THE PROBLEM WITH WITCHES - RELEASING JUNE 30!

So sorry I didn't send you all an April newsletter, but there's a good reason, I promise. We now have a release date! Barring zombie apocalypse or natural catastrophe, The Problem with Witches will be in your hands on June 30. Initially, I'd thought it would be a novella, but the book finished out at about 100,000 words. So, though not quite as long as my normal novels (which are about 150k-200k), I am delighted to give you a full-length adventure with Ben, Marcie, Raina and Mikhael. Here's the relevant stuff about it:

ONE: Pre-order links for the ebook are already up for Amazon, iBooks, Kobo and Nook. Blurb, buy links AND Chapter One excerpt can all be found here.

TWO: Print Version - Since the print version doesn't accommodate pre-orders, we'll try to get it released just prior to the June 30 date. It will be eligible for the Kindle Match program, so if you elect for that, you can get the Kindle version free if you buy the print book from Amazon.

THREE: To celebrate this release, we're running a sale on the two books most connected to it! See the next section after this one, "In Honor of PWW," below.

FOUR: In early June, I'll offer a Chapter Two exclusive excerpt to the folks at the JWH Members Only FB page, so if you're not already on that, be sure and click that Join button. The members are always posting fun stuff related to the books, and I show up there regularly as well.

You can see the gorgeous cover for PWW in the sidebar of this newsletter AND on the website page. Click on it on the website page for an enlarged view. Now, just as a refresher, this is a crossover novel of the Arcane Shot and Knights of the Board Room characters. There's something seriously scary about to happen in New Orleans if Mikhael and Raina from In the Company of Witches can't stop it, but since they pull in Ben and Marcie of Hostile Takeover for help, as well as some other characters you know well from both series, the bad guys don't have a chance. We hope.

To those who have been after to me to tell Ramona's story to round out the Arcane Shot series into a trilogy: She's going to make a prominent appearance in this novel, which I hope will inspire the muse in that direction.

IN HONOR OF PWW RELEASE - A SALE ON HOSTILE TAKEOVER AND IN THE COMPANY WITH WITCHES!

Since Ben and Marcie from the Knights of the Board Room series and Mikhael and Raina from the Arcane Shot series are the primary characters in The Problem with Witches, I wanted to give anyone who hasn't read either or both their stories to have an even better chance to do so. So, from now until the June 30 release date, Hostile Takeover and In the Company of Witches will be on sale for $2.99 each (usually $4.99). The price has already changed on Amazon, Kobo and iBooks. For my Nook readers, you will enter the promo code BNPJOEY40 at checkout. Since time zones can vary for the different vendors, I recommend not waiting until June 30 to buy the books, so that you won't miss your chance at the special prices.

IMPORTANT NOTE: You don't have to read In the Company of Witches to enjoy The Problem with Witches, but I would recommend Hostile Takeover since Ben and Marcie's background is pretty key to the story. And even if you don't opt to read ICOW first, you can download it for the lower price in June and read it later, because I'm betting (hoping) you'll want to read Mikhael and Raina's story after you get to know them in PWW (smile).

MARK OF THE VAMPIRE QUEEN RE-RELEASED AT SELF-PUBLISHED PRICE

My request to have the rights of the last two VQS books belonging to the original publisher returned to me was 50% successful this round. Mark of the Vampire Queen officially became mine again in April, and it has been re-released as a Story Witch Press title with a fabulous new cover. Buy links have been updated on my website, and you can see that awesome cover there or at your favorite vendor site. I have my fingers crossed that on the next round of reversion requests, I'll get back Vampire Queen's Servant and Jacob and Lyssa's first two books will be reunited under the same publisher again. A reader recently re-read VQS and proclaimed, "This was my first vampire genre book series to read. I was scarred for life....[Lyssa] burnt me, twisted me, tore me apart....I was hooked forever. She pulls things out of me that I never knew were there. I devoured her series like a prime rib dinner at a Michelin star restaurant! It consumed me. I dreamed about it. It has been four yrs or so now, her stories still stick with me." I loved hearing that!

Note on Audio version: I know my audio readers always ask (thank you for that!), so here's the deal on the audio version. No plans for it yet, primarily because I don't have back the whole VQS series from the original publisher. My audio books do "okay," but they're not huge sellers, so in order to have any hope of interesting an audio publisher in VQS, I really need to have the first book in the series. Once that happens, we'll see how it goes. Nightfall (which is available in audio) was kind of a happy circumstance because at the time Audible picked it up, it was my one and only VQS book with Ellora's Cave, it was a complete standalone in the series, and Ellora's Cave had a very prolific relationship with Audible. Keep your fingers crossed for future good news on the audio front, and thanks for your support of my other audiobooks at Audible!

HERE'S MY 100 BOOK LIST - WHAT'S YOURS?

