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Kathy riding Lexie (2[8] copy

Promoting Ghost Encounters: The Lingering Spirits of North Devon

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Everyone has favourite authors and favourite books. Isn’t it wonderful when they come together? And that’s what is happening today. My first encounter with Helen Hollick was as an historical fiction writer at the Historical Novel Society whose conference I attended in Denver, Colorado, a number of years ago. Helen was there from England and I learned all about her prowess as a writer. Next I realized that she was the person to apply to with my first two historicals about the Loyalists. I did. She and her team accepted them and my writing was on the HNS online list of book reviews.

This amazing writer moved to Devon and continued to write and publish, all the while through her newsletters keeping her readers enthralled with her journey. Along the way Helen told wonderful bits about her horse-loving daughter so, to me, this new book which carries Kathy Hollick’s name as part of the byline was inevitable.

Thanks to both Helen and Kathy for this book which is coming out soon. I’ll be purchasing a copy through the link below for sure.

Promoting Ghost Encounters: The Lingering Spirits of North Devon

By Helen Hollick (With daughter Kathy Hollick)

Everyone assumes that ghosts are hostile. Actually, most of them are not.

You either believe in ghosts or you don’t. It depends on whether you’ve encountered something supernatural or not. But when you share a home with several companionable spirits, or discover benign ghosts in public places who appear as real as any living person, scepticism is abandoned. In GHOST ENCOUNTERS: The Lingering Spirits Of North Devon, mother and daughter share their personal experiences, dispelling the belief that spirits are to be feared.

Ghost Encounters will fascinate all who enjoy the beautiful region of rural South-West England, as well as interest those who wish to discover more about its history… and a few of its ghosts.

(Includes a bonus of two short stories and photographs connected to North Devon)

Book Links:

Pre-order the e-book on Amazon

https://mybook.to/GhostEncounters

Paperback published February 28th – e-book will also be available on Kindle Unlimited

ABOUT HELEN and KATHY

Known for her captivating storytelling and rich attention to historical detail, Helen might not see ghosts herself, but her nautical adventure series, and some of her short stories, skilfully blend the past with the supernatural, inviting readers to step into worlds where the boundaries between the living and the dead blur. Her historical fiction spans a variety of periods and her gift lies in her ability to bring historical figures and settings to life, creating an immersive experience that transports readers into the past. Her stories are as compelling as they are convincing. She is a USA Today best-seller, and also writes the Jan Christopher cosy mystery series set during the 1970s, and based around her years of working as a library assistant.

Helen and her family moved from London to Devon, England, in 2013 – you might have spotted her and Kathy on repeats of BBC TV’s Escape To The Country.

 

When not encountering friendly ghosts, Kathy’s passion is horses. She started riding at the age of three, had a pony at thirteen, and discovered showjumping soon after. Kathy now runs her own Taw River Equine Events, and coaches riders of any age or experience, specialising in positive mindset and overcoming confidence issues.

Kathy lives with her farmer partner, Andrew, in their flat adjoining the main Devon farmhouse. She regularly competes at affiliated British Showjumping, and rides side-saddle (‘aside’) when she has the opportunity. She produces her own horses, several from home-bred foals. She also has a fun diploma in Dragons and Dragon Energy, which was something amusing to study during the Covid lockdown.

 

 

LINKS

Website: https://helenhollick.net/

Amazon Author Page: https://viewauthor.at/HelenHollick

Blog: supporting authors & their books https://ofhistoryandkings.blogspot.com/

Monthly newsletter : Thoughts from a Devonshire Farmhouse

https://ofhistoryandkings.blogspot.com/2024/01/thoughts-from-devonshire-farmhouse.html

images of Helen Hollick's books

 

And here are my books so far. How wonderful to have this link with Helen Hollick!

images of Elaine Cougler's 8 books.

Even More on Her Own After Battle and Shipwreck

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The Loyalist Legacy launch day cake!

For those of us who love a good story, especially one of which we loyalists are a part, join me in reliving Part II of this story first printed in the Loyalist Trails magazine that lands in my InBox every Sunday. Thanks, Loyalist Trails and UELAC! 

 

 

The “Very Clever” Loyalist Wife: Part Two

reprinted with the permission of author and copyright holder Stephen Davidson UE

The loss of her son William and the family’s New Jersey estate in the summer of 1780 must have been overwhelming for Margaret Hutchinson who only four years earlier had arrived in the New World filled with dreams of prosperity and happiness. Tragedy struck again when her son Ralph “died within British lines”. The story passed down through the family is that he was thrown from his horse while serving with the New Jersey Volunteers. At some point in the war, the Hutchinson’s third son —Major — drowned while with the same loyalist regiment.
Having lost three sons, Margaret and her husband John made arrangements for Francis, their seventeen year-old boy, to board with a farmer in Pennsylvania as they waited for the expected victory of the king’s army. The family acquired a farm four and a half miles north of New York City on the road to Kingsbridge (now in the northwest Bronx).
Mourning the death three sons and the separation from a fourth, Margaret then had to come to terms with the unwanted but necessary absence of her husband John in the fall of 1781. Historical records do not say whether his motivation was to seek out compensation for his wartime losses or to make arrangements for his family’s return to England, but Hutchinson had been making careful preparations for a transatlantic journey.
On November 15th, John drew up a will, seeing to it that his extensive property in New Jersey would be divided among his remaining family members: Margaret, Francis, his daughter Margaret, and Ann. As his wife Margaret would also receive all of his personal estate. Major Thomas Millidge, a fellow New Jersey loyalist, was one of the executors listed in Hutchinson’s will. Having settled his family and his affairs as best he could, John Hutchinson then boarded a ship for England. It would be the last time he would see his family and his newly adopted country.
At some point in 1782, Margaret Hutchinson learned the devastating news that she had become a widow. Word reached New York that during its passage to England, John Hutchinson’s ship had filled with water and sunk. John had drowned in the shipwreck.
As she waited for the defeat of the patriot forces, Margaret arranged to have Francis, her remaining son, leave Pennsylvania and join her in New York. And then came the stunning news of the defeat of the General Cornwallis’ army at the Battle of Yorktown. For all intents and purposes, the war that had taken Margaret’s three sons and husband was over. Returning to Hanover Township was an impossibility for the loyalist family. But where would Margaret and her three children go?
By August of 1783, the forty-six year old widow made her decision. With the help of Samuel Brownejohn, a New York City loyalist, she sold the farm on the Kingsbridge Road and prepared to join the thousands of loyalist refugees who sought sanctuary in what remained of British North America. Having the proceeds of the sale of her house as her only financial resources, Margaret left the United States of America on a ship bound for Annapolis Royal on Nova Scotia’s western shore. Twenty year-old Francis, 19 year-old Margaret, and 11 year–old Ann sailed with their mother.
Major Thomas Millidge, a family friend and an executor of John Hutchinson’s will, sailed on the brig Nancy, and so it is very likely that Margaret and her children were also passengers on this vessel. Among the other ships in the fall evacuation fleet were the Michael, the Robert and Elizabeth, the Betsey, the Lehigh, the Cato, the Skuldham, and the Hope. The voyage could not have been an easy one. Three ships in the fleet, the Joseph, the William and the Henry made it as far as the Bay of Fundy where they encountered hurricane winds that drove them south to Bermuda. The three sailing ships did not arrive in Nova Scotia until May 1784.
The Rev. Jacob Bailey, an Anglican minister and fellow refugee who would come to befriend Margaret Hutchinson, was a witness to the 2,500 loyalists who flooded into Annapolis Royal in 1783. He commented on the desperate housing shortages that saw the local church, courthouse and stores crowded with refugees. Bailey noted, “Hundreds of people of education and refinement have no shelter whatever”.
Margaret and her three children eventually settled in Cornwallis, a community 13 km outside of Annapolis Royal. And now what would this “very clever” loyalist widow do?
The establishment of St. John Anglican Church in the refugee settlement would signal the beginning of the next chapter in Margaret’s life. Her new congregation had called upon a minister that many of them had known when they lived in Falmouth, Massachusetts (modern Portland, Maine).
The story of Margaret Hutchinson and the Rev. John Wiswell, a loyalist widower from Massachusetts, will be told in next week’s Loyalist Trails.
To secure permission to reprint this article contact the author at [email protected]

