Bookcast 102: Nothing but Blue Skies

Epi 102 of the BookCast was a bit shorter than usual since I was traveling for work in Charlotte, NC (which, by the way, was absolutely lovely – shoutout to the Kimpton Hotel and Steak 48!) but I still wanted to share my week with you all.

On the reading front, I'm cruising along at 179 books out of my 200-book goal for 2024, about 4 books ahead of schedule. This week I managed to squeeze in three reads: Beverly Jenkins' "Holiday Heat," Stephanie Nicole Norris's veteran-themed "Wait No More," and Zariah Well Banks' holiday novella "Mistetowed."

Big social media update: I've mostly moved over to Blue Sky from Twitter/X. While my author account is still auto-posting on Twitter, I'm actively engaging on Blue Sky now, loving the positive vibes and especially enjoying our "Black Sky" and "BlackBookSky" feeds. You can find me at @authorDLWhite on Blue Sky.

Writing-wise, "Calculated Risk" is with the editor (looking at a 2025 release), and I'm still working on a special 10th-anniversary cover for "Brunch at Ruby's." My new project, "The Festival at Evergreen Falls," is coming along slowly. I just cleaned up the first three chapters and realized my hero doesn't have a POV.

OOP. 

If you're interested in keeping up with my work, you can find me on Instagram at  author_DLWhite, check out my Substack for Tuesday teasers and weekly posts, or visit booksbydlwhite.com/linkinbio for all the links and details.

Thanks for sticking with me through 101 episodes! Though my coffee got cold during this recording (the worst!), it was great catching up with everyone. Until next time!

Transcript

All righty, friends, lovers, neighbors, people. I don't know. Welcome back to the book cast. This is my platform for sharing short fiction and updates on life as a self-published author of romantic fiction that centers black love. I made it through that sentence without stumbling over myself.

00:00:30 DL White

Please clap.

00:00:32 DL White

This is episode 101 and I am DL White and Atlanta based author of 14 novels, numerous short stories and fan fiction works. But I'm a reader first, so we usually begin with a book report and then we talk about writing and topics of the day and the topic of the day is blue sky. That's right. I'm namely mainly on blue.

00:00:52 DL White

Die these days, I know I said I am not leaving Twitter and I have not. My author account is still up. It is uploads, updates only.

00:01:00 DL White

I have a few things like all author that automatically post to Twitter. That's where the automation sits. And then I just manually pull that over to buffer and schedule it to run on blue Sky until all author has moved any operations over to Blue Sky. That's kind of how that will run, but I'm not logged into Twitter.

00:01:21 DL White

Or X whatever they're calling it these days. I know I said I wasn't leaving and I haven't, but I'm primarily not there because I've learned a whole lot about the owner of that website and his.

00:01:34 DL White

Dealings and his relationships and how he used that site to manipulate people and in my opinion, in my opinion, pretty much delivered this election to a person that I did not elect to run this country. I'm not in agreement with it and so I have moved to a platform.

00:01:56 DL White

That works the way I would like it to work to where we can post without getting a bunch of divisive comments and more people don't log in ready to fight.

00:02:08 DL White

So blue skies were attacked. I've actually been on blue sky for a long time, like since back in the day when you had to get an invite code and I tried to get my friends on it. So I had pop in about once a week and post my stuff, but I'm there full time now and it's great. We have a really nice black sky feed and we have a black book.

00:02:29 DL White

Sky Feed, which is so heavenly. It's just all black books.

00:02:33 DL White

All the time really. Really like it. So that's where I'm at. I have also moved over social media account for the *NSYNC Fiction Archive, so that's also on Blue Sky. So there are if you post a story on the archive, it automatically posts to Twitter, and now it automatically posts to.

00:02:52 DL White

Blue sky. So that'll be fun. It's going to be fun to watch fandom fill out over there because it's very sparse. It's a, you know, it's a brand new social media site and you know, just like Instagram's new. And TikTok was new, it's gonna really fill it out. And I'm hoping it will fill out with more.

