Jen Minkman's Blog, page 4

Die Insel

“Ich laufe auf das Meer zu. Die Wasser­oberfläche erstreckt sich endlos bis zum Horizont, in welche Richtung ich auch schaue. Unsere Welt ist klein. Wir sind auf uns selbst gestellt und können uns nur auf uns selbst verlassen. Wir vertrauen auf die Macht tief in uns, wie unsere Vorväter es uns lehrten. 
Würde ich mich von hier nach Westen wenden, würde ich auf eine Barriere stoßen – auf die Mauer. Dahinter sind die Narren. Zumindest sagt das jeder. Ich habe nie einen gesehen.” 

Leia lebt auf der Insel. In einer Welt, in der Kinder ihre Eltern im Alter von zehn Jahren verlassen, um auf eigenen Füßen zu stehen. Quer über die Insel erstreckt sich eine Mauer, die niemand je übertreten hat. Die Narren auf der anderen Seite sind nicht empfänglich für Vernunft – sie glauben an Illusionen. So besagt es die Schrift, die einzige Hinterlassenschaft von den Vorfahren, die den Ostländern noch erhalten ist. 

Als ein fremder Mann an den Strand gespült wird, trifft Leia zum ersten mal einen Narren von Angesicht zu Angesicht – und ihr Leben wird nie wieder so sein wie es war. Ist das, was sie und ihre Freunde über die Insel glauben, wirklich die Wahrheit? 

Oder sind die Menschen hier, in ihrer Welt, die eigentlichen Narren?

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L’Île

‘Je marche vers la mer. La surface infinie de l’eau se prolonge jusqu’à l’horizon, d’où que je regarde.
Notre monde est petit. Nous sommes livrés à nous, et ne dépendons que de nous-mêmes. Nous dépendons de la Force enfouie profondément en nous, comme nous l’ont enseigné nos ancêtres.
Si je devais marcher d’ici vers l’ouest, je me retrouverais devant une barrière – le Mur. Derrière se trouvent les Idiots. Du moins, c’est ce que tout le monde dit.Je n’en ai jamais vu un.’

Leia vit sur l’Ile, un monde dans lequel enfants quittent leurs parents pour se débrouiller seuls lorsqu’ils atteignent dix ans. À travers cette Ile s’étend un mur que personne n’a jamais franchi. Les Idiots vivant derrière celui-ci ne se prêtent à la raison – ils croient aux illusions. C’est ce que Le Livre dit, le seul objet légué aux insulaires de l’est par leurs ancêtres.

Mais lorsqu’un homme étrange échoue sur le rivage et que Leia rencontre un Idiot en personne, sa vie ne sera plus la même. Les croyances qu’elle et ses amis ont sur l’île sont-elles réellement fondées ?
Ou bien les habitants de leur monde sont-ils en fait tous des Idiots?

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Die Eiland

"Ek loop aan see toe. Die branders borrel en skuim oor my kaalvoete. Seemeeue skree bokant my kop. Die eindelose oppervlakte van die water strek tot aan die horison, watter kant toe ek ookal kyk."Ons wereldjie is klein... Ons is op ons eie, en ons het net die Krag diep binne-in ons om op staat te maak. "As ek hiervandaan in 'n westelike rigting sou loop, sou ek by 'n versperring kom: die muur. Daaragter is Dwase. Volgens ons voorouers mag ons nie oor die muur klim nie."Die Dwase glo nie in hulle eie Krag nie. In plaas daarvan glo hulle aan iets buite hierdie wereld, wat hulle gaan red."Niemand wil met sulke idiote meng nie."Leia woon op die eiland, 'n wereld waar kinders hulle ouers verlaat wanneer hulle tien jaar oud word, om na hulleself om te sien. Oor hierdie eiland is 'n muur gebou waaroor niemand nog ooit geklim het nie. Die Dwase wat aan die ander kant woon, is nie vatbaar vir rede nie. Hulle glo in illusies. Dit is volgens die Boek, al wat die Oostelike Eilandbewoners se voorgeslagte aan hulle nagelaat het.Maar dan spoel 'n vreemde man op die strand uit, en Leia ontmoet 'n Dwaas van aangesig tot aangesig. En haar lewe is nooit weer dieselfde nie. Is dit wat sy en haar vriende omtrent die eiland glo, regtig waar?Of is almal in hulle wereld inderdaad Dwase?
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時間的陰影

