Geoff Nelder's Blog, page 11
February 14, 2017
Writer Christopher Davis takes to my blog
This week, I am handing the reins of my blog to a Californian Native – his words, see below. You’d not think so because his writing style is so English and I mean that in a good way. I’m always pleased to greet writers who’ve yet to appear on these pages so hello there, Christopher Davis.
Good Morning and thank you for having me.
I’ve two novels on tap so far for 2017—one short and one full length—and both will be published by the good folks at Solstice publishing.
Walking to Babylon—the first up and released February 2nd—is the longer version of a story that I wrote for the Multiple Myeloma Research charity anthology Paladins. My story in the anthology was titled Low and Outside and as you could guess takes both its title and story line from the game of baseball, as the story is told over a couple of beers at a farm team game in Las Vegas.
The collection was published in England and is stocked with some of the best indie crime writers on the scene today from both sides of the pond. Paladins was put together for a crime writer friend—Craig Furchtenicht and his wife—Henrietta—who at the time—was fighting a valiant battle against Multiple Myeloma. She has since lost that battle and writing the longer story was my way of remembering the smiles posted from a hospital room on Facebook as she struggled to keep those of us writers participating, in the game.
Walking to Babylon is not for the faint of heart as it follows a pair of unlikely Vegas mob types—Sammy Soriano and Tommy Two Guns Viglierchio—as they grow up busting balls for the old man.
Vigleirchio has cancer and Soriano knows it, but there is really nothing that he can do except be a friend. After a hard life of drug use, fast living and even faster women, Viglierchio chooses to end it all one night in the desert outside of Las Vegas under a silver summer moon.
I love the colours in this cover art and I want to think the author Christopher Davis is that man.
Ain’t No Law in California is a much longer post-apocalyptic, western that has lived on the hard drive of my computer for six or seven years. The original story was slated to be a traditional western and written as three stories, in the hope of gaining the attention of the shorter e-book publishers of the time.
After two complete re-writes and another in first person, I scrapped the idea and the story took on a more SCI-FI, Steam-Punk, Dystopian feel. A couple of folks read through it—after having read the original version—and it seemed that the Dan Bardwell series of odd westerns would get off the ground.
An untitled follow up is nearly complete and both are written as traditional as can be with the exception that they take place a hundred and fifty years in the future after a nuclear war has nearly wiped humanity out.
Walking to Babylon was just released on the 2nd of February and Ain’t No Law in California is making the various rounds of editing and should be out before spring and available through Amazon or Solstice Publishing?
***
Christopher Davis is a central California native and grandfather of three rambunctious little ones. When not tending herd, he can be found trying his hand at writing Crime, Western and Horror fiction. Chris lives with his wife and a little dog that has nearly lost his mind.
Find out more at www.christopherdaviswrites.com
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February 4, 2017
CJ Warrant chases me round the desk
This week my blog page has been usurped, wrenched from my tender hands by a writer, CJ Warrant, whose speciality is dark romance. Does this mean I am to be chased around my writing desk, again? We’ll see. In the meantime let’s see what she says for herself.
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First and foremost, I want thank you for having me. It’s a great pleasure being here and to take over your blog.
There is some much I want to say, but mostly, I would like to introduce myself.
My name is CJ Warrant, and I write Dark Romantic thrillers and Suspense. I’m half Italian and half Korean—and yes, I do eat kimchi and pizza, and sometimes both at the same time.
I was born just outside of Seoul Korea, and my first language was Korean. But when I came to this wonderful country, I had to learn English—side by side with my mother and siblings. Through out the years, and meeting so many diverse people, I have picked up on some other languages.
I was army brat through and through, and had the privilege to travel with my family, and meet so many great people and see different parts of the world.
One of the places that stuck with me to this day is Wisconsin. Yes, I said Wisconsin. We only lived there for a year, but it was a year to remember.
Reason being, I learned not everyone is mean because of my nationality or how my eyes looked. My connection with my family grew stronger. But then our family dynamics shattered when a driver, who wasn’t paying attention to the road, killed my younger brother. And the house we lived in was, or still might be…haunted. (More of a playful ghost, from what I remembered anyway.)
Anyway, my debut novel, Forgetting Jane was developed from that experience from living there, but of course, the plot has a more sinister side to the story than how I lived in that farmhouse.
As for my writing,
My first novel, Forgetting Jane is published through Solstice Publishing and is available at:
Amazon: http://myBook.to/ForgettingJane
I currently have several stories in the works. Two series, and another couple single titles. All Dark romantic thrillers.
I also have Forgetting Jane coming out in audio book and it’s in near completion. If you would like more detail, please subscribe to my newsletter to get more detailed news about my books. Just follow the link below.
http://www.cjwarrant.com/contact-cj.html
You also can find me at:
www.facebook.com/cjwarrantauthor/
If you would like to come by and say hi to me, I’ll be at the La Grange Public , Chicago with some of my author friends. We’re doing readings and some giveaways on February 7th, at 7:00 p.m.
Thank you again for letting me introduce myself. It was fun being here!
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CJ, I’m glad I allowed you access to my page and…hey, what are you doing? Stay on that side of my desk. I’m a married man. Noooooooo!
The post CJ Warrant chases me round the desk appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
February 3, 2017
#Review Unmaking Atoms by Magdalena Ball
Unmaking Atoms by Magdalena Ball (2017)
ASIN B01MR0KHBS
ISBN-13: 978-1760412821
Ginninderra Press
Link to buy: https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?_encoding=UTF8&field-keywords=Unmaking+Atoms&node=341677031
You know me, I am to poetry as a banana is to a wheelbarrow. However, sometimes a tome lands in – or is that on – my lap that makes me sit up and admire the way words can be arranged, re-arranged, and a magic wand applied to give added fictive value.
I’ve admired the poetry of Magdalena Ball for many years and I was honoured to include some of her science fiction poetry in Escape Velocity magazine. This collection is a wondrous mix of passion, and emotion crafted in such a way only a poet with an understanding of science can do. I could as easily say as only a scientist with an understanding of poetry can do because you don’t need to be a scientist to appreciate these verses, nor need to be a poet to bathe in their prosody and richness.
