To My Followers

Hey guys! I'm looking for help with my cover reveal! Leave a comment below for me with your email if you're interested. I'm looking at the 9th April. I'm really excited about it and just love it!
***Sorry for the delay, there were some last minute changes and I'm waiting for the final to come through. As soon as it does, an email will go out!

99c Ebook Extravaganza!

So Curiosity Quills is celebrating St Pattie's Day with 99c on a collection of their books! Check it out here! Also, enter to win a $75 Gift Card with the rafflecopter below



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Edits

So this week I've been working through my edits for Kiya: Hope of the Pharaoh. Let me tell you, it's hectic and intense! I think I should win the Bad Mum award for dumping my child of with friends and family so I can work through the manuscript and get it back to the editor asap. There were many late night and early mornings... early mornings more because I get really bad allergies from these obnoxious weeds that pop up here in Arizona... but I made it through this round! Now I'm waiting to hear what my editor thinks of the adjustments.




Just for fun, here are some of my own sketches to help you visualise the story before it comes out. They aren't amazing but oh well! Yes, I'm still waiting on my cover :-D

A.K. Morgen Writes: St Patrick's Day Blowout from @CuriosityQuills

A.K. Morgen Writes: St Patrick's Day Blowout from @CuriosityQuills: In celebration of St. Patrick's Day, Curiosity Quills has recently employed a drunk generous leprechaun, and he's sharing his p...

What I thought of Island of the Blue Dolphin

So this is my first real "review", but I refuse to call it a review because it's just my opinion. So any time I read and talk about a book I will call it that, my thoughts on the book. 

So ladies and gentlemen, my first book opinion!

To be honest, I struggled to read this. I know it's an MG, but I think since it's so old the writing didn't appeal to me. My analytic critique brain kicked in and wanted to correct and the telling and cut all the unnecessary had's out. I'm terrible I know, it's a classic and I'm ripping it apart in my mind.

But, the story definitely interested me. The thought of being stuck alone for years with only wild dogs who wanted to eat you for companions is frightening. When her brother dies at the beginning I was like "Oh, he died," but I wanted to be like "What????" IT didn't help that she seemed to barely react at all. I think maybe a rewrite to fit with currents trends would make this riveting, like The Hatchet. 

Cover Reveal - Colour Wielders by Dawna Raver

Today is the cover reveal for Dawna Raver's novel being released in April; Colour Wielders. Check out the blurb and scroll down further to see this fantastic cover!

Behind the Mysts, hidden from Mortal eyes, is a land where Gods and creatures of myth and legend dwell. And in the Mortal Realm, their Princess lives.

Quinn Sinclair is clueless to who she is. She thinks she's an ordinary young woman—well, mostly ordinary—living an ordinary life with her less than loving mother in Conifer, Colorado. On the night of her birthday, Quinn finds herself betrayed by a man who sends her life spinning out-of-control.

As she struggles to pick up the pieces, a vision of a man with haunting tourmaline-blue eyes begs her for help, and she finds herself transported into a Magykal battle forever changing her life.

Arik Morgaine—Demigod bad boy and outcast of the Magykal Realm—tried to avoid contact with Princess Quinn Sinclair for eighteen years, not wanting to make good on an old threat. But the fates have other plans. Arik can no longer deny his growing desire for Quinn, or the need to protect her from those wanting to control her burgeoning powers. Can the two of them come together and save the Magykal Realm from being destroyed by the Darkest of Magyks, or will powers beyond their control destroy them and their world forever?

Colour Wielders will be available in digital and print formats from Curiosity Quills Press April 19, 2013. Go to dawnaraver.com for more updates.

Gerilyn Marin Blog Hop stop

Today I am hosting Gerilyn Marin who is talking about her upcoming novel. BURIED will be available on Amazon, B&N, KOBO and iTunes on the 18th of March, and you can mark it on your to be read list on goodreads.

Buried 

Book One of The Paranormalville Trilogy 

Like every resident of Fane’s Cove, Cadence McKenna knows her town is, well, odd. And yet, they’re accustomed to the near-daily supernatural happenings- so accustomed, in fact, that when Grey Addison moves to town and stays, she is shocked to find that she’s the only one who insists that there must be something strange about him.  

With her life-long—if minor—psychic sensitivity handed down from her grandmother, she knows that what she feels isn’t simple paranoia.  After all, how many normal guys pay no mind to random poltergeist activity occurring right in front of them?   

Cadence can’t blame anyone for wanting to ignore that there might be more to his presence there- perhaps if he is a normal guy, it’s just the first sign that whatever it is about the town that drives visitors away is fading.  She might have even grudgingly let it go, but then she sees Grey acting very suspiciously and knows that she can’t dismiss her feelings until she understands why he’s in Fane’s Cove.  Even if it means sticking her neck out by pretending to get close to him . . . and learning more about her town’s history than anyone would ever want to know. 

Gerilyn shares a ghostly experience!

