Michelle Garren Flye's Blog, page 89

Final Cover for Where the Heart Lies!

Just got the final cover for WHERE THE HEART LIES, due to be published by Carina Press July 2012. Isn't it pretty?

Five stars for WEEDS AND FLOWERS!

A reviewer finally made me cry. I've always heard it could happen, but I didn't really expect it to. I've developed a pretty thick exterior skin about my writing. Yeah, inside I wince sometimes but outside, I appear quite stoic. Say what you will about my writing, I can take it. Immature, too much sex, not enough sex, trying to be something it's not, never going to sell…whatever. I guarantee you whatever negative you can come up with to say about my writing is nothing worse than the negative voices I hear in my head all the time. I've had to ignore those inner voices, and I can ignore you, too.

So how did Dolce Amore of Booked Up Reviews finally bring tears to my eyes? Well, if you hadn't noticed, WEEDS AND FLOWERS is pretty important to me. It was the first novel I ever wrote (and finished) and it sat unread and unappreciated on my computer until last Christmas. Then I did something I thought I never would. I self-published it, because an unread book is nothing, and I didn't want WEEDS AND FLOWERS to be nothing. Still, sending something so dear to me out into the world was difficult. What if it's not ready? What if the other books don't play nice with it? What if it sits alone on the Amazon playground, unread, unwanted?

Dolce Amore, who has written very thoughtful and positive reviews of my other two books as well, set my mind at ease at last with her review, the first official review of WEEDS AND FLOWERS. The part of her review that made me cry (just a little, I swear) was this part:

It's a wonderful story that makes you stop and think. It's about love, loss, and life. So well written it makes you feel like you were there, seeing all with your own eyes. It's different from the other books by Ms. Michelle Garren Flye, but no less wonderful. I love it and I rate it 5 stars.

Thank you, Dolce Amore and Booked Up Reviews!

Booked Up Reviews Gives SECRETS OF THE LOTUS Four and a Half Stars!

I discovered, to my surprise, that Booked Up Reviews just did a review (yesterday, coincidentally on my birthday) for SECRETS OF THE LOTUS. I am happy to report the reviewer, Dolce Amore, liked it enough to give it four and a half stars. Yay! I am thrilled by the thorough job Ms. Amore does with her reviews, even going so far as to quote some of her favorite passages, and though she didn't find quite as much to like in this one as she did in WINTER SOLSTICE, she did say it was "a lovely and wonderful story". Thank you, Ms. Amore and Booked Up Reviews!

Celebrating My Birthday: WEEDS AND FLOWERS is free again!

I love getting flowers. For my birthday, Valentine's Day, whatever. I think it stems (pun intended) from my school days when you could get flowers at school and you'd be called to the office to pick them up. For the rest of the day, everybody knew you were special because SOMEBODY sent you flowers.

Well, it's my birthday, and I can't send everybody flowers to make them feel special, but I can do another giveaway of WEEDS AND FLOWERS on Amazon. Click here to download your free copy. And enjoy!

An Excerpt from WEEDS AND FLOWERS

My bike leaned against Jeff's metal building, but I didn't know he was there until I smelled the smoke. I froze, looking guilty, almost as if I were the one who'd been caught smoking. He looked back at me, removed the white stick from his mouth and blew a smoke ring. "Wanna smoke?"

"No."

"Didn't think so." He turned away from me.

I hesitated for a moment, looking curiously at the cylinder and thinking about Marleen's remark that Jeff was smoking "something". Curiosity got the best of me. "What is it?"

His mouth quirked. "Just a little weed." I must have gasped because he laughed a little. "Cigarette, idiot. You want some or not?"

"No," I said, but I sat down on the wall next to him. The weeds had died back a little, but the spot still felt secluded. I wasn't sure why I was sitting there with Marleen's greasemonkey brother, but I was uncertain about leaving until I knew Marleen had returned from her chat with Brian. And it felt rude to sit somewhere else when I knew Jeff was already sitting here.

Jeff made no comment, but continued to smoke his cigarette and blow smoke rings. I admired his ability in spite of myself. "You're good at that."

"Lots of practice."

