First, The Two Kingdoms Book I: The Garnetsword is getting great reviews and our new contest is up and running at
http://carolineaubrey.net/The_Garnetswo
The Two Kingdoms Book I: The Garnetsword received 4.5/out of 5 stars and a TOP PICK from NIGHT OWL REVIEWS. Read the full review here, and see why the book made reviewer Kate Seely cry:
http://www.nightowlreviews.com/nightowl
Secondly, Caroline's second book in the Torrid Twisted series will be out August 15, 2010, in both eBook and print formats. Second Night: More Fairy Tales Retold explores the erotic and the fantastical in new retellings of classic stories:
"We all know the stories from childhood: beautiful heroine meets handsome, mysterious hero; they fall in love, marry, and live happily ever after....or do they?
"Even though times have changed, we still have the deep longing to be desired above all by a demon lover, the bad boy, the vampire, the one whom we are not supposed to find ultimate happiness with. In these retellings of The Goose Girl, East of the Sun, West of the Moon, Beauty and the Beast, and a Selkie Legend, Caroline Aubrey reimagines these stories for a modern world; the same horrors facing women in the old world face them in the new one, but this time there is a twist: to survive the horror of the Bloody Chamber, we must keep our wits about us and rely upon the strength of women to do so."
From “A Fox’s Tale”:
As he kissed her, he placed the keys in her hand. They were heavy and cold to the touch. Parting, he smiled. “These will open every door. Explore to your heart’s content, dearest, however,” his eyes shone with a bright light as he gazed upon her, “the room at the topmost height of the house, at the tip of the stairs, please do not enter. It is the one thing I ask of you. Can you do that for me, my darling girl?”
Nodding, Miranda put the keys on the table. “Of course.”
Pointing to the keys, Kitsen separated them, until the lightest one stood out. “This is the key to my room. You will have no need of it, but it is here.” Standing, he placed his hands on her shoulders, and kissed the top of her head. “My dearest love, I shall return in two days,” he said.
And then, he was gone.
To find out more about Caroline's Fairy Tale series, published under the Torrid Twisted Tales line with Whiskey Creek Press/Torrid books, click here.
Thanks, as always, for your support and friendship!
" . . . well-presented, intelligent and incredibly sexy. . . . Chris raises the difficult subjects of women being commoditized; the contrast between physical attraction and mental stimulation; and a whole host of big topics that give this story a strong sense of being intelligent and insightful as well as being erotic and arousing. . . ." Ashley Lister, Erotica Readers
________________________________________
"...C. Garcia-Sanchez' work is arousing and challenging, but not easy. If you're seeking fairly mindless entertainment, sexy stories that go straight to the genitals while bypassing the soul, look elsewhere. If you are willing to dig deeper, to think and to feel and to appreciate the many-leveled complexity of sexual desire, I strongly recommend this book... Emotionally intense and unfailingly provocative... This is the exact opposite of the consumable, forgettable stories currently marketed as "erotica". It deserves (dare I say it) the label of literature..." ~Lisabet Sarai
Chris blogs regularly on the multi-auhtor site Oh Get A Grip (http://ohgetagrip.blogspot.com/) I really enjoyed his answers, and his approach to writing racy lit in the heart of the Bible Belt:
1. You mentioned that you're dedicated to the short story form, rather than the longer novel or novella form. What attracts you to the short story?
I've been doing a lot of soul searching on this question lately.
Fiction can be divided roughly into two camps, literary and popular. If you write so called popular fiction it seems to me these days you have to write novels or you're nobody. That's a big change from the past, when short stories had a much bigger place in the world and the major writers were known for their short story fiction. Then the pulp magazines died, leaving only the slicks, and then the slicks have begun dying and it’s hard to get your name in those. Writing short stories today is only a little more lucrative than writing poetry, which is to say not at all. But lately the pulps have been making a kind of come back in the form of anthologies. Anthologies like Suzie Bright’s "Best of" erotica series, and the Jakubowski "Mammoth" anthologies are paperback reinventions of the old pulps. In fact, the mammoth books are printed on the same cheapo pulpy paper that gave the pulps their name. They're short fiction, and have a thing
for showcasing new and unknown writers along with the big names. I've had some luck with those, and I’ve had the privilege of sharing a few covers with some of my literary heroes.
