Christine Amsden's Blog: Christine Amsden Author Blog, page 34

Eagle Rock, Missouri

 

The body of water in the background of my book cover  is Table Rock Lake, a man-made lake that stretches for many miles through southern Missouri and Northern Arkansas. The story takes place in a fictionalized town called Eagle Rock, MO, a tourist town on Table Rock Lake in the Ozark Mountains. There is a real Eagle Rock, by the way. An old friend of my grandfather’s used to live there years ago, and my family visited him when I was a child. He would take us out on the lake on his motor boat. I can’t remember exactly what made me think to use the town’s name and location for this story, but I assure you, it is fictionalized. The real Eagle Rock has a population of 1 or 2 dozen people, and if you blink driving through, you’ll miss it. It was a beautiful area, though, and going with the advice “write what you know,” I decided it would suit this story nicely.

Cassie is on Twitter

I confess, I’ve never really known what to do with twitter. As Christine Amsden, I mostly tweet my new blog posts, and hey, maybe that’s good enough. Most of what I have to say that’s important at all goes up on my blog sooner or later. Plus, I’m a novelist — saying something in 140 characters isn’t in my nature!

But this week, I decided to try an experiment. I’ve set up a twitter account for Cassie Scot, the heroine of my new urban fantasy series. She is listed as a NORMAL detective, and adds that

NORMAL Detective. Please note: I do not do love spells, location spells, exorcisms, summonings (demon or otherwise), potions, charms, or memory modification.

Her location is given as Eagle Rock, MO, the primary setting for the series and Cassie’s hometown.

I’m not sure what Cassie will have to say, but she usually comes up with something. This is all just for fun — no spoilers, no direct pushing of the books (although indirectly, its existence is a push for the books). At this point, I’m actually picturing Cassie as she is before the start of book 1, trying to establish a NORMAL detective agency but having little luck. Once the book comes out, I may shift that timeframe, but I will continue to avoid blatant spoilers. (Teasers are fair game.)

If you’re interested, here’s the twitter link:

@CassieScot

Feedback is appreciated — this is an experiment so I’ll be curious to know if it’s working.

Characters Welcome

 

Characters Welcome

 

 

Come join me next week at Savvy Authors, where I will be leading a new and highly interactive workshop for writers who want to get up close and personal with their main characters. This is a different type of character workshop, one that goes beyond general wisdom and into an open dialog where your character is the one doing the talking.

The workshop will start off with some general strategies, then ask you to introduce yourself (as your character). I (and the other participants) will ask you pointed questions, not only to find out more about you, but also to try to bring out your voice. During the last two weeks of the class, you will then have the chance to write and post a section of your story (novel or short) that I will critique with an eye to how well your character comes to life.

Starts February 11th

Cassie Scot Cover Art Reveal!

After much delay and anticipation, here it is, the cover art for my upcoming novel, Cassie Scot: ParaNormal Detective!

Drum roll please….

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The cover art was painted by Ural Akyuz.

Some of you may be wondering: What’s going on in the picture?

The woman is Cassie, more or less as I envisioned her when I wrote her. I even provided the artist with a link to a picture of the outfit she is wearing, though he adjusted the color to better suit the background. She’s looking off into the distance, thinking of… well, any number of things. This series is written in the first person, and a lot of it takes place inside Cassie’s head. There is a mystery, some romance, and even a bit of action, but her own desire to be something more than she is drives the story. It will drive the entire series, actually, only resolving in the final volume.

There is a glow coming from the lake, one the crescent moon can’t fully account for. This is an abstract, a representation of a source of magic that Cassie can’t see and is therefore not looking at, though she knows it’s there somewhere. It is intentionally subtle, and I don’t expect most readers to pick up on it. It’s enough that I know it’s there, and if you care to buy into it, then so do you.

Mostly though what I asked for, and what I got, was lovely cover art. There is some darkness in this story, but it is full of light, life, and hope. The leaves are green, the plants are in bloom, and Cassie has a snapdragon tucked behind her ear.