For example: Charitable Crumb – ‘after so many years of entanglement’…’whatever means / we could find to keep / the conversation going. … typing words breathlessly against the rising steam of time.’
All of us can take something from this verse. Communication, time, the dual meaning of entanglement is clever.
Another sample from The No Times Times:
‘Oh entropy / here you are, right on cue / Nothing regains order/ without work’
Reminds me of my first teenage graffiti “Entropy wins.” The principal asked me to explain it but as I started to the science lecturer told him it was good science and so I was let off with a caution. This poem though is more than entropy as it is about time and its scorched expansive past saying the present can be the future if seen from elsewhen. And from ‘Walking Into Eternity’ we see that entropy is that elegant word for chaos, disorder, decay. Nicely put.
One of my favourites – I knew the facts but it’s the way they’re distributed in poetry…
Reflecting Sphere
‘All the riches of periodic table hotpot
the scale of atoms and molecules
forged 14 billion years ago
exploded into space
carbon, oxygen, nitrogen
define you.
– – – –
You are, chemically
already a star.’
In my science fiction novel, Exit, Pursued by a Bee, I use QM Time decoherence as a theme, so it sent a shiver up my neck to see Decoherence through the window
‘Sometimes it’s all about the window.
… (more verse)
Until the moment you open it
probability waves
a fluttering hand
the tightly packed microscopic
pixels remain unlimited
possibilities surrounding you
multifoliate, like energy.’
Wonderful. Of course I’ve yet to absorb every poem, it is a collection I’ll return to time and again until I have none. I could say In no part did I stop to complain. After all that is from Unchanging unceasing murmur: a line from James Joyce Dubliners, which inspired Magdalena Ball’s
Unchanging unceasing murmur
‘In no part did I stop
to complain, warm, rewind
this path of nowhere’
Other verses have been inspired by such luminaries as Emily Dickinson, Grace Cossington Smith, an ekphrastic poem by Vincent Van Gogh, and Francois Rabelais.
Highly recommended.
Nelder News
In December Solstice Publishing released my short story, The Chaos of Mokii as an ebook. It’s the first short for which I had to write a blurb, acknowledgments and select a cover art. Previously, I’d done all that for novels of over 80,000 words rather than a tale of only 3,400 words. The blurb? Mokii is a city existing only in the consciousness of its inhabitants. Olga is sitting in a train while her minds negotiates past Mokii’s bouncer and relaxes into the entertainments and infrastructure of the mind-city. She discovers a thief about to usurp the city in order to take its lucrative telepathic advertising. Does she thwart him? Yours for 99 pence or a dollar 22 cents to find out!
Grab it on Kindle http://mybook.to/ChaosOM
Links to buy ARIA and other of my books are on my Amazon author pagehttp://author.to/Amazonauthorpage
ARIA: Left Luggage is only 99p give or take a few pence at the moment on Kindle so grab it at smarturl.it/1fexhs
Or via other formats http://geoffnelder.com/project/left-luggage-arial-trilogy-part-1/
Geoff facebooks at http://www.facebook.com/AriaTrilogy and tweets at @geoffnelder
The post #Review Unmaking Atoms by Magdalena Ball appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
January 28, 2017
Guest Writer: Rachael Tamayo
The blog tour continues and this time it is that writer extraordinaire, Rachael Tamayo that wrenches the steering wheel from my hands, throws me out of the car and takes over.
When Writing: All Those little details
by Rachael Tamayo
As a reader, or a writer, have you ever read something that just seemed to be….missing something? Can’t put your finger on it? Grammar looks good, plot seems okay….but…..just not quite feeling it?
This has happened to me when I’m working on my own books, or reading the unfinished manuscripts of others. Occasionally I’ll see it happen in published works as well. So, what on earth am I talking about?
Those missing details. That’s what I’m talking about. The things that give the scene life. They make the blood flow in the veins of your characters and the heart beat in your plot. Don’t ever underestimate a well placed little nugget, even something simple.
Example one: He swerved to avoid the car that veered into his lane.
OK, it’s to the point. Nothing really wrong here, tells us what is happening, right? But does it draw you in? Does it make you feel what the driver is feeling? If you can make you reader feel what the character does…you’ve succeeded. You will have a reader that will turn the page to see what happens.
Example two: The headlights shone into his face on the too dark country road. Is this car in my lane? Gripping the wheel with two large hands, his knuckles went white as he swallowed and jerked his car to the left. Gravel flying as his heart slammed into his ribs. The vehicle sped by, oblivious to the fact that they were in the wrong lane. Picking up the phone, he dialed 911.
See the difference? Details. Add a couple of sentences and suddenly you are there, in the car. Your heart is pounding and your mouth is dry. The detail of the headlights, his internal thought coupled with the action puts you in the scene, in his head.
This is where you want your reader.
I’ve heard writers say that they have trouble with this. Personally, this is what I do. I sit and imagine myself watching this happen…or maybe it’s happening to me. What’s the first thing you might notice? How is your body reacting? What is your thought? What sounds do you hear? Is there a smell?
Of course, then there is the issue of character development. The same method applies. In order to create people that are real living breathing beings in your books, you have to think this way. What kind of personality does he have? How does he react in an emergency, or when he’s angry? How does this play off of the other characters? What flaws does he have? Writing the perfect man or woman won’t get you far. People want to read about people that make mistakes, because they are real. They want to relate to your story. They want to see themselves in your characters.
However, remember one thing. Don’t take it to far. Being overly descriptive of every little nuance gets old. Page after page of little details just won’t due. You must trust your reader to use their imagination. Be descriptive, but vague. Let them carry themselves there in their minds, TRUST THEM! Otherwise, they will find themselves skimming and flipping pages to get past this never-ending description of a bedroom and back to the plot.
And there you have it. Now that you know what’s missing…take a breath and open that laptop.