Thanks to Stephen for allowing me to reprint part II of his excellent story. We had a great flurry of emails back and forth when I contacted him. Seems we have a lot in common!

Click on the Loyalist Trilogy books below for great historical stories with satisfying endings:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Writing Whirlwind: Guest Author Wednesday

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A few years ago I joined London Writers Society where I met a whirlwind named John Matsui. When you check his bio below you’ll see he absolutely deserves that descriptive word along with many others such as ambitious, helpful, kind, talented, broad thinking and clever. When we sat in my living room a week or so ago I could see that his cross genre writing was expressing itself in an historical way and I eagerly suggested he join me as my Guest Author for December. You will definitely learn some new and exciting things from John. Here he is to start the process.

Welcome, John!

John Matsui: My Guest Author Today:

What the heck is the author of dark fantasies doing writing a guest blog for Elaine Cougler?

My name is John Matsui and after a working life that careened like that silver marble in a pinball machine — journalist, business consultant, internet entrepreneur — I’ve turned to writing speculative fiction that specializes in not being specialized.

What held and still holds all parts of my working life together is a love of writing sprinkled with creativity. It was always a tough go holding back my imagination as a daily newspaper reporter/editor/columnist. When I entered the world of business as a PR consultant and marketer, I found my notions of stuffy, old business types in the corporate world to be just plain wrong. The top folks in the biggest corporations welcomed my whimsical side. The smaller the business and the lower the rank, the more conservative the thinking.

As usual, I digress. Back to how all of the above fit with Elaine’s focus on historical fiction.

I love sci-fi, fantasy, horror, thrillers, detective mysteries, and, of course, historical fiction and I blur most of them in all of my novels. What’s great about historical fiction is the discipline needed to create fascinating characters and weave their stories into the tapestry of real people and events. When history is brought to life accurately through riveting historical fiction as Elaine Cougler has done in her Loyalist Trilogy, the reader wins in two ways: 1) a thrilling and empathetic voyage through the eyes of another; b) insight into historical events and players that our formal education missed.

While my novels’ main characters range from a guy people call a vampire and a celebrity chef who sniffs down murderers on the side, they nudge their way into historical fiction because my skeptical side doesn’t buy a witch’s curse or demon spirits as the raison d’être for my pseudo vamp and my chef’s preternatural sense of smell.

My vampire Dragul Mangorian (Late Bite and Lycanthrope Rising — Books 1 & 2 of the Toronto Vampire Chronicles) is the last of the Homo Sanguinus, a subspecies of Homo sapiens. He was born and raised in what would become Canada among a people who fled the Old World across the Bering Land Bridge 10,000 years ago to avoid never-ending warfare and genocide at the hands of humans.

In the New World, the Sanguinus co-existed with other First Nations most times in peace but usually in mutual fear. I touch on the 17th Century Beaver Wars (French and Iroquois Wars) in Lycanthrope Rising and plan to explore it in greater detail in upcoming novels.

As kin to humankind, the Sanguinus interbred with Sapiens until forced separation of the subspecies severed the genetic link for successful reproduction. Scientists now say Homo Neanderthalensis interbred with our ancestors and many of us carry a sloped forehead gene in our DNA.

And the vampire part? The Sanguinus consume blood to live with their preferred beverage of the human varietal. However, like most parasites, they prefer not to kill their hosts because that’s plain wasteful.

Chef Nathan Sherlock, star of my foodie thriller Gravity Games, possesses an extraordinary sense of smell that allows him to select the best ingredients and blend them in palate boggling ways. What only he and business partner/love interest Bonnie know is his olfactory abilities go far beyond what adoring fans of celebrity chef ‘Nate The Nose’ suspect.

Suffice to say that a special Canada-U.S. anti-terrorism squad recruits the duo to sniff down perps who have weaponized gravity and left the world hanging in suspense.

Historical fiction comes in via the back story of a villain in Gravity Games where his upbringing behind the Iron Curtain warps his mind and sets his direction in life. The financial collapse that led to Occupy Wall Street in New York City’s Zuccotti Park then spread to over 951 cities across 82 countries puts the driving forces in Gravity Games into motion.

Why do I turn to historical events and characters of the past for my fantastical yarns?

First off, I‘m not so creative that I can imagine an entirely new world in all of its multitudinous dimensions. I find it easier to start with a basic premise and then use the real world and real history to flesh out the details even if I reimagine them e.g. The Crusades and other conflicts were thinly veiled wars within wars. Humans and Sanguinus populated the forces of both sides to disguise wide-scale killing.

I could be a lone voice here but my second reason for entwining my stories with historical fiction is credibility. I believe that even the most speculative of sci-fi, fantasy, and paranormal tales needs grounding for average readers to step aboard. Harry Potter needed a miserable home life with his aunt and uncle. When motivation is spawned within real events, in my opinion the plot and the characters gain authenticity.

As writers, our primary role is to create characters that our readers fear, love, hate, and worry about. There must be an emotional attachment to the characters. How do I get readers to empathize with a non-sparkly, fearsome, blood-drinking vampire? I portray him as a member of a First Nation, the lone survivor of historical / anthropological genocides. He’s the victim.

I mentioned discipline earlier. There’s nothing like history to focus a writer’s explosive creativity like a demolition expert directs impact. History creates a dance partner to keep characters in step. History also fixes events, perfect opportunities for actions to reach a climax.

If I can use historical events to create empathy for a fearsome vampire, I think they have a place in almost any genre of fiction.

