V.R. Leavitt's Blog, page 3
March 30, 2015
Interview – 5th Wind Nation
Hello! Today I am very happy to have Kyalamboka from 5th Wind Nation. Let’s jump right in!
Q: Tell me a little bit about 5th Wind Nation and your current plans to build a Unity Center.
A: 5th Wind Nation will be a true non-profit organization where one can go to receive the aids they need in life, i.e. food, clothing, or job assistance. We will try our best to accommodate every need. Although some services will be free, we will be partnering with other non-profit organizations.
Q: What inspired you to get into this kind of work?
A: The condition of the community has always remained the same and the politicians and religious authorities always talk of what they claim they’ll do to help the community and fix it up but most of it never gets resolved. Like, for example, at some food pantries, We’ve seen fruits and vegetables that weren’t fit for human consumption and had mold on them. Regardless if it’s a church, if you ask for help, they’ll turn you down if you don’t have the money or aren’t a member of the specific church. This is why we wanted to start a Unity Center to help others.
Q: What are some of the challenges of your work?
A: One of the main challenges is raising the funds for the building, which is why we’re doing a crowdfunding page on Indiegogo. Although it’s great to partner up with other organizations, there is a high possibility of running into scam artists. We are coming up with ways to avoid that problem. What was our biggest challenge was to maintain the building but we came up with a solution, by having a store that we will sell items from, so that everything we offer remains free. As far as administration goes, we plan on rounding up volunteers from school districts and community service programs who are trying to enter the field. Not only will they get community service credits, they will get the experience they need for the field they are applying for. Most people don’t know, that no matter how many schools you go to, if you don’t have the experience, you will not be hired.
Q: What are some of the rewarding aspects of your work?
A: One of the most rewarding aspects is that we would be able to build a better community than what we have currently. We hope to see people leave our organization to start a better life.
Our ultimate goal will be to stop the useless violence and hate crimes because of trivial reasons.
Q: What is a typical day like for you? Or are there no typical days?
A: A typical day involves us working almost 24/7 on getting funding for the project.
Q: If you could live in a book, which one would you live in?
A: I would like to live in the universe of Nadine Haynes Experience, a very old series, conceptualized back in 1999. In that universe, magic exists and magical girl-type warriors save the day!
Q: What do you do when you’re not doing work for 5th Wind Nation?
A: When we aren’t trying to promote the Unity Center campaign or working, we blow off steam by watching TV, drawing, writing, Photoshopping or watching videos online.
Q: Is there anyone who has inspired, motivated, encouraged or supported your work?
A: In terms of inspiration and motivation, H. R. Giger, the artist who did artwork for some Ridley Scott movies (i.e. Aliens, Species movies, etc), because his work taught me that no matter how different a person is, you can still make a difference or be loved if you give yourself or the other person a chance. It’s okay to be different just as long as you love who you are.
Michael Jackson, who said in a song, that if one wants to make the world a better place, they should take a look at themselves and make the change.
Sax Preacher, a minister from an organization who told me that people may say one thing, but if you listen very closely, you can hear their true voice within their words.
Martin Page, who always finds the beauty in life and always has an encouraging word to say.
Q: Do you have a favorite brand, flavor, type of coffee?
A: One of us drinks coffee, and that’s me. I love it with a lot of cream and a bit of sugar.
We both, however, love to drink tea.
Final Thoughts?
My boyfriend also have a horror/fantasy book published titled The Beloveds: The Birth that revolves around three best friends, Habiba, Luvyna and Suki with a friendship that ties them to the past and the past comes back to haunt them in the form of an evil and self-righteous extremist Billy Madison and his boys, all of whom want to take over their city Black Starlight.
Thank you so much for your time. I wish you the very best of luck! Let’s chat again soon.
A: Thank you! It was fun chatting with you! ♥
5th Wind Nation is a non-profit organization dedicated to uniting and serving people in need. By providing food, clothing, shelter and counseling, we hope to bring empowerment and unity to all.
5th Wind fulfills the community’s role and the mission of charity to anyone in need, by providing personal service that strengthens, unifies and supports all individuals, religions, families and community-based organizations.
Check out our Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and official site to learn more about us:
TWITTER: https://www.twitter.com/5thWindNation
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/FifthWindNation/
TUMBLR: https://www.fifthwindnationinc.tumblr.com/
WEBSITE: http://www.5thwinds.org
We look forward to helping out in the community and abroad!
March 25, 2015
Guest Post from author Harry Bingham
I’m Harry. That’s Harry-short-for-Henry. I’m not a closet Harriet, or Harmony, or Hilary, or Henrietta. If you met me, you would, I think, find me a fairly normal guy. A married-with-kids kind of guy.
In my writing life, however, I’m a professional cross-dresser. I write first person in the voice of a young (late-20s) woman, Fiona Griffiths. If she worries what to wear for a date, then I worry with her. If she needs to sort out make-up, or buy a skirt, o
r wonders if she’s pregnant, I’m right there with her: fingering through the make-up, trying on clothes.