00:03:08 DL White

Positive, joyous atmosphere than we see on Twitter. So looking forward to.

00:03:15 DL White

That.

00:03:16 DL White

This past week I didn't get too much reading or writing done. I had some work travel. I was in Charlotte, NC, which is a lovely city, just a lovely city. We were over there at the Kempton Hotel, which was.

00:03:29 DL White

Very nice. I had a a beautiful view of like a, you know, a grassy courtyard area. The hotel was lovely. The people in Charlotte were just delightful. Was the last governance meeting of the year for this group. So everyone was jovial in good spirits. Everything went.

00:03:48 DL White

As well as could be expected, you know it was a good 2 1/2 days with my people, but I'm happy to be home. I'm never so happy as I am when that plane lands and then I get in my car and I drive home and I drag my suitcase up two flights of stairs and I can sit on my own bed and be around my own.

00:04:09 DL White

Stuff and turn on my space heater. So yes, Charlotte was lovely. I got a chance to meet someone that I've been working with since 2021, but I have never met her face to face. So that was just delightful. Had a really good time at great restaurant Steak 48, and Charlotte owes me nothing.

00:04:28 DL White

Just had a really good time, but I'm happy to be home and happy to be sitting in front of this microphone. I hope you can tell by the tone of my voice that I am. I'm feeling better, not 100%, but you know he's not in office yet and so I'm just, you know, I'm. I'm borrowing worries, I'm borrowing trouble by continuing to be depressed.

00:04:47 DL White

About the state of the nation and how things are going to be difficult beginning in January, but.

00:04:54 DL White

I decided, you know, last week. I'm I'm going to live anyway. Not to really let that situation take what I have built my life out to be seeking joy and moving to blue Sky has a lot to do with that. I need to be able to log into social media and not be on, you know, on guard and not have my ankles.

00:05:14 DL White

Up and not, you know, post things so as not to be divisive and invite an argument so.

00:05:21 DL White

I'm looking forward to that. So let's get rolling on today's episode. It's probably going to be a Shorty. I didn't get a whole lot of reading or writing done, but again, I cannot skip an episode, so let's just go ahead and dig in. Today is Sunday, November 17th. It is sunny and crisp in Atlanta. I have a mic and I am ready to dig in, but first I need some.

00:05:40 DL White

Coffee because my.

00:05:41 DL White

Throat's a little bit dry.

00:05:57 DL White

Alrighty, welcome back. Terrible news. My coffee is cold. I had to go pick up a prescription and I decided whenever I leave the house, I get to go to Wendy's. So I went and got a breakfast sandwich and some coffee, and I came back and I started working on my outline and then decided I didn't really want to outline. I'm just going to shoot from the hip today. But then I got distracted by other stuff. And then I said, hey, let's go ahead and record. And now my coffee is cold.

00:06:21 DL White

Bad, bad. Anyway, let's begin with the book report. I am at 179 of 200 books for 2024. My goal is to read 200 books. I have read 179. I am 4 hooks ahead of schedule, so I don't think I'm going to have a problem hitting 200. I'm probably going to exceed that.

00:06:43 DL White

This week I got three books in. I got most of those in on Monday before I left town, and then Friday and Saturday when I got back to town.

00:06:53 DL White

I read holiday heat by the Miss Beverly Jenkins. I read. Wait no more. With your permission. Spin off by Stephanie. Nicole north. Because if she is going to do anything, she is going to put out a book. This was actually a celebration of Veteran's Day because the hero in this book is a veteran. And that mistletoe, a holiday novella by Zariah.

00:07:13 DL White

Well, banks, I read that yesterday it was still not bad. Not bad. I you know, of course I have some Nets, but I did put my review up at Goodreads. So if we are friends, go ahead and check that out this week. I don't know.

00:07:25 DL White

Meeting.

00:07:26 DL White

I have no clue, not not a darn clue. I have tons of books in my Kindle. In my book funnel in my random audible audio book apps. Lots of books to read. Don't know what I'm reading, but I don't have any arcs that are due this week, so it's basically a free for all.

