Merry Farmer's Blog, page 17

Trail of Dreams … Coming Tomorrow!

Yesterday we started reading Chapter One of Trail of Dreams…. Let’s continue with that, shall we?

Aiden Murphy chuckled as Katie bristled. “My apologies, a ghrá,” he teased. “If you think you’ll find a dragon here in the great American West, then go right on looking.” His heart soared at the mental picture of Katie rushing across the prairie, pushing through the tall grass, turning over rocks, and rushing into the hills to search for dragons, lance in hand.

The Katie right in front of him humphed and twisted to glare at him. “The only dragon I see is the one stalking me from behind,” she clipped.

Aiden’s smile broadened. He loved her bullish frown. He loved the bright flush and warm freckles that kissed her cheeks. He loved the saucy tilt of her chin, the intoxicating sway of her hips as she walked, the bounce of her bright copper curls. He loved her.

“If I’m a dragon,” he met her barb for barb, “then you’d best beware. I might just breathe fire.” He was certainly hot enough for fire every time she was near.

“Is that what that terrible smell is?” she fired back with a toss of her curls.

Aiden laughed. His heart thumped against his ribs—like the dragon she’d accused him of being was trying to get out. “Aye, that’s the fire and brimstone that burns deep in my soul for you, a ghrá.”

“Ha,” Katie scoffed, though Aiden caught the flush in her cheeks deepening. “Are you such a lunk head that you can’t tell the difference between upset digestion and love?”

“I’ll admit,” Aiden fired back, sending Dean, walking beside him, a knowing glance, “love is upsetting.”

Dean chuckled and shook his head, an ironic smirk tweaking his mouth. Aiden wasn’t one to pry into another man’s troubles, but Dean had confided enough of his dealings with Miss Emma Sutton to him in the last week for him to know a thing or two about what lay behind the smirk.

“If love is so upsetting,” Katie went on over her shoulder, “then you should give it up.”

“What?” Aiden called to her. “Give up? Never. Heroes never give up.”

Katie laughed in earnest, giving Emma’s arm a squeeze. “See what I mean?” she said. “The daft man doesn’t even know he’s no hero.”

A chip of ice cut through Aiden’s good-humored grin. Lord, but Katie drove him mad sometimes. He couldn’t remember a time that he didn’t love her, stubbornness, prickles and all. But she did have a way of cutting him when he least expected it, all in the name of “friendly” banter. He consoled himself with the thought that one day—one day when Katie least expected it—he would hold her in his arms and kiss the prickles right out of her. Sooner rather than later, if it were up to him. Leaving Ireland may have been the best thing they could do to speed things along. They were in a new land with new dreams and new possibilities.

“What about you, Miss Emma?” He changed tack and tried to bring Dean’s sweetheart out of her shell. “Is love nothing more than a sour stomach?”

“Well… I….” Emma tripped over her own tongue.

Dean tensed just enough for Aiden to notice, his face pinching. “I think Emma is entitled to keep her opinion to herself,” he said. He followed that by murmuring so that only Aiden could hear, “Leave Emma out of this. She’s got enough to worry about at the moment.”

Aiden nodded. “I’m sure her thoughts are as pure and refreshing as she is,” he said with a smile. In the week since they’d met, Aiden had come to like and respect both Emma and Dean, and if his new friend declared his sweetheart off-limits from the teasing banter he was used to, he would honor that. “As for your thoughts, a ghrá,” he shifted back to Katie, “I think our good Father Daniel back in Ballymote is thanking his lucky stars he doesn’t have to hear your confession anymore.”

Katie laughed, full and throaty, sending a wave of desire through him that threatened to make it difficult to walk comfortably. “Now that he doesn’t have to hear your confession, Aiden Murphy, maybe he won’t fall asleep in the confessional anymore.”

“He only slept during my confession because he was exhausted after hearing yours,” Aiden shot back.

Katie humphed again and quickened her pace. She and Emma began to distance themselves from him and Dean.

“Did the priest really fall asleep while you were confessing?” Dean asked, smile broad.

“He did,” Aiden said. “The poor man’s eighty-two. He used to nap while the good folks of Ballymote poured out their sins to him. I heard Father James scold him about it once, but Father Daniel explained that if we all assumed he was asleep, we would confess more and find deeper absolution.”

Dean laughed aloud. “I’m sure you had your fair share of things to confess about Miss Katie.”

“Volumes,” Aiden laughed. “I’ve been having impure thoughts about her for half my lifetime, much good that it’s done me.”

Dean raised his brow. “That’s unusually gloomy for you.”

“Not at all,” Aiden continued to chuckle. He watched Katie’s back as she and Emma plowed ahead. “It all comes from your basic misunderstanding and complete bafflement over women and what they want.”

Dean grunted, smirk back in place. “You can say that again. I love her with all my heart, but I don’t understand a thing going on in Emma’s head.”

“No man can ever understand what goes on in a woman’s head,” Aiden agreed. “If we had the slightest inkling of what they think, if we could piece together the barest fragment of how they work, then like as not, we’d get overconfident and turn the world on its ear.”

