Guest Post by Carrie Aulenbacher, author of The Early Bird Café

For years, Jim and Eve have shared breakfast every morning at the Early Bird Café. Their constant friendship, however, is thrown into chaos when Jim begins writing his second novel.

Available on Amazon US and Amazon UK

As I walk around in this old café, it is not only the setting of my book, The Early Bird Café, but it is a haunt for me.  The worn linoleum floor squeaks familiarly under my feet, the mismatched salt and pepper sets among the tables fit just right in my hand.  Even the dated cash register makes me want to keep coming back here when I need some relief from the daily grind.  Such is the inner world that I visit as the setting of my debut novel.

People ask me how I wrote such a story.  They say they never knew I had all of this inside of me.  To me, it is not something that I created, but something that I’ve discovered inside of me over the years.  I feel more like an explorer at times when I write.  I am not bringing anything new to life, in my mind; I’m simply uncovering an inner world and reporting back to my readers with my findings.  I’ve trod these streets on snowy, dreary days, my hands thrust deep in my pockets to thwart the cold.  I’ve donned sunglasses to sneak a peek on hot afternoons, watching around the corners as my characters have gone on living out their lives.  I’ve listened to a hundred conversations between Jim and Eve while sitting in the very next booth, never writing anything down; just listening.

I find that, the more I immerse myself in their world and get to know them, the better I am able to document what they’re doing, what they’re saying and what they’re not saying.  So, I hate to disappoint those who insist that storyboards and outlines are the best way to go.  I’ve never used any.  There is no storyboard to map out one’s own life, and I find that such an approach doesn’t work for my characters in their own lives either.  I just let the chips fall where they may and I see how things unfold for them.

That’s why I feel that Jim’s journal entries are such a good fit for the format of my novel.  His entry at the end of every chapter is a sneak peek inside his mind much like my trips to the café are my sneak peek inside their world.  To get inside his head is just as important for the reader as those times I would watch him prowl these streets clad in his leather jacket like a sexy yet forlorn rock star.  As intimate as The Early Bird Café is, it is Jim’s journal that shows us just how much he hides from his best friend, Eve.

These hints at further mystery make me keep coming back here.  As we discover just how private Jim keeps his innermost thoughts from his very best friend, how much could he be hiding from me, his author?  I ponder this as I occupy the corner table and watch him cross the floor before me.  Easing into the booth, he opens that journal laconically while Cassie pours him a perfect cup of coffee.  He shirks the leather jacket from his broad shoulders, revealing a tight shirt that leaves nothing to the imagination.  This author can see his mind working out something.  Running his hand over an unshaved jaw, the pen begins a sentence in the journal in front of him but hesitates, then stops. 

I watch his eyes glaze over as he stares out the window.  He chews his lip absentmindedly.  Dropping the pen for his cup of coffee, he runs a hand through his luscious brown curls, oblivious to me.  This is why I became a writer.  Because there are characters like this living in the inner world in my head that I don’t fully know - yet I just can’t resist.  I have to know.  What makes a guy like Jim tick?  Why is he the man that he is?  And who can save him?

Eve comes in the door, and one can almost sense his aura change.  It is clear there is something mysterious about her that he is trying to unlock with his own writing.  She’s got something that makes his eyes dance and his smile broaden.  I feel a smug satisfaction at realizing that, for all the secrets he still hides, there is yet another who holds an ultimate secret from him.

As the author of this unique love story, I can’t wait to come back and watch it all unfold.

Carrie Aulenbacher

# # #

About the Author 

Carrie Aulenbacher was born and raised in Erie, PA, and currently works at one of the largest locally owned logistics companies in the tri-state area where she has enjoyed varied roles duties as an Administrative Assistant / Tax Clerk / Social Media Coordinator for the past 15 years. Although The Early Bird Cafe is her first publication, Carrie has had a lifelong love of writing.  On her website www.carrieaulenbacher.com you’ll find some freebies of short stories and poems she has written over the years.  In her spare time, Carrie is a full-time mommy who loves collecting old books, exploring her nearby woods, growing tons in her flower gardens and treasure hunting in the local antique shops. You can find Carrie on Facebook and follow her on Twitter @Aully1 

