A.L. Butcher's Blog, page 81
January 3, 2021
Dirty Dozen Author Interview – Rebecca Miller
Welcome to Rebecca Miller
Please tell us about your publications/work. My writing credits include being a freelance journalist for The Inquisitr, The Weekly Register-Call, The Daily Camera, and the Earthkeeper. My books include Libertine Awakenings: A Psychosexual Odyssey under my pen name, Cat Ravenelle, and Being Max’s Mom under my birth name. These were self-published through IUniverse and KDP, respectively. I also did transcription work for President Obama. The Whisper is my latest novel.
Do you think the written word (or art) bring power and freedom? Absolutely. Writing The Whisper was incredibly empowering for me and helped me heal from the traumas I’d witnessed as a hospice nurse as well as attending my brother’s death. Writing shapes history facilitates change, educates, and informs. It’s cliché, but the pen is mightier than the sword.
What piece of advice do you wish you’d had when you started your publishing journey? Buy a she-shed and hide from your family members. Seriously, if I had a nickel for every time I’ve been interrupted….
What’s your greatest networking tip? The Power of Three. Tell three people three times a day about your book. That can be in a post or a conversation—it’s a bit exhausting, but it works.
If you could have dinner with any literary character or author, who would you choose, and what would you eat. Judy Blume. I’d take her to Le French and have some wine and a Salade Nicoise.
How much research do you do for your work? What’s the wildest subject you’ve looked at? WELL, since you asked. For this book, it was my life, so that part was easy, BUT for my erotic fiction, I actually went to swingers clubs and observed. I had a notebook in my purse. It was pretty interesting, and no, I didn’t participate. I’m too much of a germaphobe for that type of behaviour. I found the lack of hand sanitizer and protection disturbing.
How influential is storytelling to our culture? It’s essential to the survival of us as a species. We are doomed to repeat history…as evidenced by our current situation. We need to tell our ancestors’ stories to continue that lineage and tell our own stories. As I’ve aged, I’ve noticed how life does spin in a bit of a spiral. Right now, I’m having my students read part of The Decameron and thinking about how they’ve survived our recent lockdowns. We are not that different from our peers in 1300 in how we deal with forced isolation and an invisible enemy.
What’s the best advice you’ve received about writing/publishing? Don’t give up. And don’t be afraid. You can’t please everybody. Like I’ve told my friends, I’m not everyone’s cup of tea, but I am someone’s double vodka.
What’s the worst piece best advice you’ve received about writing/publishing? Just publish and don’t worry about being perfect—it was referring toward just barfing words on a page and hitting send. Whereas I can get behind the idea of writing drunk, edit sober, you need to edit again and again—but not get crippled. Finally, letting go of my manuscript and giving it to the world is…was…right this moment, terrifying.
If you could be any fantasy/mythical or legendary person/creature, what would you be and why? Wonder Woman. Spin in a circle, and BAM. Outfit changed.
Which authors have influenced you the most? Judy Blume was the first author who I blame for my desire to become a writer. I read a TON of feminist lit in college. Books by Ram Dass and Pema Chodron sit on my shelf. All hail Virginia Woolf.
What is your writing space like? I have a desk in a shared home office, and I literally have a screen I put up in a vain attempt to send the message to leave me alone. It doesn’t work. I have headphones, and I have to listen to low-fi to block out the noise. I can track my writing sprints by how many coffee cups, diet Coke cans, and wine glasses are balanced around me. I’ve tried writing in coffee houses, my bedroom, even sat on the floor in my bathroom, but they STILL find me. Hence, the request for a she-shed. Might have to put up an electric fence. Too many kids….
Tell us about your latest piece? The Whisper is a story about love and absolution. More than that, it’s my story. I worked as a crisis hospice nurse for four years. I am Rose McWhorter. Everything in the story is true but written in a way that protects my patients’ identities. In The Whisper, I tell the story about what it’s like to be a hospice nurse and what happens when we die. While it’s not intended to be a religious book, it is spiritual. The whisper I heard to become a nurse, to the final whisper that told me my work was done came from God. I didn’t know it at the time, but my life profoundly changed. I learned self-forgiveness, trust, regained my family and fell in love with being alive.
What’s your next writing adventure? Probably try to work on Book 2 of Libertine Awakenings. I have it on jump drive but never continued.
What are your views on authors offering free books? Do you believe, as some do, that it demeans an author and his or her work? Nah. It’s like dark chocolate. If I get it for free, I’m still going to appreciate it. And, if no one eats it, no one gets to experience the sweetness of it. Which reminds me, I have some in my desk drawer.
