SOLSTICE AUTHOR VANAYSSA SOMERS WEIGHS IN ON THE BOY SCOUT

 

VANAYSSA SOMERSTHE BOY SCOUT by Vanayssa Somers

BUY THIS BOOK: http://amzn.to/1PWvuOg

Published: February 12, 2016

Published by Summer Solstice Publishing

The Magic Will Find You!

           

My desire to write was driven by the transformative power of Story. As a child, I loved books about characters who did the right thing and overcame great odds. I was fired with the hunger to experience transformation in my own life and inspire others.

Born in a Yukon winter, I moved to beautiful British Columbia as a toddler and grew up in the deep forests of Vancouver Island. Over the years I trained as a Registered Nurse, earned a B.A. in Sociology from University of Victoria, worked as a Reiki Master, Psychic and NLP counselor. I was blessed to mother a beautiful daughter who, unfortunately, passed away in her twenties. Through that loss I discovered a gold mine of new depth in myself and in life itself, as she returned to visit me and open a new awareness of life after death. The greatest gift of all is life itself.

Over the years I have sought to help and inspire others through my work as a nurse, as the owner/operator of a seaside spa in the U.K., as counselor and psychic.  A graduate of The Monroe Institute and a follower of Bruce Moen’s books and website, I work in soul retrieval and connection with my family in the Afterlife. I believe romantic love to be one of life’s highest experiences. Writing romance is my joy.

VANAYSSA AUTHOR

To contact Vanayssa Somers, click on this link: www.paranormalfantasyromance.com/contact

 

BLURB

A massive shipping container stands open and waiting on the dock of a huge port city, in almost any country. A truck drives up and a load of human beings, in this case, youngsters, are off loaded and packed inside the crate. A crane lifts the container. It takes its place among dozens of other gigantic shipping containers, all locked together on board a freighter.

A week or two later, the container is lifted once more and deposited on another dock, thousands of miles from home. At some point, the kidnappers unlock the crate and those souls who have survived the ocean journey are gathered up and taken somewhere to be sold.

Sold as slaves for either sex, or hard labor, or both. For the remainder of their lives.

Behind them, their country; their birthrights; their families; their rights to education, freedom of speech, equality, all the things we take for granted.

Shocking enough when it takes place on the other side of the world.

More so, when it takes place in America, and the youngsters being kidnapped are American children.

Melchior, King of Fairies, and Theresa, a young American woman are passionately in love, soon to be wed. But a new purpose takes hold of these two magical Wizards as they discover the hazards young people face, unknowingly, every time they step outside their home.

In any country on earth.

Even ours.

 

Amazon reviews for Vanayssa Somers Books:

…one of the best supernatural romance books I have ever had the pleasure of reading. Following Theresa, through the span of many years was both interesting and intriguing, never once slowing down. The transition from past to present was seamless. It flowed with the grace of a well trained ballerina gliding across the stage and air with one toe keeping it all in balance. The story is the most interesting of concepts and the romance filled my heart and drew me in. I would recommend this story for anyone who loves the mix of supernatural and love, or to anyone who just loves love. Well done Miss Somers, this story and your writing is a true treasure.

***************************

…I loved this book! I couldn’t put it down. Vanayssa Somers made the story and the characters come to life in a way that few authors are able to do. She did her research well on the pagan practices and the horrible time of burning ‘witches’ and any one that dared to be ‘different’ This book has everything from shape shifters to wizards to fairies & more. Truly mesmerizing to the reader with believable characters and places.

 

CHAPTER NINETEEN from The Boy Scout

by Vanayssa Somers

 

Bad Medicine

 

While Theresa engaged Callaway’s shamanic alter ego far away in his ancient Chinese hiding place, 21st century police were setting out to raid his current hideaway. And bring an end to the longest crime spree in human history.

It was 1530 hours on the police clock, a hot summer sun high in the sky.

In the lush forests outside of Summerford, near the border between New Hampshire and Maine, nine vehicles thundered up the graveled road and long driveway toward Callahan’s home.

Avalon’s covert team, subcontracted to Interpol, had been able to bring expanded information to McEwan about Callahan/Tenga. His history, his global organization, his fetish for children. The military intelligence section of Melchior’s elite staff had no problem gathering this data. A lot of it had been gathered already, from centuries of battling the wicked shaman’s efforts to destroy Fairyland. It was there, available, in their Special Ops security files.

Consultation with the U.S., European and Asian headquarters of Interpol, together with intel provided by the covert team from Avalon, had produced a full, massive dossier on Bradley Callahan. Philanthropist, Honorary Boy Scout, Inspirational Speaker.

Arch-criminal, kidnapper, human trafficker, drug boss, rapist, murderer. Killer of small children.

The full extent of Callahan’s crimes was still not fully compiled. A team of experienced staff were busy twenty-four hours a day, raking through every ounce of evidence from every part of the world, fitting the pieces together like a gigantic jigsaw puzzle.

His activities were so widely established, and covered so many criminal categories, as to be unbelievable. How could one human being create and manage such a vast rulership of evil?

As one of the top officers of Europol, the European organization independent of, but parallel to, Interpol, had said, it almost felt as though Callahan were not human, but some other kind of creature. Something unheard of in the annals of crime.

The estate was surrounded by forested acreage with wide views of mountains and ocean. Its privacy was underlined by a seven foot tall ironwork fence and gate at the final approach to the house itself.

A disembodied voice echoed from an intercom in the gate, demanding to know their identity and purpose.

The first vehicle, its markings indicating the presence of U.S. law enforcement, pulled to a stop at the gate. A grim-faced officer leaned out his window, requesting admission. He identified himself as an officer with Summerford’s Police Special Reaction Team.

The housekeeper/general assistant on the other end of the intercom went silent for about a full minute as eight more vehicles growled their way up behind the first one.

Then, just before the driver of the first vehicle put his foot to the floor to smash his way through the gate, an answer came.

“Mr. Callahan is not home at this time. We have standing orders never to admit anyone while he is absent from the property, ever, no matter who they are. However, I have sent him a message to tell him you are at the gate and require admission. He may reply shortly.”

The housekeeper/assistant had, in fact, telepathed to Tenga, far in another Age and place. Interrupting the Boss’s plans for his special prisoner trapped in an Energy Web, under an ancient sun looking down upon a volcanic planet.

“Fine. There are nine police investigation vehicles here, and we are coming in. We are fully armored and carrying battle-trained personnel. If you prefer, we can break down the gate. Or, you can open the gate and preserve this very nice entryway for future use. It’s up to you.”

Moments later the gate swung open, admitting the cavalcade of ominous looking armored vans and trucks. Two of the trucks each carried in back ten police officers in full riot gear complete with assault-style semi-automatic rifles.

The other trucks were transporting a full squad of uniformed officers carrying long guns.

At the front of the house an armored truck pulled to a halt. It was a Cadillac Gage Peacekeeper II, built for urban police special actions.

Innocent bystanders and witnesses could be placed behind it, sheltering them from a firestorm of bullets if it came to that.

Within minutes, law enforcement descended in full, irresistible power on the home base of Bradley Callahan, Arch Criminal.

In a steady stream, police boots thumped into the entryway, up the stairs, through the house, into the basement, looking not only for the obvious but for the hidden, the covert, the subversive.

Experts among the teams began to probe corners, window frames, behind pictures, closet shelving, anyplace a hidden compartment or room might await their ferocious, unrelenting onslaught.

Like a mighty ancient army entering a walled city with merciless swords drawn, set to draw blood, the officers carried their long shields, their rifles, their full battle equipment and protective gear.

Nothing in this entire estate, its length and breadth, in the house or on the grounds or in the forest surrounding the estate, would escape their precise and exhaustive examination.

One voice shouted, “I’ve got something!”

The lead investigator, Terry Kincaid, the only member of the raid not equipped with rifles or riot gear, shambled calmly over to his officer.

Kincaid was a veteran of the force, had seen just about everything crime and human madness could throw at law enforcement.

But the dossier on this guy defied belief. He had even wondered if someone was exaggerating when he’d spent the entire previous night sitting up in his study steaming his way through a mountain of paper and computer files.

He stood at the side of one of his best officers, a guy who was known as the go-to person for finding hidden stuff. Monty had a gift. He could sense when something was there, when someone had spent real time figuring out how to cache something away.

But this was outstanding. He’d found a hidden latch, in a closet, disguised as part of the molding, and pressed it. Bingo. The wall had slid smoothly aside, revealing what was almost, basically, another, smaller, house.

Terry stood gazing at the scene before him, at what looked amazingly like a Thaan – a sacred space. Something he’d learned about in a rare trip to the far north, the farthest reaches of Alaska. It was part of shamanic ritual, a place where all the shaman’s stuff was kept, where he carried out chanting and vibratory exercises which, it was said, could open hidden worlds and give a shaman the ability to even change shape and appearance. Not all medicine men everywhere in the world called their sacred space a Thaan – but that was what it was, no matter where on the planet rooms like this were found.

He and his wife had been travelling tourists, and both had an interest in ancient pagan practices. They’d explored aboriginal practices in Australia and Eurasia. Whenever a holiday beckoned, Marta Kincaid made sure it was an educational trip.

The history of North America’s aboriginal peoples was one of Marta’s specialties. She was a professional expert witness, acting on behalf of the Native population when legal need arose. The opportunity to explore further and deeper than anything she’d ever stumbled across had made her persuasive in arguing that her husband should accompany her. Go with her to those far northern reaches and learn about ancient medicine man practices.

You never know, she’d said, when this stuff might come in handy. You get all sorts in our big cities, and you should grab this chance to learn.

So he’d gone with her. Like she’d said. You never know.

And right now, he knew he’d be taking her out for a very special dinner quite soon.

It was an Aladdin’s cave of…stuff.

Shaman’s stuff.

So. This Callahan…maybe had a hidden side. Something no one had suspected.

Maybe he was up to his eyes in this cultish activity. No, not cultish. Way deeper, more extensive, more ancient, than any cult.

Shamanism was a part of human development from the most ancient times, in all parts of the globe.

We’d left it behind, supposedly. But Kincaid knew well, from his private reading, that quantum physics was beginning to open doors onto atomic secrets that were confusingly similar to the old shamanic dreamworld skills.

He felt goosebumps form all over his body as he stood methodically taking note of the items hanging on walls, standing on cabinet shelves, lying carefully stacked on the floor against walls, systematically arranged on large and small tables.

And then he noticed a glass cabinet with items that reminded him of something much more prosaic. Something he actually had experience of in previous crimes. Something quite common in the hiding places of the most dangerous killers. Crazed killers.

If only he was wrong. But the moment his eyes fell on the cabinet, he knew.

It was a collection. This Callahan was the worst kind of criminal – he killed and collected mementoes of his victims.

A Collector.

Above the cabinet, a corkboard. With photos. He moved closer. Children. Beautiful little children, wide eyes staring at the camera in confusion and fear.

He sighed deeply, feeling the mix of despair and finality, a familiar feeling, something he’d come to recognize as the beginning of the solution.

In here, in these rooms, behind the sliding wall, was the evidence that would convict Callahan more than any testimony of any witness.

Stepping across the room, he donned a pair of plastic gloves and carefully slid the glass cabinet door open. Using a pair of tweezers, he picked up the first small item on the lower shelf. A tiny mitten, blue, a common kind of mitten any mother places lovingly on the small hand of a beloved child.

He replaced the mitten and took a look at the other pieces in the heartbreak collection. Every piece was something obviously belonging to a small child.

Although there was no evidence yet of bodies, he knew there would be bodies. Somewhere.

Beneath all the exotic, unusual aspects of this madman, there lay the mind of a common killer. The need to keep souvenirs of each victim. So often, the nail in the killer’s coffin. Irrefutable evidence of murder.

He felt himself going pale with stress. So this would be one of those cases. The worst kind. Haunting his retirement years, keeping him awake, making him bolt upright in bed at two in the morning, sweat pouring off his forehead.

Whatever ancient pagan parts there were to this man, this monster, in the end they all came down to the commonplace. A man who took what he wanted, without regard for anything or anyone.

A common psychopath. Dressed in more ritualistic, unusual garb, perhaps, but common in the basic facts.

He turned to the officers directly behind him, and gave orders.

“Get the forensic team in here, now. There will be bodies, probably many. Children, by the look of things.”

One of his officers, carefully stepping around with the plastic booties they were all wearing, said to him, “Sir, look at this.”

He pointed toward a post-it note, pinned to a corkboard on one wall.

It read, in perfect penmanship, “Get someone to move the bodies at the west fence.”

“Shit,” Kincaid said.

The young officer swallowed hard, took off his hat, smoothed his hair, wiped his forehead, looked at the floor. His lips trembled briefly, just slightly. Then the hat went back on, the head went up, and the sharp, probing eyes began to search the room again.

Members of the forensic team had been downstairs, carefully going through a whole library of what was probably going to be major evidence. He heard footsteps enter the room, and two of its members stood beside him, gazing around in awe.

Now, Kincaid pointed to the post-it note on the corkboard, and to the collection of souvenirs on the cupboard shelves.

The District Attorney commented, “There’s enough here to keep everyone busy for a long time, and we had better get some team members over from another area, there’s just too much for our outfit. We’re a pretty small city. What do you think?” She’d come along due to the high profile of this suspect and the wide assortment of offences he appeared to have committed.