For the most part, I don’t find those things either weird to do, or all that hard. I’ve been on enough shopping trips with my wife that I’ve got easily enough experience to draw on. I know to get the little things right. So a dress that I might just call “pink” or “purple” will have some whole other name in Female Land. It’ll be fuchsia or amethyst or crushed berry or something else completely. I might have to go online to check what the contemporary colour names are, but that’s fine. I’ll make sure that Fiona will end up looking at dresses in the kind of colours that people are wearing today, not five or ten years back.
(That online research is easy enough, but it does come at a price. I often get followed around by those ads that target you, based on your recent browsing history. I’m often being offered a nice pair of high-heeled shoes, or a gorgeous new amethyst skirt. The book I’m writing at the moment has a corpse who was identified via some plastic surgery that she’d had done. That incident required me to check out various plastic surgery websites – and I’m currently being followed around by ads inviting me to have breast enlargement surgery. I’m tempted . . .)
Relationships are a tad harder to write about, but only a tad. The basic chemistry of fancying someone isn’t so different, no matter what sex you are. And, yes, I personally don’t fancy tall men with flat stomachs who show me a good bit of kindness and attention, but it’s not so hard to figure that women might well find that combination attractive. I never get very detailed in my sex scenes, but I don’t think I’ve messed up wildly there either.
“But isn’t it weird for you?” people always want to ask. “Isn’t it strange writing as a woman?”
Well, kinda, but I write fiction. I make things up. Jumping into other people’s heads is my core professional skill. I’ve written historical fiction too, and thinking my way into the head of (say) a 1920s oilman and World War 1 veteran is probably a bigger ask then just switching sex. Also I don’t think anyone would question a woman’s right or ability to write as a man. I can’t see that the issue should be so different the other way round.
But finally, it certainly helps that I’m not writing women’s fiction and Fiona Griffiths is not – to put it mildly – a girly girl.
I write crime and my character is simultaneously a highly talented and tough detective and a woman with a fragile, dangerous mind. In the words of one Amazon reviewer, “it is brilliant to have such access to her beautiful, freaky mind. Fiona is an incredibly talented detective. She is similar to Lisbeth Salander, an intelligent but profoundly damaged young woman, but Fiona is less hostile and more curious, sort of a good guy sociopath.”
In the words of another reviewer, “She’s now a brilliant, awkward, socially aware but extremely awkward waif of a copper who is also explosively dangerous and somewhat ambivalent about procedures and laws, as long as she catches the criminals.”
And those things give me a fabulous combination to work with. Fiona’s astonishingly tough in situations of danger . . . but she’s absolutely hopeless at some of the most basic life skills: cooking dinner, going on dates, shopping for clothes. Likewise, she’s nothing short of a genius at matters of criminal investigation . . . but can misread social situations in the most clumsy of ways.
Probably the main reason why I chose to write as a woman was so that I could really maximise those contrasts. We’re very used to Jack Reacher type models of toughness and I wanted to get away from them altogether. So Fiona is petite – a slim 5’ 2” – but she’s extraordinarily tough and resourceful in situations of physical danger. We’re also used to the seen-it-all maverick cop having arguments with his bosses. Fiona is young, junior and female . . . but she simply refuses to act feminine and deferential, even in situations when, you know, a little deference might really help.
I think that’s probably something of a feminist agenda, but it’s definitely a gift to me as an author. Put everything here together and the hardest thing – by far – about writing as Fiona Griffiths isn’t that she’s a woman but that she’s her. An utterly unique, explosive, and surprising individual who comes roaring off the page like nothing else I’ve ever written.
I’ve absolutely no idea what it is about my mind that created this woman. I don’t know why my fairly even-tempered mind should produce this scorching force of nature. But I’m delighted that it has. My one real challenge as a writer now is to think my way into being Fiona Griffiths, then just let her be herself.
And that’s why, I think, I never really relate to people asking me whether it’s hard to write as a woman. Because novelists don’t work with stereotypes. We work with individuals. And I don’t write as some Universal Woman, I write as just one person, who just so happens to be female. It is, I’m happy to say, the best job I’ve ever had.
————
Harry Bingham is the author of The Strange Death of Fiona Griffiths, which can be found here on Amazon. He also runs the Writers’ Workshop and Agent Hunter, websites which help first-time writers improve their skills and find literary agents.
March 18, 2015
Interview – Dog Trainer, Karen Peak
Hello! Today I am very happy to have my friend, Dog Trainer, Karen Peak here! Let’s jump right in.
Q: How long have you been training dogs either as a hobby or professionally?
A: I began formally training my first dog in 1982. I was 12 and that was the youngest the local obedience club would let me join. However, they made an exception for my younger sister as Dad knew the head trainer.
Q: What inspired you to get into dog training?
