Pat Bertram's Blog, page 176

Bowls of Light

When I was sorting through some of my things in preparation to packing them and putting them in storage, I found a whole slew of Christmas lights. It seems ridiculous to store the lights considering how cheap they are, wasteful to throw them away, and silly to drag them to a thrift shop, so I decided to use them up. I put bowls full of lights all over the house, and oh! What a festive air!

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Pat Bertram��is the author of the suspense novels��Light Bringer,��More Deaths Than One,��A Spark of Heavenly Fire,andDaughter Am I.��Bertram is also the author of��Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with��Pat on Google+. Like Pat on��Facebook.

Tagged: bowls of lights, jar of lights, lights

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

Who knew that snow is a tourist treat? I sure didn���t! I have mostly lived in a cold climate where snow happens wherever you are, but in the desert, where I have temporarily found myself, snow is so rare that people will drive many miles to see it.

And that is exactly what a friend and I did yesterday — drove almost a hundred miles round trip just to see the whiteness and throw a snowball or two. A lovely sight!

Below��is a photo of the Pacific Crest Trail. Now you can see why people are concerned about beating winter when they through hike — it’s too easy to lose��the trail under all that snow, and besides, it’s cold!

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Pat Bertram��is the author of the suspense novels��Light Bringer,��More Deaths Than One,��A Spark of Heavenly Fire,andDaughter Am I.��Bertram is also the author of��Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with��Pat on Google+. Like Pat on��Facebook.

Tagged: going to see snow, Pacific Crest Trail, PCT, snow, tourists

Searching for the Wild Snow

I���m getting ready to head out and go searching for the wild snow.

Once upon a time, perhaps thirty years ago, more than two feet of snow fell in the desert, but I���ve only seen flurries a couple of times since I���ve been here, and whatever stuck to the ground disappeared as soon as the sun came out. So, when a friend invited me to go snow hunting, I gladly accepted. Snow!! Out here, where it seldom even rains, snow seems a mythical phenomenon. Dare I believe?

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, andDaughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: desert, desert snow, snow

Interviewing . . . Me!

What genre are your books?

All of my novels have elements of intrigue, adventure, mystery, suspense, romance, history, and some have a touch of science fiction.��A Spark of Heavenly Fire, for example, is the story of people who become extraordinary during a time of horror ��� a bioengineered disease is decimating the population of Colorado, and the entire state is quarantined. One character is obsessed with finding out who created the disease, one couple tries to escape, one woman does what she can to help the survivors. A thread of romance connects all the stories. All these different stories entwined into one makes it difficult to settle on a single genre, though many reviewers call it a thriller, and my publisher, Second Wind Publishing, sells it as mainstream.

What are your favorite genres?

I like to read novels that have it all ��� mystery, adventure, romance, a touch of strangeness, a bit of truth ��� but since I can���t find that sort of novel very often, I settle for just about anything. Non-fiction, genre fiction, literary fiction, whatever is at hand.

Do you think you gain sales for your books through blogging?

I know I���ve made a few sales because of blogging, but I don���t think blogs are a particularly good sales tool. I do think blogs are wonderful for connecting with readers once readers have discovered you, they can be a great source for support and suggestions, and they are a way of meeting people who like the same things you do. Mostly though, I just enjoy blogging.

Tell us about your book, Daughter Am I.

Daughter Am I��is a young woman/old gangster coming-of-age novel.

When twenty-five-year-old Mary Stuart learns she inherited a farm from her recently murdered grandparents-grandparents her father claimed had died before she was born-she becomes obsessed with finding out who they were and why someone wanted them dead. Along the way she accumulates a crew of feisty octogenarians-former gangsters and friends of her grandfather. She meets and falls in love Tim Olson, whose grandfather shared a deadly secret with her great-grandfather. Now Mary and Tim need to stay one step ahead of the killer who is desperate to dig up that secret.

What similarities if any between your other books and Daughter Am I?

The unifying theme in all of my books is the perennial question: Who are we?��More Deaths Than One��suggests we are our memories.��A Spark of Heavenly��suggests we are the sum total of our experiences and choices.��Daughter Am Isuggests we are our heritage.

Do you sell your books as an eBook?

My books are all available for sale��as��ebooks, and the first 30% of each is also available free on Smashwords. The books are also available in print for those who still prefer to own a physical copy of the books they read.

What do you think the most influential change in book publishing will come from?

