Amy Rivers's Blog, page 14

#WhatsYourStory Featuring Melissa Baldwin

​Melissa Baldwin is an avid runner, planner obsessed, and has always had a love for writing. She is a wife, mother, and avid journal keeper who took her creativity to the next level by fulfilling her dream with her debut novel, An Event to Remember...or Forget. Melissa writes about charming, ambitious, and real women and is now a published author of seven Romantic Comedy novels and novellas.
 
When she isn't deep in the writing zone, this multi-tasking master organizer is busy spending time with her family, chauffeuring her daughter, traveling, running, indulging in fitness, and taking a Disney Cruise every now and then.
​Long ago I gave up my dreams of creating the perfect hair-bows for my daughter or learning how to sew my own designer gowns. And after many failed attempts at making the yummiest gourmet recipes found on Pinterest, I accepted that frozen pizza is okay once in a while. Speaking of Pinterest, those boards are still full of crafting and organization ideas that I have yet to implement into my busy life. I do consider myself a master at multi-tasking, but even I have sat in the middle of my bedroom floor doing the ugly-cry. I remember many days that I asked myself what else am I supposed to be doing?
 
It was New Year’s Day 2014, I began that day at the gym, climbing the dreaded revolving stairs trying to loose the many pounds of holiday treats I’d consumed between Halloween and New Year’s Eve. I was even listening to Tony Robbins in search of the ultimate method to motivate me.  It was at some point during those forty minutes that I asked myself this question… “What do you love to do? Find that and do it.” 
That’s all I remember. At that point I was ready to chase after my dreams and for once actually catch them.
Six months later I finished writing the book I had started over and over again. And with the help and advice from a wonderful friend, I published it.
 
What an amazing feeling! I still remember the day that I held the beautiful paperback in my hands. My eyes filled with tears as I flipped through the pages that I created. I actually did it, I followed through with something I had always thought about doing but never thought I could. If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard someone say… Oh I could never do that or I wish I could do this?”
The worst part is that it never stops, no matter how much we grow, learn and accomplish our tasks. We will always want to be better. This is not a bad thing as long as we’re happy with where we are in the present. We can continue to strive to accomplish our goals and when we do, we can add another to that never-ending bucket list.
 
Since publishing my first novel in 2014, I haven’t stopped writing. I just finished the first draft of my tenth book. In March, I signed a contract with my publisher for two more books coming in 2018. The story ideas are endless and I love every second of it.
 
I have to say my favorite part of becoming an author has been the friendships I’ve made and the many talented authors I have met along the way. Next up on my bucket list, to meet the one and only Sophie Kinsella. If I’ve learned anything on this journey, it’s that anything can happen.
To Spring with Love ​To Spring With Love: A Novella
 
Summer Peters is thrilled to be done with the frigid winter. Spring is in the air, and she’s ready for a fresh new start. Her career is thriving, she’s searching for a new place to live, and she’s finally ready to take her relationship with Alexander Williams to the next level.
 
What she doesn’t expect is to be blindsided by Alexander’s assistant, Melanie, who seems to be up to her old tricks, even stooping as low as dating Summer’s ex-boyfriend, Jake. Once again, Summer is faced with the dilemma of having to share Alexander with a woman who’s out to destroy their relationship.
 
To add to these challenges, she receives devastating news from her best friend, Angie. At a critical time when she may need her best friend the most, she learns Angie may not be there for her. She quickly realizes that she may need to lean on someone she never expected during this time of change.
 
Continue to follow Summer on her wild one-year journey in this third book of the Seasons of Summer Novella Series. Stay tuned for the final installment coming Summer 2017.
​
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#WhatsYourStory Featuring Christina Hogdson

​Cristina Hodgson, mother of two, born in Wimbledon, London, currently lives in southern Spain. Cristina had a long career in sport, reaching national and international level and still actively participates in Triathlon races and enjoys outdoor activities. In her spare time she also enjoys reading and writing. She won a sports scholarship to Boston College. After a period in Boston, she returned to the UK and graduated from Loughborough University with a degree in Sports Science.
A LITTLE OF CHANTELLE ROSE is her debut novel. Amazingly, it has nothing to do with running!