“Still, it would be nice to know that we’re on the right path sometimes,” Dean said. He blew out a breath and dragged a hand through his hair.

“Ah, but we’re always on the right path if we’re on any path at all,” Aiden told him. He reached behind to lift his fiddle case off his back. His fingers always had an urge to play when his heart beat harder.

“How do you figure?” Dean asked. He held out his arms to hold the fiddle case while Aiden took the instrument out as they continued to walk.

“Well, we don’t know what’s going on in their minds, they don’t know what’s going on in our minds, so the only way to get two and two together is to keep moving forward.”

He lifted his precious fiddle out of its felt-lined case and smoothed his hand over the wood, plucking the strings to be sure it was in tune. A few turns of the tuning pegs and it was ready. He took up the bow, then nodded as Dean shut the case and slung it over his shoulder, carrying it like any good friend would.

“Take Katie Boyle, for example,” he continued, raising the fiddle to his chin and drawing the bow across the strings, producing a long, smooth note. He began a tune that started slow. “She’s quick to tell one and all that we’ve known each other our entire lives and are best of friends. She’s not at all shy about sharing stories of how inseparable we’ve been since I was in knickerbockers and she was in short skirts. She might not tell you about how I held her hair back while she was bent double over the rail giving her lunch back to the sea on our journey across the ocean, but she trusted me to clean her up when she was done. So she can argue all she wants, but one way or another, she’ll end up in my arms, and in my bed,” he added with a wink, pausing in his song.

As he started up again at a faster tempo, Dean laughed. “So you keep moving forward.”

“That is right, my friend.”

“No matter how many brambles and pitfalls await you on the path.”

“Absolutely.”

“And you think this way you’ll win the girl in the end.”

“I know it.” He played a quick flourish, fingers dancing across the strings with a distinctly Irish flare. “One way or another, Katie Boyle will be mine, to have and to hold, to kiss and to love, forever.”

He launched into a cheerful jig to match the skipping of his heart. Ahead of him, Katie burst into laughter over something she or Emma had said. The sunlight glittered off of her halo of curls. All was right with the world, or at least as right as it was going to get in that moment.

“Well, I wish you luck, my friend,” Dean said, thumping him lightly on the back. “Because I think you’re going to need it.”

 

Trail of Dreams will be out tomorrow!

Or you could go ahead and preorder your copy today at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or iBooks.

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Trail of Dreams…in TWO days!

Guess what? Only two more days until Trail of Dreams launches! But how about we get started now? Here you go….

Chapter One

Nebraska Territory, 1863

As far as Katie Boyle was concerned, the Oregon Trail was a slice of heaven on Earth.

“I love the sky,” she commented in her thickest Irish brogue to her new friend, Emma Sutton. The two of them walked together, arm in arm along the hard-packed dirt of the trail. Dozens of wagons rolled along the worn path beside them, the sound of their wheels and the clopping of the oxen that pulled them music to Katie’s ears. “I love the grass too. It’s the tallest I’ve ever seen and it rolls like the waves of the ocean.”

“Mmm hmm,” Emma replied, eyes downcast, cheeks pink in spite of the hat that shielded her face from the sun.

“It’s a fair sight better than the actual ocean,” Katie went on, peeking at Emma from the corner of her eyes. “I don’t think I’ve ever been as sick as I was on the ship that brought us over from Ireland.”

“Oh?”

“Aye. The way it rolled and tossed on the waves? Well, I didn’t think I’d make it to America. I cursed my mam, cursed the heavens, and you can be sure I cursed Aiden Murphy most of all.”

“Aiden?” Emma flushed and stole a glance behind them to where Aiden walked with Dr. Dean Meyers, the object of Emma’s affection, several yards back.

“I’m sure it’s his fault somehow,” Katie teased, twisting to look where Emma was looking.

Katie arched an eyebrow at the spring in Aiden’s step and the cocky angle of his shoulders. The afternoon sun shone down on his dark hair, lending a sparkle to his blue eyes. He wore his fiddle in its case slung across his back. He’d worn it since the moment they’d all set foot on the road that led from their humble village of Ballymote, all the way to America and the trail they walked now. That fiddle had been a part of him for as long as Katie had known him, which was to say his whole life.

Aiden caught her watching and winked. Katie promptly ignored his audacity and the flutter in her gut.

She glanced to Emma, but her new friend had missed the entire impish display. Emma had eyes only for Dean Meyers.

“He’s a brazen beast, isn’t he?” she asked, referring to Aiden.

“He’s lovely,” Emma replied, staring straight at Dean. The moment he glanced up and met her eyes, Emma snapped to face forward. She smoothed a hand over the skirt of her overly formal dress—something her mother had forced her to wear to catch a man—and cleared her throat.

Katie did her best to hide her smile. She’d only known Emma for a short time. Not much more than a week ago, the wagon train Katie and her family were traveling with had come across Emma and her mother and Dr. Dean Meyers at a lonely way station. They’d been there for a week as Emma’s ankle healed from an injury sustained in a tornado.