You know I'm a fan of movie storytelling, and a recent discovery is the Equalizer remake with Denzel Washington (the sequel's pretty good, too, and yes, I did watch the series all those years ago - grin). In the Denzel Washington version, his late wife was reading the "100 books everyone should read" list before she died of cancer, and she fell short a few books. So in the movie, he's always reading a book from the list. It had me thinking of what 100 books shaped me as a writer and a person, so my latest GoodReads blog post is a discussion about that. I hope you'll tell me what books would be on your own list. You can find the post here.

COME SEE ME IN JULY - THE SEXY AND SASSY SIGNING, CHARLOTTE NC

I'd love to see you all in Charlotte in July! If you haven't signed up for it yet and want to go, you can find out everything about it here. HAVE A BOOK YOU WANT TO BE SURE I BRING? Shoot me an email at storywitch@PROTECTED and give me a heads up, or use this pre-order form. With 46+ titles, there are only so many I can bring, and I want to be sure to have the ones you most want to purchase.

SWAG - Keep an eye on my FB page, because I'll be doing a little video showing off the awesome swag I'm bringing, as soon as I get the last bit of it in (smile). The fabulous Elizabeth SaFleur gave me the idea, because she did one about all the goodies she's bringing. It's going to be a fun weekend!

SO WHAT'S NEXT?

Vampire Master - I have been taking SO many notes for Wolf and Ella's story! The plot just took a really interesting turn in terms of Wolf's background, particularly on how he became a vampire. I don't know if the muse will stick with that direction, but if She does, it's going to make it a very challenging book emotionally to write. Yet I wouldn't have it any other way. You know if I'm not down in the darkest part of the human psyche, where the noblest parts of who we are get called forth, I'm not down deep enough to write the story the way I want to write it - ha! I sincerely hope to have this one out to you before the end of the year.

I won't share that "turn" yet, in case the muse tweaks it a bit, but just to give you a heads up on the general storyline, Ella is a submissive at Club Atlantis, introduced during Vampire Mistress/Trinity, and Wolf made his appearance in Vampire's Soul. A few months back, I gave you a little teaser story about these two in Dreams of a Vampire Master. For those who want to see me do something along a contemporary vein, don't worry. I'm sure after I finish this one, next stop on my list will be a contemporary, likely a Nature of Desire series story. You can always see some of the ideas I'm playing with on my "In the Works" page on my website. We have plenty more adventures ahead, I hope!

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USUAL STUFF

CONTACTING ME - Remember, you can find me online through my website email contact link or email me directly at storywitch@PROTECTED. You can also leave a question for me under my Author Profile on GoodReads. I'm on Facebook under Joey W. Hill, and you can visit the JWHMembersOnly FB fan forum group here. I'm @JoeyWHill on Twitter, and my Pinterest boards related to the books are here.

Thank you all so much for your support of my work!

DIDN'T GET A RESPONSE? It seems those darn online filters are becoming more and more aggressive. And don't get me started on the many ways Facebook plays tricks with my messages, lol. But responding to my readers, and doing so in a very timely manner (within 24-48 hours), is extremely important to me. So if you have sent a communication to me in any of the mediums I've mentioned - direct email, FB, GoodReads or Twitter - and have not received a response, a technical glitch has occurred. Either your communication did not get through to me, or my response did not reach you. If you suspect that's the case, use one of the alternative communication methods to send me a "Hey, Joey, I sent you a note through email (or FB, or a tweet, etc). Did you get it?" message, and we'll make sure we sort it out. I will never intentionally ignore my readers!

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NEWSLETTER NOTES

While you can subscribe to the newsletter through my website, you may find your email host isn't letting it through, thanks to broad spam-blocking mechanisms that don't separate communications you've specifically requested to receive, from those you haven't. Regrettably, there's not a lot we can do on this side if the newsletter is hitting an email filter that is bouncing it without notifying either one of us. However, we do have some things you can try that seem to have worked for folks:

FIRST - make sure the newsletter email is part of your contact list: "newsletter@PROTECTED."

SECOND - Check whatever filters you do have for spam and the like and see what methods are available to you to ensure an email like this gets through. My newsletters have a plethora of links in them to make it easy for you to find the things I'm talking about, but the flip side of that is it can get the newsletter tagged pretty quickly as spam.

THIRD - Contact me at newsletter@PROTECTED and ask to be unsubscribed. Once we confirm with you that has been done, rather than us sending you an invitation (which can bounce for the aforementioned reasons), we have you go in to the website newsletter link and subscribe yourself - here's the link to that. If it works, you'll get an automatic invitation to confirm, and then, fingers crossed, you should be set.

FOURTH - If none of this works or all of it is just too frustrating and you want to say "screw it!" (and I can hardly blame you, lol), then just make sure you've liked my FB page or are following me on Twitter. This is because EVERY MONTH I will post the latest newsletter link on both of those, to make sure it reaches the widest number of people possible! It's the same link monthly, so if you want, just put https://storywitch.com/newsletter/?latest as one of your Favorites. You can click on it anytime to see if an update has been posted. I post a new one every 30-45 days, give or take a few days.