He agreed, and she went off to make some calls and confer with her team downstairs.  They needed help. Particularly because every single piece of evidence had to be handled meticulously and documented in detail. And there were hundreds of pieces of evidence, in all likelihood. Anyone making a mistake in this crime scene – for that was what this house was beginning to look like – would suffer for it.

Children, many of them, probably, had lost their lives here, in this house. Mistakes would be unacceptable.

Terry walked around, taking mental note of every item. He wished he could take pictures for his own use, so he could show Marta. But absolute professionalism was required in this nest of terror.

He recognized many items they’d learned of on that trip, and then from extensive reading they’d both done after returning home. Reading and internet research, videos of topics which ninety-nine percent of people knew nothing about.

There, on that table, was a Shila Dhunga, a clear quartz crystal which represented the celestial mountain. A mountain which connected the shaman to three different worlds – the upper, middle and lower.

By accessing these three worlds through the quartz crystal, the medicine man, supposedly healer, could See the spirits causing sickness in a tribe member.

It worked through the aesiric trance. Necessary to be an effective healer. Or whatever this particular shaman was. Not, perhaps, a healer.

There on the table was a shaligram – a black fossil ammonite, representing the cycles of birth and annihilation.

An aura duster. A fetish pot, interesting. Each shaman made a different kind of collection of items for this. On the wall, a medicine shield, a prayer stick. Here and there, a strange sight, a pile of animal skins. Pieces of leather. Bones, of what origin he could not say offhand. But they would find out. A shudder passed over his back.

He wandered further into the rooms. Feathers, vines, leaves, twigs. Rattles, larger ones, small ones.

On one wall, a collection of some very fine drums. Beautiful art work on some of them. Skins stretched across the frames perfectly, expert craftsmanship. He wondered if Callahan made his own drums. He wondered what animal the skins came from, shut out nightmare imagination.

Or maybe Callahan was not the shaman, himself. Maybe someone in his outfit was the medicine man. At this point, they couldn’t take anything for granted.

There was a healer’s staff. Altar decorations. An altar. A magical wand, used to project black or white energy to someone or something else.

And there. One of the most vital of ancient shamanic tools, a talking stick.

While this kind of stick was used in a healing group, like AA, to help someone take their turn at speaking, it also had other uses.

It represented the world tree, its leaves, branches, trunk and roots. It represented the three worlds again, the upper, middle and lower.

This was essential helper to the shaman as he travelled through time and space, searching for the spirits causing illness, searching for animal totems, this was a tool synonymous with shamanism.

He felt a yearning to remove the talking stick from the wall, where it lay lengthwise, carefully arranged on hide-covered nails, to feel it in his hands, smell it, handle it.

Ignoring his need to reach out and touch it, Kincaid leaned over, hands behind his back, and examined the ornate carving, not only there for beauty and to give visual information of ancient history, but for the more exotic purpose of symbolism.

For these tools were not just outward show, or meant to induce trance in someone seeking a medicine healer’s help.

These tools could be used to carry out shape-changing, travel into the depths of the earth and to the far reaches of the universe. Apparently. So the videos had said.

He’d wondered about that. You just never knew. Married to the kind of woman he was married to, he’d learned to have an open mind.

These tools were used to achieve states and experiences that quantum physicists were only now, at this end of the historical dialectic, beginning to identify as being humanly possible.

They expressed an ancient hominid acquaintance with the deepest, farthest reaches of the subconscious, almost unknown to the white man. Or woman.

He really had to stop thinking and speaking in terms of male presence all the time. There were now plenty of female shamans in the world. Some, quite famous. Using the internet to find clients, as all these practitioners did. Making far more money than Kincaid and his sort could hope to ever see as they plodded through the muck. Through the detritus of criminal madness which peopled their daily work life. Nothing exotic about the worlds he and his officers travelled in. No, sir.

When it came down to it, Callahan was common muck. When you stripped all this mind-blowing stuff aside.

He was just another killer. Just another rapist.

There was a cell waiting with Callahan’s name on it. Possibly, it would have to be a very special cell. Perhaps, lead-lined. Unless, at last, the finality of true death awaited him. At the hands of a jury.

And where, exactly, would they find a jury of Callahan’s peers?  The idea was laughable.

But shape-shifting and time travel were not necessary parts of jury selection. The presence of a healthy conscience and normal intelligence were the things that mattered there.

And Kincaid was going to put him there. In the hands of a jury. Oh yes. He teetered back on his heels, his hands quiet behind his back, head lifted as he gazed around one last time. Lips compressed, eyes wide.

Next step. Get out there and catch this son of a bitch. Put him away for life, or, if he had his way, put him into the Chair.

But first, they had to find the bodies.

The little bodies.

Like any decent human being, he felt tears start up behind his eyes. But he was used to this.

He could handle himself. No tears.

Not here in front of his officers, anyway.

And he marveled at his wife’s intuition. Marty. An amazing woman. She’d known, somehow.

Some day, he’d need to know all about shamanism.

Who would ever have guessed?

Kincaid could not know that this particular shaman was huddled in a parallel universe, invisible, but very much present in the room, watching in impotent, growing rage as the officers went through his sacred sanctuary inch by inch, exploring, taking notes, peering, judging, gathering evidence by the minute, evidence that would destroy Callahan’s painstakingly-structured life.

His entire world-wide network, all his contacts. In his computer, the speeches he had written, speeches people paid him top dollar to listen to. And the children, the little ones he had loved so much.

The police! They could never understand.

And his magic. His sacred tools. What did these fools know of magic carpets, magic chants and spells? What did they know of travel through time, of shape shifting?

He would show them a thing or two. But he would have to be careful about how he handled this. He could not be shot. If he were killed by a police bullet, he’d be dead. Like anybody else. Simple as that. No matter what animal he was shaped like.

He moved out of his safe place in limbo and took a stance in the woods facing the house. He eyed up the armored Cadillac Gage, the Peacekeeper II.

Perfect.

He hoped one of the intruders carried a camera. Because what they were about to see, they would never see again.  Experts would perhaps call this “a mass hypnotic trance” experience. Except they wouldn’t be able to, because he was going to destroy the house and everyone in it. The house and all the evidence against him. He’d crush the computers, smash the hard drives. Grind any evidence against him into the earth.

He knew where the evidence was.

And he’d have to go after the officers heading out to find and dig up the bodies. Without that cursed post-it note he’d left pinned to the corkboard, they would have had no idea about the bodies.

He’d have to kill, destroy, every single police officer on his property. Every one.

But he savored the moment. It was delicious. The world would be left in horror, speculating.

Maybe he could even make an insurance claim for the damage he would do to the house itself.

Grinning from ear to ear, excited beyond measure, Tenga prepared himself.

The only one who would instantly know what had happened here, would be Melchior, King of Avalon.

He wondered suddenly, where Melchior was. The question took up residence in the back of his mind. He knew the Special Ops team had joined up with Interpol to investigate himself, the one-of-a-kind outlaw, Callahan.

So why wasn’t Melchior and his little team of “covert operators” here, with the police? It bothered him more than it should, and he remembered the thought that had passed through the prisoner’s mind, Theresa’s mind, about Melchior being there in the Mesozoic…but that was impossible. The woman was probably just hysterical. Like most women.

Right now he had to give the Summerford Police Force a thrill they would not forget. Just before he killed them all.

Muttering a spell, he threw back his head and uttered a chant.

One young officer, trailing behind his colleagues with shovels, all heading for the west fence, heard a strange shout in the woods and paused. He peered toward the trees.

“What was that?” he asked aloud. The others stopped, frowned, looked back at him.

“Come on, Talbot, there’s a job to do here. What do you mean, what was what?”

At that moment, the forest facing the ironwork fence began to move, to wave back and forth. The group froze, their shovels over their shoulders, faces turned as one toward the woods.

“What the hell? What’s making the trees move like that?” asked the one who’d urged Talbot to hurry up.

The sentence was barely out of his mouth when a nightmare roar sounded and they stood in shock. An unbelievable sight met their eyes.

A dinosaur, as massive as a two storey building began to lumber out of the woods toward them. It paused, lifted its terrifying head armed with rows of sharp teeth, turned to look right at them, and began to move deliberately toward the group.

As one, the men screamed, yelled for help, threw their shovels aside, and fled toward the house. Other officers, hearing the racket, came out and stood staring.

One of them yelled into the house, “Everybody run. Hide. There’s a goddamn dinosaur out here. T Rex. It’s coming right for us.”

No sooner had the men slammed the door shut – as though that would help –than the sound of tearing, crunching metal echoed around the property.

The armored van, built to withstand automatic machine gun fire, lay with its roof crushed down to the ground, bent beyond repair, a gigantic foot resting on what was left of the truck’s body. The animal stood at least thirty feet tall, its own armored plates far superior to any armored vehicle when combined with the killing power of the giant predator.

The windows were filled with human faces, expressing a combination of fear, horror, and excitement.

“Max,” one of them yelled through the house to the forensic photographer, “get in here. This is the picture of the century. You’re missing it…”

His voice faded as they all turned and fled toward the back of the house, and Kincaid came out of the hidden den to see what the uproar was about.

He was just in time to see the entire front of the house begin to shake and come apart, the window frames falling inward, the door falling flat on the floor, and a massive green leg intruding through the wall.

The creature was coming inside, was going to destroy the entire structure of the home. The entire crime scene. There would be nothing left to convict Callahan with. That was the only thing Kincaid could think as he stood his ground.

Max materialized beside him, camera flashing and popping. Then Max grabbed Kincaid’s coat and yelled, “Get out of here, Detective. Run. Shit, what’s wrong with you, man? Run!”

But Kincaid looked around, frantically trying to think how to stop the beast. This house was all they had to follow Callahan’s own path of destruction around the globe. If the beast came fully inside, tore the roof off the house, which it clearly intended to…

Then it gave a mighty shove forward, another huge leg thumped onto the floorboards and suddenly the dinosaur was right there, in front of him, right in the house, the roof crashing in, boards falling everywhere, glass splintering.

And the whole earth seemed to be shaking, as in an earthquake. The house shook, the ground shook.

The beast thundered toward Kincaid, who astonished even himself by standing his ground. Moved into shooting stance with arms outstretched. He lifted his weapon toward the T Rex’s head. And suddenly, the game changed.

A stand of century-old virgin timber at the front entrance, a half dozen 80-foot Douglas fir trees which had formed a source of pleasure and shade for those who lived there, began to teeter and fall forward, tumbling in majestic collapse over what remained of the roof of the house, and with a never-to-be-forgotten rumble, gave up the ghost. Kincaid fled to the back door with the remainder of his men, watching over his shoulder as a small forest fell on the beast, no doubt crushing it under a gargantuan weight of board feet.

Then Kincaid stopped, whirled around, his eyes bugging out in disbelief once more.

The T Rex was no more. Not dead. Not lying stretched out across the remains of the front entryway.

No.

The great predator had vanished.

He called the men to come back. Ordered them to pull themselves together and get back in there. Or else.

“It was a bunch of trees falling, the animal has disappeared,” he hollered to them.

Cautiously, taking courage from the new silence in the house, a couple of his officers returned, expecting a scene of total carnage.

Yes, the front of the house was in carnage. But there was no sign of the towering beast.

There was no body. The mighty tail, which had apparently dragged and swished across the fir trees, pulling them down, had disappeared along with the rest of the beast.

what remained of the roof of the house, and with a never-to-be-forgotten rumble, gave up the ghost. Kincaid fled to the back door with the remainder of his men, watching over his shoulder as a small forest fell on the beast, no doubt crushing it under a gargantuan weight of board feet.

Then Kincaid stopped, whirled around, his eyes bugging out in disbelief once more.

The T Rex was no more. Not dead. Not lying stretched out across the remains of the front entryway.

No.

The great predator had vanished.

He called the men to come back. Ordered them to pull themselves together and get back in there. Or else.

“It was a bunch of trees falling, the animal has disappeared,” he hollered to them.

Cautiously, taking courage from the new silence in the house, a couple of his officers returned, expecting a scene of total carnage.

Yes, the front of the house was in carnage. But there was no sign of the towering beast.

There was no body. The mighty tail, which had apparently dragged and swished across the fir trees, pulling them down, had disappeared along with the rest of the beast.

 

what remained of the roof of the house, and with a never-to-be-forgotten rumble, gave up the ghost. Kincaid fled to the back door with the remainder of his men, watching over his shoulder as a small forest fell on the beast, no doubt crushing it under a gargantuan weight of board feet.

Then Kincaid stopped, whirled around, his eyes bugging out in disbelief once more.

The T Rex was no more. Not dead. Not lying stretched out across the remains of the front entryway.

No.

The great predator had vanished.

He called the men to come back. Ordered them to pull themselves together and get back in there. Or else.

“It was a bunch of trees falling, the animal has disappeared,” he hollered to them.

Cautiously, taking courage from the new silence in the house, a couple of his officers returned, expecting a scene of total carnage.

Yes, the front of the house was in carnage. But there was no sign of the towering beast.

There was no body. The mighty tail, which had apparently dragged and swished across the fir trees, pulling them down, had disappeared along with the rest of the beast.