Guest Post ~ ImagiNation Unveiled: The Hidden Realm, by Judy Probus

"A fascinating fantasy novel ... reading this book felt very much like I was watching an episode of Avatar meets Indiana Jones in space." - MuggleNet.com, the #1 Harry Potter website 

"I think this could have the potential to be this generation's answer to The Never Ending Story!" - NarniaFans.com 

Available on Amazon US and Amazon UK

Across the Cosmos spins a once peaceful planet now under siege by an evil sorceress, an exiled member of the royal family, and thousands of soldiers in the army they wield.

In a last ditch effort, the oldest member of the benevolent empire scans the solar system for help. He locates three earthlings who he believes are uniquely capable of completing a secret mission with Zhii, the Imperor’s daughter.

The fate of the universe hinges on unlikely shoulders. The quartet is tasked with finding and assembling the Crystal Heart, a mysterious and powerful weapon that was broken and scattered throughout the ImagiNation centuries ago. Their adventure takes them on a quest to the four corners of the alien planet where magic, danger, and fantastical creatures lurk. But even if they succeed in their quest for the Crystal Heart, they must use it against their evil foes in an epic battle that is destined to take place on the Crystal Castle’s front lawn.

In a world of such skepticism, where what can be seen or touched is paramount, only the youngest at heart or those with extraordinary imaginations could believe a descendant of the most elite line of dragons survives… Each inquisitive soul must decide if they dare to believe a dragon-sized tale that spins mortals, aliens, sorcery, and fantastical creatures together…

Thanks for inviting me to your site, Tony. Hikari Ryuu (Ryuu), my dragon, and I are happy to have landed in such a wonderful place. Above is the synopsis on the back cover of the novel and a short snippet from inside the supplement that contains backstories, a map of the ImagiNation, and sketches of several main characters.

I met my dragon on a flight to New York. The beauty of the skies sparked my creative muse like never before. I returned home with the determination to write a novel. Later that week, while waiting at a stoplight, I envisioned my dragon sitting on my steering wheel! The other characters formed in my mind shortly thereafter.

My YA fantasy/adventure story is about young people from two worlds who face extraordinary circumstances without possessing innate superpowers. They must solve a series of rhymes and use the Ancient Ways on their quest to find a powerful ancient Crystal Heart. Instead of relying on technology, they must rely on the power of their imaginations, courage, ingenuity, and faith in one another in order to save the universe from destruction.

In real life, young people face many challenges these days yet they possess some of the world’s most potent imaginations, which I believe to be the most powerful and under-appreciated renewable resource in the universe. Krycling the ice monster; Vargon the ogre of the forest; his minions the Stump Dwellers; Master Mantis the crystal wizard; Vahdeema the evil sorceress; the magical Itz; Dillywogs; the space-age Trolls; and of course, Hikari Ryuu, the courageous young dragon are just some of the fantastical characters readers of the book will have fun discovering.

Imagine on!

Judy Probus

# # #

About the Author

Judy Probus is the author of the adventure fantasy novel ImagiNation Unveiled: The Hidden Realm. Her husband Bill and extended family reside in Kentucky, “The Unbridled State” – a perfect place and state of mind for a writer of adventure fantasy tales. Judy possesses a B.S. and Masters in Education, experience in the performing arts and teaching, and has volunteered countless hours in the local school system. Besides writing, Judy enjoys reading, listening to music, watching sports and movies, gardening, traveling, and learning new things about Earth and beyond. Discover Judy’s imagination and what inspires her to write at ImagiNationUnveiled.com and follow her on Twitter @JudyProbus

Guest Post by Bob Van Laerhoven, Author of Baudelaire's Revenge

Everyone is guilty of something - the only mystery is,

to what degree?

