Elven Warriors, Cover, and a Birthday!

What better birthday gift can I give to one of my team members and all around AWESOME person, Sheri Velarde, than to share with my equally terrific followers the cover and a quick introduction to her upcoming book, Quest for Redemption.

So Happy Birthday and Reveal Day, Sheri!

Synopsis

The fate of the realms rests on the hands of an elven princess yet to prove herself and an orphan just learning his powers. 

Zanna is an elven warrior princess, who seems to have it all, yet really has nothing. Her fate is not in her own hands. Instead, it is bound to an ancient magic she has no control over. She wants to rule the elves, yet must prove herself worthy before she is accepted. She also wants to find her mate, but after two thousand years, didn't hold much hope. 

Her existence has become mundane, and she craves something new. A routine assignment suddenly turns into something bigger that could ruin all of them. Is she strong enough to save the world and find her own happiness too? Can she change and help change the fate of the world with her? 

Will is an orphan who has always been confused by his strangeness. He keeps himself apart, separate from those around him. A chance meeting with a remarkable woman changes everything. He not only learns about himself, but about a whole other world that he is a part of by birthright. 

However the father that abandoned him as an infant stands to ruin his future and the future of the world unless he can be stopped. Will and Zanna must face loved ones who work against them and their past as well as find the strength to fight a bigger enemy and save the realms from evil. 

Can love, friendship, family, and acceptance defeat evil before it brings the realms crashing down? Can Zanna prove herself worthy to rule the kingdom?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sounds great, RIGHT! Now here's the gorgeous cover that goes with this exciting story!

 I absolutely love it...don't you?

So who is Sheri Velarde, how can you follow her and know when you can pre-order this book?

Read On!

Sheri Velarde is an author, artist, independent comic creator and jewelry designer out of Albuquerque, New Mexico. She is a creative soul with eclectic taste and style when it comes to her art and writing. Sheri is a multi-publisher romance author who is now branching into fantasy as well with her Defender of the Realms series. When not creating (which her fiancé argues is never), Sheri can be found spending time with her fiancé and their two dogs, reading, watching fantasy movies, attending metal concerts and just taking time to stop and enjoy life.
You can view Sheri’s work on her website/blog: http://sherivelarde.weebly.com/, on her Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Sheri-VelardeKelly-Ryan/, and on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Sher_V.

Quest for Redemption will be out on Three Worlds Press soon!

RELEASE DAY for Eye of the Storm, Book 4 of the Kelli Storm series

Over the last week, I have featured an excerpt from Eye of the Storm and an interview with its author, Kenneth Hoss.

TODAY, Eye of the Storm goes live on Amazon:

Get your copy here: Eye of the Storm

No Kindle?  Dowload the free eReader app to your computer, tablet or phone from the FREE Reading Apps page at Amazon

UPDATE: What Has REALLY Been Going On! and SALE

THROUGH 7/31, DARK DEALINGS IS ON SALE FOR THE KINDLE AND NOOK FOR $1.49. LET'S PUT UP SOME NUMBERS FOR KICK CANCER OVERBOARD!

Have been MIA for two weeks.  My apologies.  But it has been a crazy time, mostly good. I have been on interviewed on the radio and in the newspaper, scheduled another radio interview, held one major and two minor book signings.  On July 17^th I was interviewed by Bert Baron of WCTC.AM radio 1450 which covers central New Jersey. It was a lot of fun and Bert was terrific.  What was even more exciting was when I found out that my interview followed Bert’s interview with Joe Piscopo, of SNL and other fame.

The following day was my first major book signing courtesy of the Draft House in Long Branch New Jersey. If you have never done or attended a book signing in a pub, you are missing out.  It is fun to have readers and supporters stay and hang out to talk to you and each other.  In the case of this event, I was hosting it as a benefit for Kick Cancer Overboard (KCO), a local charity that sends cancer survivors and their families on cruise to help restore the soul and celebrate life.

During the month of July, I am donating 50% of my royalties from ALL sales, print or eBook, to KCO.  

SO THERE IS STILL TIME TO HELP KICK CANCER OVERBOARD. On the 18^th, I also had a wonderful array of donated gifts and gift baskets to raffle off for KCO. And it was a great success despite the thunderstorms that blew through just as we were getting started.  Some thought that the storms were appropriate for a Dark Dealings event.  Many of those who did not come because of power failures or downed trees have reached out to me since to purchase signed books.