My son and I do art shows showcasing young people with autism. The thrill these kids get having their art up for display reinforces my stance on the free book. If no one sees your art, no one can enjoy your art or be influenced by it. I’m delighted to have my work shared.
What are your views on authors commenting on reviews? Depends. If someone is a troll, I think you have the right to defend yourself.
How do you deal with bad reviews? Weep bitterly and grab my voodoo doll.
Sort these into order of importance:
Good plot 2
Great characters 1
Awesome world-building 3
Technically perfect 4
With the influx of indie authors, do you think this is the future of storytelling? I think it’s great. It’s freeing. The idea of the “vanity press” is an act of, well, vanity is long gone. I think it helps contribute to the diversity of authors and that diversity can show us the world through someone else’s eyes.
Is this the age of the e-book? Are bricks and mortar bookshops in decline? As long as there are dinosaurs like me and hipsters like my son, the bookstores will survive.
Are indie/self published authors viewed with scepticism or wariness by readers? Why is this? It’s all about myth-busting. So I didn’t get picked up by Penguin. Does that make me any less than a writer? Usually, if I get this type of snark, I’ll ask them about their latest publications. Crickets. To write, and then to publish takes guts. And time.
What is your greatest success? Being Max’s mom—he is the light of my life. He’s changed me in ways that I cannot monetize. I learn from my son every single day, especially now during COVID. He’s taught me how to use Google Classroom so I can teach my students.
How important is writing/art to you? During this crisis I have learned that art and music are essential. Writing kept me going. The arts are what makes us human.
What are your hopes for the coming year? Try to survive the last push of COVID19 and all its trimmings, attempt to salvage my son’s senior year of high school, and hopefully get a couple trips in once it is safe to move. I’m not sure what my next move is writing wise. 2020 taught me that plans can change, so go with the flow.
Tell us a silly fact about yourself. I still compete in beauty pageants and I’m a highland athlete. Weird combo.
What did you want to be when you ‘grew up’? Not a nurse! I wanted to be a writer. I ended up a hybrid, that’s ok.
Links to book
Links —I think you already have them.
Bio I live in Denver, Colorado and I work as adjunct faculty for my local community college teaching nursing arts, anatomy and physiology, and medical terminology. Writing is my side job while I’m on sabbatical. My love, Dennis, and I share our home with three boys, two cats, and have adopted a feral cat named Darryl who lives in our backyard catching mice and chasing bunnies.
For fun, post-COVID, we look forward to traveling overseas, skiing, taking the kids to Disney, supporting the local arts, but during the pandemic, we love working in our garden, supporting local biz via takeout, and firing up the smoker. We are grateful.
January 2, 2021
Book Spotlight – The Whisper – Creative Non-Fiction – Rebecca Miller
Synopsis
Rose McWhorter is a gifted empath who can “hear” and “see” things that others cannot. She works as a hospice nurse for the largest hospice in Denver, Colorado. She’s on the elite afterhours team that responds to crisis and death calls for pediatric and adult patients. She’s a Celt and a descendant of female mystics and warriors. Rose is strong but weary. She’s haunted by her failure to sit with her mother when she died.
The Whisper begins with Rose sitting at the table where her mother used to sit. She’s charting a death that occurred at her mother’s former nursing home. Rose visits the home often and is confronted with her guilt and reminded of the first time she heard the whisper. While grieving at her mother’s bedside, she heard her deceased mother whisper “be a nurse.” Rose follows the directive and, after a few years, becomes a hospice nurse.
Her workplace, once non-profit, was acquired by a for-profit organization and is starting to fall apart. She encounters numerous abuses, from staffing shortages to workplace bullying and violence, resulting in Rose becoming worn down by the stress and the deathwork. After a hard death, she’s decided to quit her job, but changes her mind when she hears the whisper of her deceased mother telling her to “remember her lessons.”
Rose returns home, pondering the command, and activates her Gift. She’s led to open her mother’s Bible. Inside, she finds a card with a verse about love. She decides to use the verse as a writing prompt in her journal to review the lessons she’s learned working in hospice. The first line of the verse is, “Love is patient.” That night she called to help a patient who couldn’t breathe, but the actual mission was comforting his grandson by being patient and listening to him, helping him express his love for the grandfather through a piece of art. As she moves through the weeks and months, she is challenged more and more with difficult and sometimes dangerous calls, all while her job erodes.