Winner of the Hercule Poirot Prize for best crime novel of the year

Available on Amazon US and Amazon UK

YOU DON’T SEDUCE INSPIRATION, INSPIRATION SEDUCES YOU

We Flemings love our pubs and  our world-famous monastery beers.  They fuel a lot of, eh, cultural discussions.  And, in my case, a variety of what I could term “friendly but boisterous insults of the author.” Someone blows his alcoholic fumes in my face and delivers a target line, more or less like this: “Thirty-five books published in thirty-three years? If I was a fulltime author like you, for sure I would publish even more books, and they would be a lot better and sell much more than yours! You know why? Eh? Because I would write them utterly wasted! Alcoholic fluid is excellent for a fluent style! Rodeo-style! Fast and dirty! What a life you have, you lucky bastard! Writing isn’t like…like…working as I have to do.”

Sigh.

My standard answer in those cases, delivered with utmost dignity, is: “And what would you write about?”  Their standard answer usually goes like this: “Eh….I would think of something! Anything! Eh… Something commercial! Romance, love, sex, mayhem, murder, a villain you would like to tear to pieces with your bare hands, eh….I would think and think until I’ve found something.”

Sometimes, when I’m in the mood, I try to explain them that you don’t seduce inspiration by thinking. Inspiration seduces you when you allow her. The Muse demands a clear head and an intimate connection with your own brain. Okay, I admit, that last part of the sentence sounds weird. And it isn’t that I have gulped down a few monastery beers (world- famous!).

Still, it is kind of like that.

I have to be open in order to find my theme.

Or better: I have to be open so that my theme can find me.

Receptive, that is what a writer should be when a theme knocks at his door.

It so happens that a few days ago, I finished my new novel: “De schaduw van de Mol” (The Shadow of the Mole). So I spent a few evenings in various very Flemish cafés to celebrate this happy feat. I had a bunch of, eh, cultural discussions. Truth is: they become boring after a few days. Therefore, I’m on the look-out for a new theme. It’s like a fever that’s slowly building up.

There are writers who complain about “writer’s block.”  Or how hard it is these days to find a real good theme. Maybe they’re not curious enough. When I was little, my mother used to call me in sturdy Flemish a curieuzeneuzemosterdpot. It’s an untranslatable word – just try to say it out loud phonetically, heehaw - but it means that I am dreadfully curious.

A talent for a writer, I assure you.

In my view, you must not only be curious but also passionate about something if you want to write something worthwhile. Although this is an era where for the most part literature has degraded to mere entertainment, I’m a stubborn little guy and I like to think that literature has the ability to say something meaningful about the human condition. 

Authors can use stories as a vehicle to probe the vast universe of the human mind. I like my novels to have a social angle: individual lives caught up in broad social currents, often upheavals in tense times. All I have to do to find that angle is to listen, read and watch empathically. Then the rest follows as sure as day and night.

An example.

Only yesterday, a female journalist told me about her recent experiences in the metro of Algiers when she travelled after eight o’clock pm from station Haï El-badr to station El-Hamma. Let me give her the stage in her own words: “I was correctly dressed: a beige dress reaching to my ankles, a sweater that covered my arms and a shawl around my hair. I was hardly wearing any make-up.  At Haï El-badr, I nipped my train, had to wait for the next one. I was alone on the quay. A young man wearing a police uniform came up to me. Without  any hesitation, he said: “Are you not afraid to be here alone at this time of the evening? Be careful: you could be molested.” I told him I thought that Algeria was not like India or Egypt where women can be raped in broad daylight.  He tried to reassure me, but at the same time he asked for my mobile number because he thought I was assez jolie (very handsome).

“Once in the train, I noticed I was the only unaccompanied woman in the carriage.  In the station Amirouche a bunch of adolescents got on board and immediately started to harass me. An older man intervened but when the young freaks had backed off, he reproached me harshly: was I mad or stupid? In the eyes of those thugs  I was  une catin, a prostitute,  being alone on the metro at this hour instead of being home and tending for my man and children.

 “Out of the metro, going to my friend’s house, only a two minutes walk, two times men asked me what my price was for half an hour. At last standing before my friend’s door, another hissed something behind my back and shot me a menacing glance when I looked over my shoulder. Luckily, the door opened. I stumbled inside…”

Listening to her story, seeing her outrage, feeling her pain and confusion, something stirred in me.

