C.L. Lynch's Blog
September 18, 2019
Big News!
June 23, 2018
I Wrote A Left-Wing Book And I Am Left-Wing. Die Mad About It.
March 30, 2018
Harriet the Spy is Autistic
December 11, 2017
Pre-Orders, Free Downloads, and Signed Paperbacks, Oh My!
[image error]It’s an exciting week here for me.
After YEARS of blood, sweat, and ignoring my family (YEARS), History is finally and irrevocably set for publication this Friday, Dec 15th.
It’s long. It’s dramatic. It uses the word vagina at least three times. Tim says and does embarrassing things at least four times. It’s hopefully just what fans of Stella and Howie want, except for all of those bits in between that make fans send me emails that say things like “what are you doing?? ARGGHH!”
Anyway, it’s available for pre-order at a dirt-low price, and the price will go up dramatically after publication so if you think you might read it, snag it now!
In celebration of History’s release, I’ve made Chemistry temporarily free in online stores, I’ve discounted the paperback price, and I’ve listed three signed copies on Goodreads as a giveaway!
So if you enjoyed Chemistry, please tell your friends that they can snag it for free. And if you want to win a signed copy, you can enter the giveaway below:
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Goodreads Book Giveaway
Chemistry
by C.L. Lynch
Giveaway ends January 10, 2018.
See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.
November 24, 2017
How long is your favourite book?
When I finished the final draft of History and ran the wordcount, I nearly jumped out of my chair with celebration.
IT WAS UNDER 200,000 words!
I mean, barely, but still. So what if it’s 199,682 words long? That’s still
I was deeply relieved, because for a while there it had bloated to a monstrous 220,000 words!
Even in its newer, slimmer version, History is a beast of a book. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I’m not sure. My fellow authors say, “No one will read all of that! Why not split it into two?”
I thought about that. But I couldn’t do it.
First of all, there is a story arc to History, and cutting it in half wouldn’t work. It wouldn’t even be ending on a cliffhanger. It would just be literally stopping the story half way through and asking people for more money. I have no interest in bilking people so they can find out what happens next. I could end the book on a cliffhanger, but there are really only two good places to do that, and one is only 60,000 words in, which would really be more of a novella than a novel, and the other would be over 150,000 words in, which means the ending would be a novella. Plus, I’d be ending on a cliffhanger which a lot of people despise with a passion.
I mean, how many of you read the end of Catching Fire and wanted to throw the book across the room?
So. I wrote a long book. But is that really such a bad thing? Let’s try to turn this word count into something meaningful.
History is longer than Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire but shorter than Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
It’s longer than any of the Lord of the Rings books (which amazes me because I feel like Return of the King was the longest book EVERRRR but maybe it just felt that way reading it) but it’s shorter than any of George R R Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire books (probably because I don’t spend five pages describing banners on a battlefield. I mean, the books are gripping but then THAT happens and it’s like COME ON, GEORGE).
It’s longer than any of the Twilight books but it’s shorter than the Outlander books.
It’s longer than Jane Eyre but shorter than Middlemarch.
It’s longer than Great Expectations but shorter than Moby Dick.
Do you know what I realized, when I started comparing my book to other books?
That word count doesn’t matter to me, as a reader. So many other factors come into the perceived “length” of a book. Like, I would consider Order of the Phoenix to be a faster read than Great Expectations, wouldn’t you? And Moby Dick might be shorter than A Game of Thrones, but I know which book I would blast through faster.
So my book is long.
That doesn’t mean that it’s too long. Only my readers can tell me that. And if people start complaining that it’s too long and they DNF it, then that’s on me. Not because I wrote a long book, but because I wrote a book that felt more like Moby Dick than Outlander or Order of the Phoenix.
So I’m okay with the length, as long as it keeps people turning pages.
… But I’m still really happy to have it under 200,000 words.
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November 8, 2017
Want to read HISTORY for free? Here’s how…
Hi everyone! For a limited time only, I am collecting members for my Advance Review Team. If you read and enjoyed Chemistry, and are looking forward to the sequel, then this is a way you can read it earlier than anyone else, and for FREE!
Oh, and you’ll have a chance to win a signed paperback copy.
The only entry requirement is that you must have already read and left a review for Chemistry. You have until the day I send the book out to my street team to leave that review if you haven’t already. I’ll be sending History out for Advance Review in just a couple of weeks.