The advent of digital publishing means that small publishers have a smaller investment in the digital books compared to paper print runs, and they can take more risks with green writers who have some imagination but are still learning their craft. Guys like me. I always refer to myself as an “apprentice writer’ in spite of being published. More about that later. Digital books are a wonderful thing, and it has at least the potential to reach readers worldwide on the Internet, compared to paper books which only reach the people in that bookstore. The problem with digital publishing is still the medium. Electronic Ereaders are hideously expensive, klutzy, frustrating, mean spirited gadgets that most people get for Christmas, and by Lent, the dam thing is languishing in a desk drawer where it belongs. Digital books are also priced at the same price as hard cover books which is insane. Also you can’t share DRM protected digital books
with friends, or go to a used bookstore and pick up a used digital book cheap. When those issues change digital books may hit take off speed, but not before.
Anyway, short stories. I’m a short story writer, not a novelist. This is no more a choice then being gay or straight is a choice. I tried writing novels, and I just can’t. My brain isn’t wired for it. You write what the story fairy gives you, and the story fairy gives me short stories. So somewhere along the way, I heaved a sad sigh and decided I’d just try to be the goddamnest short story writer I could. Short stories are a beautiful and difficult art form for the same reasons poetry is. And nobody ever got rich writing short stories or poetry.
2. Now that we've established your love for the short story, what about genre? Your Whiskey Creek press book, Mortal Engines and the Color of the Moon, is classified as science fiction, yet it seems as though the stories cross genres: feudal Japan, not-too distant future. How would you classify your work in the genre police mode?
Like I said, you write what the story fairy gives you. I don’t think the story fairy likes me very much, so she gives me short stories. As Lady Dainagon would say “Shigata ga nai!” (What can you do?) Here’s how I see myself, and I say this especially for any new writers who may be reading this interview. Listen up folks, I’m just about to tell you something genuinely useful you should know.
Okay, two things. First I see myself as a pulp writer by default. I like to think of myself as an erotica pulp writer but I’ve written other things too. Erotica writers are the literary equivalent of punk rockers, disreputable and independent. I always feel like I was born thirty years too early, but if I had been born even earlier than that I’d be one of those guys like Robert E Howard, or HP Lovecraft, holed up in a seedy hotel room with a bottle on the floor and a cigarette on my lip, hammering away on a big Royal Portable, working for peanuts. People say you should write what you know. Most of us don’t know very much about anything. What you do is write the genre you know and love. Ray Bradbury grew up devouring Edgar Rice Burroughs in the pulps, and Flash Gordon in the Sunday funnies and he became Ray Bradbury. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards grew up listening to Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf records and became the Rolling
Stones. That’s how it works in the real world. You don’t choose the genre, the genre chooses you. At least it does if you’re a truthful writer and you’re not faking it to make a buck. You should write what you love and screw ‘em all and swing for the fences every time you sit down at the fucking keyboard. That’s what I know for sure is true
Now the second thing. I always refer to myself as an “Apprentice Writer”. I have good reasons for doing this. Beginning writers should think about this. The dirty secret of all writers is that every one of us secretly believes we’re an undiscovered genius. A couple of us really are, the rest of us really aren’t. But the geniuses like Stephen King all agree that talent isn’t worth shit by itself. You have to pay your dues at the keyboard. I try to bench press 1000 words every day whether I have something to say or not. Work is better than talent. If you work at it, sooner or later the story fairy will throw you a good one just out of pity. And when you write, you should always swing for the fences. If you think about the market when you’re at the keyboard, you’re a monkey. The keyboard is the sacred place where you should be looking for the truthful thing you feel and find a way to express it. If you write that
way, you’re going to spend a lot of your time feeling bad. You’re going to look at other writers and you’re going to look at your own stuff and feel like you’ve been shoveling shit with a keyboard. When you feel like that, and feeling like that is very good sign, tell yourself “I’m an apprentice writer. I’m still learning the craft, I don’t have to be good yet. My job is to learn all I can from the people who write better than me and type till my fingers bleed.” That’s your job. This is what Buddhists call “Beginner’s Mind”. This innocence with yourself is a blessed source of patience. The more you try to tell the truth, the worse you will fail. So what you have to learn first is how to fail really well. The Beatles didn’t start out as the Beatles. They started as a spunky little bar band playing strip joints in Hamburg Germany where drunken audiences threw wooden chairs at them because they were such a
shitty sounding band. They played eight hours every night like that for almost a year, and slept on the floor in the men’s toilet. That’s how you get to be the Beatles. And once they figured out how to play as a band, the distance between “Love Me Do” and “A Day in the Life” is only four years which is amazing.