One night, Rose attends to a patient who reveals a gun and his suicidal intentions. Rose comes perilously close to death but is able to talk her patient down. Her husband Dennis became enraged, demanding that she resign. Her actions resulted in a two-day suspension for removing the weapon. Regardless of the pressure, she’s determined to see the prompts through to find out what she needs to learn.
Rose continues working the afterhours, revisiting parts of her past, further reinforcing her lessons. She visits a man whose son is dying of AIDS. She sees a gun on his table, reports it, but leaves it behind, per her directive. The patient’s father later uses it to hold a nurse and CNA hostage after his son’s death. The father sexually assaults the nurse, but the CNA escapes. The father ends his own life. Dennis again demands that she quit as she was supposed to be on the call. Rose initially lies to him, but after a call where a wealthy man forces her to help him with his suicide or risk losing her job, Rose breaks.
After the call, Rose breaks down and hears the whisper say, “almost.” Rose decides that she’s had enough. The next day she works a double-back, rolling into a benign day shift. She begins to have second thoughts. She needs to hang on just a little bit longer, intuitively sensing that her lessons were almost complete.
That day Rose receives a phone call from her brother, Kurt, that their brother, Ed had a severe heart attack and is on life support. Kurt asks her to take the lead. Rose is hesitant, based on her past with Ed, but calls the hospital to find out that her brother is on the brink of death. The hospital needs a family member present since his girlfriend didn’t have any rights to his care. Time is short, and his body is failing. Rose is heartbroken. Her brother, Ed, is 1000 miles away.
Rose wrestles with the fact that the hospital could forbid her to help Ed because of their estranged relationship. Ed was a criminal and attempted to harm her son, and they hadn’t spoken in years, despite being very close before the incident. Rose anguished between being a nurse and a sister. She’s afraid that she wouldn’t be welcome or that she wasn’t good enough or strong enough to help him. She’d failed so many others.
The whisper tells her that she must go. She realizes that she needs to be a nurse for her brothers and call on her ancestors’ strength. Rose is the family matriarch, and it’s her duty. She’s the only one with the skills to help. Rose and Dennis leave to drive across the country, racing against time. On the drive, she’s able to resolve multiple complications due to her experience. She arrives and falls into the role of a hospice nurse. She learns that Ed was devoid of brain activity and learned of a congenital brain defect, concluding that her brother was on the autism spectrum, just like her son Wolfgang. It is a moment of reckoning, explaining his erratic behavior. However, she and her brothers painfully decide to remove supports. Ed was gone.
Rose provides a peaceful passing for her brother. When he dies, she hears the whisper that he is her final patient. On the way to collect his ashes, she discovers, via text message, that she lost her job but is unburdened. She realizes that her final lesson was, “love never fails.” As a result of her lessons, she provided the greatest comfort for her brother and her family, regaining their love and inclusion and solving the mystery of Ed’s behavior.
A few months after his death, Rose was attending Catechumante with her son, Wolfie. The Dean asked the confirmands to think about how God worked in their lives, leading them on a path without their knowing. The question startles her into realizing that the whisper she heard was God and that her path to becoming a nurse was to serve her brother. All of her suffering and her work were lessons to learn to help him pass. Rose finally feels peace and forgives herself. She realizes that she was enough all along.
January 1, 2021
Crónicas de la luz más allá de la tormenta – Light Beyond the Storm – Spanish Edition
En un mundo oscuro donde la magia es ilegal y los elfos son esclavos, una joven hechicera elfa huye de la casa de su malvado Cuidador para salvar la vida. Perseguida por sus hombres y por los corruptos Cazadores de Brujas, debe encontrar un refugio. Mientras los esclavistas recorren todos los lugares llevándose a los elfos de lo que queda de sus hogares ancestrales, y los Cazadores de Brujas hacen la vista gorda ante la tragedia, se fragua una historia de poder, amor y una terrible venganza.
https://books2read.com/LBTS-Spanish
#Elfos, #Fantasía, #Fantasía oscura, #Fantasía erótica, #Magia
December 30, 2020
2020 Writing Round-up
I had all sorts of plans in 2020. Didn’t everyone?
Stress does not help with the writing process. Some people thrive on stress – I am not one of those people. I looked at my writing plan and knew I hadn’t fulfilled it. However when I investigated further – it was not as bad as I thought.
10 Bundles – not quite one a month
Light Beyond the Storm Box Set
Print edition of Dark Tales and Twisted Verses, several large print editions and many translation editions.
