Kelly Hashway's Blog, page 42

Friday Feature: The Never Veil Series

Today I have not one but three books to share with you! Check out The Never Veil Series by Amy McNulty.


In a village of masked men, each man is compelled to love only one woman and to follow the commands of his “goddess” without question. A woman may reject the only man who will love her if she pleases, but she will be alone forever. A man must stay masked until his goddess returns his love—and if she can’t or won’t, he remains masked forever.

Seventeen-year-old Noll’s childhood friends have paired off and her closest companion, Jurij, found his goddess in Noll’s own sister. Desperate to find a way to break this ancient spell, Noll instead discovers why no man has ever chosen her. She is in fact the goddess of the mysterious lord of the village, a man who refuses to let Noll have her right as a woman to spurn him.

Thus begins a dangerous game between the choice of woman and the magic of man. The stakes are no less than freedom and happiness, life and death—and neither Noll nor the veiled lord is willing to lose. 

Winner of The Romance Reviews' Summer 2016 Readers' Choice Award in Young Adult Romance.
Grab it on Amazon.

For the first time in a thousand years, the men in Noll’s village possess the freedom to love whom they will. In order to give each man the chance to fully explore his feelings, the lord of the village decrees all marriages null and void until both spouses declare their love for one another and their desire to wed again. What many women think will be a simple matter becomes a source of village-wide tension as most men decide to leave their families and responsibilities behind.

Rejected by the lord and ashamed of her part in the village’s history, Noll withdraws from her family and lives life as an independent woodcarver. This changes when her sister accuses her of hiding her former husband Jurij from her—and when Jurij eventually does ask to move in. Determined not to make the same mistakes, Noll decides to support her male friends through their new emotional experiences, but she’s soon caught up in a darker plot than she ever dared imagine possible from the men she thought she knew so well. And the lord for whom she still has feelings may be hiding the most frightening truth of them all.
Grab it on Amazon.

Men can love, but they can also hate. Noll knows too well that the men in her village have adjusted poorly to the freedom of their hearts, but she hopes to bring peace back to her community. With the lord’s return, Noll feels confident that together, they can work to settle down the villagers, but in his rebirth, he remembers only one thing about her: that she caused the curse that tortured him for a millennium in the first place.

Determined to start anew, Noll must accept that, romantically, she and the lord are better without one another, but she’ll need his help to uncover what’s really behind all of the suffering in her village. Escorted to a land beyond the mountains, Noll uncovers the truth about her village and the strange occurrences in which she’s had a hand. When someone who loves her discovers the same things and betrays her, Noll feels powerless to stop her village’s fate. By learning to forgive and seek forgiveness, Noll finally understands true love of a free heart—along with true sacrifice.
Grab it on Amazon.
Or get all three books together here. Amy McNulty is a freelance writer and editor from Wisconsin with an honors degree in English. She was first published in a national scholarly journal (The Concord Review) while in high school and currently writes professionally about everything from business marketing to anime. In her down time, you can find her crafting stories with dastardly villains and antiheroes set in fantastical medieval settings.


*Want your YA, NA, or MG book featured on my blog? Contact me here and we'll set it up.