When I was asked to be on the Oh Get a Grip blog, I had some misgivings. For one thing, there were a couple of big names on the blog and I didn’t think I could pull my weight next to them. But I did. For over a year now, this is has been my personal Hamburg, where every week there is a theme someone else has chosen, that I know little or nothing about and on Wednesdays, no matter what - I have to get in the spot light, plug in my amp and say “Hi Folks! What a luvly audience!” and make ‘em get up and dance before the wooden chairs start flying. This is hard, trying to come up with something original every week, but its tremendous discipline. I recommend it to anyone. I’ve never been to college or had any writing courses ever. But this blog has been the closest thing to a writing class I’ve ever had. And because the audience is friendly I get to experiment a lot, because if I flop – I’m an apprentice! I’m allowed
to flop, who cares? And if you don’t play around with your instrument and improvise you’ll never find out what’s in there. The greatest thing for a writer is when you can surprise yourself. And if you take chances, sometimes you can really knock yourself on your ass with something amazing you didn’t know you had inside. That’s when writing is an act of love.
3. Do you find that genre-defying stories give you more freedom as a writer? Why, or why not?
Genre defying stories will cripple you as a writer. Publishers won’t know what to do with you. The market will not know how to define you. Critics won’t get you. Readers who are looking for a one handed read, or a fluffy romance won’t read you twice. You have to be true to yourself. That’s what gives you freedom as a writer, nothing else. The best damn vampire novel ever written is still “Interview with the Vampire” written by Anne Rice when she was a nobody, flying low to the ground with no fans and nothing to lose. There’s so much truth in that novel, and it’s a great read. That’s the gold standard for popular fiction if you can pull it off. If you know how to write your truth in a popular genre that wins you fans, then you’re very blessed. That’s the best deal you’ll ever get.
4. You blog every Wednesday on "Oh Get a Grip" at http://ohgetagrip.blogspot.com/ . I particularly enjoyed your last post about adventures in reading erotica at your local library. Do you think that public reading spaces inhibit your work as a reader and as a writer?
I’m not sure I understand the question, but I’ll take a swing at it. The fact that erotica can be found in public libraries, even in the Bible belt is huge to me. It wasn’t that long ago you could go to federal prison for having a copy of “Tropic of Cancer” in your suitcase when you came in through customs. Now you can read it in Google books for free. You see advertisements on day time television for KY “Intense” to help women have powerful orgasms, and the commercial shows a man and woman in bed ooing and ahhing and cuddling in the afterglow. It wasn’t that long ago you couldn’t even say the word “pregnant” on TV, and TV shows had married couples like Ozzie and Harriet chastely separated in twin beds. Candida Royale wrote the foreword for the new PHAZE books “Coming into the Light” anthology which has some of my stuff in it, and she explained about the evolution of social attitudes towards erotica in recent
years. People like Suzie Bright and Candida Royale paid the dues for that and I really admire them.