My debut novel, which was released just recently, was actually written thirteen years ago. After graduating from Loughborough University with a degree in Sports Science, I travelled and worked in various jobs. One of which was as an extra in a British produced gangster film which was filmed in Nerja, Spain. It goes without saying that my sport mechanics and kinetic energy knowledge wasn't put to maximum potential in this part-time job. But it was certainly a fun and unique experience, but most importantly it gave me an idea.
            A year later I sat down and within three months I had written my 90 K novel. Little did I know that what I'd achieved was actually the easy part. The road to publication was about to begin and it was going to be a long and almost impossible journey.
            Thirteen years ago, the publishing industry was still largely virgin to e-books. It was all print and the Big Four book publishing houses only accepted manuscripts through agents. And agents only accepted printed copies of the first three chapters that had to be sent with a query letter and a S.A.E. I was living in Spain and the postal cost to send my work to the UK was quite expensive. I carefully went through a list of agents accepting fiction in my genre, contemporary women's romantic comedy and selected just a handful to send my work to. I remember excitedly posting off my work in the innocent belief that I'd get accepted straight away.
            What I didn't know is that most agents and publishers can receive up to 40 + query letters per day. Now, I’ve never been a whiz at arithmetic, but this is pretty basic maths: 40 x 5 (let’s make it a 5 day working week) = 200 manuscripts per week. Your basic agent's staff will be working a 40 hour week. That’s 5 query letters to get through per hour . Dedicating an average of 12 minutes (not counting "wee" stops) per letter, (opening/ reading and deciding course of action). It takes me longer just trying to decide which shoes to wear in the mornings! So it’s quite a feat to get through all those submissions on a daily basis! And of course all the agents that I had so painstakingly selected, rejected me. I was disheartened to say the least and gave up, pushing from my mind all thoughts of getting my work published.
            The years went by and the manuscript sat in a corner collecting dust. Until a couple of years ago, when my dad, who'd read the original manuscript and loved it (as only dad's can of course) encouraged me try and get it published again. I now found myself in a full time job, with two young children to look after, never mind the house work / cooking and trying to keep  up some sort of social life etc. etc. and it took me over a year to re-edit and up-date it.
            This time I sent it straight to several small independent publishers who accepted non solicited and non agented work. With the emergence of e-books, the book market and the publication process had changed and developed. The up-front cost to produce an e-book is minimum and most paper back books are printed on demand. This in turn has led to the the growth of smaller Independent publishers more willing to give authors that golden chance.    
So after months of  e-mail torture and nail-biting web searching, I received the e-mail of my dreams; that my work has been accepted for publication! And that, ladies and gentlemen, is without a doubt one of the most magical and incredible moments that any author will feel in the road to publication.
            It has taken me longer to find a publisher than it did for me to actually write my book! And I still sometimes sit in awe, and wonder if I have, in fact, dreamt the whole thing up!
            The first step is to have a dream, the second is to make it a reality! Believe in yourself, believe in your work….
            One author who I greatly admire and would have loved to have met, is Agatha Christie. Not just because of her world renowned writing talent, best known for her 66 detective novels, 150 short stories and her famous sleuths Hercules Poirot and  Miss Marple, but also because her fascinating life outside the literary world.
A Little of Chantelle Rose  At the age of twenty-four, Chantelle Rose has all a city girl can expect: a tiny bed-sit in South London, a lousy poorly-paid job, a tyrannical boss, and quite a few exes added to an ever-growing list. 
Desperate for change, she becomes an extra in a seedy crime film. When that leads to the opportunity of a lifetime – a role to play with a million dollars to win and seemingly nothing to lose – she accepts without thinking twice. After all, what could possibly go wrong? In any event, she´ll earn enough to buy her dream home, set up her own business and never worry about money again.
And what about love? Two men have won her heart: Robbie – sultry, silent, mysterious; and Lionel – Hollywood heart-throb, charm, wealth, adventure.
But who can she trust? Who is bent on scaring her away, and why?
There seems to be more at stake than just her heart. Will a million dollars be worth it?
Website: http://cristinahodgson.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HodgsonCrist...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HodgsonCristina​
Email: Hello@ChristinaHodgson.com
​
Where to Buy A Little of Chantelle Rose Amazon

#WhatsYourStory Featuring Jennie Marts

Jennie Marts is the USA TODAY Best-selling author of award-winning books filled with love, laughter, and always a happily ever after. Readers call her books “laugh out loud” funny and the “perfect mix of romance, humor, and steam.” Fic Central claimed one of her books was “the most fun I’ve had reading in years.”
She is living her own happily ever after in the mountains of Colorado with her husband, two dogs, and a parakeet that loves to tweet to the oldies. She’s addicted to Diet Coke, adores Cheetos, and believes you can’t have too many books, shoes, or friends.
Her books include the contemporary western romance Hearts of Montana series, the romantic comedy/ cozy mysteries of The Page Turners series, the hunky hockey-playing men in the Bannister family in the Bannister Brothers Books, and the small-town romantic comedies in the Lovestruck series of Cotton Creek Romances. 
​​ ​Hi there. I’m Jennie Marts. I’m a hybrid author from Colorado that is sadly addicted to Diet Coke and Cheetos and wishes that typing burned more calories.
I started writing as a career about seven years ago. I’d always considered myself a writer and had dreamed of someday writing a book. As my kids were getting ready to graduate and leave the nest, I was evaluating what was next for me now that my role of mom was changing and decided to just go for it. And I’m thrilled and so happy that I did.
I knew that I wanted my first book to be fun and light and to be filled with scenes that conveyed laughter, romance, the friendship of women, and a little mystery and intrigue.
I independently published my first book, Another Saturday Night and I Ain’t Got No Body, at the very end of 2012. It was the first in my romantic comedy/cozy mystery Page Turners series. The series is about a group of women in a book club who search for clues and romance while eating really great desserts. Each book follows a different woman in the book club and the first is about Sunny, an ordinary schoolteacher who discovers that dating can be deadly as she goes on six blind dates and one of them might be with a murderer.
After indie-pubbing my first book, I got my first three-book deal with Entangled Publishing for the Hearts of Montana series. These books follow my passion for stories set in small towns with warm summer nights, spunky heroines, and hot, hot cowboys. Tucked Away, the first book is about a city girl who inherits a farm in Montana and discovers a lonely teenage girl, a goat named Clyde, a super-cute cowboy, and a place she can finally call home. Hidden Away and Stolen Away complete that set.
After that, I became a true hybrid, splitting my books between traditional publishing and indie-publishing. I continued to write the Page Turner mysteries, but also branched out into a series of hockey-playing brothers in the Bannister Brothers series and hunky Colorado country boys in the Cotton Creek Romantic Comedy series. And I now have written nineteen books and have seventeen published, and have a new three book cowboy series debuting with Sourcebooks Casablanca next spring.
I knew that I wanted this writing career and have gone after it with all I have. One of the key things that changed my life and turned my writing career around was when I discovered writing sprints and found my ‘sprinting tribe’. The concept seems so simple: set a timer and write during a set amount of focused time. But having the support and accountability of the others in my sprinting group makes all the difference. And suddenly I went from writing two books a year to writing four to six books a year.
Learning to sprint really changed everything for me, so I decided to write my first non-fiction book, and created a Writing Sprints Journal, a way to manage your time and increase your writing productivity. I published the journal last month and hope that it helps other writers in their journey. You can find my Writing Sprints Journal here: http://a.co/dPGMjff .
I think the world of publishing has changed so much and so fast that as writers we feel the need to write faster just to keep up. The support I’ve received from my sprint partners has been tremendous. I truly believe having a group of writer friends, whether in person or online is one of the best gifts that a writer can give themselves. And the romance industry is great at supporting each other.
My tagline is love, laughter, and always a happily ever after, and I love to make readers laugh and cry and fall in love with a swoony hero. I have been inspired by writers like Nora Roberts and Janet Evanovich. I adore Susan Elizabeth Phillips, and when I met her in person the first time, I started crying as I tried to tell her how much she inspired me. She was, of course, wonderful and gracious and simply gave me a smile and a hug. I’d like to be her when I grow up.
For now, I’ll keep writing stories about cute cowboys and hot hockey players who fall for cupcake bakers and the coach’s daughter. My newest release is Skirting The Ice, the third book in the Bannister Brothers series and this one is so much fun because the heroine is actually the hockey player and the hero is Jack, the third brother who is a cute-as-sin nerd. Murphy is wild and reckless and Jack is steady and solid, and declares his love in a math equation.
This book is so much fun. You can find it on Amazon at: http://a.co/bNUWvKn and the whole Bannister Brothers series is Free for Kindle Unlimited subscribers.
I love to hear from readers. You can find me on Facebook at Jennie Marts Books, or Twitter at @JennieMarts. And visit www.jenniemarts.com to sign up for my newsletter and keep up with the latest sales and new releases. 
Skirting the Ice "The Bannister Brothers series has everything I love...hockey, humor, and heart!" - Kristin Miller- New York TimesBestselling author

