Matthew D. Ryan's Blog, page 13
June 12, 2014
Blog Tour: Stop #4
My blog tour for my fantasy novel, The Children of Lubrochius, continues today. Every day until June 27th, I’ll be visiting a variety of blogs across the Internet where I’ll be interviewing, guest posting, and providing promotional material for my novel. At the end of the tour, one of the commenters on the tour (the tour sites, NOT AToastToDragons) will win a prize (a gift card at Amazon.com for $20). Likewise one of the tour hosts will win a prize at Amazon (a $10 gift card). Todaywe have: Books and Other Spells (http://www.booksandotherspells.blogsp...). Please check them out and show them your support.
And check out the sponsor of the tour: http://www.goddessfish.com/.
Finally, I am running a promotion during the entire tour. My novel will be available on Smashwords for 50% off for all those using the appropriate coupon code: LX23U.
June 11, 2014
Blog Tour: Stop #3
My blog tour for my fantasy novel, The Children of Lubrochius, continues today. Every day until June 27th, I’ll be visiting a variety of blogs across the Internet where I’ll be interviewing, guest posting, and providing promotional material for my novel. At the end of the tour, one of the commenters on the tour (the tour sites, NOT AToastToDragons) will win a prize (a gift card at Amazon.com for $20). Likewise one of the tour hosts will win a prize at Amazon (a $10 gift card). Todaywe have: Lisa Haselton’s Reviews and Interviews (http://lisahaseltonsreviewsandintervi...) Please check them out and show them your support.
And check out the sponsor of the tour: http://www.goddessfish.com/.
Finally, I am running a promotion during the entire tour. My novel will be available on Smashwords for 50% off for all those using the appropriate coupon code: LX23U.
June 10, 2014
Blog Tour: Stop #2
My blog tour for my fantasy novel, The Children of Lubrochius, starts today. Every day until June 27th, I’ll be visiting a variety of blogs across the Internet where I’ll be interviewing, guest posting, and providing promotional material for my novel. At the end of the tour, one of the commenters on the tour (the tour sites, NOT AToastToDragons) will win a prize (a gift card at Amazon.com for $20). Likewise one of the tour hosts will win a prize at Amazon (a $10 gift card). Todaywe have: Rogue’s Angels (http://roguesangels.blogspot.com/) Please check them out and show them your support.
And check out the sponsor of the tour: http://www.goddessfish.com/.
Finally, I am running a promotion during the entire tour. My novel will be available on Smashwords for 50% off for all those using the appropriate coupon code: LX23U.
June 9, 2014
Blog Tour: Stop #1
My blog tour for my fantasy novel, The Children of Lubrochius, starts today. Every day until June 27th, I’ll be visiting a variety of blogs across the Internet where I’ll be interviewing, guest posting, and providing promotional material for my novel. At the end of the tour, one of the commenters on the tour (the tour sites, NOT AToastToDragons) will win a prize (a gift card at Amazon.com for $20). Likewise one of the tour hosts will win a prize at Amazon (a $10 gift card). Todaywe have: Andi’s Book Reviews (http://andisbookreviews.blogspot.com/) Please check them out and show them your support.
And check out the sponsor of the tour: http://www.goddessfish.com/.
Finally, I am running a promotion during the entire tour. My novel will be available on Smashwords for 50% off for all those using the appropriate coupon code: LX23U.
Announcement: Upcoming Blog Tour for The Children of Lubrochius
Goddess Fish Promotions has organized a Virtual Book Tour for The Children of Lubrochius by Matthew D. Ryan (me), a Fantasy book available now. The tour will run June 9 – 27, 2014. The tour will consist of guest posts, promotional blurbs, interviews, and perhaps the occasional review. Throughout the tour, The Children of Lubrochiuswill be available for 50% off at Smashwords for those who use the appropriate coupon which is: LX23U. I also will be awarding a $20 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour, and a $10 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn host.
The list of tour sites is now complete. Remember to check out Goddess Fish Promotions; it wouldn’t have been possible without them!
June 9: Andi’s Book Reviews
June 10: Rogue’s Angels
June 11: Lisa Haselton’s Reviews and Interviews
June 12: Books and Other Spells
June 13: 3 Partners in Shopping, Nana, Mommy, and Sissy, Too!