5. You live in the Bible Belt, which doesn't really look upon subtle differences between pornography and erotica. Have you been able to have much of a public persona as a writer, or has the cyber world given you more freedom to have a fulfilling career as a writer where you can meet and greet the fans and get the word out about your work?
I have fans?
Unfortunately my public persona has never been much of a problem for me. Not yet anyway. My work is largely unknown, though my stuff has appeared in several anthologies by now. I'm getting to be quite the pulp writer. PHAZE books especially likes my quirky style and came to me to put a collection together for them which should be out later this year. I’m finishing the last story for it now, called “El Pimientero”, which means “pepper grinder” in Spanish. (You’d have to read it.)
I’m not sure being well known would make any difference though. I had the fanboy privilege a couple of weeks ago of meeting Charlaine Harris when she visited my little town. She wrote the sexy Sookie Stackhouse novels which became HBO’s Trueblood series. Plenty of naked people doin’ it doggy with vampires in Trueblood and I didn’t see any Baptists picketing her, so again, we live in exciting times where things have moved on a great deal. It will only get better.
C. Sanchez-Garcia
(http://whiskeycreekpress.com/authors/J
1. Your book, Jim Whitaker’s Hill of Beans, encompasses your collected wisdoms over the years. What wisdom would you impart today if you were placed on the spot and suddenly asked to be clever and witty? (no pressure… ha ha)
Huh?
2. As a columnist, your work has appeared in the Palmyra Mo. Spectator and the Hannibal Mo. Courier-Post. What was the funniest letter you ever received? What was the most memorable?
Perhaps the most memorable was from from the guy boycotting me because I wrote that his candidate for Congress - an active KKK member - was unqualified because his head retained the shape of his hat when he took it off at bedtime. In fact he had a hole drilled into his headboard. You know how the "S" and the "W" are near each other on the keyboard? I don't think the way he addressed the envelope and spelled my last name was a mistake.
Come to think of it, that may have been the funniest as well. The guy didn't deny the hole in the headboard.
3. Your daughter has been immortalized in your columns and in Hill of Beans, the book. What has been her response to all the attention?
She openly protested as she grew during her teen years. Yet, I could always spot that slight smile and the eye twinkle as she said "You write about me again? Dad." I knew she was soaking it up when asked by a stranger if she was the girl who caused her father to buy aspirin by the case. Today, as a grown woman with a child of her own, she remembers fondly those columns as a souvenir or a memoir of sorts of her childhood. She loves it when I write about her daughter.
4. Do any member of the community appear in your column? If so, are names changed to protect the innocent? What is their response.
What innocent? I seldom write about anyone specific. People recognize themselves through me, through the situiations I relate, thriough the composite people I use. That's good. I don't like picking toilet paper out of our pine trees.
5. The writer’s notebook is becoming a thing of the past. Do you carry one everywhere you go?
No. My journalism training helps me remember what I want to note in columns. Besides, I hear plenty of "is this going to be in your column" or "be careful or this will be in the paper." Mostly, those are protesting-too-much questions from people who want to be mentioned or noted. Most people enjoy lughing about themselves and they certainly enjoy laughing about me. Carrying a notebook might be ... a little dangerous. It could put people off.
6. How is living in Missouri affect your writing? Do you think you would be a different writer if you lived elsewhere? Would you live anywhere else other than where you live now- why or why not?
There are so many Missourians full of pudding - hey, I mean that in a nice way.I try to style my writing, though, to help people everywhere feel a relationship to it. I know that's sorta impossible, but I want to cross regional cultures and bounds. Really.
I like Missouri. The people and the weather and the culture and the land itself are so diverse, so entertaining in both the etheral and earthy sense, in both the bawdy and the sophisticated sense. Besides, I had enough trouble getting that couch in the front door.
7. Describe your writing process from start to finish.
My writing is usally 50 percent complete by the time I reach the computer. Observing, thinking, digging into my own mind get me started in my head. When it starts to hurt, it's time to get to the PC. I absolutely hate staring at a blank Word document and a blinking cursor, trying to spark an idea. Whit on that.
