Alison Stuart's Blog, page 28

Exciting news - GATHER THE BONES

I was thrilled to get an email last night advising me that GATHER THE BONES was a finalist in the Colorado Romance Writers AWARD OF EXCELLENCE (mainstream w/romantic elements category).  To be a finalist in any American contest is an honour but to be in such illustrious company is mindblowing.




Mainstream with Romantic Elements
Gather the Bones ~ Alison Stuart Lyrical Press ~ Anne-Marie Smith, editor
Sea Change ~ Karen White NAL/Accent ~ Cindy Hwang,editor
Just Down the Road ~ Jodi Thomas Berkley ~ Wendy McCurdy,editor
Dancing at the Chance~ DeAnna Cameron Berkley ~ Jackie Cantor, editor
The Anatomist’s Wife ~ Anna Lee Huber
Berkley ~ Michelle Vega, editor
Winners will be announced June 8.
A huge thank you to the Colorado Romance Writers - judges and co-ordinators for the work involved.
This is GATHER THE BONES second award nomination :-)

TOURING THE WORLD with SECRETS IN TIME

Like my hero in SECRETS IN TIME, the ability to transcend time and space is to be treasured. Fortunately I don't need witchcraft to help me navigate our new digital world.



Thanks to the wonderful people at Goddess Fish Promotions, I am going on a SECRETS IN TIME world book tour without having to leave the comfort of my own home. The ability to reach out to people across the globe through the internet still amazes me...and yes, I am of that generation who remembers when the first fax machine arrived in the office. We thought that was smoke and mirrors.
So here is my hectic blog schedule... I can tell you now, every post is different and there is a chance to go in the draw for a tour giveaway if you stop by and leave a comment. 
April 15:  Flirting With Romance
April 16:  Books Amour
April 17:  Lisa Haselton's Reviews and Interviews
April 18:  Book 'Em North Carolina
April 18:  Review Teena in Toronto
April 19:  Writers and Authors
April 22:  Romancing Rakes For The Love of Romance
April 29:  Andi's Book Reviews
April 29:  Review  I Heart Romance
May 6:  Words of Wisdom from The Scarf Princess
May 13:  Deal Sharing Aunt
May 13:  STOP 2 Long and Short Reviews
May 20:  All I Want and More
May 27:  Welcome to My World of Dreams 
June 3:  The Muse Unleashed
June 10:  Just Reading for Fun

So join me on my world discovery tour (Oh...and I will be here as well!).
Alison

HISTORICAL NOVELISTS 4 DAY BOOK FAIR

Just like a real book fair...a chance to browse through a wide range of historical novels and find your next "new to me" favourite author...

It is 12 April on a beautiful autumn day in Melbourne so I present my stall and a chance to find out more about SECRETS IN TIME and read an excerpt ...
http://alisonstuart.blogspot.com.au/2...

STOP AND BROWSE...HISTORICAL NOVELISTS BOOK FAIR IS ON!

They are lining up for a book fair for readers who like stepping back in time...and in the case of SECRETS IN TIME, literally!

When you were a child did you dream of waking up and finding yourself magically transported back in time? I did...I would squeeze my eyes tight shut and wish and wish and wish. Of course I woke up still firmly in the twentieth century and with the benefit of hindsight, I can't imagine anything worse than finding myself in the seventeenth century without a flushing loo or a toothbrush!
Or what if you come forward in time...what would you make of the flushing loo, a toothbrush, television, cars...and cricket. These are the dilemmas facing my hero, Nathaniel Preston in SECRETS IN TIME, a dashing seventeenth century cavalier who, with a healthy dose of witchcraft to help, finds himself in 1995...