 

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS TO VANAYSSA SOMERS’ BOOKS:

 

Twitter 

Facebook

LinkedIn

Amazon Author Page

 

 

 

 

 

SHE’S BAAAACK! KC SPRAYBERRY & THE LIE, RELEASING MARCH 4

The Lie by KC SprayberryFor those looking for a good psyche out in YA, look to author KC Sprayberry and her characters in The Lie, coming next month on Amazon and through Solstice Publishing. Gritty without gratuity, The Lie offers up heaps of poor judgement and plenty of guilt after a foolish prank goes badly wrong. For older teens.

In her own words; author K.C. Sprayberry:

To understand the lie, someone must answer the question: How well do you know your friends? That is the underlying theme of this young adult psychological thriller. Amy has always been a loyal friend to Jane. Despite her family’s dislike of Jane, Amy continues to support her friend, to take the blame for minor incidents, until a cold Friday night in November that changes the lives of an entire community.

 

The Lie releases March 4, 2016

http://bookgoodies.com/a/B01BX85XSG

 

Blurb:

 

For high school siblings, Amy and Bryce, the night began The Lie by KC Sprayberrywith a football game. Bryce was stuck at home with a cold, brought on by an uncaring coach. Amy was in the stands, playing with the band whose funding had been taken away and given to the football team.

Her best friend, Jane, brought the band together to play a prank on the team in protest.

The prank went wrong. Horribly, tragically wrong.

And the lie that started it all would not stop.

 

About the Author:

KC SprayberryBorn and raised in Southern California’s Los Angeles basin, K.C. Sprayberry spent years traveling the United States and Europe while in the Air Force before settling in northwest Georgia. A new empty nester with her husband of more than twenty years, she spends her days figuring out new ways to torment her characters and coming up with innovative tales from the South and beyond.

She’s a multi-genre author who comes up with ideas from the strangest sources. Some of her short stories have appeared in anthologies, others in magazines.

 

 

SEE THE TRAILER

https://youtu.be/p8liti0tEr0

 

MEET THE PROTAGONISTS:

A m y    P e a r s o n

Amy

Introduce yourself to our readers. Where do you fit into the story? What should we know about you?

 

Hi, I’m Amy. This is my story, of trying to get rid of a weird friend and also trying to get my family to believe I’m not a total fool. I’m a senior at Landry High School and totally bummed. After all my hard work, I may not be able to go to college next year—because the football team and cheerleaders will get our funding. And that made all of the band so mad that we did something totally off the way… and we… we… we kind of made something really bad happen. I can’t talk about that. It’s too hard to even think about that night and if I do talk about it, a lot of good people are going to get into trouble.

 

What are your feelings about this story?

 

Sometimes, I think this story is a great way of showing people that you can’t always trust your friends. But then I start thinking about all the bad that happened for the next year, all the incredibly scary things we learned about the people who were the real masterminds of what happened, and I just want the whole thing to disappear, for it to have never happened. Only, that would be a lie. And that’s what got us here in the first place. A lie. A really big, horrid lie.

 

How do you feel about being a character in this book?

 

This is my story. A mistake I made. I’m not happy that people will see me having panic attacks or trying to get rid of a friend who wasn’t a real friend at all, but that’s what happened. We can’t change that now. Would I rather everyone watch my music videos and tell me want a great singer I am? Sure, but that wouldn’t be the whole truth.

 

TreyThe only good thing about this story… well, one of two good things… is Trey. He and I, we had the chance to fall in love. I mean really in love. I’m sure of that now and it hurts to know how sad he is but I’ll always have those special moments. (smiles softly) Do you think they can get Brant Daugherty to play Trey in the movie? You know, that guy from Pretty Little Liars?

 

 

 

What do you see in your future? (No spoilers please!)

 

My future is kind of going to stay like it is. Can’t really say anything else

 

Is there another The Lie in the future? Will you be part of it?

 

I don’t think there will be a sequel to The Lie. If there is, I doubt I’ll be part of it. Can’t say much more now.

 

Say a movie producer comes knocking. What actor/actress would you want to play you and why?

 

Oh, Sienna Miller. She looks exactly like me. And I’ve seen all her movies. She’s totally cool.

 

 

B r y c e    P e a r s o n

Bryce

Introduce yourself to our readers. Where do you fit into the story? What should we know about you?

 

Hey, guys, I’m Bryce. A great gunner on the special teams for the Landry High School Wildcats. I’m also Amy’s two years younger brother. She’d want me to tell you that. But I’m more than a pesky brother. I’m the person she comes to whenever Amy gets caught up in a Jane disaster. Let me tell you, Jane is a total loser, a user, and someone that should just fall off the face of the earth.

What should you know about me? Other than the whole on the football thing? Well, I’m not a total jock. I have a 4.0 GPA, with a heavy emphasis on science and math. I want to be a volunteer firefighter with my dad at his station, when I’m old enough, and my future goal is to go to Jacksonville State University in Alabama, be a Gamecock. Oh, and get a date with Ziva from NCIS. That’s one hot chick!

 

What are your feelings about this story?

 

This story is important. People have to know about the Jane’s in this world. They’re users. They’ll take down anyone that gets caught in their web of deceit. And mostly, they will destroy anyone who stands in their way of getting what they want.

 

How do you feel about being a character in this book?

 

I have to be in this book. The author didn’t want me here except as a minor character at first, but I proved to her that I was necessary. Amy needed someone who had her back. My sis has this incredible talent—she plays five instruments and sings like an angel, but she doesn’t believe in herself. And that’s how come Jane was always using Amy.

 

What do you see in your future? (No spoilers please!)

 

My future? I’ll finish high school, help my dad reno houses, and go to Jacksonville State University in Alabama. Beyond that, I don’t really know. A lot of things are up in the air right now, but I won’t ever forget what Jane did to us.

 

Is there another The Lie in the future? Will you be part of it?

 

There will always be another The Lie in the future. Users are everywhere, and they never take responsibility for their actions. Will I be part of it? I hope not. I don’t ever want to live through that kind of stuff again.

 

Say a movie producer comes knocking. What actor/actress would you want to play you and why?

 

Movie? About our boring lives? (laughs) Yeah, I wish our lives had been normal and boring. I wish we could have booted Jane to the curb a long time ago. But that didn’t happen. So, a movie? Who plays me? Well… Theo James, the dude from Divergent and Insurgent. Yeah, he’s a lot like me. That will work. (Do you think there’s a chance Ziva from NCIS will be in the film too?)

 

J a n e    P r e s t o n

Jane

Introduce yourself to our readers. Where do you fit into the story? What should we know about you?

 

I am Jane Preston. Don’t believe those Pearson’s. They’ll say anything to make me look bad. I can’t believe they would dare to open their mouths, after all the trouble they caused me. It’s Amy’s fault all this happened. She was the one that planned the whole problem, right from the beginning. She’s such a wuss. Always crying. Always wanting Mommy to like her. She needs to get a life. (emotionless laugh) Like that will happen now.

What are your feelings about this story?

 

Well, if it was the truth, more about how much of a troublemaker Amy was, it would be good. But it’s not. The whole thing is all wrong. Amy was the one that planned stuff, but then she’d chicken out and I’d have to step in and fix her messes. That dummy couldn’t do anything without Mommy’s approval, and Mommy didn’t like me. And I could never convince Amy to stop being such a Mommy’s brat.

 

How do you feel about being a character in this book?

 

Boring! Totally boring. Nobody asked me how I felt about all these lies those pathetic losers told about me. They didn’t care that my dreams got all messed up. All everyone did was talk bad about me. How awful is that? Nobody cares about me.

 

What do you see in your future? (No spoilers please!)

 

Oh, my future is great. As soon as I get away from these losers, I’ll have a lot of fun. JSU as a college is a total loss. I’ll be going to a much better college in a few years. Everybody thinks I’m stuck in this place, but they’re wrong. I’ll get away, as soon as everyone believes what a little loser Amy is.

 

Is there another The Lie in the future? Will you be part of it?

 

Gawd! I hope so. And whoever writes it better get it right this time. That dummy that was talking to Bryce and Amy all the time only got their “oh poor me” story. Dummy didn’t bother to talk to me, to figure out that I was only making all the losers in the world pay. I mean—who cares what happened to all those people? They were a total loss all their lives.

 

Say a movie producer comes knocking. What actor/actress would you want to play you and why?

 

Please let there be a movie. I’ll get a lot of money from it. And I’ll be able to go to a really great college without everyone hearing about pathetic Amy and her loser brother, Bryce. Who should play me? Jena Malone. She rocks. She’s that actress from the Hunger Games and she will do me very well. But she has to come see me, talk to me about how to make the movie more about me and the problems those stupid Pearsons gave me.

 

Social Media Links:

 

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/KC-Sprayberry/331150236901202

 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/kcsowriter

 

Blog: http://outofcontrolcharacters.blogspot.com/

 

Website: www.kcsprayberry.com

 

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5011219.K_C_Sprayberry

 

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B005DI1YOU

 

Google +: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+KcSprayberry/posts

 

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/kcsprayberry/boards/

 

Manic Readers:

http://www.manicreaders.com/KCSprayberry/

 

AUTHORSdB:

http://authorsdb.com/authors-directory/5230-k-c-sprayberry

 

From Humor to Horror: The Mortician and Her Charge

A fellow scribbler recently asked if I’d thought about working in other genres, and I had to take a moment before answering. After a couple of slugs of coffee, here’s what I said: Anything’s possible, but do YOU consciously sit down and say “I’m going to write a romance today?”

It’s true that we have an idea about what we want on the page after a few false starts and a meme or two. But if you’re like me, you give your characters a wide berth and let them do the driving.

The tale of halting mortician Enid Krause and her charge, the badly decomposed Jurgen Heuer (read “Heuer” as in “lawyer”) for me was a platform from which to launch some stories about what it’s like to be a funeral director in the space of a few precious days. The minutae, the stuff we as directors take for granted like getting the flowers from visitation suite to church to grave without the family and mourners seeing us do it, became a subject of intense interest for some readers. The fact that the work was so physical along with the long hours often spent waiting for something to happen seemed to be a jump point for discussion as well.

That HEUER went from conversation piece about an atypical job to an award winner under the HORROR category in 2015’s PREDITORS & EDITORS reader poll did not surprise readers, but it did surprise me in the best possible way.

HEUER LOST AND FOUND is many things to me: it is a platform from which to rhapsodize about things near and dear, but it’s also a staging point for exploring complicated grief, guilt, addiction, false love, false starts, and, yes, embalming while under the influence of all of the above. Most exciting to me, was that I was able to present difficult and often horrific subjects under the umbrella of gonzo fiction; that is to say: by making the tough accessible through humor.

I’d like to thank my publisher Summer Solstice, a line division of Solstice Publishing, for believing in what I am trying to do. Solstice gives me the courage to press on through the hard slog that is editing and promoting. Most importantly, they give me what I need to keep creating new work. Thank you Melissa Miller, Kate M. Collins and K.C. Sprayberry for keeping me on task.

The PREDITORS & EDITORS Reader’s Poll was my first award and as such, my most precious, not just for the validation it gave me personally (shades of Sally Field at the Oscars back in 1985 dogged me, but only for a moment), but for the acknowledgement that the book and characters are MORE than they appear. What seemed incredibly funny to some mortified others and vice versa. Tissue boxes, I’m told, were reached for in the closing chapters, while others cheered for Heuer, a “strange and complicated” character, to succeed in spite of his sometimes odious behavior.

Have I tried other genres since Heuer? Most definitely, but only because the characters allowed me to do so. If HEUER LOST AND FOUND has taught me anything, it’s that everything is subjective at all times.

Thank you one and all for your tremendous support on the journey. I am incredibly grateful.

Adult, unapologetic and wholly cognizant,

I am

FUNKHAUSER SIGNATURE

Since this article was first published, the author has JPEG Scooter Award Winner - Copyreleased two more books in the Unapologetic Lives series. SCOOTER NATION follows up with the erstwhile and chemically-dependent funeral directors at Weibigand Brothers Funeral Home as they combat a mendacious sybarite hell-bent on remaking the business. SHELL GAME COVER w Readers FavoriteSHELL GAME, released in September 2017, goes outside Weibigand’s to examine a seemingly pastoral community with a lot to hide. When an ethereal black cat is kidnapped by a feline fetishist sex cult obsessed with film auteur Pilsen Gudderammerung, society must choose between moral or physical gentrification.

 

Biography

IMG_20160104_121131

Toronto born author A.B. Funkhauser is a funeral director, classic car nut and wildlife enthusiast living in Ontario, Canada. Like most funeral directors, she is governed by a strong sense of altruism fueled by the belief that life chooses us and not we it.

 

Her debut novel Heuer Lost and Found, released in April 2015, examines the day to day workings of a funeral home and the people who staff it. Winner of the Preditors & Editors Reader’s Poll for Best Horror 2015, and the New Apple EBook Award 2016 for Horror, Heuer Lost and Found is the first installment in Funkhauser’s Unapologetic Lives series. Her sophomore effort, Scooter Nation, released March 11, 2016, through Solstice Publishing. Winner of the New Apple Ebook Award 2016 for Humor, and Winner Best Humor Summer Indie Book Awards 2016, Scooter picks up where Heuer left off, this time with the lens on the funeral home as it falls into the hands of a woeful sybarite.