If you haven’t read the first few chapters yet, check them out.

Firm release date May 15, 2013. Expect regular updates for important news.

Book Review: Alien in the Family

Alien in the Family is the third book in this bizarre comic-book style science fiction series that I continue to read for reasons beyond understanding. It’s like when you’re watching a really bad movie or TV series, and you know it’s bad, but it’s bad in a specific way, and you can’t take your eyes off of it even though you know you should. That’s what this is. In fact, it would make a great TV series. If by great you mean people will continue to watch it for years after it stopped being good because there is something about that wish-fulfillment fantasy that speaks to the average American viewer. Like Heroes.

What can I say? Super-sexy aliens, intergalactic danger, and a wedding. This book wasn’t as good as the first two books in the series for one reason: The last quarter of it was given over to a long, drawn out description of wedding prep and an actual wedding. I think the author may have been having more fun with her fantasy wedding than I was. I’d recommend skipping that part — seriously, nothing else happens.

Still, on to the next book in the series!

Rating: 2.5/5

Title: Alien in the Family

Author: Gini Koch

Genre: Cheesy Sci-fi (the cheese is important. It’s a soft cheese, or maybe a curd cheese, like cottage cheese)

Published April 5th 2011

Cassie Coming to Life…

We’re close! Today I received the image for the cover art and I am so thrilled with it. I can’t do more than tease you with it for now, but we’re days away from the big cover art reveal. At this point, it only needs the title and by-line, then my publisher will send me the final image.

This cover isn’t like my first two. It’s a real painting, the kind I’ve always hoped would grace the cover of one of my books. I won’t say any more about it for now, but next week I’ll do the big reveal, tell you a little bit about the artist, and direct you to more of his work. I’ll also share my thoughts on the cover, and why I think it does a nice job representing the book.

Book Review: Alien Tango

The second volume in the super-sexy alien fantasy series follows the style of the first, so if you liked it, you’ll like this one too. If you didn’t like it, you won’t like this one. If you’re like me and are not sure why you’re reading, you’ll still wonder, but you’ll probably keep reading.

Kitty Kat isn’t a great character. She’s essentially a comic book geek whose superhero fantasies are coming true. And hey, I kind of get that. I’m no comic book geek, but I had the normal amount of superhero fantasies. The thing is that as a reader, I like my characters to make a certain degree of sense, even when they are playing a wish fulfillment role. Kitty doesn’t make sense. She was in marketing, and now she’s morphed into a heroine archetype — tough, witty, thinks on her feet. Yet months have passed since she learned about aliens and started dating one, but she still hasn’t learned much of anything about them. She has materials she could be reading, but apparently she’s to cool for that sort of thing. Um…but how do you make lightening-quick decisions and put together pieces of a complex puzzle involving alien conspiracies when you don’t really understand the context?

But the book remains kind of fun. So turn off your brain and enjoy the ride!

Rating: 3/5

Title: Alien Tango

Author: Gini Koch

Genre: Science Fiction

ISBN: 0756406323

Published December 7th 2010

Running the Mile

When I was a kid, I was pretty much the stereotypical nerd. Okay…okay…I still am! But I’m wiser now. For one thing, I’ve learned that I can run…maybe not quickly, but I can do it. I’m not that kid hopelessly watching the natural athletes from the sidelines as I once again feel the dawning certainty that I have failed my Presidential Physical Fitness Test before I’ve even begun. Some of you may know that I’ve been working the couch to 5k program since November. Well, last week, I successfully ran for a full 30 minutes. By contrast, the first week, I could scarcely do 9 one-minute intervals with walking breaks in between.

It is amazing what I have learned about exercise as an adult, mostly through aerobics and strength training classes at the gym. They have taught me good posture, good breathing techniques, how to do push ups on my knees or if I can’t do that — against the wall. They have met me at my level and shown me how to reach for the next level.