I now have at least two other book signings in the works, not including the local Barnes and Noble that has asked me to get the book warehoused by B&N, so he can have a signing for me.  For the writers among my readers, I publish my print edition through Createspace, a division of Amazon.  As a result, Dark Dealings is listed in the Ingram catalog. But because the initial listing shows it as POD (Print On Demand) the store manager cannot stock it or sponsor a signing.  He pointed me to place on the B&N website where I could find the paperwork to get the book warehoused.  It is a 2-4 month process. I hope to have it ready for Halloween (crosses fingers).  I have also been asked to appear closer to Halloween on another radio program that covers the western New Jersey area.

Then there is the deferred graduation party I am having this coming Saturday for my son.  His godfather is an attorney in California and could not make the actual ceremony because of his trial schedule. So we pushed the party put so he could make it. Will be prepping for 50+ people. Hope it doesn’t rain.

On the less than fun side, I have been running back and forth to doctors with my father. In less than two months he developed an egg sized growth on the outside of his ear.  The biopsy did come back for cancer.  Complicating the removal is that he has emphysema (oxygen tanks and all).  So he needed clearance from four different doctors to even have a combination of local and twilight anesthesia.  But it is localized and external, so we are optimistic.

So I move forward on all fronts. I am trying to catch up on reviews that I have promised. Sitting in doctor waiting rooms gives you more time to read.  I also have asked my good friend and guest blogger, John Bermingham to prepare an overview of the fair use/copyright issues of using Pinterest.

Edits are under way of Ogham Court, a novel that takes a closer look at Nora of the Singing Stone and Devlin of the Salmon Run Inn from Dark Dealings and the unusual events on a cobble-stoned street in the Tribeca section of New York City. Expect this before year end.

I also have an outline ready for a prequel that covers some of the events in Micaela’s life around the time of her parents’ deaths.

Just some things to keep you entertained while I work on the next Micaela book. Who shall be by her side? Liam? Ethan? Maybe Parker?

A time to buckle down and get to work.

Review: Deadly Pleasures by Mary Firmin

I am not by nature a romance reader; my tastes go to much edgier material.  Deadly Pleasures, by Mary Firmin has enough thriller and romance to engage any reader from start to finish. It is Sex in the City meets Stephanie Plum, who Janet Evanovich described as incredibly average but heroic, if necessary, a phrase that echoes in Megan Riley, the man character in Ms. Firmin’s novel.  I love and write female protagonists who are capable of saving themselves.  Megan sometimes gets herself into wrong situations, but always for the right reasons.  This saves some scenes from testing the reader’s credibility.  The best part of her is that she does this while confronting her own failings.

Megan Riley has bigger things to worry about than the fact that her neighbor has just been found dead. 
Her engagement has just ended and her real estate career is floundering with the California market.  Tired of emotional ties, ready for a new adventure and battling her own demons, Megan and her three best friends make a fateful decision. They hire hunky stripper Michael Harrington as their timeshare boy-toy—unaware he is a suspect in a series of gruesome murders.  Other suspects include Megan’s ex-fiancé, and the husbands and exes of her wealthy friends. The complicated murder investigation is led by a handsome widower detective whose focus on finding the twisted serial killer before he strikes again is distracted by his attraction to Megan, the first since his wife’s death .

But who will be the next to die? Following her own investigation, Megan takes a wild ride through L.A.’s bondage parlors, hidden sex clubs, and the extravagant lifestyles of the rich and famous; soon she discovers that her quest for adventure has abruptly transformed into a dangerous game of life and death.

My only suggestion would be that if these characters reappear in future books that the other ladies need more page time and more depth. Each seems to be there to represent a “type” instead of a person.  They deserve fleshing out.

I really liked Deadly Pleasures, would recommend it and read more of Ms. Firmin’s work.  She is a credit to the indie market, publishing through iUniverse. We need to promote and support those writers of quality who, like their characters, choose their own path, as steep and rocky as it may be at times.

As of the day I am writing this, Deadly Pleasures is available on Amazon for $0.99.

I give it 4.5  triskeles

    

Mary Firmin was born in England, raised in Canada then moved to the USA. She lived in Santa Monica California, for many years and raised three children. After selling real estate on the fashionable West Side of Los Angeles she became Vice President of a large firm. She and her husband Bill owned a boat and belonged to a Southern California yacht club and spent lots of weekends visiting Catalina Island and traveling up and down the Coastline. She now lives in Rancho Mirage, where she has written a Society Column and plays golf. Mary is an active member of Mystery Writers of America, Romance Writers of America, Palm Springs Writers Guild and Women in Film. 

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/MaryFirmin

Twitter: http://twitter.com/firminmary

Blog: http://maryfirmin.blogspot.com/

Website: http://maryfirmin.com

To find a list of other reviews that are part of the INDIEpendence Day Blog Fest click Here

Chaos or Opportunity?

