Stephanie Faris's Blog, page 41

How My Writing Process Works: A Guest Post by S.K. Anthony

Today I'm honored to be hosting one of our favorite bloggers. S.K. Anthony is a talented writer and blogger...and I can't wait to read her latest book! Today she's telling us all about her writing process. Spoiler: it involves coffee and wine! (There's also giveaway at the end that includes a $25 Amazon gift card, so be sure you enter.)

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How My Writing Process Works 
by S.K. Anthony

I think it works via miracles. Seriously. I'm a pantser so when an idea hits me, I sit down to write and I wing it. If I start trying to figure out the plot, structure, or the why of things I stress out and confuse myself. Then I revise, rewrite, revise. Take a break and repeat. Then revise and rewrite some more. My writing process also works well with wine and coffee (not together—that'd be gross).

Speaking of wine and coffee, when I write, my mind loves to focus on the most ridiculous things. Like writing rituals for example. I must have things a certain way or I might as well give up on life. Okay well maybe something less dramatic. 

My writing process MUST include these:

Coffee when I start working, a few hours later I might switch to wine. But it must be white wine. I love red, but to write: white.I must have music or background noise. I write down new ideas with black pens but revise with blue. Don't judge me!I must have a few notebooks (say 3 or 10?), at least 5 pens, and different colored stickers by my side even if I don’t use them . . . they need to be there so I can concentrate, clearly.I usually work in my kitchen, so when writing I like to face the window, but . . .When revising I have to face the opposite wall. Why? I don’t know.  These are just some of them, I'm sure I have more that I can't think of right now. And before you think I'm completely alone well let me tell you: I'm in good company. Mark Twain wrote while lying in bed. Shakespeare, Milton, and Chaucer recited Homer’s invocation of the Muse before typing a word. John Cheever wrote mostly in his underwear. And Dear Hemingway wrote standing . . . and naked. 

Tell me I’m not the only crazy one, is there something you do that makes a difference with you being productive? 



Blurb:
Kevin Pierce is a teleporter, a ladies’ man, and a loyal friend. Or so he thought.

As a genetically altered Luminary, he helps the government bring down some of the most dangerous criminals. Not very challenging if you have his special abilities. But when a group of rebel Luminaries attacks his Organization the fight for survival begins.

One shattering event after another tests the depth of his relationships, his sanity, and his powers. Emotionally torn, Kevin must choose carefully where his loyalty lies. In the middle of all the unexpected chaos he gets the biggest shock of his life when he’s faced by a betrayal he never saw coming. Angry, injured, and ready to even the score, Kevin goes Static . . .
Bio:
S. K. Anthony is a writer, a reader and a make-stuff-up-er who lives in New York with her husband and toddler twins. She is a wine connoisseur, which just really means she knows she loves it, and a caffeine addict. When she isn’t busy with her family, she finds herself being transported into the world of imagination. Well, either that or running away from spiders…she is convinced they are out to get her!





Contact info:
Blog | Facebook | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads | Twitter | Google+ | Pinterest

a Rafflecopter giveaway

No, I Don't Want a Sears Rewards Card!

It has become a pet peeve of mine that every time I'm out shopping, I have to go through a Q&A session just to pay.

"Do you have our Happy Shopper card?"

"You could earn 12 points on today's purchase."

If you agree to sign up, you then must spend the next five minutes spelling out your name, email address, and home address. You'll then be the lucky owner of yet another piece of plastic to dangle from your keychain.



I've learned to just say "no."

For my husband's birthday earlier this year, I stopped by Sears to buy him a piece of luggage. I finally hauled it over to the cash register, where the kind cashier checked me out and asked the dreaded question.

"Do you have a Sears rewards card?"

"No, I don't really shop here. It's been something like 11 years since I've even been in your store."

"You can use it at Kmart, too!"



Seriously?



I wonder if anyone actually owns this card. Are there still people who shop at Sears or Kmart every single week?




How many rewards cards do you own?

Introducing Our Little Secret by Ashelyn Drake

Today I'm part of an exciting blog tour for our blogging friend, Ashelyn Drake (aka Kelly Hashway).




Ashelyn is a very prolific young adult and new adult author who has the most amazing covers! Her latest book, Our Little Secret, came out yesterday.



Blurb:

Becca Daniels needs a passing math grade…but what she wants is to spend more time with Toby Michaels. 

The only problem is Toby is her best friend’s twin, and Tori has a very firm “no dating the brother” policy. 

But Becca’s grade has hit rock bottom and she needs a tutor. It just so happens that Toby is a math genius and more than happy to help—lucky her! Working so closely with the handsome, popular Toby, Becca can’t hide her attraction, and it soon becomes obvious he feels the same way. 

Becca doesn’t want to lose her best friend, but she isn’t willing to give up Toby either. 