Want to know more? Click here.
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October 31, 2017
Strong Women In Fiction Giveaway
Strong Women in Fiction, a collaboration of women authors whose works feature strong female lead characters, is excited to bring you the 2017 Strong Women in Fiction Giveaway Hop from November 1 at 12:00 am EST to November 15 at 11:59 pm EST.
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From November 1st to the 15th, you can check out over 30 different giveaways, all of which involve strong women in fiction. Giveaway items include books featuring strong female characters (like Stella Blunt!), artwork depicting strong women, or prizes that in some way support female authors.
Any questions?
What do you mean by ‘strong’?
A strong heroine can be physically strong (*cough*Stella*cough*), emotionally strong, in a position of power, capable of stupendous magic, whatever. There are lots of ways for women to be powerful, and we celebrate them all.
How do I enter?
Each author has their own giveaway. Some are as simple as clicking the link and collecting the prize – in my case, a free download of Chemistry, the first in the Stella Blunt series.
“Stella is no Bella” – School Library Journal
“Stella is not an easy character to like, which is why it’s so great to see her lowering her guard and learning to trust.” IndieReader Discovery Awards (Winner for Humor 2017)
“…overflowing with wit… a fast-moving and very fun zombie blood-fest that challenges ideas about femininity and teenage love.”
So check out the linky below and hop over to each author’s site, and you can enter whichever giveaways strike your fancy. Enter one, none, or all!
September 1, 2017
The Amazing Paperback Giveaway – Enter Now!
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Imagine walking to your mailbox and finding package after package containing awesome new books to read. A grand total of twelve of them, in fact. And one of them is Chemistry!
Now is your chance to win all twelve paperbacks, and there are SIXTY FIVE ways to enter.
RULES:
U.S. Residents Only can enter (as a Canadian, this makes me sad, but the majority have spoken).
One winner with receive all twelve books. Each author is responsible for sending their book to the winner.
One winner will be chosen randomly at the end of the contest.
Contest dates: 9/1/17 – 9/22/17
Good luck!
June 4, 2017
“Award-Winning Author” has a certain ring to it!
[image error]I’ve received some pretty great emails in my life. If you have ever emailed me to rave about how much you loved my book, your email is on that list. But the day that I got the email from Amy Edelman of IndieReader, I was having a pretty low day. You know the kind of day – the kind where everything seems particularly difficult. The kind of day that makes you feel beaten-down and maybe a little sorry for yourself.
I was going through my emails, deleting the spam (the number of emails authors get offering to ‘market’ or ‘review’ their work for whopping amounts of money is truly depressing) when I read the words “Congratulations! It is our pleasure to inform you that your book won in the Humor category for the 2017 IRDAs!”
Whoa, wut.
I re-read that email a bajillion times checking to see if I had misread it. Nope. Winner. Not grand prize winner of the whole shebang, but honestly, I don’t expect to take major prizes with a zombie romance full of swear words. Howie isn’t THAT adorable.
But yeah – it isn’t a mistake, it’s for real. Chemistry is officially an award winning book. IndieReader’s Discovery Awards are judged by publishers and Kirkus reviewers. Each book is read by two judges. In order for a book to be a category winner, it must get a minimum of 4 stars from both of the judges. If no book achieves that, they just don’t announce a winner for that category.
So it really means something that Chemistry won. It means two random people with presumably high standards read and liked my body-positive, feminist, angry zombie romance. That’s pretty surprising.
The award was announced at BookCon in New York on Saturday. I couldn’t attend because I’m poor and New York is on the other side of the continent and is NOT cheap to visit. But it still means something that someone in New York said my name in the contect of the word “award”. I like that combination a lot.
So, yeah. Whenever I’m having a bad day I can remind myself that I am now an award-winning author. BOOM, baby. Who’s changing this toddler’s diaper? It’s just C.L. Lynch, the award-winning author. Who washed these dishes? Only an award-winning author. Okay, so my husband does the dish washing in our family. And the laundry. But you get the idea.
To celebrate, I’m giving away the first three chapters of Chemistry in an instafreebie giveaway, so if you know anyone who might like it, send them the link! https://www.instafreebie.com/free/doT2B
May 18, 2017
My Main Character is Ableist – My Response to a Call-Out That Never Happened
When my book, Chemistry, first came out I wasn’t sure what kind of reception I would get.