John Matsui “Someone to Watch” (Goodreads.com) bio:

John Matsui is a former daily newspaper writer, turned public relations guy, turned business consultant, turned Internet entrepreneur, and finally author of thriller mashups that stick to a single genre like confetti in a hurricane.

His storylines and characters, like his work life, rush everywhere at once and still arrive at the finish line with all plot threads neatly and satisfyingly knotted or so readers have told us. Unless you have a habit of reading the last pages of a book first, you clearly enjoy this form of topsy-turvy, jigsaw mystery. That or you decided to see how far from the beaten path John could go.

People who [enjoyed] [hated] [laughed] [cried] [got sick over] [have no idea what to think about] John’s writing are invited to visit https://johnmatsui.com/ or email the author at: [email protected] and tell him they [loved] [despised] [shared] [ripped apart] [borrowed a copy of] [bought a copy of] his books and that they plan to [buy his other books] [recommend him] [start a bonfire with it] [spread it as fake news].

John’s novels include: Late Bite: Vampire On Trial: Lycanthrope Rising: The True Story Behind The Vampire-Werewolf Wars; and Gravity Games, A Nathan Sherlock Foodie Thriller. They are available as eBooks through most popular online vendors. The paperback version can be ordered on Amazon.com or clicking the link on John’s Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/John-Matsui/e/B00L8GIQ2E

He’s currently working on the third book in the Toronto Vampire Chronicles (Late Bite and Lycanthrope Rising are Books 1&2), a YA steam-punk time travel novel Girl Out Of Time, and Dark Matters, a collection of twisty short stories.

John and wife Judy live in Wortley Village, a quaint neighbourhood in London, Ontario, far from Toronto’s clash of vampires, werewolves, superheroes and high housing prices.

For more information about the author and his writing go to:

Amazon: www.amazon.com/John-Matsui/e/B00L8GIQ2E

Blog: www.JohnMatsui.com

Twitter: johnmatsui99

 REVIEWS

 “Mind-boggling!”  ReadersFavourite.com

“Fun with antigravity”  Amazon.com

“More please”  Goodreads.com

“Eye-popping”  Literary Titan

“Keeps readers guessing” Midwest Book Review

“A path-breaking novel” Lovelaughter.net

 “Kept me up all night”  Amazon.com

 “Quite a ride!”  Bookmagiclove.blogspot.ba

“Recommend it to anyone, vampire enthusiast or not”  ReadersFavourite.com

“Pure entertainment”  CityGirlScapes.com

 

Click on the Loyalist Trilogy books below for more great historical stories:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ghosts From Niagara: Guest Author Wednesday

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A few years ago I was asked to take part in a Doors Open event in lovely Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario. The museum there was one of the spots on the tour where I joined other authors with books about the area. The delightful Barbara Nattress was one of those authors and she now has a second book featuring the history of Niagara through her fictional characters.

Today we welcome Barbara to introduce both of her books which feature ghosts, history, young love, and the Niagara area. Welcome, Barbara!

Ghosts of The Past

War is never a good event. The families suffer. The countryside suffers. The soldiers suffer. The life everyone knew never returns.

The War of 1812 between the United States and the United Kingdom was no different. Many innocent people were killed only because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The Niagara Peninsula was an area of concentrated fighting because of its proximity to both Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. The town of Newark at the mouth of the Niagara River was home to many Loyalists who had settled there during the Revolutionary War. In 1813, the town was burned to the ground by the American soldiers as  local residents watched. Feelings and opinions about the Americans were cut and dried. You were either with them or against them.

These Loyalists had left the life in America behind and had to start over again clearing land and establishing a home. For many it was the second time they had done this. Others were business men and merchants and were not accustomed to pioneer life.

A number of years ago my great aunt decided to research and write the family history. She discovered her ancestors had come from Holland in the late 1600’s and settled along the banks of Lake Champlain. As disputes over taxes by the British escalated into the revolutionary war the Van Every family moved to Syracuse and later Albany. Being loyal to the British was not a wise choice in 1774. Finally in 1778 with the patriarch of the family in jail, the rest of the family crossed the river and landed in what is now Queenston.

The family stayed loyal to the British, helped run raids for food with Butler’s Rangers, and kept watch for American troops crossing the river terrorizing pioneers. For these services the Van Every family were awarded settlement land along the Niagara River. In 1799 they were endowed with the honorific United Empire Loyalist. When the opportunity arose for my husband and I to move to Niagara on the Lake and become the owners of a Bed and Breakfast, I kept many stories and ideas in my mind that later would become part of the Loyalist House books.

Dreams in the Mist, takes place during the War of 1812 and tells of a family living along the Niagara River. Patrols of British soldiers regularly traveled up and down the river. While families were always on alert for American patrols crossing the river, life went on as normally as possible on the farms. Men continued tending animals and crops, women tended the gardens and kept the household running smoothly. Children played games and helped with chores and teenagers fell in love with boys and girls on the next farm.

The story also tells of a couple looking to start a new chapter in their life after retirement and takes place in the present and in the Niagara area. As luck would have it, they purchase the home along the river where our Loyalist family resided during the War of 1812. It is now a Bed and Breakfast aptly named Loyalist House B&B. Our Hosts Marilee and Phillip are enthusiastic B&B owners, knowledgeable about the history of the area and of the homes.

I used the idea of weaving past and present together to create the story of these two families whose lives intertwine. What a perfect setting to have a ghost living in your home. Niagara-on-the-Lake is noted as being the most haunted place in all of Canada.

This excerpt from Dreams in the Mist tells of Hannah and her boyfriend Peter meeting secretly along the river. Peter’s family have decided to move back to the American side as they feel the Americans should take over this area. Hannah’s family are staunch supporters of the British.

The Proposal

 Hannah was sitting behind the bushes by the river bank, waiting for Peter. She had managed to get out of the house without anyone seeing her, but it had been close. The waiting part of these rendezvous was always the worst as Hannah worried that Peter might be seen and would have to turn back before they met. Hannah stepped out of the bushes just as Peter reached the dock. In the dark silent night , they embraced, glad that the meeting was finally here. They returned to the bushes to talk about how their friendship could continue despite the war.

“Where do you keep all the letters we are exchanging?” asked Peter.

Hannah told him she kept them in her pocket or under her pillow at night for now, but she had been looking for a hiding place where no one would look. …She told Peter she would continue to look the next day for a safe place to keep the letters, where only she might think to look.

“How are we going to see each other if your family moves across the river?” asked Hannah. …

Peter hadn’t asked Hannah to marry him, but he took both her hands and asked if she would marry him after this disagreement between the two countries was settled. Hannah of course said yes and asked Peter how long he thought that might be. Of course he didn’t know the answer to that but hoped it would be maybe a year….

Peter continued to tell her how he thought they could meet at the river. It would be more difficult as there would be no way to get letters to each other, and they would have to be careful as now he was considered the enemy on this side of the river. He thought for the rest of the summer and the fall they could meet on the fifth day of the month at midnight by the dock. They would only wait half an hour for the other person to show up…. One last kiss and a long embrace and they separated. Peter rowed back up the river along the shore while Hannah watched, tears streaming down her face.

