Please welcome the rockin' cover of Blood Fugue by E.J. Wesley

Author E.J. Wesley is throwing a blog party to celebrate the release of his new book cover and wants you to join in the fun. Jump over to his blog to learn about how you can win some awesome prizes, including $50 toward a cover of your own and advance reader copies of Blood Fugue.

Now here's the rockin' cover!

Cover work by Sketcher Girl, LLC

What's the Story About?

“Some folks treated the past like an old friend. The memories warmed them with fondness for what was, and hope for what was to come. Not me. When I thought of long ago, my insides curdled, and I was left feeling sour and wasted.”

Missouri's own E.J. Wesley

Jenny Schmidt is a young woman with old heartaches. A small town Texas girl with big city attitude, she just doesn’t fit in. Not that she has ever tried. She wears loneliness like a comfy sweatshirt. By the age of twenty-one, she was the last living member of her immediate family. Or so she thought…

“We found my ‘grandfather’ sitting at his dining room table. An entire scorched pot of coffee dangled from his shaky hand. His skin was the ashen gray shade of thunderclouds, not the rich mocha from the photo I’d seen. There were dark blue circles under each swollen red eye. A halo of white hair skirted his bald head, a crown of tangles and mats. Corpses had more life in them.”

Suddenly, instead of burying her history with the dead, Jenny is forced to confront the past. Armed only with an ancient family journal, her rifle, and an Apache tomahawk, she must save her grandfather’s life and embrace her dangerous heritage. Or be devoured by it.

BLOOD FUGUE by E.J. Wesley, is the first of the MOONSONGS books, a series of paranormal-action novelettes. At fewer than 13k words, BLOOD FUGUEis the perfect snack for adventurous readers who aren’t afraid of stories with bite. Available wherever fine eBooks are sold September 2012.

Join the Party! Here are some links you may want to check out.

The Open Vein, E.J.'s blog -

E.J. Wesley on the Twitter

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If you are feeling particularly supportive and happen to have a twitter account, please tweet this sample tweet or feel free to make one of your own:

Join the party! Author @EJWesley is previewing the cover to his story, Blood Fugue. Win an ARC & other stuff http://the-open-vein-ejwesley.blogspot.com/

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If you have the time, Brinda Berry interviewed me on her blog today. Check it out HERE. Have a happy Monday.

Advanced Reader Copy Update and a Blogfest with incredible prizes

I want to remind those that are interested that the drawing for the paperback Advanced Reader Copy of my book, SLIPSTREAM is still open. Please go to my Christmas post here if you have not done so already and leave a comment that says "I would like an ARC".  I have a few interested folks and want to thank every one of you that already commented for your wonderful support. I will keep the contest open for another week and will draw a winner on Friday, January 13th (13 has always been a lucky number for me since I was born on that day). My giveaway is of course, international.

In the month of February, there's going to be a cool blogfest that is hosted by:

1) Live to write...Edit when necessary.
2) Cassie Mae over at Reading, Writing, and Lovin' it.

Why is this blogfest cool? Because I get to talk about my characters and you can too if you join in!

Here are the details:
Monday, February 6th--Characters on the couch:

Have one of your characters answer the following questions (to make this work to your benefit, choose a character who is the hardest for you to write :) Max 250 words (Not including the questions—only the answers).

1. What is your biggest vulnerability? Do others know this or is it a secret?
2. What do people believe about you that is false?
3. What would your best friend say is your fatal flaw? Why?
4. What would the same friend say is your one redeeming quality? Why?
5. What do you want most? What will you do to get it? 

Wednesday, February 8th--Dialogue Introduction:

Have two characters introduce each other using only dialogue—no backstory, no internalization, just dialogue between the two. Max 250 words.

Friday, February 10th -- Emotion Flash Fiction:

Emotion is the engine of a story. Pick an emotion and in a flash fiction piece of 250 words MAKE us feel it! We want to connect with your character. This will be a challenge in 250 words.

Prizes include two books, two query critiques, and two FULL MANUSCRIPT critiques. Like seriously...these hosts are going to read 80,000 plus words per person for the winner. That is an AWESOME prize. It's so hard to get feedback...so hard to find someone that will actually set aside the time to look seriously at your work-in-progress.

Have a great Thursday and go sign-up for the blogfest! It seriously looks fun.

A note on my banner...

I have always loved blue eyes. I blame
where I was raised. No one in Utah looks
like me being half-Japanese.

I got a few comments this week regarding the new look of my blog.  I chose the wolf eyes banner up top simply because it's all wintry in Salt Lake City now and the eyes are a pretty blue. I like blue eyes and have since kindergarten. I remember my teacher handed out papers to all the kids. She asked us to take a crayon from a box and write what color we thought our eyes were.  I wrote down blue because I loved blue. Then she passed out a mirror and told us to take a look and see.  I looked in the mirror and saw brown eyes the color of dog dung. I was traumatized. But I'll never forget it. Prior to that time period, I don't even think I was aware of what I looked like really.  Maybe it was the start of my body image disorder. I have no idea.

So yeah...it has nothing to do with my book. I wanted to make a banner that could reflect my book. Then I realized how impossible that seems without custom artwork. In one sentence I would pitch my book as Schrodinger's cat only with hockey sticks, glass spiders, and monsters from the id. Only no one knows what that means.  Maybe the wolf eyes might work in one aspect. They're more serious than goofy penguins. If I had to rate my book with MPAA ratings, it would get a R-rating.  The penguins that I used before might make people think, "Oh Mike's book is great for kindergartners!"... which is a resounding..."ummm noooo."  I have the goofy penguins banner on my computer hard drive if I ever want to resurrect it. But I think I'll try the wolf eyes for a little while. Who knows...maybe when spring rolls around I'll switch to bunnies.

My story has been as challenging as this for me to define.

Also I finished my final edits on my book and sent it back to DDP. I say final because I've read through it twice (in the last two weeks) and fussed and fussed with it and it really needs to just get out of here. If it stays here more, I'll start changing some things.  I'm really happy at this very instant with the way it looks. I can't say that I'd feel that way tomorrow or the next day. So I'm not ever going to reopen it. I'm just going to let it go. I don't want to edit anymore. Not on this project. To give you an idea of how much editing this book has gone through I will tell you. I wrote a first draft in 2008. A beta reader that I trust pointed out glaring things wrong with it.  So I rewrote 3/4 of the book. Seriously. Then I hired a private editor and edited it line by line. Then I edited it myself. Then I went on query and submission. DDP picked it up. Then I edited it again with a professional full grade editor line by line. Then I just now edited it again on my own as a final look through. And then I re-read it twice in two weeks and changed more stuff.  Last night, I rewrote the opening paragraph fifteen times.  I think everything is perfect. So I'm done. I'm letting go.

As writers, there can be a point where we edit something to death.
I think I've gotten close to this point with my current manuscript.

In a few weeks I may have some advanced reader copies that I can give out on my blog. They'll be paperback with no cover art.  Paperback with cover art won't be available probably until summer 2012. Ebook release will come first in May. That's just how DDP does business. I know I've got some people who have been extremely loyal to the blog so if they want a free copy of said book with no cover art to read before the release date, I think I can make that happen.  Plus I can start querying some of the sites that review Fantasy & Sci-Fi stuff and see if I can get in their queue.

Have a great weekend. I'm off to see Immortals!