A flicker.

A connection deep in the subconscious regions of the mind.

The beginning of a story.

A novel?

We’ll see. Let it brew.

But one thing is certain: inspiration is seducing me.

Again.

Thank God.

Bob Van Laerhoven

# # # 

Visit Bob's Website http://www.bobvanlaerhoven.be/en  and find him on Twitter @bobvanlaerhoven 

Book Launch ~ A Lady at Willowgrove Hall, by Sarah E. Ladd

Her secret cloaks her in isolation and loneliness. His secret traps him in a life that is not his own.

Available on Amazon US and Amazon UK

Darbury, England, 1819

Cecily Faire carries the shame of her past wherever she treads, knowing one slip of the tongue could expose her disgrace. But soon after becoming a lady’s companion at Willowgrove Hall, Cecily finds herself face-to-face with a man well-acquainted with the past she’s desperately hidden for years.

Nathaniel Stanton has a secret of his own—one that has haunted him for years and tied him to his father’s position as steward of Willowgrove Hall. To protect his family, Nathaniel dares not breathe a word of the truth. But as long as the shadow looms over him, he’ll never be free to find his own way in the world. He’ll never be free to fall in love.

When the secrets swirling within Willowgrove Hall come to light, Cecily and Nathaniel must confront a painful choice: Will they continue running from the past . . . or will they stand together and fight for a future without the suffocating weight of secrets long kept?

A Lady at Willowgrove Hall  ~ Litfuse Giveaway

One grand prize winner will receive:

• A Kindle Fire HDX
• A Lady at Willowgrove Hall by Sarah E. Ladd

Enter today by clicking the icon below. Giveaway open to US and Canadian residents only and  ends on November 2nd. Winner will be announced November 3rd here.

# # #

About the Author

Sarah E. Ladd has always loved the Regency period — the clothes, the music, the literature and the art. A college trip to England and Scotland confirmed her interest in the time period and gave her idea of what life would’ve looked like in that era. However, it wasn’t until 2010 that she started writing seriously. Her latest release, A Lady at Willowgrove Hall is the third and final release in the Whispers on the Moors series. Sarah has over ten years of strategic marketing and brand management experience, including five years of marketing non-fiction books and three years of marketing the musical arts. She lives in Indiana with her husband and daughter - and very lovable Golden Retriever. Find out more at her website www.sarahladd.com and find Sarah on Twitter @SarahLaddAuthor

Guest Post ~ The Devereaux Dilemma, by Steve McEllistrem

 

In a future where religion and disease have brought social order to the verge of collapse, and where some humans have been biologically and others mechanically enhanced, Jeremiah Jones must find the one man

who might be able to fix everything.

Available from Amazon US and Amazon UK

I’ve long loved the science fiction classics, like Dune, Foundation, Rendezvous with Rama and Fahrenheit 451. But I didn’t start out writing science fiction. I began with fantasies, westerns, mysteries, thrillers and literary fiction, none of which I published. I’ve also written legal books, newsletters and articles for many years. Those pay the bills but don’t provide the sort of comfort a good piece of fiction does.

The Devereaux Dilemma didn’t start as science fiction, but as a philosophical novel. I was curious about what would happen if someone proved there was no God. I thought that would be a fascinating question to explore. However, most of the people I discussed it with hated the idea of such a proof, so I was forced to re-think the concept and eventually I transformed it into a futuristic story about the nature of religion and its place in our society.

I thought at first that The Devereaux Dilemma would be a single book exploring the question of faith, but I realized as I was writing it that I had a much deeper story to tell, something that required a trilogy. And I wanted to write it as science fiction because the very best science fiction serves as a commentary on the present. It provides us with a warning of where we’re headed, showing us possible futures if we don’t change our direction.

I also wanted to write realistic science fiction. Hyper drive and aliens don’t really interest me. I’d much rather explore where humanity is going, what we will be in fifty or a hundred years. We may be less than a century from the point where we can create humans of any sort we like. Already many of us have non-human parts in us or genetically enhanced parts. When do we stop becoming human and become something else, something new? When will our growing understanding of how the mind works allow for unscrupulous people in power to manipulate our minds?