 

A devotee of the gonzo style pioneered by the late Hunter S. Thompson, Funkhauser attempts to shine a light on difficult subjects by aid of humorous storytelling. “In gonzo, characters operate without filters which means they say and do the kinds of things we cannot in an ordered society. Results are often comic but, hopefully, instructive.”

 

SHELL GAME, tapped as a psycho-social cat dramedy with death and laughs, is the third book in the series and takes aim at a pastoral community with a lot to hide. “With so much of the world currently up for debate, I thought it would be useful to question—again—the motives and machinations championed by the morally flexible, and then let the arbiter be a cat.”

 

Funkhauser is currently working on THE HEUER EFFECT, the prequel to HEUER LOST AND FOUND.

 

 

HEUER LOST AND FOUND

JPEG NEW COVER 2018

Unrepentant cooze hound lawyer Jürgen Heuer dies suddenly and unexpectedly in his litter-strewn home. Undiscovered, he rages against God, Nazis, deep fryers and analogous women who disappoint him.

 

At last found, he is delivered to Weibigand Brothers Funeral Home, a ramshackle establishment peopled with above average eccentrics, including boozy Enid, a former girlfriend with serious denial issues. With her help and the help of a wisecracking spirit guide, Heuer will try to move on to the next plane. But before he can do this, he must endure an inept embalming, feral whispers, and Enid’s flawed recollections of their murky past.

 

Winner Best Horror, Preditors & Editors 2015

Medalist Winner “Horror,” New Apple EBook Awards 2016

Geo Buy Link: http://myBook.to/heuerlostandfound

 

 

PRAISE

“Funny, quirky, and sooooo different.”

—Jo Michaels, Jo Michaels Blog

“Eccentric and Funny. You have never read anything like this book. It demands respect for the outrageous capacity of its author to describe in detail human behavior around death.”

—Charlene Jones, author THE STAIN

“The macabre black comedy Heuer Lost And Found, written by A.B. Funkhauser, is definitely a different sort of book!  You will enjoy this book with its mixture of horror and humour.”

—Diana Harrison, Author ALWAYS AND FOREVER

“This beautifully written, quirky, sad, but also often humorous story of Heuer and Enid gives us a glimpse into the fascinating, closed world of the funeral director.”

—Yvonne Hess, Charter Member, The Brooklin 7

“The book runs the gamut of emotions. One minute you want to cry for the characters, the next you are uncontrollably laughing out loud, and your husband is looking at you like you lost your mind, at least mine did.”

http://teresanoel.blogspot.ca/2015/05/heuer-lost-and-found-unapologetic-lives

“The writing style is racy with no words wasted.”

—David K. Bryant, Author TREAD CAREFULLY ON THE SEA

“For a story centered around death, it is full of life.”

—Rocky Rochford, Author RISE OF ELOHIM CHRONICLES

“Like Breaking Bad’s Walter White, Heuer is not a likeable man, but I somehow found myself rooting for him. A strange, complicated character.”

—Kasey Balko, Pickering, Ontario

Raw, clever, organic, intriguing and morbid at the same time … breathing life and laughter into a world of death.

—Josie Montano, Author VEILED SECRETS

LINKS

Amazon Author Page:  https://www.amazon.com/A.B.-Funkhauser/e/B00WMRK4Q4

Website:  https://abfunkhauser.com/

Twitter:  https://twitter.com/iamfunkhauser

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

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

Publisher:  http://www.solsticepublishing.com

Email: a.b.funkhauser@rogers.com
Audio Interview:

Interview Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2yhaXfh-ns

Interview Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoPthI1Hvmo

 

 

TIME TRAVELING TRIPLETS, TELEKINESIS AND K.C. SPRAYBERRY

Multi genre author K.C. Sprayberry stops by the blog to discuss her latest YA, PARADISE LOST BOOK 2 THE ULTIMATE PARADOX, with a little help from her characters who compare her to ‘mom’. Welcome K.C. Talk to us about Paradox 2.

 

Book CoverParadox Lost Book 2: The Ultimate Paradox is about triplets (DJ, Matt, and Elisa) that are also time travelers. DJ and Matt are typical brothers, shutting out their sister, but not for the typical reasons. They sense that she’s not really supposed to be with them, so they’re giving her the cold shoulder.

While in most ways, these teens seem very typical, they also possess incredible talents. Not only are all three strong telekinetics, they also have other talents, such as spellcasting, healing, thought reading, telepathy, and a whole host of other skills. They’re about to finish their education when the story began in book 1, but that derailed quickly when it became clear that a legacy foretold two centuries ago is now about to come true.

DJ, the eldest of the trio, has to run for his life after being convicted of his dad’s murder. Only Dad is still alive, but seriously injured, in another time. Matt is a ghost, having been killed in a Rogue attack in Mexico, but he’s not the kind of guy that sits back and does nothing just because all the other ghosts tell him that’s what they do now. Elisa is a captive at Beaufort School for Visionary Studies and she’s not taking that sitting down. Her captors soon learn that she’s not someone they should ever mess with.

DJ, Matt, and Elisa try to go on their own path, thinking that is the best way to solve the problem. That only delays them in their quest, until all of them are reminded that together they’re a force to be reckoned with and then they have to get past a few stumbling blocks before they’re ready to combine forces.

 

Paradox Lost: The Ultimate Paradox releases January 15, 2016!

 

Welcome to book two of a series much like Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson books, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, and Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series.

 

If you had the chance to read Paradox Lost: Their Path, you came to know DJ, Matt, and Elisa, and discover the path destiny has laid out for them. In Paradox Lost: The Ultimate Paradox, these triplets each have to make their way through a series of obstacles and prepare for a showdown with Rogues.

This new story brings out new information about the Sullivans and the destiny none of them was aware would be theirs to claim, along with several big surprises.

 

Book Blurb

 

The past changed the future …

                                    . . . the future must salvage the past.

 

Falsely accused of murdering his father, DJ faces a terrible penalty. That’s the least of his worries—Uncle Toby and his army of Rogues are bent on tearing history apart, and DJ and his allies have to stop them any way they can. But only a True Neutral can save their world, and The First, his family’s ancestor, is long dead. His brother Matt was killed by Toby’s actions, and his sister Elisa is fighting her own demons.

The past created by their uncle needs to be uncreated into what it was meant to be. And these three teenagers, triplets and direct descendants of The First, must learn to ally with each other to correct the errors made real in the past.

And the Gateways reveal themselves as something no one ever suspected….

 

Pre-order now!

http://bookgoodies.com/a/B01AATE9UW

Author Bio

author photoBorn and raised in Southern California’s Los Angeles basin, K.C. Sprayberry spent years traveling the United States and Europe while in the Air Force before settling in northwest Georgia. A new empty nester with her husband of more than twenty years, she spends her days figuring out new ways to torment her characters and coming up with innovative tales from the South and beyond.

She’s a multi-genre author who comes up with ideas from the strangest sources. Some of her short stories have appeared in anthologies, others in magazines.

 

 

Website/Blog/Twitter links

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/KC-Sprayberry/331150236901202

 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/kcsowriter

 

Blog: http://outofcontrolcharacters.blogspot.com/

 

Website: www.kcsprayberry.com

 

CHARACTER INTERVIEWS

 

DJ Sullivan

  1. Introduce yourself to our readers. Where do you fit into the story? What should we know about you?

 

Lucas Till as DJ Sullivan croppedI’m Dennis James Sullivan XI. Call me DJ. Everybody does. I’m the oldest of triplets. We’re pretty astral with our powers. Not just telekinesis and telepathy but other stuff. My big thing is the ability to use brute force when I’m out helping my dad. That’s why Matt died instead of me. Kind of sucks. I could have… well, maybe I couldn’t have stopped those boulders. We’ll never really know that.

Anyway, lots of strange things have been happening to me. My uncle, Toby, wanted to have my powers bound but my posse helped me out of that tight spot and we’re now in hiding. That doesn’t sit well with me. Like Matt, I’m a take action kind of guy, but unlike him, I also need to think about stuff before I do it. And all of these powers are scaring me a lot. Like who doesn’t know about the True Neutral. I sure don’t want all that responsibility.

 

  1. What do you think about the author? Tell us everything. We want to know.

 

Nice lady. A lot like Mom. Matt will probably say that too. We think alike too much. This person understands us, lets us be ourselves. Love that. She’s even giving me time to think about Lexie, my girl. Well, she might be my girl, if everything works out all right.

 

  1. What are your feelings about this story?

 

It’s a good story. Real. What we face with Rogues right now. Rogues are Travelers who don’t like the rules and aren’t willing to follow them. They do what they want. The whole personal gain thing doesn’t seem to have caught up with them yet, but it will. See, we can’t do anything that will help us out of a tight spot, unless it’s to help humanity. That’s why I haven’t been able to go back to that place in Mexico, before Rogues attacked, and bring back my aunts and uncles… and Matt.

 

  1. How do you feel about being a character in this book?

 

Hey, don’t get me wrong. Sure I’m down about losing most of my family, but being in this book, letting the world learn about Travelers? Fantastic! We’ve been doing this for so long and it’s time ordinary humans learned about us. It’s totally cool going back in time, or even seeing the future—and I want to do that so bad one day. First, though, we need to clean up this Rogue problem.

 

  1. What do you see in your future? (No spoilers please!)

 

More of the same until we have all Rogues taken care of. But that’s cool. No problem there. See, Matt and I would have been in Repairs if this whole Rogue War thing hadn’t gotten in our way. Repairs is where Travelers go fix problems that have come up. We would have even got to work with TES (Traveler Enforcement Squad) to stop other Travelers from changing history. Now I’m not sure what I’ll do once we finish here. Sure would like to have a lot more adventures.

 

  1. Is there another Paradox Lost book in the future? Will you be part of it?

 

A few more. That’s what Matt and Elisa keep telling me. Sure hope they don’t include that whole True Neutral thing. I’d like to have a normal life for a while, as normal as Travelers can have.

 

  1. Say a movie producer comes knocking. What actor/actress would you want to play you and why?

 

Someone wants to make a movie about Travelers? Cool. Totally cool. Who would I want to play me? Let me think. There’s this guy. Just did a movie, X-Men: Days of Future Past a few years back. Lucas Till is his name. Yeah, he’d play me really well.

 

Matt Sullivan

  1. Introduce yourself to our readers. Where do you fit into the story? What should we know about you?

 

Stefano Masciolini as Matt SullivanYo, Matt here. Yeah. That’s right. The guy that died in the first book is coming on strong in this one. I get to tell my own story, and let me tell you, I’m not gonna hang around wherever the cosmos has stuck me and cry about being dead.

I’m the middle triplet, the one that is always on the go, always thinking up new pranks. Now, though, I’m the guy with a mission—to help my brother and sister kick some Rogue ass. First, though, I have to figure out how to get away from this prison without walls where I’m stuck, and that’s going to take quite a bit of work. Turns out that whole personal gain thing I’ve lived with all my life and didn’t think much about? Well, around here, it’s huge. You want to use someone for something, you run into this invisible wall that knocks you backward. Can’t get through it. But I’ll figure out how to get out. You can bet on that.

So, you want to know more about me, do you? I’m pretty much a what you see is what you get sort of guy. No sitting around discussing things in committee for me. Action—that’s where I’m at. Let someone else handle all the discussions. I’ll be out there teaching those Rogues a lesson they won’t ever forget.

 

  1. What do you think about the author? Tell us everything. We want to know.

Awesome lady. Kind of reminds me a lot of my mom. You know the type. Family first, kick the backside of anyone that hurts them. Herself last. She’s pretty cool the way she lets me take the lead instead of shoving me into a corner while Elisa and DJ get to have all the fun.

 

  1. What are your feelings about this story?

 

This story is intense. All our lives DJ and me (oh yeah, and Elisa) have had to live with this legend about the True Neutral. We’ve all heard over and over again how The First made this prophecy that someday, someone would get all the powers Travelers have. Crazy if you ask me. Some of those powers will be the direct opposite of others, but that’s the way it is. Anyway, like who wouldn’t want to be this person in total control? But not me. No way. I’m not a give orders kind of person, and besides, nobody would listen to me. But the story, especially the parts when I get to see my girl, Dixie, great.

 

  1. How do you feel about being a character in this book?

 

Love it. Wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. People need to know what Travelers really can do, and why we can’t sometimes. They also need to know all about personal gain. That’s pretty important. It’s kind of like this—we can’t go save you from messing up your whole life because you’re about to be in more trouble than you thought possible. That was your choice. You have to pay that price.

 

It’s kind of like what happened to me when I begged to go with my dad in book 1. That wasn’t what I wanted, and I sure don’t like the consequences, but I figure I’ll somehow get used to this prison without bars. Maybe.

 

  1. What do you see in your future? (No spoilers please!)

 

Well… you mentioned no spoilers. Not much I can tell you except that there will be another book soon. Other than that, I’ll probably go back to that prison without walls, until it’s time to break free again.

 

  1. Is there another Paradox Lost book in the future? Will you be part of it?

 

Oh yeah. At least two. More if I can help it. I love the adventures, even as a ghost. Definitely going to make sure there are more books.

 

  1. Say a movie producer comes knocking. What actor/actress would you want to play you and why?

 

An actor playing me? Really? Definitely Stefano Masciolini. Dude might be Italian, but he looks exactly like me. And he’s into all the action and kicking major butt thing.

