This has been a particularly busy week for me. First, I am proud to present this new edition of my novel The Blood that Flows. It's a unique piece in my collection. It doesn't really feel like anything else I have published in the last ten years. For starters, though it has romantic elements, it is not a romance novel. I have been defining it as a horror, paranormal detective novel with a woman sleuth. I don't normally write detective novels, perhaps because this novel was published over ten years ago and it was a flop (dear reader, please do not get spooked by the idea that it was a flop. It was the first novel that I tried to publish and I didn't know much about launching a book. I also had no reputation as Stephanie Van Orman and was only known under my pen name Sapphirefly. However, even with all that against it, it did make me more money than I spent, so in that way, it was a success). Because it was less successful than I felt it deserved to be, I thought I must not have written it very well.
I released a half-edited version on my account on Quotev. Sometimes doing something like that helps me understand if a project is worth revisiting or if it's better off dead. When I reread portions of The Blood that Flows, I was actually impressed by how good it was. If a baby author handed it to me and asked me to look at it, I would have told them it had a ton of potential and was worth working on. So, why not say that to myself?
The low points in the preparation process were these. First, I had to go through all the edits my old publishing company had suggested and decide which one of us was full of poo. It turns out that I was more full of it than I thought and I ended up accepting more of their changes than I rejected. I hate admitting that I don't always know the best way. Second, there was a pirated version of this book available on Amazon before I even uploaded my ebook on Amazon. Were they stealing it off Quotev? WTH?
The high points were these. When I ran it through the editing software on the last go, I had very few errors. That's never happened before. It gave me a lot of confidence that my editing process is getting more effective. I have read more than my fair share of articles over the years saying that you can't do your own editing, You'll miss stuff. You can't see it the way an editor can see it. Blah, blah, blah... blah. For another thing, I really enjoyed the tagline on the back of the book. Would you rather die for love or kill for love? Awesome!
Here's the synopsis:
My sister lives her life looking through rose-colored glasses. It comes from looking at the world through blood... a vampire's gaze. It's a world where everyone wants to drink her blood like she's wine. How much can she give before she flows over? And how many people do I have to kill to make it stop?
Here's the excerpt:
My sister lay motionless on the bed with a glassy look in her eyes. Actually, she hadn’t looked sharp since before she became a vamp, but this expression was more vacant than usual. Her dark hair curled around her white face and she stared off into space like she hardly noticed my arrival.
I closed the window, locked it, and drew the curtains. Then I went into the bathroom attached to her room and got a bandage to stop her bleeding. Vampire blood didn’t clot at all compared to human blood. After all, a vampire was only two steps from being a corpse. It would take ages for her cuts to close. As I wrapped her wounds, she yanked the blanket out from under her and pulled it over her chest. If she was cold, he must have drunk quite a bit.
I shuddered. What had London done to her body and for what? It would take her over a year to close up, even after she stitched herself shut. Sometimes I thought vampires were more like Frankenstein’s monster than Dracula.
I whispered quietly, “How much has he drunk? A cup? A liter?”
Silence.
“Two liters?”
She averted her eyes.
I was more pleased with this book than I expected to be. Here are some goodie links:
YouTube link to the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1d9BJnxEFk
Commaful link to the short version: https://commaful.com/play/sapphirefly/
Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09RYSLYCT/ref=sr_1_2?crid=3UR5LQFHIP2VH&keywords=stephanie+van+orman&qid=1644298914&sprefix=stephanie+van+orman%2Caps%2C145&sr=8-2
IN OTHER NEWS!
I gave my website a massive overhaul this past week, and it now looks almost completely different. If you have a minute, why not go have a look?
https://tigrix1.wixsite.com/stephanievanorman
Because The Blood that Flows is not a steamy romance, it will not be very successful. Nothing that is not a steamy romance is very successful these days, but I was pretty pleased to offer this book for free. I was pleased when Free-ebooks.net featured it on the front of their website. I was happy with the new cover that I bought ages ago and still looked good when I brushed it off. I was happy with the last line of the book. And even though I was too nervous with the gore level in this book to label it as anything lower than 18+, I would give it to my 15-year-old self and wish her the best. She liked the gory stuff. I hope all of you enjoy it. In an odd way, it is probably the closest thing I have ever written to chick-lit.
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