Buttoned-up accountant Jack Bannister lives an uncomplicated life until his teenage crush moves back into the house next door—all grown up and sexy as hell. Murphy Ryan is still wild and reckless, and danger has followed her to Colorado. Jack will do whatever it takes to protect her, even it means letting her go…again.
Murphy Ryan is focused on building a new NHL women’s hockey team. But staying on her game is hard with the distraction, and the memories, of the hot nerd in the house next door. Jack Bannister had been her first kiss, and she wants him to be her last. With his dry humor and sexy glasses, being smart never looked so good.
Jack’s been given a chance to win back the one that got away, but worries this gorgeous hockey player is still out of his league. He’s kept his heart on ice, but now that Murphy’s back, she might be the one to finally thaw it.

​ Where to Buy Skirting the Ice  Amazon

#WhatsYourStory Featuring Natalie Giarratano

​Originally from small-town Southeast Texas, Natalie Giarratano earned her MFA & Ph.D. in creative writing from Western Michigan University. She is the author of Big Thicket Blues (Sundress Publications, February 2017) and Leaving Clean, winner of the 2013 Liam Rector First Book Prize in Poetry (Briery Creek Press, 2013). Her poems have appeared in Sakura Review, Beltway Poetry, Tupelo Quarterly, Tinderbox, Best New Poets, and TYPO, among others. A multi-genre editor, she lives near the foothills of Northern Colorado with her partner, their daughter, and old-man pup. Maybe it was the poet in me who would cry at slow songs as a child because the music seemed sad (no matter what the lyrics might convey). Maybe the writer began in between Ramona and Beezus in a Beverly Cleary book or lost within the ornate descriptions of Tolkien’s The Hobbit. As a child, I read whatever I could get my hands on. And the worlds I created in my head were so much less bleak than the one created by my narcissistic father who could knock down his four daughters with a few stunting words. But I loved words. I wanted them to work for me, not against me. Writing stories and later on poetry became ways to reclaim and repurpose language.
 
I had mostly been encouraged by teachers to keep reading and writing, and even though we didn’t have a lot of money, my mom made sure I could buy a book from the Scholastic Book catalogue every now and then. And, of course, libraries were my refuge (and also where I consumed the books of which my Catholic parents would not approve). However, when my writing turned the least bit negative or dark, there were talks with my parents about me being “suicidal” or needing therapy. But I’m still here lurking in the darkness, trying to make my own kind of light and music along the way.
 
A first-generation college student, I stumbled my way through undergrad and into graduate studies and found myself accepted into an MFA program (in poetry) at Western Michigan University. I thought I was a fraud, though, and even told one of my MFA mentors, Bill Olsen, as much during my first conference with him. He told me that I was talented but in need of a “poet ego”—to feel confident enough as a writer that my work could keep progressing and reaching uncomfortable places, which meant I would go on to write an entire book about my upbringing in a rural southeast Texas. That conversation changed everything. My poems became richer and more complex, and I found my voice. I still consider Bill and his partner, poet Nancy Eimers, my poetry parents and went on to study with them again for a Ph.D.
 
Mostly written as part of my MFA thesis, my first book won the Liam Rector First Book Prize for Poetry in 2013 and was published by a tiny university press—Briery Creek Press—later that same year. If you’re a poet, you know that contests and open reading periods are what you have to work with, and I had entered the book into 30 – 40 of these contests over a four-year period before Leaving Clean won. A warts-and-all autobiographical collection, the publication of Leaving Clean has made for some awkward conversations with real people who show up in the book.
 
My second collection of poetry, Big Thicket Blues, was just released this past February and is an extremely altered version of my doctoral dissertation. I think I went on to add about ten new poems (in addition to cutting an 8-page poem) and shifted the poems around. In addition, I added 15 bracketed vignettes throughout the book, which sort of act as commentary on and connector of the other poems in the book, hopefully adding to the overall music. I sent this book out to 25 or so contests and open reading periods over a three-year period before it was selected by Sundress Publications in October of 2015. Each year that it did not get published, I reconfigured it. I was not so married to these poems or the book that I was afraid of what I might lose or what they might become with the changes, which was very different from the way I felt about my first book.
 