A: I am not sure really. It was a combination of things. My mother had showed in Obedience before I was born and when I was little. My father dabbled too. I have always felt very at ease with animals.
Q: What are some of the challenges of your work?
A: First is getting owners and other trainers to realize that the methods many of us were trained in decades ago are based in basically junk science and poorly done research into animal behavior. Animals learn far better when we get rid of chokes, prongs, shocks, alpha rolls and ear tweaks and focus on instead motivation in a positive manner. Alpha is a myth that needs to be put to bed – even in wolves Alpha is a myth. Hierarchies are more fluid. Second is owner compliance. No matter what work trainers do if the owners are not doing the work from management to behavioral modification, the results will not be as desired. Then we have to remember that dogs are thinking creatures and just because we feel they should do X (like love dog parks), the individual dog may have his own ideas. I cringe where I hear owners say Sparky has to do this because I want him to. Well Sparky may not like other dogs, Great Aunt Edna picking up him or Sally dressing him like a dolly. Respect that.
Q: What are some of the rewarding aspects of your work?
A: Clients who are willing to be reasonable, rational, do the work and management and even seek a behaviorist I recommend if I determine that the dog is past my skill set. These are the ones who have the greatest chance of success on various levels.
Q: What is a typical day like for you? Or are there no typical days?
A: There are no typical days. Every client is different and every situation is different.
Q: Are there any misconceptions about your profession that you’d like to clear up?
A: We are not the Dog Whisperer – in fact he has done more to set back the science behind learning and training decades. All I can say is Google Dog Whisperer and dangers then go look for the behavioral breakdown often called Showdown With Holly. Then go to the Pet Professional Guild and learn how to choose a good trainer. Good training and behavioral work is not flash, mystical moves and energy. It takes time, it takes work, and it takes willingness to understand it can be boring and tedious. When you use methods seen on TV, you will do more harm than good in the long run.
Q: You’ve written a book and many articles about dog training. What is the writing process like for
you?
A: Abstract. All I can say is at any point in time I have ten to twenty articles drafted that I pull out and finish when needed. I am glad with my books that I self-publish and have no time frame. There are times I have to just put it down for a few months and take a break. Then there is oh well, waiting too long due to weather and other factors to take pictures and now winter has hit. I write off the top of my head, what comes to me as a topic – unless I am asked to cover something specific.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: I am trying to finish the follow up to “Am I Ready for A(nother) Puppy or Dog?” This second and yet to be titled book will serve two purposes. It will act as a guide for my own clients. Instead of giving them handouts and such, I would like to give them a more professional looking book. Second will be a guide for dog owners to get them started and understanding various things in a shorter format. I also have a book started on parenting from the view of a dog trainer. I have been working on it for years, no rush but I think I should push more before the kids are grown and out of the house.
Q: Are you currently reading anything, if so, what?
A: I am finishing the Pine Deep Trilogy by Jonathan Maberry – again. One of those series I will read over and over.
Q: Are you listening to any music currently that you’d like to tell us about?
A: Savatage, Alice Cooper, generally classic rock.
Q: What’s the best movie you’ve seen recently?
A: Hmmm… Recently, not much. However one of my favorite movies is Tucker and Dale vs Evil. The hidden story is about how what you see may not be what is reality.
Q: What do you do when you’re not training and showing dogs?
A: I sub teach, write, read, blog and watch horror movies. Pretty boring.
Q: Is there anyone who has inspired, motivated, encouraged or supported your dog training?
A: Mostly my friends and fellow trainers. I have found many of them encouraging and helpful. I hate to name names but they know who they are.
Q: Do you have a favorite brand, flavor, type of coffee?
A: Not really. I tend to drink Wegman’s brand at home – decaf generally 
Going to decaf was not fun but was a necessity. I do have to admit that my go to when out is often McDonald’s iced vanilla when I am not at Starbucks.
Final thoughts?
I am me. It has taken me years to get where I am and will take years to get to where I want to me. I am always learning. It has also taken me years to realize that I do not need approval from others to be me. Yes I have to live within social norms but I refuse to be a “soccer mom” though people assume because of the front I put on that I am. Get to know me, I am far from that stereotype. I am not perfect and refuse to be. But I love working with dogs and kids. Life has no owner’s manual so I am just winging it!
Thank you so much for your time. I wish you the very best of luck! Let’s chat again soon.
A: And thank you for doing this! It was fun!
Karen’s Bio:
I was raised in Massachusetts and moved to VA when I was 27. I am married with a son and a daughter. I live in a multispecies household and substitute teach. I am a published writer, started blogging recently so I can share more of my works from the local news paper with others since I am not paid for my writing nor am I on the paper’s e-version. Therefore blogging lets me share my work and expand upon my word limit.
