Happy 2009 to everyone!

I’m home now from a week in the mountains with friends, celebrating the release of STOLEN FURY and the New Year Holiday. We had a great time hanging out, playing games, going sledding with the kids and overall just relaxing. I was able to blog in a few places to promote STOLEN FURY, but mainly it was good just to get away and unwind from the stress of the last month – kids home, holidays, book promo, etc. Unfortunately, I contracted some kind of weird cold virus last weekend, which I thought I was on my way to getting rid of when we left Tuesday, but somehow I managed to lose my voice while we were gone and today it’s even worse than it was before. I literally HAVE no voice now. Physically I feel fine, I just can’t talk. So it makes for an interesting time here. My hubby and kids are thrilled (I’m the yeller in the house). Me? Not so much. I’m just hoping my voice decides to return sometime before Wednesday and my big book launch party.

So in case you’re interested in my happenings, I blogged today at Killer Fiction. I wasn’t able to post about it until now because we just got home from the mountains, but the post is up if you’re interested. Tomorrow the Statesman Journal is running the article about me and my book in their Sunday edition (I’m told it’ll be on page D5 for those of you in the area), but for those of you outside Oregon, you can find it on their online page.

My launch party is all set for Wednesday night, 1.07.09. Aside from my voice not cooperating, everything else is good to go. I think we’re going to have a HUGE turnout, too. Everyone I’ve talked to about it is coming, and I keep getting emails and comments from people telling me they’re bringing friends and that their friends are bringing friends. I honestly had no idea people would be so excited about it, but they are. I’m a little worried the bookseller isn’t going to have enough books, but I guess that’s out of my hands. (She told me she was ordering at least 100, maybe more).

In good news, I’ve been hearing from people who are seeing my book all over, and places where it’s already sold out. That’s pretty cool to hear. And though I really wasn’t stressing too much about where the book is at, a friend has fixed that for me. Here’s a snippet of our conversation:

Him: “So people all over can buy your book? Like, all over the country?”

Me: “Well, actually, all over the English speaking world. I know from some emails I got that stores in Australia already have it. And it’ll be sold in Canada soon if it isn’t already.”

Him (very shocked): “Wow. That’s just…woooow. How do you sleep at night knowing it’s EVERYWHERE?”

Me (suddenly very nervous): “Oh boy. I was sleeping fine because I hadn’t thought of it that way. Thanks for adding to my stress level!!!”

Tomorrow is a down day for us – packing up all the Christmas decorations, getting the kids ready for school on Monday (Hallelujah!!!!). I’m very much looking forward to the return of normal life. And I’m so itching to get back to writing. I miss it.

How was your New Year’s Holiday? Do anything extra-special?