This second collection was influenced by Lynda Hull, Yusef Komunyakaa, CD Wright, Jake Adam York, and Tyehimba Jess, among others. CD Wright, whose work shifted my own in a sort of docu-poetry direction, in the vein of Muriel Rukeyser, passed away in her sleep at the age of 67 in January of 2016. While I had been to a couple of her readings at past writer conferences, I hadn’t met her. That is, until I was wandering the AWP book fair in Chicago, and my friend pointed her out to me. There she was at the Octopus Books table with no one else around, sitting behind copies of 40 Watts. With hands shaking, I bought the small book and had her sign it. I totally forgot that I had another of her books, Rising, Falling, Hovering, in my bag at that moment, as I had been working on an essay about hers and Komunyakaa’s long poems. I wish I had been able to express to her how much her work has meant to me instead of trying to babble smartly about her poetry. 
Big Thicket Blues ​Big Thicket Blues is a collection of poems that try to hear new song from a broken record: being a voice and not just a body, being complicit in bigotry but evolving, being a picker of wounds, being godless and American, being uncomfortable being.
 
Consider yourself warned: this intricately carved, seamlessly patchworked foray into a boiling machinery of heritage, sin and deliverance may haunt itself into your dreams. Big Thicket Blues is so crammed with music, so lucid and tangled, so lifted into sky past bramble and past the tinnitus of our ordinary pains that it delivers us into a brilliance all its own. Make sure you know how to listen to what could kill or cure you before you bring down the needle on Giarratano’s indelible groove—and remember: don’t trust anyone who cannot allow music /to suck them deep, the way I’ve always wanted some god to /suck me into that kind of epic darkness....  
Website: http://www.nataliegiarratano.com/
Where to Buy Big Thicket Blues Amazon Square Up

#WhatsYourStory featuring Natalina Reis

Natalina has always been fascinated by the written word and by the age of eight she was already trying her hand in poetry and short creative essays. Alongside her fascination for words and storytelling, she has always been curious and amazed with the diversity of the human race. Her journey into publication was one of a lifetime and she often acknowledges that she has been in training for this career her whole life.
Natalina’s experiences and travels have given her the insight that now translates into the worlds she builds within her books. Her contemporary romances show signs of her love for world building where the setting often becomes an important part of the plot. In Desert Jewel, her first published romantic fantasy, Natalina used her familiarity with Africa and Afro-Brazilian mythology to build a world that is part-real, part-fantasy, wholly magical.
As a young woman Natalina could not get enough of fairy-tales (even the gruesome ones) and as an adult she continued to feed that love by getting lost in many a fantasy book and movie. Lavender Fields was inspired by that love of magic, fantasy and the constant curiosity of asking herself, “What if?”
Desert Jewel was a finalist for the Maine Romance Writers 2017 Strut Your Stuff contest in the Science Fiction/Fantasy/Paranormal category and has received many glowing reviews both on Amazon and Goodreads.
In March 2017 she was invited to be part of a paranormal/fantasy/sci-fi romance panel during the Virginia Festival of the Book in Charlottesville, Virginia. She had the great honor of sharing the panel with the great Pintip Dunn and Margaret Locke.
A linguist by profession, Mrs. Reis enjoys using language as an integral part of the plot, infusing even totally fabricated worlds with an aura of believability.
Natalina was born and raised in Portugal. She moved to the U.S. as an adult after marrying an American sailor. A lifetime learner, she has earned three degrees, speaks five languages, and dreams of learning a non-alphabetical language sometime in the future. She lives in Virginia where she teaches English as a Second Language to elementary school children, a job that challenges her creative and language skills on a daily base.
Natalina’s dream is to be able to dedicate herself full time to her writing and always be true to her muse. She doesn’t believe you can have too many books or too much coffee. Art and dance make her happy and she is pretty sure she could survive on lobster and bananas alone. When she is not writing or stressing over lesson plans, she shares her life with her husband and two adult sons.
​I’ve always been a Johnny-come-lately in most things. Writing was not any different. I started writing when I was still in elementary and have never stopped. I started with poetry and evolved into short stories and then novellas.
When I was twenty-three I moved from my native country to the United States. I had been writing in English for a few years, experimenting with fantasy short stories all through college, dipping my toes in a foreign language that somehow had always felt natural to me.
Other than my husband I didn’t know anyone in this new country and was alone a lot. So, I did what I had always done when I was lonely and/or stressed—I turned to reading and writing. By the time my first son was born I had written a full-length fantasy/paranormal/historical romance. Yes, you read it right. The novel—set in Scotland—was one third historical fiction, one third fantasy with paranormal elements, and a third romance. I had no clue about the publishing world, but I asked questions, researched, found The Writer’s Market in my local library, and got busy with the business of being rejected by every agent and publisher in the country.
Being a navy wife meant moving a lot. We moved across the ocean again, this time to Scotland where I wrote my second full-length novel. This time a contemporary romance set in Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of Congo where I had lived as a teenager. Once again I braced myself for the barrage of rejections that soon followed my submissions.
I didn’t give up. Writing that is. I had sort of given up on being published and assumed that the fact I was writing in a foreign language would never allow me to be the writer I knew I had in me. But I kept on writing. After we moved back to the States, I wrote another novel. This time a paranormal romance set in Scotland. Can you see a pattern?
Then life got crazy with kids turning into obnoxious teenagers that required all my attention and sanity, the decision to go back to college for a second degree. Then a third, closely followed by a teaching career. I was still writing but the novels were slow coming. I wrote a few but never finished them.
A little over two years ago, after a very rough patch in my life, I realized I had moved away from the three things I loved the most—reading, writing, and dancing—and decided to refocus. I joined a couple book clubs, a Zumba class, and began writing again. One of my reading clubs led me to a small local writing online group. At the time we wrote flash fiction to prompts posted weekly by our site admin. I had never been read by anyone other than my teachers and all the publishers and agents who had rejected my novels. Even though a nervous-wreck every time my fellow writers read one of my stories, I found that it was also extremely rewarding and helpful. When they loved it, it made me soar. And when they criticized my writing, it helped me grow.
Enter National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). I was a writing fool that month but by the last day of November I had a complete, spanking new romance. I’m not going to lie. It needed a lot of work but I was excited to have a viable manuscript in my hands. Now what was I going to do with it?
After many edits and revisions, the biggest hurdle was to be brave enough to send it out. My past experiences were not happy or positive ones and my doubts as a second language learner still crippled me. So when I got wind of this Twitter event called Pitmad, I threw caution to the wind and thought, “Why not? Nothing to lose.” Soon after I had a publishing contract.
Moral of the story? Don’t ever let your fears cripple you to the point of inaction. Challenge yourself and let the chips fall where they may. What’s the worst that can happen?
I’m far and foremost a romance writer, but I love trying new sub-genres from fantasy to suspense. One of my favorite sub-genres—both in writing and reading—is romantic comedy/chick lit. A few years ago I accidently stumbled upon an author I had never heard of. I fell in love with the simplistic, happy cover and decided to read it. Sophie Kinsella quickly became one of my favorite authors, one I would love to meet—even though I’m pretty certain I would freeze and say nothing.
I can only hope that my writing and my stories bring my readers the same amount of joy and pleasure, Kinsella’s stories bring me.
Loved You Always The last person Emily Rose expects to reconnect with is Jeremy Peter, her childhood best friend. When Jem walks back into her perfectly settled life, Em puts up her guard. She has no desire to place her heart on the line again.
She’s moved on and is in a serious relationship with someone else. But the universe—and her kooky sister—have other ideas.
Thrust into an unexpected and dangerous adventure together, Em is forced to confront her unresolved feelings for Jem and decide what kind of life she really wants. That is if they both survive.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TichaB
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authornatalinareis
Website: https://catarinadeobidos.wordpress.com
Instagram: www.instagram.com/reisnatalina/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14883335.Natalina_Reis
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Natalina-Reis/e/B01ADQ9FJW/  
Publishing Author Pages:https://www.hottreepublishing.com/natalina-reis
http://www.limitlesspublishing.net/authors/natalina-reis/ Where to Buy Loved You Always Buy It Now