I’ve finished a course on Editing and Proofreading, and 19 work-related courses.
Editing for Perseid Press and some freelance editing.
I now have a Fiverr profile.
All things considered, not too shoddy.
In 2021 I plan to finish a couple of novellas, get some more translations sorted, find more editing clients and continue learning Photoshop.
December 29, 2020
2020 – Get you gone!
2020 – the year everything changed. 2020 – the year everyone wants to forget, but no one will.
The Coronavirus – Covid 19 was first identified in the city of Wuhan in China, at the end of 2019 and the World Health Organisation declared an International Public Health Emergency in January 2020. That bastard spread. As of October 2020, WHO estimated 10% of the world’s population had been infected, and over 1.7 million people have lost their lives. Many more have lost their jobs, businesses or been left with long lasting health issues.
Suddenly social distancing came into force, millions of Brits (and elsewhere) were furloughed. Most of these folks had never even heard this term before March 2020. Capitalism and economies around the world trembled.
Politicians took decisions, failed to take decisions, took the wrong decisions, took more stringent decisions and then it all began again.
Then there was the US election….
2020 was a year of reflection, a year to consider others and doing one’s duty to protect one’s fellows. Many did, some didn’t. There were conspiracies aplenty – protests in the streets (which did nothing to slow the spread of the virus). There was Captain, Sir Tom Moore – a world war 2 veteran who pledged to walk 100 laps of his garden to raise a £1000 for NHS charities. He stole the heart of a nation and raised £32 million – this humble man who had given so much before gave again and brought the nation hope in humanity. Others followed, the old, the young, rich and poor. Concerts were staged online, carehome workers moved in to protect their residents and did not see their own families for months. Strangers stood together (socially distanced) and clapped for the NHS. There’s a good possibility that this awful pandemic saved the NHS – especially after the Prime Minister got the virus.
It brought out the good in people, and the bad and downright stupid. In my town we had a businessman who knowing he had been exposed not only flew abroad, but opened his shop, refused to mask and cited Magna Carta ‘for his rights’. Wrongly. The part he cited was not only repealed and has not been law for 800 years but was never meant for the common person. World leaders ignored the advice, the science and infected their staff.
2020 – the year of stupid, the year of science, the year of humble folks uniting nations, the year capitalism and politics were found wanting. (If they hadn’t been before.)
As the year draws to it’s close, I doubt there is anyone who will not be glad to see the back of it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Tom
December 27, 2020
Power Automate – A Marketing Tool for Writers – Part 1
I am fairly new to the word of Power Automate – also known as Microsoft Flow – but I have to say – it’s awesome. You do need Microsoft 365 and the basic, free package is not as versatile as the paid packages, but it’s useful nonetheless.
https://unitedkingdom.flow.microsoft.com/en-us/
Basically it’s a tool in which the user can set up ‘flows’ – for example – I have several tweets scheduled at specific times. Flow will tweet the text I put in, to the Twitter account of my choice and fetch the image I want attached from dropbox, (or any of the other apps available) and post it on a specific day at a specific time. Another option – I have set to to email me when a certain phrase is tweeted – so I can see how many times it’s retweeted. You could have a book title, a specific phrase or username. It’s a good way of seeing how much traffic your tweets get. It has over 400 connections to services like Twitter, Trello, Sharepoint and lots more.
I use it in the day job to log the responses from forms to an excel document, but it can email a specific user informing them a new response has been posted.
You can make an automated flow – in my case emailing me when a certain twitter phrase is used; a scheduled flow – to go out on this day, at this time, with this frequency. It can do more (but I haven’t investigated it that far.
So far I have 50 flows set up, mostly to tweet and track tweets.
Power automate provide templates for the more common tasks, but you can set up you own.
There are guided tutorials https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/paths/automate-process-power-automate/
You can automate 3 types of flows
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-automate/flow-types
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/modules/get-started-flows/1-introduction
To set up a flow you click on CREATE FLOW
If I want to make a scheduled flow for example a twitter post) I would click scheduled flow, add in the set up details as below
Flow name – You can call this anything.
Run this flow – this would be the date you want to start the actions – it defaults to today at 10am but you can change it.
Repeat every – pick a number (1 day, 1 days etc). If you choose week – then you can select specific days of the week
Hit create
This will take you to this screen
Click NEW STEP (this will then allow you to add an action)
If you can’t find the connectors – type POST A TWEET (or whatever) in the box. You will have to grant Power Automate access to Twitter (this is true of the other connections, like dropbox), but it is secure.