I also started the Safe Kids/Safe Dogs Project in 2000.
https://westwinddogtraining.wordpress.com
March 13, 2015
Short Story – “The Hole”
Hey everybody, I have some exciting news. I entered a three round writing competition and out of the 30 people in my heat, I placed fourth which means I advance to the second round. For the contest, we were given a character, an activity and a genre. For my heat it was a prison warden, fishing and action/adventure. It was one of those stories where I had a solid beginning, but no idea where it might go. Sometimes that’s great and sometimes, it’s terrible. I am happy to say I’m really glad how this one turned out and I wanted to share it with you. I hope you like it.
That cloud was trouble. There wasn’t any bad weather forecasted, but the Atlantic waters off the coast of Florida never kept any weatherman’s promise.
Paul scanned the horizon from the stern of his old, beat-up Boston Whaler Montauk named “Jail Break.” The water was calm, the sun warmed the air. A perfect day for the noble art of fishing and thinking. Or as his wife liked to say, fishing and drinking. She was half right. At fifty-four years old, he didn’t drink much anymore, but he liked being by himself.
Paul cast a line out and waited. Everything was just right…except for that cloud. It wasn’t menacing, it was just off somehow. Maybe it wasn’t the cloud at all. Maybe it was something else.
Goddamn Nolan. Inmate number 7039460, Brevard County Jail. He was what Warden Paul Howell would call a model inmate. He’d been incarcerated for grand theft of an ice cream truck that he took on a joy ride. His ride ended when he crashed into a retention pond. To his credit, Nolan never denied what he did, surprisingly was not drunk or high at the time of his arrest, and even told the arresting officer that he had planned to take the truck to a local children’s hospital to treat the kids. Altruistic as it seemed, grand theft was still grand theft, and Nolan was a repeat offender.
“I’m not going to have any trouble with you, am I?” Paul asked Nolan.
“No sir. Just want to do my time and get out.”
They all said the same thing. Bunch of liars. But for some reason, the skinny man with unkempt sandy blond hair, seemed different. Whether it was his wide childlike eyes, or the way he sat in the chair fidgeting with a loose string on his jumpsuit, Paul didn’t know, but a part of him wanted to believe that Nolan was genuine; that there was a guy on this earth that would steal an ice cream truck for the sole purpose of surprising some kids. But it was probably bullshit.
It was smooth sailing until Nolan had been given a new cellmate. He’d gotten along fine with his previous one, but the morning after they’d paired him with the new guy, Nolan called for the guards. The officers reported to Paul that Nolan, just as calm as can be, told them he’d beaten his cellmate down because he was a pedophile. Paul checked the records and sure enough, there was a charge for sexual abuse of a child. He was going to be all right, but he’d definitely be spending time in the infirmary. The question was what to do with Nolan?
“Should we put him in the hole?” one of the guards asked.
“Yes. No…not yet. Bring him here,” Paul said.
The two guards shared a glance that suggested they disagreed completely with their warden.
Not good.
Minutes later they returned with a handcuffed Nolan and sat him down. Paul leaned on the edge of his desk and rubbed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “I thought you said you weren’t going to give me any trouble?”
“Well, sir, I didn’t want to. And honestly, I ain’t caused you any trouble. Just my celly. He’s a bad person.” One of the guards behind Nolan snickered.
Paul shook his head. “I got news for you, kid. This is a prison. It’s full of bad people. A lot of people would say that since you’re here, that you are a bad person.”
“But, ain’t bad. I never hurt anybody.”
“You don’t think that stealing people’s property, repeatedly, doesn’t hurt people? You sure as hell hurt your celly, don’t you think?”
“He–”
“He what? Deserved it? You and me could go round and round about that, but it doesn’t really matter. I can’t have you doing this. You said you wanted to do your time and get out. This could lead to even more time.”
“I ain’t never done nothing like this before, and I swear I won’t do it again, but I just can’t be cellies with a pedophile. One of them sons of bitches killed my daughter.”
There was that look again. That wide-eyed, childlike pleading look.
“Is that true?”
Paul’s shoulders slumped. He was thinking of a way to work something else out, when he saw the two guards sharing the same look as before. A warden couldn’t show weakness in front of his guards any more than the prisoners could show weakness around each other.“I may be a lot of things, but I’m not a liar. They never caught that bastard though.”
He straightened up and rolled his shoulders back. “I’ve got to do something with you. If I don’t…it’s going to look bad.”
“I know, but you gotta understand–”
“I don’t have to understand anything, Nolan. I have to do my job. You’ve beat a man within an inch of his life, and I don’t have much choice other than the put you in the SHU while we figure things out.”
“No! Please! I can’t go in the hole. I can’t!” Nolan scrambled to his feet, but the two guards behind him grabbed his shoulders and dragged him out of the office. The last thing Paul saw was Nolan’s eyes imploring him to change his mind, but it was too late. Still, it felt all wrong. Who wouldn’t want to beat down a pedophile? Especially when… But the prison had a zero tolerance policy on inmate violence, and for the most part, it worked. Most of the time, Paul thought they deserved the hole, but sometimes he had his doubts as to whether it was fair or not. The looks on their faces when they came out was eerie. Haunted. Men with tear streaked faces, and dull eyes. A lot of guys went in one way and came out different. Off somehow.