25% of the total production of books printed by the major publishing companies are pulped, which is an incredible waste, so I think more books will be digitally printed as needed. It makes sense financially, especially if the cost of production goes down. Ultimately, e-books will become the preferred format for ���disposable��� books, such as��bestsellers��that readers will only read once.

If you could give one tip for aspiring authors, what would that be?

I���ll tell them that a book begins with a single word. Many novice writers get intimidated by the thought of writing an entire book, but all you ever need to write is one word. I know that���s not much of a goal, but in the end, it is the only goal. That���s how every book all through the ages got written ��� one word at a time. By stringing single words together, you get sentences, then paragraphs, pages, chapters, an entire book. After that, who knows, you might even reach the pinnacle and become a published author. All because you set your goal to write one word.

Where can folks learn more about your books and events?

I have a website �����http://patbertram.com����� where I post important information, including the first chapters of each of my books, but the best way to keep up with me, my books, and my events on a daily basis is here on this blog: http://ptbertram.wordpress.com

All my books are available both in print and in ebook format. You can get them online at��Second Wind Publishing, Amazon, and��Smashwords. Smashwords is great ��� the books are available in all ebook formats, including Kindle, and you can download the first 30% free.

What do you do to promote other authors?

I do author interviews and character interviews, and post excerpts on my blogs, and I don���t charge a penny! Of course, since��the authors��get what��they pay for, I can���t guarantee��they will sell books because of��my efforts, but they��will be promoted via Facebook and Twitter. If I you are an author and interested in being interviewed by me, click here to find the directions for my Author Questionnaire. Click here to find the directions for my Character Questionnaire. And click here to Let me post your excerpt!

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: A Spark of Heavenly Fire, author interviews, Daughter Am I, genre, interview, old gangsters, tips for new writers

Drifting . . .

I���m sitting here mindlessly playing computer solitaire, not thinking much of anything, just letting old sorrows, lost hopes, and unborn possibilities drift around in my mind like flakes in an old fashioned snow globe.

It���s futile to try to sort out the thoughts. There���s no need to dwell on what is gone and what can never be — those are part of my very being, so that even when the thoughts are not recognized, I feel their importance.

Nor is there any need to dwell on what has not yet happened — although those possibilities are still unformed, I feel their portent.

I���m trying not to rush through this strange hiatus between all the endings and a new beginning. So many people are gone from my life, through death, mental illness, and misunderstanding that sometimes I am overwhelmed by the complexity of starting over alone and wish to make immediate decisions and plans to give me a start on the future. But other times, like now, I am content to let the future take care of itself. There may never again be a time where so much is open to me. When I have to start making decisions, the world will narrow with each choice.

If I continue to do my mostly volunteer work for an online company, I will be tied to the computer for longer than I wish, doing work that has long since lost its appeal. If I were to walk away, I will have to embrace one further loss since this ���job��� has been part of my life for many years. If I were to get a real job to make my financial situation stronger, I won���t be able to take dance classes. Nor will I have time to write (or rather, not write, which is what I so often do). If I continue to take dance classes, I won���t be able to travel, or at least not much.

I am not yet ready for such a narrowing of possiblitilities��even if it means embracing my sorrows and lost hopes a bit longer.

And so I drift.

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: a world of possibilities, drifting, drifting thoughts, loss, snow globe

The 9th Annual Short Story Challenge

A friend just sent me information about a writing competition open to writers around the world — The 9th Annual Short Story Challenge. It’s an interesting concept, one of never encountered before. It’s not my sort of thing, but I’m posting the information in case you are interested.

There are 3 rounds of competition.

In the��1st Round (January 16-24, 2015), writers are placed randomly in heats and are assigned a genre, subject, and character assignment.�� Writers have 8 days to write an original story no longer than��2,500 words.

The judges choose a top 5 in each heat to advance to the��2nd Round (March 12-15, 2015)��where writers receive new assignments, only this time they have just 3 days to write a��2,000��word��(maximum) short story.

Judges choose finalists from the 2nd Round to advance to the 3rd and final round of the competition where writers are challenged to write a��1,500��word��(maximum) story in just��24 hours (April 24-25, 2015).�� A panel of judges review the final round stories and overall winners are selected.

If this sounds like fun to you, it’s easy to register.�� First, download and read the��Official Rules and Participation Agreement.�� Once you have read and understood the terms, you are ready to register by clicking here.�� The entry fee is US$45* by the Early Entry Deadline of December 11, 2014 and then US$55* until the Final Entry Deadline of January 15, 2015.

