I love everything about writing my books. The research and plotting. Developing characters and creating scenarios for their fictional lives. Deciding what crime my villains will spring on their unsuspecting victims. And not knowing how the book ends until I make the journey with the characters is so satisfying.

I do not, however, enjoy marketing. Seriously! There is so much to learn about running Facebook ads. And don’t even get me started about trying, unsuccessfully by the way, to make an Amazon ad. I also can’t seem to master Tik Tok or Book Tok or any kind of Tok.

My trek into the nightmare of marketing is driven by the desire to increase my book sales. So far my endeavors have been participating in book events with Northwest Independent Writers Association (NIWA), as well as doing a few on my own. I love talking to potential readers and discussing my books along with other authors’ books. And I’m really good at sales! I’ve been told I can sell someone the shirt their already wearing!

Obviously, I’m participating in writing blogs for Ladies of Mystery, but I also try to post blogs on my author’s website. And have looked into writing a blog for Goodreads to see if I can attract more readers to my books.

One of the benefits to working events with other authors is learning how to well … market. Paty Jager has been helpful beyond words, answering my questions and holding my hand as I flatten my learning curve. From creating ads to crafting a newsletter to navigating tools like Audible, Paty has provided great insight. Her patience is endless and if not for her I would’ve tossed in the towel after the first week.

Now I’m running a Facebook ad every week or so and my book sales are creeping upwards. I haven’t been able to master an Amazon ad yet, but plan to keep trying. I noticed that my eBook sales are up via Draft2Digital. In fact, the Brooklyn New York Library ordered all five of my eBooks. What?!? As did the Jackson County Library in my hometown of Medford, Oregon.

One of my favorite marketing tasks so far has been scheduling more solo book events. I’ve landed a booth spot for Donald Daze in my current hometown and the Jackson County Library has invited me to do an event in June.

Marketing might be a touch challenging, but I do love a good challenge! I would love any tips or tricks you’ve had success with, so please feel free to share at author@kimilakay.com

I’m off now to work on my current WIP, “Chaos in Cabo”, because causing chaos for my characters is way more fun than marketing!

Happy writing, Ladies ~ Kimila

Footnote: As you know, I lost my son, Derrick, seven years so with each passing child, I deeply feel the loss for the parents. Dear friends of mine lost their 21-year-old son, Jason, in a motorcycle accident a week ago. My apologies for the short blog this time, but I’ve been in Medford wrapped in the comfort of family and friends. Hug those close to you because no matter how much time you think you have … it will never be enough.

“Hi, my name is Kimila and I’m a word-aholic.”

I absolutely love words! I grew up in a family of storytellers and some of my crazy clan may have made up their own words occasionally. For instance, warshcloth for washcloth, tempature for temperature and yellow for hello. You get the idea, right?

Now part of the reason for these created words could be because my relatives moved to Oregon from Oklahoma before I was born. And all y’all no what a strong southern accent can do to the English language.

When I entered the working world one of my first jobs was a secretarial position at a bank. I’d always thought of myself as a great speller, but my mean supervisor soon taught me that was not the case. Imagine you’re typing a letter on a manual typewriter, and you’ve read the piece believing the missive is error free. Then … your supervisor hands it back with red ink markings showing your misspelled words and errors.

I became a better writer, editor, and speller thanks to Mean Mary. And the invention of computers and software has helped immensely. I love that Word tells me what’s wrong with a hint of blue or cute red squiggly lines.

My very first WIP in 2004, “Murder in Margaritaville” (no Jimmy Buffet would not let me use the name) was a labor of love created on a desktop using a keyboard. I pounded out all 125,000 words over the course of three months. Worked hard on editing, printed the pages, and clipped them into a three-ring binder. Then I had my mom, of course, and a few friends read my masterpiece.

Oh, the life of a novice writer. I attended my first Willamette Writer’s conference that year and fell for the line, “I’d love to represent you and your novel, but first we’ll need to have it professionally edited by our team of awesome editors. For a small fee (fortune).”

Of course, I forked over the money for the editing service and learned some valuable tools I still use today. Such as, the correct way to use the word “like”, which I had used incorrectly 30,000 times in my 125,000 word bemouth. One of the editors and I became friends after she sent me a sticker with the word “Like” in the middle of circle, then crossed out.