At first, sneaking around is fun, stealing kisses right under Tori’s nose. But things take an ugly turn when Toby’s ex-girlfriend Meredith catches them together. Meredith demands Toby take her back and restore her reputation, or she’ll tell Tori their secret. Do they dare tell Tori the truth? Or would that just make things worse? 

Surrounded by secrets and knee-deep in deception, something has to give… 

How far is Meredith willing to go to keep Toby and Becca apart? 

And how much is Becca willing to risk to keep… 

Our Little Secret?



Bio:
Ashelyn Drake is a New Adult and Young Adult romance author. While it’s rare for her not to have either a book in hand or her fingers flying across a laptop, she also enjoys spending time with her family. She believes you are never too old to enjoy a good swing set and there’s never a bad time for some dark chocolate. She is represented by Sarah Negovetich of Corvisiero Literary Agency.

Contact info:
Website | Blog | Twitter | Amazon | Goodreads | Facebook | Instagram

Also, if you know anyone in the Nashville, Tennessee area, pass on the news about this event I'm participating in tomorrow (Thursday) night:

Introverts Need Awkward Conversation

I hate going to the grocery store. Hate, hate, hate it. First there are the crowded aisles.



Then there's the mundanity of picking out groceries for the week.



Then there's the fact that I always seem to get the noisy cart.



The only thing that makes it somewhat better is talking to the (usually) friendly cashiers. It's why I go to this store...



Instead of this one...



I went to Publix early Sunday morning, determined to beat the crowd. The aisles were mostly empty, with the exception of a few stock people. One was almost in my way but not quite. 

"Good morning," she said as I reached for the sour cream.

"You're fine," I said, meaning, 'don't bother moving because you aren't in my way.' My comment was met with that awkward silence where you realize what you SHOULD have said was just, 'Good morning' in reply. So I did what any introvert would do...



By the time I arrived at the cash register, I was ready to make less awkward conversation. I stepped up and made a joking comment about the hard work that goes into unloading a cart. The response?



She did not respond. She made not a single comment the entire time she scanned, aside from the usual, "Would you like your meat in plastic bags?" type of questions. I realized in the five or so minutes that it took her to scan my items that if you don't make conversation, the entire checkout process is very, very awkward.



I'm an introvert. I DO like conversation...but I don't feel 100-percent comfortable with it, if that makes sense. I always feel like I'm making a complete idiot of myself.



Do you make idle chitchat when you're at checkout or would you prefer to just stand there in silence?

PJs or House Pants?

If you've been to Walmart recently, you've likely seen this:



Perfectly normal people, wandering around in broad daylight in pajama bottoms. Okay, some aren't so normal...



It isn't just Walmart. I've seen them at the mall, in restaurants, and at the movies. Apparently at some point someone decided that as long as you paired them with a T-shirt, you could wear pajama bottoms anywhere.



My husband once asked a convenience store employee if he was wearing pajama bottoms. The guy said, "No, man. These aren't pajama pants. They're house pants."

I was curious, so I looked up these house pants. They look like this:


They're defined as pants you wear around the house. In other words, pajama bottoms. Apparently if you call them house pants, though, you're allowed to wear them in public.



So the next time you see someone in Walmart wearing pajama bottoms, remember...those aren't pajama bottoms. They're house pants.



Would you ever wear pajama bottoms in public?

A Very Special Flashback Episode

I grew up in the 80s. Our prime-time TV consisted of 30-minute comedies and sappy dramas like Dynasty. Many of these shows were staples of my childhood:



Fortunately, sites like Hulu Plus, Netflix, and YouTube have given us the ability to re-watch these shows. I watched the entire series of this show again. It was the first time since the 80s that I'd seen it.



I also re-watched this show on YouTube. Some of the episodes had been removed, but I was able to find most of them.



As cheesy as these shows seem today, there is something charming about them. It's probably just the nostalgia factor. But while watching them, I've realized they did something that I haven't seen in a while. Every season or so, the characters would get together and reminisce and, for no reason whatsoever, you'd get a recap of things that had happened up to that point.



Called a "clip show," the concept actually began during a time when shows weren't as likely to be shown over and over again. Once reruns came into play, the concept became redundant, but that didn't stop any of the 80s or 90s shows. In recent years, though, the practice seems to have stalled. If it happens today, it's usually as a parody of clip episodes, such as The Family Guy's 100th episode.



Today's habit of streaming entire seasons of shows in rapid succession makes those flashback episodes annoying. While watching 90210, for instance, I was being shown clips from episodes I'd watched a couple of weeks earlier. I had to remind myself that when they originally aired, those episodes were spread out over years. You were seeing flashbacks to things that happened when you were a junior...and you were now in college.