It soon becomes apparent that Loyalist house is also home to a former resident, now a ghost. Hannah, a teenage ghost resides in the attic and interactions with B&B guests often results in difficult situations for the present day owners. Marilee is determined to discover more about the home and who this ghost is. Should she tell the guests about the ghost? Why is the ghost still here? What happened to her family? And why is there so much sobbing and crying coming from the attic?

Hannah’s Search is the sequel to Dreams in the Mist and follows Hannah as she searches for her family and her fiancé during the war. Unaware she is a ghost, she discovers she has powers to see what goes on in her home but not leave the house. Her Father is conscripted by the British and her mother and siblings leave to find a safe place. She often ventures down into the house only to find it has changed into something she can not understand. Often there are strangely dressed people wandering around the bedrooms .

Marilee is still trying to discover who this ghost is and secretly discovers she can sometimes see what this ghost is up to in her dreams. Marilee can almost predict if it will be a night of peace or if the noises in the attic will disturb everyone. The ghostly encounters often erupt into scary but hilarious situations. Can you imagine five women booking into the B&B with the intention of finding and photographing the ghost?

Will Marilee and her friend be able to find out who Hannah is and what happened to her family? Will Marilee be able to communicate to Hannah that she is safe in the attic? Will Hannah finally realize she is a ghost and be able to move on? How much furniture will be destroyed before the situation is resolved?

In this excerpt from Hannah’s Search, Hannah is quite concerned as she watches her parents prepare to leave the farm. She hears her Father tell her mother that she must walk across country for several days with the two children to his brother’s farm as it is not safe to stay here anymore. Hannah’s father will likely have to join the British troops in the area.

Hannah was terribly anxious. She flitted about the house both day and night trying to keep a watch on her family. She saw her mother packing things in a small case and making those dry biscuits that she did not like, so she knew they were planning on leaving. One night when her family were asleep, she crept into the room where the case was and unpacked all the things her mother had put in. The next morning, she saw her mother sigh and repack the clothes. When she looked closer, she noticed her mother had tears in her eyes.

On some of her trips downstairs, Hannah was puzzled by what she saw. There were things happening in what she thought was their kitchen, but people dressed in odd garments were working at very strange pieces of equipment that she had never seen before. The odd thing about it was they were doing something with food that she recognized. It was though she was drifting between different societies. One she had known and loved, and the other beyond her imagination. The strangers never seemed to bother with her, except every once in awhile someone would stop what they were doing and stare in her direction as though they had heard a noise.

The War of 1812 was a pivotal point in defining Canada as a nation. Men stood side by side defending the country to keep the values in which they believed. Over the years other wars forced men and today women to again fight and die to keep those same values. These ghosts of the past stand together as heroes and should never be forgotten.

There was a Peter, Paul and Mary song in the sixties “Blowin’ in the Wind” that stated “When will they ever learn, when will they ever learn?” I think the ghosts of the past may still be singing this song today.

I hope you will enjoy reading both these books as much as I have enjoyed writing them. When I finished the books I almost felt a loss as I was no longer in touch with my characters. I often wonder what Marilee could do next?

Find Barbara and her books on Goodreads here.

 

Click on the Loyalist trilogy books below for more great historical stories:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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From the Nile to the Victorian Age: Writing History into Poetry

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Today I am most pleased to welcome to my blog the multi-talented and extremely capable Erin Sweet Al-Mehairi. Erin has always been the first out of the gate to help me, another writer, whenever I’ve asked. She has reviewed my books, done interviews with me and used her multitude of talents for my advancement over and over. For a list of those talents just take a look at her email signature:

 

 

Erin Sweet Al-Mehairi, B.A. English, Journalism, History
Publicist, Editor, Writer, Journalist,
PR and Marketing Professional

Addison’s Compass Public Relations, Owner
Hook of a Book Media and Publicity, Owner
Sinister Grin Press, Marketing and Publicity 
Bloodshot Books, Marketing and Publicity
DarkFuse, Advertising and Publicity
 
Co-Host and #MarketingMorsels Director – 
The Mando Method Podcast on Project Entertainment Network! Download each Wednesday!
Offering freelance editing, publicity services, and marketing consultation! Over 20 years of experience in editing, PR/media, publicity, professional writing, advertising, marketing

Yup! That list is at the bottom of each and every one of her emails to me. And she has one of the most pleasant personalities I’ve ever encountered. Thanks so much, Erin, for joining me here today.

Erin is also a poet and a few months ago put out Breathe. Breathe., a collection of her poems. She says it has been so well received that a more formal edition is planned for the next few months. Meanwhile here is her guest post:

From the Nile to the Victorian Age: Writing History into Poetry

By Erin Sweet Al-Mehairi, author of BREATHE. BREATHE.

As a poet in the modern age, I often hear people dismiss poetry as a style of writing they don’t read, or stereotype it as mushy love musings, or even simply that they don’t understand it. I’m glad that readers have thought enough of me as a person and writer to at least tell me they will attempt to read mine, but what I long for is that they will come away with a better appreciation of what poetry can be, which urges them to think outside their box (and that readers who don’t know me will be swayed to pick it up and appreciate it). I can understand the apprehension about some of the poetry that’s out there today. I, too, have a hard time understanding the structure, the meanings, and the feel of some of the mainstream thoughts which seem a little bit of a re-working of older quotations. However, what I’ve tried to do with my own writing is just to put the emotions and feelings I have (stemming from my life experiences) down on the page, or write about what I have been inspired by, to channel the images in my mind to paper. The effect that they would hopefully have on readers is that they’d at least be able to capture the images in their mind too. You know when you read a book and it’s so good you feel as if you’ve watched a movie? That’s what I hope to do through my poetry as well, to create snippets and scenes for readers that are highly visual, and in some cases, visceral.

Recently I had a limited edition poetry and short fiction chapbook published by Unnerving Magazine, a print and online magazine that also publishes a select amount of standalone collections, novellas, and novels. Called BREATHE. BREATHE., it encompasses two sections of poetry—one about breathing through pain; the pain of spousal abuse, rape, illness, anxiety, and more darkness of the human race, and the second, about breathing through fear; the fears that we house from childhood, in our lives, in our blackest nightmares, monsters, serial killers, etc. The two short stories are dark fiction as well, one based on the mire of human nature, which I penned after being inspired by Crayola discontinuing their dandelion yellow crayon, and the other, a story spawned after I had been reading about an Egyptian goddess named Anuket, which I coupled with a recurring nightmare I had in my childhood of being drowned.

For some of the guest articles I am writing in promotion of my book, I have written about the reasons for writing my chapbook, for instance, because some of it was based on my own personal experiences. It was therapy. Since Elaine herself is not only a lovely person and host, but an author of a spectacular series I’ve loved of historical books in her Loyalist series, I’ve decided to switch gears and tell you a little about how history influences my work, even this dark fiction chapbook.

