Ali Noel Vyain's Blog, page 5

Alice Flowers Tarot Box Set

Alice Flowers Tarot

eISBN: 9798227892522

All 78 of the Alice Flowers Tarot stories. Alice Flowers is a strange young woman ridiculed because she acts too much like her estranged aunt Madeline Austen. One day Alice is sent the Fool card which starts an adventure the young elf will never forget. It’s an adventure caused by studying the Madeline Austen Tarot deck.

This book will be released on August 1, 2025.

These stories have been serialized and released in order starting with Story 1: The Fool. I would recommend starting at the beginning. The latest release is Story 71: 7 of Wands.

If you can’t wait for this full book, then I would recommend starting with the first story or even the book on the tarot deck featured in the stories.

Alice Flowers Tarot Story 1: The Fool

ISBN: 9798223824381

Alice Flowers is a strange young woman ridiculed because she acts too much like her estranged aunt Madeline Austen. One day Alice is sent the Fool card which starts an adventure the young elf will never forget.

Madeline Austen Tarot Deck

ISBN: 9798224146772

The tarot deck featured in the Alice Flowers Tarot series with pictures of the cards and their simplified definitions.

Writing Outtakes Episode 118 Calls

Writing Outtakes Episode 118 Calls

Sara and Sami have a maintenance issue and Janine learns she was right about her mother’s plan.

Featured book: Deviation

Where to buy: https://books2read.com/u/mv8L9V

Copyright © 2025 by Ali Noel Vyain.

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Unique Title #118 Deviation

Deviation

eISBN: 9798231875825

print ISBN: 9798231184088

A poetry collection about being considered a deviation and the consequences and reactions to such treatment.

This book will be released on September 1, 2025.

If you can wait for this one, I’d recommend two others poetry books which are similar in theme.

Discounted

eISBN: 9781005646714

print ISBN: 9798201724788

A poetry collection about being discounted and overlooked due to prejudice. Also includes reactions to the prejudice and perhaps some hope as to change.

Failure

eISBN: 9781937050986

print ISBN: 9798201512569

A collection of poems about a subject which is too taboo to write about. Yet, it can be defined in different ways and affects people in different ways. We all have something to learn from failures, whether they are ours or someone else’s.

Alice Flowers Tarot Box Set

Alice Flowers Tarot

eISBN: 9798227892522

All 78 of the Alice Flowers Tarot stories. Alice Flowers is a strange young woman ridiculed because she acts too much like her estranged aunt Madeline Austen. One day Alice is sent the Fool card which starts an adventure the young elf will never forget. It’s an adventure caused by studying the Madeline Austen Tarot deck.

This book will be released on August 1, 2025.

These stories have been serialized and released in order starting with Story 1: The Fool. I would recommend starting at the beginning. The latest release is Story 70: 6 of Swords.

If you can’t wait for this full book, then I would recommend starting with the first story or even the book on the tarot deck featured in the stories.

Alice Flowers Tarot Story 1: The Fool

ISBN: 9798223824381

Alice Flowers is a strange young woman ridiculed because she acts too much like her estranged aunt Madeline Austen. One day Alice is sent the Fool card which starts an adventure the young elf will never forget.

Madeline Austen Tarot Deck

ISBN: 9798224146772

The tarot deck featured in the Alice Flowers Tarot series with pictures of the cards and their simplified definitions.

Book Series

After I have written over a hundred books, I still don’t understand why anyone would want to promote a book of mine in the middle of a series or even read books in the middle of the series. I would think everyone would want to promote the first book in the series and also start reading from the first book in the series before going on to the other books within the same series.

Publishing is a strange business and it has changed from the time I got into it in March 2003 to now. I’m sure it will continue to change. I used to publish directly to different retailers, but that became tedious. I did used to have an account for Amazon, but I find they have too many rules and it was hard to publish books within series.

Then I was introduced to Smashwords and learned I could just upload my books once and they would be distributed to pretty much everywhere else. That was a relief. Another thing was that Smashwords makes it easy to publish books within the series they belong in.

To date, I have completed 9 book series and I have learned that there’s at least one website who claims I don’t write in series. They also have my first published book wrong. They claim the first book to be The Strange & Unusual Universe of Silver Moon Unicorn. That’s technically the third published book.