Kind of like that cloud in the sky. It hadn’t really grown, but it was still there. Lurking.
There was a tug on Paul’s line. He pulled the rod back and started to reel the fish in. It wasn’t huge, but it was putting up a good fight. It’d probably be big enough to fry up and eat for dinner. Other fish started jumping out of the water as he reeled his in. Bluefish. No doubt about it. He reeled it in and gently worked the hook out of its lip as it stared back up at him with its dark, fathomless eye. It reminded him of Nolan.
“Dammit,” he said as he tossed the fish into the sea water filled bin next to him. The fish swam furiously in the bin, and made thumping noises against the sides. This was supposed to be taking his mind off of the prison, yet here he was putting a creature into a tiny box against its will. He considered calling the jail and telling them to take Nolan out of the hole.
Thunder rumbled. Paul stood straight up and looked at the sky. The troubling cloud was now a front. A bolt of lightning shot down toward the water.
Paul hurried to the helm of his boat and turned the key. Nothing. He turned it again, but got the same result. “Come on!” Thunder cracked through the sky, closer this time. He took a quick look back and the front was on him. He kicked the steering column and gave the key another furious turn. The old engine came to life as fat raindrops smacked the windshield.
He’d made it maybe twenty yards when a bolt of lightning struck the boat. The force of it knocked Paul backwards, through a tangle of rope and cast net. He slammed his head on the back of the boat. As darkness tugged at the edge of his vision, he smelled sulphur and heard the engine die.
“No. Please, no.” Paul heard a voice, but he couldn’t place it, but then realized it was his own. Every part of him hurt. He didn’t open his eyes fo
r fear of what he’d see. His head was all fog and dizziness, and he felt like he was floating, but when he tried to move his arms and legs, they were stuck in place. His ears rang and the smell of salt and burnt fiberglass filled his nose. With a jolt, he remembered being overtaken by the storm.
He slowly opened his eyes, or at least thought he did. All he saw was darkness. He wiggled his hands and realized he was submerged in water except for his shoulders and head. Still unsure of what he was tangled in, he tried to pull himself up, but banged his head into something solid. Exquisite pain shot through his already aching skull. His boat had capsized and overturned, and from what he could gather, he was underneath, lashed to his boat by line and his cast net.
No light of any kind played through the water. He found his voice and called for help a few times. The sound of his voice rising in panic scared him. He heard cries like that before. Some of the guys put into the hole would yell for help, for their moms, for death itself. No more yelling for now. The throbbing in his head continued, and he felt nauseated. Concussion? Probably. Either that or sea sickness. Wouldn’t that just be a hoot?
“Yeah, that would be funny. Wouldn’t it, sir?” a voice said.
“Who’s there?”
“Nobody. Not at least according to you. To you, we’re just a bunch of dumb dogs, aren’t we? Found drugs in your cell? Stick ‘em in the hole. Mouth off to a guard? Stick ‘em in the hole. Beat up your celly because all you can see is the face of the asshole that killed your daughter? Stick ‘em in–”
“That’s not fair! I didn’t want to put Nolan in the hole.”
“But you did it anyway.”
“This isn’t happening.”
“Which part? Talking to me or you being trapped under your boat? Because you’re definitely talking to me and you’re definitely trapped under your boat.”
Paul closed his eyes and shook his head. Maybe he was still unconscious from his fall.
“You’re not.”
Unexpected emotion rose up in him. He yelled for help as hard and loud as he could for
as long as his throat could take it, and when he was done, his arms were numb from being tangled ever tighter, and he struggled for breath. The only sounds in return were the faint ringing in his ears and the gentle lapping of the water against the sides of the turtled “Jail Break.” He tried to untangle himself with the thought he could climb onto the bottom of the boat and signal for help, or maybe sleep, but the more he struggled against his ties, the more tangled he became. Frustrated and exhausted, he rested his head against his shoulder and dozed off.
Wild dreams spun in his mind. Tattooed prisoners, going into the SHU like men, but coming out as scared children with tear streaked faces. Fish swimming madly in a bucket, thrashing so hard against the walls that their bodies broke into pieces. Worse than any of that was the feeling of dread, of complete aloneness. The feeling of not knowing if you’d ever see the sun again, let alone the people you cared about, that’s if they still even cared about you.
Paul startled awake by inhaling a lungful of salt water. After he finished coughing and gagging, he opened his eyes to the darkness again. Pitch black. Impossible to tell how long he’d been asleep, if he could even call it sleep. He was also lower in the water than before. If he pulled himself up and touched the boat with his head, his chin barely cleared the water. The “Prison Break” was taking on water.