I’ve always been interested in history, reading books of historical basis from a young age, and then getting a bachelor’s in history (as well as journalism and English) mostly just because I enjoyed taking the classes (and maybe had a bit of a dream of writing for National Geographic). So not only does the Goddess of the Nile, Anuket, make her presence known in one of the short stories within this chapbook, I also feature a poem of a Native American tribe’s “spirit of winter” who wreaks havoc when the icy frost appears for its season, which is a real legend. Sometimes my poems, though dark as featuring a serial killer or an unknown creature, are set in various eras, such as the Victorian era or the Gilded Age. I almost prefer, unless using my writing to deal with my own past or present fears, to set my characters in the past.

After the success of my limited edition work, which sold out, the publisher agreed to publish an expanded print and digital version of BREATHE. BREATHE. to enable more readers to enjoy my work. I’ve been busy writing not only stories of various dark fiction genres and styles, but more poetry that has allowed me to play around with time periods and characters from the past. That’s where my forte for history and the Gothic comes in and I have loved every minute of the creation process. It’s fun to imagine me in the mind of a character, whether on the end of giving or receiving evil intentions.

Poetry is much more than about love, though some of mine is about the wrong end of love as you might see if you read my almost gut-wrenching words, but about a slideshow of the past as well. My poems could be the start to a story, as I’ve had readers ask me for more about a character they’ve been given a sneak peek of, or they could seem as a scene from an Agatha Christie novel. I gather my inspiration from mystery and historical fiction books, magazines, from non-fiction reading on Native Americans or myths and legends from various time periods, and from movies. However, I gather a good amount of inspiration from road trips with my partner, Tim, and our three kids to art and historical museums and locations, the shores of Lake Erie—where historical lighthouses, buildings, and shipwrecks abound (oh, and lake monsters?), libraries, and nature. My family is used to hearing all my new ideas for pieces of work as we drive home. You’d think they’d roll their eyes by now, but they don’t, and I appreciate so much all the encouragement they give me to showcase a woman of the 1890s (you know, the one with the dark eyes and with the white gloves in the photo at the museum), a Viking legend read about while looking at an artifact (what did he use that weapon for?), a French spy from the French-Indian War (how did she feel?)….

Poetry gives me a great outlet to practice my sentence skills, to create lyrical phrases, or to condense action. It’s actually good homework and a way to download from your brain to your pen. Emotionally, this is a wonderful therapeutic way to encourage healing in yourself and others. For those non-emotionally driven poems, say with the historical bent or that of a Gothic character or monster, I always say if I think a story deserves more, or the muse hounds me to it, I can always turn that character or scene into a longer story later. But if not, or until then, why not let others enjoy scenes from my head in giving them something to ponder, and if they want more, let it ignite their own thoughts.

In late September, my poetry and short fiction collection, BREATHE. BREATHE., will be publishing in its expanded version with a brand new cover and will be available for order on Amazon in various formats. I hope you’ll take a chance on the stories and the poetry, which readers have told me read more like tiny stories rather than a honeycomb they can’t get through. In all seriousness, reviewers, fellow authors, and readers have called me “brave,” and my writing “emotional and raw” and “action-oriented.” For those that enjoy history, I hope you will enjoy my dark tales and poems featuring historical characters as well and that they will transport you to another time and place. Though these are Gothic and darker in nature, I hope to one day publish a collection of historical poetry too and I plan to keep working on my historical fiction novels and stories that are in the works. I would love for you to follow my writing and connect with me on social media. I always love to hear from readers and fellow writers.

Thanks so much to Elaine for her friendship, support, encouragement, and tireless personality, which serves as such an inspiration to me.

Find me online at www.hookofabook.wordpress.com for news of my writing, author interviews, and reviews of the latest books I’ve enjoyed, most of them historical fiction.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/almehairierin

Twitter: www.twitter.com/ErinAlMehairi

Instagram: www.instagram.com/erinalmehairi

Erin Sweet Al-Mehairi, Biography

Erin Sweet Al-Mehairi is the author of BREATHE. BREATHE., a collection of dark poetry and short stories published by Unnerving Magazine. She will also be featured in the upcoming anthology HARDENED HEARTS, also publishing by Unnerving at the end of 2017. Erin has been a writer for over 25 years, knowing she’d never stop writing after winning her local newspaper’s essay contest in high school, moving on to garner degrees in history, journalism, and English. A professional editor and writer for over 20 years, she also works in public relations, marketing, and publicity, currently owning Addison’s Compass Public Relations and Hook of a Book Media, the latter from which she offers editing and marketing and publicity consulting and work for writers, authors, and publishers across many genres. She also is a co-host on The Mando Method Podcast with her Marketing Morsels segment, offered on the Project Entertainment Network and available on iTunes and iHeart Radio. She has a wide range of interests (such as hunting treasure on the shores of Lake Erie and perusing bookstores) she enjoys when not driving her three kids to a myriad of activities or cooking them somewhat healthy dinners. Don’t worry, she balances that out with lots of baking. She tries to squeeze in writing, even if her cat always chooses that time to sit on her lap (or notes). Erin and her family live in rural Ohio. Find Erin on almost all social media outlets and at www.hookofabook.wordpress.com.

 And now back to Historical Fiction and my Loyalists:

 

 

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Why Are So Many New College Graduates Such Bad Writers?

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Today’s post is reblogged from a post by Jeff Selingo, New York Times bestselling author, Washington Post columnist, higher education strategist, LinkedIn Top 10 Influencer, on August 11, 2017. Let’s jump right in:

Jeff Selingo

A few months ago I was having breakfast in downtown Washington. I couldn’t help but overhear a casual job interview happening at the table next to me. The interviewer owned a government contracting business and was looking to hire a person to help write proposals to federal agencies.

Near the end of the conversation, the interviewer complained about how difficult it was to find good writers these days. The two men talked about their college experiences, majors, and how they learned to write.

“I was a math major,” the interviewer said [to] his companion, “but the biggest differentiator in business now is good writing.”

He’s not alone in his opinion. According to national surveys, employers want to hire college graduates who can write coherently, think creatively, and analyze quantitative data. But the Conference Board has found in its surveys of corporate hiring leaders that writing skills are one of the biggest gaps in workplace readiness.

“The biggest differentiator in business now is good writing.”

That’s why so many employers now explicitly ask for writing and communications skills in their job advertisements. An analysis by Burning Glass Technologies, which studies job trends in real time by mining data from employment ads, found that writing and communications are the most requested job requirement across nearly every industry, even fields such as information technology and engineering.

Good writing takes practice and it seems that many college students, especially outside of writing-intensive liberal-arts majors, are just not being asked to write often enough. In the book, Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses, the authors described a study that tracked more than 2,000 students enrolled at four-year colleges. Among those who graduated on time, exactly half said they took five or fewer courses that required at least 20 pages of writing.