剛在高中教完一年書的漢娜一心只想過個輕鬆愉快的暑假，她和弟弟班一起到亞利桑那州一個湖邊的小木屋去住，卻意外地和班的童年老友賈許重逢。當年那個來自納瓦侯族印第安人保護區的小男孩，如今已經是個身材壯碩的男人，漢娜不由自主地對他產生情愫。
然而命運卻似乎一心要捉弄他們，不給漢娜任何平靜。她開始每天晚上做惡夢，夢中都是納瓦侯族印第安人的陳年舊事，還有各種恐怖的陰影追獵著她。它們似乎越逼越近——然而賈許為什麼也出現在這些夢境裡？有時候，過去也能有迎頭趕上現在的辦法。
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Schaduw van de Tijd

Hannah is helemaal klaar voor een heerlijk rustige zomer na haar eerste werkjaar op een middelbare school. Samen met haar broer Ben gaat ze naar het vakantiehuisje van hun moeder in Arizona. Daar loopt ze Josh, de oude jeugdvriend van Ben, na jaren weer tegen het lijf. De kleine jongen uit het Navajo-reservaat is plotseling niet zo klein meer, en Hannah voelt meer voor de volwassen Josh dan alleen maar vriendschap. 
Maar al snel is het gedaan met de rust. Nacht na nacht wordt Hannah geplaagd door vreemde nachtmerries over het verleden van de Navajo's en griezelige schimmen die haar achtervolgen. De schaduwen komen steeds dichterbij... en waarom komt Josh ook steeds in haar dromen voor? 

Soms is het verleden nog niet echt voorbij.

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Takin' it easy...!

I have to admit, I worked myself into the ground last year. (FYI, I think in 'college' years because I'm in education... so my year stops at the beginning of July and starts again at the beginning of September!)

I wrote a lot on a deadline (wanting to publish part 3 in the Island series in June because of a large promo I did with BookBub) and wanting to translate The Space in Between before the end of July (because I went on vacation to the Philippines in August) almost took me to the brink of burn-out. Having a 4-day job AND spending the other 3 days writing books is not a good idea (hey, where did my weekend go?!).

So I've decided to take things easy for a while. I am now only working 3 days a week in education, so that's a big improvement, plus I'm writing without any deadlines. I am writing for FUN again. :) I know it would be wise from a marketing point of view to publish something new in November before the X-mas season, but I am not going to beat myself up over it if I don't. Tomorrow, my new English book The Space in Between will go on sale, last week the Dutch version of The Boy From The Woods was published, and that should satisfy my fans for the next few months. I have so many ideas I still want to put on paper that I will most likely 'buffer up' and get a pile of books done before publishing anything new, so I can just use my surplus of written work to publish something new with regular intervals.

Three days of teaching, three afternoons of writing and one day off is what my life will look like from now on. It makes me happy, it pays the bills, and it keeps me more balanced. I am sorry if I am making you wait a little bit longer, readers, but there's only one Jen Minkman and I have to make sure she doesn't crash and burn. ;)Newsletter for New Releases here: http://eepurl.com/x1X9P

The Space In Between - Croeso i Cymru!

So, I did it again - I went to one of my book places! In this case, it's for a book I haven't even published yet (but will soon): 'The Space in Between', set in the beautiful Welsh town of Penmaenmawr.
Moira joins her Wicca-practising sister Tabby when she wants to do a Halloween ritual at the ancient stone circle in the hills behind their village. Little does she know that this will transport her to a magical land and she'll go back to that land in her dreams every night. Why does the mysterious boy named Hayko need her help, and will she be able to stop herself from falling for him? After all, he doesn't really exist - or does he?

Welcome to Wales!As you may have noticed, the title of this blog post had some weird, non-English words. That's because people in Wales, besides English, also speak Welsh, an ancient Celtic language. Croeso i Cymru means 'welcome in Wales' and is pronounced kroy-so ih koom-ree. As you can see on the welcoming sign for Penmaenmawr, the road signs are bilingual.

