Maggie Hemlock's Blog, page 5

Dewey’s Updates: Coming Up for Air

I’ve always wished I were one of those people who could just read straight through the day. Don’t get me, I can read a lot in a day. I just have to come up for air from time to time. This is one of those times. I’ve divided the day into little 4 hours chunks. With the last one being not quite 4 hours because I don’t plan on being up until midnight. lol

So far today I’ve managed to read for 3 hours and 39 minutes. So about 1/3 of my 10 hour goal. I’m feeling a little fuzzy brained – hence writing this blog now instead of sometime later.

What have I read so far?

Well, about 300 pages of the newest Twilight book. Yep. It takes me back to my late teen years. It’s been forever since I read Twilight, but I think I might actually like this one better.

I also took a small break from Midnight Sun to read a portion of Perfume by Patrick Suskind for my group read. I dropped in and left my thoughts and jumped back into reading. This one both keeps my interest and infuriates me to no end.

I have noticed a them of blood for this readathon. Perfume is a book about a guy trying to make a perfume/cologne that smells like virgin blood. Well, it’s supposed to be but it feels like the writer keeps getting distracted.

I figure I’ll finished up the last 275 pages of Midnight Sun around 3 O’clockish. Then I’ll have to decide what to read next. I have plenty of options. I’m not sure if I want to go with the Circus of the Damned (3rd book in Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series, a reread for me, but what I’m currently working on reading), another Stephanie Meyer book, or just grab something short from the shelf. I think I want to continue with vampires and the like, though.

Hope you’re having a good readathon!

Good Morning Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon/I started early

Good morning!

I slept rough last night. I’m about 7.5 days into quitting smoking and it’s effecting every area of my life. I’m running a little late with this blog because I didn’t know my desktop computer would choose this morning to spazz out over an update that didn’t install correctly. It’s fine now, but now I’m running around trying to make up for the lost half an hour when I thought I had plenty of time this morning!

I thought I had so much time in face that I read when I woke up. Yeah, I’m trying to make that a habit and a part of my new ‘non-smoker’ morning routine. I’m trying for 10 hours this round. Since I only read 35 minutes this morning before the official start – I’m counting it. It’s not much, but it’s enough to make me feel like maybe I’ll reach my goal!

I read number 4 & 5 of the new little Amazon ‘series’ of short stories. I loved the 4th and the 3rd was just okay. I usually love Emma Donoghue, but this little dystopian number about population growth and illegal babies just made me shake my head. I might’ve enjoyed it more if I read it not first thing in the morning. I’m ChildFree by choice, but I write books about men having babies. I have no problem with other people having babies and the story was just…. I don’t words it’s too early in the morning and I want to grab a bite to eat before the official start of the readathon. Overall, I’d recommend both of the stories – even if the latter is just to share my headache/confusion/thinking too hard early in the morning

My Updated Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon TBR

So… It’s the night before Dewey’s and my slow behind is finally considering what I’ll read tomorrow in a serious manner. I’m about 30 minutes from being a full week quit of smoking. It’s made me slow at everything, but I’m pushing through.

So what am I reading tomorrow? Well, tomorrow is a quick chat discussion of our current section of Perfume by Patrick Suskind. I”m reading this book with a lovely group of people I met on Reddit’s R/Bookclub. This section is only about 66 pages so I’ll likely get it out of the way early in the day. maybe not the first thing, but early in the day. I’m really enjoying this book so far and can’t wait to dig into the next section.

Okay, no judgement, because I’m really against people judging people based on what they read. It’s not cool. Unless it’s hateful that can hurt others leave people alone. What am I reading that I feel the need to give this disclaimer? I’m reading Midnight Sun. Yes, the 5th Twilight book. I was so into when I was younger. I was never Team Edward, but yeah I was in love with the series. So, yeah, I’m reading the new one. I’m about 100 pages in and keep cracking up at how dramatic Edward is. I mean that’s Meyer’s style, but still. It’s funny. I have about 550 pages left, but since it’s YA I still don’t believe it’s a full day of reading.

Beyond these two I’ll update here on on my FB page as the day goes on! What are you reading for Dewey’s?

My Dewey’s TBR for October 2020!