Add in the tweet text – including the URL if you have one. You are limited the the character restrictions on twitter. If you want to add images then you would add another step – and select where the image is adding the file path. Th
In the top right you can save, check the stages and test. The flow checker will let you know if there are errors and how to fix them. It’s a good idea to test the flow – this can be done manually (you will need to do this the first time), or automatically – this will duplicate a previous successful run. You will then get a link to the FLOW RUNS page and this will let you know if your flow is successful.
How is this useful for writers? You can set up tweets, post to various newsletters, or get followers. I think you can back up documents using an automated flow.
More time to write:)
December 23, 2020
La ciudad de la Luz #Fantasía #Edición en español
¿Quién gobierna en este juego de intriga donde la magia está prohibida y los elfos esclavizados? Un viaje donde las creencias se rompen como el vidrio, la verdad no es bienvenida y abundan los monstruos de la antigüedad: comparte el romance y la venganza, la magia y la pasión, y el salario de la codicia en un mundo de fantasía oscura.
(18 clasificados – contiene escenas de naturaleza sexual y violencia)
#Fantasía
#Fantasía oscura
#Romance de fantasía
#Edición en español
https://books2read.com/Spanish-Shining-Citadel
Il Segreto di Blossom Rise – Edizione italiana
Quando una giovane infermiera accetta un lavoro in un vecchio ospedale militare, scoprirà un segreto di famiglia e troverà i suoi spettrali occupanti un po’ troppo familiari.
https://books2read.com/BlossomRise-Italian
#Fantasmi, #Paranormale, #Horror, #StoriaBreve
December 21, 2020
Tears and Crimson Velvet – Short Story winner 2020
Tears and Crimson Velvet has won best Short Story for 2020 on the NN Light Book Heaven reviewer site.
https://www.nnlightsbookheaven.com/post/2020-nnlight-book-award-winners
See the comments from the site below
Tears and Crimson Velvet by A.L. Butcher
Someone haunts the Opera House and while Madam Giry tries to keep her distance when the hauntings turn to murder, she knows she must act. Will she finally break her silence about what is going on or will she do what is necessary to protect those she loves?
For fans of Phantom of the Opera, this is a must-read. A.L. Butcher weaves a masterful story filled with emotion, angst, mystery, and murder. I do believe Gaston Leroux would consider this variation on his immortal tale a wonderful addition to his work, The Phantom of the Opera.
In the original story, Madam Giry is a mysterious character and the reader is left wondering whose side she’s on. Christine’s? Erik’s? In this tale, Butcher takes us inside the mind of Madam Giry and what she knows about the hauntings and the Phantom himself.
A brilliant short story that tore my heart out. Highly recommend!
Madame Giry finds herself embroiled in the tragedy unfolding at the Opera house; mystery and murder stalk the corridors and, it is said, a ghost haunts the place. Giry knows the truth, for she recalls the caged man she met so many years ago. This is her story, their story.
When murder and mystery begin at the Opera House one woman knows who is behind it, and what really lies beneath the mask. Secrets, lies and tragedy sing a powerful song in this ‘might have been’ tale.
December 15, 2020
Broken Toys – Blog Tour #Thriller
Broken Toys
by Glenda Thompson
Genre: Thriller
Texas Ranger Noah Morgan has his life together—with a great job and the girl of his dreams. Too bad it’s all based on a lie. A single phone call threatens to bring it all crashing down. After an irate citizen complains shoddy workmanship has left him with a booby-trapped driveway, and the local sheriff’s office is too busy to respond, Noah takes the call. The investigation of local scam artists uncovers a human trafficking ring. Noah fights to avoid being swept back into the sights of his murderous family—people he escaped at the age of seventeen.
Can he keep his past a secret or will his carefully crafted life come to a violent end?
Goodreads * Amazon
A sixth-generation Texan with Scottish roots, Glenda Thompson can ‘bless your heart’ with the best of them. As a former emergency medical technician married to a south Texas Lawman, she’s used insider information from both their careers as inspiration to build her Broken world of Texas Rangers with hidden pasts and dark secrets. When she’s not busy embarrassing her children or grandchildren by dancing in the middle of a country road during a rainstorm, she can be found huddled in her writing cave with her law enforcement technical adviser/husband working on another story in her Broken universe.
Website * Facebook * Twitter * Instagram * Amazon * Goodreads
Follow the tour HERE for special content and a giveaway!
$25 Amazon
a Rafflecopter giveaway