Moira, the main character, works in a small hotel in town called the Gladstone. This is what it looks like from the outside:

And this is what it looks like on the inside:

This is the town station, where Moira had an accident one year ago:

And this is what I imagined Moira's house to look like. The only thing that's not there is a garage, otherwise it's pretty much the house I had in mind!

This is Penmaenmawr Promenade and the beach. It's high tide in this photo, so you can't actually see the sand!

Walk to the Stone Circle! Walking around town was fun and all, but my bigger plan had always been to visit the stone circle I used in my story! So, off we went (I dragged my sister, or rather, she dragged ME as the climb got steeper and steeper :).

We walked all the way uphill via Mountain Lane and only found out we could have driven that bit up when we got to a parking lot, haha! After that, there was still a brisk walk ahead. When we got to this milestone, at least we knew we were on the right track (though, to be fair, we did get lost once).

After that, we went higher,
and higher,and higher still, (you can see my sister and the stones sticking out in the distance)until we were there! :)(me, completely exhausted)(my sister, looking way fitter)

Invoking the magic...
Here I am, sitting at the exact spot where I imagined Moira to be sitting while doing the ritual. Of course, in the book I have three people (Moira, her sister Tabby, and her brother Dai) forming a circle within the circle.

... isn't the view just amazing? :)

And all the way down, we could see Penmaenmawr. I can't believe we walked all the way up here! My knees were still suffering after a few days. But it was totally worth it :D
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International Authors' Day!

That's right - it was about time we had one of those! After all, there's Mother's Day, Father's Day, Labour Day, Valentine's Day... all pretty important. And since books are important to me because I happen to write them, I've decided to dedicate a short post to the reason I started writing a series despite having sworn I never would. And at the bottom of this post, you can enter my giveaway to win a print copy of the entire trilogy I wrote :)

What started it all? A writing contest. I entered the dystopian writing contest organized by young-adults.nl (a well-known YA forum in the Netherlands) and struggled to keep my story below 20,000 words. No mean feat, I tell you, because I'm known to ramble on quite a bit once I get started. After submitting the story to the woman who'd set up the contest, I translated it to English (because I do that to all my books in order to reach a wider audience) and published it on Kindle. To my surprise, it was a big hit (even though some people mistook my novella for fanfic, for some obscure reason). Soon, I was getting reviews saying that the book was too short (I sort of agreed with them) and it should be expanded. So after a few months of reading reviews from people begging me to write more, I caved and wrote two more books. It was an absolute thrill ride, and I can't wait to write another series. I'm hooked on revisiting my own characters!

If you want to get hooked on Leia, Walt, and other people populating the world of the Island, you can win the entire trilogy by entering the Rafflecopter below! :)

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What's the Spanish word for 'sadsack'?

Sorry, I hardly ever rant on this blog, but now I feel the need to do so.
Last month, one of my books was published in Spanish! What a thrill! The translator worked under a royalty split agreement, meaning that she'll get paid half of the royalties for every sold book. I had a fantastic cover, I had some reviews lined up, I was ready to see what the book would do.
Well, this is what it did: it sold 13 copies. In an entire month. So, let's see - the translator made about 7 dollars. But that's not what I am pissed off about. It is this: someone stole my book, pirated it, and now it is being plastered all over the internet for free. And I don't just mean shady torrent sites. I mean actual YA blogs. That's right, bloggers who write reviews about books and apparently are 'passionate' about books are shamelessly putting up my book FOR FREE DOWNLOAD on their sites. Meanwhile, the translator gets $0.00. I'm not even that sad about myself (I make enough money off my English books for the moment) but what about this poor woman who slaved away at my book and is not compensated for it by seeing some actual sales? She's currently working on another title of mine, and I have half a mind to just tell her to stop, because I sure as heck can't afford to pay for it upfront (not with sales figures like those) and I can't in good conscience offer her another 'royalty split' deal if this is how young adults in Spain treat their authors.

If you think this is a disgrace, share this post and make people aware of what they're actually doing by stealing books! They made me decide to just give up on the Spanish ebook market. I won't be publishing any more books in digital format if this is what will happen.

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Author Angela Snyder is giving away a ton of books... including mine! :)

Please enter the giveaway HERE! Newsletter for New Releases here: http://eepurl.com/x1X9P