 

 

Elisa Sullivan

  1. Introduce yourself to our readers. Where do you fit into the story? What should we know about you?

 

Sophie Turner as Elisa SullivanMy name is Elisa Sullivan. I’m a Traveler. That means that I get to travel through time on these really great Gateways. And I can talk to them. Not many Travelers think Gateways are sentient, but they are.

I’m a triplet, the youngest one. Our family is part of this kind of scary but totally awesome legacy, where one of us is supposed to become the True Neutral. Only no one really knows when that will happen. And everything about Travelers, especially Sullivans, is connected to the 1906 Great Earthquake and Fires in San Francisco. There’s a huge world out there, but we can’t seem to get past the ‘original event’ and figure out that a lot of people need our help. Sure hope that happens soon, ‘cause I think I can find places where we can do a lot of good.

 

  1. What do you think about the author? Tell us everything. We want to know.

 

She’s great. I like how she makes me so strong, but also lets me be afraid. That’s real, how most girls will react in the situations I face. And she doesn’t make me into some wimpy crybaby. But that whole screaming thing? Yeah, I do need to learn how to tone that down. A lot. Got to hear myself as a little girl doing it. Wow! That really hurts the ears.

 

  1. What are your feelings about this story?

 

It’s a fabulous story, full of adventure and intrigue. My awful uncle doesn’t realize that I’m the one person he never can control. He tries, though. Has since I was a little girl, but I don’t like Toby one bit and I’ll never do anything he wants.

 

  1. How do you feel about being a character in this book?

 

I love it. Well, there are times when I’m not so sure, but mostly it’s a lot of fun. Can you imagine being able to hide from everyone on plain sight or sneaking around as a spirit and then going back to your body? And traveling through time, seeing all those great places. Riding in Gateways is a blast.

 

  1. What do you see in your future? (No spoilers please!)

 

Oh, a lot more adventure. My brothers—all Travelers—will learn that I won’t sit in the shadows any longer. I am as good as Matt and DJ, and I won’t let anyone stop me from being part of their adventures!

 

First, though, we have to get through the third book, and kick some major Rogue butt. I’m really thinking I need to deal with Miranda. She really pisses me off with that “wittle baby” thing she’s always doing. I’ll show her who is a baby. (pauses for a minute.) Or maybe not. Is that personal gain? Can I get in trouble for that?

 

  1. Is there another Paradox Lost book in the future? Will you be part of it?

 

Current plans are for at least one more Paradox Lost book, possibly two. Who knows what the future holds? This trio of young adults seem to like the action.

 

  1. Say a movie producer comes knocking. What actor/actress would you want to play you and why?

 

For Elisa? Sophie Turner from Game of Thrones. She’s an actress that has to overcome numerous obstacles. I can see her reveling in the role of Elisa, the child no one accepted, felt as if she shouldn’t have been there.

 

Book Trailer: https://youtu.be/2dzY5Z0qOrY

 

Social Media Links:

 

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/KC-Sprayberry/331150236901202

 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/kcsowriter

 

Blog: http://outofcontrolcharacters.blogspot.com/

 

Website: www.kcsprayberry.com

 

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5011219.K_C_Sprayberry

 

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B005DI1YOU

 

Google +: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+KcSprayberry/posts

 

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/kcsprayberry/boards/

 

Manic Readers:

http://www.manicreaders.com/KCSprayberry/

 

AUTHORSdB:

http://authorsdb.com/authors-directory/5230-k-c-sprayberry

 

 

GHOSTLY BITS O’ WHIMSY WITH K.C. SPRAYBERRY

Night is falling faster and the leaves are turning. What better time to search behind what’s right in front of us? Author K.C. Sprayberry has no difficulty whatsoever doing this. For her, supernatural is second nature. Welcome K.C. and her latest…

COVERGhosts are popping up all over Landry. The town is being overrun and no one knows why—least of all Hailey Hatmaker and her Ghosties crew. Only none of these ghosts are talking. They’re terrified of something that only Hailey and her team can figure out. Something which could prove disastrous for them all.

Excerpt:

It felt so good to discover ghostly action in Landry once again. The Ghosties had just finished a dry spell like no other we had ever seen. We’d just gone through five months with nary a ghost to bother us. No goo oozing out of heating vents, or papers flying out of hands to plaster against the ceiling.

The call this morning had me, the fantastic, fabulous Hailey Hatmaker, gathering my group together lickety-split. We met up on the run, and raced all the way over to Bank of Landry. Once there, we had almost danced with glee at what greeted us. That was an hour ago. This particular ghost was proving far more difficult to exterminate than we had anticipated.

We could have got harsh long ago. I grinned. I sure don’t want this to end any time soon. I’m having fun again.

“You won’t stick around. No ghost has ever ignored me.”

I planted my pink and white beret more firmly on my head and darted forward. When I put on white jeans and a peppermint pink t-shirt this morning, I never expected an emergency call.

Nope, I wasn’t a cop, a firefighter, or even a paramedic. I had my thirteenth birthday just before Halloween and started dealing with ghosts nine years ago. Me and my fellow Ghosties had helped Landry, Georgia deal with weird hauntings, and this one proved we had a lot more ghostbusting to do in the future.

“Banks don’t give out free samples,” I yelled. “Tell me who you are, and what you want.”

That should have worked, except for one little thing. The wispy man behind the counter wearing a baggy black coat, vest, and pants with a white shirt ignored me. With a frantic expression and a bobble of his checkered bow tie as he swallowed, he tossed more money in the air. It was the worst thing to do when the Ghosties carried weapons that brought instant obedience from the other ghosts we had encountered.

I signaled the other Ghosties over. They gathered in a circle, two on each side of me.

“Did you get the dirt?” I asked.

“The manager said he worked here in 1912,” Annie Knott said. “He went bonkers after the Titanic sank.”

She tucked one side of her chin length, light red hair behind an ear after delivering the current info in a clipped voice. Her green eyes darted from side to side when the ghost cackled.

“Did he do this when it happened?” Freddie Conders asked.

“Of course,” she replied. “I’m pretty sure that he won’t quit because we asked nice. Lemon juice and salt?”

“No other way to handle it.” I pulled out a spritzer from a fanny pack. “Sly, Freddie, take the left. Annie, you’re in the middle. Tink and I will handle the right. Don’t miss.”

Sylvia ‘Sly’ Cherboom broke into giggles while Tinker ‘Tink’ Kacklin groaned. None of the others ever lost a chance to remind him about the day he doused one of our sworn enemies. He still claimed that it was an accident.

Like the rest of us wouldn’t have loved to cover Suzie in lemon juice and salt. Tink really needs to explain that better than he has.

“Places,” I said.

Tink held up a salt sprayer, a baby bottle with the tip of the nipple sliced off. I stood beside him with a spritzer filled to the brim with lemon juice. Annie faced our target. She had a weapon in each hand since she was such a great shot. Sly and Freddie hauled out their containers and skidded to their position.

“One last chance,” I said to the spook. “Leave. Don’t come back.”

The ghost tossed a bundle of hundreds into the air. The Ghosties fired. Our target sizzled and howled before vanishing.

https://youtu.be/qphwGt1suyc

About the Author:

author photoBorn and raised in Southern California’s Los Angeles basin, K.C. Sprayberry spent years traveling the United States and Europe while in the Air Force before settling in Northwest Georgia. A new empty nester with her husband of more than twenty years, she spends her days figuring out new ways to torment her characters and coming up with innovative tales from the South and beyond.

She’s a multi-genre author who comes up with ideas from the strangest sources. Some of her short stories have appeared in anthologies, others in magazines. Three of her books (Softly Say Goodbye, Who Am I?, and Mama’s Advice) are Amazon bestsellers. Her other books are: Take Chances, Where U @, The Wrong One, Pony Dreams, Evil Eyes, Inits, Canoples Investigations Tackles Space Pirates, The Call Chronicles 1: The Griswold Gang, The Curse of Grungy Gulley, Paradox Lost: Their Path, Canoples Investigations Versus Spacers Rule and Starlight. Additionally, she has shorts available on Amazon: Grace, Secret From the Flames, Family Curse … Times Two, Right Wrong Nothing In Between, and The Ghost Catcher.

Social Media Links:

Facebook

Twitter

Blog

Website

Goodreads

Amazon Author Page

Google +

Pinterest

Authorgraph

TEN AUTHORS, TEN DAYS: DAY TEN: MEL MASSEY

Welcome to Day Ten. Rounding out the line up is Solstice Shadows author Mel Massey, whose penchant for things otherworldly is proved once again. Her latest, SERVANT OF THE BLOOD, is exceptional. If the play is the thing, then the creature is the écoulment.

Bravo, Mel!

Servant of the BloodThe Servant of the Blood, Allatu, will always come when called and has for generations. She will fulfill wishes – for a price. Set in Tunisia, an ancient creature is called to do her master’s bidding but nothing comes without a price.

Release date:

September 15, 2015

Buy link:

http://www.amazon.com/Servant-Blood-Mel-Massey-ebook/dp/B014JMYW5S/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

ExcerptPrologue

Two covered figures, one bent with age and the other a child, quietly made their way from the main house into the night. The older of the two pulled the smaller one along in the dark by the hand as they walked further and further into the shadows.

This was the night of the new moon. It was the perfect chance to see the deed done. If what her son, Samir, told her was true, this would be the last chance she would have. She could not let her son and his family fall to ruin. She would not allow it. They thought her an old and feeble woman. True, the years have taken their toll on her body – but not her mind. Her mind was as keen as it ever was.

She remembered many things. Many lost and forgotten things handed down to her by her own grandmother. For many years, she had forgotten them all. Her marriage, her duties as a wife, and then motherhood whisked those tales away as if a hawk swooped down and carried them off. Only as she lay in her birthing bed, laboring to bring her sons into the world, did pieces of the tales return. They gave her strength. She was a wife, mother, and now a grandmother – but once she was Luja who knew the family’s secrets.

Now, after so many years had passed, she turned once again to those memories of her grandmother. The new moon was when one did this sort of thing, she remembered. Her granddaughter, Hala, was her ever-present shadow and she meant to share this thing with her. She pulled the sleepy child along in the dark, headed for the farthest corner of the gardens.

“I’m tired, Grandmother.” Hala whispered.

“Hush, child. We have things to do, you and I.” She looked once more over her shoulder and pushed on, past the unkempt and dying gardens to the farthest corner beside the stone wall. “I think this will do.”

She handed Hala a small bundle wrapped in cloth before kneeling on the ground. She felt around until she found a stick big enough to suit her needs.  With more force than she knew she still possessed, the old woman began to dig a hole beneath the olive tree. Her arthritic hands ached, but her spirit soared. She would see this thing done. It had to be done. No one else knew what she did. She would save her family.

Hala sat heavily on the ground, her head resting in her hands as she watched her grandmother dig. That was good. Let her see each step. Let her understand there are ways beyond those of the modern world to get what one needs. Tonight, she was herself again. She imagined herself the young and beautiful Luja who had a wild spirit and a quick temper.  In the morning, she would be Grandmother again… but not yet.

Satisfied with the size of the hole, Luja reached for the bundle in Hala’s arms. She snatched it from her and anxiously unwrapped the contents.  The girl’s curiosity roused her from her fatigue. She leaned forward to see the objects of the bundle laid out in the dirt. A precious bowl of honey and two figs sat beside another, longer item.

Luja carefully began unwrapping linen from around it. It was sacred to her family, her grandmother told her. It was only to be used in the direst of circumstances. How to use it was only taught to the daughters of the family, for men were not permitted to touch such things.

“What is that, Grandmother?” Hala whispered.

“Our salvation, sweet girl.” From the folds of aged linen, a statue emerged. It was carefully made. The age, Luja did not know. She knew it was delicate and priceless. It was made from clay but held together by a thin layer of gold. It was the image of a woman, naked but for carvings on the body. She did not know what they meant but she showed Hala the statue reverently. It was as shiny as the day Luja’s own grandmother showed it to her. She remembered her voice shook as she told Luja of the power in the statue and how it worked.  Luja asked her grandmother if she would ever use it. “I would not dare,” she told her. Well, Luja dared.

“Who is it? Why is she naked?”

“She is the one who will help our family.” Luja told her.

“How? Papa says we have no money and soon we’ll be living on the streets.  Are we going to sell this, Grandmother? Sell it to pay the money Papa owes?” Hala’s words drove a knife into her heart. No child should know of the woes of her parents. Samir was foolish and selfish to say such things where the children could hear. But his foolish and selfish ways were the reason they were in such dire straights. He gambled what they had and risked everything on dreams that never came true.

“No, my child. We will not sell her. She is priceless and too powerful to sell, but she can help us in other ways. Give me your hand,” Luja carefully placed the golden statue in the hole and reached for Hala. “It will only hurt for a moment.” Before the child could understand, Luja pulled a knife from the folds of her dress and made a small cut in the palm of her hand.

“Ouch, Grandmother!” Hala tried to pull her hand back but Luja kept it firmly grasped over the gold statue.

“She only requires a little blood, child.  When you come of age, you will bleed every month. Blood is nothing to women. Men like to think they know of blood and pain but we are the ones who truly know.  Now, you know the power of your blood. It is precious because you are a virgin, unspoiled by men. Mine would not do for this. There,” she released her grip on the girl’s hand and watched as the crimson droplets painted the gold surface. “That is enough.”