Rachael Tamayo is the author of the Friend-Zone series and several short stories all available on Amazon. Her Newest release, Claim me (Finale to the Friend-Zone trilogy) will be available February 14th.
Website: www.Rachaeltamayowrites.com
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/RachaelTamayo
Twitter https://twitter.com/rtamayo2004
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/tamayorachael
Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Rachael-Tamayo
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January 25, 2017
#free #story STELLAR SENTINELS
STELLAR SENTINELS by Geoff Nelder
Science Fiction first contact short story submitted to the Writer’s of the Future Award in 1987. It didn’t win but came close and was awarded an Honourable Mention and a hand-written note from L. Ron Hubbard.
Note this story is nearly all dialogue, the reason for which becomes clear in its reading.
Stellar Sentinels by Geoff Nelder
‘What are you thinking, Jwerk?’
‘Can’t you tell, Zatl?’
‘My brain hurts too much.’
‘Think pain killer.’
‘Funny.’
‘…I’m waiting… ‘
‘Someone’s coming.’
‘Of all the time to get a blinder. Are you sure, Zatl?’
‘Sure I’m sure.’
‘How can you be sure? We’ve not intercepted anything but clutter since we’ve been here?’
‘Clear your head, Jwerk. We were put here because the indigo and magenta gaseous entwining swirls would attract inquisitive strangers.’
‘That’s all very well for you, who never get blinders. It takes me ag — ‘
‘Shush! Yes, there is something coming in close. From l8O, 23, E slow at 42.’
‘Zatl, when we accepted this duty we were told that the chance of interception was practically zero. More chance of two suns singing a duo.’
‘That means it came from sector 34. Nothing’s ever come from there.’
‘It’s not fair. It would come when I’m not in a fit state to receive it. I told them back at base I get these — ‘
‘Hold it, Jwerk, there’s two, no three separate sources.’
‘I have too many important things to get on with in my life for this stupid compulsory duty. That sad Xfol was prepared to go in my place but oh no. I, Jwerk. My number was up.’
‘We must intercept…’
‘Oh, Zatl, do we?’
‘Of course. Regulations… there’s something odd.’
‘Let’s just report back and let Base handle it.’
‘Jwerk, don’t be so dumb. Why d’you think we’re here? Aliens mustn’t discover our home.’
‘Huh! It’s such a mess anyway. It’s time we found somewhere else.’
‘And, we have to find out where they come from. Yes, their thought transmissions are weird.’
‘Well what do you expect from aliens?’
‘No, Jwerk, it’s not just language differences it’s as if they were travelling in some kind of containers.’
‘You mean like those unfortunate creatures that Bqort encountered two duties ago Zatl, they killed him didn’t they?’
‘The inquiry hasn’t finished. It appeared that he thought they were dead or dying and he was trying to get into their container when it ignited.’
‘Come on Zatl, I’m off. You coming?’
‘No. It must have been a communications failure. Surely sentient creatures wouldn’t destroy themselves deliberately. Can’t you help with DR3 frequencies?’
‘I suppose so. We should move apart though, just in case.’
‘Good thinking, Jwerk. I’ll drift to sector 180/24/D and start listening for their transmissions at the opposite end to you.’
‘Zatl, you are actually enjoying this aren’t you?’
‘Of course! Now let me do any dialogue, they might be clever.’
‘Really Jwerk?’
‘Are you still picking up three?’
‘Yes, Jwerk, aren’t you?’
‘Well, I’m feeling purple. You know, not in top form today, I suppose now I’m concentrating… yes, I detect three. Hey, they are weird – just listen to — ‘
‘Shush, they’ve slowed down. Stopped. But there’s nothing to indicate they’ve detected our presence.’
‘Perhaps they have more than one sense. Primitives.’
‘It could be useful to know how others might perceive us in a physical sense.’
‘Hey, Zatl. I told you I’m going if you keep up such perverted thoughts. And I’ll tell Base.’
‘Go then. Just a moment, I’m picking up a transmission on D25 ~ beamed straight at me.’
‘I can’t detect it. It’s not fair.’
‘It’s a maths series! Dear oh dear. How pathetic. Come nearer to me, Jwerk. How’s your pre-school binary?’
‘You’re right. Exactly what we were told they’d do. Hah! Shall we play?’
‘Yes, but I’ll wait until they finish their sequence. They’re bound to give us a few little problems to establish our intelligence.’
‘Let’s not wait Zatl. There is only one number series that they are likely to test us on that doesn’t occur in nature.’
‘I know, prime numbers. Anyone transmitting that series must be sentient. What’s on your devious mind?’
‘Only that we give them the answer before they ask the question. That’ll give them a shock!’
‘Of all the ectoplasmic wonders of our race I have to be paired up with you. My dear Jwerk, has the thought not tweaked your prosaic synapses that we ought not let others believe ourselves to be intelligent entities?’
‘No. Why not?’
‘Just suppose they’re malevolent. They might be able to travel faster than us and trick us into leading them to –‘
‘Oh yes, our Base. But, but wouldn’t they –‘
‘Take our silence as intelligent behaviour and follow us home anyway? I don’t think so.’
‘No Zatl, and stop conveying your thoughts as if they were mine. I was going to say, wouldn’t they refuse to communicate with us for the same reason?’
‘Too late. Their speed, formation and signals have already indicated sentience. Nevertheless, the thought must have occurred to them that it is dangerous to take strangers back to their home.’
‘Why? If we can prove our benevolence and if…’
‘No, my dear Jwerk. Suppose they make a mistake and we were evil… and even if we were not evil it would be too coincidental if our stages of development were equal, wouldn’t it?’
‘So, we could show them a thing or two.’
‘And then what? Suppose we solved all their problems; of science, medicine, mathematics, the perfect music. They would lose the urge to develop and progress and probably see no purpose in their lives.’
‘But we don’t know all those things.’
‘No, but they might think we do and even if we only helped them a little then the lifelong struggle and urge to experiment and be proud of one’s own achievement is dented for ever. Besides –‘
‘You’re painting a gloomy picture. What besides?’