The most important lesson I learned, though, was do not pay someone who’s dangling the dream of helping you land a book deal. After paying for the editing, the agent, who’d lured me into her web of deceit, told me my masterpiece wasn’t a good fit for her firm.

She gave me a few reasons, but the one that stuck and haunts me still was, “As a novice writer, you should stick to 70-75,000 words in your books.”

I decided not to perseverate about this unpleasant experience and moved forward with my fledgling career. To hone my skills, I wrote short essays published by the “Cup of Comfort” anthology series. You learn how to be an efficient wordsmith when the count is 2,000 words. How to tell an interesting, compelling story without the excess baggage of unneeded words. That being a ruthless editor of your own work serves to make your story stronger.

Now that I’ve let go of the “book deal” dream, I’ve embraced creating interesting characters and writing the fabulous stories swirling in my mind. With three novels, a novella, and a handful of short stories in my collection of work, I feel good about my writing skills. A few glowing reviews for these books has also encouraged me to continue weaving my beloved words into dark and twisty tales.

Still, every now and then, I hear those long ago words echoing in my mind. As a novice writer, you should stick to 70-75,000 words in your books. And worry I’m being too wordy, adding unnecessary blather that will bog down my story and cause a reader to set the book aside.

Each novel I have written over the past six years has grown in wordcount. I find myself watching the count with a bit of trepidation as the number draws close to 70,000. But then I ask myself, is the story good? Can it be better? Have the character’s completed their journey within the tale? Are the loose ends wrapped up for the reader? Have I created a sense of anticipation for the next book?

At this point, I smile and keep writing until the story has reached the finish line. I don’t think of myself as a novice writer anymore, but instead as a writer who loves words and plans to let them determine when the tale is told no matter the word count!

Happy New Year, Ladies of Mystery! And happy writing!

Are you all ready for Christmas? I am, finally, and feel accomplished with all my gifts wrapped and under the tree. We traveled to our home town for the holiday weekend and are enjoying visiting with family and friends. Christmas Eve brings a few gift deliveries and tonight we will make my sister’s famous Lemon Shortbread Christmas cookies.

Looking back on the last few months, I realize though that I’ve been so immersed in holiday prep, I’ve missed out on actually visiting with friends and family.

Each year at the crack of dawn on the day after Thanksgiving, I’m up replacing my fall decorations with Santas and all things Christmas. This year, our oldest son, Norman, and his lovely wife, Kendra, along with our two adorable grandkids, Sloan and Carter, came for Thanksgiving. One of the things the grandkids have always enjoyed was decorating my tree. It was fun watching them sort through decades of ornaments, carefully putting them on my nine foot tree.

We always exchange gifts at Christmas, but it dawned on me the best part of this Thanksgiving was being present to experience them adorning our tree with memories from Norman’s childhood. We played games, watched the Ducks and Beavers play their last civil war game, and visited this and that.

It could be because I’m in my sixties now, or maybe because my mom passed several years ago, and along with her a lot of my holiday traditions. But I now think the best gift of all is being in the presence of family and friends.

I know Santa hasn’t delivered our gifts yet, but I’m already looking toward the New Year and thinking about how I can be more in the moment with my loved ones. The age old adage, “Your Presence is the best Present” should be the mantra we all follow.

So, as challenging as it might be, I’m going to focus on not being on my phone when I’m with others. Listening to my husband, Randy, when he wants to share a funny story or even his latest political opinion. (Insert eyeroll) I want to participate in the retelling of beloved family stories when I’m with my siblings, nieces, nephews, cousins, since so many of us have lost the elders in our lives.

My husband, Randy, isn’t much of a holiday prep guy and doesn’t quite understand all the Christmas hype. Of course, I’d love for him to join in my fun. But he enjoys meeting friends for holiday toddies and watching football. The camaraderie of yelling at the refs and cheering on your favorite team is his favorite gift. A gift that’s hard to wrap for sure but something Randy loves and … will remember forever.