“Who is she?” Hala asked, holding her injured hand close to her chest.

“She is the servant of the blood. She is the giver of desires and the force of the Mother. I do not know her name. She is what she has always been to our family – our salvation and our curse.”

“What do we do now?”

“We bury her, Hala. Then leave the offerings. If they are pleasing, if we are pleasing, she will hear them and come to answer our prayers.”

“Is it right what we are doing, Grandmother? I’m not sure Papa will approve,” Hala said as she stood.

“Certainly, he wouldn’t. If he did, I should question my actions.”

“I don’t understand–”

“Never you mind, my dear. Come, help me cover her and set these offerings to right.”

“How will we know? How will we know if she will help us or not, Grandmother?” Hala asked as she scooped dirt back into the hole.

“I am not certain. We women must do what we can to save those we love. Here, hand me that bowl.” Luja placed the bowl of honey directly above the buried statue. “There, we have done what we can. It is out of our hands now.”

Luja and Hala covered their heads once again and silently made their way back through the garden toward the house. The girl still held her injured hand close to her chest and her grandmother pulled her along in the dark. It had been years since Luja felt so alive. She committed a great sin tonight. This sin was one she would not apologize for. She was a woman and women must do what they can in the shadows to see their families prosper in the light of day.

Social Media Links:

www.melmassey.com

@melmmassey

Amazon author pagehttp://www.amazon.com/Mel-Massey/e/B00ID9Z9D8/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_1

TEN AUTHORS, TEN DAYS: DAY EIGHT: KAREN KING

Can love survive death?

sapphire blue cover“No one has ever walked out of Red. Once the Soul Catchers get you they don’t let you go.” Denny’s words scare me but I have no choice. If Will is in Red that’s where I have to go.

I’ve never really thought what it was like when you died. I’m only 16, too young to worry about that. At least I thought I was. I’ve heard about Heaven and Hell, of course, but it doesn’t look like I’m in either of them. All I know is that Will is here too and I need to find him. I can’t face spending eternity without him.

Friend and fellow author Karen King talks soul trekking in her new YA Sapphire Blue. Even better, as at press time, Karen had great news to share: She has racked up an award for cover design. Take a look:

golden star awards 2nd place - Paranormal trophy 300

Congrats!

Q & A

  1. Sapphire Blue reads like a quest journey; a YA novel that takes the protagonist through Hell in search of her Will, like Dante searching for Beatrice in the Inferno. What inspired you to follow this path in YA?

I’ve always believed that we live on after we die, that our souls go back to the place we came from, join our friends and family and carry on with our journey. I was talking about this to someone one day and they said that they hoped they didn’t forget life on Earth, when they died that they still had their memories. That started me thinking about what it would be like. If you loved someone would your love still survive in the afterlife? Does everyone go to the same place? It was from this that the idea of Sapphire Blue was born.

  1. In our fast-paced, social media driven culture here in North America, how do you account for the exploding popularity of YA literature?

People still like to lose themselves in a good book, kids, teens and adults alike, and there’s some amazing YA stories published at the moment. YA deals with things that teens (and adults) worry about, living, loving, dying, fitting in, the world ending. It’s imaginative introducing new worlds, magic, strong characters and above all it usually encompasses Hope. And that’s the thing I think people want to hold onto most in these uncertain times. Hope that you’ll survive, win through, that things will get better.

  1. What and who did you read as a teen and young adult? Which one(s) stayed with you?

Agatha Christie and The Saint books by Lesley Charteris. I loved trying to solve the mysteries in the Agatha Christie books and the nonchalant way The Saint dealt with the situations he was in.

  1. Let’s backtrack for our readers: Give us your elevator pitch for Sapphire Blue.

Sapphire Blue is a YA with a difference in that it’s set in the afterlife. It’s a story of love, bravery, drama, mystery, horror but above all Hope.

5. Your cover is in the running for an award. Tell us about it.

Yes I’m chuffed to say that the cover for Sapphire Blue –and the cover of my children’s novel, Firstborn – is in the finals of the Golden Star cover Art Contest run by Highlighted Authors http://highlightedauthor.com/golden-star-cover-art-contest/paranormal-cover-category/

I’ve got my fingers crossed for them both but there are some great covers in the finals so I’m just happy they’ve got this far.

6. What’s next?

Accent Book has just signed me up for three contemporary novels so I’m working on the second one of those – the first one is finished. After that, I’ve been asked by a couple of readers to write a follow up to Sapphire Blue so maybe I will.

ExcerptOur first drive together. Later, I’ll take photos of wherever it is we’re going, save a leaflet, a ticket, or receipt. Today deserves a whole page in our scrapbook.

Will’s a good driver. His eyes constantly dart to the mirrors to check what’s behind him, around him, in front of him, and he keeps his speed steady. I feel safe with him.

I look out of the passenger window, trying to guess where we’re going. As soon as we join the dual carriageway I know. Mawlish Cove. Where we went for our very first proper date. It’s our special place, the one we go to when we want to celebrate something, but usually we have to cycle there. I think of all the places we can go now that Will can drive, to the coast a few miles away, a sightseeing tour of the local villages, maybe even drive to Wales to see my cousin, Gemma. I’ll be seventeen in a few months and maybe I can pass my test too, then we can go away for weekend, share the driving. I glance at Will and smile. I’m so proud of him.

“I love you,” I say.

“Love you too,” he replies. Then he starts singing.

“Sapphire Blue,

I do love you,

Forever me,

Forever you!” I join in the chorus, bubbles of happiness fizzing through me.

Will wrote the song for me last Christmas, calling it Sapphire ‘Blue’ after the color of my eyes—he said. He knew his folks were buying him the guitar he’d been begging for all year, so had secretly written the song to surprise me. It was the first thing he played. I remember how he picked up the guitar, slowly strumming the strings, then he’d walked over to me, sat down beside me and gazing into my eyes he’d started singing. It was only a short song, one verse, nothing special, I guess, but it summed us up. Me and Will, together forever. A warm surge of love spreads through me. I reach out and touch his hand. He turns to me and our eyes meet.

Just for a couple of seconds. An eye blink. Hardly any time at all.

But long enough for us to not notice the container fall off the back of the lorry in front. When we do notice, it’s in the middle of the road, blocking our path. A shard of ice slithers down my spine.

“Stop! Will, stop! We’re going to crash!”

Even as I shriek the words I know that there isn’t enough time to stop. I’m frozen to my seat, my eyes fixed in terror on the huge metal box just meters away.

“Hold tight!” Will jerks the steering wheel to the left in an attempt to avoid it, but he loses control of the car, and we’re skidding off the road. OMG, now we’re heading for a huge tree. It’s looming in front of us, solid and immovable. Its long, leafy branches swaying in the wind like scaly, green arms reaching out to grab us.

“Shit!” Will’s almost standing on the brakes in an effort to stop the car. My body shoots forward, then is pulled back by the seatbelt. My head slams against the back of the seat. The tires screech as the car starts to slow down but not quick enough for us to avoid the tree. I shut my eyes, not wanting to see the inevitable, horrific moment of impact. I can hear Will shouting, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I love you!” I want to tell him that I love him too, but I can’t speak, can’t move, my body’s turned into a block of granite.

I’m dimly aware that someone is screaming as if their soul is being ripped from their body. It is a few seconds before I realize that the screams are mine.

We’re going to die.

Craaaaaash!

An explosion shatters in my head.

biographyKaren King has had over one hundred children’s books published. She’s written for many children’s magazines too including Sindy, Barbie, Winnie the Pooh and Thomas the Tank Engine. She writes for all ages and in all genres; story books, picture books, plays, joke books and non-fiction.  Sapphire Blue is her second YA novel. She also writes romance novels under the name of Kay Harborne.

Buy Links

Amazon UK  http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-Blue-Karen-King-ebook/dp/B00QKYAL7W/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1417793348&sr=8-1&keywords=sapphire+Blue+by+karen+king#_

Amazon.com http://www.amazon.com/Sapphire-Blue-Karen-King-ebook/dp/B00QKYAL7W/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1417779552&sr=1-1&keywords=sapphire+Blue+karen+king

Solstice Publishing   http://solsticepublishing.com/sapphire-blue/

Author Links

Website: www.karenking.net

Author Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/?ref=tn_tnmn&__adt=7&__att=iframe#!/KarenKingAuthor

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/74448.Karen_King

Twitter: @karen_king

Amazon Author page: http://www.amazon.com/Karen-King/e/B0034P6W7I/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1

Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/kryski/

Wow, Karen. You are busy. Keep us appraised and best of luck. xo

TOMORROW:

Reily Garrett

Carnal Innocence Banner

TEN AUTHORS, TEN DAYS: DAY SEVEN: SIMONE SALMON

Author Simone Salmon’s unbridled enthusiasm for EVERYTHING leaps off the page. Whether in her debut novel CAMILLE AND THE BEARS OF BEISA-DRAFNEL or in a simple print interview, she goes, grows and thinks OUT LOUD. See for yourself!

Welcome, Simone!

 

CAMILLE AND THE BEARS OF BEISA-DRAFNEL

 

Camille Final CoverSometimes running away is the best decision for self-preservation. 

Sometimes unlearning the truth reveals centuries of lies. 

Sometimes the shadows in the periphery simplify complex realities. 

Sometimes love is an expansive concept riddled with explosive diversions. 

Years of deception and suppressed trauma do not prevent secrets from unraveling when parallel worlds clash, intertwining families and exposing hidden agendas. An unwanted romance mirrored in an alternate universe has devastating consequences for an unsuspecting young woman and a mysterious stranger.

 

Q & A

  1. On their own, the teasers for Drafnel promise so much: lovers divided, literal magic, parallel worlds and lives spinning out of control. How would you classify your work?

Teaser 6 mind 1024x512Hi AB, first thank you so much for this interview and for having me on your blog. In response to your first question, my original intent was to write a ghost story so perhaps my initial thoughts were for a thriller. However, it became apparent that the more the story unfolded genre-specificity became less important. I just went where the characters took me and they wanted to cross the Teaser 3 clock 1024x512boundaries of many genres. The result is an entanglement of science fiction, paranormal thriller, time travel, folkloric fantasy and romance all blended into one cohesive genre-bending whole.

  1. Diversity in literature is close to your heart and your work. Can you offer us some insights into how best to achieve the goal and how you did so in Drafnel?

Old black magic book with lights on pages

This is a difficult question for me because in writing this story diversity was never part of my conscious thought process. I’m not sure if this is a result of my previous naïveté regarding the controversy over the lack of diverse characters represented in SFF or that in the quest to express my creativity the characters just reflected people who are most familiar to me. I cannot offer any advice other than to do some research if the subject matter is unfamiliar, which in a sense feels hypocritical because I did no research for anything unfamiliar in Drafnel. Truly, I feel that once you’re connected to creative energy all of the information needed is provided. Creativity is subjective and I am hesitant to provide instruction on how to include diversity in anyone’s story. In a sense, my feeling is that advice would somehow taint the creative process and inject an impartial influence thereby limiting individual inspiration. Diversity in any art form should always be an individual’s unique and very personal interpretation independent of society’s restrictive conformity to whatever is considered the norm or acceptable.

  1. The world we live in constantly heaves and changes. What inspirations did you take from our world and bring to Drafnel?

This concept of time, how it is viewed and used is a very integral part of the novel. The Dahli watch meltingstory operates in many locations and across parallel universes all within the same timeframe. My hope is to convey that time is relative and ultimately a man-made concept which has been used as a form of control in all aspects of our lives. Most of us feel the need to work regimented schedules such as a 9 to 5 job or we feel that we are running out of time when we reach a certain age. Once we are able to remove ourselves from that limiting construct of existence, that time is linear and absolute, we can achieve far more satisfying accomplishments with less effort, anxiety or energy. Time should be removed from all of our internal equations and messaging for optimum quality life experiences.

  1. Are you a Tolkein fan?

TolkeinYeaaasss! Who isn’t? Now let me first confess that I read The Lord of the Rings as a pre-teen. Although I marveled at the imagery and suspension of belief which is pure Tolkien mastery, it wasn’t until seeing the story on the big screen that my appreciation for his genius was truly sealed. He was a marvelous storyteller. I admire anyone who possesses the ability to tell a story in such a way that it inspires or motivates or sparks an emotional connection and appreciation of things unknown or known. I hope that Drafnel invokes those same feelings for readers.

  1. Tell us how you got started? What is your method, dear writer?

Drafnel Teaser Watch 1024x512Truthfully, I was able to write this book because I decided to hire a writing coach. Deborah Rigas, who passed away from cancer, kept me focused. Her passing fueled the completion of the first draft. As far as method, I cannot admit to any. I did not do any character mappings, or plan out plots or research any scientific data for Drafnel. Outlines have proven uninspiring and disastrous for me. Deborah told me “a writer writes” and that became my mantra. I find that true writing, the type that is engaging and surprising, is a mystical experience. For me it is a connection to the unseen energy that creates something out of nothing. The art form, whether it is a painting, novel, song, etc., starts out with a modicum of familiarity rooted in this physical world, but then evolves into the channeling of something unknown and unidentifiable which we choose to label as “imagination”.