But, seriously, they had another flashback episode six months later, during a Christmas episode. That one couldn't have just been too soon to me. It had to have annoyed viewers back in the 90s, right?



Of course, I should point out that the Kardashians do a stupid Christmas party at the end of each season where they watch childhood videos and bore the audience. Maybe that's the modern version of the flashback episode.



And my favorite show, Big Brother, does an episode at the end of each season where they recap the season and show unaired footage. But they've been doing that since 2002 or so and I always skip that episode because...snore.



Do you think today's TV shows should have flashback episodes?

My Publishing Journey: Guest Post by Murees Dupé

I'm so excited to welcome Murees Dupé to my blog today. Murees is celebrating the release of her first book--a nail-biting time for any author! She's sharing her own publishing journey with us today. Be sure to scroll down and learn all about her new book after you read the guest post!
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My Publishing Journey
by Murees Dupé

Like most writers I started off pursuing traditional publishing. I reworked my novel many times, over and over. I crafted various query letters and received many rejection letters. Needless to say, I didn’t get a dream agent, nor did I acquire a big publishing deal, even though I devoted more than 4 years to that goal. Turns out, traditional publishing wasn’t right for me. 

Instead, I opted for the self-publishing route. Even though I found the prospect daunting and even harder work than the above scenario, but it was a better fit. The most important part was that I was enjoying each phase of self-publishing. Yes, I was tired and at sometimes broke, but for me, it was all worth it. Every step I took brought me closer to a finished product that I loved. 

Today I can honestly say that my dream has come true. I have published a book and I feel so blessed. Thanks to my family, fellow bloggers and an excellent editor and cover designer, I am enjoying my dream. I struggled in the beginning and my journey was definitely not easy. But I wouldn’t change it for anything. Those difficulties made me who I am today. 




Blurb:
Claire is sassy, human, and an outcast of society―who only wants to know where she belongs. 

Alex is arrogant, selfish, and an immortal warrior―who thinks he’s prepared for everything. 

Claire knows the world of immortals is where she belongs. As her guide and guardian, Alex finds it hard to resist Claire’s subtle charm. Can the two overcome their differences and embrace their passion for each other, or will the possibility of true love be lost to both forever?

Pick up a copy here!
Bio:
Murees Dupé was born and still lives in South Africa. When she is not thinking up new stories, she is spending time with her family, playing with her three dogs and cat, watching TV, or overindulging on desserts. To learn more about Murees, visit her website www.mureesdupe.com.




Contact info:
Website | Blog | Twitter | Amazon | Nook | Kobo

Where in the World? (Is Carmen Sandiego): Guest Post by Meradeth Houston

I love time-travel stories. I remember watching movies like The Philadelphia Experiment as a kid and thinking, "How cool would it be to be able to travel to a different time?"

My fascination with time travel has continued as an adult, so it's exciting to see one of my favorite bloggers, Meradeth Houston, has a new time travel book out. Today she is writing about her own childhood fascination with time travel. Be sure to check out information on her book, Travelers, which you can buy now for only $0.99!

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Where in the World? (Is Carmen Sandiego)
by Meradeth Houston

Okay, to start off, please tell me I’m not the only one who played the “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego” games? I loved those as a kid! The show was fun and I loved the computer games. They were slow and clunky and ridiculously primitive, but I got a kick out of them (which probably says a lot more about my childhood nerd-factor than I care to admit…). Anyhow, we also had the where in TIME is Carmen Sandiego, which is probably where my fascination with time travel began. And it’s never really gone away, because there are just so many cool things I’d love to go see!

There are plenty of people in the past that would be seriously fascinating to talk with (hello Gregor Mendel, my all-time historical crush, even if he was a monk…and probably ate too many peas). But the places and events also really attract me. I mean, I’d love to go back and experience a few things, so long as I got to come back for dinner ☺. Wouldn’t a walk through the libraries of Alexandria be fun? Or how about watching a ceremony at Stonehenge? The completion of the pyramids at Giza? I could go on and on. But that’s why I like time-travel as a concept—it allows me to imagine going back and getting to see these things, which is probably as close as I’ll ever get without a TARDIS.

Okay, confession time: what event would you most want to witness in all time if you could? If I could only pick one, it certainly wouldn’t be easy. But I’d love to watch Mendel figure out that what he was seeing in his plants had much larger implications for heritability (I did say I was a nerd, right?). Buuuut, the coronation of Queen Victoria (not from the cheap seats) would also be pretty fun ☺.




Blurb:
Sienna Crenshaw knows the rules: 1) no time traveling beyond your natural lifetime, 2) no screwing with death, and 3) no changing the past. Ever. Sienna doesn’t love being stuck in the present, but she’s not the type to to break the rules. That is, she wasn’t the type until her best friend broke every one of those rules to keep Henry, her twin brother and Sienna’s ex-boyfriend, alive. 