“Yes sir, it is.”
“No, please no.”
“No what? No despair? No hatred? No hoping your death comes quickly because that’s the only way out of this? No. You get all of those things.”
“Why?”
“Nobody is arguing the people in your prison don’t deserve to be in prison, but the SHU? Really? That’s your solution to everything even though you know it doesn’t work. Nolan almost convinced you, but you did it anyway. Too worried about what your little punk guards thought than doing the right thing. You’re the boss, Paul. You. Not them.”
He opened his mouth to speak, but it filled with water. He tilted his face up and spit it out. Clearance was down to maybe 5 inches now.
“Uh oh. Getting a little desperate?”
“I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry. Just try harder. You’re better than this, Paul. Be a leader.”
“I will. I promise. But how will I get out of–” Water flowed into his mouth. He spit it out one last time and took as big a breath as he could, then went under. He opened his eyes under the water, felt the sting of the saltwater burn his tired eyes. He also noticed a light. It was all around him, radiating through the water. This was it. This was his time. He thought of his wife as he closed his eyes again. He hoped she thought of him as a good person. Hoped she knew he loved her. Wished he could turn all of his wrongs into rights.
He blew some air out of his mouth. Then a little more, and a little more until his lungs were almost empty. He parted his lips slightly ready to breathe in as much water as he could. It would be the first time he’d breathe liquid since he came into this world. Then he felt something slip into his mouth. Plastic. A mouthpiece of some kind. He opened his eyes and saw the blurry figure of a man in front of him. The man gave the “Okay” symbol and then air filled Paul’s mouth. He took a breath, the first breath of a new life. The man sliced away the netting and rope, and in a few minutes Paul was free. The diver guided Paul out from under the boat and to the surface. Paul squinted against the morning sun, tears streaked down his face.
The man who saved him was a scuba instructor taking an early dive with a friend when they saw the turtled “Jail Break.” They almost hadn’t gone diving at all since the storm the day before had likely stirred up sediment, making for unfavorable dive conditions.
“I sure am glad you decided to dive today. What’s your name?” Paul asked the diver.
“Dave. But most people call me by my last name.”
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
“Nolan.”
“You don’t say.”
“Glad we could help. Maybe you can get somebody out of a bind, someday. You know, pay it forward.”
“I plan to.”
March 11, 2015
Guest Post – Author, Andrea Michaels
What inspired me to write Reflections of a Successful Wallflower – Lessons in Business; Lessons in Life?
I have a textbook situation. My mother influenced my entire life. I yearned for her recognition (never to come, by the way). And that dynamic was destructive. As my mother was a Type A Narcissist, any word of criticism or leading to my recognizing that she was less than perfection itself would have caused a breach in our relationship, unhealthy as it might have been.
So, I waited. And I stored up my feelings. Until she died I was not comfortable revealing my thoughts about her, nor some of my relationships. I didn’t want to be judged by her, and judged I would have been for the bad choices I made. The positive things I revealed would have been ignored.
I made mistakes. Lots of them. In the process I learned a lot of lessons. My career is in the Events Industry. When I started, there was no industry. Everything I did was trial and error with no role model, no classes, no books to read. As my career developed and I created (with a very few others) the industry that is world recognized today, I wanted to share my experiences and those lessons learned. I wanted to show that adversities could be overcome and give specific lessons on how to do so.
I do believe that the same set of skills are needed to nurture personal relationships as are needed to develop business relationships. I also believe that stress is not necessary and there are ways of avoiding it.
So if I can empower, inspire, teach, mentor or even simply entertain, then the book has done its job.
Andrea Michaels is the president of multiple award-winning Extraordinary Events . EE just took home its 39th Special Events magazine Gala Award. Andrea was presented with the Steve Kemble Leadership Award during The Special Event in January 2015, adding to numerous personal honors, including the Pillar of the Industry Gala and the Event Solution Hall of Fame awards. She is the author of Reflections of a Successful Wallflower – Lessons in Business; Lessons in Life and co-author of three other business books - Stepping Stones to Success with Deepak Chopra and Jack Canfield; Yes You Can with authors Dr. Warren Bennis and Jim Rohn and Bushido Business – The Art of the Modern Professional with Tom Hopkins, Brian Tracy and Stephen M.R. Covey.
Follow Andrea on https://www.facebook.com/pages/Extraordinary-Events/;https://www.facebook.com/pages/Reflections-of-a-Successful-Wallflower-Lessons-in-Business-Lessons-in-Life/ and Twitter @extraordinaryev.
February 21, 2015
Interview – Author, Christine Haggerty
As part of author Nancy Chase’s, “The Seventh Magpie” book launch extravaganza, I’ll be interviewing a series of participating authors. Check out all the interviews here.
Q: What compelled you to write your first book?
