Month: November 2017


Nov
2017

Happy Green Bean Casserole Day!

categories: Adorkable, debut, doing what you love, Goodreads, Romance, YA

Hi everyone!  I hope you are having a very Happy Thanksgiving!  My favorite thing about today is that it reminds me there is so much to be thankful for–and I think, like a lot of people, I forget this way too often.  Family and friends, good health, food (especially green bean casserole, yum!), shelter, kind people with good hearts and bookshelves overflowing with amazing books.  I also found this yesterday which made me pretty ecstatic :).  ADORKABLE was one of the most read this week in sports romance books on Goodreads!!!

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Woohoo!  So thankful for this and the fact that people are still reading my books.  I’ve been writing this month–yay, yay, hooray!–and I’m thankful for that as well.  My work in progress is a story I loved from the very beginning, and I’m falling more in love with the characters as I continue.  Hopefully, I will have some book updates soon, but until then…

Happy Green Bean Casserole Day, everyone! 🙂

Happy reading,

Cookie O’Gorman


Nov
2017

NINJA GIRL Fan Art!

categories: doing what you love, Fan Art, fun, NaNoWriMo, nice surprise, Ninja Girl, YA

I love fan art!  It is one of the coolest, most thoughtful, best things out there, and it has personally helped me find books/movies over the years that have become some of my favorites!  I love it when a reader takes time out of their busy schedule and creates a picture, drawing, video etc.  They put not only their time but their talent into making that, and it means so much.

As much as I love it, though, I never really expected anyone to make fan art for my work.

But someone did, you guys!!!!!

I got this tweet from Alyssa last Friday (it was sent a couple of days earlier, but I didn’t see it until then).

Ahhhhh! Isn’t it awesome?!? <3 <3 <3

I couldn’t stop staring *____*.   Snow looks SO perfect, strong and kickass and so dang cute!  (Sidenote: I’d always thought Snow would be doing a high kick on the book’s cover but never found the right pic.)  And then take a look at the bad guy–notice his wince as our NINJA GIRL is kicking butt and taking names.  And then, oh my goodness, Ash!!!  He is possibly my favorite part of this whole scenario.  His little heart eyes as he watches Snow are…sigh…perfection <3.

The tears came even though I tried to stop them.  They were the good kind of tears because I was just so moved.  Alyssa didn’t have to make this; she didn’t have to draw an action scene of NINJA GIRL.  But she did, and I am over-the-moon grateful for this!  Go check out her instagram (@fanbookart) and while you’re there look at her other amazing pieces.  I’m particularly fond of the Harry Potter drawings ;).

This was such a cool and unexpected surprise.  To get to see Snow and Ash drawn like this…it is just incredible, made me cry like a baby.  Honestly, I still can’t stop looking at it.  If I ever see Sally and Becks from ADORKABLE rendered this way, going by my previous reaction?  Well, we better get the tissues ready lol.

To Alyssa and all of the other fan art creators out there: You are amazing, and as a writer and a lover of awesome things to fangirl over, I am SO thankful for your talent and your thoughtfulness.

It’s almost the middle of November, and I’m still NaNoWriMo-ing.  Surprises like this and the encouraging comments I’ve heard from other readers/writers definitely have given me the drive to push forward.  I’ve added over 11,000 words to my WIP, and I’m hoping to add more.

I hope you are doing well and are having a great week!

Happy reading,

Cookie O’Gorman


Nov
2017

NaNoWriMo

categories: doing what you love, NaNoWriMo, self-publishing, writing, YA

November is National Novel Writing Month.

If you’re a writer, you probably already knew this lol!  But if not, basically, the goal is to write a novel (or about 50,000 words) in a month.  That’s actually a bit short for a book–a typical YA romance ends up being between 60,000-80,000 words–which is somewhat of an arbitrary range, but when I started writing, I did a LOT of research on this.

FYI, my rough drafts were always short of the normal length.  *Le sigh*

But anyway, back to NaNoWriMo.

I’ve always thought about participating.  There’s even an online community/website here!  Sooo…this year I’ve decided to try and stick with it.  I haven’t signed up–mostly because I feel like the people may have their own friends/groups, and I’m nervous about introducing myself, getting to know new people yada yada yada.  Maybe someday I’ll finally take the plunge, but for now, I’m staying in my hermit writing cave lol!

My personal NaNoWriMo goal is to write every day and to significantly advance my current WIP.

If that means 50,000 words…awesome.  If it means I get to “The End,” that would be even better.  If not, though, I’ve decided to be proud of the progress and enjoy the journey.

Confession time: I’m a slow writer.  Also…I only work on one story at a time.  Gasp, I know!  There are people who can work on several stories at once.  It still baffles me when authors are able to put out multiple books a year!  Truly, I envy and respect those writers SO much.  But right now, that’s just not me.

So again, my goal is to write, write, write!

Currently, I’ve added about: 561 words (Nov. 1) and 1,248 words (Nov. 2) to my WIP.

I hope this post didn’t bore you too much, just really wanted to share this with you guys :).  Wish me luck, and I hope you all have a great weekend!

Happy reading,

Cookie O’Gorman