June 16: MAD Hoydenish
June 17: Our Wolves Den
June 18: Lockdown – A Bunch of Brilliant Projects
June 19: Room With Books * (bad link)
June 20: Literary Lunes Magazine
June 23: Angels with Attitude Book Reviews June 24: Long and Short Reviews
June 25: Welcome to My World of Dreams
June 26: Paranormal Romance and Authors That Rock
June 27: Mismatched Bookends
Remember: the Smashwords coupon code for P off is: LX23U
Movie Review: Maleficent (2014) (4 *’s)
Disney’s Maleficent is the latest reimagining of a Disney children’s tale as a rated PG film—more palatable for adults, but not quite as intense as a PG-13 or higher film. It is based on the Disney classic Sleeping Beauty, my favorite as a young child (I mean, it has a dragon! What more do you want?) Maleficent stars Angelina Jolie in the title role, Elle Fanning as the Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty), and Sharlto Copley as King Stefan.
The story begins with the younger years of Maleficent, a female human-sized fairy living in the fairy moor right next door to the human kingdom. One day she finds a young human boy who is trying to steal a small gem from fairyland. She makes him give it back and the two of them become friends. As time goes by, their relationship deepens. When Maleficent turns sixteen, Stefan gives her what he says is true love’s kiss. Unfortunately, things don’t last and he becomes an infrequent visitor lured away by the honors, riches, and desires that dominate the human world. Maleficent is hurt, of course, but she survives. She goes on with her life. But soon the king of the human kingdom turns his eye toward her moor and conflict ensues. This conflict forms the backdrop of the entire Sleeping Beauty story. But it’s Sleeping Beauty with a twist. Maleficent is set up as a sympathetic character for the movie.
Strengths: the acting was good, the plot good, and the special effects were quite remarkable. I couldn’t find any logical holes in a single viewing. The life lessons were decent; the message about love well-taken. Weaknesses: my biggest problem with the film is that since it is based on Sleeping Beauty it would likely draw a very young crowd in spite of the PG rating. It’s not as bad as a PG-13 rating, but even so, redefining Maleficent as a misunderstood heroine will likely be confusing to the very young who are familiar with the original tale. Further, I felt that Disney missed an opportunity to reconcile King Stefan with Maleficent—such would have made a powerful tale of forgiveness that would have been very instructive. As it was, the ending was okay, but perhaps a little dark for the very young.
Anyway, I’ll give Disney’s Maleficent four stars out of five with a warning that some of the plot may be too mature for the very young. Still, it was a good movie.
June 5, 2014
Announcement: Upcoming Blog Tour for The Children of Lubrochius
Goddess Fish Promotions is organizing a Virtual Book Tour for The Children of Lubrochius by Matthew D. Ryan (me), a Fantasy book available now. The tour will run June 9 – 27, 2014. The tour will consist of guest posts, promotional blurbs, interviews, and perhaps the occasional review. Throughout the tour, The Children of Lubrochiuswill be available for 50% off at Smashwords for those who use the appropriate coupon. I will be awarding a $20 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour, and a $10 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn host.
The list of tour sites is currently under development. We will keep you informed as we get more information. Remember to check out Goddess Fish Promotions; it wouldn’t have been possible without them!
June 9: Andi’s Book Reviews
June 10: Rogue’s Angels
June 11: Lisa Haselton’s Reviews and Interviews
June 12: Books and Other Spells
June 13: 3 Partners in Shopping, Nana, Mommy, and Sissy, Too!