I currently live in the house of my reputedly psychic great grandmother. She passed when I was only 4, but as a young child I was brought to see you nearly every day and so far, I've been the only one to show a 'sensitivity' (not nearly as strong as hers, but still stronger than other members of our family). When I saw her, it was always the same, she was laid up in bed, in jammies and a thick, brown men's bathrobe. I do think I'm a little better prepared than most when strange things happen, as I was raised with a healthy respect for the supernatural & am by choice pagan.

On with the weirdness . . . one night I was home, pretty much by myself (hubby was at work, only had one child at the time, but he was sleeping at the other end of the house). I was on the phone with the hubby when I glanced. The front room/den of the house was dark, but out of the corner of my eye I saw the figure of a woman in a sea green dress. I looked into the room, and, clearly, there was nothing there. I mean, if it had just been a shadow, I would have written it off, but sea green is a vivid color, especially in a dark room. So I called my mother and asked if gram'ma had a sea green dress. As expected, Mom asked why I wanted to know, so I told her what I saw. She told me yes, and it was her favorite.

I kind of went, ". . . okay," and went on with whatever I was doing (which had been my mother's reaction, too)—because, really, what do you do about something like that, anyway?

Maybe a year after this incident, we forgot all about it. She was having pictures from her wedding reception restored, and I didn't have any pictures of my older family members, so she gave me prints of the two she thought I'd want most. The first was of gram'ma dancing (with one of my mother's uncles, I think) and one of my father's parents (who at this point have both passed away).

In the photo of my great grandmother she's wearing the sea green dress. In the pic of my dad's parents, she's in the background, but facing the camera and staring dead into the lenses.

Think my heart stopped for a second when I saw that.

Query Critique - Leigh Statham

For a start, I love this lady! She's hard working, smart, funny and a great CP! I think she's read one of my WiP's about a hundred times because I just can't get it right and keep nagging her to look at my revisions. So, I'm honored that she would allow me to use her query on my blog.

Query -

Fifteen-year-old Lady Marguerite Vadnay loves spending her days covered in grease while fitting gears with the smithies. She's always had the run of her father’s steam-powered estate and millions in the bank, but as she approaches her sixteenth birthday she begins to feel the leash her social position is attached to might be poised to strangle her. Lord Vadnay, her well-meaning father, hires the best governess in France, who also happens to be the most evil governess in
France, to ensure her education as a lady. Her best friend, Claude, an orphan, tells her to grow up and be grateful for her money and secured future. Even her overly pedicured suitors make her feel her days of running wild through the fields and studying engineering in the forges are not only over, but were wasted. Not sure what to do, Marguerite grits her teeth and goes along with the plan until Claude takes a position with the Royal Corp of Engineers that will send him to New France and her governess starts to talk about a school for well bred but unmarriageable girls, which would be a fate worse than hell. Marguerite decides it's time to take her future by the reigns and make her own destiny. She never would have considered crossing the sea as a Daughter of the King, a social program set up by young King Louis XIV to shore up the colonies in New France, but now it seems her best option is to follow Claude's lead and try to catch up with him in the New World.

Marguerite prepares to take the aership voyage alone, but finds
herself surrounded by an unlikely group of supporters: a brilliant
automaton, a simpering neighbor and the annoyingly attractive Captain
Laviolette. As the voyage progresses, Marguerite learns that life
outside her father’s estate is full of people who hate her because of
her birthright, illness can strike anyone at any moment, and that love
is not something you can plan. Regardless of hardship, she sticks to
her goals and her standards until their aership is attacked by
ruthless pirates and she begins to think she’s made the wrong choice.
But the cogs of fate have been set in motion and Marguerite’s life
isn’t the only one dependent on her becoming more than a spoiled rich
girl. Her natural leadership skills and days of running wild in the
fields of Western France, studying engineering, prove to be
instrumental in saving the lives of her crew mates and herself, but
only fate will bring her full circle to the love and forgiveness she
realizes she desperately wants.

17th century New France (Canada) was constantly under attack. Young
King Louis XIV quickly realized a larger population of family
settlements, rather than single men and soldiers, was the fastest way
to thwart occupation. He vigorously recruited young women to join
their countrymen across the sea, to marry and build the population up
against invasion, for several years. Nearly 1,000 of these “Daughters
of the King” were rewarded handsomely for trekking across the pirate
infested Atlantic to a strange land. The greatest reward, perhaps,
being that they were allowed their choice of spouse. My great-great
grandmother, Marguerite, was one of these girls.