A: My compelling reason to write my first book was that I was approached by a publisher. He had read some of the pieces I posted on my blog and asked if I had an idea for a novel and if I’d want a contract. Yep, it really happened like that. That’s when I started my young adult series, The Plague Legacy. Acquisitions was released in December 2013 and Assets will be coming out in April 2015.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: At this very moment, I am revising a second fairy tale novella, a version of Hansel and Gretel that I’ve titled One, Two, Blood on my Shoe. It’s part of a collection that includes my first novella, Pretty Things.
Q: What are you currently reading?
A: I am currently reading Of Tangible Ghosts by L.E. Modesitt, Jr. I met the author at a conference called Life, the Universe, and Everything Symposium and he bought me a diet Pepsi and shared his fries and recommended it because I have some history background.
Q: Where you have lived and what you have experienced can influence your writing in many ways. Are there any specific locations or experiences that have popped up in your books?
A: I grew up very poor. We lived in a dome made of high school gymnasium scraps. No indoor plumbing (outhouse). Subsistence farming with a lot of hunting/gathering to survive. My dad was determined to stay off the grid and out of the world after Vietnam. That kind of survival shows up in the world of The Plague Legacy. The Grimm Chronicles, my fairy tale novellas, have more of a snarky sassiness to them that reflects some of my personality.
Q: What is your writing space like? Do you have a designated space? What does it look like? On the couch, laptop, desk? Music? Lighting? Typing? Handwriting?
A: I have a nice little office in my basement that has all of my favorite things, like books and dragons and fairies, but I tend to work all over the house. If I can, I stand up while I write because I like to move around a lot while I think. If it’s nice outside, I to work out on my deck.
Thank you so much for your time. I wish you the very best of luck! Let’s chat again soon.
A: Chat…and have very big cups of coffee.
YES!! Great plan.
Haggert Pretty Things Blurb:
When Maddie’s father catches her with a boy, he hauls her into town in a pig wagon and finders her a husband. But Peter’s cabin in the woods promises something very different than Maddie’s happily ever after.
Pretty Things, a retelling of “The Robber Bridegroom,” is the first novella in the Grimm Chronicles series. Warning: not your granny’s fairytales!
Christine Haggerty Bio:
Christine Nielson Haggerty grew up in rural Utah with three brothers, a sister, several chickens, a goat, and an outhouse. She always loved the escape of fantasy and the art of writing, and her passion for life is to craft stories of strength and survival.
As a former high school language arts teacher and a black belt in karate, Christine has found a niche in combining those skills to help authors write effective fight scenes.
The author of the award-winning young adult series The Plague Legacy, she is now launching her fairytale novella series The Grimm Chronicles.
Links for Christine Haggerty:
www.christinehaggertyauthor.com
www.wattpad.com/ChristineHaggerty
Facebook: Christine Haggerty, Author
Twitter: @chaggerty99
Amazon: www.amazon.com/Christine-Haggerty
Goodreads: www.goodreads.com/author/show/7468114.Christine_Haggerty
Author’s Combat Academy: www.authorscombatacademy.com
Interview – Author, Satis
Q: How long have you been writing either as a hobby or professionally?
A: I’ve written, in one form or another, for as long as I can remember. The first ‘book’ I ever wrote was Star Trek fan fiction when I was about eleven years old. I ended up writing a series of four stories, and my mother had it printed and bound. It was so exciting to hold my work in my hands!
Q: What compelled you to write your first book?
A: As cheesy as it sounds, my son. After we read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings as bedtime stories, I wanted to create a world like Tolkien’s that we could discover and explore together. That was more than three years ago, and although he’s almost eleven, we still read new chapters together at night.
Q: What are currently reading?
A: Nancy Chase’s The Seventh Magpie, of course! I’m only a few chapters in, but I’m loving it so far. I’m also re-reading a book called The Last Death of Tev Chrisini, by Jennifer Bresnick. A while ago I tried to get into the Gormenghast novels by Mervyn Peake, but I had to put it aside because it was too dense. Technically I consider myself still reading it since I never finished it, but it may take me a while to get back to it. In general I prefer to read books by new and unknown authors—I like to think I can support them in some small way!
Q: Where you have lived and what you have experienced can influence your writing in many ways. Are there any specific locations or experiences that have popped up in your books?
A: Oh, absolutely. I grew up in a lot of places, but most memorable was probably the years my family spent in Switzerland. There’s a setting in the second Redemption of Erâth book that is taken directly from a small alpine lake that I once hiked to with my father. You approach it from below along a narrow dirt path, and the last few yards you have to climb up near-vertical rock. When you pry yourself over the edge, there’s this crystal clear lake reflecting the sky back at you, surrounded by grass fields and scree. It’s absolutely breathtaking.
Q: Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?
A: My stories inevitably deal with darkness and despair, because it’s such an enormous part of my own life. If there was anything I’d want people to take away, it’s that darkness and depression are a part of life, and sometimes there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. You persevere anyway, as best as you can, until you die. My—that’s gloomier than I intended!