“If students are not being asked to read and write on a regular basis in their course work,” the authors wrote, “it is hard to imagine how they will improve their capacity to master performance tasks that involve critical thinking, complex reasoning, and writing.”

Training for any activity in life requires practice that usually exceeds the tasks we will need to handle later on.

Extensive writing is rarely assigned in many college courses because it’s a labor-intensive activity and raises the workload for students and professors. Students don’t understand why they need to write five-page papers, let alone 20 pages, given many of them won’t write much more than PowerPoint slides, e-mails, or one-page memos once in the workplace.

But training for any activity in life requires practice that usually exceeds the tasks we will need to handle later on. Not every college graduate needs to be a novelist, but if college students become competent writers who draft clear prose, then they’ll also be able to compose anything on the job, from PowerPoint slides to reports.

Recently, I asked a few of the best writers I know, including high-school teachers and college professors who taught me how to write, what can be done to improve the communications skills of college graduates. They offered plenty of good advice for how students can develop their writing and approaches teachers and professors can use in the classroom. Among them:

  • Writing takes time, in preparation and in actually writing. Students shortchange the research and organizing necessary to be good writers. “Too often students let their brain spill onto a page and then they submit their masterpiece,” said Leslie Nicholas, my high-school journalism teacher and a former teacher of the year in Pennsylvania. “They need to learn that the writing process is not linear.”

  • Drafting is a critical part of the writing process. Instruction in schools encourages writing on the fly by requiring students to compose essays during class time or to submit only final papers rather than drafts along the way. One problem with a single deadline for writing projects is that it doesn’t introduce students to the idea that self-editing is a critical part of good writing. Art Markman, a prominent author and psychology professor at the University of Texas at Austin, said he shares the “awful drafts” of his own papers with students to show them that good writing doesn’t just happen, but rather is the result of multiple iterations.

  • Don’t forget to edit yourself. Barbara Adams, an associate professor of writing at Ithaca College, told me that after every draft, students should print out what they’ve written, wait a while—maybe an hour or a day—to view it with fresh eyes and edit it on the printed page. “Read everything you write aloud to see how it sounds,” she said. “Then cut out the fat, redundancies, repetitions. Let it flow. Don’t worry about sounding elegant or smart or literary, just be clear, direct, purposeful.”

  • Writing is not a solitary experience. The best writers learn from others. Without sharing multiple drafts of their writing with anyone else, students never get the chance to apply feedback to improve their work. But feedback also needs to happen quickly. Too often students hand in a paper only to get it back weeks later, by which time they don’t care or have moved on to something else.

  • Writing is meant to be shared with more than a teacher or professor. Sharing the final product with an audience outside of a classroom is important in engaging students in the writing process, Nicholas said. “It is frustrating for students to put a great deal of effort into a writing assignment and then share it with just one reader, the teacher,” he said. “How many actors would perform for an audience of one?” Technology has allowed students to distribute their writing more widely through blogs and wikis, and even podcasts, Nicholas added. “Because podcasting is audio only, students are forced to convey their message clearly,” he said.

  • Read good writing. Perhaps the best way to improve writing is to read good writing, and not just 140-character tweets or Facebook shares. We develop an ear for language, sentence structure, and pacing by reading others and trying out something we learn from them.

What are some of your tips for improving writing of students coming out of high school or college? How did you learn how to write?

Jeffrey Selingo is author of There Is Life After College: What Parents and Students Should Know About Navigating School to Prepare for the Jobs of Tomorrow. You can follow his writing here, on Twitter @jselingo, on Facebook, and sign up for free newsletters about the future of higher education at jeffselingo.com.

He is a regular contributor to the Washington Post’s Grade Point blog, a professor of practice at Arizona State University, and a visiting scholar at Georgia Tech’s Center for 21st Century Universities.

This post is adapted from the Washington Post’s Grade Point blog.

Elaine Cougler’s historical fiction trilogy:

     

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Traitor’s Knot and Our Canadian Story: It Started With a Dream

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This is an exciting summer in so many ways. We Canadians are celebrating Canada 150 and Cryssa Bazos’ Traitor’s Knot has launched to wonderful acclaim. Today Cryssa is my guest author and her intriguing post follows. Welcome, Cryssa. Good luck with the wonderful Traitor’s Knot.

The Hudson’s Bay Company – 17th century multicultural start-up

This year, when Canada recently celebrated her 150th birthday, I thought about how we became a nation and all the long line of diverse people who paved the way. Curiously enough, Canada’s early story revolves a department store—the Hudson’s Bay Company. When you think Hudson’s Bay Company, you’re probably thinking of HBC, Bay Days sales and that iconic point blanket. I think of all that, but I also see an institution with a quintessential Canadian history, that started as a multicultural startup in the 17th century.

Pierre-Esprit Radisson (1637-1710): By Christian Robert de Massy, illustrateur, pour la Fondation Lionel-Groulx. – Moi, Mathieugp, chargé des projets numériques à la Fondation Lionel-Groulx, j’ai téléversé les illustrations du projet Le métro, véhicule de notre histoire, qui appartiennent de droit à la Fondation., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54025457

It started with a dream. Two French Canadian trappers (coureurs de bois), Pierre-Esprit Radisson and Médard des Groseilliers, were looking for the holy grail of beaver furs. They had been trading along the St. Lawrence River and making a decent living, but they had heard that the richest, thickest beaver furs could be found in the far north, and for that they needed financial backing.

There were rules as to where they could trap and licenses had to be secured. Radisson and Médard applied for a trading license from the governor of New France, the Marquis d’Argenson, to explore the upper Great Lakes. The governor declined their request, but that hardly stopped the two intrepid trappers. They gathered their gear and set off in 1659 to explore north of the Great Lakes to Hudson’s Bay.

Arrival of Radisson in an Indian Camp: By Charles William Jefferys – mechanical reproduction of 2D image, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7357040

When they returned to New France, they carried with them the best quality of furs anyone had ever seen. Laden with the equivalent of a king’s ransom, they presented the governor with a sample—likely to rub his nose in the fur, quite literally. Enraged, the governor arrested them and, worse, confiscated their furs.

When they were finally released, the two Radisson and Groseilliers were more determined to prevail. If their country would not seize on the unparalleled resource, then they would have to look elsewhere for backing. So they headed south, to the English colony of Massachusetts.

In Boston, they met a business cartel that agreed to support the venture. A ship set out in 1663 only for it to be broken up by ice sheets. Most would have abandoned the venture, but one Englishman, Colonel George Cartwright, did not let this disaster deter him. Recognizing that they needed additional resources, Cartwright took our French trappers with him to London, where he introduced them to Prince Rupert of the Rhine, the first cousin of King Charles II, and 17th century poster boy.

