Elise VanCise's Blog, page 14

ROWing along the writing rapids ROW80 Update

Some weeks are smooth sailing everything on the checklist gets done and goals are completed. . Other weeks… Well, those crazy weeks are like trying to navigate rough rapids against the current, with a broken paddle.
During those weeks of rough waters everything is out of balance and goals can seem to be unachievable. Fighting against the current can be exhausting to both body and soul. Instead of paddling like a madman to get three inches upstream, turn that raft and head for shore.
Take a de...

The Heart of the Hunter Scavenger Hunt

Welcome to The Heart of the Hunter scavenger hunt sponsored by Juniper Grover Book Soulutions! Here's how to play :) Just read through the excerpt below and about this great new book by Natalie-Nicole Bates. There are several words missing from the passage and it's up to you to hunt them down!  At the bottom of the post is a list of blogs that have the rest of the words for the excerpt. You'll find the special words somewhere in the posts of each blog highlighted in green. Don't forget t...

A Life Renewed Not just a story, it's her story, Lisa Andrews Guests on Gladiator's Pen

Author Lisa Andrews guests today to tell us a bit about her inspiring true life story A Life Renewed. 
An Introduction of "A Life Renewed" by Lisa Andrews
Lisa Andrews and her husbandA highly-achieving student and athlete, Lisa was in sixth grade when she was diagnosed with AML leukemia. The news shocked her and her family, along with her entire small-town community. Over the next six months, Lisa and her mom basically lived at the hospital. When she wasn’t receiving chemotherapy, Lis...

Goals: A map out of bat country

  2014 started off with a bang but there’s a lot to juggle and things can get off track and out of control fast without a clear marked map of where we’re going. That’s where goals come in.
Without a map we’re just driving down a desert highway from point to point. Sure, that gets us where we need to go eventually, but takes a lot longer to get there and it takes us through “bat country.” Where life becomes chaotic like that scene in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. “Suddenly, there w...

Hunted author Ruby Fielding is in the ludis for a chat

Author Ruby Fielding has dropped into the ladies for a chat about her latest book, Hunted to be released on January 16th. So pour a cuppa and get comfortable as she tells us a bit about Hunted and Ruby.

Tell us 3 little known facts about Ruby Fielding. My favorite season is winter, although this one has been a bit extreme even for me! I’m currently living in a cabin in the heart of a New England forest – up in the White Mountainsin New Hampshire and baby it’s cold out there!
I’ve tra...

Coming Soon The Briton and the Dane: Timeline by Mary Ann Bernal

Today Mary Ann Bernal joins us in the ludis to talk about her upcoming release The Briton and The Dane: Timeline. So pour a cuppa and get comfortable as we explore the latest addition to this fantastic novel series.

[image error] GP: What Inspired You to write this novel in The Briton and the Dane franchise?
Mary Ann: When I first set pen to paper when writing The Briton and the Dane, the storyline was about Gwyneth and Erik’s relationship, and the problems they faced in a land ravaged by war and conquest. G...

One Word/60Seconds: Bourbon

"Bartender, refill." This was a hell of a case. The kind that made an investigator chase his tail before he could get a decent lead. How did he get mixed up in all of this chaos? 

He gave a snort and knocked back the fresh glass of bourbon. He knew exactly what got him into this mess. Toughts of chasing the doe eyed skirt who sauntered into his office with a sad story and tear in her eye. There was probably an onion slice in that silk hanky. 

He motioned to the bartender for another....

Book Hooks: Tingle, a bite of The Rosary

Book Hooks is a new weekly meme hosted by the MFRW Authors Blog. It's a chance each week for authors to hook readers with a few sentences  from their current WIP or any preveiously published book.  
My 'hook' for this week is a short excerpt from one story, The Rosary, in my flash fiction anthology, Tingle. The story involves a priest who is having trouble sleeping on one hot summer night. what he discovers in the garden during a midnight prayer isn't holy at all. Will a soul be lost...

Noir Reading Challenge 2014 Are you ready to slip into the darker side of fiction?

Welcome to the first reading challenge sponsored by Gladiator’s Pen.
  Noir : crime fiction featuring hard-boiled cynical characters and bleak sleazy settings
I have had a love of this dark genre for a long time. Noir is the underbelly of fiction, the place where darker themes are explored. I can sit and devour hours watching The Maltese Falcon, The Long Goodbye, Casablanca, Detour, City That Never Sleeps and so many more. (Thank you God for Netflix!) Though, Noir is much more than film.
Th...

Sneak a peek at an outlaw

Sneak Peek Sunday, created by fellow author Sara Walter Ellwood, authors post six paragraphs from either a WIP or a published work.  I’ve chosen six paragraphs of my work in progress, Outlaw Born. I’d love to know what you think of this short excerpt.
Blurb: The war forced Ben Mason into long separations from family and set him on the battlefield against brothers. His luck left him more often than it came to him. He fought through it all to rid himself of the tarnished name given to him...