Bringing out the second 50 percent usually requires putting the first half in that document, something that inspires embellishment, detail, etc. If I get stuck, I ask for suggestions from my family, a move that always inspires me. Then, of course, I read it over for further ideas. I often have ny wife read it over. (That's how I sell my column to publishers - at least two people in the nation read it every week.) I very seldom get up from the computer and return later to finish a 750-word column. That to me makes writing a chore.
8. How does your wife feel about her frequent starring role in your work?
I'm allowed by my wife to write about my wife only if I identify her only as "my wife." What does that tell us? After 30 years of marriage, though, she expects to have a "frequent starring role."
9. How is the Bouncing Baby Gallbladder?
Setting quietly on the top of the entertainment center in goldfish bowl. Low maintennance. Just change the formaldahyde every three months or so. No trouble at all. Except late at night we often hear these spongy sounds in the kitchen while the cat is asleep.
10. What are your future projects?
I'm making own website - along with 17 billion other people every day.
Working on a book about my granddaughter, much along the lines of my columns.
Taking a hot-air balloon around the world in 80 days. If the airline lets me take a balloon onboard that is.
It really is a new year for me, having celebrated 2010, the birthday of my beautiful 7 year old daughter, and my own birthday earlier this month. I love January. I get all that tsuff out of the way very early on and can concentrate on other stuff.
I am thrilled that the editing and galleys are out of the way on my new book from Torrid books. In celebration, I will be talking with other authors throughout the year and presenting our conversations here on Chaconne. I am pleased to introduce editor and journalist Melissa Newman, whose first novel, Sister Blackberry, is currently available through Whiskey Creek Press.
Melissa Newman began her writing career as a journalist — a profession she truly embraced.
She would spend the next twenty years in the newspaper industry rising to the ranks of editor and then publisher.
Although Newman enjoyed life as a journalist with so many opportunities to write about others, a career change allows her to be more focused on the type of writing she loves most – fiction.
Newman now works as Alumni Relations Director at her alma mater, Union College in Kentucky where she earned her Bachelor’s degree.
She has won numerous journalism awards, serves on the boards of the Kentucky Commission on Women and Kentucky Harvest Southeast. She lives in Kentucky with her husband. They have two grown daughters.
1. Melissa, thank you for joining us on Chaconne today.
I am honored to be here today on Chaconne, thank you so much for having me, Caroline.
2. Your new novel, Sister Blackberry, has received great reviews! Tell us a little about the novel, please.
Sister Blackberry is a novel about female relationships – mothers, daughters, granddaughters and friends. All women, I believe, keep secrets even from their closest allies. Sometimes it’s to protect themselves but in many cases it’s to protect the ones they love from hurt or disappointment. In the case of Viola Garland, our heroine in Sister Blackberry, the secret is kept not only to protect herself but also to protect her daughter, Doris. She wants her family to be whole – that’s all she’s ever wanted, but this secret is the family’s undoing and keeps them disjointed for nearly all of Viola’s life. The story carries the reader through three generations of Garland women. We watch as Viola’s two daughters Nadine and Doris grow into teenagers and become enemies, we see how their lives take separate paths of pain and emotional turmoil because the secret existed. We then, see how Nadine’s hatred of her sister is passed on to another generation – Viola’s two granddaughters. The Garland matriarch is ready to reveal her secret on her own but before she gets the chance, the truth surfaces on its own.
3. Sister Blackberry is a story about women, and the secrets that can bind women together. What do you think motivated Viola to tell the truth after all these years?
Sister Blackberry is a story about women, and the secrets that can bind women together. What do you think motivated Viola to tell the truth after all these years? Melissa: We begin at Viola’s nursing home bed where she has just read a newspaper article about a discovery at a Rayes County building site – skeletal remains of a male that forensic anthropologists believe have been in the ground for over 60 years. Viola is compelled to tell her granddaughters Maggie and Denie the truth about what happened during that blistering summer of 1936. Because her two granddaughters despise the only family they have left, their aunt Doris, this is Viola’s one last attempt to keep her remaining family together after her passing. As strongly as she has believed since 1936 that keeping the secret would keep the family together, she now believes that telling the secret is the only thing that will begin to heal the wounds the lie has caused.
