Strictly Business is Finally Here! (Also, a brief lesson in how not to be an author)

At long last, Tera Bodnar and Eric Yun are back–and hotter than ever–in book two of The Loft series: Strictly Business! 

Yes, it’s been a long time coming–alarmingly close to a year, in fact. Telling the story of Tera and Eric has become my passion project, and I was super excited for book two to come out in December… then in February… then March… then May… I’m sure you get the idea.

As many of my previous blog posts can attest to, the past year-and-a-half or so has been a pretty rough time in my life. While there have been some incredible high points–publishing my very first book, for one–there have been some pretty severe lows as well. Without going into too much detail, the various setbacks that I’ve experienced over the past months have made it feel like the journey to finally publishing Strictly Business and the few other projects I’ve been working on would forever be one step forward and two steps back. In a twisted bit of irony, the frustrating will-they-won’t-they between Tera and Eric was starting to feel like a metaphor for my own life.

I believe I’ve briefly mentioned my struggle with depression and anxiety before. And while I can tentatively say that I’m climbing my way out of a depressive episode now, there was a long stretch of time where I found myself stuck between being too depressed to write, and periods of great inspiration where writing was what got me through the day. My ambition, eagerness to write/publish all the story ideas in my head, and my simple need to boost my self-confidence and give myself something good to look forward to all led me to make some embarrassing mistakes, like scheduling promos for books I’d hoped to have published in the near future before they were finished. And every time I blew past a self-imposed deadline I felt more like a failure, until I started wondering why I’d ever bothered trying to make it as a romance author.

But, you came here for some good news, right? Well, for starters, I’m obviously super excited that Strictly Business is finally available on Amazon. Yay! Unfortunately, only the Kindle edition is available right now, with the paperback hopefully coming soon. Both it and Whip Smart will be available for $0.99 until Aug. 12, so get them on sale while you can!

But what about those other projects I’ve been working on? What about book three of The Loft and the Risky Business duet? Well, I can tell you that they’re coming… soon. For a while, at least, I’m going to try to play it safe and not promise any strict publication dates. However, I can pretty confidently say that High Risk (Risky Business #1) should be out by the end of this month, and Tangled Love (The Loft #3) will be out sometime in September.

Again, I want to thank all of you who have waited months and months to see how Tera and Eric’s story unfolds. I’m dedicating this one to you, dear patient–if perhaps sexually frustrated–readers. I truly hope the reward has been worth the wait. These characters have become almost like best friends to me, helping me through some tough times, and I can’t wait to share their continuing story with you.

In that spirit, how about some gratuitous “dream cast” pictures? You know, just in case you’d like a refresher on who’s-who in The Loft (or just want an excuse to stare at pictures of beautiful people).

(EDIT- 4/4/19: Hello, all! For those of you who are new here and eager to see how I envisioned the characters–or those of you returning to enjoy pictures of beautiful people–I apologize for the lack of pictures. Unfortunately, due to this recent blog post by Jenny Trout, I’ve decided to play it safe and remove my celebrity “dream cast” pictures from my blog. I know I’m far from the first author to share their visual inspiration for their characters, that my website/blog is not actually monetized, and that I would never use unauthorized photos on book covers or official promo materials, but I realize now that what happened to Jenny could happen to anyone, and I’d rather not take the risk of getting sued. I know that on other blog posts I’ve used reaction gifs featuring actors/celebrities who also happen to have served as visual inspiration for a few of my characters, and those will remain in those posts for the time being. However, all relevant images from my designated “character ‘cast'” posts will be removed. I will leave the names of the actors/celebrities, though, so anyone who wants to know how I envisioned the characters in my own mind can look them up. Or, just check out my Pinterest board, which has way, way too many pictures.)

Tera- Nina Dobrev

Eric- Choi Siwon

Alexis- Emeraude Toubia

Luke- Zhang Yixing

Megan- Holland Roden

Aaron- Dominic Sherwood

Mr. Drake- Henry Cavill

Whip Smart and Strictly Business are on sale for $0.99 now. Happy reading… 😉