I have a spreadsheet with all the book titles so I can keep track of them all and know how many books I have and how many book series I have. After doing all of this, I still don’t understand why anyone would think I just write stand alone books. Even when I point out to them politely that is not the case, they ignore me. I take it they do not care to get the correct information and think they can trust Amazon on whatever it claims about me.

If my listing is wrong, I find it hard to believe they got the other writers’ listings correct. Unfortunately, Amazon is riddled with technical problems that they never seem to take care of. As they are unwilling to do what they need to do to clean up their mess and they have also made it clear they don’t care if we, the writers, get to eat, then I will not deal with them directly. I need a buffer between myself and Amazon. They are too frustrating for me to deal with.

Currently, I use Draft2Digital and they will distribute to Amazon for me. If a book doesn’t fit Amazon’s requirements, I will know right away. I have noticed they should have all the print books, but a few don’t show up because Amazon has trouble with the ISBNs. Draft2Digital has assured me they are working with Amazon to fix the problem. I’m not worried. I’m just disappointed with Amazon that they have all those technical problems and have the audacity to put more restrictions on writers.

I do wish people would stop spreading misinformation and check the facts before making claims. My personal website is far more accurate than Amazon is when it comes to information on my books. I do my best to keep it updated.

Fantasy Reading

Science fiction and fantasy tend to overlap. Some writers do write both and both science fiction and fantasy tend to be lumped together. Sometimes the distinctions between the two genres become blurred and that’s fine too. I don’t mind as I do enjoy reading either or both at the same time. I also enjoy writing both.

I mentioned Andre Norton in my previous post and she’s worth mentioning for this one too. Her fantasy books tend to be set in her witch world. Those books dealt with magic, women’s power and women’s concerns that tend to be overlooked by many people in the real world. Not all her characters in that series were humans or witches.

Another one is JK Rowling who created the wizarding world which has fascinated many people around the world. She created a rich and vibrant world that was full of humor and love. It’s just a shame she has a serious issue with trans people. To me, she sounds as if she has a problem with being a woman and what that means in a male dominated world.

J.R.R. Tolkien wrote some fantasy adventures. Mostly the Lord of the Rings series. It’s long and epic. He may have written more if he didn’t have to have a regular job, but what he left behind is quite good. I enjoyed how lots of different kinds of people came together to destroy an evil that was going to destroy all of them. The movies are a close second to what he wrote.

Lewis Carroll didn’t just write Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, he also wrote other fantasy stories, such as Sylvie and Bruno, that were just as good. His books are dreamlike with the chapters reading like episodes.

I read a lot of fantasy and take away that some is quite silly and playful, while others are quite serious. For some books, it depends on when in the timeline you are to see if the elves are playful or serious. My own writing can be just like that too.

Science Fiction Reading

When I first started reading science fiction, most of the characters were male. In some ways, it wasn’t surprising to me. Eventually, many of the writers, who were also male, did add women to their stories. Some made the women sound exactly like men. I know Robert Heinlein tended to do that. Although, he did get the complaint right about how men don’t do housework. Others got the women realistically.

From science fiction, I got futuristic backgrounds and high tech toys characters could play with and use for whatever purpose they wanted. There is one device, which still doesn’t exist, that I got from many of the science fiction writers called a refresher or ‘fresher. It’s an all in one shower which allows a person to step inside and it washes, rinses, dries and will also shave and give a massage. Since science fiction was dominated by men, they didn’t see other uses for the ‘fresher.

Which gave me an idea that I used in one of my books. It was in the Starlover series and it involved an uncle and his niece. The uncle was a mechanical genius who thought installing the ‘fresher on board his spaceship would help his niece learn about hair and makeup. He didn’t realize that his niece didn’t care about those things. So, she got him back. Some people who have read that part and commented how funny it was and that they enjoyed it.

Other things also made the reading interesting. With Heinlein he had a curmudgeon character which continuing showed up in different books under different names, but it was typically the same person. I always suspected it was Heinlein himself. Arthur C. Clarke was more scientific, which did make things interesting. He also had a dry sense of humor, which could sneak up on you when you least expect it. Isaac Asimov had realistic women characters that I could relate to. He also created some good men characters that many women loved and wanted to meet in real life.