00:07:47 DL White

I'm just going to open it up and whatever I land on, that's what I'm reading. I am trying to write a romance so I am most likely going to be reading some romances, but I'm really. I'm actually craving a thrill.

00:07:59 DL White

Speaking of thrillers, I started cross and I think I'm about 5 episodes in and I just need somebody to not die in an episode basically. So I decided that my way of getting through these next two for however many years is I'm just going to consume everything on every streaming channel that was.

00:08:18 DL White

Never released and so I'm just. I'm going to dig into it. Books, movies, art, people that's going to be my coping mechanism. So I don't what I'm reading this week, but I know it's going to be darn.

00:08:31 DL White

But I don't have much of A writing update. Calculated risk is still with the editor. I don't expect that back for a minute. It's not going to be out until 2025, so I'm not too worried about it. A thing I do need to get going on is a new cover for the brunch at rubies 10th anniversary issue. I need to figure out how to do a hardback.

00:08:52 DL White

Amber cover or hire someone to do 1. I need to figure out what concept that cover is going to be. I thought I had decided on one, but I just kind of don't like it, so we'll see. We'll see what I end up.

00:09:05 DL White

With and then not much fest. Not much progress on the festival at Evergreen Falls. I did go ahead and clean up the first 3 chapters just because I I need it to be right. That's my foundation and I realized that I only have one point of view so far. So I got to go in and add my hero's point of view.

00:09:25 DL White

Which is going to give me twice as many chapters as I have, so I'm really hoping to get in new words.

00:09:30 DL White

Tonight and then I'm I'm way behind on sub stack. So the plan is to get my rear back in gear with my Tuesday teaser Tuesday post and then Wednesday and Friday posts of same time next week for my paid subscribers. That's the plan for this week I have to.

00:09:50 DL White

And you get back in that saddle. I can't. You know, I can't. I can't let things continue to keep me down. So look for those at author dlwhite.substack.com or short fiction.

00:10:04 DL White

Short fiction by dlwhite.subsec.com and again, if you are looking for me on social media, I am on Instagram at author under score Dale White or at Blue Sky at author DL White dot BSKY dot app. Or I think it's blue sky dot social. I don't know author Dale White. I'm in there. I'm in there. Look me up.

00:10:23 DL White

I don't have much to update on today, like when I said quick and dirty I meant quick and dirty. That's like, you know, 10 minutes. But I tend to yap. So we're going to end up at about 20 minutes by the time this episode is up. But that brings us to the end of the.

00:10:38 DL White

So I must bid you adieu, but not before thanking you so much for joining me for today's chat, not only for this one, but for the previous 100 episodes. I really enjoy having you here. I love sitting in front of this mic and talking about myself and my work. I welcome any comments or feedback you might have at books by the allwhite.com slash.

00:10:57 DL White

Podcast slash 10.

00:10:59 DL White

One you'll find full show notes and links to all of the things I've talked about if they're relevant, and a transcript for today's show at that website, you can also find me over on sub stack. Please share the podcast if you enjoyed this episode or previous episodes, and if you listen on Apple Podcast or Spotify, give a girl a rating. I'd so appreciate it.

00:11:19 DL White

Do not forget that you can support this podcast with your book purchases at payhip.com Slash.

00:11:25 DL White

Books by DL.

00:11:27 DL White

By spreading the good word or by joining the newsletter or the sub stack, links are all on my website of books by dlwhite.com/link in bio. Lastly, you can throw some coins in the hat at bookcast.busroute.com. Those monthly supporters currently cover my Buzz Sprout subscription which allows me to bring this podcast to your faces.

00:11:48 DL White

And your ears and I really appreciate that support every little bit really, really does help. So thank you so much. The book cast is written, produced and edited by me. Dale White, our theme music and any sound effects are provided by picks. The day I will be back next week. Until then, please enjoy your weekend. Have a super.

00:12:06 DL White

And we'll chat again soon. Bye bye