With my background in legal writing, it would be natural for me to warn of what we might become in an essay or article that is grounded in facts and predictions, based on our collective history.

But one thing I’ve learned through all my years of writing is that it’s the characters who make the story what it is. Detailed descriptions of technology are meaningless without the connection to what is human in all of us. Reading statistics about the holocaust, for example, one can easily fall into a jaded mindset. The numbers are too vast, the deprivations too horrifying to fully grasp. Yet when you put that into the context of one well-defined life, you understand it much more completely.

Think about how deaths in faraway places hit us compared to the loss of a loved one. It’s never the same. Yes, it’s terrible that all those people were killed by terrorists in Syria or Iraq or New York City, but if you don’t live there, if you don’t have friends or family there, it doesn’t have the same impact as the tragic death of someone close to you.

That’s where fiction generates its power. That’s why a science fiction novel with great characters can have a much greater impact than gloom-and-doom predictions from some physicist or social scientist. We grow attached to those characters and root for them, agonize with their defeats and cheer their victories.

So The Devereaux Dilemma and The Devereaux Disaster, though occasionally dark, also offer up hope. The future is not completely dystopic in my writing. It is firmly grounded in a world much like the one we live in today, with good and bad elements. I want to show readers my vision because I want them to think about where we’re headed and if we should be moving in that direction. Forewarned is forearmed.

Steve McEllistrem

# # #

About the Author 

Steve McEllistrem is the author of The Devereaux Dilemma, which was a finalist for the 2014 International Book Awards, and The Devereaux Disaster, released in May 2014. The conclusion to the trilogy, The Devereaux Decision, is due out in January 2015.

He has also written dozens of legal books, including Higher Education Law in America and Deskbook Encyclopedia of Employment Law. In addition, he is a producer and co-host of Write On! Radio on KFAI in Minneapolis and St. Paul. Find out more at www.mcellistrem.com and find Steve on Twitter @SteveMcEllis

Guest Post by Author Russ Hall ~ What Fuels the Story!

Retired sheriff's detective Al Quinn hasn't spoken to his brother, Maury, in twenty years but when Maury lands in the hospital under suspicious circumstances, Al reluctantly has to investigate. Al learns the hard way who he can trust - and who's willing to do whatever it takes to succeed.

With everything he loves on the line, Al will find out just how far he'll go

to protect his own.

Available on Amazon US and Amazon UK

People coming early to writing often ask, “Where will I get my ideas? What will motivate me as I write?” Slightly more experienced writers (and even they are always learning, if they’re good) may say that there is an easy answer, but it can tend to sound magical or mystic at first. I’m talking about the “creative experience.”

No matter what you write, whether story, novel, song, or poem, you’re going to eventually leave some of yourself on the page. It doesn’t matter how you start out, if you stay at your writing you will start putting things that you think about and that matter to you on the page. You’ll go back later and see that it is often the good stuff in the story, because you felt it and imbued it with emotion.

Now I like to start a story with a point of tension, one that lets characters have an arena to show the reader something about themselves. I have read about Mexican cartel violence in the news, getting more brutal and closer to where I live, and I worry about how a local drought may lead to heightened chances of huge wildfires, again happening closer to where I live. I feel emotional about these things, so I use them. They pop into the book because I’m thinking about them. They interest me, and they should interest readers.

Then I need to think about characters in this setting. I recently retired and really enjoy my solitary times alone. I’ve lived by myself for quite a while and am used to it, and uncomfortable out of it. So I ask myself, “How would I feel if that got disturbed? If someone, or even more than one person, were thrust into that space?” I feel an emotion about that, so I use it.

In To Hell and Gone in Texas, I got to draw on a setting I like, which is peaceful but could be threatened. I got to draw on personal characteristics. I do feed the deer that crowd around my front office window each morning, I do fish, and I play chess by myself (sad to admit that last one).