Frank Herbert was dry, but not necessarily in a bad way. He just didn’t waste words and was rather blunt. Dune was long and followed through generations and centuries all centering on politics and spice. That thing humans couldn’t live without for their tech. Philip K. Dick played with reality in ways that was confusing. I know he had an aunt who had schizophrenia and I think he understood it quite well. I’m not sure he had it, but that knowledge made his stories all the more interesting to read.

And finally, I get to Andre Norton who wrote both science fiction and fantasy under male pseudonyms. Her science fiction featured both women and men who had to work together. Even when she had mostly men in her stories, they were easier to understand. Some even were shy and unsure of how to deal with women because of lack of experience. Those characters only grew up around other boys. Then after having to work with a woman, she was the one who took him aside and put him at ease. She probably told him what it was like to be a woman and how they like to be treated. I always liked how she would have men and women working side by side. Sometimes they got along fine and at others there was some conflict.

So, I have gotten from these writers more on men and women characters and how they can interact in a futuristic time period with more tech. I don’t think humans have acted that much differently between the Victoria era and futuristic times. The main difference is the scenery and technology. In the Victoria times, the focus was more domestic and social. In the future times, there is social and working. There is prejudice in both time periods whether there are aliens or not as there is in my stories too.

Victorian Literature

I’ve always been drawn to Victorian literature and it didn’t matter if the writer was American or British or Canadian. I tended to read them because they gave me a good insight into how life was for real women of the time. Something which history tends to overlook and just focus on the men and what they did.

My favorites are Jane Austen, Louisa May Alcott, the Brontë sisters (Charlotte, Emily & Anne) and L.M. Montgomery. Their books were women centered and I learned a lot from all of them. They opened a door to a world that history ignores. I do have a tendency to call them Victorian Romances. They were the slow burn psychological romances that I find more interesting than the modern physical ones.

I learned what domestic work entailed and how they learned it, which isn’t taught these days. Many people don’t understand what domestic work can mean and it’s typically neglected and dismissed by many in the modern age. Domestic work can mean cooking and baking from scratch, cleaning, taking care of children, and all sorts of needlework such as embroidery, knitting, crocheting, sewing, mending, etc. It’s more than what a modern homemaker is expected to do.

In my writing, I do focus on women and what they do, whether it be domestic work or something else entirely. I also focus on relationships and how people interact with each other. These writers influenced me and I think they are right to point out what “women’s work” is all about. Without women doing all that work and their courtships and other relationships, the rest of us wouldn’t be here. Yet, women are still ignored and dismissed and not treated as equals to men. It’s sad there are still too many sexist people who won’t give women a chance. Some of them being women themselves.

So, of course one of the themes which comes up in my writing is sexism and how women are quite capable and competent. I do try to have a variety of women characters. Not all are heroines. Some are villains. Some are empty headed and shallow. I do that because women are varied and not all the same.

And if the women in my books end up with men, typically it’s because the men treat them well and not as slaves. I have Jane, Louisa, L.M., Charlotte, Emily and Anne to thank for that trope.

Reading and Writing

I am aware, at least intuitively, that my writing is influenced by what I have read. I have read a lot of books over the years. When I find a writer who writes what I enjoy, I tend to find everything I can that they wrote. I mainly read Victorian literature, fantasy and science fiction.

I find the Victorian literature gives me a good foundation in the psychology of characters. Fantasy and science fiction gives me themes to consider and think about. So, I use both characters and themes with a story plot when I write my fiction books. For my poetry books, I pick a theme and write 100 poems on that. I know my writing is strange because I am strange and see the world differently than what most people (those who have gotten into my face about it) think I should.

I like to write about all sorts of fantasy characters that can play with tech toys and give some scientific sounding explanations as to why they exist. Although the science might not be hard core, it at least is present to explain people such as vampires or weres who don’t always turn into wolves. One reason I like to write about different fantasy characters is to show prejudice when it appears. Sometimes that comes in the form of denying such people can exist and yet they do in my universe. The deniers tend to go into shock when they meet those they don’t believe exist. I also like to compare and contrast different characters to show that some are good and some are bad irregardless of whether they are human, were, elf, fairy, etc.

Kitchen Witch: Pizza

Kitchen Witch: Pizza

Best friends Renae and Morgan demonstrate how to make pizza from scratch.