‘Two alien species in close proximity are very likely to infect each other with some disease or other.’
‘So we are not going to communicate with these three container-things?’
‘Oh yes, Jwerk, we are!’
‘But just now…’
‘Think, my friend, we need to know who they are; stop them from exploring our base region; and find out if they posses any useful infomation. Besides.’
‘Oh, Zatl, another besides’
‘Life is a game, and we are winners aren’t we?’
‘But it means we’ll never be able to go home in case they’re following us. Doesn’t it, Zatl?’
‘It might do but then it might not if…’
‘Killing off inquisitive strangers isn’t one of our jobs, surely?’
‘Well, Jwerk, it might not come to that. There is another solution but let’s give them something to think about now they have stopped.’
‘Right, I’ve interpreted their transmission of squared number series by pulsing the first hundred prime numbers in base eight and again in base ten.’
‘Good. That will tell them that we are tuned in. Wait now, Jwerk.’
‘What are they doing Zatl?’
‘Listen.’
‘I am listening but — ‘
‘Shush. They are thinking.’
‘Do you mean like us?’
‘No, Jwerk, aren’t you picking up coherently yet? The three containers are communicating on a different radio frequency to the one they beamed to us.’
‘Are they talking about us?’
‘What do you think? Just a moment, they’ve finished. They’ll be transmitting to us next. Get ready to decode.’
‘Zatl it’s gibberish.’
‘Wait… Didn’t you attend coding courses? Another few seconds worth. Got it!’
‘Got what?’
‘Their decoded message on frequency F65 I’ll relay it to you.’
< Hello Greetings Peace Hello Greetings Peace Hello Greetings Peace >
‘It’s a bit…’
‘Patience, Jwerk. I’ll acknowledge.’
Greetings.
‘They are garrulous, Zatl.’
‘That’s good. We can learn a lot from them without giving away much in return.’
< Are we near your home planet? >
‘They’re fools if they think that we’ll point them to our home base tell them no Zatl.’
‘Well, we could ignore the question or… listen.’
Yes
‘Zatl! What are you doing?’
‘Steady, you’ll rupture a synapse. Their idea of ‘close’ is undefined so I’ve really told them nothing.’
< We are 6.7 light years from ours; vector 23/4d/-2. Where, exactly, is your planet? >
‘Well Zatl we know what we need to know. What do we do now, destroy them?’
‘We do not know that they have not played a bluff. Calculate what data we have for those co-ordinates while I stall them.’
We do not have a home planet in the same sense that you seem to have.
< But you said we were near it! >
We do not need to have a solid base. Our kind gather as a home location.
‘Come on Jwerk, what is there?’
‘I can’t… yes, there is a small solar system there. There’s been an exponential growth in radio transmissions from the third planet over the last time unit after nothing for the previous billion. No confirmed details though.’
‘Right, Jwerk, let’s find out what they want.’
Are you lost?
What for?
Is there some resource you are exploring for?
‘That’s all we need, a species that cannot be content with what it has. I have a nasty feeling about this one, Zatl’
‘I agree. This lot will not return empty handed but their thirst for knowledge could help us to get them away from our base. I have to do some persuading to let one of us go back with them.
‘Not me! I volunteer to return to the beacon point to transmit your martyrdom.’
‘I thought you might, Jwerk, but you would have to follow at a discreet distance to relay my transmissions.’
‘Ah, you don’t expect to return yourself?’
‘Would you let an alien gain detailed knowledge of military capabilities, scientific developm…’
‘Yes, I mean no, but why then are you willing to go?’
‘To lead these potentially dangerous aliens away from our species and — ‘
‘Don’t tell me. So that you will be remembered as Zatl the Great One.’
‘Shush, I must answer them.’
We must both have concepts that are not mutual. We are prepared to share our knowledge with you.
***
‘It was a good try Zatl. Zatl?
‘Zatl are you there?
‘I felt the detonation. Were they not pleased that you offered to go with them, Zatl?
‘Were you able to get into one of their containers with them, Zatl?
‘Zatl?
‘Base said we are all to relocate: it’s getting too busy around here.
‘Zatl?
‘Zatl, they’re going to send a team to those co-ordinates you got. So you will have some company for when you come back won’t you, Zatl?
‘Zatl?
‘You are getting this?
Is this THE END
© Geoff Nelder
Nelder News
Last month Solstice Publishing released my short story, The Chaos of Mokii as an ebook. It’s the first short for which I had to write a blurb, acknowledgments and select a cover art. Previously, I’d done all that for novels of over 80,000 words rather than a tale of only 3,400 words. The blurb? Mokii is a city existing only in the consciousness of its inhabitants. Olga is sitting in a train while her minds negotiates past Mokii’s bouncer and relaxes into the entertainments and infrastructure of the mind-city. She discovers a thief about to usurp the city in order to take its lucrative telepathic advertising. Does she thwart him? Yours for 99 pence or a dollar 22 cents to find out!
Grab it on Kindle http://mybook.to/ChaosOM
Links to buy ARIA and other of my books are on my Amazon author pagehttp://author.to/Amazonauthorpage
ARIA: Left Luggage is only 99p give or take a few pence at the moment on Kindle so grab it at smarturl.it/1fexhs
Or via other formats http://geoffnelder.com/project/left-luggage-arial-trilogy-part-1/
Geoff facebooks at http://www.facebook.com/AriaTrilogy and tweets at @geoffnelder
The post #free #story STELLAR SENTINELS appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
January 22, 2017
Debbie De Louise grabs my b…
Yes, writer extraordinaire, Debbie De Louise grabs my blog!
Have you seen this? No sooner have I managed to pull on my bouncer’s armband and booted out Nicole from usurping my blog then another one sneaks in under the radar. Here she is Debbie De Louise. Such a good writer she can write herself onto anyone’s website. Let’s see what she has to say…
Debbie De Louise, writer
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It’s my pleasure to participate in the Solstice Publishing author’s group winter blog tour by sharing a post about myself, my books, and my feelings about writing.