It’s that time of the year again – Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon! I’m super excited for this one. I’ll be about a week quit of smoking then and reading all day will be a nice reward. This time I’m going for the goal of reading for 10 hours again. Yeah, I didn’t get it last time, but I wanna try again. I have to have sleep so 24 is out of the question. lol

So what am I going to read this year? That’s the question I’ve been pondering for a while now and I’m still not one hundred percent sure. I think I may just crack open Deathly Hallows to finish up my 2020 reread of HP. Though, I’ve been putting it off because well… You know. If you don’t just Google J.K. Rowling + transphobia. Yeah. I’m trying not to let her ruin it for me, but eh… We’ll see how it goes.

My other option is just to finish up whatever book I’m reading when it lands on that day, plus finish up my group read for the month since that’s our last discussion day, and then jump back into my reread of the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter Series. Honestly, I’m just not sure. I’m usually a mood reader and while I’m going through nicotine withdrawal that’s truer than ever. So, my TBR is TBA. lol I am going to try for 10 hours of reading during the 8AM-8AM period, though.

Happy Reading!

Book Swag! Hemlock Wolf Pack Journal!

I’ve considered swag in the past. Folks ask me about it here and there and I’m always a bit shocked and flabbergasted when that happens. I never know what to say when someone likes my stories that much.

I’ve always said if I did swag (and for a long time that was a big fat if) it would have to be something I loved and would use myself. That pretty much narrows things down to coffee mugs, stickers, bookmarks (aren’t they a dying species in the world of ebooks, though?) and of course journals. I journal a lot. I journal about life, mental health, and of course writing. I have way too many writing journals for a normal person, but I’m not a normal person! I’m a writer.

So, given how much free time I’ve had due to staying inside because the plague is going around I decided now was a good time to get things started. So…. Journals. Well, the first of what I hope to be many in a line of journals!

After three editions and tries this is the one I fell in love with! Seriously it’s my current journal right now and if things go right I hope to release a new ‘cover’ every month for the series. Don’t worry lovelies – sexy men will be on the covers soon!

My Favorite Reads of September 2020

I don’t normally do this sort of blog, but since I’m reading so much I figured I might as well share a few favorites. I’ve always held back, because I don’t read a lot in my genre. It’s just a thing about needing variety in my life. If I write and read it – where’s the spice? I do read gay romance and general LGBT romance, but they don’t always make my top books for any given month.

This month I read 13 books in total. (Squeezed one more in last night after all.)

I’ve challenge myself to pick my top 3 favorites only. I could probably ramble long blogs about half the books I’ve read this month, but I don’t want to bore you guys. So in no particular order here are my favorite reads of September 2020.

Will My Cat Eat My Eye Balls? By Caitlin Doughty

This one was a work of non-fiction by a youtuber I stumbled upon. She’s a funny and goth mortician and she’s freaking adorable if way morbid! Well, okay, not morbid. She just talks about death and death related things in a way we can all understand. This book addressed and answered questions children asked her about death. It was freaking awesome.

2. With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo

This was a YA coming of age almost romance about a high school senior named, Emoni. She faces not only the challenge of being a very young teenage mother in a racially divided place. She lives in what she self describes as the ghetto and attends a less than stellar school. She has a real gift for cooking and works her butt off to study abroad for two weeks in Spain. I adored this girl and her story. I listened to this one as an audiobook and the narrator did a wonderful job of bringing Emoni to life.

3. The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

I’m not gonna lie- when I first bought this book it was the beautiful cover that caught my attention. Then the blurb stole my morbid ghost loving little heart.

This book blends the past and the present in a beautiful way. The blurb tells it better than I ever could – because I can’t even… I loved this book.

Welcome to the cursed town of Sparrow…

Where, two centuries ago, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery. Stones were tied to their ankles and they were drowned in the deep waters surrounding the town.

Now, for a brief time each summer, the sisters return, stealing the bodies of three weak-hearted girls so that they may seek their revenge, luring boys into the harbor and pulling them under.

Like many locals, seventeen-year-old Penny Talbot has accepted the fate of the town. But this year, on the eve of the sisters’ return, a boy named Bo Carter arrives; unaware of the danger he has just stumbled into.

Mistrust and lies spread quickly through the salty, rain-soaked streets. The townspeople turn against one another. Penny and Bo suspect each other of hiding secrets. And death comes swiftly to those who cannot resist the call of the sisters.

But only Penny sees what others cannot. And she will be forced to choose: save Bo, or save herself.

