Florence Witkop's Blog, page 60

Here’s today’s link to the blog advert

Here’s today’s link to the blog advertising Wolf Legend and a chance at a $30 Amazon gift card. http://www.booksandfandom.com/

Watching deer is a big thing around here. A friend once told of her surprise upon moving to the area to find out that ‘wildlife sightings’ is a competitive sport. How’d she not know that?

Anyway, a while back… a week or so… our grandson, Robert, cleared paths all over the yard. His plan was to leave deer food in several places in order to lure the deer to our yard so we could enjoy watching them and gain bragging rights. Then the wind started to blow and the paths disappeared. We checked the calendar and saw how close it is to spring and decided to let the sun do our work for us. So some day, when it’s warm enough, the deer will once again have some corn to eat and we’ll be able to tell the world how many deer were in our yard.

Today’s book blast site for Wolf Legend

Today’s book blast site for Wolf Legend is: http://2ndbooktotheright.blogspot.com/

Looks like winter might actually end. I still love winter but even I will admit that this one was more winter than we are used to. We got stuck in our own driveway, thanks to not clearing it while Dick was in the hospital and Robert had pneumonia. Guess who shirked her responsibility? Yep. Me. So our wonderful neighbor ended up plowing it for us. Here’s to neighbors and all other people who go out of their way to help out. And now spring is just around the corner. I’m actually looking forward to it.

Today’s Book Blast for Wolf Legend with

Today’s Book Blast for Wolf Legend with a chance to win a $30 Amazon gift card is I Know That Book. http://www.iknowthatbook.blogspot.com/

I’ve been thinking about the stories we writers write and how we categorize those stories when the time comes to sell them. And I’ve realized something. All stories by a particular writer will be similar no matter what genre they are placed into. Mystery, science-fiction, romance, fantasy, or any other of the many, many categories that are out there.

Because the story comes first and the genre is a marketing ploy that only exists only so readers can better find what they are looking for. So, while the framework of the story may vary according to the genre it’s placed into, the meat and muscle will be similar to any other story by that writer, something readers who search for a good read by author instead of genre have figured out.

Today’s Book Blast tour site for Wolf L

Today’s Book Blast tour site for Wolf Legend with a chance to win a $30 AMazon gift card is Black Lion Book tours. http://www.blackliontours.blogspot.com/ Black Lion is the company that’s doing the publicity. They also do a blog themselves and that’s where you can read all about Snowball today. I think she likes the publicity she’s getting. She’s conscious of her appearance and tips her head in a cocky way and grins whenever I think about her lately.

Yes, I think of her as a real wolf with whom I have a psychic bond. She kind of slid into my consciousness as Wolf Legend grew into a full length novel and I can’t get her out now no matter how hard I try. Not that I try because I kind of like her puppy thoughts.

Today’s Book Blast locale for Wolf Lege

Today’s Book Blast locale for Wolf Legend with a chance to win a $30 Amazon gift card is A Writer’s Life. http://carolineclemmons.blogspot.com/

I became a writer to make money working from my home, not because I have any burning desire to write. Not because some inner compulsion pushes me towards the computer to spew out all my inner trauma and joy.

Not too long ago, however, I thought about going to work at MacDonalds or Walmart instead because they sound easier than the marketing that goes with writing for a living.

When the thought wound around through my mind, I discovered something. It hit so hard I fell into the nearest chair and stared at the wall for a long time.

I didn’t want to quit writing. I couldn’t. Somehow, sometime, during the years and years that I’ve been doing this, my writing segued from a business to a profession. From a craft to an art. From something I did for money to something I do because it fulfills something inside of me.

Talk about revelations! I now have joined those writers who write because they must, not because they choose.