When a seventeenth-century cavalier hurls himself over her garden wall, Doctor Jessica Shepherd is more angry than surprised. Although she ís no stranger to military re-enactors, there ís something different about Nathaniel Preston. If he ís to be believed, something…or someone…has sent him forward in time from the midst of a civil war to the quiet English countryside of the twentieth century.
With time working against them, Nathaniel has to convince Jessica why fate brought them together before he ís forced to return to his own era and certain death in battle.
Can the strength of love overcome all obstacles, even time itself?
Of course, Nat has a very good reason for his time travelling...he just didn't reckon on falling in love...or the dangers of foreknowledge. Can you imagine knowing the exact time and method of your death or the cause you will die for is doomed?
In the following excerpt, Nat wrestles with these questions:
I cannot sleep.
Every time I close my eyes I see this new world and all its wonders. The noise overwhelms me. Even now in the dead of night, I hear the carriages racing past and see the bright lights illuminate the curtains over the windows. Light. There is so much light.
I try to order things in my understanding, relate them to my own time, but I fail. My own ignorance fails me. I am a savage in this land. Jessica the Witch must think me a veritable fool, and that concerns me. I think of her warm, sun-touched skin on that day I first saw her, and the courage with which she faced me. I want to touch her. I need that touch of a warm, living being to remind me that I am still a man and not an object of pity.
The knowledge of my death tugs at my mind. I keep pushing the memory of that cold stone in the chapel away. I don’t believe I am to die. I am only thirty years old. I have two small sons. Who will care for them? Who will protect my sister and my grandmother?
Alice. Help me. I can’t live with this knowledge.
I hear her voice coming through the mist of my mind. “You must find the strength. Remember why you are there. Learn as much as you can of this new world Nathaniel,and you will have a chance to set things in order.”
I close my eyes and remember all we talked about, Alice and I. She is right, I have to acquire the knowledge needed to set my world in order. But to do that I will return to my time. To do that, I must die.

To read a longer excerpt and for buy links, click HERE. Available in eformat only at Lyrical Press (all formats), Barnes & Noble and Amazon 
If you, like me, love the seventeenth century, then don't miss my two full length novels set in the English Civil War, THE KING'S MAN and the award winning BY THE SWORD or if you like a ghost story with a bit of a mystery, history and romance, then GATHER THE BONES is the book for you (set in the 1920s world of Downton Abbey)

Whether it is Spring (and you are looking for great reading for your summer holidays) or autumn, as it is here in Australia (and you are looking for a good novel to curl up with on a cold winter afternoon), then don't miss the HISTORICAL NOVELISTS BOOK FAIR (12-15 April). To find more fabulous authors market stalls, click HERE

And for a chance to win a $25 Amazon Voucher, enter the SECRETS IN TIME CONTEST by clicking  HERE

Writer's Life: In the Waiting Room...with Godot

“Let's go." "We can't." "Why not?" "We're waiting for Godot.” ― Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot

Did anyone else study Beckett's Waiting for Godot at school? I know I did...and I've seen it done as a play. Do I understand it? Thought I did at the time...now I'm not so sure!



Over the Easter break I went bushwalking...there is nothing like a tramp (no Godot puns intended!) through the Australian bush, crackling dry after the end of a hot summer with scent of eucalyptus hanging in the air, to get yourself thinking.
As I pondered the work in progress (or works in progress...there are a couple), the conclusion I came to is that too much of my life is spent waiting...my mantra seems to have become, "When X happens, I will be able to do Y." Hmmm...other people might call this Writers Block perhaps?


At the moment I have 3 submissions and several contest entries out there in the big wide world. Every morning I leap for my iPad on the off chance there might be an email with some fabulous news...every morning it is the usual round of emails from the wives of ex dictators wanting me to help them squirrel away their fabulous wealth or (lucky me) $1million wins in lotteries I didn't know I had entered. These are not the lottery results I am waiting for!




The upshot of this waiting is I stop doing anything else. As I twiddle the feathers on my quill, my thought process goes down this road... "When I get that offer from X publisher, I will get on with writing Y".  Ah ha I hear you say, Why don't I get on with writing Y anyway? Because, I reply, my quill towards my guttering candle to see if burning feathers really do revive fainting women,  if I don't get that offer from X publisher then there's no point pouring my heart and soul into Y because nobody wants X.... Get the picture?

But to make it even worse, even if I do get published, I still drop into "waiting" mode. First there is "waiting for edits", then "waiting for the cover", "waiting for the release date" and on on it goes. Paralysing me into a complete standstill. My daily routine is subsumed into mini waiting periods...I will finish writing this blog before I do any writing...oh wait, what am I going to write? I'm waiting to hear from publisher X about book A and publisher Z about book B...should I be working on the sequel to Book B or should I be working on a series set up for Book A...

...and on the circular argument in my head goes.

A few years a go I did Margie Lawson's Beating Self Defeating Behaviours Course...obviously I need to go back for a refresher. If this isn't a self defeating behaviour then I don't know what is!

So I need to shake myself out of the doldrums and I think the answer is to get back to work on something I really want to do and let the submissions/the contests and the new release take care of themselves. Better to wait in hope or wait and dream up fabulous new characters and plots for the next book...just in case Publisher X really does want Book A...STOP right now!