Writer Wednesday: Life Goes On And So Does Publishing

I've had a rough fall season. If you've been following my blog or any of my social media outlets, you're aware of that. But here's what I've learned. No matter what is happening in your personal life, the world continues to spin. Time keeps flying by. I took some time to myself to regroup and care for my dog, but what I didn't do was allow myself to stop living.
In November, I committed to National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), but more than that, I promised myself that I'd not only write book one in my adult psychic mystery but that I'd take my Ashelyn Drake adult romance novella and turn it into a full-length novel. When my grandfather passed away, I almost let that second promise go out the window. I didn't write for days and told myself I was allowed to not finish that goal in the month of November. 
But something happened. 
I realized I'm not the type to let a goal go without doing everything in my power to see it through. Yes, between my grandfather passing and my dog getting seriously injured, I had every right to step away from my writing. But I couldn't. I found that stepping away was worse for me. I needed to keep doing the things I love because that's how we get through tough times. Writing became therapeutic. My pace slowed drastically since I couldn't focus for long periods of time and I had to keep constant watch on my dog so she didn't rip out her stitches. But I finished both books.
Why am I sharing this with you today? Because I see writers who get stuck with a bad publisher or bad agent (I've lived through both!) or who experience hard times in their personal lives and feel like giving up all together. To those writers I want to say, live goes on. Even though you might feel like things couldn't get worse, I can assure you they will get better. You can pick yourself up and carry on.
I also want to thank all of you. Thanksgiving was tough for me because I always spent it with my grandfather. This year, I just wanted it to be over. But now that I've had some time, I want to thank those of you who reached out when I needed it. There was one day when I got a comment from a total stranger who found me on another person's blog and made a point to seek me out and offer condolences. That made my day. Seriously. And it reminded me how a small act of kindness can make such a difference in a person's life. So thank you. Writing might feel lonely at times, but this community of authors is nothing short of amazing. I'm thankful to have each and every one of you in my life.

*If you have a question you'd like me to answer from the other side of the editor's desk, feel free to leave it in the comments and I'll schedule it for a future post.

Monday Mishmash 12/5/16

Happy Monday! Monday Mishmash is a weekly meme dedicated to sharing what's on your mind. Feel free to grab the button and post your own Mishmash.
Here's what's on my mind today:Chorus Concert  Today is my daughter's chorus concert. I'm excited to see her in her first concert ever.Dual Signing  Ayla and I signed together on Saturday. She sold out of books! A few of you have contacted me about getting signed copies of her books. I have to put in an order (probably tomorrow because today is a packed day for me), but I'll let you know as soon as I get more copies in.Holiday Sale  My daughter's school is having a holiday sale this week. I'll be helping out for a little bit today, but I can't leave my dog home alone for a long time yet.Hadley's Stitches  Hadley is on the mend. Her stitches come out on Wednesday, and her shoulder and mouth wounds are healing pretty well. She'll have quite a few scars, but she's still beautiful inside and out.Editing  I have three client edits on my plate this week. Not sure how that happened! Wish me luck!That's it for me. What's on your mind today?

Friday Feature: The Ghost Files Volume 4 Cover Reveal

Title: THE GHOST FILES, VOL.4 PART 1Author: Apryl BakerPublisher: Limitless Publishing, LLCRelease Date: December 20, 2016Cover Designer: Wicked by Design

PRE-ORDER:AMAZON US ** AMAZON UK ** B&N **  iBOOKS
Sleep, little children, all safe in your beds. But when the boogeyman knocks, if you are up watching… he’ll make sure that you wish you were dead! 
Once every one hundred and fifty years he emerges from the darkest depths to feed. With each soul he takes, he grows stronger. There is but one gift he needs in order to gain the power he seeks. One gift that will allow him to walk amongst all the precious little children.
And it’s the one gift Mattie Hathaway possesses…the ability to bring images to life with just a drop of her blood. The demon Silas has warned her to never reveal this ability, not even to her father who shares her power to communicate with the dead. She’s heeded his warning, but hiding it may no longer be an option.
Children are disappearing all over the Charlotte area. When their bodies are recovered, they are always the same—broken, beaten, and bruised. Fear is spiraling out of control in the Queen City as parents glance nervously around each corner, seeing the boogeyman in every shadow.
When one little girl goes missing in Mattie’s neighborhood, it’s up to her and Officer Dan Richards to find the truth. In doing so, she uncovers a far greater evil than she’s ever come up against. The one thing she was bred to defeat.
Deleriel. A fallen angel…one of the first demons. He is powerful, ambitious, and now that Mattie is on his radar, she’s all he needs to complete his arsenal.
Amid of whirlwind of secrets coming to light, Mattie is faced with uncovering the truth about her own heritage. She must come to grips with it before she can begin to prepare for the battle of a lifetime…a battle she never asked for but is caught in the middle of. 
Can she face her own truths before it’s too late?