#WhatsYourStory Featuring Monique McDonnell

[image error] ​I am an Australian author who writes contemporary women's fiction including chick lit and romance.
I have written all my life especially as a child when I loved to write short stories and poetry. At University I studied Creative Writing as part of my Communication degree. Afterwards when I was busy working in public relations I didn't write for pleasure for quite a few years although I wrote many media releases, brochures and newsletters. (And I still do in my day-job!)

When I began to write again I noticed a trend - writing dark unhappy stories made me unhappy. So I made a decision to write a novel with a happy ending and I have been writing happy stories ever since.
I am the author of six stand alone novels  and novellas including Mr. Right and Other Mongrels and Hearts Afire and the Upper Crust Series. Many of my novels focus on an Australian characters meeting and visiting US characters.
I live on Sydney's Northern Beaches with my husband and daughter where I enjoy drinking copious amounts of coffee and long walks on the beach.  Every writer’s journey is different. I feel like an old hand now. I’ve been writing for ten years seriously (I always wrote but ten years ago I took a year-long course and  haven’t stopped since) and I’ve been published for five.
As a result, it feels like I’ve had a lot of advice and a lot of time to sift through it all to determine what does and doesn’t work for me. That’s not to say that I can’t learn new things but I already know for example that I’m a plotser – I start writing and partially plot, that I prefer writing the first draft to any other part of the process, that getting up at 5am doesn’t increase my productivity and that handwriting journal pages is a waste of time because I can’t read my own writing.
Trial and error have taught me these things and I think everyone should try new techniques every so often to see if there are any new ideas out there for them, or even just to be sure they have the best methods in process for them.
I’m an indie author and to be honest most of the authors I know in real life are traditionally published. I’ve been really lucky to be part of a wonderful real life writing group for over ten years. This writing group, which evolved out of that writing course I mentioned earlier,  was great for me because they have kept me accountable, read my stories, helped bounce ideas around and cheered me on when I wanted to give up.
What I noticed however, as time went on, was that at some point, despite all of us being on the same journey, our paths diverged. A couple of authors in the group had one book published and essentially stopped writing, a couple of other people went on to do Masters and Doctoral degrees in creative writing which changed their focus, another of my friends is traditionally published and writes one novel a year.
For me as an indie author who predominantly sells ebook, in order to gain any traction, I need to write and publish several books a year.  I need volume and to get that I’ve learned I need to be accountable.
In doing some online research about productivity I discovered that successful writers have a routine and that they know which times of day they are most productive. That was big for me. Now that I know when I write best I try and leave that time free to write. Everyone is different I’ve met writers who are morning people and writers who are night owls – you need to know what works for you.
Another thing I worked out is that if I write a thousand words a day at the end of the year I will have 365,000 words. Not exactly  revolutionary thinking I now but for me it was a bit of a lightbulb moment. Even if I only write 300,000 (so I get 65 days off) that is still five books.
Having determined that would be a good idea for me to do that I made two other decisions; one was that I needed support to succeed (a community of people cheering me on) and secondly I probably wasn’t alone in wanting support for my writing goals. I also knew that writers use Facebook effectively to build community and share ideas so I decided to set up the #1000wordsaday Facebook group at the start of 2016.
We now have just shy of 300 members made up from writers from all over the world – lots from Australia like me, but from all over. It’s a community of people supporting each others journey and it includes all the active members of my real life writing group as well.
So, I suggest that if like me you need support you might like to find a real life writers group or join an online one like mine.
Any Way You Build It [image error] When single-mother Sarah pulls up in front of the house her aunt left her she has three goals; help her kids be happy and healthy, find a job and stay away from men. The last year has been a hellish roller-coaster and now she needs to create a stable life where everyone, including her, has their two-feet firmly planted on the ground. What she didn’t count on was a sexy neighbour who made keeping her focus and her balance way too hard.
Todd has two rules, never date locals and even more importantly never date women with kids. Growing up with his own mother and a revolving door of ineffectual step-fathers Todd has vowed never to put anyone in that position. He’s perfectly happy living his life with his Peter-pan syndrome undisturbed – until Sarah and her two adorable children move in across the street and turn everything upside down.
Todd isn’t the kind of guy who can stand back when someone needs help and Sarah clearly needs a lot. When Sarah gets injured Todd has no choice to step in and be a good neighbour who lends a hand, because he’s definitely not helping her because he likes her, after all that would be crazy.
Opportunity, proximity and attraction mean two neighbors determined to remain single have quite a struggle on their hands.
If you like tree houses, indoor camp outs and shameless flirting you’ll love Any Way You Build It.
Any Way You Plan It is Book 6 in The Upper Crust Series
Book 1 – Any Way You Slice It
Book 2 – Any Way You Dream It
Book 3 – Any Way You Fight It.
Book 4 – Any Way You Plan It
Book 5 – Any Way You Want It