A tornado. The very thought of it set Katie’s heart pounding. She could only imagine how exciting it all had been. Between the little Dean had said and the looks he and Emma had been exchanging for the last week, Katie surmised there was more to the story than met the eye. No matter how much she hinted and pried for more information, Emma had said little about it. Bless her, but Emma said little about anything. At least she didn’t mind if Katie talked until she was blue.

“I still think you should march right up to that man and kiss him, bold as brass,” she said, tilting her face into the sunlight.

“What?” Emma gasped, clutching her arm tighter. “I could never.”

Katie laughed. “I don’t suppose you could, but wouldn’t it make a sight? I’m sure half the old biddies in this wagon train would clutch their chests and drop dead of heart attacks. I’d be glad though,” she finished.

“You would?” Emma blinked.

“Yes, and why not? Love is a beautiful thing, and watching two young people fall head over heels down the hill of love to the valley of bliss is a rare treat.”

Emma blushed darker. “If only that were possible.”

“And who says it’s not possible?” Katie hugged Emma’s arm tighter. The laughter of children—some of them likely her younger brothers and sisters—rang up and down the line of wagons and a light breeze blew the rich scent of earth and grass across their path. How could anything not be possible?

“My mother,” Emma sighed, shoulders sagging. “You know she has it in her mind that I should put Dean aside and give all of my attentions to Dr. Sandifer.”

Katie’s lips twisted in a bitter sneer. “That great lummox.” She knew too well the fuss Mrs. Sutton was making over the blustery, arrogant doctor that had joined their wagon train in Independence. What she didn’t know was why a woman who seemed to be in all her right mental faculties would toss a peach like Dean Meyers over for a pit like Russell Sandifer.

Emma heaved another sigh and lowered her head to stare at the toes of her and Katie’s shoes as they poked out from under their dusty skirts—one cotton, the other silk—as they walked. It didn’t take much for Katie to see how deeply her friend was hurting over the entire confusing thing.

“Bah. I hate to see you so fussed over the situation,” she said. “No girl as pretty and as smart as you are who has a man like your Dean pining for you should be thwarted by something as common as a mother.”

“Mother has been through so much,” Emma argued.

Katie cut her off with a sniff. “All mothers with bright-eyed children have been through so much. My own mam struggled through the Great Famine while trying to raise more than half a dozen children, all while my father sweated and toiled to put food on our plates.” She shook her head. It wasn’t something she liked to think about. They’d come to America precisely so they wouldn’t ever have to think about those times again.

She brushed her free hand through the air as if to clear the past. “You’re not the only one whose mother thinks they know what’s best for them where men are concerned,” she confided.

“Oh?” Emma perked up a bit.

Encouraged, Katie went on. “Aye, Mam’s had it in her head since I was knee-high that I should fall in love with and marry Aiden. Aiden!” She snorted. A swirl of something warm and tickly and unwelcome filled her gut.

Emma started to glance back at Aiden and Dean walking behind them, but stopped herself. “Aiden seems like a perfectly acceptable young man.”

“And that’s his problem,” Katie insisted. She took a breath. “Aiden and I have known each other almost since the day we were born. He’s only a few months older than me. I consider him one of my best friends, really, I do. But his mam and mine have been thick as thieves and just as crafty since their school days. Right from the cradle, they determined that Aiden and I were meant for each other.”

“How romantic.” Emma smiled.

“It is not romantic,” Katie growled. “It’s been a bloody big nuisance. Imagine, my whole life, everywhere I go and everything I do, Aiden has been there. He was there when we were young ones, skipping stones in the pond and chasing after foxes in the fields. He was there when we sat in that great, drafty school having numbers and letters and history pounded into us. And he’s been there, cheeky as a beggar, playing right into our mams’ schemes by bringing me flowers and playing on that blasted fiddle outside my window at all hours of the day and night. Flowers, when all I want is a friend. Imagine. He crowds me so much that I can’t tell whether my thoughts are my own or his. Why, when Da and Mam decided to pull up roots and move to America, he convinced his entire clan to come with us, just so he could continue to bother me.”

Emma listened to the speech, her mouth dropping open more with each word and her eyes filling with stars. When Katie finished and tipped her head in a stubborn nod, Emma said, “That’s the most beautiful story I’ve ever heard.”

“Ha,” Katie laughed. Her heart beat faster, but she did her best to ignore it. “It’s a dull story at that. Can you imagine what it’s like to have a rogue like Aiden shadowing your every step, never leaving your side?”

“It would be wonderful,” Emma sighed.

“Aiden is good, but dull as toast,” Katie protested. “I don’t want a boy everyone expects me to marry, a boy who I used to catch frogs with. I want adventure. I want excitement. I want to explore and discover and fly. There’s so much more to this wide world than the town and the people you’ve had around you your whole life. I want passion when I fall in love.” She grabbed Emma’s arm with both of her hands, her whole body vibrating with the force of her longing. “I want to fall in love with a valiant hero, a man who will risk life and limb to save me and… and rescue me from a dragon.”

