Last gasp of summer

I was up in the mountains and visiting friends in the Bay Area for the past three weeks before returning home to beautiful Laguna Beach.  I figured the summer-like weather and warm ocean temps would be over by the time I got back. I was happy to be wrong!

Usually the water temp here in Laguna is around 68 degrees Fahrenheit in the summertime.  On rare occasions it climbs to 70 or above.  When I got home this past week, the water was still a balmy 71 degrees!

It's hard to complain.  I managed some surfing with friends and a bit of snorkeling.

Now the weather has turned and the skies are threatening rain.  Sea temps are sure to drop soon, too.  Ah well, the good times couldn't last forever.  Plus we need any rain we can get.  And besides, all of the nice weather makes it awfully hard to write!  Maybe now I'll get a little work done. :-)

Autumn in the Eastern Sierra

I'm back up at Mammoth Mountain in the Sierra Nevada mountains this week, putting the finishing touches on my latest novel.  I've arrived at the peak of fall color here in the Eastern Sierra, which is stunning, but also makes it a little hard to sit inside and write!  Yesterday I spent the day at McGee Creek Canyon, hiking and taking photos.  It was a nice day to be out!

I did manage to get some work done this morning, but now it's time to head back out on my bike to enjoy the scenery!

Rubbing Shoulders with Giants

After 25 years of rejections from the publishing industry, it certainly is a relief that I am able to finally put my books out on my own these days.  It is even better when I manage an occasional sales boost that lifts me up on Amazon bestseller lists alongside some of my writing idols.

This week I dropped the price on Memoirs of a Starving Artist down to 99 cents and am running some ads to support the sale.  I woke up today to find that I was sitting at number seven on the Author Biographies and Memoirs list, just behind Maya Angelou.

On the Travelogues list I was just ahead of Jon Krakauer and Bill Bryson.

Of course I realize that without these ads and the low price, I'll drop like a rock, but there is still some small thrill in being right up there alongside these literary giants, however fleeting it may be!  And hey, maybe I'll even manage to keep up some momentum.  That dream itself is enough to keep me plugging away...

New Memoir Cover!

I decided this week to change out the cover for my Memoirs of a Starving Artist to portray something more compelling than a coffee cup, which was the image on the previous cover.  I figured I should have something that better represents my journey over the past 20 years or so.  After searching around a bit, I've opted for this one:

I'm pretty happy with it.  Thanks to the designer, James at Go On Write.

Thank You Marie!

It's been a few weeks since I posted anything here, so I think it's time for an update!  I'm currently busy revising away at my latest effort, Bachelor Number Nine, and spending some time in lovely Laguna Beach.

We've had some epic surf this week here in Southern California, thanks to a hurricane named Marie.  Of course, as a surfer I had to take some time off this week to hit it!  These kinds of swells don't come around every day...

After surfing on Wednesday, I headed up to the famous Wedge in Newport Beach to take some photos of the body surfers who have free reign on the place during the day.  Lifeguards kick out all of the surfers and body boarders, just to keep things from getting too crazy out in the water.  Here are some shots:

Today the swell was finally winding down out there, but this is definitely one of those that will be remembered for years to come!

Bachelor Number Nine - First Draft finished!

Whew!  When I started working on the second volume in my Bachelor Series last May, I hoped to have a 65,000 word rough draft of Bachelor Number Nine finished by the middle of August.  Well, it is now August 14th and... I just made it!

I've completed my first draft, which came in at 64,911 words.  Only 89 words short of the target!  I'm pretty happy with it at this point.  We'll see how I feel once I get into the revisions, but hopefully I'll have it all done and ready to go by the end of September.  Knock on wood, anyway!

Not One Giveaway, but Two!

This month on Goodreads I'm giving away a free paperback copy of not just one of my books, but two of them!  These giveaways are open to readers in the United States (sorry foreign readers!).  The first book is my latest romance, Bachelor Number Five:

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Bachelor Number Five

by Kenneth Rosenberg

Giveaway ends September 28, 2014.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

The second is my non-fiction Memoirs of a Starving Artist: An Itinerant Writer's Journey through an Unconventional Life:

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Memoirs of a Starving Artist

by Kenneth Rosenberg

Giveaway ends August 31, 2014.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win 

Feel free to enter one or both!  Don't want to miss the next one?  Sign up for my New Release and Giveaway notifications list by entering your e-mail below! (No e-mail addresses will be shared with anyone, ever.  Also, signing up for the e-mail list below will not enter you into the giveaways.  Click on the links above for that).

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Good luck to all who enter!