4. The family secret can open up a lot of old wounds and hidden pasts. What inspired you to tell this story about secrets?
My inspiration to tell a story about old wounds and hidden pasts didn’t come from any real situation, it’s entirely fiction. I often, about three or four times a year, dream in full-length novels or movies, if you will. Some of them are worth keeping and some are not. Sister Blackberry was certainly in the keep category. I immediately woke up and began writing an outline. Where it came from, I’ll never know. Maybe one too many slices of deep dish pizza! But a good bit of inspiration for loving the story’s concept comes from the way I was raised. As the youngest of two sisters, I got to see up close and personal how girls evolve into strong women. In my family women have always been the secret keepers – all of them. In most families when someone is in trouble they always turn to a woman who can help carry the load and be trusted not to pass it on. I didn’t realize how important a role this was until I became a secret keeper myself.
5. Sister Blackberry has been compared to some of the great Southern gothic novels written during the southern literary renaissance. How do you feel about being given that mantle?
I love that Sister Blackberry is being compared to some of the great Southern gothic novels during the southern literary renaissance. I will graciously wear that title as a badge of honor. Although, as with most southern writers, the southern tone of the novel is not intentional, it simply just is. It is what I know – being southern. The people I grew up around, the places I went and the life experiences I had were all southern. It just simply exists within my being. Even if I wrote about having High Tea with the Queen of England, my descriptions of the experience would emerge southern. Just as my audible voice will always be heard with a southern accent, I think my writing voice will spill ink out onto the pages with that same dialect. It’s simply unavoidable.
6. While writing Sister Blackberry, did any of the characters take on a life of their own?
Sister Blackberry’s characters, for the most part, did not take on a lives of their own during the writing process. Like most southern women I like to have control of not only my life, but the lives of those around me -- this certainly includes my characters. I gave my characters their personality traits before I began to write about them. Like a sculptor, I paid a great amount of attention to their details. They all stayed true to their natures, except one – Lois, the waitress in the Cleveland diner where Deegee worked. She would escape me time and time again and I could never figure out why, though I was never sorry when I followed her down the paths she would take me. Maybe it was because she was mentally ill and her very nature proved to be uncontrollable. Lois may still end up with a book of her own, I’m just not sure yet.
7. Tell us about your process in writing. How much time do you devote to it, how long does it take you, from start to finish, to work through a draft? Do you start with an outline, or do you just write?
I devote one day a week, about eight hours during that day, to my writing. I normally choose to write on Sundays. During that time, I can write anywhere from 3,000 to 6,000 words. I like this process because I can prepare my mind all week long by thinking about the work. If I come up with ideas through the week, I have a small notebook and a tape recorder for documentation. This process takes me about four to five months to take a manuscript from outline to the end. I am devoted to my outline throughout the process and I leave plenty of room between lines to add notes. I like to think of my outline as a living and breathing document, it evolves over time just like my manuscript.
8. You live in a gorgeous part of the country! Has living where you live impacted your writing at all? If yes, how?
Living in Southeastern Kentucky has had a tremendous effect, I’m sure, on my writing. I remember back in my early 20s when I was a budding journalist here. I met David Dick, a former globe-trotting network news correspondent turned Kentucky author. I was so fascinated by him – he had been everywhere and had done everything I wanted to do. He had escaped the small town life and became a worldly journalist covering war, famine and political corruption. He was truly making a difference out there in the name of the First Amendment. During our conversation Mr. Dick could see the longing in my eyes to do what he did as a journalist. This is what he said to me: “I spent the first half of my life trying to get as far away from home as possible and the second half trying to get back.” Years went by before I finally, truly got that statement and then I understood. I never went around the world but I did work around the Midwest. I couldn’t wait to get home. Making a difference in the world isn’t nearly as satisfying as making a difference in your own community. I found that these mountains I see in every direction I turn are as much a part of me as my arms and legs. Without them, I am not a whole person and it always happens to turn up in my writing.