As a librarian, reader, and author, books and the written word have been very important in my life. I can’t imagine a world without them. Writing transports people to places they’ve never visited within as well as outside of themselves. It entertains, teaches, amuses, and sometimes saddens. The saying “The pen is mightier than the sword” is true. Even before paper was invented or languages defined, storytellers played an important role in communities. They still do despite the fact there are so many forms of communication today. A good story has value whether it is read off a screen, through the pages of an “old-fashioned” book, or listened to on audio CD’s or digital files.
Books have healing properties. It’s been proven that reading has many emotional benefits, and what benefits your mind also positively affects your body. Have you ever found yourself so immersed in a book that you felt like you were one of the characters? Have you traveled in time with a historical novel? Been frightened by a horror story? Fallen in love with a romance? Surprised by the twist in a mystery? Excited by a scene in a thriller? Books can stir your emotions and stimulate your mind. Who needs drugs or other addictive agents when a story can relax or energize you? There are no limits to where your imagination can lead you with the pages of a book as your guide.
I remember when I first started reading in second grade. It was more fun to me than any of the games I played. I felt like I’d discovered a wonderful secret or found a magic spell. As I grew older, my love of books increased. I admired the authors who were able to make me visualize the worlds they created. Then I began writing my own stories to entertain myself. But I also had a dream that one day, like my favorite authors, I would also be able to reach people around the world and give them the gift of my words.
Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Debbie De Louise
Publishing my own books today feels just as magical and not a little unreal. Seeing my books listed online or occupying a spot on my library or bookstore’s shelf seems incredible. When people review my books or personally give me feedback, knowing that my words are being read through their eyes is nothing short of miraculous. Still, I know that there are millions of books out there and more being published every minute. How can I hope to compete? How can I make my dream come true and reach all the people who would enjoy my stories? That’s the lament of new authors as well as old. I don’t have the answers. The best advice I can give myself as well as other writers who want to stand out from the crowd is to write what comes from their heart. Readers identify with real feelings, and most fiction is based on reality. You’re the only one who can write your book. Tell the story you’d like to read, and chances are others will be interested, too.
For more information about me and my books and stories including my Cobble Cove mystery series, connect with me through the following links:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/debbie.delouise.author/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Deblibrarian
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2750133.Debbie_De_Louise
Amazon Author Page: http://amzn.to/2bIHdaQ
Website/Blog/Newsletter Sign-Up: https://debbiedelouise.com
Sneaky the Library Cat’s Blog: (blog hosted by the cat character from my Cobble Cove mysteries who interviews other animal characters and some real-life author’s pets) https://sneakylibrarycat.wordpress.com
Cobble Cove Character Chat (Facebook page where you can interact with the characters from my mysteries): https://www.facebook.com/groups/748912598599469/
I will be hosting an author hour on Monday, February 20 from 3-4 pm during Mystery Thriller week https://mysterythrillerweek.com/
Some of the characters from my mysteries will be helping me post information about their books and offer some giveaways. For more information, visit the event page at
When Jack Trumps Ace: Debbie De Louise
https://www.facebook.com/events/1244007262287370/
Also, look for my romantic comedy Novella, When Jack Trumps Ace, coming this February from Solstice Publishing.
+ + +
Thanks, Debbie for your blog piece here on my blog. I see one of your books has pre-empted the new President with its title – haha.
Nelder News
A few days ago I was interviewed by the prestigious magazine, Cheshire Life, about the Chester’s Climate ebook. Two attractive young women met me in the Pitcher & Piano restaurant bar in Chester and we chatted about the book. Then I told them of a curious circle of fate in the IT sense with the book: Chester’s Climate: past and present was born on a BBC Microcomputer in the early 1980s but sold as a paper book but is now out as an ebook. Hence from computer to computer over a 32 year interlude. In fact the 1985 version was sold with a 5″ floppy disckette of data, text and formulae too – way ahead of its time! The girls then leaned forward and said, “What’s a BBC MIcro?”
Haha. So here is a pic of one, girls and anyone else under 30.
BBC Micro circa 1983
Price £1.99 ebook and equivalent for US$
Product link for Chester’s Climate https://payhip.com/b/62pM
Nelder News
Last month Solstice Publishing released my short story, The Chaos of Mokii as an ebook. It’s the first short for which I had to write a blurb, acknowledgments and select a cover art. Previously, I’d done all that for novels of over 80,000 words rather than a tale of only 3,400 words. The blurb? Mokii is a city existing only in the consciousness of its inhabitants. Olga is sitting in a train while her minds negotiates past Mokii’s bouncer and relaxes into the entertainments and infrastructure of the mind-city. She discovers a thief about to usurp the city in order to take its lucrative telepathic advertising. Does she thwart him? Yours for 99 pence or a dollar 22 cents to find out!
Grab it on Kindle http://mybook.to/ChaosOM
Links to buy ARIA and other of my books are on my Amazon author pagehttp://author.to/Amazonauthorpage
ARIA: Left Luggage is only 99p give or take a few pence at the moment on Kindle so grab it at smarturl.it/1fexhs
Or via other formats http://geoffnelder.com/project/left-luggage-arial-trilogy-part-1/
Geoff facebooks at http://www.facebook.com/AriaTrilogy and tweets at @geoffnelder
The post Debbie De Louise grabs my b… appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
January 15, 2017
Nicole Luttrell – guest blogger
I haven’t allowed other authors to usurp my blog for a few months but my virtual arm was twisted to let Nicole C Luttrell sneak in and offer some comments on a writer’s life for us to take in. Am I a professional writer? I don’t know. I sell books, articles and stories so in that sense it is professional but I only just make enough to keep me in Marmite and whisky. The writers’ retreats I love to attend swallow up the rest even with the pittance I receive for editing other people’s novels. I’m guessing Nicole isn’t using the word professional writer in the sense that she can live off her writing earnings but her blog piece is a fun read. Note she is a fellow science fiction / fantasy writer. Adjust your specs and here we go.
Nicole Luttrell, my blog is yours, drive carefully.