Prince Rupert of the Rhine: By Anonymous – CherylHingley.com, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5022018

Prince Rupert long had the reputation of an adventurer. He had cut his baby teeth fighting in his home of Germany during the Thirty Years’ War. When that wrapped up, he arrived in England to help out his old uncle, King Charles I, who had a nasty civil war on his hand. Rupert’s cavalry prowess had nearly demoralized the Parliamentary side, but in the end, even his tactics couldn’t win this war for the King. After the King’s arrest and subsequent execution, Rupert led a squadron of ships and harassed the Parliamentarians in the Azores and the Caribbean. The moment he heard about this new venture in the New World, he was in.

Rupert introduced Radisson and Groseilliers to his cousin, King Charles II (who was also a bit of an adventurer himself, the scoundrel), and he readily agreed to supply two ships, the Nonsuch and the Eaglet. On June 5, 1668, the two ships left Deptford for Hudson’s Bay. Unfortunately, the Eaglet reached only as far as Ireland before having to turn back.

The Nonsuch continued on to James Bay, the little southern dip of Hudson’s Bay. There they founded the first trading fort, calling it Charles Fort, in modern day Waskaganish in Quebec. Naturally, you name it after the monarch who sponsored the trip if you have any sense. But they didn’t leave Rupert out in the cold, for they named the river that flowed through there Rupert River.

They trapped and traded the winter of 1668 and when fall arrived the following year, the Nonsuch returned to England carrying a prized cargo of beaver furs. The value of the pelts was valued at £1,233, the equivalent (at that time) of a laborer’s lifetime wages.

The Hudson’s Bay Company was officially incorporated on May 2, 1670 by royal charter granted by King Charles II with Prince Rupert named as its first governor. The company had control of the entire area around Hudson’s Bay, known as Rupert’s Land, spanning approximately 1.5 million square miles!

Picture of Rupert’s Lands: By BlankMap-USA-states-Canada-provinces.svg: Lokal_ProfilWpdms_ruperts_land.jpg: en:User:Decumanusderivative work: Themightyquill (talk) – BlankMap-USA-states-Canada-provinces.svgWpdms_ruperts_land.jpg, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12853860

 

Cryssa Bazos is an award winning historical fiction writer and 17th century enthusiast with a particular interest in the English Civil War. Her debut novel, Traitor’s Knot, is published by Endeavour Press and placed 3rd in 2016 Romance for the Ages (Ancient/Medieval/Renaissance). For more stories, visit her blog cryssabazos.com.

Social Media links:

Website: https://cryssabazos.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cbazos/

Twitter: @CryssaBazos

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cryssabazos/

Buy Links:

Traitor’s Knot is available:

About Traitor’s Knot:

England 1650: Civil War has given way to an uneasy peace in the year since Parliament executed King Charles I. Royalist officer James Hart refuses to accept the tyranny of the new government, and to raise funds for the restoration of the king’s son, he takes to the road as a highwayman. Elizabeth Seton has long been shunned for being a traitor’s daughter. In the midst of the new order, she risks her life by sheltering fugitives from Parliament in a garrison town. But her attempts to rebuild her life are threatened, first by her own sense of injustice, then by falling in love with the dashing Hart. The lovers’ loyalty is tested through war, defeat and separation. James must fight his way back to the woman he loves, while Elizabeth will do anything to save him, even if it means sacrificing herself.

Traitor’s Knot is a sweeping tale of love and conflicted loyalties set against the turmoil of the English Civil War.

Praise for Traitor’s Knot

“A hugely satisfying read that will appeal to historical fiction fans who demand authenticity, and who enjoy a combination of suspense, action, and a very believable love story. Five stars.” Elizabeth St. John, bestselling author of The Lady of the Tower

“A thrilling historical adventure expertly told.” – Carol McGrath, bestselling author of The Handfasted Wife

“Cryssa Bazos is equally at home writing battle scenes as writing romance, and the pace keeps the reader turning the pages.” – Deborah Swift, bestselling author of The Gilded Lily.

Cryssa Bazos is an award winning historical fiction writer and 17th century enthusiast with a particular interest in the English Civil War. Her debut novel, Traitor’s Knot, is published by Endeavour Press and placed 3rd in 2016 Romance for the Ages (Ancient/Medieval/Renaissance). For more stories, visit her blog cryssabazos.com.

Social Media links:

Website: https://cryssabazos.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cbazos/

Twitter: @CryssaBazos

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cryssabazos/

Buy Links:

Traitor’s Knot is available:

About Traitor’s Knot:

England 1650: Civil War has given way to an uneasy peace in the year since Parliament executed King Charles I.

Royalist officer James Hart refuses to accept the tyranny of the new government, and to raise funds for the restoration of the king’s son, he takes to the road as a highwayman.

Elizabeth Seton has long been shunned for being a traitor’s daughter. In the midst of the new order, she risks her life by sheltering fugitives from Parliament in a garrison town. But her attempts to rebuild her life are threatened, first by her own sense of injustice, then by falling in love with the dashing Hart.

The lovers’ loyalty is tested through war, defeat and separation. James must fight his way back to the woman he loves, while Elizabeth will do anything to save him, even if it means sacrificing herself.

Traitor’s Knot is a sweeping tale of love and conflicted loyalties set against the turmoil of the English Civil War.

Praise for Traitor’s Knot

“A hugely satisfying read that will appeal to historical fiction fans who demand authenticity, and who enjoy a combination of suspense, action, and a very believable love story. Five stars.” Elizabeth St. John, bestselling author of The Lady of the Tower

“A thrilling historical adventure expertly told.” – Carol McGrath, bestselling author of The Handfasted Wife

“Cryssa Bazos is equally at home writing battle scenes as writing romance, and the pace keeps the reader turning the pages.” – Deborah Swift, bestselling author of The Gilded Lily.

 

Come take a look at the Loyalist trilogy. Click here.

Yay! Book 2 of the Loyalist Trilogy earned a new award!

 

 

 

 

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How Do You Keep Your Inspiration?

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Author Maaja Wentz

Today I have the distinct pleasure of entertaining here on my historical fiction blog an author from a different genre. Maaja Wentz is a Toronto writer whose joyous smile shown at left is heightened in her lively guest post below. Welcome to Maaja! Enjoy, Everyone! And don’t forget to enter Maaja’s contest.

Just before you begin Maaja’s guest post I have to mention that last week my website let me down and even though I wrote my usual Wednesday blog post it didn’t send properly. Consequently my readers didn’t get their notification. After you finish reading Maaja’s interesting words below please consider checking out last week’s post, War on Our Doorstep! It’s got loads of photos in it. Ah, technology! And now read about inspiration—

How Do You Keep Your Inspiration?

Guest post by Maaja Wentz

When authors speak in public, readers and newbie writers alike ask the same question: Where do you get your inspiration? This weekend I attended Toronto’s Ad Astra science fiction and fantasy convention where I listened to authors such as Brandon Sanderson, Robert J. Sawyer, Julie Czerneda, and Diana Whiting. None of them expressed difficulty getting ideas. In fact, Sanderson read us a story which he had written on the plane and in the airport on his way to Toronto.

There’s a little secret writers share. Most, myself included, have more story ideas then they have time to develop. Between life events, the news, and new discoveries in science and history, there will never be a dearth of story sparks. The challenge is to stay inspired through early drafts, revisions based on beta reader feedback, and multiple revisions after editorial review. For traditionally published authors this process often takes a year, leaving sequel-hungry fans waiting.

At least traditionally published authors have editors with deadlines to goad them into action. As an indie author, seeing things through to the end is lonelier because editors are freelance and deadlines are self-imposed. I love the exhilaration of writing a first draft. The blank page holds limitless possibilities and new scenes come quickly, but editing is a slow slog.

What is the secret to persevering from idea to polished book? For many, it’s the same element that drives actors, singers, and dancers — the joy of performing. Doing public readings where I can see the audience laugh or hold its breath is its own reward. On the Wattpad reading app my novel, Feeding Frenzy, has received over 124 000 reads to date. Winning a Watty Award and interacting with Wattpad readers online keeps me going because I know real people are enjoying my characters and their adventures.

When I can’t share my work, reading keeps me motivated. Writers get inspiration from the same source readers get entertainment and food for thought. We need to see what other writers are capable of, the creative challenges they set themselves, their differing voices and styles, and their solutions to technical puzzles. Reading fiction also helps us remember the pure pleasure of books from the reader’s point of view.

There is a danger inherent in this kind of inspiration according to Hugo and Nebula award-winning author Robert J. Sawyer. At Ad Astra on Sunday, he read from his work-in-progress about the Manhattan project and the inventors of the atomic bomb. Sawyer said he wouldn’t read anything fictional featuring Enrico Fermi, Robert Oppenheimer, or Richard Feynman. He worried fictional depictions of historical figures might overlap with his own research-based ideas. For fear of accidental plagiarism, or of having to limit his imagination to avoid it, he is sticking to non-fiction for now.

Unlike Robert J. Sawyer, I’m still learning the craft and business of writing. My inspiration comes from reading my favourite genres: fantasy and science fiction. To stay current, and for the pleasure of reading, I purchased ten of the top fantasy and science fiction novels on the Amazon ebook charts. The idea is not that I will be inspired to write like these authors, but that their books will motivate me to keep revising, editing, and polishing to the end. If I never wrote another story, I would still have over seven novel drafts on my computer, waiting to be edited and published. All I need is sufficient motivation.

Want to win the chart-topping fantasy and science fiction novels I chose to inspire me?

Click on this link to enter the contest, but act now. Contest ends May 30, 2017.

Maaja Wentz is the award-winning author of poems, short stories, and her lighthearted supernatural thriller, Feeding Frenzy, coming soon. To find out more and get free stories, visit: maajawentz.com

 

The Loyalist Trilogy

The Loyalist's Wife 2nd edition
The Loyalist’s Wife 2nd edition Chill With a Book Award winner!
Second in The Loyalist Trilogy
Second in the Loyalist Trilogy Discovering Diamonds Award Winner
Third in The Loyalist Trilogy
Third in The Loyalist Trilogy Released November, 2016

 

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Guest Author Barbara Kyle Makes An Entrance

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One of the people from whom I’ve learned a lot on my own writing journey is the very successful historical fiction author, Barbara Kyle, whose Thornleigh books just grab the reader and won’t let go. A former actress whose talents there helped her achieve success as an author, Barbara joins us today with an important tip for writers. For readers, I give you many hours engrossed in the books of this talented lady.

A few weeks ago Barbara put her years of writing, editing and teaching excellent workshops (I’ve been to two of them!) into a new publication. Page Turner is sure to help all writers and I’m pleased to help Barbara let people know about this new book.

Thanks so much for visiting, Barbara!

Making an Entrance

by Barbara Kyle

First impressions are crucial. We all know that about “real life.” It’s equally true of a reader’s first impression of a fictional character. Their response to your story’s protagonist is especially important.

Yet new writers often waste this opportunity by introducing their protagonist in idleness or passivity. Be smart – put the visceral impact of the 1st impression to work for you.

Think of your story as a movie, and your protagonist as the star, and give him or her a dynamic and meaningful entrance. Focus on two steps:

  1. Determine the character’s defining quality

  2. Show that quality through action

Action is the key. Description of a character tells the reader mere facts and has little visceral effect, whereas showing the character’s defining quality through action produces an emotional response in the reader, leaving a deep and lasting effect.

Screenwriters do this very consciously. Watch any film you admire and notice how the scene in which the hero or heroine first comes on screen demonstrates their defining quality. In other words, it shows the character’s essence.

When actors first read a script this “essence in action” is the very thing they look for. I know – I made my living as an actor for twenty years.

As a writer of fiction, you can use this screenwriting technique to powerful effect. Strive to write an entrance scene for your protagonist which, if your story were made into a film, would attract an A-list actor to the role – a star.

Here are three examples of the kind of dynamic entrance I mean:

  1. In A.S. Byatt’s POSSESSION, the young scholar Roland Mitchell, researching a Victorian poet, opens an old book in the London Library and out fall two unsigned love letters written by the poet. Roland impulsively steals the letters – and thus begins his audacious quest for the truth about his subject. Roland’s essence is his ambition to excel as the foremost expert in his field.

  2. Ian McEwan’s ATONEMENT opens with Briony Tallis, a precocious child, obsessing about the play she has written, and orchestrating her young cousins to take roles in her fictional world. Her need to control people, and her obsession with storytelling, are the essence of her character.

  3. My novel THE QUEEN’S LADY, set in London, England in the reign of Henry VIII, opens with seven-year-old Honor Larke risking her life to try to find her servant-friend amid a May Day riot. When she sees the mob viciously attack a foreigner, then move on, Honor’s curiosity and pity drive her to help the dying stranger. This is her essence, shown in action.

The examples above are all opening scenes with a protagonist, but your opening doesn’t have to feature the protagonist. You may want to kick-start the story with some other event – for example, one featuring the antagonist. What’s important is that when you do bring your protagonist on stage, give them an entrance in which the action they take resonates on a meaningful, emotional level with your reader.

Whether your hero or heroine is a rogue, a lost soul, a killer, or a saint, their entrance is your opportunity make them a star.

Barbara Kyle’s Bio

Barbara Kyle is the author of the acclaimed Thornleigh Saga series of historical novels (“Riveting Tudor drama” – USA Today) and thrillers, with sales of over half a million books. The latest in the Thornleigh Saga is The Traitor’s Daughter.

Barbara is a popular presenter at international writers’ conferences. As a mentor, she has launched scores of writers on the path toward published success. Her latest book is Page-Turner: Your Path to Writing a Novel that Publishers Want and Readers Buy. See www.BarbaraKyle.com

 

 The Loyalist’s Wife, The Loyalist’s Luck, The Loyalist Legacy

by Elaine Cougler

Available at Amazon.com and many other places.

 

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