I am a new writer in the fiction world.  What a time to jump into the deep end.  I’m still struggling with the questions of craft and now I must also figure out Facebook, Twitter, blogosphere and all the options for publishing.  So here in The Grove, there are more questions right now than answers.  Please feel free to share your experiences and help fellow travelers find our way through the forest.

So as I understand it, in the traditional publishing world there are several entities that assist the writer in becoming an author.  The difference between writer and author was once explained in a workshop I attended as (and I paraphrase): you are a writer until you get a contract, then you are an author.

So in the way things used to be, oh say, two months ago before Borders began its downward spiral and the e-books rocketed out of the holiday gate, I, as a writer, would finish a manuscript and then begin the query and pitch cycle.  It being a bad idea to pitch before I have a reasonably finished product.

So let’s say things go according to plan, after all, I write fiction/urban fantasy.  So follow along on my fantasy journey.

Said agent would most likely recommend revisions to increase the likelihood of signing with a publishing house.

Having survived the vetting and debating of a publishing house, I would then be paired with an editor who in all likelihood would ‘suggest’ further revisions to make it even more marketable.

And finally 18 months to two years later, the novel is ready for primetime.  At some point prior to that, I would begin working with a publicist on how to launch your novel to make the bestseller list. But which one?  NYT, Amazon, B&N, in the perfect world (this is my fantasy) ---all of them.

But here I am at the edge of some new world.  E-books are flooding the market.  It is, in some cases, the classic drive to eliminate the middle man by both the writer and the distributor.  Not a new phenomena in general economics.  The writer wants to shorten the distance to launch and the keep more of the revenue and the distributor wants, well, essentially the same thing.

But the agent, editor, and publicist do serve a valuable function in this process.  Let’s face it, few of us are equipped to negotiate a contract, we are often word-blind when it comes to our own work and most have only a rudimentary knowledge of superior marketing strategies.  But, how to rise above the pile, hit a bestseller list and work a day job?  In self-pubing the writer must become agent, editor, and publicist.

Or does the writer find someone with more expertise?  Afterall, I don’t repair my own transmission or do my own dental implants.  Does this mean that the process will become more fragmented with independent editors and publicists, similar to the agent model filling a need? 

Does this create an opportunity or opportunists?  Are you using a specialist to help you navigate the new reality of publishing and bookselling?  Are you happy with them? How did you find them?

Thoughts?  

Selling Books in the Amazon (Age).

As readers and writers we live in a period more exciting than a 13^th sign, a Mayan end-time, or a Zombie apocalypse—the expansion of publishing channels.  I have been for my entire writing life in sales.  I was an Investment Banker on Wall Street, the owner of a gourmet shop, a commercial banker and a teacher (try convincing high school students that learning Geometry is a good investment of their time and then tell me that’s not a tough sell.)  So, in addition to the craft of writing, I am a student of the business of publishing and, more importantly, selling books.  Writing a book that does not sell is, in my mind, akin to keeping a journal.

In college, I was a Biology major with a particular interest in evolution and physical anthropology.  Like mathematics, these areas of science are more about patterns and progressions.  Perhaps because my brain is wired a certain way, I like to watch, study and sometimes comment on patterns and change in other areas of interest.  The book industry is in the midst of something bordering on catastrophic evolution, as compared to the slower Darwinian type. Borders has hired re-structuring lawyers, small publishing houses and e-publishing platforms are expanding rapidly.  Amazon is a (or is it the) major player in book sales with over a gazillion titles.  Gazillion is a technical mathematic term meaning more than I can wrap my head around. Amazon also has its own e-publishing platform. Will we see the return of the small bookstore and what will it look like?

At the end of the day, the issue is how many books will I sell (someday) or how many will you?  And how will we do that?  One of us may write the great American Novel or just a really good read, but we need to stand out from the crowd.  It is not just the agent’s slush pile that matters anymore; it is Amazon’s slush pile. 

We are responsible for our own brand.  How do we create it and promote it to reader market?  The goal is to reach people who may never have heard of us and convince them to read our book.   What will the marketing channels of the future look like? Will there be any point in signing books in Barnes and Noble or Borders if foot traffic declines?  This may sound exaggerated now, but if current trends continue the book selling industry will be a very different animal before too long.

So as we sit in the Storytellers’ Grove like our ancestors who sat around the fire, please share your wisdom, ideas and thoughts.

For further interesting thoughts on the subject click on one of my favorite blogs Pimp My Novel to your right and read the Jan 13 blog called “A Lesson Brand Management”.

For new members of the blogosphere, click the tiny pencil to share your thoughts.