She was so wrapped up in the image she painted for herself that she almost didn’t hear when Aiden called out, “There are no dragons in America,” behind her.

Katie jumped, flushing with heat at the sound of his voice. She told herself it was embarrassment at being caught pouring her heart out where others could hear. She let go of Emma’s arm and twisted to glare at Aiden. “Shut your gob, Aiden Murphy,” she ribbed him the way friends did.

Aiden, being Aiden, only beamed at her. “Now why would I do that when you’re talking nonsense and need to be set straight, a ghrá?”

“Ack! Don’t call me that,” Katie growled. She faced forward once more and kept walking, but her skin prickled as though she’d given herself away.

 

The scene continues tomorrow, so come back for more!

Or you could go ahead and preorder your copy today at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or iBooks.

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Writing Tip: Being Hybrid for Indie Authors

Once upon a time, the big discussion in the publishing world was whether authors should be traditionally published or whether they should self-publish. The arguments came fast and furious on both sides, and more often than not, mud and curse words were hurled like gunshot across the battleground. But then everything seemed to smooth out and calm down, and even trad pub admitted that a lot of self-published writers out there were up to snuff and worth their salt. Not only that, many formerly traditionally published authors saw how lucrative self-publishing could be, and left their contracts or self-published books on the side.

And the age of Hybrid Authors was born. It was the best of both worlds. For hybrid authors, a promising career in traditional publishing gave them their first boost, and they were able to capitalize on that head-start and make boatloads of money off of their self-published work. Plenty of studies show that hybrid authors make the most money and sell the most books.

So where does that leave those of us who are very happy to swim the indie waters without searching for hooks from trad pub?

image courtesy of goXunuReviews via flickr commons

We were all doing fine. Fine, that is, until the panic gong was sounded over Amazon upending our bottom line with Kindle Unlimited. I heard from so many writers this past summer who freaked out when their sales were cut in half as Kindle Unlimited was introduced. Authors were running in circles, screaming that this was the end of everything. And yes, a lot of people had to go back to day jobs to make ends meet for a while.

The choice that we were all suddenly faced with was whether to dump all of our eggs in the Amazon basket or not. Going exclusive with KDP Select meant that we were subject to a better set of algorithms and product placement, and therefore to sell (or lend) more books. The catch? As more and more authors dove into KDP Select in order for their books to be included in Kindle Unlimited, the smaller the payout for each borrow became. And I’m not even going to talk about the unscrupulous authors who game the system by writing ten page stories that pay out, even when the reader only clicks through one page, then tosses it aside in disgust.

Suddenly, we were all faced with an equation (and I hate math). Was it better to go all-in with Amazon, depriving ourselves of sales at other venues, notably Apple and Nook? Was the money we made through those other retailers enough to make up for what we would lose by not being part of KU or dipping into the magic Amazon algorithms? I witnessed untold discussions amongst my author friends about what we should all do this past fall. Everyone had a different answer.

But here’s the thing. I’m not an alarmist. I never have been. Sure, I panic when things change suddenly, but I also like to look for new opportunities when rugs get yanked out from under me. And as I was looking, the word “hybrid” smacked back into me.

Here’s a thought. We, as exclusively indie authors, can be hybrid authors just as much as our trad/indie brothers and sister. We can be hybrid Select/Not Select authors. I have this theory that the new way to go for those of us who self-publish might just be to split our work between going exclusive with Amazon and distributing to a larger audience.

Maybe it’s something you would do as a matter of genre or series. I’m giving this a try by putting my new contemporary romance series in KDP Select, but keeping my historical westerns available across platforms. Maybe it’s a matter of backlist and frontlist—trying one out in Select, then moving it to the larger world, or vice versa. There may be some other way of having your cake and eating it too.

The thing about KDP Select that I don’t hear very much, that hasn’t been talked about much in the author circles I’m part of, is that just because a book can potentially be borrowed as part of the Kindle Unlimited program, that doesn’t mean it can’t also be purchased outside of KU, the way any other book is purchased. My theory is that if you have some books in KU, the most voracious of readers will find you and eat through what you have available through that service, then, if you’ve done your job as a writer well, they will be so hooked that they’ll go on and purchase your books outside of the KU program.

The key to writing success these days is not in gaming the right system or resting on the laurels of some algorithm, it’s in discoverability and audience-building. As long as your books are available to readers, one way or another, they have the potential to be purchased. Lumping some but not necessarily all of your work into one of the more flashy, crowd-pleasing services—Kindle Unlimited right now, but who knows what it will be next week—could be the answer to the discoverability riddle.

So I say, let’s all give it a try. Let’s not shake our fists at the big guy every time they make a move that startles us. There are ways to work with, through, and around any changes that the publishing industry can throw at us. We’re writers, after all. That implies a certain degree of creativity. Let’s get creative!

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Excerpt Wednesday – Trail of Dreams, First Kiss

It’s Wednesday, folks! And since Valentine’s Day is this weekend, how about a first kiss scene today?