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Monique-McDone...
Website: http://www.moniquemcdonellauthor.com/...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MoniqueMcDonell
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MoniqueMcDon...
Blog: http://www.moniquemcdonellauthor.com/...
​Goodreads: ​https://www.goodreads.com/author/show... Where to Buy Any Way to Build It Amazon

#WhatsYourStory featuring David Sharp

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The Best Books You’ve Never Read

Before I was a writer, I was a reader. Somewhere in between, I also became a librarian. As such, I tend to view the process of book production with a blended vantage point. It’s difficult for me to address writing topics without talking about the fine art of reading— and every writer should be a reader too. It is from this triple-perspective that I have observed a curious phenomenon that will flip your brain inside out. Ready?

Some of my favorite books over the last decade were not published by Big Five publishers! Of course, I’ve also enjoyed many titles from each of the Big Five. But what I was surprised to discover is that some of the gems I’ve found in indie publishing had a more lasting impression on me than many of the mainstream titles I’ve read.  How can that be given all the taboos of independent and small press publishing? If these books are so good, why weren’t they picked up by one of the big guys? Here are my own findings:

                The Taboos:
                The digital age of do-it-yourself publishing opened the floodgates of amateur writers who have little use for the likes of “editing” or “rewrites” and who just want to pull up their name on Amazon. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with being a hobbyist, and why not wrack up a few sales if you can? It does create a tricky process for readers to find the good stuff, though. It’s a lot like looking for a needle in a stack of other needles that are poorly constructed and riddled with grammatical errors. But then you find something that makes all those bandaged fingers worth it.

                The Good Stuff:
                The good ones are difficult to tell apart from mainstream titles. Attributes include quality covers, good structural development, smooth composition without grammatical errors, and proper formatting. Each of those attributes was probably the work of a different person, because good books aren’t the result of just one person’s effort. There are various editors and artists all along the process. In short, the good stuff is good stuff because it’s good! …stuff.

                And what? The Author Just Doesn’t Like Money or Something?
                I’ve discovered a number of independent and small press authors who turned down big house contracts for numerous reasons including artistic differences or loss of creative control. It really depends on the author’s goals. Big houses will offer wider distribution and probably increased sales. But if that means the project has to submit to another person’s vision, the author may feel it’s not worth it. There is also the author’s timetable to consider. Even authors who’ve had multiple titles on the best-seller lists will tell how difficult it was to get their first book published. Most had to shop their manuscripts for years and weather rejections upon rejections before they finally got a nibble. That kind of endurance race isn’t for everybody. And, frankly, some titles do better independently. Why?

                Sales
                It’s the nature of industry. Large producers move more and more toward producing content with the lowest common denominator. They’re looking for stories with a wide audience that will probably cover multiple demographics. This is because publishing is a business, and a business is reliant on income, and income is generated by sales. That doesn’t mean they don’t publish some really good stuff. But it does mean that they’re not as interested in niche markets and quirky subcultures. If that’s the best audience for a particular book, then it might not be the worst thing to go with a more independent model. While there may not be as many sales, the author sees a higher percentage of the profits, and it may not take as many sales to make the author happy as it would to appease Random House or HarperCollins. If your story doesn’t have mass appeal, then maybe you don’t need mass production.

                So, Why Were Those Stories So Good?
                Because they didn’t have mass appeal. They weren’t intended for the lowest common denominator. They struck a very specific chord in my heart. And they also had the power to surprise me. The downside of being an avid reader is that you become harder and harder to please. You become too familiar with the established trends, and you need something a little more experimental. We’ve seen this phenomenon with music. The first decade of the new millennium was thick with industry-produced music that didn’t have the iconic identity of the previous decades. Now indie music is the mark of trendsetters, and even big labels frequently try to emulate a home-spun sound. People are looking for something different. 

                For Example?
                To get you started, here’s a few independent and small press offerings I’ve enjoyed:

How to Break an Evil Curse by Laura Morrison Humorous Fantasy. If you’re interested in some light-hearted, quirky adventure that’s just fun to read, you won’t go wrong with this one. Witty narrative and loveable characters stylistically remind me of William Goldman’s The Princess Bride, and her plucky heroine wouldn’t be out of place in the likes of the more recent Disney movies. It was originally released as a serial, but now you can read it in its entirety. You’ll have to get an account with the site that hosts her, but it’s free so stop complaining! And you might even find some other serials to addict you while you’re there.

Coffee Cup Tales by Richard Keller Quirky Short Stories. I bought this one at a conference. I was probably drawn to it because I used to be a barista. I wound up carrying it in my computer bag, and I’d pull it out whenever I had to wait somewhere. It was a fantastic time-killer, and you always look more intelligent when people scheduled to meet up with you discover you reading a book. (The effect doesn’t carry over to smart phones.) The stories are clever and diverse; you never know what to expect from the next one.