SECRETS IN TIME CONTEST

If you could travel back in time, who would you like to meet?

Enter the SECRETS IN TIME CONTEST for a chance to win a $25 Amazon Voucher. Just follow this link: http://a.pgtb.me/BRCpwC
or go to http://www.alisonstuart.com

Contest ends 30 April

Secrets in Time

SECRETS IN TIME IS OUT NOW!

HOOZAH! 
It is a few days early but I am so excited to see SECRETS IN TIME is already up on several online book stores. 

It's available as an ebook from the following sites:  AMAZON, LYRICAL PRESS (all eformats) and ALL ROMANCE EBOOKS (all eformats).





When a seventeenth-century cavalier hurls himself over her garden wall, Doctor Jessica Shepherd is more angry than surprised. Although she ís no stranger to military re-enactors, there ís something different about Nathaniel Preston. If he ís to be believed, something…or someone…has sent him forward in time from the midst of a civil war to the quiet English countryside of the twentieth century.
With time working against them, Nathaniel has to convince Jessica why fate brought them together before he ís forced to return to his own era and certain death in battle.
Can the strength of love overcome all obstacles, even time itself?
For More Information and to read an excerpt...click HERE

Historical Heroes

Next Monday April 1 (US time), my historical time travel, SECRETS IN TIME is released.
There will be an "online" launch party on my Facebook page on Tuesday 2 April 7.00 pm, Australian Eastern Standard Time. To join the fun, come over and "Like" my page...click HERE.  The theme of the party is "Historical Heroes".
In a departure from my darker themed books, SECRETS IN TIME, is a lighthearted look at love through time, although there is a darker reason for Nat's time travelling... 
SECRETS IN TIME
When a seventeenth-century cavalier hurls himself over her garden wall, Doctor Jessica Shepherd is more angry than surprised. Although she ís no stranger to military re-enactors, there ís something different about Nathaniel Preston. If he ís to be believed, something…or someone…has sent him forward in time from the midst of a civil war to the quiet English countryside of the twentieth century.
With time working against them, Nathaniel has to convince Jessica why fate brought them together before he ís forced to return to his own era and certain death in battle.
Can the strength of love overcome all obstacles, even time itself?
Because I am now a certified time traveller I am inviting a few heroes of history (real and fictional) to the party. Because SECRETS IN TIME is based on the English Civil War and that is my favourite historical period, I need look no further than these two gentlemen.
PRINCE RUPERT OF THE RHINE Timothy Dalton as Prince Rupert in CROMWELLTop of my list is, of course, PRINCE RUPERT OF THE RHINE. Nephew of King Charles I, Rupert was the quintessential "cavalier" - young, dashing, charming and devastatingly handsome. His dashing nature was his undoing in battle with his hot headed cavaliers bursting upon the enemy and then disappearing off the battlefield in hot pursuit of the fleeing enemy or the baggage train, never to return to the field of battle. He  fought valiantly for his uncle, only to have King Charles turn on him after he was forced through military necessity to surrender the city of Bristol, thus losing control of the west of England.  SIR THOMAS FAIRFAXWhile I am on the subject of English Civil War heroes, my own personal historical hero is SIR THOMAS FAIRFAX. "Black Tom" was the antithesis of Rupert. Tall, dark, grave but, like Rupert, a brilliant leader. His story is often overshadowed by Oliver Cromwell.  I fell in love with him when I first read Rosemary Sutcliff's RIDER OF THE WHITE HORSE. 
To read a short story I wrote about Sir Thomas Fairfax (THE PETITION) click HERE Dougray Scott as Sir Thomas Fairfax in TO KILL A KINGSo Rupert and Tom will be coming to my launch party, whether they like it or not (I am sure Rupert will have a ball). Just so I can get the guest list spot on...I am looking for other suggestions of historical heroes.
Which Historical Hero (real or fictional) would like to invite to the party?
(For more information and to read an excerpt from SECRETS IN TIME, click HERE)

The End

THE END... I always write those words when I reach the end of writing a book. They are the punctuation mark that finishes my relationship with that world I have created.