She started to march around Aiden to find Emma or her mam, but Aiden stopped her.

“Poor Katie,” he said. “We wouldn’t want you to lose your bet now, would we?”

“Too late for tha—”

Before she could finish her sentence, Aiden swept her into his arms and covered her mouth with his. Katie’s heart dropped into her gut, and her mind flittered off into the ether. His arms were warm and strong around her. His lips tasted like earth and fire itself. He pressed into her with an insistence that had her sighing for more. He nipped at her lower lip, then teased his tongue alongside hers. The sensation was delicious and foreign and wild all at once.

She grabbed hold of his sides and dug her fingertips into his flesh through his vest and shirt. A low growl rumbled through him. It set every one of her nerves throbbing. She switched from being helpless at his invasion to meeting him exploration for exploration. Something primal in her core wanted all of him that she could get and more.

Sense slammed into her a moment later. She gasped and pushed back, raising a hand to her mouth. Reluctantly, she lifted her eyes to meet his. Aiden stood close to her, his whole face lit with embers that looked as though they could ignite the sea.

“There,” he said, hoarse in the best possible way.

When he didn’t go on, she said, “There what?” Her own voice wasn’t much steadier than his.

“You’ve won your bet.”

Confusion cooled the wildfire burning inside of her. She stood straighter, planting her hands on her hips. “What kind of daft thing is that to say?”

A lazy grin spread across his face. Katie’s heart lurched at the kiss-red stain to his lips. She’d done that.

“You bet me that you could get a man to kiss you within a day of arriving at the fort,” he told her. He spread his arms wide. “Well, you did.”

Her mouth fell open. Her heart fluttered. “That is cheating,” she snapped. A beat later, she smacked him across the chest.

Aiden laughed. “You never specified who it was who had to kiss you, a ghrá.”

“Don’t call me that!” she shouted.

Before he could get another word in, she growled in frustration and turned on her heel to march off. This time he didn’t stop her. This time a tiny part of her wanted him to.

“I’m only trying to help you,” he called as she walked away.

Katie twisted to snap back at him, “Go help yourself!”

“I’m trying to do that too,” he laughed.

She shook her head and kept right on walking away. He let her go, but the sound of his laughter followed her. She had a feeling it would follow her for the rest of his life.

Right along with the memory of that kiss.

 

Whew! Things are heating up on the Oregon Trail! And we’re only 5 days away from the release of Trail of Dreams! Lucky for you, it’s is currently up for Preorder! Reserve your copy today at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or iBooks.

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Cheyenne Women

A Cheyenne Woman, 1927. I think she could easily be the head of the Quilling Society.
Courtesy of Wikicommons

One of the most fun parts of my research into the Cheyenne way of life was discovering the way that women functioned in their society. The role of women was very different within the Cheyenne community of the second half of the 19th century than it was in white society of America…and yet in a lot of ways it was similar.

One of the big similarities that struck me was that male and female society amongst the Cheyenne were largely separate. The women had their duties and responsibilities, and the men had theirs. While the men were responsible in large part for hunting and warfare, both of which were important ways they provided for their tribe, women were in charge of what I would classify more as daily life chores of the village. This reminds me a lot how, in white society of the 19th century, a woman’s realm was the home, and, really, a man had far less say about how his house was run than a lot of modern people realize.

Cheyenne women were responsible for preparing good, making clothing, caring for children, and making and building tipis. There was a lot of prestige attached to these tasks too. I really enjoyed reading in George Bird Grinnell’s book The Cheyenne Indians: Their History and Lifeways about how Cheyenne women had various societies for the different tasks they performed. The Quilling Society was one of the most important of these, and to be invited to join was a great honor. Quilling was the art of decorating clothing and other items with quills and beads and other adornment, so it was sort of like a sewing or quilting circle in white culture, but with actual political punch in the running of the village.

I was impressed by how much clout women had amongst they Cheyenne. They weren’t considered as full equals with men, though. They didn’t smoke with the men, for example, which was an important social and ceremonial practice. There were some strange rules about where they could sit or how they had to walk around a fire or men who were meeting as well. But so many of these things were just as strange and eyebrow-raising as customs amongst white American society.

A Cheyenne couple talking under a blanket outside the woman’s tipi.
This is part of an awesome collection of ledger art, courtesy of https://plainsledgerart.org/

One thing that did really shock me and take me aback about how Cheyenne men and women interacted with each other, though, was the fact that grown brothers and sisters were forbidden to speak to each other. I have three brothers, and according to Cheyenne rules, I would not be allowed to speak to or have any kind of relationship to any of them. Not cool! I suppose I can see how this would have developed from an effort to prevent incestuous relationships? Maybe? Still not cool.

Another detail that I found to be incredibly sweet and that I included in my book Trail of Dreams was the Cheyenne way of courtship. If a young man wanted to “go out” with a young woman, he would wait at the door to her tipi with a blanket draped around him. Then, when she came out, he would wrap her in the blanket too, creating their own little cocoon in which they could talk (or make-out) without interference. Grinnell mentions that if a woman was particularly popular or desirable, she could step outside of her tipi and find several men in blankets lined up to spend time with her. Then she would spend a few minutes talking under the blanket of each man before going on with her duties.