How Reading and Writing Entwine

Since my move earlier this month I’ve read less than in the previous months of this year. There’s been so much to do and it’s eating into my downtime. Sure, years before I’ve read a lot less. Though, I’ve definitely noticed a link between how much I read and how much I write. If I read more I write more.

I always describe this as the feeling I’ve poured all of my words out of my fingertips and onto the blank page. Reading is like going to the gas station and getting a refill. I like variety in my life – so I tend not to read a lot of romance. I just need something different in those two entwined but very different parts of my life. Still, I know if I’m having a hard time writing I need to do some heavy-duty reading. Like sit down and read half the day and repeat until I feel normal. I think it’s partially the downtime of things. I think the other part is that reading gives me my motivation back.

I’ve never struggled for ideas. They’re everywhere in my life – my brain, my notebooks, my bulletin board, and sometimes on the back of napkins or in my phone notes. I’m never reading for ideas. I have those! lol

I believe reading a really good story reminds me of why I write in the first place. I grew up reading and the stories were at times my best friends and confidants. I grew up in a toxic and abusive environment. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, but the one thing I brought away from it that’s 100% freaking awesome is my love for reading. I read to explore new ideas/places/worlds I’d never visit otherwise. I read to make sense of the world around me and to feel connected to something bigger than myself. I write for those same reasons. Sometimes, I just need to be reminded of that by a good story.

My average for 2020 so far is 15.22 books. I’ve read 12 books this month. I’m a quarter of the way through another and I might finish it today if everything lines up, but most likely not. I know it’s only 3 books less than normal, but now that I’ve reestablished that reading habit – I can feel the absence of those books.

No worries – next month I will more than make up for it with Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon Happening. I’m already excited for that one and trying to figure out which approach I want to take to for this one. I really liked using the last one as a jumpstart for reading IT. Though, I don’t know if I’m ready to tackle another book of that size or if I’m in the mood for it. I still have plenty of time to decide, though.

Craving Some Variety in My Writing and Creative Life

Before you say it – yes! Yes, I should be writing on the second book in my new series. I’m taking today off to do some behind the scenes stuff and let my mind wander a bit. A wandering mind is a writer’s best friend.

I love the world I’ve created. My sexy shifter men and my magic and the places all over the Hemlock Universe I love. Hell, there are worlds I haven’t told anyone about. Like those Starscales the Sleeping Omega Prince is related to? They’re out there in what we’d call outer space just living their sexy dragon lives. I want to take my readers there one day.

This isn’t a blog about “Hey, ya’ll I’m done with this omegaverse I’ve been writing for almost three years now!” Hell no! This universe is my home when it comes to the keyboard. At this point I’d rather cut off my fingers than give up writing in my universe.

But there are other parts of the Hemlock Universe I want to explore. Mainly, the women. Okay, not Zoey. I think she’s the most talked about woman in my universe and I get it – she’s annoying. She’s that one family member everyone has and just wants to grab and shake. She was always going to be that character, though. She’s the combo of a few men I know actually. I just wrapped them up in little heroic but annoying Zoey Hemlock.

Before I wrote MPREG I wrote in a variety of genres. I tried my hand at everything while I practiced for what I didn’t know at the time would be the thing that stuck in the long term. Guys, ladies, my fellow enbies, I miss writing female leads. I’ve missed it for a while, but recently it’s been a strong urge. There are so many interesting women in the extended universe (in my brain lol) that I’d love to bring to the page. Maybe that’s a little evident to readers who read all of my books – Gloria and Lynia (The Crow King’s Heir) and then Hela and Olivia. (The Omega Midwife)

Heck, I miss it so much I gave Hela a chapter of her own in The Omega Midwife. I’d have loved to write her story with Olivia, but alas the Saga is (was? It’s over now.) Mpreg. Gay romance. All about my sexy men who I adore.

I’ve had folks ask me “Then why not write some straight people books?” Ummm… That’s complicated. When I ghostwrote at the beginning of my career I got burnt out on vanilla straight relationship writing. Seriously, it killed me on it. I was writing so much of it to pay the damn bills. And…. the power dynamic most people like to read of the Alpha guy and the little pretty omega woman is triggering to me. As someone who survived sexual abuse that will never be my jam. The romping happening in most of those books is consensual. I get that, but it’s the language and all of that stuff the genre is expected to have.

