ratings have always been intensely personal, and I don't like the idea that someone may view them as my idea of what a 'good book' should be. I'm not qualified to judge that. For a while, I resolved to only rate books I liked, but even that's been bugging me. I'd go back to an old book, and think, 'now why on earth did I give that a three? I liked it!'

I'm also removing the dnf shelf. Many of the books that were on there are clearly loved my many, and I disliked that those authors might see that as an indictment from me. It is simply that I love a certain style of writing, and certain types of protagonists. When books don't meet my very personal ideal, I simply don't continue reading. Those have now been melded into my 'read' shelf. I wish GR had the ability to make 'invisible' shelves for our personal records. Maybe in a future incarnation.

In the meantime, I've created a new shelf of 'personal favorites' using the same very personal standards. That should provide a good sampling of those books that I just find so compelling that I'm willing to read them again and again. Plenty of excellent read-again books reside in my plain old 'read' folder as well, just these made a special place in my heart. :)

Again, sorry for the dust.