So after learning all these things and more, I hope that I’ve translated them well into the story of Trail of Dreams.

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Writing Tip: Silencing Self-Doubt

Not gonna lie. Suck happens. Especially in the early days of anyone’s writing career. I am a firm believer in the fact that every writer always has something they can improve on, and if they’re taking writing seriously as a professional, they will actively be trying to learn and improve their skills. Life is about learning and development is about striving to be better all the time.

© Tamara Kulikova | Dreamstime.com

But what do you do when that quest for improvement turns in on itself? How do you handle those voices in your head that tell you every word you’re writing is drivel and you’ll never be good enough? Because those voices are there and they’re loud. They can cripple the best intentions of any writer chasing their dream.

I have problems with these voices during the drafting process of every single book I write. Yep. It’s true. There’s a bit of self-doubt built into the process of writing a first draft. I think it’s because when you start drafting a book, you have no idea what you’re going to come up with. The blank page before you is a sea of white unknown. There are no guarantees and no reassurances on that page. Whatever you write, it could be awesome or it could be terrible. You don’t know, and uncertainty is fertile ground for blows to self-esteem.

So what do you do?

Of course, the only answer, simple and complex at the same time, is to write. You’re never going to know what you will come up with, awesome or suck, unless you get it out there on the page. And while this is true, it’s also one of the most frustrating pieces of advice because it’s so vague. Telling someone to ‘just write’ when their self-esteem has brought them to a standstill isn’t particularly helpful.

So here are a few more things you can do to combat it.

I like using concrete things to help me to get words on pages. I cling religiously to my daily word count goals when I’m drafting. They’re not just a practicality for me, they’re a promise. My word count goal can change depending on what I’m drafting and what else is going on in my world. Regardless of what number you set, drawing that line in the sand and sticking to it, typing one more word and one more word, no matter how sucky you think they are as you type them, can give you the motivation you need to get your writing going.

Another concrete thing that helps my writing and my self-esteem as I’m writing is outlining, or, if you’re a pantser, writing about my writing. Any time I get stuck or convince myself that what I’m writing is complete nonsense, taking a step back and writing on a pad of paper about what I’m writing (what just happened in the story, what needs to happen, why the characters are acting the way they’re acting, why I’m stuck, why I think it’s bad, what I think I’ve done well) always seems to give me a boost and clarify where I’m going.

Of course, these are concrete things that are designed to deal with an emotional problem. Sometimes the answer to getting beyond self-doubt is to take a break, take a walk, have coffee with a friend, and shoot the breeze with other writers.

A word about other writers, though. I don’t know about you, but I have a serious problem with comparing myself to other writers. It’s bad. I compare myself to other people in real life, though, too. But as bad as my tendency to compare is, every time I have actually opened up and really talked to another writer about their process and their fears and issues, it helps me to put things into perspective. And yes, then we BOTH feel better. Sharing with others is the best way to discover that we’re really not alone in this whole thing.

Self-doubt is one of those things that we just have to deal with as writers. All of the awards, accolades, and sales in the world aren’t going to take that self-doubt away from you at all times completely. But even just knowing that can help you to combat it when it rears its ugly head.

So what do you do to combat self-doubt?

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Excerpt Wednesday – Further along the Trail of Dreams

 

It’s Wednesday, which means it’s all about the excerpts! So let’s get right into it, shall we?

“That was Ireland,” she said, turning her face away from him dismissively. “There’s an entire new country full of men that are twice the prize you are.”

“Really? Where?” He gestured to the wide open land they walked through. As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but grass and hills and the occasional stand of scrubby trees or rocks. Far toward the horizon on their left was a tall formation of rocks that reached up to the sky like a chimney.

“Well they’re not going to be scattered across the prairie like buffalo,” Katie said.

“Ah,” Aiden nodded. “The Great American Buffalo Dragon.”

She snorted, a smile escaping for a heartbeat, then sniffed to stop herself from laughing harder. “There are plenty of men at the forts we’ve passed. There will be plenty more to come.  Just you watch.”

“And what, precisely, will I be watching?”

A wicked grin spread across her lips that shot heat right through him. “You’ll be watching me catch a string of beaux.”

“Will I now?” He feigned doubt. In truth, he knew that Katie could capture the heart of any man she wanted with just a flutter of those long copper lashes.

“You will,” she announced, proud as ever. “In fact, I’ll make a wager with you. When we reach the next fort, I’ll have half the men stationed there begging to walk out with me.”

Aiden laughed. “That would be a crowd, a ghrá.”

She huffed in frustration. “All right, then. I wager you I’ll have a man falling all over himself to kiss me before a whole day has passed.”

He had no doubt she could do it. Not that he would let any man dare get that close. “It’s a deal,” he said.

She gave him a self-satisfied nod. “You’ll see. As soon as we reach the next fort, the men will all be twice as handsome and twice as strong as you are.”

