Category Archives: Book planning

Thoughts about works in progress and how they develop. Back stories that may be interesting to the readers and some of the character development.

Holiday Free Book Promotion is Live

Hi, Guys!

As the holidays approach, we all get busier and busier with cooking, shopping, and visiting with friends. I hope you’re ready for it. Here’s a book giveaway that some great writers are giving to you. Read on for details.

Exciting Book Giveaway!

Starting today, November 21st, and running through January 7th, the Galactic Greetings & Happy Holidays 2019 group giveaway will be live on Prolific Works. I’m thrilled to have two of my stories, my full-length novel Time Walker and my short story, The Wizard’s Gift included in this giveaway that features over 25 authors. Together, we are offering over 40 eBooks or eBook samples for free. To download, simply go to this linkChoose your books and download them. You may sign up for the author’s mailing list or not. It’s up to you.

About Time Walker:

For Mali Harper, getting in the time monitoring unit of TIM (Time Integrity Management) is the first step to realizing her dreams and building relationships. When an opportunity presents itself, she has a chance to make a big leap.

A growing time anomaly requires a Time Adjuster team to go back to the 18th century to correct the situation by whatever means necessary. Failure could mean the end of everything humanity has built in the future, including the space station Mali is living on. As an era expert, she is added to the team, but she isn’t trained for fieldwork yet. Now, they must hope that her adaptability and knowledge are enough to save the future.

Time Walker is the first book of a trilogy that combines time travel with the steam-driven era in an exciting story that keeps you guessing. If you enjoy time travel novels with punches of action and adventure, then this book is for you. Pick up your free copy during this giveaway.

About The Wizard’s Gift

When his kingdom is threatened by a powerful wizard, a Wizard King must conjure a method to leave his knowledge to his heirs. Calling on his skills, he devises a unique plan.

The Wizard’s Gift is a fantasy short story to be enjoyed by teenagers to adults of all ages.

That’s it for this short post. I hope you will enjoy a happy holiday season and will pick up some books to read. They make wonderful presents.

Lily

In the throes of NaNo & other news

First off, I can’t believe I haven’t blogged since August before I went to the World Science Fiction Convention! Well, I have been busy, but most of it has been catching up after that incredible trip.

Photo: Lily on bus tour
My first day in Dublin included a High Tea Bus Tour of the city. Isn’t this a clever idea?

World Science Fiction Convention in Dublin

Photo: Dublin Liffey riverside
The tilted building is the Dublin Exposition Hall where the main convention was held. My hotel room was about six blocks away on the east side of the Liffey River.

The convention was great although somewhat exhausting. So many panels and things to do. I loved the concert featuring music from various science fiction films. Awesome musicians. Costume contest was amazing. Dublin fandom outdid themselves to make this a fantastic convention. The biggest drawback was that the art show and a few other things, including George R.R. Martin signing autographs, were in a different building several blocks away. I never made it down there. With so many people and multiple panels at the same time, you had to choose wisely.

Photo: Poulnabrone portal tomb in the Burren of Ireland.
Poulnabrone is an amazing Neolithic portal tomb situated on the Burren in western Ireland. It is smaller than I imagined it as the location makes it look huge in photographs. Still very impressive.

I spent an additional two weeks  in Ireland, rented a car – will not do that again – and drove to the west coast where I did a little research and enjoyed the beauty of the country. This was my fourth trip to Eire over the past forty years. The last time I’d been over was in 1989, and I can say the place has changed considerably. Many more people, cities growing bigger, but at the heart of the towns, it is still the same Ireland.  Unfortunately, it was also the wettest August they’d experienced in many years, or so the locals told me.  I was rained on most every day and the Galway area experienced heavy rains. And cold… it was cold!

An amazing experience over all and I had a grand time. I enjoyed the welcome of several bed and breakfast places and renewed my spirit while I was there.

NaNoWriMo Begins

Starting in late October, I attempted to plot the second book in my Time Threads series with an eye to having it out in late Spring. It didn’t go as smoothly as I hoped, so I leaped into NaNoWriMo with a poor plan. In spite of that, I did complete the challenge of 50 thousand words on November 15th, so that is true to form for the past few years I’ve been doing it. I am still working on the book and hope to complete the first draft by the end of the month.