June 16: MAD Hoydenish
June 17: Our Wolves Den
June 18: Lockdown – A Bunch of Brilliant Projects
June 19:
June 20:
June 23: Angels with Attitude Book Reviews
June 24:
June 25:
June 26: Paranormal Romance and Authors That Rock
June 27: Mismatched Bookends
World-Building Athron: Spellcraft Skills
The spell system developed for my gaming system for the world of Athron is unique and complex. Early generations of system, in fact, proved to be too complex and the system had to be simplified. The final result is a list of skills accessible by any character: Magical lore, Any Spellcraft, Any Rune Lore, Any Alchemy, Energy, Scroll Lore, Command Item, Item Lore, Minor Magical Lore, Minor Spellcraft. These skills provide the backbone of the magic system as player characters understand it. As far as casting spells are concerned, the most important skills are Spellcraft, Rune Lore, Alchemy, and Energy. These are not singular skills, however; there are different spellcraft disciplines, and rune lore disciplines. For example, one discipline is fire. So, wizardly characters have the option of purchasing any of the following skills: flamecraft, fire rune lore, and fire alchemy. Originally, the energy used to activate these skills was divided by discipline as well. That is, there were separate skills like fire energy, and water energy. Unfortunately, this proved to be too complicated for the purposes of a game and involved far too much note-keeping. So it was simplified to a single energy skill. That cleared up a lot of note-keeping problems and headaches.
I used to have a list of spell disciplines or types somewhere. I probably still do, but I’m just too lazy to find it. Anyway, going from memory: there were the four basic elemental disciplines (fire, earth, water, and air) and a random assortment of others (wood, blood, flesh, bone, soul (conjuration), seer (divination), hell (demonology), death (necromancy)). In the gaming system, I was able to develop the elemental disciplines for the game. I have separate lists of spells, potions, and runes for each of those four spell disciplines. The other eight, however, were never fully developed. I can use the elemental disciplines as a template for the others in the future and get a general sense of what each spell discipline is like, but I don’t have hard-fast details. Fortunately, I don’t need quite so many details for work in a novel that I do in a game. My needs can be satisfied with a few quick notes. So, the spell system in my novels has an open-ended twelve disciplines or so, while the gaming system has a mere four. For the gaming system, the idea was always to expand it some at a later date.
Next week we will begin examining the fire discipline.
June 2, 2014
Announcement: Upcoming Blog Tour for The Children of Lubrochius
Goddess Fish Promotions is organizing a Virtual Book Tour for The Children of Lubrochius by Matthew D. Ryan (me), a Fantasy book available now. The tour will run June 9 – 27, 2014. The tour will consist of guest posts, promotional blurbs, interviews, and perhaps the occasional review. Throughout the tour, The Children of Lubrochiuswill be available for 50% off at Smashwords for those who use the appropriate coupon. I will be awarding a $20 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour, and a $10 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn host.
The list of tour sites is currently under development. We will keep you informed as we get more information. Remember to check out Goddess Fish Promotions; it wouldn’t have been possible without them!
June 9: Andi’s Book Reviews
June 10: Rogue’s Angels
June 11: Lisa Haselton’s Reviews and Interviews
June 12: Books and Other Spells
June 13: 3 Partners in Shopping, Nana, Mommy, and Sissy, Too!
June 16: MAD Hoydenish
June 17: Our Wolves Den
June 18:
June 19:
June 20:
June 23:
June 24:
June 25:
June 26: Paranormal Romance and Authors That Rock
June 27: Mismatched Bookends
Goddess Fish Promotions is organizing a Virtual Book Tour...
Goddess Fish Promotions is organizing a Virtual Book Tour for The Children of Lubrochius by Matthew D. Ryan (me), a Fantasy book available now. The tour will run June 9 – 27, 2014. The tour will consist of guest posts, promotional blurbs, interviews, and perhaps the occasional review. Throughout the tour, The Children of Lubrochiuswill be available for 50% off at Smashwords for those who use the appropriate coupon. I will be awarding a $20 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn commenter during the tour, and a $10 Amazon Gift Card to a randomly drawn host.
The list of tour sites is currently under development. We will keep you informed as we get more information. Remember to check out Goddess Fish Promotions; it wouldn’t have been possible without them!
June 9: Andi’s Book Reviews
June 10: Rogue’s Angels
June 11: Lisa Haselton’s Reviews and Interviews
June 12: Books and Other Spells
June 13: 3 Partners in Shopping, Nana, Mommy, and Sissy, Too!
June 16: MAD Hoydenish
June 17: Our Wolves Den
June 18:
June 19:
June 20:
June 23:
June 24:
June 25:
June 26: Paranormal Romance and Authors That Rock
June 27: Mismatched Bookends