Within my circle of friends, we no longer exchange gifts, despite the fact that I always find the best presents. However, there is nothing like laughing over memories of our adventures throughout the year. Sharing fun stories about our families. Plotting and planning where we might vacation together. Or working out the details for our annual girls’ beach week on the Oregon coast. Again, I’m reminded that the best part of these gifts is the presence of all these wonderful people in my life.

Of course, one of my favorite places to be is in my writing zone. I love being down the rabbit hole with my current WIP, “Willow’s Woods”, enjoying the characters of Stoneybrook. And I can’t wait to start my stay in Cabo where “Chaos in Cabo” takes place. I do know though that when I’m writing I am very not present. I tend to ignore everyone and everything, wanting to stay in my zone and focus on my process. The anticipation of what my characters might do next or where the story will take us keeps me enthralled.

But in the coming year, I do plan to take a break and pop out of myself and be in the moment. I can’t wait to enjoy all the presents in my future I’ll be blessed with by my presence.

Merry Christmas, Ladies of Mystery. I hope each of you, and your families, have a lovely Christmas and a blessed New Year!

The holiday season is upon us! My tree is up, and we had a wonderful time visiting with my grandkids and their parents. Next will be decorating the house with all my favorite things and wrapping presents I’ve bought throughout the year. And with three newly published books, I can’t wait to gift them to all the people who supported my writing efforts this year.

As much as I love the festivities of the holiday season, I have to admit, I love writing more.

When I found myself faced with a few obstacles this past summer while trying to finish my novel “Vanished in Vallarta”, my normal writing routine became a frantic, almost 24/7 push to complete the editing phase of the novel.

Part of the frenzy was due to also trying to wrap up “Redneck Ranch” and polish a rewrite of “Five Golden Rings.” I wanted to have all three of these books available for the Portland Holiday Market which occurs the third week of November. All of a sudden, I found myself scrambling at the end of October to publish and order the books for an arrival date in time for the market.

Thankfully, I was blessed with some heroic efforts from friends who believe in me, and all three books were ready in time for the Portland Holiday Market. These ladies are definitely on Santa’s “Nice List”!

Prior to the book publishing craziness, I had developed a balanced schedule of work (Unfortunately, I still have a day job), write, house work, write, yard work, write, meal prep, write. You get the idea. But the pressure of wanting these books completed by a self-imposed deadline, caused me to fall down a Writing Rabbit Hole! And I liked being there!

When I would venture out of my abyss, I’d find unfinished house work, empty cupboards and a husband losing his ability to support my passion. But after a half-hearted effort to catch up on these things and spend time with Randy, back down the writing rabbit hole I would go.

Now, though, I’m anxious to find my balance again. Maybe, despite my sleepless nights and endless fretting, I liked the stress of meeting a deadline. Enjoyed being immersed in México with my fabulous characters. Adored walking the streets of Stoneybrook with Wyatt, Harley, and the rest of the townsfolk.

But equity in all areas of my life needed to be addressed. With this goal in mind, I dredged up a tried and true work technique I learned many, many years ago. Power Blocks! When I was first building my investment business, I was taught to designate two hours of each day to certain work related projects. This method helped me accomplish more during an eight hour work day, so surely it would come in handy now.

I’m close to retiring, so some days my job only takes about two hours. First block assigned. Next I knew I should do a household task or project and made a list to work from. Two down, two to go. Since I’m up early, two hours writing in the morning seemed prudent. If I was successful with the other daily power blocks, I could eek out two more hours in the afternoon before Randy arrived home from work to focus on expanding my marketing efforts. Paty Jager will be proud this task made the power block task list.

December will be a good trial month to implement my power block approach. Of course, I may have to substitute chores and projects with decorating and baking, but it is the holidays after all!

One thing I know for sure, I’m passionate about my writing! I know too that I can survive deadline related stress, self-imposed or otherwise. I also believe applying an idea generated by the 1930’s quote of Allen F Morgenstern, “Work smarter, not harder!”, will help me stay focused.

I’m excited about the three books I have planned for this year: “Chaos in Cabo”, “Whispering Willows, a Novella” and “Willow’s Woods”. Plus, I’m planning to write two short stories for anthologies in 2024.

So, if you’ll excuse me … I’m heading back down the Writing Rabbit Hole!!!

Now for my shameless promotion. “Vanished in Vallarta” is now available on Amazon: