Category Archives: Writing

From the Writing Desk of…

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Fotolia_38091399_LHappy New Year! Well, maybe not for you perhaps, but its a new year for me today. It’s my birthday and though I’m getting older, I feel fairly optimistic today.

My family members will all be at home tonight; no one has to work the late shift at their jobs which is nice! My daughter is making me breakfast as I type this, and tonight she is making me homemade pizza and a brownie fudge sundae for dessert. My three kids also gave me Nikon Coolpix AW100 camera. My daughter’s idea. She’s the photographer in the family but she thinks she needs backup, and I’m it. Yes, I’m totally spoiled with such an awesome family! I am truly blessed.

Since this is a new year of life for me, I changed up the look of my blog a bit. I did that last night before going to bed. I think I’m going to like it. In the interest of keeping my blog updated in a timely fashion, I also plan on making my posts a bit more personal while in keeping with the original tone of being a blog which focuses on writing. I can honestly say I’m excited about this!

And so there you have it. My new year’s resolutions. Or should I say birthday resolutions? Whether today is your birthday or not, have a great day!

Progress

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Sometimes it is nice to take a step back and think about where you have been and what direction you are heading in now. That is what I have been doing for the past four days. I didn’t do any writing, editing, or revising. My focus shifted onto other things in my life, things that will give my future writing endeavors clarity. I needed these past four days. Before that, my focus was solely on writing the next sequel in my book series and trying to figure out how to market said series. The past four days have cleared some of the fog out of my brain.

This is my “writer’s blog/website”, but I am a whole person, not solely a writer, not merely a writing machine. I am a Christian and a pastor’s wife. I don’t always advertise that because I don’t want my writing to be classified as Christian fiction. Instead, I want my writing to be classified as fiction written by a Christian. That might not make sense to you, but then again, it might. If not, let me explain.

When I was young, I read a lot of Christian fiction. Those novels were, primarily, romance novels with a “witnessing tract” of text inserted somewhere into the story. It was sort of like when you are reading a news article online today and you encounter in the middle of the article an advertisement which you have to scroll past in order to get back to the main article. Maybe things have changed since then, but I decided long ago that I didn’t want to write a work of fiction and then have to figure out a convenient place to insert a witnessing tract. It’s not that I am against giving testimony of what I believe; it’s that I am not personally fond of tracts, especially when they do not “fit neatly” into my written work.

In addition to that, there are not a whole lot of science fiction and fantasy writers who fit the standard Christian fiction model. Add to that the fact that many in Christendom do not believe Christians should even write science fiction and fantasy, because if something cannot occur in the real world it is wrong to imagine such things happening. I can’t quite go along with that logic and until I’m convinced otherwise, I’ll keep writing science fiction and fantasy.

I spent the past four days at the second annual Reformation Montana Conference where I listened to speakers such as Dr. James White of Alpha Omega Ministries, Phil Johnson with The Spurgeon Archives, Chris Rosebrough with Pirate Christian Radio, and fellow Montanan, Jordan Hall, who also authors the blog Pulpit & Pen. My brain is full to overflowing, but in a good way. I feel refreshed, and this writer is ready to begin a new week of writing.

Semper Reformanda!

Avoiding Anti-social Behavior

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Image representing Facebook as depicted in Cru...

Image via CrunchBase

 

Anti-social. I remember being labeled that by my aunt one Saturday morning when I was a kid. It’s true; I was not excited to see my aunt and uncle along with their two boys, my cousins, EVERY SINGLE SATURDAY. I mean, come on, it was the weekend! Did I want to spend the day with two boys who pestered me and assaulted my Barbie dolls? No way!

 

In today’s world with all its social networking sites, I don’t particularly want to be labeled as anti-social. Being social has its limits however. If I took advantage of every social networking site out there, I would be chained to my computer all day. At the same time, I don’t want to miss any networking and marketing opportunities. Adding to this conundrum is the persistent advice of all the marketing gurus out there who insist you must make the most out of ALL these social networks. They always add the caveat that you must “be sociable” on these networks too; you can’t go there merely advertising your books and then leave. I agree with them on that point. It annoys me when an author joins a group, promotes his book, and then leaves the group conversation. It does not inspire me to buy his book. But again, I don’t have that much time in my day to be sociable on a multitude of networks out there.

 

So, I’ve decided to focus my social behavior on a handful of social networks. Specifically, I have decided to focus on my Facebook author page. Facebook, as annoying as it can be at times, has been my primary social network for several years. I’m familiar with it and I’m comfortable with the platform. My author page isn’t that much different from my primary page, but I haven’t really done much with the author page since I started it. Taking the advice of marketing gurus about being sociable and not just advertising my book, I have reevaluated my Facebook pages. In the past, I put personal “sociable” things on my personal or primary Facebook page, and I put book advertisements for my books on my author page. In other words, I didn’t really engage with people on my author page much.

 

In light of that, I’m changing the way I use Facebook. I’ve decided to neglect my personal, private page and focus all of my future status updates on my public author page. I feel that this action is necessary due to time constraints. I don’t have the time to split my updates between two Facebook pages. I started to notice a difference right away. I began to get “likes” from people I’ve never met. When I first set up my author page, I invited folks I already knew to “like” my author page. Since I have a link to my author page on my website, I picked up a few more “likes” from that, but primarily most folks on my author page are folks I know personally. That has been changing however, ever since I began changing the way I engage with folks on my page.

 

I also recently decided to give Facebook’s ad campaign a try. I ran my first ad for ten days. I advertised my website instead of my author page. My book sales had dropped off pitifully before that, but within that ten day time period I sold eight books. It’s not a phenomenal success story by any means, but for a novice writer trying to get her name out there among the myriad of other writers vying for the same thing, it feels like a success to me.

 

What social networks have worked well for you? Do you have any tips or secrets you want to share?

 

Tips On How to Avoid a Vrykolakas Encounter

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As an indie author I subscribe to marketing newsletters. I am not only a person and a writer; I am a sole proprietor of a business. I’m the CEO, and my headquarters is located in my brain.

 

One of the newsletters I subscribe to suggests making lists and giving tips on things pertaining to my book. Of course my book is fiction. No problem says the marketing newsletter, simply find something in my fictional book which can help folks who are interested in reading my particular genre of fiction. The example given was: If you write about a fictional frugal housewife, then give a list of frugal dining options.

 

Okay, except I don’t write about frugal housewives. I write about vrykolakes, dark elves, banshees, and such. But I’ll give it go anyway!

 

How to Avoid a Sticky Encounter with a Vrykolakas

 

  1. They first popped up on the radar of humanity on the island of Strongili which is present day Santorini. For all I know, they may still be hanging out on the island. You might want to avoid it for that reason. However, the pictures I’ve seen of Santorini are GORGEOUS and if I ever get the chance to go there I’ll take my chances with the vrykolakes.
  2. If you do go to Santorini, you can simply take the precaution that the ancients did with vrykolakes. Don’t EVER answer the door on the first knock. If you get a second knock at your door, you can
    Santorini

    Santorini (Photo credit: yovanoff)

    rest assured that it is only a human knocking. Maybe it’s room service. You’d better answer it so your food doesn’t get cold!

  3. If all else fails and you wake up in the night with a vrykolakas sitting on your chest, don’t panic! It’s probably just a bad dream and you’ll wake up from it eventually. That’s what you get for obsessing over vrykolakes!
  4. If you go to Santorini and can’t afford the airfare to take me along with you, why don’t you pick up my book The Vrykolakas Deviation and read it while you’re there. I think it would be a lovely idea! I can see you sitting on the beach reading it now! Make sure you wear sunscreen!

 

Kindle Edition – $2.99 at Amazon.com

 

Paperback – $12.99 at Amazon.com

 

Nook Edition – $2.99 at Barnes and Noble

 

Paperback – $12.99 at Lulu.com

 

Support independent publishing: Buy this book on Lulu.

 

Meet My Monsters: Ziv

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Z is for Ziv in this final entry for the Blogging from A to Z April Challenge.

Ziv is a supporting character in my second novel The Darkness Below in the Narcissus Legacy Series. Let me introduce her using the 5 W’s and an H.

Who: Ziv is half dark elf and half human. Like her mother, Gerliind, she is born into a life of slavery to the dark elves. Ziv goes blind at a young age and the House she belongs to views her as useless. She is sold to the liikurda as food.

What: Thanks to her dark elf heritage, Ziv has a unique fae ability. Though she is blind, she can see a glow around other fae creatures.

When: The story introduces us to Ziv when she is fourteen years of age, penned up with five other humans waiting to be eaten by the liikurda, and the story follows her and the other characters through fifteen years of their lives. Obviously, she does not get eaten.

Where: The story takes place in the realm of the dark elves, a world called Subtenna which is dark all of the time due to a thick cloud cover.

Why: Every hero needs a sidekick or two. Ziv is one of two sidekicks. She is a reluctant sidekick which makes her interesting. She is quiet and gentle. Unless you get on her bad side. If her temper flares she has a cutting tongue, and if someone comes after a person she cares about she will go on the attack without a second thought.

How: Ziv’s life alters course after she meets the main character in the story: Kaie, who is a vrykolakas princess and a banshee. Ziv reluctantly lets Kaie and her fellow sidekick, Sedge, talk her into becoming a vrykolakas. She regains her eyesight as a result. They embark on a life of thievery becoming raiders on the world of Subtenna. That dark world has never seen raiders like the three of them before, and soon their infamy spreads far and wide. A warrant is issued for their arrest which leads them on a far different journey where they ultimately become battle magi. But their story doesn’t end there; it is only the beginning of what they will accomplish on the dark world of Subtenna.

The Darkness Below, book two in The Narcissus Legacy

The Darkness Below, book two in The Narcissus Legacy

 

Vrykolakas, Yes, It’s a Real Word

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I admit, I’ve been known to make up my own words for my fantasy and science fiction novels. Many have thought that I made up the word vrykolakas too. I assure them that I have not, and that it is a real word of Greek origin.

After I decided to write a vampire novel a few years back, I stumbled across the vrykolakas legend purportedly originating on the lovely island of Santorini. Oh, how I would love to visit Santorini one day! I’m sure all of the vrykolakes are long gone from there and it would be perfectly safe to visit!

Upon discovering the sneaky vrykolakes, a.k.a. the bloodless vampires because they don’t drink their victim’s blood, I began writing The Vrykolakas Deviation which centers around two vrykolakes who are not like the rest – Sandor and his daughter, Keeva. It’s a novel of contrast between Sandor and the other vrykolakes and also contrast between Sandor and his daughter. Unlike him, she never grew up around other vrykolakes, she has never even met another as far as she knows. She is naturally curious and when she at last meets up with one, she drags him home to study him, not realizing at first that he happens to be her father’s worst and highly dangerous enemy, Severin.

As the story progresses, you might think Keeva has a death wish, and maybe she does at first. The question remains: Does she find what she has always been looking for in the end?The Vrykolakas Deviation

 

A to Z Blogging Challenge

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Undercroft

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Cover of "Bibliophile's Dictionary: 2054 ...

Cover via Amazon

 

For lack of coming up with a better idea for the letter “u”, I present the definition of the word undercroft for the A to Z Blogging Challenge. (Plus, it’s my husband’s birthday and I’m fixing him a birthday feast tonight so I really don’t have the time to do an extensive post today.)

 

Undercroft (UHN duhr KROFT) -

 

n. a crypt used for burial under a church; an underground vault or chamber.

 

excepted from The Bibliophile’s Dictionary

 

Of all the dictionaries I’ve owned, I love The Bibliophile’s Dictionary by Miles Westley the best. I have used it countless times in my writing endeavors to give my novels a bit of splash and color.

 

Laughter

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Blue drum set

Blue drum set (Photo credit: Sunfrog1)

As another week closes on the Blogging from A to Z Challenge, we come to the letter “l”. I chose the word laughter for it is indeed good medicine.

My daughter’s best friend invited us to her high school last night to hear her sing. She lives in another town; so we had to eat dinner early and drive twenty-seven miles or so. She and the other choir members along with the band members are preparing for some sort of state competition. We’re a homeschooling family and I’m not familiar with all the in and outs of such things. In essence, their performances last night were for the sake of the students so that they could get over the jitters before the real competition begins.

When we got there we were disappointed to learn that the duet we had hoped to hear my daughter’s friend be a part of was axed from the show. She still sang, but with several other choir members. In addition to that disappointment, the remaining number of acts to listen to that night numbered close to thirty. I was mentally trying to calculate how many hours that would translate into. I nearly bolted when I heard the music teacher say she’d squeezed in a couple more that were not listed on the sheet, neither of which was the hoped for duet we’d originally come to listen to.

As I sat there ticking off each subsequent act, the next act up was percussion. Drums to wake everyone up a bit. Before they began each act, the students were required to state their name and rank within the high school – freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior. This took up valuable seconds and I did not appreciate it. So began the three percussionists – I’m so-and-so, and I’m a freshman… Then, to my delight and nearly everyone else’s in the audience was the second percussionist who said, “I’m Austin, I’m a junior, and I like to take long walks on the beach.” The shock and laughter at what he said rang throughout the auditorium.

The second time Austin introduced himself, he told the crowd that his favorite exotic animal is the elephant.

Close to the end, he and another boy played the drums once again. Before they began he informed everyone that it was the last act he and the other boy would be playing that night. (There were other kid’s acts yet to follow.) He thanked everyone for coming to see them (implying in his comment, that we’d come to see just the two of them perform, not everyone else). Then he said, they’d be playing in Shelby the following day if anyone wanted to come catch their act down there. The auditorium erupted in applause and the boys had to wait for it to quiet down before they played their last piece. I would have given them a standing ovation but my legs were numb by that time from sitting so long in the hard auditorium chairs.

I don’t know what profession young Austin will choose in life, but he shouldn’t rule out stand-up comedian.

(A-Z April Challenge)

Meet My Monsters: Kaie

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I had mistakenly thought I had posted about Kaie already, but a quick check confirmed that I posted about her parents, Keeva and Severin, as well as some other family members from my first novel The Vrykolakas Deviation.

Kaie is the main character in my yet to be released novel The Darkness Below. She has been a fun character to develop and not at all like I originally imagined her. For example, I never intended for her to be afraid of the dark. She is essentially afraid of monsters even though she is a monster – half banshee and half vrykolakas. She can’t quite shake the feeling that there is something lurking in the shadows waiting to devour her.

The Darkness Below, book two in The Narcissus Legacy

The Darkness Below, book two in The Narcissus Legacy

Her life journey begins when she is twelve years old.  Wanting to grow up too fast, she runs away to prove that she is already an accomplished banshee. She becomes swept away through time and space, landing in a dark realm known as Subtenna. She is no longer twelve years old when she arrives there, and she has no idea how long she was trapped in the stream which took her there. Once there, all of her childhood fears take on real form, and she discovers that the gateway she came through is one-way, barring her exit from that realm.

(Blogging from A to Z April Challenge)

 

James

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James. There are a multitude of folks in the world named James, but I have one in particular in mind today. James Lackey, my son, to be exact. Today’s letter in the Blogging from A-Z April Challenge is “J” after all.  The reason he comes to mind is because he wants me to hurry up and edit his work in progress. He’s not the demanding sort; he’s good natured and patient. Yet, when he recently returned from a trip to Estes Park, Colorado, where he attended a conference for the Signature Leadership capstone course he is taking, he informed me by way of a casual comment, “There are a lot of people who are waiting to read my book.”

It’s true. I am a slow editor. His manuscript is interesting; the story is engaging. But I’m editing. I have to slow down and go through it with a fine-toothed comb. I’m making progress, but it is slow, I admit.

His twin brother, Andrew, recently published his first book, Ground of Oam, which I also edited. It took me quite a while to get through that manuscript too. It’s part of a series they are working on together called Oam’s Cry. They are not co-authoring the series per se. Instead, they are writing different time periods of the series, hence my need to hurry up and get James’ story edited.

Ground of Oam by P.A. Lackey

Ground of Oam by P.A. Lackey

 

 

(Blogging from A-Z April Challenge)