I’ll Be Back

I fell on Monday and banged up my knee and leg. Although I finally managed—with a lot of help—to make it out to the office, I don’t anticipate being able to sit here long.

I’m not sure when I’ll get to the office (a small building in the backyard) again so don’t expect to see a new post for a few days. If your comment goes into moderation, please be patient if there is a delay in comment approval.

I’m looking at this hiatus as an unplanned vacation!

Blog Book Tour This Week

After my recent three-week blog book tour, I decided I would make shorter tours in the future. This week, I’m taking a short tour with four stops. I hope you will visit the host blogs and comment. It’s a lot of work for a blogger to host a blog book tour stop, and I want my hosts to know they are appreciated.

The stops on this tour are at blogs that don’t focus primarily on books and writing. I’m excited about the opportunity to reach new readers through these blogs.

• Tuesday, December 2
  • Father Jerry’s Jottings
  • Guest post: Starting a Blog
• Wednesday, December 3
  • Word Sell, Inc.
  • Interview by Brad Shorr
• Thursday, December 4
  • Light Within
  • Guest post: Writing a Mystery: Dream or Destiny
• Friday, December 5
  • Father Jerry’s Jottings
  • Guest post: Blogging for Beginners

I hope to see you at each of these tour stops.

New Review for Dream or Destiny

Dream or Destiny has been reviewed through Nothing Binding’s book review program. You can read the complete review at Nothing Binding, but here is a snippet:

Lillie Ammann has written a fantastic book that really reaches out to you and pulls you in. I felt like the main characters were great friends of mine, and I really related well to them. The story line was wonderful, and kept me guessing throughtout the entire book. …  I also really enjoyed the fact that religion was involved in this story. I’ve noticed that many authors stray away from religion in order to keep readers interested in their work and to not offend anyone. I was pleased that this author included references to God and used it in a way that a reader wouldn’t be bothered by it, religious or not.

You will find excerpts from a number of reviews of Dream or Destiny on the review page. I appreciate the positive reviews the book has received.

If you’ve read the book, I’d love for you to post a review at Amazon.com.

Blog Book Tour for Dream or Destiny

Note added 10/27/08: Check the blog tour page for a tour schedule that is updated daily with direct links to the posts. The list below includes links to the host blogs’ main page rather than to specific posts.

I’m going on an international tour for Dream or Destiny—a blog book tour, that is.

As you can see from the schedule below, I’m stopping at some fabulous blogs. The hosts are located in Germany, India, Scotland, Belgium, Guatemala, and the US. They have lined up a variety of activities—interviews, a podcast, reviews, and guest posts. The interviewers came up with some intriguing questions. I hope you’ll follow the tour and visit all the super blogs who will be hosting me. You’ll have a chance to win a copy of Dream or Destiny at many of the stops.

• Monday, October 27
  • Words for Hire
  • Guest post: Write a Novel in Six Months … or Thirty Days
• Tuesday, October 28
  • The Bluestocking Guide
  • Review
• Wednesday, October 29
  • The Bluestocking Guide
  • Podcast interview
• Thursday, Oct 30
  • eWritings Online Public Relations
  • Guest Post: Where Did That Idea Come From?
• Friday, October 31
  • Cute Writing
  • Guest post: Preparing a Manuscript to Submit to Editors or Agents
• Monday, November 3
  • Life of a Writer
  • Interview
• Tuesday, November 4
  • Unwriter Ron Berry
  • Review
• Wednesday, November 5
  • Unwriter Ron Berry
  • Interview
• Thursday, November 6
  • Confident Writing
  • Interview
• Friday, November 7
  • eWritings Online Public Relations
  • Guest Post: Getting Published with a Little Help from My Friends
• Monday, November 10
  • Writer’s Notes
  • Review & contest
• Tuesday, November 11
  • The Dark Phantom Review
  • Guest Post: A Twisted Tale of Cover Art
• Wednesday, November 12
  • At Home Mom Blog
  • Interview
• Thursday, November 13
  • Straight from Hel
  • Guest Post: How Things Change—Editing a Manuscript Ten Years Later
• Friday, November 14
  • Writer’s Notes
  • Interview & answer readers’ questions

I hope to see you at all my stops around the blog world!

Books and Autographs

If you’re eager to buy Dream or Destiny, the publisher has books in stock now and Amazon.com will have books soon. And if you want my autograph, fill out the request form and I’ll send you an autographed bookplate for your book.

Order Dream or Destiny from GASLight Publishing, LLC

Order Dream or Destiny from Amazon.com

Added 10/23/08: If you bought the e-book, I’ll send you an autographed postcard. Just indicate on the form whether you want a bookplate or a card.

Dream or Destiny is Launched!

We had a wonderful book launch party for Dream or Destiny yesterday. I was thrilled that so many of my friends seemed to really enjoy the readings, the door prizes, and the food.