When I think about all I have learned as an adult — all I have set out to learn by choice, because something in me wants to be healthy — I can’t help but wonder what is wrong with educators in this country when it comes to physical education. Do they even take it seriously, or is it just for show? Of course, it couldn’t possibly be as important as reading, writing, and arithmetic. Our children need to learn more math and science so we can stay ahead of other countries. And yeah…gym…whatever…just don’t let it take up too much of our precious time.

Isn’t there a staggering childhood obesity problem going on in this country? Isn’t it fast becoming a national health crisis? We’ve gone into the lunchrooms to replace the milk with skim and the toast with whole wheat. We’ve decided ketchup isn’t a vegetable. (Good call, really.) We’re learning how to eat…isn’t it time we learned how to run?

When I was a child, I was always in the advanced reading groups. I’m not sure I was aware of students in other groups, or of their needs, though as an adult I appreciate the fact that children struggling to read get special help and attention targeted at their level. An advanced third grader may be able to read Harry Potter on his own, but others still need Dr. Seuss.

I needed Dr. Seuss in gym, but I never got it. For that reason, I continued to need Dr. Seuss in high school and beyond. It was like they handed me Harry Potter and said, “Read this. What do you mean how? Just do your best.” So I sat there, watching the other students read, in awe of some of them, but utterly unable to perform the feet myself.

There are things children can learn about exercise to make them better at it. If you ask someone to run a mile and he can’t, you can put him on an interval schedule, steadily lengthening the intervals until he can run that mile. It’s not like I was alone in my needs, either. If there are reading groups in school, why not running groups? How about if you take those naturally athletic kids and challenge them, while you help the rest of us learn to breathe?

Everything I know about exercise today has been hard-won, and almost none of it came from P.E. in school. I’m never going to be an amazing athlete, or even a good one, but I am going to run. From where I started, that feels like a superpower. And maybe it is. It will keep me healthier, make me stronger, and even make me smarter. If I could go back in time to tell the younger version of me something, I’d tell her how to run a mile. Since that’s a fantasy, I’ll do the next best thing — tell my kids how to do it.

Book Review: Touched by an Alien

Let’s cut to the chase: This is cheesy. The “science” in the science fiction book involves a lot of hand waving and I couldn’t always follow it logically, even internally. So I tried not to think of this book as a science fiction read, instead trying to suspend disbelief for the romantic fantasy — tough chick meets super-sexy alien empath here to save the world from alien parasites. (And who is, amazingly, genetically compatible with humans!)

The romantic fantasy did work, largely because Jeff, the super-sexy alien, was a great romantic hero. Sexy, empathic (so he knows just what his girl wants), not afraid to pursue the woman he wants, and loyal. He tells Kitty he wants to marry her within about five minutes of meeting her, and it worked! If I turn my brain on, I don’t believe even a strong gift of empathy would give you that kind of insight in five minutes, but the way he staked his claim early and confidently laying himself out there was effective.

The big reason I’m so borderline on this one isn’t, believe it or not, the super-cheesy scifi. Since I watch Doctor Who, that would be pretty hypocritical of me.

The trouble was Kitty. I didn’t believe in her. I did, at first, suspend disbelief when she used her mighty pen to kill an alien parasite sticking out the back of a man’s neck. She goes with the super-sexy alien and learns all about them while they try to recruit her, and I was fine with that. But as the book progressed, less and less about her truly made sense. Her courage, desire to help save the world, her extremely quick-on-her-feet thinking, and her leadership abilities seemed to spring fully formed on the steps of a courthouse when she was 27 years old. She was in marketing, which I’m sure involves some degree of creativity — I’m not saying none of it made sense — but the ability to lead men into battle is something I would expect from someone with military experience. It does turn out that her parents have been hiding secrets from her, but unless you accept genetic memory (and I really really don’t), that doesn’t explain her abilities.