"Why do you sit back here all the time?" I looked at the rusted back of the metal building. I couldn't imagine the draw.

Jeff shrugged and took a long draw off his cigarette before answering. "Because nobody else likes to sit back here."

"Because of the weeds and bugs."

"Yeah."

"You like weeds and bugs?"

"No."

"So why sit back here with them?"

"I don't like people either." Jeff glared at me.

I nodded. "That makes sense. If you don't like people, the only place to go is where there aren't any. The only place you can be sure there won't be any people is where people don't like to be."

"You talk a lot," Jeff said. Our eyes met and I realized for the first time that he had very nice eyes. Blue green with flecks of gold. They reminded me of a description I'd read once about the Mediterranean Sea.

Breathing moment: Quotes about writing

One of my favorite authors who I am grateful to be able to call a writing buddy, Ellen Meister, recently posted an inspiring quote from J.D. Salinger on her blog. You can read it here: Side Dish.

I'd never read this particular quote, but I found it very inspirational. I love quotes, especially by writers or about writing. When I hit a roadblock in my writing, I troll the internet for inspirational quotes. Every year I put a quote in my Christmas card—something that means something to me and that I hope will mean something to my friends and family.

Anyway, Ellen's quote got me thinking about some of my favorite writerly quotations. One of my absolute favorites and one that I try to live my writing life by:

"I try to leave out the parts that people skip." — Elmore Leonard.

Here's one that's a little less light-hearted, but one that I also love:

"The idea is to write it so that people hear it and it slides through the brain and goes straight to the heart." — Maya Angelou

That quote right there is why I rewrite and rewrite some sentences. I don't know if I've written sentences that go straight to my readers' hearts yet, but I'm working on it.

But I have to give one of my favorite authors credit for really nailing why I write, and why I try to write something new every time. Mark Twain said it best, didn't he, when he said:

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." — Mark Twain

I hope one day I will have broken new ground in the writing game. If not new ground for other writers, at least new ground for me.

Don't forget to breathe today!

BREATHE honored by Versatile Blogger Award

A couple weeks ago, I got a nice surprise when my friend and fellow writer A.J. Brown gave me my very first Versatile Blogger Award. I'm not totally certain I deserve this award, especially recently. I haven't really kept on my posts like I should. However, I'm going to accept it, because I've learned that honors and awards offered by friends quite often mean much more than those given by strangers. Thank you, A.J. It means a lot to me that you think so much of me as to offer this.

For those who don't know about the Versatile Blogger Award, there are a few rules. First of all, thank the person who passed the award along to you. I've done that. Link back to his/her blog. Well, that's no problem. I think A.J.'s already on my O2 Links of Interest, but in case you've missed him, here's another link: Type AJ Negative.

Next, I'm supposed to link back to the original site: The Versatile Blogger Award. Check.

Now comes the hard part. Nominating fifteen blogs for the VBA. Okay, here goes:

1. I'd nominate A.J., but somebody's already beat me to it. But seriously, if you're into writing, horror, funny family stories, author interviews, reviews, etc., you should check out his aforementioned blog. If ever there was a versatile blogger, he's it.

2. Jennifer Reno of Jenn Reno Photography. Why a photography website? Oh my, so many reasons. First of all, I won't deny it. She's a friend of mine. She's read my books and mentioned them on her blog. But really, it's about her work. Remember the old adage "a picture is worth a thousand words?" Well, Jenn has millions of words on her blog, then. Every picture she takes tells a story. One of my favorites is of a little boy in a Batman cape hugging his mother. And it's not just Jenn's pictures either. She links to multiple other talented photographer's sites. It's fantastic exploring those sites and finding inspiration in the real people depicted on them.

3. John Peter's Dark Scribblings. John recently revived his Dark Scribblings, and I'm thrilled. He's posted interviews, articles and just some pretty interesting thoughts. John's one of those writers who's really interested in working with other writers, and I'm glad I've had the opportunity to do just that on occasion.

4. Steve Lowe's Assorted Shitzengiggles. If you're not easily offended, check out Steve's website. It's good for a laugh, a giggle, and sometimes a snort. I think A.J. may have nominated Steve, too, but since Steve was one of my original HONEOWPs I feel I need to follow suit.