Pursuit of a King by Candace Christine Little Middle Grade Allegorical Fantasy. If you’ve been missing Narnia lately, this may be a good book for you. It’s wildly imaginative, well told and full of surprises. Like the works of C. S. Lewis, this book contains Christian symbolism and allegory that has been woven into an enchanting otherworld with exotic dangers and delights. The plot takes several twists and turns, and doesn’t end up quite where I expected it to.

Wallflower Blooming by Amy Rivers Political Thriller. Okay, it’s not really a political thriller. But the introverted protagonist might feel like that’s what she’s gotten herself into. I met the author at a conference, and she’d just gotten a piece accepted into a volume of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series. This book is similar in that it’s a feel-good book with a happy ending. Sorry for the spoilers. But sometimes, what you’re in the mood for is a happy ending, and this book is a great place to start because it’s the first of a trilogy. That means three happy endings for those of you doing the math. But I’ve also had opportunity to read some of the author’s darker writings, and I can’t wait to see those titles in full jagged bloom as well.

These are four vastly different titles whose only commonality is that I happened to enjoy them, and I didn’t discover them through mainstream channels. Maybe some of these aren’t quite for you, but something else might be. That’s what niche markets are all about. I still love my favorite bestselling authors, and I’m not putting out some obnoxious call to boycott the big presses. All I’m saying is, leave some room on your book lists for the indie titles.

​You’ll be glad you did.  David Sharp is a noisy librarian. He has written three plays which have been produced six time altogether. He is a regular contributor to The Writing Bug, and he has written a novel for which he is seeking representation as well as numerous short works.
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Spring Break & the Family Vacation

I love having a family that wants to do things together. For Spring Break this year, my "keep it simple" mother suggested that we take the kids to Disneyworld. HAHA! There's nothing even remotely simple about Disneyworld. Just thinking about it gave me nightmares for months. That being said, my immediate reaction was "YES!" and we booked the condo a year ago. 

In the weeks leading up to the trip, reality set in and I realized I was going to have to do some serious planning. Two kids, my mother, father, sister and me....we were going to need some direction. The nice thing about staying in a condo is that we cooked most of our meals, taking away the stress of eating out every night. We learned many things during this trip. We learned about how to use (and not to use) Disney's FastPass program. We learned that Universal Studios Express Passes are worth every damned penny. We learned that bean burritos are, indeed, the best picnic lunch. And, most of all, we learned that we still love being with one another. 

We only nearly killed each other twice. Pretty good for a seven day vacation. My mom and I rode way more rides than we ever thought we could (though we expressly avoided rides with the word "hurl" in the title). It was the vacation of a lifetime! And one that I can now safely check off my list of things I'm only ever doing once. 

Spring Break. Check. Now, on to summer vacation! 

(PS I'm working on my "how to survive Spring Break with your parents and your kids" as we speak!) 

#WhatsYourStory with Victoria Cooke

​Victoria Cooke grew up in the city of Manchester before crossing the Pennines in pursuit of her career in education. She now lives in Huddersfield with her husband and two young daughters and when she’s not at home writing by the fire with a cup of coffee in hand, she loves working out in the gym and travelling. Victoria was first published at the tender age of eight by her classroom teacher in year three who saw potential in a six page story about an invisible man. Since then she’s always had a passion for reading and writing, undertaking several writers’ courses before completing her first novel in 2016. ​Victoria Cooke
I was always called ‘imaginative’ as a child. I wasn’t really sure what that meant at the time, but I grew to understand that having an imagination, brightened life up a little. From a young age my mother took me to the library and my love of books grew. It wasn’t until I hit my late twenties that I actually thought writing a novel was something I’d like to do, at the time I was reading lots of books because I owned a very quiet boutique and it was a way to pass the time. I particularly enjoyed romantic comedy books, since it’s a genre that’s light and easy to read. I read a lot of Lindsey Kelk and Sophie Kinsella books and soon found myself daydreaming about my own story ideas.
I actually started writing back then and completed about half of a novel before my laptop was stolen and of course, I hadn’t backed it up. I left the idea of writing behind for a while since I couldn’t face trying to replicate what I’d lost. In actual fact, looking back, I was probably quite naïve about my ability. It wasn't until I approached the end of my maternity leave after my second child that I returned to the idea of writing. This time I read lots of blogs about writing, signed up to writing courses and practiced. I was in a much better position to begin my debut novel.
There were many occasions whereby I doubted my ability, I had sleepless nights, worrying about the fact I’d probably just written a load of rubbish and wasted my time. My driving force was the fact that I’d told family and friends that I’d started writing a novel. I was driven to finish it because I didn’t want people to see me give up again.
I did invest in a manuscript critique, I wasn’t ready to let friends or family read my work because I had no idea how it fared on the scale of decent to dreadful. I knew a good critique would point out strengths and weaknesses in my work, giving me an opportunity to improve the manuscript. I approached Katherine Trail at KT Editing services who provided my with a ten page summary of my work, she pointed out what I did well and what to work on. I learned a lot from this process and am thankful to Katherine for her diplomatic assessment, the way she articulated her thoughts and the fact she always pointed me towards a solution for any problems she found.
My plan was always to approach a publisher, there aren’t many publishers that will accept unsolicited manuscripts, but my thoughts were to try the few that did, and then approach agents if it came t nothing. HQDigital came highly recommended by other authors I’d come to know through online book groups. HQ are particularly well known for their gorgeous cover designs, they’re also a digital imprint of Harper Collins so a quite a bit player in the book market. I was thrilled to discover I could send a synopsis, cover letter and three chapters of my manuscript via email without an agent. I wasn’t expecting to hear anything back for a while, and to be honest, I wasn’t hopeful of a deal. I was more hoping that the rejection email that I was expecting may provide me with a glimpse of why my story wasn’t right. Needless to say, I was shocked when only a few days later the full manuscript was requested. That gave me hope, even if it was rejected at that point I knew the chapters I’d sent had caught their eye and as such there was something there to improve.
It was another two days before I got the call to offer me a one book deal. I was ecstatic, shocked and relieved.
My book ‘The Secret to Falling in Love’ was published worldwide in ebook format on the 9th of February 2017.
The Secret to Falling in Love Status Update: I’m going offline for a while… Wish me luck! xx
 