Okay so my notes -

For
a start, way too long! An agent won’t read past the first paragraph
"she begins to feel the leash her social position is attached to might be poised to strangle her"  This sentence feels odd.
Switch the Sentence about Lord Vadnay to read: Her well-meaning father, Lord Vadnay, hires the best governess in France...
"Claude, an orphan, tells her to grow up and be grateful for her money and secured future. Even her overly pedicured suitors make her feel her days of running wild through the fields and studying engineering in the forges are not only over, but were wasted" - This is probably something you can either cut or summarize to make the query shorter.
"Claude takes a position with the Royal Corp of Engineers that will send him to New France and her governess starts to talk about a school for well-bred but unmarriageable girls, which would be a fate worse than hell. Marguerite decides it's time to take her future by the reigns and make her own destiny" - This would probably make a really good hook. Re word it a little and shrink it down and it would be perfect.
"a brilliant automaton, a simpering neighbor and the annoyingly attractive Captain Laviolette" - So unless you mention them again in the query, cut them. There’s already so many people mentioned. My query letter for Kiya doesn’t even mention two of my most
important characters, her love interest and the Commander who uses her to rock Nefertiti’s boat. They’re great to have in the story, but too many in the query distracts from the main plot points.
The second paragraph is more like a short synopsis. Paraphrase and summarize.
I don’tknow if you deliberately didn’t include the name, genre, and word count but I’d put
it before the last paragraph to show the end of the query and the beginning of the history.
The last paragraph is a nice little piece of history which is relevant, and you’re right to put it
at the end.










Thanks for letting me look this over, and good luck with your queries! If anyone else wishes to add anything, please feel free, I'm sure she'd appreciate the help.

Blog Tour - The Charge by Sharon Bayliss

Okay, confession time. I'm not a history buff. In school, I liked history at least more than math, but I've always been more interested in the present and future. So, why did I write an alternate history? Probably because I love to make things hard for myself. :) But, I suppose if I'm allowed to change history into whatever I want and add a touch of magic, it's a lot more fun.

The flag of the Texas Empire, based on the first official flag of the Republic of Texas.

My alternate history fantasy, The Charge, is set in an alternate present day North America and in this reality, the state of Texas never joined the United States and instead became it's own nation. For those of you who know American history, this possibility would have been unlikely, but it is based on reality. Texas was an independent nation from March 2, 1836, to February 19, 1846. So, it follows that inquisitive types might wonder what would have happened if Texas never joined the U.S.

The Charge isn't meant to be a realistic theory of what might of happened if Texas stayed it's own nation, it's meant to be more of a fantastical "what-if". For starters, the first President of Texas in my alternate history had supernatural powers, so I play pretty fast and loose with reality. :) However, that doesn't get me off the hook research-wise.

I actually did my research after I finished writing the story, and that strategy worked for me. An interesting alternate history is all fine and good, but if you want a story that people actually want to read, (and by "people", I mean more than just history teachers) the plot and character development are far more important than an clever "what-if" premise.

However, my general readership may also include some history buffs. Every time I thought about getting lazy with my research, this fictional alternate history geek would pop into my mind and start pointing out my mistakes.

If you want to do an alternate history, you really have to sit down and re-write history. My history deviates in 1836, so anything that existed before then gets to stay the same. Everything that happened after that is called into question. I wrote the timeline of all the big events that happened from 1836-2013 in my alternate world. I had to consider how my change would have impacted real events like the Civil War and The Great Depression and had to come up with likely new wars and important events.

If you're writing an alternate history, I suggest going through your novel with a fine-toothed comb and looking for any references that could possibly have been altered by your change in timeline. Places, events, brand names, political figures, basically any proper noun. Cities were an obvious issue. For example, Sam Houston does not exist in my timeline so there can be no city called Houston in Texas. And then there are smaller things. I realized that using the term "African-American" to describe race didn't make sense when I was referring to a Texas resident, they would technically be an "African-Texan".

When you're creating new events, I suggest modeling real world events. It's easier to make events seem plausible when they are similar to real things that have happened. No one can say, "that would never happen", if actually did or almost did. I used a lot of Cold War parallels to describe the twentieth century conflicts between the U.S. and the Texas Empire, but my Cold War got hot. Instead of the Red Scare, I have the "Blue Scare," a wave of irrational and intense hatred of Texas. And I use the Cuban Missile Crisis as a model for the events that led to the U.S. bombing the Texas Empire. The main difference is that in my version, the disaster isn't narrowly avoided, it happens, and of course, Castro is replaced with the current King of Texas.

History buff or not, writing an alternate history is not for the faint of heart. Expect to spend some time with your nose a history books. But I have to say, I had a blast and I loved the challenge. And I have plenty of information in the timeline I created that never comes up in The Charge, so I've got lots of good stuff left to use for later installments or possibly even a prequel.

Thank you, Katie, for inviting me to your blog!

Sharon Bayliss is a native of Austin, Texas and works her day job in the field of social work. When she’s not writing, she enjoys living in her “happily-ever-after” with her husband and two young sons. She can be found eating Tex-Mex on patios, wearing flip-flops, and playing in the mud (which she calls gardening). You can connect with Sharon at www.facebook.com/authorsharonbayliss and www.sharonbayliss.com. 

Purchase Link: FORTHCOMING – If you wish, you can use http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=the+charge+sharon+bayliss as a placeholder.

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TheChargeBook

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17239442-the-charge

Excerpt:  http://sharonbayliss.blogspot.com/p/sample-chapter-of-charge.html

Trailer:  http://youtu.be/-r_6XNVfsAg

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