“Why, Katie Boyle, are you saying I’m handsome and strong?” he teased.

She huffed out a breath and smacked his arm.

“Now what did I do to deserve that?” Aiden laughed and rubbed his arm.

“You were born.”

Her sullen answer made him laugh harder. “Aye, that I was, a ghrá. Born for you.”

She clucked and shook her head and crossed her arms, but beneath every one of her signs of protest, Aiden could see the truth of her affections pressing to get out.

Good news! Trail of Dreams is currently up for Preorder! Reserve your copy today at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or iBooks.

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George Bird Grinnell and The Cheyenne Indians

I’m a day behind on my Monday History post, but I would rather be late this week than skip it entirely. Because today I want to talk about the man to whom I owe an incredible debt of gratitude in the writing of Trail of Dreams. And that’s George “Bird” Grinnell.

George “Bird” Grinnell,
courtesy of Wikicommons

Now, you’ve probably never heard of Grinnell. He was born in 1849 and died in 1938, so that’s no surprise. But to me, he’s the kind of man that should have been studied in History classes all those years ago. Grinnell was a key figure in the early conservationist movement, a naturalist, anthropologist, and someone who recognized early on that the West was disappearing and needed to be preserved and documented as much as possible.

Grinnell was born in Brooklyn and went to school at Yale, but his passion was for the open lands of the West. He began traveling West as a young man, even going along with one of Custer’s expeditions against the Indians as a naturalist. (Not THAT expedition, though) His experiences instilled in him a great need to preserve the land, and, along with Teddy Roosevelt, he was one of the founding members of the Boone and Crocket Club. He also organized the first Audubon Society.

But where I owe my debt of gratitude to Grinnell is in his relationship with and connection to the Native American tribes of the West. At a time when their land was being taken away and the government of the people who flooded into their lands persecuted them, Grinnell lived amongst the Native Americans and earnestly sought to learn their ways. His book, The Cheyenne Indians: Their History and Lifeways, was an essential resource for me in writing Trail of Dreams, because it details every aspect of life amongst the Cheyenne at the end of their way of life as they knew it.

Portrait of a Cheyenne brave, from the Smithsonian collection,
courtesy of Wikicommons

Grinnell was accepted amongst the Cheyenne. They were the ones who gave him the name “Bird” in honor of the fact that he would come and go, like a migratory bird. He would spend entire seasons living with them, talking to them, and experiencing life as the Cheyenne knew it. You can tell from reading his book that he really listened to all of the stories that the people had to tell him. They trusted Grinnell and were open with him.

When you read Grinnell’s book, which was published in 1923, the most remarkable thing about it is how personal it sounds. He tells the stories of the Cheyenne with a closeness that speaks to the relationships he had with these people. Half the time he writes as though reporting anthropology, but then he’ll slip into retelling anecdotes about specific men and women, their triumphs and their foibles, as though you’re sitting around a campfire smoking with him. Those kinds of details drive home how real and how human these voices from the past are, and how much they lost.

Another thing that I find so important about Grinnell’s work is that he was driven enough to publish it and many more articles. He began publishing in journals in the late nineteenth century, and was prolific in the early 20th. Sometimes we forget that, even at the time when official policy was far more destructive toward the land and the Native Americans, not everyone agreed with what was going on. It was a good reminder for me to see that there were men and women who worked tirelessly to preserve the way of life and the untouched land that was being bowled over by progress. Not only did I enjoy reading about that, I’ve tried to bring it into my Hot on the Trail series through some of the characters, namely Dean Meyers and Aiden Murphy.

So as nice as it is that you would read my books, I hope that you’ll pick up Grinnell’s The Cheyenne Indians when you have a chance. This is History the way it’s meant to be told. Real. Alive. Human.

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Excerpt Wednesday – More Trail of Dreams

It’s Wednesday! You know what that means. It means it’s time for an excerpt. Here’s a little bit that I just love from Trail of Dreams

He nodded to the ferryman. “Tell the fine lady here that she needs to be careful of dragons in the prairie grass.”

The ferryman laughed as he poled the raft along. “Can’t rightly say I ever saw me a dragon out here.”

“There you have it,” Katie said, crossing her arms where she sat. “Idjeet.”

The ferryman working the rope on the Boyle’s raft tripped and staggered, tipping the raft slightly to the side. Katie gripped the edges of her wagon seat and lost the color in her face. Even yards away, Aiden could see the fear back in her eyes.

“Just because this gentleman has never seen a prairie dragon doesn’t mean they don’t exist or that you shouldn’t be careful of them,” he argued on, his tone as mocking as he could make it. “Why, there could be one just around the river bend, waiting to snatch you.”

With a quick, wary gesture, Katie snapped her head up to meet his eyes. “Are you out of your mind? Has all that fiddle playing filled your head with fuzz?”

She was fighting it. The color came back to her face in splotches, but at least it was coming. His chest swelled with pride in her.

“You scoff now, but I’ve seen photographs of prairie dragons,” he said, resting his weight on one hip and crossing his arms in challenge.