MEET APRYL BAKER: So who am I? Well, I’m the crazy girl with an imagination that never shuts up. I LOVE scary movies. My friends laugh at me when I scare myself watching them and tell me to stop watching them, but who doesn’t love to get scared? I grew up in a small town nestled in the southern mountains of West Virginia where I spent days roaming around in the woods, climbing trees, and causing general mayhem. Nights I would stay up reading Nancy Drew by flashlight under the covers until my parents yelled at me to go to sleep.
Growing up in a small town, I learned a lot of values and morals, I also learned parents have spies everywhere and there’s always someone to tell your mama you were seen kissing a particular boy on a particular day just a little too long. So when you get grounded, what is there left to do? Read! My Aunt Jo gave me my first real romance novel. It was a romance titled “Lord Margrave’s Deception.” I remember it fondly. But I also learned I had a deep and abiding love of mysteries and anything paranormal. As I grew up, I started to write just that and would entertain my friends with stories featuring them as main characters.
Now, I live Huntersville, NC where I entertain my niece and nephew and watch the cats get teased by the birds and laugh myself silly when they swoop down and then dive back up just out of reach. The cats start yelling something fierce…lol.
I love books, I love writing books, and I love entertaining people with my silly stories.
CONNECT WITH THE AUTHOR: ** PUBLISHER ** FACEBOOK ** TWITTER ** ** BLOG ** GOODREADS **

Writer Wednesday: A Tip For Tenses

Today's topic comes from Lidy, who asked:
"The trouble comes with which tense to use. Simple past or past progressive? But then I end up mixing and switching tenses. Is there a trick or tip to keep your tenses straight/consistent?"
First, for anyone not familiar with the term past progressive, let me explain it. Past progressive can indicate a continuing action or an action that was interrupted or happening when something else occurred. You write this tense by using a form of "to be" and a verb ending in -ing. Here are some examples with the past progressive in italics:
Continuing action:Tom was being a bad friend.I was writing all afternoon.
Interrupted/happening when something else occurred:I was sleeping when my dog suddenly started to bark.I was leaving the house when the phone rang.
Okay, so here's my advice. Avoid "to be" (helping verbs) at all costs. This is something I learned when I took writing courses. "To be" (in all its forms: is, am, was, were, are) is a sign of weak writing. Let me rewrite the examples above to remove the use of "to be" verbs.
Tom's actions made him a bad friend.I drafted my book all afternoon.As I walked out the front door, the phone rang.My dog's loud bark woke me from a deep sleep.
Now I could've constructed better sentences, but this is just to give you an idea of how to do this so I kept my examples simple. Basically, avoiding "to be" will result in stronger sentences. However, if you are mixing past and past progressive, don't assume you're incorrect in doing so. There is a time and place for past progressive. The real question is, do you want to use past progressive when "to be" verbs are stereotyped as weak writing and can be avoided?
*If you have a question you'd like me to answer from the other side of the editor's desk, feel free to leave it in the comments and I'll schedule it for a future post.

Monday Mishmash 11/28/16

Happy Monday! Monday Mishmash is a weekly meme dedicated to sharing what's on your mind. Feel free to grab the button and post your own Mishmash.
Here's what's on my mind today:Nursing Hadley Back To Health  After my dog collided with a rock wall, she needed stitches and has wounds on her mouth, cheek, and shoulder. She wants to scratch all the time, which opens those wounds again. We can't cone her because the cone would lay on the wounds, so we have to watch her every second. Needless to say I'm not sleeping or able to leave the house.Editing  I have a small break in edits (off until Thursday), which is good considering Hadley is taking most of my time and attention these days.Cover Design  This weekend I designed the cover for Lies We Tell, my first adult book! It's a suspense and will release in April 2017.Drafting  With the death of my grandfather and Hadley's injury, I had to stop drafting. I just couldn't. I'm taking a break from writing to get my thoughts together and come to terms with things.Book Signing  On Saturday, my daughter and I will be signing together at Middle Smithfield Elementary school for their local vendor event.
That's it for me. What's on your mind today?