Lifestyle journalist and thirty-something singleton Melissa hashtags, insta's and snapchats her supposedly fabulous life on every social media platform there is.
That is until she wakes up on her birthday, another year older and still alone, wondering if for all her internet dates, love really can be found online? The challenge: go technology free for a whole month!
Forced to confront the reality of her life without its perfect filters, Melissa knows she needs to make some changes. But when she bumps into not one, but two gorgeous men, without the use of an app, she believes there could be hope for love offline!
If only there was a way to choose the right guy for her…

Twitter: twitter.com/VictoriaCooke10
Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/VictoriaCookeAuthor/
Instagram: instagram.com/victoriacookewriter Amazon Kobo Barnes & Noble

#WhatsYourStory with June Moonbridge

About the author:
June was born in June and she always loved the moon. She comes from Slovenia, a country which got its independence almost three decades ago.

She studied economics, and quickly realised she hated it. Afterwards, she found herself working in a mainly male-dominated businesses; at first in automotive and later steel products. She can choose the best steel for your project, but don't, please don't, ask her which lipstick brand you should use.

She started to write in high school and was criticised by her teacher. Stubborn as she is, that didn't stop her. Under different pen names, she had stories published in magazines, and then went on to publish three books.

After having two children, and learning that her second child has autism, she married their father and carried on working. Work and family life left her with little free time. But the desire to write didn't die. When life somehow sorted itself out, she decided to write a novel in English and her first submissions were rejected...

For what happened then, re-read the third paragraph, second sentence above... ​I was always a reader. Actually I’m lying. I became a reader after I learned to read – and boy my mum had a hard time to teach me how to read.
I loved to be read to, but as a child, I just didn’t want to learn how to read. As I had (and hopefully still have) a good memory, it had got me through the first year of school. I remembered everything my mum had read to me. When my teacher and my mum had figured out what was going on my mum started to bribe me – she realised that was the only possibility to get me reading.
Well, I can imagine that not so many years later she was sorry that she did as I became a 'book eater'. Although at that time our libraries’ policy was ‘you could only borrow three books at one time’ – I was privileged so I could take home more. At one time, I remember I took home two big bags.
It might come as a surprise, but as a child I didn’t even think about becoming a writer. Nope. I wanted to be a veterinarian or a ship’s captain, but you can bet I’m neither.
My so called ‘writing career’ began in my high school. I have written short stories before, but never published them. Of course I’ve kept my journals. I still have them in the attic. But when I was in high school my Slovene (my mother’s tongue) teacher hated everything I had written. But that didn’t put me down. After a while, when I was finally fed up with her criticism, I decided I needed a second opinion from people that didn’t know me. So, by using several different pen-names I started to send my short stories to the magazines and got them published and reviewed, with very positive reviews. You can imagine I didn’t care about my teacher’s opinion anymore.
Through the magazines my Slovenian publisher found me, and they published three books at the beginning of the millennium.
However, real life caught up with me. Not quite positive experiences with the publisher, starting a family, changing my ‘day job’ career, learning that my second child has Autism, … well, I have been putting all my effort taking care of all this, and putting my writing career to the side.
Approximately a decade later, when some of the above things had somehow sorted themselves out, my always vivid imagination exploded and I was unable to restrain it. ‘Voices’ in my head were (and are still) just too loud and the stories they told and are telling, wanted to be written on paper.
And it was actually funny. The characters in my head wanted me to try and write in English – which I learned as a second language for eight years and I use it daily because of my ‘day job’.  So I said to myself, why not. So I sat down and I wrote my first novel in English, put it through the editing and proof-reading process and then submitted.
I would be lying if I’d tell you that my ‘debut’ novel was accepted right away. It wasn’t. I had my fair share of rejections, but then – it happened. I got a positive feed-back and my first novel was published by Safkhet Publishing, which – sadly – last year closed their doors.
When that happened I decided, at least for the time being, I’m not going to look for another publisher. Instead of that I sailed into the world of self-publishing. It’s fun. I’m in control of everything, but it is definitely a lot of hard work.
I republished my first novel under its initial title ‘All That the Heart Desires’ in June 2016. My second novel ‘Torn Between Two Worlds’ was published on 1st February 2017.
My WIP - third novel ‘At the End of the Summer’ is currently with my editor and beta reader. I think that it will be finished and polished at the end of April 2017. I haven’t decided yet whether or not to submit it to some publishers. This is still something I have to clear up with myself. However I will be published, just the publication date that is not as yet set …
My fourth novel – WIP IV. – is - not so patiently – waiting to be written down… Gosh, all the mess in my head…
In all this time while in ‘publishing’ business, I’ve met virtually through Facebook and Facebook groups a numerous number of authors I hope someday I’m going to meet in person too. I just need to find time and attend some authors’ conferences and soon.
Why there are only twenty-four hours in a day?...
Caught Between Two Worlds A vacation on the shores of the Egyptian Red Sea was Veronica Blake’s long lasting dream.
But dreams turn into nightmares. Controlling boyfriend Peter complains and embarrasses her frequently in front of everybody from the start. A trip to the ancient sites turns into a disaster. But the salvation comes in the form of the mysterious Nicholas, a blue-eyed man she remembers from the hotel.
Deep in the Sahara desert Veronica encounters a totally different way of life. She desperately seeks the truth about everything that happened. Alone and afraid of her new written future she finds consolation with Nicholas, the only man she’s left to trust.
Will she ever accept the truth she seeks, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Will she be able to find a way back to the life she was forced to leave behind?

Website: http://www.junemoonbridge.com/​
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JMoonbridge
Twitter: https://twitter.com/JMoonbridge​
​ Where to Buy Caught Between Two Worlds Amazon Amazon UK