We all of us like to feel comfortable and protected, which is why there is nothing cozier than reading an action-filled book full of danger while sitting in a favorite chair at home. When something threatens us, when we are yanked out of our comfort zones, and when we are suddenly pulled into danger where we are way over our heads, we can feel strong emotions.

I try to use that in every way possible, the way I feel presented in a way with which the reader can resonate. As you enter the process of writing your story, or poem for that matter, you may start with one sense of what you’re writing and find, as you draw more and more upon your experiences, values, interests, ambitions that you are weaving together characters who matter, a setting the helps drive your story, and raising issues about which you feel strongly.

In the process of writing, you will also know more and more about your characters and their dilemmas, and that will help the story stay engaging as you create complex people and situations. I’m a believer that to some extent I have to become at least part of each character, understand how everything feels from his or her perspective. In my case, it’s easier to understand some of the issues and aspects of male characters. But stretching hard to understand how I would feel from the female point of view is invaluable in making dialogue that matters in every line.

This where the “trust me” part comes in. Go ahead and leap into that story with whatever germ it takes to get you going—something you heard in the media or at the hair salon. Then let your inner self loose as you write. Ride the creative experience by letting pieces of yourself happen on the page. Once you get used to it, the process won’t seem mysterious at all. It’s just how writing often works.

Russ Hall 

# # #

About the Author

A writer of mysteries, thrillers, westerns, poetry, and nonfiction books, Russ Hall has had more than twenty books published. He has been an editor for major publishing companies, ranging from Harper & Row (now HarperCollins), Simon & Schuster, to Pearson. He lives in Lago Vista, TX, where he hikes, fishes, and tends a herd of deer that visit daily to peep in the office window and help with the writing. In 2011 he was awarded Sage Award, by The Barbara Burnett Smith Mentoring Authors Foundation--an award for the mentoring author who demonstrates an outstanding spirit of service in mentoring, sharing and leading others in the mystery writing community. In 1996 he won the Nancy Pickard Mystery Fiction Award for short fiction. In 2014 he won First Place in the Austin International Poetry Festival. Find out more at his website www.russhall.com/

Book review ~ Paris Syndrome by Tahir Shah

On the morning of her fifth birthday, Miki Suzuki’s aged grandfather gave her an unusual gift – the fragment of a story. The tale told of a magical realm where all the women were beautiful, dressed in the finest gowns, and where the men had the looks of movie stars. The trees were covered in ivory-white blossom all year round, and

 everyone was joyful and proud. This place, young Miki learned,

was a city in far off Europe – a city called Paris.

Available from Amazon US and AmazonUK

Touching, exciting, lyrical and amusing, the adventures of a Japanese girl in Paris had my full attention from page one. I was reading the Kindle version and even the fact that there are an astounding 173 chapters didn’t stop me. Perfect for reading on portable devices, during those ‘grabbed’ moments of escapism, every chapter of Paris Syndrome has an appropriately haiku-like quality.

I could feel the innocent wonder of our heroine, Miki Suzuki, at her first sight of Paris. I shared her desire to complete the simple task she had promised for her grandfather, which is of course frustrated at every turn.

Tahir Shah has an engaging style, a convincing knowledge of Japanese culture and delights in breaking the ‘rules’ of novel writing. Coincidences and misunderstandings wittily keep up the pace and even the smallest characters are wonderfully observed. I particularly identified with the unlikely hero, Michi Kinjo, an erstwhile reporter prepared to do just about anything to have a desk by the window of his office at the Asahi Shimbun (Morning Sun) newspaper.

Paris Syndrome is a book you will happily re-read and still discover something I promise you won’t find anywhere else. Highly recommended!

  

Tony Riches 

# # #

About the Author

Tahir Shah lives in Casablanca, Morocco, with his wife. The author of fifteen books, many of which chronicle his journeys through Africa, Asia and the Americas, they have appeared in thirty languages and in more than seventy editions. He says there is nothing so important as deciphering the hidden underbelly of the lands through which he travels. He also makes documentary films, which are shown worldwide on National Geographical Television and The History Channel. Find out more at Tahir’s website www.tahirshah.com/ and find him on Twitter @HumanStew.