Ed. My condolences, friend. Her legacy: your legacy. Beautiful.

  1. What’s next?

I’m in the process of writing the next book in the Camille and the Bear of Beisa series. It will be based on Catherine’s brother, Caleb, who we learn a little about in Drafnel. I am also working on a non-fiction book which discusses following intuition and higher guidance. That book will detail my own spiritual journey, including my realization of psychic phenomena. I’m hoping to complete both over the next six to twelve months.

  1. I love the cover. Who designed it?

Thank you so much for saying that. The cover was a very personal undertaking and looks amazing in the print copy. One day I had the urge to paint. I didn’t know how to, but a few YouTube videos later, decided to take a stab at trying. The background, on the cover, is one of my paintings which was actually, in my mind, unfinished. I really did not know what it was missing or why it felt unfinished, but it remained that way for a couple of years. When I completed the book, my friend, Leo, suggested that I use one of my paintings for the book’s cover. I decided that the unfinished piece would be ideal. In my hunt for the perfect cover designer, I discovered a talented artist, Cat Castleman, in a Facebook writing group. She designed the character illustrations which were added to the painting. That was my painting’s purpose I guess – to be the background on the book’s cover. Now it feels finished.

  1. Your guilty pleasure? (person, place or thing).

hammockI love candy, especially toffee and milk chocolate and of course ice-cream, specifically of the caramel sea-salt variety. It’s a terrible obsession and wicked on my hips and behind, but I cannot resist. I am also learning to appreciate the freedom to just be and do absolutely nothing. I used to feel guilty whenever I found myself unproductive, but hell I’ve been multi-tasking and working multiple jobs for most of my life. Now I relish those moments when I’m doing nothing at all, just existing and taking in the wonders and miracles of life.

  1. Happy endings: for or against?

Hmmm, I’m not a big fan of happy endings, mostly because my belief is that, if art does indeed imitate life, then, for me, most endings should be flawed or unexpected. And if there is happiness then there should be a tinge of something disastrous or unsettling just beyond the horizon awaiting the right impetus for activation. That’s not to say there aren’t happy endings. My feeling is that they are short-lived or appear to be rare, in my world anyway, unless the people involved are spiritually evolved or are on the path toward spiritual realization, but that’s a whole other discussion.

Ed. Count on it!

  1. The day you got your contract: care to share an anecdote?

OMG catOMG! I read that thing over and over in disbelief which then became unbelievable joy. This entire experience of finally realizing my childhood dream continues to feel very surreal. It’s sort of like when you awake from a deep sleep where you’re having an intense dream and you’re unsure if you’re awake or still dreaming. When you realize you are awake you try to remember everything that happened in the dream, but can only grasp little splices. Then you take those splices under continuous analysis trying to figure out the meaning or significant correspondence in your life. That’s how this all feels.  Like a dream. And I keep analyzing every moment along the journey wondering if there is deeper meaning or what will happen next.

 

biographySimone Salmon, a Jamaican born New Yorker, is the mother of two sons and a Jack Russell terrier. Her debut novel, Camille and the Bears of Beisa – Drafnel was released on August 28th, 2015 and has been receiving stellar reviews from bloggers and readers alike. She is a graduate of Bronx High School of Science and attended Barnard College.

Simone was raised by her father’s mother in Kingston, Jamaica until the age of eleven. She, along with her two brothers and sister, began living full-time with their parents in 1977.

Simone hosted the MiracleMindFest teleseminars in the summer of 2013 which spotlighted twenty-one spiritual teachers, including Vincent Genna, Mas Sajady, Howard Martin, Davidji, Julie Geigle, Jean Slatter, Roland Comtois, Sunny Dawn Johnston and Elizabeth Harper, just to name a few. She credits the series with catapulting her own spiritual journey, including her discovery of mediumship and a now trusted practice of following higher guidance. She is also a spiritual truth seeker who appreciates psychic phenomena and timelessness.

Simone is still working on her exit strategy from corporate America where she currently manages a word processing department in a law firm. She continues to write novels, poetry and expand her multisensory perceptions.

Music of all kinds, warm weather, lounging on the beach, and experiencing the unknown are just a few of her most favorite things.

 

Links Image

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

Twitter: @miraclemindcoac

Blog: Origisims

Website: www.ssalmonauthor.com

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/simsalmon/

Goodreads: Goodreads

 

Press

Review on Clatter and Clank – Fiction by BR Sanders

Spotlight on Alex McGilvery’s World

Feature on Tevis Shkodra – Dystopianauthor.com

Review by Merrill Chapman – Rule-set.com

Spotlight on Books and Blondes – John E. Guzzardo

Spotlight on Get In John’s Head

Spotlight on Tales of a Bookworm – Jaelyn Quisel

Feature on The Dark Geisha – Eden Royce

Spotlight on Gloria Weber’s Blog

Feature on The Mysterious Ink Spot – Rachel Stapleton

Interview with BR Sanders

 

Book Buy Link

getBook.at/ssalmon-drafnel

Thank you for stopping by Simone. Your journey is an amazing one and I, for one, look forward to following along! Best of luck.

ABF

 

“To understand the heart and mind of a person, look not at what he has already achieved, but at what he aspires to.”

–Khalil Gibran

TOMORROW:

Karen King takes us on a preternatural journey to the underworld in her acclaimed YA novel SAPPHIRE BLUE.

Karen jpeg

 

 

TEN AUTHORS, TEN DAYS: DAY SIX: JIM CRONIN

author photoScience fiction writer Jim Cronin takes up the the reins as we enter week two of the blogothon. Citing a preference for 50’s and 60’s era Sci Fi movies, classical music and my favorite martian as creative influences, I can’t help but applaud this wildly inventive author. Word to the wise, though: keep an eye on your DNA!  Hi, Jim!

­­­­­­

The Story:

Book CoverHis home world is dead; the victim of a supernova, but this does not stop Karm from attempting to save the Brin, his extinct species. Rescued by an alien race from a derelict spacecraft as a vial of DNA, then cloned, Karm must travel back in time, convince a small team of co-conspirators to join him in his quest, and outmaneuver a power hungry monarch and his fanatic brother, leader of The Faith, both absolutely committed to opposing him.

All of Karm’s plans rest on the untested and controversial cloning theories of the young geneticist Dr. Jontar Rocker, and the abilities of his bodyguard, personal assistant, and surrogate niece, Maripa. Will their combined efforts be enough to overcome the power of the monarchy and the planet’s most influential religion? Will Karm’s secrets destroy the trust of his companions and ruin his campaign to save the Brin?

Reviews:

Great book! Twists in plot were well thought out & timed perfectly – just when you thought you knew where you were going, a twist comes into play…

by Clare Bruno

Mr. Cronin writes on several levels successfully: from the detailed lives of a myriad of characters to the larger economic & political powers at play in a full world, complex and dangerous. And that’s not even counting the star that’s about to go supernova!…

by Debauched Sloth

The author’s characters are varied, both in personality and trait, which makes them all interesting…. Hegira augurs well for Jim Cronin’s future books. I look forward to reading more from him…

by Tracy Black

Excerpt“Come in, Latonia Base…come in Latonia Base. This is Starship Hegira, repeat, this is Hegira. Come in, Latonia.”

Static crackled from the speaker. The lieutenant, bleeding and dying from the injuries he received during the mutiny trembled feebly as he gripped the microphone. Blood soaked his crest feathers; his talons broken and jagged from the hand-to-hand combat in the spaceship’s passageways. He knew his wounds were fatal, but his duty was clear: to report back to base about the failure of the mission. His body tensed as the next wave of pain shot through him.

“Latonia Base, this is Hegira. Come in. Priority clearance Falcon, Delta. Come in Base. Damn you to hell!” the soldier shouted in desperation. “Somebody answer! Come in, Latonia!” The microphone dropped from his talons, clattering on the control panel before falling to the metal plated floor. The lieutenant slumped back into the chair, pressing a blood soaked rag to his shoulder. Staring out the view port he watched the star-filled blackness and wondered at the cruel turn fate had taken over the past few days.

Link to Amazon .com Page to Order: http://www.amazon.com/Hegira-Jim-Cronin-ebook/dp/B010E3EKC6/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1435425640&sr=1-1&keywords=Hegira+jim+Cronin

Q & A

  1. HEGIRA features a character cloned from a vial of DNA. To what degree did your knowledge of Zoology play a part in the science behind the story?

While I do have some familiarity with cloning, my main goal was to pick some aspect of science which has the potential to be controversial. I wanted to deal with the schism between science and religion and bringing cloning to its full potential struck me as an interesting subject. Evolution is too familiar, but I wanted something with a similar potential.

  1. Your self-confessed struggle with the English language (tongue in cheek) is refreshing and all too familiar. Tell us about    the writing courses you took and which ones helped you most on your quest to write The Novel.

To be honest, I only had one writing course in college. That one consisted almost entirely of us writing each night whatever struck our fancy. The topic did not matter. We could write nothing but “I have nothing to say tonight” if we wanted, so long as we wrote something.  The professor then would respond. His response may or may not have been anything related to what we wrote. I guess it was sort of a late ’60’s or early ’70’s sort of thing. What I have learned about writing came more from working as a teacher and paying attention to what my Language Arts partners taught and my trying to copy them whenever I required my students to write something.

  1. Your worst rejection letter ever: what did it say?

These actually were pretty much the standard “Sorry, but this is just not the sort of story we are looking for right now.”  Rejections. None of then were rude or anything, but always disappointing.

  1. The day you got your contract: anecdote, please!

ShhhhhPlease don’t tell my wife this, but I actually did a bit of a victory dance in the living room. I NEVER dance. It is absolutely not something I do. But for some reason I did then. If she ever hears I did a dance she may force me to take her out dancing.  That would be bad. 🙂

Ed. Don’t worry friend. Your secret is safe with me!

  1. There are a lot of science fiction films out there that have suffered darts. DUNE comes to mind (and I liked it for all its campy 80’s fashion). What’s your favorite and how did it inform your work as a science fiction writer?

I much prefer the books to their films, but Ender’s Game was pretty good. I also am a Ex Machinacompulsive viewer of almost any 1950’s or 1960’s era sci fi movies. Of course I also thought Guardians of the Galaxy was a hoot. Ex Machina made me think and was very interesting. The new Star Trek movies are very good as well.

  1. What’s next?

Currently I am almost finished with the sequel to Hegira. This will be a trilogy, I hope. The third book is only in rough outline form so far though. I also have an idea for a YA science fiction story floating around.

  1. What’s your second favorite genre and why?
Author Jeff Shaara
Author Jeff Shaara

This is kind of a toss up between fantasy and historical fiction. I love Tolkein, Eddings, and Martin, but Jeff Shaara and David McCoullough are also incredible. Of course books on Physics, Evolution, and science in general are always good too.

  1. Who and what do you read when you aren’t writing, editing and publishing?

Science Fiction, History, Historical Fiction, Science, and the occasional Stephen King or James Patterson, among others. I almost always have two or three novels going on at the same time. Does that qualify as an addiction?

  1.  Do you have a muse?

MarvinNot really. Guess I am too grounded in science for that.  Unless you count all of my Marvin the Martian characters I have hanging around. But I do listen to classical music when I write.

  1. Last words? Tell us something you want us to know.

Whether it’s writing, or some other passion you may have, never give up until you have exhausted every ounce of effort and drive you can muster to achieve it. And then go out and give it some more before you move on and try to find another dream. If you give up before you have given it your everything, you’ll always have regrets. That, and just a simple, Be Nice To Others.

Ed. I can live with that!

biographyI worked for thirty five years as a middle school science teacher, but am now semi-retired, working part-time as an educator/performer at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. I have been married for thirty seven years to the love of my life, Diane. Together, we raised two incredible sons, and now have a beautiful granddaughter to spoil rotten.

I was born in Kansas City, Missouri and lived in Arlington, Virginia before moving to Denver where I attended High School and eventually college at Colorado State University, graduating with a degree in Zoology and a teacher certification. I currently live near Denver in the small town of Parker.

Links Image

Website:  http://www.authorjimcroninhegira.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Author-Jim-Cronin/704524026327838?ref=hl

Twitter: @authorjimcronin

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/hp/?dnr=kjTxJ-RsTaDhq19ukZhtJ3GJTaCRW19d27h8

Link to Amazon .com Page to Order: http://www.amazon.com/Hegira-Jim-Cronin-ebook/dp/B010E3EKC6/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1435425640&sr=1-1&keywords=Hegira+jim+Cronin

Thank you Jim Cronin. Best of luck with HEGIRA and the sequel! Let that imagination roll. Cheers,

ABF

Whether a character in your novel is full of choler, bile, phlegm, blood or plain old buffalo chips, the fire of life is in there, too, as long as that character lives.”
—James Alexander Thom

TOMORROW:

Author Simone Salmon talks time relativity, the importance of relaxation and her new novel CAMILLE AND THE BEARS OF BEISA-DRAFNEL.

NEW HEAD SHOT

TEN AUTHORS, TEN DAYS: DAY FIVE: HOWARD GLEICHENHAUS

Blog Funkhauser is delighted to welcome versatile author Howard Gleichenhaus to Day Five of a ten day extravaganza that spotlights writers of various genres and formats. Howard’s latest THE SUBTERFUGE CONSPIRACY takes the reader on a wild ride from the shores of Lake Ontario to the backstreets of Paris and beyond with protagonist Ted Lansing who is currently evolving in an as yet untitled follow up to Subterfuge. Welcome Howard!