Not that I believe any book is actually completely finished...it could always be that little bit better, the words in paragraph 2 on page 167 could be rearranged...ENOUGH! At some point a writer has to let go and hit the "Send" button that will send it winging into the waiting Inbox of an eager editor or agent, who will of course promptly respond with "This is the greatest novel ever written, here is a contract for a gazillion dollars..." . Such are the thoughts you will entertain for about the first twenty four hours as you eagerly hit the refresh button on your own inbox...again...and again...

Of course when you don't get an instantaneous response (and quite honestly I would be extremely suspicious of any editor who got back to me in twenty fours*), depression sets in. That has to be the worst book I have ever written. They are going to hate it. What was I thinking? Why didn't I fix paragraph 2 on page 167?...and on the spiral into depression goes... for at least the next 48 hours. I'm not alone.

Novelist Simon Brett wrote: "...There are two points in the novel-writing cycle when authors are particularly vulnerable.... Almost every writer I know goes through the same reaction after a novel is finished – there are 24 hours of euphoria and then all the negative thoughts you have shut out while finishing it come out, and either you get drunk or depressed or get the flu.
"The other point is two-thirds or three-quarters of the way through a novel, when almost all writers get what I call the 'three-quarters sag', when the only thing you like less about what you've written so far is the ideas you have for finishing the book. My books are written quite quickly, so it only lasts a week or two, but for people who spend two years writing, it can take months." Simon Brett in the Guardian 


It is no surprise that rated among the 10 of occupations with the highest rates of depression are Artists, Entertainers and Writers according to health.com but let me hasten to add, I am no Virginia Woolf or Sylvia Plath. There are many writers who suffer clinical depression and having friends who battle serious depressive illnesses I do not make light of it. But there is a distinction between an illness and just a mild sense of loss!

Being essentially a person with a sunny disposition and a happy childhood (and thus doomed never to write "great literature"), the "depression" I suffer at the completion of a book can realistically be described as a mild sense of loss. 

I have been living inside my characters heads. I know every nuance of their behaviour, what their favorite color is...and if I'm really in the zone they talk to me. We have conversations. (No...seriously, other writers will no exactly what I mean) and then quite suddenly they've gone. I've waved them off at the door and the house feels empty. 

I look at the mound of ironing, the washing up, a study that is breeding dust elephants and a to do list as long as my arm which includes such unimportant things as "Last year's tax". I cannot settle to anything (particularly as I'm checking my inbox every 5 minutes). 

I have been doing this long enough to remember the days before the internet when the query letter was neatly typed and put in an envelope with a stamp and for months I would dog the postman before the inevitable rejection slip arrived (if at all). If a manucript was requested it was printed out (I'm not quite THAT old...we did have computers and printers!), secured with a rubber band and the family fortune expended in sending it off...only to have a single one page rejection return. 

Now it is all mechanised (or is that digitalised?). Submissions are done online ...some publishers even have a "Submission" proforma to which you attach your manuscript and off it goes, lacking even the interaction of an email and in modern business models you are assured of a response in 4-6 weeks. 

In the first 3 months of this year I have signed off on two books. Two chances of publication...two chances of rejection. Every morning I check my Inbox with a mingling of fear and optimism. Bouyed always by Charles I's  quote "While I live, I hope" (at least I've always believed it was Charles who said this...shortly before he had his head chopped off). "While I have a submission in the ether, I hope..." When the response comes, I can always tell instinctively whether it is a rejection or an acceptance, even before I click on it. It exudes a "vibe". If it is a rejection, then it will get no more than a glance as I slide into the obligatory 24 hour sulk. I only allow myself 24 hours - any longer is self indulgent- before I read it properly and take away any kernels of improvement from the editor's experience. If it's an acceptance...well...that's what we all hope for isn't it? That's why we write...So what do I do now my latest book has gone winging its way into cyber space? Well I really should tidy my office, strike a few things off the to do list and start my next book...WHAT ABOUT YOU?
*I did once get a response from an agent in less than 24 hours - to tell me they weren't interested, of course. Date for the diaries: My latest book, SECRETS IN TIME, will be released on APRIL 1. IF YOU LIKE A FUN, SHORT, ROMANTIC HISTORICAL TIME TRAVEL WITH A GORGEOUS CAVALIER...this is the book for you.

SECRETS IN TIME

My latest book, SECRETS IN TIME, is released on April 1.

It already has a 4.5 rating on Goodreads and if you are interested in reading an excerpt, you will now find one available on the SECRETS IN TIME Goodreads page http://www.goodreads.com/reader/35193... or visit my website http://www.alisonstuart.com/latest-re...