Every writer receives feedback from the��judges��for every story submitted, and a special review forum is available for the participants to submit their stories for review from fellow writers throughout the competition.�� During the Short Story Challenge 2014, there were over 3,300 comments made on the 200+ stories submitted on the forum.����Click here��to visit the forums.

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: 9th Annual Short Story Challenge, short story contest

Authors, Would You Like to be Interviewed?

If you are an author, I am inviting you to let me promote your latest book.

I do author interviews and character interviews,��and post excerpts on my blogs, and I don���t charge a penny! Of course, since you get what you pay for, I can���t guarantee you will sell books because of your efforts and mine, but they will be promoted via Facebook and Twitter. If I haven���t scared you off, click here to find the directions for my Author Questionnaire. Click here to find the directions for my Character Questionnaire. And click here to Let me post your excerpt!

Here are some tips for doing the most compelling interviews:

For my Author Questionnaire, I begin with the question, ���What is your book about?��� It���s the hook, the reason why we are all at the blog ��� to know about your book. So, please, don���t start your interview with boring questions like, ���Is this your first book?��� Why would the reader care if it���s your first book if they don���t know what it is about? And please give the title of your book. If you���ve done your job right, people are going to want to learn more about your book, but if you haven���t provided a title, how will readers know what it is?

Pick ten questions that most resonate with you. Responding, ���I don���t know��� to a question is a waste of your time, my time, and the reader���s time. If you don���t know, pick a question to which you do know the answer. Giving monosyllabic responses is just as bad. You���re a writer, right? Supposedly you know how to hook readers. So hook them. Tell them something interesting. Most writers say they have no message in their books, that they just want to entertain, so be entertaining.

Almost as bad as ���I don���t know��� is saying ���It���s difficult to describe.��� You���re a writer. Take the time to find the necessary words. And please, do not respond to a question with, ���You���ll have to read the book.��� There are 130,000,000 published books as of this very moment, so people have plenty of options. They don���t have to read your book. You have to make them want to read your book.

Proof your interview or guest post. If your interview is full of typos, people will assume that your book is full of typos. If your grammar is sadly lacking, people will assume your book is as ungrammatical. And if your interview is boring, people will assume your book is also boring. So please, spend time on your presentations. It does you no good to carelessly throw together an interview, guest post, or excerpt, and expect readers to instantly fall in love with you and your work.

But most of all, follow the directions. I ask people to submit their interview as a comment reply on the blog, yet every day I get a message from someone asking for my email address so they can send me their interview. Um. No. If I wanted it sent via email, I would have provided the address.

Only about 10% of the people who do interviews for me provide everything I ask, which makes the interview rather a futile project. So, for best results, please FOLLOW DIRECTIONS!

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: advice to authors, author interview, blog promotion, follow directions, how to do a blog interview

Life Happens

I���m beginning to get a bit nervous about discussing my impending future because the uncertainty of��my life��bothers people — bothers them a lot — and I don���t like putting them in such a position. Oddly, the uncertainty doesn���t really bother me all that much. In fact, I am more fearful of settling into my solitariness and stagnating than I am of uncertainty, which keeps me dreaming of impossible adventures.

(In case you���re new here, after the death of my life mate/soul mate, I came to my nonagenarian father���s house to look after him in his declining years, and now that he���s gone, this house will soon be sold, and I will have to start my life from scratch.)

I have suffered so many losses in the past few years that I feel lost myself, but I���m not sure that���s a bad thing. I don���t want to remain the same forever, nor do I want to do the same things I���ve always done. It���s time for me to try on different lives to see what (if anything) will fit. It does feel strange, though, that my options are both limitless and limited (limitless because a world of possibilities awaits me, limited because of a lack of resources). Such extremes add to the uncertainty. How do you choose a path when thousands are open? How do you deal with the requirements of modern life when resources are few? And most especially, how do you sort through all the things you don���t want to do to find the things you do want to do?

I have no idea how to begin a life from scratch, but as one lovely woman told me today, ���You do it one step at a time.��� And she should know — although she���s still fairly young, she had a stroke one night and woke up blind. Talk about having to start from scratch! I���m lucky. I don���t have to start from so far down. I can start from where I am right now, with all my baggage, both welcome and unwelcome.

But even she has cautioned me to make immediate plans. To make a decision — today.

The truth is, life happens. It���s as simple as that. You take one step, then another, and all of a sudden you are somewhere you never imagined. I had no intention of ever looking after my father, no thought of taking dance classes, no dreams of dancing on stage, and yet, those things have all happened, one unwitting step at a time.