Suddenly, Sienna is caught in an unfamiliar reality. The upside? Henry is still alive. The downside? Sienna’s old life, including the people in it, has been erased. Now, Sienna and Henry must untangle the giant knot in time, or her parents and all the rest of the Travelers, will be lost forever. One problem: the only way to be successful is for Henry to die. 

Pick up a copy here!
Bio:
I've never been a big fan of talking about myself, but if you really want to know, here are some random tidbits about me: 


I'm a California girl. This generally means I talk too fast and use "like" a lot. I have my doctorate in molecular anthropology. Translation: I sequence dead people's DNA and spend a whole lot of time in a lab, which I love. I've been writing since I was 11 years old. It's my hobby, my passion, and I'm so happy to get to share my work! My other passion is teaching. There's nothing more fun than getting a classroom of college kids fired up about anthropology! If I could have a super-power, it would totally be flying. Which is a little strange, because I'm terrified of heights.Contact info:
Website | Blog | Twitter | Amazon | Goodreads | Facebook

It Takes Two to Tango...and a Cover Reveal!

It has become difficult to watch the news of the Ashley Madison data breach because something is really, really bothering me about it. It's something I read the first day it happened...

"The hackers mocked the site and the customer base, saying that 90% to 95% of the users were male."

Why had we not heard that data before? I looked up that statistic and found the company was once sued by an employee who claimed she was injured typing up thousands of fake profiles. Was she angry-typing?



But there is actually even more proof than that. Gizmodo conducted research into claims that the site was mostly female. Their investigation found that most of the members were, indeed, male. In combing the data, the Gizmodo reporter found that very few of the females on the site had ever even checked their inbox messages. Two-thirds of the men had checked their messages at least once. So who are the men communicating with on the site? Are they logging in to find empty inboxes on a regular basis? If so, wouldn't the site have died long ago?




The answer? ROBOTS! The reporter describes Ashley Madison's membership as "a science fictional future where every woman on Earth is dead, and some Dilbert-like engineer has replaced them with badly-designed robots."



After being challenged by Ashley Madison, Gizmodo dug a little deeper and found evidence that male users of the site had been contacted by bots on a fairly constant basis. They even demonstrated the computer code the site used to regularly communicate with men.



So these men were chatting with computers. Which is kind of funny, when you really think about it!



We've all seen the question, "Is online flirting cheating?" But this brings a new question. Is it cheating if the person at the other end isn't even a human being?

And now for today's cover reveal!!! S.K. Anthony will be guesting here when her book comes out in a couple of weeks, but in the meantime, check out her beautiful cover!




Synopsis:
Kevin Pierce is a teleporter, a ladies’ man, and a loyal friend . . . or so he thought.

As a genetically altered Luminary, he helps the government bring down some of the most dangerous criminals. Not very challenging if you have his special abilities. But when a group of rebel Luminaries attacks his Organization the fight for survival begins.

One shattering event after another tests the depth of his relationships, his sanity, and his powers. Emotionally torn, Kevin must choose carefully where his loyalty lies. In the middle of all the unexpected chaos he gets the biggest shock of his life when he’s faced by a betrayal he never saw coming. Angry, injured, and ready to even the score, Kevin goes Static . . .
Add it to your Goodreads *here*

IWSG: #TenThingsNotToSayToAWriter

It's the first Wednesday of the month, which means hundreds of us will be posting about our insecurities. If you're a writer, join in!



Over the summer, the hashtag #TenThingsNotToSayToAWriter seemed to take over the sizable writing community on Twitter. It even got the notice of Time.com:



Novelists, journalists, and freelancers from all backgrounds joined in to share their frustrations. It was amazing how passionate people were about the topic.



As a full-time freelancer and novelist, I've heard it all. From "Since you aren't working..." to "We'd love to have you write for us. We can't afford to pay, but it's great exposure."

(We make fun of people who say that last one in the freelance writing community, by the way!)



In the middle of all of this, I was at a writer's event, speaking to a fellow writer. She's just starting out in her career, having published her first novel only recently. I was telling her about my own journey and mentioned how many times I was rejected when I was writing romance.

"Really?" she said. "I wouldn't think any romance novel would ever be rejected."

The way she wrinkled her nose made it clear...romance was beneath her. I knew exactly who she was in that moment.



The sad thing is, romance novelists work hard at the craft. They spend years honing their writing skills and learning to craft the perfect story. More than a billion dollars each year is spent on romance novels. 



Some of the ONLY writers I know who are able to afford to write full-time without supplementing their income are romance novelists. Yet every time I post about it, someone in the comments section says, "They're all trash." Most of them haven't glimpsed the inside of a romance novel in at least a decade...they just have this stereotype:



So that's my #TenThingsNotToSayToAWriter. What's yours?