I’ve thought about writing it the other way – until I figured out that was dipping my toes into what people will dub ‘role reversal’ and ‘femdom.’ I read both of those genres by the way. I just have a feeling they wouldn’t pay the bills and yeah, I’ve made a career of writing. What I write has to pay the bills. It’s my job, after all.

And neither of those is what my creativity is craving. I want to write about women like Gloria and Lynia and Olivia and Hela. I want to write lesbian romance again, but I wanna write it in this universe. I want to open up more of the Hemlock Universe and expose it for all the wonderful people and horrible villains who dwell within it. Except I don’t think the readership for A/O F/F Pregnancy crosses over with Mpreg readers and the last thing I want to do is drive readers away from my universe.

So, maybe I’ll never write these women and they’ll just be a part of the universe readers never know beyond the glimpses in my MPREG books. That makes me a little sad, but I guess unless you’re Rowling (pissed at her at the moment) or King, no one gets to write what they want all the time and that’s okay. I can live with that for now.

I’ve thought about just publishing those books and not mentioning them on my social media. That way readers who want them can find them – but that’s no way to promote a book. I’ve thought about writing them under a different penname, but I don’t want two sets of social medias. I’m bad at keeping up with one.

I’m at impasse with myself – with what I know pays the bills and what I want to write again soon.

New Apartment, New Writing Routine, and a New Series Set in the Hemlock Mpreg Universe (A Rant and a Rave)

We can all bluntly admit that 2020 has been a fucking dumpster fire. It’s not just a normal dumpster fire anymore, it’s an f-ing dumpster fire now and it just keeps burning on. It burns on and we all try to live our lives just outside of the flames even if they’re licking us. I could go on about the political state of the US or its implications on COVID19 and all the dead people. I’m acknowledging all of that is going on and it just keeps taking its toll on all of us. I’ve often wondered how people did great things during horrendous times. I’ve wondered how they lived through everything history has thrown at them. I wonder about a lot of things and it’s why I write. This year, I’ve written a lot. When COVID19 started with the lockdowns I gave myself the job of writing more than ever for those stuck at home and needing an escape from our shared morbid and terrifying reality. It’s all I could do and in someways it’s still all I can do for my readers during this time. It’s a little job in comparison to the broken world, but it keeps me sane. I’m starting to think that’s the key to surviving history – somehow staying sane and fighting back when you can.

I’ve been careful in the past to keep politics off my FB page. Yeah, that’s ending. I mean, I know folks come for the books, but it’s my biggest platform and those of you who read my books probably know how much I loathe the current administration and what the future looks like if it comes around for another four years. I’ll keep saying it. I mean, shouting into the void doesn’t help, but it does weed out those toxic people and mark them. I think we need to do more of that. Politics shouldn’t be human rights. Those should just be in place.

The world is a f-ing dumpster fire and my life is no different. I’ve moved three times in a year trying to find the place my CPTSD is the coziest and trying to escape family who has abused me and attacked me and just made my life miserable. I’m in a new apartment. I’m excited, but not that excited. I hate living close to train tracks. I hate not having mail delivery here! Did you guys know that was even a thing? I live downtown of a moderate sized town and there is no mail delivery? What the holy fuck is that about?

So, I’m not optimistic. This is just another stop for me. I’m at the age where I want to put down roots, but can’t find the soil to grow in. I’ve been told I expect too much and want too much and have unrealistic ideas. Well, if wanting to live free from abuse in a house that gets mail delivery and isn’t shaken up like I’m the chicken in a shake and bake bag is too much to ask for, I’m guilty. I’m also okay with that.

During all the chaos of my move – I wrote the first book to a new series. Nope, has nothing to do with the chaos of the move. It’s set in Green Bay (Where my readers will remember Fred Moonscale owned and sold his nightclub, Glitter Bomb!) and explores characters not directly involved with the Hemlock Wolf Pack. After spending most of the year finishing that series I needed a break – a real break and am feeling creatively better while working on this trilogy.

So, I’m trying to avoid the flames of the f-ing dumpster fire that is 2020 like everyone else, but I’m keeping on. What else can we do?

The Omega Midwife: The Final Book in the Hemlock Wolf Pack Saga is up for pre-order!

Eek! I still can’t believe this is the final book in the saga! Much more to come in the Hemlock Mpreg Universe, but the main series is complete! Pre-order it today and be the first to read it on September 12th!

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