The first step toward my new life is now in progress. I���m sorting through all my possessions, weeding out the superfluous and packing the rest. I���m also sorting through my immaterial possessions, such as��responsibilities I have undertaken and friendships that no longer bring��joy, to see what if anything is worth taking with me into my new life and what needs to be discarded. My next step will be to wait to see what happens with my father���s house. It might take a while to sell, and if so, maybe the executors will allow me to stay here until it does. Either way — staying here a or leaving shortly — my third step would be to find a storage place and move all my stuff there. And then . . .

That���s as far as I���ve gotten. Seems a good enough plan for now. So don���t worry. I won���t starve. Won���t be on the streets. I���ll just be . . . wherever life has taken me.

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: a world of possibilities, beginning from scratch, feeling lost, grief, life happens, limited resources, one step at a time

An Epic Adventure

During the past couple of years, I���ve been blogging about my yearning for an epic adventure. I���ve talked about walking up the Pacific coast, thru walking the Pacific Crest Trail, getting a small camper to roam the country and visit all my online friends. The last I might still do, but the first two are supreme athletic feats for which I simply do not have the feet. (Or the body, either!)

To me, an epic adventure is more than an athletic feat. It is a transcendental experience, one that allows us to transcend our daily experience, going beyond what we know, and somehow being transformed in the process. Such an endurance test would include physical challenges and encompass the whole range of human emotions.

And such an epic adventure came looking for me.

My Hawaiian dance class was invited to participate in a dance concert put on by the local college. Our teacher picked out two numbers — ���Green Rose,��� a Kahiko chant, and ���Nani Wali Nahala,��� a dance using bamboo sticks. (Have you ever seen Donovan���s Reef where the dancers danced with sticks? Our dance was faster and more complicated, but you get the idea.) Then we practiced. And practiced. And practiced.

I don���t know if I���ve ever mentioned that I���m musically challenged. My ears hear all the various strains, themes, and tracks of a song as a single entity. It���s very difficult for me to pick out a beat or single note from the m��lange. And yet, I was chosen to lead the class out on stage. (It had nothing to do with expertise. It was more of a height thing — the woman at the other end of the stage was the same height as I was, and I happened to be there for all the practices.)

I did learn to pick the right note, count the requisite number of beats before heading into the limelight, and keep time while leading the way, yet it was always an adrenaline-filled, nerve-jangling moment when I made my entrance, whether in class or in dress rehearsal.

This epic adventure spanned five days. Our class���s dress rehearsal on Wednesday. The dress rehearsal for the entire cast on Thursday (a nine-hour endurance test, mostly boredom interspersed with moments of heart-pounding and palm-sweating nervousness when we lined up for our turns). Two performances on Friday. One performance��on Saturday evening. A��Sunday matinee.

By the end of the day on Thursday, and even after the first show on Friday morning, some of us were wondering if the whole thing was worth it, but by Friday night we got into stride (it helped that as soon as I stepped on stage, we got a big round of applause. Sure made smiling easier!). Saturday slipped by as if this were our new life, and Sunday, though fun, was simply another day. The stage had become our life. Then it was over and somehow we had to come back to our normal lives.

Or maybe not.

Such an epic adventure, encompassing as it did the endurance test of waiting for our turns, the physical feat of dancing, the emotional highs and lows — fun and boring, exhausting and exhilarating, challenging and nerve wracking — had to have changed us somehow. Well, changed me anyway. The others have done such marathon concerts before, but it was a first for me. (Me? Dancing on stage? Seems unreal, to be honest.) Change ripples into our lives, creating a new reality. The odd thing is, I might never notice it. Change might rock our world, but since we rock with it, we are always on sure footing.

Oddly, the thing that made it all seem worthwhile for me during that second interminable day of dress rehearsal, is that whenever any of us questioned why were we doing such a thing, I���d look at us and say with a smile, ���but we look so adorable.��� And maybe something as simple as that is what keeps one moving ahead on an epic adventure. Because, of course, we did look adorable. It might even have been part of the adventure. We are all long past the ���adorable��� stage of our lives, and yet, here we are (I’m the second face from the right):

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: bamboo sticks, dancing, epic adventure, Green Rose, hawaiian dance, Nani Wali Nahala, transcendental experience, transformation

You Matter Because

Click��here to find out more about the��YouMatter campaign

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, ���an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.��� Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.

Tagged: #youmatter, you matter campaign