See You Monday & A FREE Boxset

Those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter know I've had an awful week. My grandfather passed away on Sunday, and I had to rush my dog to the vet yesterday after she collided with a stone wall. She's now stitched up like a Frankenstein dog, but she's recovering and will be okay. 

So, I'm taking the rest of the week to myself to regroup. I hope you all enjoy the holiday weekend. Be safe, and I'll see you on Monday.

*In the meantime, here's a free boxset for you. My Into the Fire trilogy boxset is FREE Black Friday through Cyber Monday. Three books for absolutely FREE. Grab yours here now.

See You Monday

Those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter know I've had an awful week. My grandfather passed away on Sunday, and I had to rush my dog to the vet yesterday after she collided with a stone wall. She's now stitched up like a Frankenstein dog, but she's recovering and will be okay. 

So, I'm taking the rest of the week to myself to regroup. I hope you all enjoy the holiday weekend. Be safe, and I'll see you on Monday.

Writer Wednesday: Description in First Person POV

Today's topic comes curtesy of Fiona Phillips, who asked:
"In your opinion, does writing from first person perspective limit the amount of description you can use (of surroundings, characters, etc.)?"
First, that's a great question, so thank you for posing it, Fi. If you're comparing first person to third person, then the answer is yes. Unless you have a main character who is extremely perceptive, you're not going to get the same level of description in first person as you would in third person. However, that doesn't mean you can't have a good level of description in first person POV. It just means you have to tackle it in a different way. 
In third person POV, you can easily set the scene, describing as much as you want. But with first person POV, you have to make sure the description is coming across in a more natural way. If the character is entering a scene that's unfamiliar to him/her, it's natural to take in the scene, thus describing it for the reader. However, a character wouldn't naturally walk into the house they've lived in for the past ten years and comment on all the details of the layout. What you would need to do is describe that layout in terms of where the MC is and what the MC is doing. The MC might toss his/her keys on the mahogany table against the wall as he/she walks in the front door. He/she might trip over the runner in the hallway on his/her way to the living room, where he/she flops down on the brown, leather couch and puts his/her feet up on the glass coffee table. See what I did there? I'm giving details to describe the scene as it pertains to the MC.
So, yes, you can have that description, but you need to tie it to the MC and present it as it makes sense. It's different from third person POV, but it can be done. I hope that answers your question, Fi!
*If you have a question you'd like me to answer from the other side of the editor's desk, feel free to leave it in the comments and I'll schedule it for a future post.

Monday Mishmash 11/21/16

Happy Monday! Monday Mishmash is a weekly meme dedicated to sharing what's on your mind. Feel free to grab the button and post your own Mishmash.
Here's what's on my mind today:NaNoWriMo Winner!  Yesterday, I was finally able to claim my November 7th victory of writing 50K. My word count continues to count against me, but at least I am officially a winner now. Drafting  I'm working on book two for this month, but it's going very slowly due to client edits.New Author Banner  I decided to finally splurge and get myself a banner to stand behind my tables at book signings. I opted for the four-foot one since I don't think the six-foot ones are fully seen anyway since the table covers them. Here's the banner I designed: December 3rd Signing  My banner I just mentioned is arriving December 1st, days before my next signing, which is taking place at Middle Smithfield Elementary School during their local vendor event. My daughter, Ayla, will be signing with me. Her first signing!Editing  I'm trying to stay on schedule with the holiday and the days off from school. Wish me luck!Happy Thanksgiving!  I hope you all have a safe and happy thanksgiving!That's it for me. What's on your mind today?