Stella Blunt – for those who haven’t read my book – is not always an easy person to like. She swears, she’s permanently in a rage about something or other, and she can’t take a compliment. I knew my heroine was what they call an “unlikeable” heroine. I knew I was taking a risk in letting her go out into the world.
My hope was that people could see past all of that. Stella has her good points, after all. She is passionate, she is intelligent, she solves her own problems, and she desperately wants to be a better person. Though she constantly berates everyone and everything, she doesn’t spare herself, either.
I open the book with a scene that immediately presents and confronts Stella’s flaws, so I hope that it’s clear that Stella will be growing and changing throughout the series. She takes the first steps toward change in Chemistry and there will be more growth and change in History.
To my relief, the vast majority of readers love Stella, either because they admire her spunk and sass, or because they identify with her raging insecurities, or both.
But every now and then, Stella meets a reader who can’t stand her, and that’s fair.
My negative reviews almost all focus on Stella’s faults – her foul language, her tendency to overreact to just about everything, and her inability to handle a difficult situation with any amount of serenity or grace. And that’s okay.
But you know what my negative reviews don’t mention?
The fact that Stella is ableist as fuck.
That’s right – Stella is ableist but that’s not what bothers the people who dislike her. They care more about her bad language than they do about the fact that she repeatedly uses words like “crazy” and “insane” as insults. They care more about her continually-raised voice than about the fact that she spends half the book trying to decide whether she wants to date someone who may or may not have physical and mental health issues.
Now, if you’re a Stella fan and you feel the need to rush to her defense – please don’t. It’s okay to love Stella. I want you to love Stella. I love Stella. But we don’t always have to love the things she says and does. Stella is a work in progress – we know this about her. She has some flaws. She has a lot of flaws. And that’s okay. But we also need to acknowledge those flaws.
If you think Stella isn’t ableist, then please go read up on ableism before you say so.
The worst part is that she doesn’t even really know that she’s ableist. Stella is keenly aware of many of her own faults. She struggles to suppress her intellectual snobbery, and she works hard to control her irascible temper – although she generally fails. But she considers her “should I date him even though he has a disease” mental debate to be completely okay. She doesn’t think twice about slinging around words like “crazy”.
I’ve been bracing myself from the beginning for a reviewer to see this and call out my book for ableism. I’ve thought about how I would respond, and how I would reassure people that Stella has already taken the first steps to overcoming her ableism, but that most of the work will happen in History.
But I’m starting to think that it isn’t going to happen. So I’ve decided to just put it out there now.
Hi. My name is C.L. Lynch and my main character is ableist.
It’s the casual kind of ableism that you’re likely to find in most teenagers who have never been forced to confront their own prejudices and privilege. It’s the kind of ableism-invisibility that most people have unconsciously – the kind that only disabled people notice. But I want you to know that I didn’t do it unconsciously. Her ableism is part of her character journey, and it will be addressed heavily in History.
Please understand that my book itself is meant to be anti-ableism. As someone who suffers from mental health issues, loves someone with a disability and has worked with some amazing and admirable people with disabilities, I revile ableism and deliberately set out to address it.
Chemistry contradicts common paranormal romance tropes by presenting Howie Mullins’s undead-ness as a disability as opposed to a superpower. He doesn’t sparkle. He isn’t super fast and super powerful. He is clumsy and has trouble learning new things. He has a lack of emotional prosody in his voice due to brain damage. He also (as we learn later on) suffers from intrusive thoughts and a certain amount of anxiety. But he is a person worth loving and fighting for.
Sure, I could have made Stella be some sort of wonderful human who naturally overlooked all of these issues and saw the person underneath right away, but that would make her too to much of a Mary Sue. Ableism is one of the most overlooked kinds of privilege/prejudice and the fact is that most teenagers and even adults evince it in one way or another. I wanted to start with a heavily flawed character who goes on a journey, and ableism just seemed to come naturally to Stella.
While Chemistry sets the foundation for Stella’s personal growth, History will go into it in much more depth, as foreshadowed by my bonus novella, With You. Howie will get to tell you his side of things – he isn’t the saint that he appears to be – and he will have his own character journey to go through as he comes to terms with who he is, and Stella will need to do the same.
I promise.
Down with ableism.
Love,
C.L. Lynch