9. What projects are you working on now?
I am currently working on my next novel House of Cleaving. This is a story about a young woman who has lost everything she cares most about in life. As a means to escape her small town and the painful memories which haunt here there, Annie Cleaving attempts to sell the only home she has ever known. A small, white frame house bequeathed to her by her grandma Lillie before she passed away. When she finds out she is holding a faulty deed to the property, the adventure begins as she discovers and uncovers the mysteries of the Cleaving family. As it turns out, Annie has to visit 14 of her mother’s brothers and sisters. She finds out many things about her family and especially about her mother Millie, who died just one year ago.
10. You started out as a journalist and moved into fiction, both of which are ways of telling a story. Which medium do you enjoy more? If not, how is the experience of writing a novel different than crafting a non-fiction piece?
If I had to choose between journalistic writing and writing fiction, I would choose fiction every time. I love to lose myself in writing a good story – one of my own creation, right down to the most miniscule details. However, without my journalism training I fear I would never have the discipline I need to get much past the first page. Journalism dictates that the writer be creative on demand. For that reason, I can sit down on a Sunday and decide that I have to be creative on that day. I dig out my notes and recordings from the week and put myself in that moment of creativity. Some may say it’s forced but I believe it to be good training for all writers.
11. Thank so much for joining me today on Chaconne. Congratulations of your great reviews of Sister Blackberry, and where can we get hold of a copy?
Thank you so much for having me today on Chaconne. I truly appreciate the time you’ve spent with me talking about Sister Blackberry. For anyone wishing to acquire a copy, go to www.whiskeycreekpress.com and look for Sister Blackberry or go to www.amazon.com and type Sister Blackberry in the search. Please visit my Web site at www.melissanewman.net and look around, leave a review or send me an e-mail.
News for this month:
My new novel, The Garnetsword, from my new high fantasy series The Two Kingdoms, will be out February 15th, 2010. It is looking like we will wait and see about the print version, so head over to Whiskey Creek Press/Torrid, and check it out!
I am the featured author on writer Beverley Bateman's blog this month. Check out my crazy interview at http://www.beverleybateman.com/GuestAut
I will be interviewing other authors here on my blog, starting January 15th. Melissa Newman, author of Sister Blackberry, will be featured.
Until laterz!
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Harlequin responds to the brouhaha with a name change. Still hasn't gotten them out of the hot water with RWA and SFWA- until they completely cut ties with Author Solutions.
Oh the dramz!
The Harlequin debacle just gets better and better!The SWFA and MWA have joined RWA in denouncing Harlequin's decision to partner with the folks whgo own AuthorHouse in developing a subsidy deal that charges aspiring writers for editorial services, publishing, and marketing. My agent friend Carolyn Grayson has commented on it extensively on her blog as well.
See the SFWA response @ http://www.sfwa.org/2009/11/sfwa-stateme
SFWA also has alink to MWA's response as well: http://www.sfwa.org/2009/11/mwa-weighs-i
And Carolyn Grayson's blog at the Grayson agency: http://graysonagency.com/blog/
Basically, it is really difficult to self edit your own work. Any reputable publisher would never ask you to pay for editing or publishing services. But this is Harlequin we're talking about, who basically built the romance book industry and with whom there would really be now RWA as well. For RWA to no longe recognize Harlequin as a publisher is big news, and now that Harlequin is backpedaling (not quitting the venture with Horizons), expect the dramz to continue.
Better than General Hospital, I'm telling you!
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Caroline visits with award-winning Dark Roast Press author Jesse Fox this month!
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Ya'll need to check out this FREE sampler, edited by Ms. Charlotte Boyett-Campo of the Infinite Worlds of Fantasy Authors (IWOFA)- my work is in it as well as 15 other incredible speculative fiction authors. Good stuff! And it's FREE!
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