Hi, my name’s Nicole. I’m a writer. I kind of make a big deal out of that. Specifically, I’m a speculative fiction writer. That means I write horror, science fiction and fantasy. I wrote a book called Broken Patterns, and I sort of think it’s the best fantasy book since Dragonriders of Pern.
Am I a little full of myself? Yeah, I’ll admit it. Calling myself a speculative fiction writer a hell of a mouthful.
I also happen to be a professional author.
I love the hilarity of that sentence, you know? A professional author? I can’t think of anything less professional, you know? I mean, think about it.
We make up stories and tell them to people for a living. We have imaginary friends and they talk to us. Lots of writers, like myself, write in our pajamas, on our couches, with a cup of coffee. We are the last people you’d think of as professional. We’re really just big kids, playing with our imaginary toys.
Well, except that we don’t just write in our pjs. We also write in waiting rooms, at red lights, during our lunch breaks. We write before our kids get up and after they go to bed. We write while other people go to the movies and go to bars and, you know, sleep.
We have to write in all of these times because most of us, including me, have day jobs. I have a full time day job, in fact. We write around jobs, school and families. In fact, a lot of us write around all three of those things at the same time. (Not me, though. I just have a full time job and two kids. Oh, and also a husband and too many pets.)
We weep over our writing, did you know that? We kill of your favorite characters, yes. But they were our favorite characters long before you ever heard of them. Characters don’t just exist for us, they live inside our minds. Killing one is gut wrenching.
Of course, the rough draft is only half of it. Once it’s done we start in editing. We edit, edit and edit some more. We edit our work until it glows. Until we could repeat the stories from memory. And sometimes we feel like we do that.
Usually, that whole repeating it from memory comes when we start promoting our work to everyone. Have you ever worked in sales? Imagine that, but all the time. The thing that makes it better and worse at the same time is that you feel like you’re selling a part of yourself. So you really believe that everyone needs what you’re selling, but you’re also taking every rejection hugely personally.
Finally, when we’re done with a book, we start all over again. Because writing’s an obsession, one that we cannot escape.
So professional writer is kind of a ridiculous thing to call us. It’s better to call us what we really are.
Addicts.
—
Thanks Nicole. So I’m a professional addict too!
The post Nicole Luttrell – guest blogger appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
January 4, 2017
#Chester’s #Climate book released
For a change I’ve released a non-fiction book. Chester’s Climate first came out in 1985, printed by a local Handbridge printer and sold out within a year. Recently, I have received requests for copies but I only have 3 and they’ve been taken apart. So Mrs N scanned in the pages and I uploaded them to Payhip – related to Paypal. I’d already done most of the research and work in the 1980s so I’m only charging $2 because it is an ebook at present.
This is from the press release:
This 40-page booklet was inspired by extremes of temperature and rain in the 1980s and was first published in 1985 and sold out in the same year. This edition is substantially the same but with a couple of pages at the end updating temperature and air pollution trends.
In this book are answers to:
Did the mid 20th Century have the best summers?
Are we due for the storm of centuries?
How often has the River Dee frozen over?
How is the Chester climate suitable for farming?
River Dee, Chester in 1929
Did you know that local weather in Chester:
Uprooted trees in the city centre?
Made the city walls fall down?
Made a church kill a child?
Made a man eat his wife then is eaten himself?
Had colder winters than 1947 and 1963?
Had tornadoes and hurricanes?
Has its own cloud formations?
CHESTER’S CLIMATE: past and present new edition released 4th January 2017
link to buy for only $2
My own cartoon illustrating how windy a Chester bridge can get!
Nelder News
Last month Solstice Publishing released my short story, The Chaos of Mokii as an ebook. It’s the first short for which I had to write a blurb, acknowledgments and select a cover art. Previously, I’d done all that for novels of over 80,000 words rather than a tale of only 3,400 words. The blurb? Mokii is a city existing only in the consciousness of its inhabitants. Olga is sitting in a train while her minds negotiates past Mokii’s bouncer and relaxes into the entertainments and infrastructure of the mind-city. She discovers a thief about to usurp the city in order to take its lucrative telepathic advertising. Does she thwart him? Yours for 99 pence or a dollar 22 cents to find out!
Grab it on Kindle http://mybook.to/ChaosOM
Links to buy ARIA and other of my books are on my Amazon author pagehttp://author.to/Amazonauthorpage
ARIA: Left Luggage is only 99p give or take a few pence at the moment on Kindle so grab it at smarturl.it/1fexhs
Or via other formats http://geoffnelder.com/project/left-luggage-arial-trilogy-part-1/
Geoff facebooks at http://www.facebook.com/AriaTrilogy and tweets at @geoffnelder
The post #Chester’s #Climate book released appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
December 11, 2016
The Fenian Uprising in Chester
I’m a stranger in Chester in that I’ve only lived here since 1978 (38 years as I write this) and perhaps this is why I can often surprise the local Cestrians with historical and geographical titbits they miss. As a newcomer and teacher I researched into the city’s past and walked its nooks and byways which many locals take for granted. For the research for my non-fiction book, Chester’s Climate: Past and Present (1987) I spent hours in the Chester Record Office, libraries and museums to glean climate-related events of the city’s past and as a by-product encountered many interesting non-climate related incidents. One such is the Irish Fenian uprising and attempted uprising in Chester.
There is little published about the Fenian uprising and likely much is exaggerated and certainly there are contradictions but the gist is taken from PORTRAIT OF CHESTER by David Bethell Published by Hale 1980 p44-45
On 27th October 1862, after serious Irish disturbances in Birkenhead a large group of Friends of Garibaldi [not particularly religious but inspired by Giuseppe Garibaldi for his anti-authoritarian, freedom, revolutionary stance while in exile from Italy) assembled at Chester Castle gates. A bottle was thrown and hit a boy in the face badly wounding him. The Garibaldians marched on Boughton, inhabited almost entirely by Irish labourers, who stood ready for battle. Their appearance dissuaded the Cestrian mob, who retired to the High Cross, where an effigy of the Pope was exhibited, and the crowd chanted, “To Hell with the Pope!”