“You have?” She sat straighter, curiosity replacing the mask of false scorn she’d put on. “Where?”

“Back in Ireland,” he said, both to her and to the ferryman with the pole, who had stopped his work and stared at Aiden with open mouth.

“You never,” Katie called him out. Her color was almost back to normal and she’d let go of the wagon seat.

“You saw the same photograph that I did, remember?”

“How could I remember something that never happened.” She tipped her chin up, almost as if they were on dry ground.

Two of Aiden’s younger brothers had poked their heads out of the back of their family’s wagon and were giggling, bright-eyed, at his story. He winked at them, then peeked past the wagon to the river’s opposite shore. It would take a few more minutes to reach it, but they were more than halfway across now.

“They’re small for dragons,” he went on, facing Katie once more. “But fat and brown. And they have fur instead of scales. They have horns, though, and great, large humps.”

The ferryman snorted with laughter beside him.

Across the stretch of river separating their rafts, Katie huffed in frustration. “Idjeet I said and idjeet I meant. Those are buffalo, not dragons.”

“Aye,” he called back to her. “The Great American Buffalo Dragon. Vicious beasties, they are. They’ll breathe fire at you and charge all at once.”

The ferryman working the rope on his wagon was laughing at the exchange now, along with both of the men on the Boyle’s raft. Behind Katie, a little sister and a brother had popped their heads up and were chuckling along as well.

“Saints be praised, Aiden Murphy. How you intend to find your way in this country is a mystery to me,” Katie said. She shifted position on the driver’s seat, relaxing even more.

 

Good news! Trail of Dreams is currently up for Preorder! Reserve your copy today at Amazon or iBooks.

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Excerpt Wednesday – Trail of Dreams, a First Look

 

At last! I’m super excited to bring you a first look at book 4 in the Hot on the Trail series, Trail of Dreams. Come follow Katie Boyle and Aiden Murphy as they get into all sorts of trouble, most of all with each other. Here’s a peek…

“What about you, Miss Emma?” He changed tacks and tried to bring Dean’s sweetheart out of her shell. “Is love nothing more than a sour stomach?”

“Well… I….” Emma tripped over her own tongue.

Dean tensed just enough for Aiden to notice, his face pinching. “I think Emma is entitled to keep her opinion to herself,” he said. He followed that by murmuring so that only Aiden could hear, “Leave Emma out of this. She’s got enough to worry about at the moment.”

Aiden nodded. “I’m sure her thoughts are as pure and refreshing as she is,” he said with a smile. In the week since they’d met, Aiden had come to like and respect both Emma and Dean, and if his new friend declared his sweetheart off-limits from the teasing banter he was used to, he would honor that. “As for your thoughts, a ghrá,” he shifted back to Katie, “I think our good Father Daniel back in Ballymote is thanking his lucky stars he doesn’t have to hear your confession anymore.”

Katie laughed, full and throaty, sending a wave of desire through him that threatened to make it difficult to walk comfortably. “Now that he doesn’t have to hear your confession, Aiden Murphy, maybe he won’t fall asleep in the confessional anymore.”

“He only slept during my confession because he was exhausted after hearing yours,” Aiden shot back.

Katie humphed again and quickened her pace. She and Emma began to distance themselves from him and Dean.

“Did the priest really fall asleep while you were confessing?” Dean asked, smile broad.

“He did,” Aiden said. “The poor man’s eighty-two. He used to nap while the good folks of Ballymote poured out their sins to him. I heard Father James scold him about it once, but Father Daniel explained that if we all assumed he was asleep, we would confess more and find deeper absolution.”

Dean laughed aloud. “I’m sure you had your fair share of things to confess about Miss Katie.”

“Volumes,” Aiden laughed. “I’ve been having impure thoughts about her for half my lifetime, much good that it’s done me.”

Dean raised his brow. “That’s unusually gloomy for you.”

“Not at all,” Aiden continued to chuckle. He watched Katie’s back as she and Emma plowed ahead. “It all comes from your basic misunderstanding and complete bafflement over women and what they want.”

Dean grunted, smirk back in place. “You can say that again. I love her with all my heart, but I don’t understand a thing going on in Emma’s head.”

“No man can ever understand what goes on in a woman’s head,” Aiden agreed. “If we had the slightest inkling of what they think, if we could piece together the barest fragment of how they work, then like as not, we’d get overconfident and turn the world on its ear.”

“Still, it would be nice to know that we’re on the right path sometimes,” Dean said. He blew out a breath and dragged a hand through his hair.

“Ah, but we’re always on the right path if we’re on any path at all,” Aiden told him. He reached behind to lift his fiddle case off his back. His fingers always had an urge to play when his heart beat harder.

“How do you figure?” Dean asked. He held out his arms to hold the fiddle case while Aiden took the instrument out as they continued to walk.

“Well, we don’t know what’s going on in their minds, they don’t know what’s going on in our minds, so the only way to get two and two together is to keep moving forward.”

Trail of Dreams will be coming on February 16th! Stay tuned for more….

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