 

THE SUBTERFUGE CONSPIRACY

 

Book CoverThe murder of a young prostitute followed by a police shootout on a cold, deserted beach on the eastern shore of Lake Ontario draws FBI Special Agent Ted Lansing into the most deadly case of his career,

Lansing and his partner, Jennifer Fallana, have three months to lay bare the Subterfuge Conspiracy, recover a shipment of stolen radioactive cesium pellets smuggled into the country across Lake Ontario and thwart the detonation of a dirty bomb set for New Year’s Eve on the National Mall in Washington D.C.

From New York to Paris, to Yemen, and back to Washington D.C., Fargo Blake, ex military, cold and deadly, is tasked by the true conspirators to eliminate their Arab coconspirators and lay blame for the attack squarely their shoulders —The perfect subterfuge terrorist plot.

Backed by a cabal of politically powerful men tied to the highest echelons of the United States government, the conspiracy reaches all the way into the halls of the U.S. Senate. The plotter’s endgame: discredit the first elected Hispanic president’s credibility on global terrorism, bring down his administration, deny him a second term and elect their hand picked successor, a radical, right wing United States Senator.

 

Buy Link: http://www.amazon.com/The-Subterfuge-Conspiracy-Howard-Gleichenhaus-ebook/dp/B00W2256AI

 

 

  1. The Subterfuge Conspiracy reminds me very fondly of Frederick Forsyth’s Day of the Jackal: Q & Ainternational locales, multiple POVs and high stakes intrigue. What is the genesis of Subterfuge?

 

First, allow me to say thank-you for the Forsyth comparison. It is always flattering (and hopefully deserved) to have a novel you’ve written fondly compared to one of the literary giants of the genre.

Some writers plot out their story before hand and stick to the outline. For me that just doesn’t work. I prefer to allow my characters to react to the situations I place them into and ask myself what would he/she do. I dope out at least two scenarios and write them both. Subterfuge began as a standard terrorist plot with a hard-boiled FBI agent in pursuit. During one particular meeting of my weekly critiquing group The Delray Beach Public Library Writer’s Studio (I am the group moderator) an off hand comment was made by one member of the group. I doubt he even remembers making it now. “What if the plotters weren’t who the reader thinks they are?”

I made a note in the margin of my manuscript. At some point I was struck by the usual temporary writer’s block that happens every so often. Going back through early drafts I saw the margin notes I’d made weeks before. Not a bad way to go, I thought. I knew I couldn’t just drop that bomb from out of nowhere so I went back into what I had already written and began to plant foreshadows. Once the co conspirators were firm in my mind the story began to flow again.

 

  1. As a Canadian, my interest piques at the mention of Lake Ontario. What dictated your choice of location for the jump-start of the plot?

lake ontarioThat is an interesting question. My youngest son went to college at SUNY Oswego, which is on the eastern shore of Lake Ontario. Over the years I visited Oswego many times. I was familiar with the lakeshore beachfront and how desolate it looked in winter. Researching Canadian nuclear facilities I discovered that Canada had a facility close to the lake, a short boat ride from the US side. It made the perfect route to smuggle nuclear materials. What started as a rather short narrative, “telling” the reader about smuggled material I rewrote the novel’s beginning to “show” rather than tell and draw the reader in with a non stop thrilling police confrontation, totally misunderstood as a simple drug interdiction. I now had my “usual” suspects in country. I then allowed by protagonist (Ted Lansing) to uncover the plot one slow page at a time, always ending a chapter with a cliffhanger to bring the reader along.

 

  1. Let’s backtrack for the readers: Can you give us your elevator pitch?

Hours, moments and seconds tick away, with millions of lives hanging in the balance. Could the unthinkable really happen, a dirty bomb, armed with stolen cesium from a Canadian Reactor site, is set to detonate on New Year’s Eve on the National Mall in Washington DC. FBI Special Agent Ted Lansing tries to make sense of who the real enemy is in one of the most diabolical plots ever conceived to subvert the United States government.

CIAWho can Lansing trust? Are Middle Eastern Jihadists really eiffel towerbehind the plot, or is it far more sinister. Could his one time friend, CIA Paris section chief, Colin Mills. be involved? Is Mills tied to a white supremacist army led by a disgraced ex military man, an avowed racist, Lt. Colonel Kyle Nugent and his right hand, Fargo Blake? Also ex military, Blake is a stone-cold killer who strikes without conscience, until a beautiful Parisian flight attendant makes him believe that a different life is possible — But Blake is trapped, he cannot get out. High-ranking members of the United States Senate are plotting to overthrow a duly elected president. Unthinkable, that is until small inconsistencies appear sending Lansing on a nonstop coaster ride from New York City to the Adirondack wilderness in upstate New York to the National Mall in Washington on New Year’s Eve. Lansing pursues Blake, and Mills into snow covered Virginia’s countryside to a clandestine CIA training facility. Two old friends facing off in one last confrontation from which only one will emerge alive.

 

  1. Espionage (is there a better descriptor?) fiction is a favorite of mine though I lack the mental courage to ever tackle such a genre. As a writer, what goes into a work like The Subterfuge Conspiracy? What is your method?

I don’t know if it’s mental courage, but I certainly wasn’t sure when I began to write Subterfuge if  I could pull it off. There were so many unanswered questions. I knew I was going to take my readers to locations I had never visited. Sure I’d been to Paris, for example, but tourist Paris. What was a typical Paris street like, not the Champs-Élysées visitors see. No more typical than portraying Times Square as a typical New Yorker’s day of fun I need to “be” in the Paris of working Parisians. For my writer colleagues, here is a secret. A Google search of Paris neighborhoods followed by Google Earth puts you on the street in front of your location and the ability to move up and down the street. You can see cars parked in front; does the bistro have a window facing the street? What is on the menu and how are the tables arranged? It may all sound like unnecessary minutia but in my writing I create authenticity in my visuals. Readers who may have been there say “Yes, exactly how I remember it.” I believe these details enhance the plot and breathe life into the characters.

 

  1. Chicken or egg? What came first: plot or character(s)?

For me it is the plot, at least in this book. My latest project, almost 100,000 words (now in first draft) will be the other way around because Ted Lansing is my protagonist, but the book is not a sequel. Since his character qualities, warts and all, were developed in Subterfuge, I have a better framework to get him in and out of situations. That being said, I always keep in mind the fact that most readers are meeting him for the first time and I cannot assume facts not in evidence. Admittedly, my first drafts lack much foreshadowing of plot line because I tend to write a linear story in that first draft. In second draft copies, knowing where I am going, I move entire chapters, add foreshadowing, and clean up plot holes my critique group uncovered. Once plot and character are finalized (reconciled?) a third rewrite readies the manuscript for the editor. A side note for my fellow writers still trying to get published: Do not skimp on professional editing. Editors are worth their weight in gold. They can take a good manuscript and transform it into a smooth professional book.

 

  1. Care to share a publishing anecdote?

I have one that is a cautionary tale for would be writers. My first attempt at getting published, back when I knew nothing about it, was to scour the Internet for an agent. I found an intriguing ad from an agency, since discredited, that made it sound so easy. I sent my query and waited. In a month came the response that I was so good they wanted me as a client and thought my book would sell. New to writing and gullible I thought them reasonable when they asked for a moderate sum ($65) to send email blasts to publishers. A month later they told me I was “this” close and another $65 would do it. Only then did I search the web for other authors who used that agency. If I had done it sooner I might have saved the $65. Fellow writers, if they ask for money, be skeptical.

 

  1. What was the first thing you thought of after typing “THE END”?

That’s an easy question. What did I leave out and how can I fix it. There is always doubt. Even now when I reread portions of Subterfuge I ask myself why I did it that way when I could have improved on it by doing it another way. There is an adage from the Pennsylvanian Dutch, Too soon old…too late smart.

 

  1. What’s next?

My third novel, still untitled, has Ted Lansing with a new partner, an African American, Washington DC Metro detective named Arlen Drew. Lansing now lives in Washington and has remarried his ex wife, FBI Assistant Director, Felicia Albreda. In what begins as the murder of a Russian forensic archeologist at the Smithsonian, Lansing is drawn into a case of international intrigue taking him to Israel and the Sinai Peninsula in search of the Ten Commandments. Readers, who have read Subterfuge, will recognize the changes in Lansing, the developing new relationship with his wife and the renewed relationship with his son, now a junior at MIT and there in Israel to receive a prestigious award for a paper he wrote on drone technology.

 

  1. Do you ever think outside your genre? Do you have the courage to tackle romance? (This question is very tongue and cheek)

Whisper in the pinesMaybe not so tongue and cheek. My first published novel, Whisper in the Pines-Secrets of the Heart is so different from Subterfuge that a reader may not recognize it as my work until they see my name on the cover. It is an unabashed love story/mystery set in 1938, in Moultrie Georgia, about a once wealthy southern aristocrat, Reggie Laverneaux, who is trying to rebuild his life after losing everything in the Great Depression. His errant wife has returned to town followed by a sociopath she ripped off while on the run from her old life. Whispering Pines, Reggie’s decaying antebellum house in Moultrie is the setting. Long forgotten family secrets are unearthed when a stranger, an elderly Jewish businessman from New York, arrives in Moultrie with answers and a promise, hope for Reggie to rebuild his life

 

  1. Your favorite all time spy (again, is there a better descriptor) movie is….?

If I had to name one character (spy) (counterspy) from literature and film it would be Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan. Sometimes I write traits I admire in Jack Ryan into Ted Lansing’s character. Ryan is fiercely loyal with a tenacity that will not quit even under extreme duress. Lansing is often down and counted out, only to prevail in the end through sheer guts. Like Ryan, Lansing can go from dealing with violence to tenderness in a heartbeat. Unlike jack Ryan, Lansing does all of this while dealing with the demon that neatly destroyed his life.

 

biographyHoward Gleichenhaus was born in Philadelphia, PA and grew up in the Bronx, NYC and Spring Valley, New York. He earned a Bachelor’s degree in Biology from Southern Connecticut State College, and a pair of Master’s degrees from Fairleigh Dickinson University; one in Biology and a second in Psychology.

After a short career in neuro-biochemical research at Rockland

Psychiatric Institute, he taught high school biology for thirty-four years in the Clarkstown Central School District, Rockland County NY. During that time, he also operated his own portrait/wedding photography business. Self-taught in Photoshop, he keeps his hand in the portrait business and still does restoration of heirloom photographs and portrait retouching. Now retired from teaching, he and his wife Fredda now live in Delray Beach, Florida. They have two married sons, and three grandchildren.

He is currently Chairman of the Board of the Institute for Learning in Retirement in Boca Raton and moderator of the Writer’s Studio of the Delray Beach Library.

Writing fiction began after his retirement from teaching in 2001, with a couple of successful short stories published before he turned his full attention to writing novels.

 

AUTHOR’S PHOTO GALLERY

When he isn’t writing, author Howard Gleichenhaus captures memories…and escapes run-ins with the guarded and famous!

Arod Yes that is the Yankees superstar Alex Rodriguez. He took offense at my photographing him with his bodyguard in the pool at a Tampa hotel where we went to see the Yanks play the Rays. Wish I was that famous. He saw me standing at the edge of the pool, tele lens in hand and got real angry.
Arod. “Yes that is the Yankees superstar Alex Rodriguez. He took offense at my photographing him with his bodyguard in the pool at a Tampa hotel where we went to see the Yanks play the Rays. Wish I was that famous. He saw me standing at the edge of the pool, tele lens in hand and got real angry.”
Loves Three new loves came into our lives.Alexa, Levi and Casey. They say that grand kids are your reward for not killing your own kids. So true!
Loves. “Three new loves came into our lives Alexa, Levi and Casey. They say that grand kids are your reward for not killing your own kids. So true!”
Fredda. "That's the love of my life for 42 years. She is my muse."
Fredda. “That’s the love of my life for 42 years. She is my muse.”
TUX. "(Florida life is easy and laid back, especially for writers, but every once in a while a guy needs to clean up and go all James Bond."
TUX. “(Florida life is easy and laid back, especially for writers, but every once in a while a guy needs to clean up and go all James Bond.”
Dream House. "We built it in Delray Beach, Florida, and artist and writers paradise."
Dream House. “We built it in Delray Beach, Florida, an artist and writers paradise.”
St Maarten. "Chillin' on the island. We met mystery writer Cathy Ace on the cruise ship. We talked writing and publishing all day while sipping fancy colored drinks on the fantail deck. She was so, so accommodating in sharing her publishing experiences."
St Maarten. “Chillin’ on the island. We met mystery writer Cathy Ace on the cruise ship. We talked writing and publishing all day while sipping fancy colored drinks on the fantail deck. She was so, so accommodating in sharing her publishing experiences.”

Thank you so much for sharing your means and methods, Howard. There’s a lot of great advice here. Be sure and pay us a visit again when Ted Lansing’s next exploit hits the presses.

Cheers. ABF

 

“There are no laws for the novel. There never have been, nor can there ever be.”
—Doris Lessing

MONDAY:

Spotlight science fiction author Jim Cronin and his latest HEGIRA.

author photo