On Sunday 10th February 1867 Fenians (Irish Republicans) held a meeting in Liverpool and resolved to attack Chester Castle the following day to seize the arms deposited there, attack the banks and jewellers shops, cut the telegraph wires, tear up the rails and escape by train to Holyhead and then to Ireland. The armoury at the Castle held 10,100 rifles, 6,000 swords and nearly a million rounds of ammunition, plus 5.040 barrels of gunpowder, guarded by only six soldiers. The Fenians believed the 54th Regiment (Chester was the 22nd so perhaps there were the 54th West Norfolk stationed nearby? – GN) to be disaffected and have Irish sympathisers.
[From Wikipedia: The rolling stock on the railway to be appropriated for transport to Holyhead, where shipping was to be seized and a descent made on Dublin before the authorities should have time to interfere.]
One of the Fenians, an ex-officer called Corydon, who was one of 50 American-Irish, who had come to Britain to foment violence (or help the Irish independence cause – depending on your point of view – GN) had been captured in Liverpool and revealed the plot to his interrogators. The news and consequent instructions buzzed along the telegraphs to Manchester, Chester, Holyhead and London.
From noon on Monday about 700 Irishmen arrived in Chester on trains from Liverpool, Preston, Manchester and Halifax. The unusual numbers leaving from Liverpool attracted attention and fresh warnings were telegraphed. The Chester Magistrates met immediately, and special constables sworn in. The 230 Chester Volunteers were called up and police stood by.
Around 4pm a train from Manchester and Stalybridge brought 400 Irishmen. 40 from Halifax and 70 from Leeds. By 5pm there were 1500 Irishmen in Chester and their leaders gathered for battle orders.
The railway authorities prepared to pull up the lines (too late or to keep them in the city but it might have prevented soldiers reaching the city too – GN). At 11pm two companies of the 54th Regiment and the Volunteers mustered in the Castle. At 1am another company of the 54th arrived from Manchester. A gunboat left the Mersey for Holyhead. Extra police were assembled in Liverpool. At 2.30 am the 1st Battalion of Scots Fusiliers, 500 men, left in a special 27-carriage train from Euston to Chester. (Flying Scotsman ? –GN)
Through the night 500 special constables patrolled the streets. The Fenians formed into columns on the main roads out of the city. The Cheshire Yeomanry were summoned. Before the Scots Fusiliers arrived the Irishmen started to melt away, and by morning they’d all gone. Some ammunition was found abandoned. The citizens of Chester (presumably not the Irish living in Boughton – GN) crowded to the railway station and gave the Fusiliers a rapturous welcome.
A sympathetic account of the Fenian Rebellion of 1867 as they pertained to America and the Provisional Government of Ireland can be read here:
http://www.yourirish.com/history/19th-century/the-fenian-rebellion-of-1867
A note on Captain John McCafferty, an Irish American involved in the uprising is in this Chester-writer’s blog http://chesterwriter.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/the-confederate-captain-and-english.html
That account has the Captain alive 20 years after the uprising whereas other accounts have him arrested in Ireland and executed in 1867. The truth might never be known as the name is surrounded by romantic legend in America, Ireland and England.
Chester Suspension Bridges
One of the documents I’d read informed me erroneously that the 1867 uprising embarrassed the military in Chester because their troops were in barracks in the Handbridge / Queens Park area on the opposite side of the River Dee to the Castle. The Fenians, I’d read, blocked The Old Dee Bridge and so hindered the military advance on the Fenians. Consequently, a footbridge was established from Queens Park to the Grosvenor Park area to the North.
This is all wonderful but nonsense. The first suspension bridge was a chain construction in 1852 (photo on the left) a full 15 years before the Fenian uprising. The bridge was instigated by Enoch Gerrard, a local entrepreneur who was developing property in Queens Park. It swayed too easily and by 1922 had become so dangerously under-maintained the local council took it over, demolished and replaced it by 1923. The bridge is a popular tourist attraction now and used regularly by me and thousands of Cestrians.
Nelder News
Last month Solstice Publishing released my short story, The Chaos of Mokii as an ebook. It’s the first short for which I had to write a blurb, acknowledgments and select a cover art. Previously, I’d done all that for novels of over 80,000 words rather than a tale of only 3,400 words. The blurb? Mokii is a city existing only in the consciousness of its inhabitants. Olga is sitting in a train while her minds negotiates past Mokii’s bouncer and relaxes into the entertainments and infrastructure of the mind-city. She discovers a thief about to usurp the city in order to take its lucrative telepathic advertising. Does she thwart him? Yours for 99 pence or a dollar 22 cents to find out!
Grab it on Kindle http://mybook.to/ChaosOM
Links to buy ARIA and other of my books are on my Amazon author page http://author.to/Amazonauthorpage
ARIA: Left Luggage is only 99p give or take a few pence at the moment on Kindle so grab it at smarturl.it/1fexhs
Or via other formats http://geoffnelder.com/project/left-luggage-arial-trilogy-part-1/
Geoff facebooks at http://www.facebook.com/AriaTrilogy and tweets at @geoffnelder
The post The Fenian Uprising in Chester appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
December 2, 2016
#Writing is Bad for You?
Writing is Bad for You?
By Geoff Nelder
I gave a talk on Releasing Your Inner Writer to an appreciative audience of 60 retirees in Ruthin, Wales, making up their branch of U3A: the University of the Third Age. Simple, right? Not when I did the research. The two attributes required to be a writer are writing skills and a creative spark. The first is important but relatively easy to acquire whereas do we all have creativity? Unless you are run by a predetermined computer program you need to make decisions all the time. What to have for tea? Which way to cycle today? I used to think we all have a book in us – that story we have an urge to reveal even if it is just a different way of telling an old story, but it seems I am wrong. Only half of that audience thrust up their hands to say they are compelled to write a tale.