5. Amanda Von Hoffmann's Gossamer and Lichen. Another of my original HONEOWPs and a very talented writer. Amanda blogs about writing, books, art and whatever strikes her fancy at the time.

6. Ash Joie Lee. Although Ash doesn't currently keep up her blog, she's got a lot of interesting stuff on it, including her ongoing Facebook Status Story.

7. Year of Giving. In 2009 Reed Sandridge was unemployed. He decided to spend his year giving $10 a day to total strangers who would then allow him to tell their story on his blog. Such an amazing blog! Go back to the first day and start reading. It's 365 days of human interaction and some really beautiful stuff that will restore your faith in humanity.

Okay, that's all I can come up with at the moment. I know there are more, so I may come back and add some. At any rate, my last obligation as a nominee for the VBA is to tell seven things about myself. Here goes.

1. I'm a Pisces. Even in the "new" astrology I'm a Pisces.

2. I'm taking piano lessons this year. I've never played a musical instrument other than a recorder in my life, but I'm taking piano lessons and I'm really horrible, but it's fun having a new challenge.

3. I don't go to church, but I do consider myself a Christian.

4. I'm a registered Democrat, but the right Republican could turn me.

5. I consider supercars a form of art. And muscle cars. And I love NASCAR. I'm having a hard time reconciling my love of cars with my desire for clean energy.

6. I stopped writing horror because I wanted to stop thinking about the horrible things that could happen to people.

7. I believe in happily ever after.

Just got my next round of edits on Where the Heart Lies…

…so this is going to be brief. This is my last chance to make any changes before it goes to copy editing, though, so the need to be thorough is pressing. I must put away all my distractions for the time being and get to it. The good news is, it probably won't take any more than a week to make the editing changes, so here's hoping I'll be back soon!

WINTER SOLSTICE gets five stars from Booked Up Reviews!

You know those moments that affirm you're doing okay, right? I hope everybody gets them, no matter what they do for a living. I've talked about validation on here before. I've gotten validation in several small ways since I started publishing. When I wrote horror, believe it or not, my validation often came in the odd looks people gave me when they'd read something of mine. "How did you write that?" That was a fun validation.

Since eschewing horror for my more romantic side, my validation has come in the form of reviews. Some are face-to-face. Friends tell me "I loved your last book!" I even had one reader chase me down to ask me when I had another one coming out. That was really nice validation. I also enjoy the comments on Goodreads and my blog and Amazon (I really love finding a new review of one of my books on Amazon!).

But let's face it, when a review site gives you a good review, it's kind of awesome. These are people who read a ton of work in my genre. To have them give me a good review is a thrill. To have them give me a great review–well, it sort of makes my day. Booked Up Reviews did that for me today. Five stars and reviewer Dolce Amore had this to say about WINTER SOLSTICE:

I think I said before that paranormal is my favorite genre, but I always take the chance of finding good writers… no matter the genre. And Ms. Michelle Garren Flye is a good one, a very good one; my favorite writers' list keeps growing…

Now, I will put into words what I think about the book: we have outstanding characters, wonderful storyline, great dialog, and delicious humor that just adds flavor to the story. And the way she adds the medical terms with the story just fills me with wonder.

Wow. Thank you, Booked Up Reviews for the validation! To read the whole review, click here: Booked Up Reviews: Winter Solstice by Michelle Garren Flye.

Second edition of Weeds and Flowers: The perfect valentine?

Yay! I just checked Amazon and my "second edition", including the beautiful new cover you see to your left, is now up and ready to be downloaded to your Kindle (or smartphone or computer with the Kindle app). Happy Valentine's Day! It's free!

If you like Weeds and Flowers, you might even like my two romances, and today's all about romance, right? And hey, today really is your lucky day! Lyrical Press is having a sale. Everything in their store is 50% off! Here's a good place to start: My Books.

I'm also scheduled to be interviewed on author John Peters' blog today. Until that's up, check out his other informative posts: Dark Scribblings. He's written some great articles and you might even spot my name in there once or twice.