Neither do I accept that experienced combat veterans would step aside and LET her command them.

She actually acted like a lot of heroines in this type of novel. She was very much an archetype — the cheeky, tough, brave, quick-witted heroine — but with no groundwork to support these extraordinary abilities it takes an overused stereotypes and turns it into an unbelievable one.

Still, this book did speak to a certain cheesy romantic scifi alien need I didn’t realize I had, and I have read the sequels (reviews coming soon), so I will recommend this if you’re in the mood. Just turn your brain off and enjoy!

Rating: 3/5

Title: Touched by an Alien

Genre: Science Fiction

Author: Gini Koch

ISBN: 0756406005

Published April 2010

Setting Stories Free

Stories are never finished, they can only be set free.

A few months ago, I was honored to stumble across a woman who had decided to take three workshops with me. It had been about a year since I had seen her last, but it didn’t take me long to recognize the novel she used for her homework discussions. At first I was charmed by some of the differences I saw, and the new directions she wanted to take the project.

And then I thought about it just a little bit harder. The truth was, the novel had been nearly publication-worthy the year before, and she was quickly reaching a point where changes didn’t make the story better, only different. Soon I feared she would lose that sparkle.

One thing that never ceases to amaze me is the number of talented writers who show up for my workshops for motivation and improvement, somehow unaware or unsure of their skill. I sometimes feel like a counselor, which is all right with me. If that’s what a writer needs to become an author, then that’s what I’ll dish out.

But it does bring upon the often-asked question: How do you know when you’re ready? Or, alternately: How do you know when it’s done?

It is a critical question, because for every talented writer out there unaware of their gifts, there is one who thinks they are better than they are. Some in this latter group have trouble hearing anything negative about their stories, will often self-select critics who will pander, and sometimes ends up self-publishing work that is not ready for publication.

Most of us walk in that middle ground, somehow simultaneously believing we are brilliant writers and absolute rubbish at the exact same time. The good news is that if you feel this way, you are on the right track. This is the attitude which allows you to hear real criticism and make real improvement. It takes a certain arrogance to plug away at an art form day after day, year after year, especially when you don’t get regular feedback. If you don’t believe, in some part of yourself, that you’re good, and I mean really, really good, you have no motivation to continue. On the other hand, if you don’t believe, in some corner of your mind, that you’re awful, you won’t hear criticism. You won’t get better. You won’t become the brilliant writer you already know you are.

It’s convoluted, but it works far better than simply believing you’re okay, even assuming that’s the truth. And believe me, you’re too close to the source to know for sure. You can ask other people, but it’s hard to know who to trust, who will be honest, who will pander, and who really is a part of that “no book is universally loved” contingent.

Since you can’t know, you have no other choice: set your stories free.

If you want to be a published author, you have to stop rewriting the same stories over and over again. You know who you are and you know what I’m talking about. Stop! Set it free. Let it out into the world. Whether or not the world accepts your story, you have to let it fly. Rejection doesn’t mean you’re awful. Acceptance doesn’t mean you’re great (although it does mean you’re published). It’s just what you do. It’s part of the process.

Meanwhile, you need to move on. Writers will never improve their craft by rewriting the same story over and over again. You have to write a million words of crap before you get to the good stuff, and that crap needs to be made up of unique stories.

Write it. Rewrite it. Revise it. Then set it free. You’ll set yourself free at the same time.

Then every once in a while, if you’re lucky, you’ll get some confirmation that you’re as brilliant as a small part of you thinks you are. Some publisher will accept your work, or you’ll win an award, or you’ll get a nice review.

I’ve published two novels and have a set of four coming out soon. I’m still not “ready.” I still fight the small part of my psyche that believes I’m rubbish, even after my second novel won two awards. I sometimes wish I could go back and revise the books I’ve already published! I haven’t finished a single novel, but I have set them free. For many of you on the brink of success, that may be the only difference between you and me.

Good luck and write on.