Here are some photos taken by Margaret Jennings, my sister in Christ at All Saints Anglican Church.

I wish all of you could have celebrated with me, and I hope you will follow my blog book tour coming up in late October and early November.

Update … Any gurus out there?

My post Rules or Artistic License appears at The Blood-Red Pencil today. Do writers have to follow the rules or can they take artistic license? Check out the post for my take on the question.

Here at A Writer’s Words, An Editor’s Eye, I’m still tweaking. When I moved the blog, I ended up with more than 300 broken links. Some of them had probably been broken for awhile—they were external links in posts. However, I didn’t know they were broken until I added the Broken Link Checker plugin. All I had to do was tell Broken Link Checker to unlink, and the problem was solved—the text was saved but the link removed.

Other broken links were links to images in posts. The images seemed to be in the right place, and the links seemed to be right, but they just wouldn’t connect. So I uploaded most of the images again and deleted a few that I couldn’t readily find.

I’m still working on internal links in old posts. When I started the blog, I used the default WordPress permalink structure (date and post or page number). I later changed to date and title and had a plugin to redirect the permalinks; however, that plugin isn’t working here so I’m changing each link individually. I’m down to 42 broken links.

There are still a few glitches that I need to work out. I’ll appreciate any suggestions anyone can make.

• There seems to be a problem with the feed. When I used the FeedSmith plugin on the old theme, a loyal reader said she could no longer get my feed so I deactivated the plugin. I tried the FD Feedburner plugin when I moved the blog, and my Feedburner subscriber number jumped from fewer than 80 to nearly 150. However, it seemed that my feed was showing comments and not posts … so I’ve deactivated the plugin and am back down to 74 subscribers … but the feed seems to be working. If you are a subscriber, please let me know if the feed is working for you.
• Trackbacks are showing up in Recent Comments. All the repaired links are showing up as new trackbacks, so Recent Comments is full of old trackbacks instead of new comments. Does anyone know a way to exclude trackbacks?
• Gravatars disappeared from comments. I think this happened when I finally got Brian’s Threaded Comments working though I didn’t notice it immediately so it could have happened later.
• CommentLuv and Keyword Luv still aren’t working. I can’t figure out why … they just don’t work. Any ideas?

One thing can’t be fixed: I lost all my replies to a number of comments. I recently responded to new comments on a few old posts and was dismayed to find there were no comments from me to the dozen or more comments. It looks like the threaded comments disappeared so there may be other missing comments as well since some of my readers also replied in threaded comments. I hate to lose the conversation but am glad most of my readers comments are here.

Have you noticed any other glitches? Tell me about any problems you’re having here so I can resolve them—or at least try to.

My goal is to have the blog in tip-top shape before my blog book tour (October 27th – November 14th). I still have a couple of open dates if you’re interested in hosting me.

Book Launch Party for Dream or Destiny

I know most of my readersare far away from San Antonio, Texas. Even so, I want to extend an invitation to anyone in the area to celebrate the release of Dream or Destiny with me.

You are invited to a book launch party, Saturday, October 18th, 2-4 PM. The party will be at Pepe’s Restaurante Mexicano, 6890 NW Loop 410.
View Map. Come enjoy refreshments, door prizes, and a reading from the book.

For those of you not near San Antonio, I’ll launch the book online with a blog book tour October 27th—November 14th. I’ll be visiting a variety of blogs for interviews, guest posts, and reviews. I’ll also be giving away copies of Dream or Destiny.

I still have a few open dates on the blog book tour. If you are interested in hosting me on your blog, leave a comment below or e-mail me.

Wherever you are, I hope you’ll celebrate with me! Thanks for your encouragement and support.

First Time Here? Welcome!

I’m Lillie Ammann, a Christian freelance writer and editor. Learn about me and A Writer’s Words, An Editor’s Eye, search a detailed archives, or check out series and related posts. I love hearing from readers; read how I moderate and reply to comments. I hope you enjoy your visit and come back often. You can contact me or subscribe to this blog in an RSS reader or e-mail so you never miss updates. Welcome!

I’m Home and Settling In

Finally … my Web site and blog are together. I love the Revolution Pro Business theme and the gorgeous header designed by the talented artist, Aundrea Hernandez (who also created the cover for Dream or Destiny).

I’m still working to get everything right. I lost my blogroll in the transfer so will have to re-create it. If your blog has been on my blogroll, check when you see the blogroll is back in a few days. Let me know if I’ve overlooked you.

There are still a lot of images missing. Though they seem to have transferred, somehow the links went haywire. So I’ll be working on that.

As far as I know, all the pages are complete. Please let me know if you find any links that don’t work or see anything missing or strange.

You may not see any new posts this week while I finish settling in, but I’ll be back to a normal schedule next week. Thanks for sticking around!

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