I have three other novels that are drafts that I need to either rewrite or edit before I can publish them, so I hope to focus on one of them over the next couple of months before I begin editing the book I’m working on now. I will be busy, busy.

Book Giveaway

I am thrilled to be part of another great Science Fiction and Fantasy Giveaway on Prolific Works that will begin on November 21st and run through January 22nd. This is a great opportunity to pick up some terrific science fiction and fantasy novels, including Time Walker, the first book of my Time Threads trilogy.  I’ll send out a blast when the giveaway goes live so you can go check out the 40+ books available.  I also have my short story, The Wizard’s Gift in the giveaway, so if you haven’t read it yet, you can grab it then.

I’m looking forward to the holidays and I’ll tell you all about my Game of Thrones tour that I did in Ireland. I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving, if you celebrate, and a very merry holiday season. Winter is definitely coming.

 

Urban Fantasy Giveaway & Cover Reveal

Here we are at the end of March. The month came in like a lion and today is lamb-like calm and sunny for the most part. The past few days are suggesting that spring has finally arrived in my part of the world (Reno, Nevada) but I know as soon as my pear tree blooms another freezing, windy storm will be along. Never fails.

But I am here to let you know that I am doing another book giveaway!

Giveaway!

I am thrilled to have one of my novels, Funeral Singer: A Song for Marielle, be part of a month-long giveaway for paranormal and urban fantasy starter books in a series. This begins tomorrow,  April 1st, and runs until April 30th. That means you have the whole month to check out the link (click on the picture above) and choose as many of the books offered as you’d like to read. We have 32 books in the giveaway, so hop over there and pick out a few to read…or take all of them!

Of course, I hope you will download and read my book, A Song for Marielle, which is the first book of my five-book series. The series is complete, so if you like it, you can find the other four on all the major stores.

Meet Gillian Foster–

A struggling musician, Gillian hopes to parlay her talent into a successful career. But a blow to the head, throws a wrinkle in her plans. A request to play for a funeral leads to a starling discovery. She can talk to the dearly departed while singing.

As she sings, she is spiritually transported to an ethereal graveyard where she finds a confused spirit who needs guidance. She can speak with the man and can even guide him to the next level. Okay, no problem. But this odd ability can also lead her to more trouble than she could have imagined as one of her spirit clients demands her assistance in locating the person who killed her.

Gillian draws the interest of a sheriff’s detective, who thinks she may be connected to the case. If that’s not enough, she also draws the murderer’s interest. Will she be able to fulfill her promise to the spirit and save her own life?

Reader comments for this book:

“I must say, it’s been a while since I’ve had a book keep me up at night. I read this book in three days. It’s a well-written tale and has an unusual plot. The main character is relatable and likable. The secondary characters are well drawn as well. It did get scary so…” J. Turner

” I once read that a good book or movie is defined by the ending whether one cares about what will happen to the characters when it’s done. “Funeral Singer: A Song for Marielle…” gave me that feeling and therefore I recommend this book to anyone and everyone and can’t wait for the next installment!!!”

Warning, this book does contain some sexual abuse, so take that into consideration.

Click on the image above for my universal link to the second book, “A Song for Menafee” at Draft2Digital.

For the entire month, I am lowering my price for the digital books in the series by $1.00, so it’s a great time to buy them. They are all available on Amazon as well as Nook, Apple, Kobo and other formats. The first book will not be free on Amazon, so use the link for the giveaway to download it.

New Book Cover Reveal

I am also revealing the cover of my new book that will be coming out in early May, Time Walker. Isn’t that cover gorgeous? The incredibly-talented Barb Hoeter at Coverinked.com created it. I absolutely love it. My novel is a time travel fantasy with a touch of steampunk. More on that when I’m ready to release it.

 

Hope it’s looking sunny where you are. Be sure to check out the Urban Fantasy Series Starters giveaway.

