How Do You Feel?

First up, let us celebrate the fact that today is post number 950. Can you believe it? I've written 950 posts for this nifty little blog. This calls for a very brief video blast from Connecticut's Hockey past.

Now, on with our post.

If you happen to be reading this not in your reader or in your e-mail, but live on the blog itself (that means you've clicked through) and you noticed that my follower count has grown, there is a very good reason for that.

Now it just so happens that the title of today's post is pulled from a new thingy that Facebook had introduced for it's users. Instead of seeing a blank box, users now see cutesy phrases like the one that you see up above.

So to answer the question, "How do I feel?" I feel purty good, and I'll tell you why I feel purty good.

About a week ago, I was invited to a general purpose event from a new writer friend. Now normally, I usually decline these events because I'm never around when they actually go off. But this time, I decided to participate.

Best thing that I ever did, because by the end of the week, I gained almost 20 new writer friends and after posting links to my blogs, gained 7 new followers to this blog. I can safely say that it was without a doubt, the best thing that I've ever done. Beyond gaining new writer friends in genres that I'm starting to explore, the networking experience has been invaluable.

For example, I managed to score an ARC from an indie writer and I'm in the process of reading & reviewing it for her.

But more importantly than that, all of this friending and networking got me motivated to write a query letter for my novella A Shadow Warrior's Redemption. For those of you who are on Facebook, you can check out the query letter in its entirety at my facebook page, which is called simply enough "Query Letter".

The absolutely funniest thing about writing this query letter is that, unlike the one I wrote for Line 21 that took me about two and a half weeks, this one I hammered the first draft out in 10 minutes. I wrote the brief synopsis in a post last week and used that in the letter. This past Saturday (1/19), I sat down to write a hook, a summation and a new synopsis for it. The 2nd draft took me about 15 minutes. I would now like to share the meat of that 2nd draft with you and I would like your opinion on it. I will tell you I got some nifty comments on it so far on Facebook, including a request from a fellow writer to read the story because her curiosity was piqued after reading it.

The meat of the letter (hook, synopsis and summation) goes like this:

The hotter the humiliation, the more sickening the payback.

Ashanti, a demonic spirit that escaped from Purgatory centuries ago, is blackmailed by Kevin to turn Keisha, the girl of his obsession, into the hottest slut of any male or female's desire, so that he can ride to her rescue and make her beholden to him. A distress call sent out by Ashanti's eldest child prompts two archangels, Michael and Raphael, to appear in the flesh and help Ashanti not only obliterate Kevin but to become Keisha's personal savior.

A Shadow Warrior's Redemption tells the story of how a supreme demon bitch from the bowels of Hell, when pressed, can briefly become a genuinely compassionate being.

All that I have left to do before submitting, is to clean/tidy the synopsis and do one last round of editing.

So even though I'm still of the opinion that Facebook is not the be all to end all when it comes to social media, it does help you as writer to get your book, your voice, and more importantly, yourself, for all the world to see and experience.

How about you? Has Facebook been able to help you in the things that you do?