Book Cover Reveal

 

I've been so excited to show you the book cover for my next book, Threatening Skye.  I love it.  Let me know what you think before it goes to publication this fall. I'd love your input.

Turning Point

 

I've been at a crossroads with my newest book, Threatening Skye, but yesterday, I came to a turning point.  What a good feeling that is.  I'm finally sure of where my story is going, and I'm excited to write it down, so here I am at 4:00 a.m. trying to get the thoughts out of my head and onto the manuscript.  I hope it's as good as I think it is!  Book Two of Branches of Time should be coming your way early this fall.  Keep up with me here, or follow my new Facebook page.  Be sure to follow the one with a profile picture of me in front of a patriotic quilt.

You can also catch me on Twitter @ twitter.com/janeobrienbooks 

Research

 

One of my favorite things to do before, and while I'm writing, is research. I can't imagine what it was like for authors before the Internet.  With a touch of a few keys, I can be in another world of fashion and design.  I can then describe my character's surroundings, clothing, and sense of style. I use what I see to project myself into another world, so when I write I feel as though I am actually there.

I often get asked, 'where can I see that house?'  'What city were you writing about?' 'Where are those little shops?'  Most of which are in my imagination, but not without help from visual aids such as clothing patterns and song lyrics.  I also love reading old letters as they give me a peek into another person's private life.  I have used several of my father's letters from WWII and some of my great-grandparents' love letters and musings about daily life.  I guess I'm a true time-traveler at heart.

Follow Me Here

If you've been following along with the saga of my hacking fiasco, I can only tell you that nothing has changed.  I tried to set up a new Facebook page, and it was disabled before I even got a start because the hacker grabbed that one, too.  I am done with Facebook.  This is when the age of computers is frustrating.  Facebook has no number where you can call and talk to a human, and I can't log in in order to voice my complaint because according to them I don;t exist anymore.

I won't let them get me down, SOOOO the only other option is to move on.  

You may continue to follow me here on my blog at www.authorjaneobrien.com. or on my Goodreads page for Jane O'Brien.  (Please note: there are two other Jane O'Brien's publishing, so be sure to follow the correct one.)  

You can also find me on Instagram.  I plan to be more active there.

I'm also on Twitter.

And soon I'll be on the brand new Threads, but I have a few things to do first before I'm ready to post.

Until I hear from you, I'll be writing Threatening Skye, Book 2 of Branches of Time.  Thanks for hanging on.  I'm so glad you're sticking around.

I've Been Hacked

 Yesterday may have been one of the worst days of my life.  My Facebook was hacked.  And when I say hacked, I mean they wiped out my personal account and my author account and took over by creating a new one.  I have lost nine years of work on my author page.  Someone out there in another country has full control of my author page.  If you are a follower of Jane O'Brien on Facebook, I recommend you block me.  Believe me, it's not me.

I recently thought I was hacked on a small scale, because my friends were getting messages to follow them when they already had.  You've all seen those.  So I quickly changed my password on both accounts and my profile picture, so I could identify which page was really mine.  My author page had a book cover of my newest book, Skye.  It's red so you can't miss it.  They only one you can see now, still has my face in the profile circle.  I had over 1100 followers and this one has 737.

They deleted both of my email names from Facebook's records and even my phone number.  Then they installed a two-step verification of their own.  I can see the name of the person who is using my account to mine followers names.  There's no way I can get in, and Facebook is unreachable.  I'm very disappointed in them and wonder if I should continue on.  

I immediately froze my banks accounts just in case they had access, but I don't think so.  I've been working on this for two days, and decided it's fruitless.  Nine years of work just went down the tubes.

I will rebuild, but it will take time.  So in a week or so, I will try to start a new Facebook page, and I will try to reach as many of you as possible.  I have a newsletter list and a list of people who have won contests and giveaways over the years, so that might help.  And I will plead with family and friends to share my new page.  In the meantime, protect yourself and block my page as it stands now.  Do not engage with them.  These are despicable people.  I don't understand why Facebook doesn't have a call number so you can speak to a human, but I suppose they would be overwhelmed, because according to my banker, she sees this many times a week.  They are far more sophisticated than they used to be.

Thank you for listening.  I pray this never happens to you.  I took many precautions, but I believe it may have happened when I downloaded a particular app on my phone, which I'm afraid to name here, because they might after me again.

Stay cyber safe.  But when they want to get in, they can and will.