FREE Giveaway is counting down…

Happy cold February. It seems like just about everywhere is getting hit with winter storms. Even Las Vegas is shimmering under a pretty decent dusting of snow. When I lived there, I think I only experienced one dusting of it. Reno, on the other hand, has been getting pretty good snowfall this month. We’ve had nine storms come in although the first two were heavy rain in the city while the mountains took the brunt of it. The Sierras are entirely coated with the white stuff and look gorgeous.

Postcard imageBut I digress… I am actually wanting to remind you that the Light Up the Galaxy free science fiction and fantasy giveaway only has five days left for you to go check out the books offered and grab yourself a free copy of a few of them. My book, O’Ceagan’s Legacy, the full novel, is available for free.

One of the hardest things for a writer to do is get noticed amid the tremendous number of authors publishing now. So, this giveaway is a way to combine the power of all the participating authors to try to reach more readers, so we invite all of our readers to explore the books offered. No obligations, but if you do read and enjoy the books, a review would be greatly appreciated. It really does help others to connect with the books.

So, please, before this promotion ends on February 26th, go out and download a few books that sound interesting to you.

Free Books Giveaway and Paperback Release

 

Science Fiction and Fantasy Book Giveaway!

Hey, gang! I am absolutely thrilled to have my Sci-Fi fantasy book O’Ceagan’s Legacy included in this Sixty Book Giveaway on Prolific Works that begins tomorrow and runs through the 26th. This is a great opportunity to pick up not only my complete novel, but many other great reads by many fantastic genre authors.

The link to the book promotion on Prolific Works is:
https://claims.prolificworks.com/gg/AvgPVwcjQH0JNucChWwW

Check it out and grab yourself some good books for FREE!  While you’re at it, nab a copy of O’Ceagan’s Legacy. If you like it, please consider leaving a review to help others find it, Besides, I want to know if you’re enjoying it or not.

Photo: Book Cover“Destiny doesn’t always unfold the way you think it will.”

Sometimes a legacy is little more than a noble name or title, or it’s something more tangible and valuable.  For Grania O’Ceagan, her family’s legacy may prove more extraordinary than she ever expected.

On Earth, the last of the O’Ceagan family on the planet dies. The spirit tasked with announcing death to this particular bloodline completes the rites for the old woman, then makes an unprecedented decision as she turns her eyes to the stars.

When her grandfather takes ill, Grania captains the family space freighter on a routine run from Erinnua to Earth.  Picking up passengers wasn’t a part of the plan, but it will add to the profitability of the trip. A ship-threatening event during a jump and the motives of her passengers test Grania’s training and judgment in an emergency that could destroy all of them. Does she have what it takes to save her ship and crew?

O’Ceagan’s Legacy is a fun space fantasy with action, adventure, and a touch of romance.

Reader comments:
  “I really enjoyed this!  The Rolling Stones with Space Banshees and a healthy dose of cozy mystery stirred in, done up in a style reminiscent of Mercedes Lackey!”

“Loved mixing star travel and the Fae.”

“This was a fun mix of paranormal and sci-fi, legend and future. I liked the concept and thought it was well carried out.”

In other news… my recent release in this same universe, In Strange Waters, is now available in paperback on Amazon.com

In Strange Waters

Book Cover: In Strange WatersFor a shape shifter stranded on a distant world, water is life itself; the main thing that makes his self-imposed exile tolerable.

But Dari soon learns the waters of Erinnua are not like the seas of Earth. The sea life appears twisted and distorted. Swimming in it feels unnatural to his water horse form as he finds it disturbing and dangerous. Even the dominant underwater species may be suffering from the effects of a terrible human-caused accident. In fact, all life on the planet may be at risk if what he fears is true.

Can Dari convince the human colonists of the danger and work with them to prevent the disaster threatening their world?
Set in the same universe as O’Ceagan’s Legacy, this tale takes the reader on an adventure with the shape-shifting puca as he explores his new home.

Want to read this book for free? Adding a little more excitement to the free book promotion, I will be making the eBook version of In Strange Waters free for five days in February beginning the 13th.

By the way, if you have Kindle Unlimited, you can read In Strange Waters for free right now!