Is creative writing open to all? Talented English teacher friends agree they might have the writing skills but are too much in awe of Kate Atkinson et al and are stymied by them. Writers on the other hand read them and find inspiration. Fay Weldon (85), literary writer on feminist issues, is blunt with aspiring writers with zero talent: Do you knit? Too harsh? Yes because you don’t have to be a solo writer or creator. Some people are at their most creative in a brain-storming group – me as an editor of Sheffield University Rag magazine in the late 60s. Around a table in the Student Union we’d come up with hundreds of awful gags in an hour. I still see them circulating but with no credits nor royalties.
Assuming you have it in you, we are back to those two basic requirements: (i) knowledge such as writing skills, grammar, “rules” that you can break but best know them first, and (ii) Creativity.
Naïve creativity can be brilliant. eg On TV news in the mid 1980s I watched Sir Keith Joseph bend down to talk to an infant schoolgirl. He asked her, “Little girl, what are you drawing?”
“God.”
“But no one knows what he looks like.”
“They will in a minute!”
Now I rolled around laughing but the commentator didn’t comment nor has it been mentioned in the media since. Creativity in a flash can happen any time to ordinary people.
The creative spark or divergence is alluded to in William Blake’s Ambiguity of Innocence:
‘To see a World in a Grain of Sand,
And a Heaven in a Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand,
And Eternity in an hour’.
Is creativity the result of a tortured mind or the other way round? Lord Byron: “We of the craft are all crazy.” True that many gifted writers, artists, scientists, dancers etc have an element of schizophrenia and are twice as likely to commit suicide than non-gifted people! (Kyaga et al 2012) However, two times a low number is still low. The suicide rate among retired people in the UK is around 8 per 100,000. Twice that means the suicide rate among writers is 16 per 100,000 so breathe easy.
What appears to be happening is that creativity goes with both divergent thinking and being able to associate thoughts from disparate areas of the brain. If you want more precision then let’s mention recent research on the precuneus area of the brain: gleaned from Beautiful Minds: the real link between Creativity and Mental Illness (Kaufman, 2013).
The PRECUNEUS is an area of the brain that displays high levels of activity during bodily rest. It’s linked to self-consciousness, retrieval of personal memories and self-related mental representations. An inability to suppress such cognitive activity might help creative people generate new ideas. They find their minds wandering, become easily distracted, can’t sleep easily – but not like most people, because new ideas result. Gifted creative people are more intuitive than most, but also more untidy and care less about appearance. “If a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind, of what, then, is an empty desk a sign?” – Albert Einstein.
High intelligence doesn’t mean high creativity. There’s a threshold of intelligence required but divergent thinking is needed too. Can we measure creativity? Should we want to? It is easy to measure basic creativity. A common test is to name as many possible uses of a single brick in five minutes. Most of the U3A Ruthin group came up with more than 5 uses. Half produced 10 or more uses. None produced more than 20 but several came up with different uses than the 40 uses I read out to them afterwards. Easy then to test divergent thinking, however, most new ideas spring out of the blue and so can’t be tested. eg Henri Poincare (he predicted gravitational waves before Einstein) in 1905 solved a tricky mathematical problem while stepping on to a bus. Imagine the conductor yelling at Henri while the professor froze mid-step. Dépêchez-vous !
The idea of ARIA came while riding a bike up Horseshoe Pass. I was thinking of mother suffering memory loss after a stroke and I thought – thank goodness amnesia isn’t infectious but imagine the ramifications.
The exuberance of springing an original idea is wonderful but luckily many readers enjoy a familiar story explored in different contexts.
Is being creative bad? Yes, partly because of the paradox between having intelligent creativity but not being able to control it. However, on a personal level if you can weather the rejections, dismal sales, enjoy an alternative income and ignore the ‘twice as likely to commit suicide’ statistic, enjoy writing if you dare.
References:
Kaufman, S (2013). Beautiful Minds: the real link between Creativity and Mental Illness Scientific American
Kyaga S., Landén M., Boman M., Hultman C., Långström N., Lichtenstein P. (2012). Mental illness, suicide and creativity: 40-Year prospective total population study Journal of Psychiatric Research XXX 1-8
Sussman, A (2007). Mental Illness and Creativity: A Neurological View of the Tortured Artist Stanford Journal of Neuroscience, Volume One
Geoff Nelder
Exit, Pursued by Bee, mystery science fiction
Escaping Reality, humorous thriller
Hot Air, thriller
Science Fiction trilogy: ARIA
Xaghra’s Revenge, historical fantasy to be published in 2017.
Other Nelder News
Last month Solstice Publishing released my short story, The Chaos of Mokii as an ebook. It’s the first short for which I had to write a blurb, acknowledgments and select a cover art. Previously, I’d done all that for novels of over 80,000 words rather than a tale of only 3,400 words. The blurb? Mokii is a city existing only in the consciousness of its inhabitants. Olga is sitting in a train while her minds negotiates past Mokii’s bouncer and relaxes into the entertainments and infrastructure of the mind-city. She discovers a thief about to usurp the city in order to take its lucrative telepathic advertising. Does she thwart him? Yours for 99 pence or a dollar 22 cents to find out!
Grab it on Kindle http://mybook.to/ChaosOM
One of my favourite short stories is CLOCKWORK.
It’s a historical fantasy in which I’ve cheekily grabbed a day out of the life of Sir Francis Bacon in 1617 and made him and his dog experience an Earth-saving moment he had to pass on down the ages. A link to it is http://www.fictionmagazines.com/shop/realm-issues/new-realm-vol-04-no-12/
Links to buy ARIA and other of my books are on my Amazon author page http://author.to/Amazonauthorpage
ARIA: Left Luggage is only 99p give or take a few pence at the moment on Kindle so grab it at smarturl.it/1fexhs
Or via other formats http://geoffnelder.com/project/left-luggage-arial-trilogy-part-1/
Geoff facebooks at http://www.facebook.com/AriaTrilogy and tweets at @geoffnelder
The post #Writing is Bad for You? appeared first on Geoff Nelder - Science Fiction Writer.