Today’s Book Blast locale for Wolf Lege

Today’s Book Blast locale for Wolf Legend, with a drawing for a $30 Amazon gift card is: http://lauriethoughts-reviews.blogspot.com/

While I’m thinking of wolves because of the Wolf Legend publicity, I’m also thinking of deer. We’ve started feeding the deer because so far the winter has been so severe and it’s towards the end of a winter that they are most likely to suffer. A few years back the Department of Natural Resources recommended not feeding them because when they gather in close quarters around a feeder, disease spreads more easily. But we’ve heard that the DNR is considering feeding them this year in spite of that caveat so we’re going ahead an doing it.

And what has happened? Nothing. One deer at the feeder. No more. So Dick checked and what do you suppose he found? That our next door neighbor has been feeding them all along, with a snazzy, high-tech feeder that spews feed out twice a day at chosen intervals. So guess where all the local deer are? Next door.

The thought has crossed my mind that if the snazzy feeder broke for some unknown reason, the deer might come to visit us. Except that, much as I love watching the deer, this is about getting them through the winter in good health, not a contest to see who can attract the most local wildlife. Darn it anyway.

Today starts a Book Blast advertising Wo

Today starts a Book Blast advertising Wolf Legend. There’s a free e-copy of Wolf Legend and a $30 gift certificate as a prize drawing for one reader of the Book Blast blogs. So here’s a link to today’s host blog in case you are interested. https://www.google.com/#q=vanillamoonblog The Book Blast will continue through March 13 with a different book blog hosting the Blast each day. I’ll post the links to each blog in case you are interested in trying for the prizes.

So that’ll be it for today. After this, I’ll just put the link in quickly so as not to be too wordy, then I’ll go straight to the topic of the day’s post. But, as you might guess, I’m being very conservative of my word use these days in case the Facebook police are watching.

My mother died last week. Not a tragedy,

My mother died last week. Not a tragedy, she was a couple weeks short of 103. I’m thinking of her because of the way she loved to read. Everything. She studied creative writing with some of the best writers of the twentieth century. Sinclair Lewis is the one who comes to mind because she liked to say that if he considered something easy to write he graded it down no matter how good it was. Mom wasn’t a snob about literature. One of my fondest memories was of her chuckling over a story I’d written that was in one of those complimentary copies of the magazine that writers are usually given. And chuckling over the stories of other writers, not her children, in those same magazines. Before turning to War and Peace or something similar. I try to follow in her footsteps and be an eclectic reader.

It’s a really cold winter. A few years

It’s a really cold winter. A few years ago, it was both cold and lacking snow and practically every septic system in Minnesota froze. After that year, people are careful to either get a warming blanket made just to keep septic systems warm or to pile straw over the system to avoid freeze-ups. But no one worried about wells because they are eight to ten feet deep.

Guess what? Towns are asking people to keep their water running all the time in order to avoid frozen pipes and in church yesterday we learned of at least three families with frozen water pipes.

No we won’t let our water run. Yet. But if this weather keeps up, I might change that in a week or so. If the pipes don’t freeze first. And the weather forecast is for more sustained sub-zero weather.

My work-in-progress, Earth Legend, is ab

My work-in-progress, Earth Legend, is about colonizing the universe. About going beyond the solar system to spread humanity to the stars. It’s also, according to some people, unlikely to ever happen because nothing can go faster than light speed. Impossible. Can’t happen.

Maybe that’s not true. One of the first things I read when I was a kid reading quasi-science in science fiction magazines was that if there is any way to exceed light speed, it’ll require utilizing electromagnetism.

I never forgot that but I figured it was just some science fiction writer’s fantasy. But not too long ago, watching a science program on TV, the subject of light speed came up and guess what? Scientists are working on the problem of building ships that can exceed the speed of light. And how are they doing it? By creating an electromagnetic bubble around a space ship. Within that bubble, the ship won’t be restricted to the speed of light because that bubble will be a tiny universe inside the larger universe as we know it. And it can go faster than light.

I like the idea of getting around the universe as easily as from New York to San Francisco. I like the thought that Chloe and everyone else on the Goliath can go really far really fast. And I like the idea that people aren’t limited by anything.

So I’m glad I sometimes write science fiction because in time it just might become science fact.