Have you guys heard about Boys Blogging Books? If not, go check them out. They’re a cool group of young guys who review books. Yay for guys who read!

My brother Jason, who’s sixteen, just joined BBB. He’s going to be reviewing a book a month. Thanks for having him, guys! He’s excited to join and is already thinking of his review. I’ll let you guys know when he posts his first review so you can give him some comment-love. :)

I’m enjoying the 80 degree temps this week and am getting stuff done before I go on Super-Secret Project Trip. My to-do list is loooong. I’m bouncing out of my chair to share my first clue with you guys and that’ll be posted on Monday.

You’ll get the next clue a week later. After that, all clues (to be explained in Monday’s video!) will come from the road whenever I have wireless access.

And then. The BIG one. A video (or group of videos) will be posted when I get home that will hopefully be fun, exciting and informative. I feel like I’ve been drinking 10 coffees a day since I heard about this project. Date of this video is TBA. Yes, yes, I know I’m being a tease. I’ve been told. :)

One of the things I’m working on this week is a new author photo. I’m going to schedule a visit to a local horse farm and will have my photo taken with a gorgeous, sweet palomino gelding. I like my other pictures, but it just makes sense to have a photo of me with a horse. :)

I was also looking at the calendar and the very first hint of PR work for Take the Reins starts in May. My promo plan is H-U-G-E and going to be oh-so-time-consuming. Eeek! But worth it. I want to go all out so I don’t look back and say, “Damn, I wish I’d…”

The first wave of pre-publication promo includes querying all of the magazines on my list that have a lead-time of 8 months. That means I’ve got to get out about 75 queries between May and June. Yeah. Thankfully, I’ve been writing them here and there when I have a free moment and I’ve got about half left to write. I’m not writing on spec anymore, but have to make an exception for a couple of magazines. I’m going after bigger mags this time and finally feel more confident about targeting magazines I wouldn’t query last year. Even now, with the book deal, my confidence meter is a little low when it comes to pitching to glossy teen mags. But I’m going to give it a shot!

I’ve fired up my Power Tracker and am prepping to send those babies. The really crazy part comes with keeping track of follow ups and deadlines. Thankfully, there’s software to track that. I used to track in a notebook, but finally plunked down the dollars for software and now I couldn’t live without it.

J.A. Konrath swears freelancing is the Number One way to get attention for your book and I have to agree. This is my…what…seventh year as a freelancer and it MADE my platform when I started looking for an agent. I swear by freelancing.

That is all.

I'm excited! I'm days away (maybe 3 days) from finishing up a huge set of edits. Y-A-Y! That's the best feeling, isn't it? To be this close to giving up the manuscript and passing it along to an agent, editor or critique partner to read. I've been working super-extra-crazy hours to make this draft as best I can and even though I go all out on all my drafts--this one got an extra oopmf from somewhere.

Also...I can't say much at this point, but work on the cover for Take the Reins has commenced!! :) As I get details that I can share from Editor K, I'll pass them along. It's so, so exciting to dream up a cover and think about the jumble of pages and words becoming an actual book. That people will read. And hopefully like. :)

As you noticed, there's no guest this Friday. On April 4, however, the fun and fabulous Debbie Reed Fischer is stopping by. Don't miss that.

Finally, I'm working on plotting a 3-video set just for aspiring freelancers. If you've e-mailed me before about how to get into freelancing, these videos are for you. They'll take you from choosing a market, to formatting and writing a query to fulfilling the assignment. Watch for those in April or early May. If you've got freelancing questions you want answered, e-mail me within the next couple of weeks and I'll be sure to try and tackle your questions.

Back to work! TGIF

Today's worthy of a double post because... I just got my March copy of The Writer and it has my Breakthrough column on page fourteen!!! Yay!! :) I've been trying to break into The Writer for five years and I'm beyond thrilled to see an article of mine in that mag.

I hope you guys check it out. :)

I was on The Writer's Website yesterday and found this nice little link: http://www.writermag.com/wrt/default.aspx?c=ni&id=56

I absolutely cannot wait for the March issue of The Writer! It'll have my piece for the Breakthrough column where I wrote how writing articles led me to my book deal. In my case, it's completely true that freelancing for magazines taught me a lot about writing fiction from putting deadlines on myself, to editing to working with editors.

Have you freelanced? Did you find it helpful before you started writing a book? If you haven't, would you consider freelancing or are you sticking to fiction