Anything else you’d like to share?
A: Gosh, anything else? I love heavy metal and cats. I hear the internet has lots of both. I was a musician and composer in a past life, and I like to pretend I’ll be famous one day for my symphonies. Or writing. Either’s good.
Thank you so much for your time. I wish you the very best of luck! Let’s chat again soon.
A: Thank you for having me! This is my first author interview; I feel dreadfully important now.
Bio: Satis began writing stories from childhood and studied music composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. His twin loves of music and writing have stayed with him throughout his life, and he regularly introduces his son to new music, as well as writing bedtime stories for them to read together. He currently lives with his wife and their son in northern New Jersey.
The Redemption of Erâth blurb: In the fallen world of Erâth, a place overrun by the forces of Darkness, a young boy is taken in by his grandfather when his parents perish in a fire at his birth. Feared and misunderstood by everyone around him, Brandyé Dui-Erâth grows up alone, save for a single family who sees the sadness in his heart.
Through his grandfather’s many fireside tales, Brandyé begins to learn the true nature of the world around him. As Darkness and its creatures begin to creep into the once-safe lands of Consolation, he discovers that he has a connection to the long-forgotten ancient world. As events force him down a path of ever-growing danger, he finds his destiny is to suffer both joy and sorrow, and to learn the true nature of Darkness and Death.
The Redemption of Erâth: Consolation is the first in a series of novels chronicling the epic journey of Brandyé Dui-Erâth through the dark and terrifying world of Erâth – a journey that will take him to the ends of land and time and put the salvation of all men in his hands.
Links: http://satiswrites.com/; http://www.amazon.com/Redemption-Erâth-Consolation-Satis-ebook/dp/B00LZQHFHE/; http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8404535.Satis/
February 20, 2015
Interview- Author, Scott Kaelen
As part of author Nancy Chase’s, “The Seventh Magpie” book launch extravaganza, I’ll be interviewing a series of participating authors. Check out all the interviews here.
Today I’m very pleased to have author, Scott Kaelen!
Q: What are some of the challenges of your work?
A: The human life is so short that a day can’t go by when we don’t learn something new. Even seventy good years of living only amount to six hundred thousand hours. And so when you want to craft a story – any story – there is always research to be done, there’s always characterisation to be pondered over. Even the darkest and dirtiest story needs a literary shine, and to achieve that you need to do two things. The first is to learn how to write, not just to vomit words onto a manuscript and consider it a piece of art when it’s really a steaming mess. The second is to delve right into the heart of your story, be it a piece of flash fiction or the world setting of an epic fantasy series. Time is short, and mastering an art not only takes a lot of time, but it’s also something that very few writers can lay claim to achieving. Me, I’ve barely bested the foot-hills of the moutain, so far.
For the Verragos Tapestry, and the ongoing creation of world and story, it’s been a huge exploration of self and an incredible journey into languages and etymology, geography and geology, human society through the ages, cosmology, and a whole host of other interesting areas of research.
My short story When Gods Awaken is less than 5000 words long, but there’s a lot to be found in those words, between the humour. I researched physics, the Big Bang and other astronomical phenomena, the book of Genesis and the creation myth, Earth history from the time when neanderthals and gigantopithecus were still around, and much more. But people don’t see all that on a conscious level when they read it, though hopefully it shows on a subconscious level, or a further read-through, and adds to the overall experience.
Q: What compelled you to write your first book?
A: 2011 was the year I realised I wanted to be a writer. It was a long-overdue realisation, after having been an avid reader of fantasy, science fiction and horror novels from the age of seven until the age of thirty … (mumble) … until today. At the time, I was studying Tolkien’s Arda, which is to Middle Earth what Earth is to Europe; people don’t realise how much richly-detailed lore they’re missing out on when they only know about The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.
I remember thinking to myself, “I love this. This is world-building at its finest. I want to do that.” So I began. And boy did I not realise how steep a learning curve it would be to become not just a writer, but a good writer. So while I’d received my catalyst to write, those first attempts at creating stories were appalling, because I hadn’t learned how to polish and tighten my prose. I know when a story is polished enough to be shared with the world, and my time for sharing came in 2014 when I began releasing my short stories and poems between September and January.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: I’m simultaneously juggling with my current work-in-progress, which will be the first novel-length story of my Verragos Tapestry series; updating the Encyclopedia Verragos and adding all its spoiler-free content to my brand new author website; putting the final touches to the German-language edition of my short story, Bleak ‘93; and also thinking ahead to future planned instalments of the Verragos Tapestry and other projects, both fiction and non-fiction.
The novel I’m working on now is called The Blighted City, and is currently half-finished. I’m really excited about this one since it will be my first published novel.
Q: If you could live in one of your books, which one would you live in?
A: I don’t have to think about this at all. I’d live on Verragos, the world of my epic fantasy series, the Verragos Tapestry. Verragos is undoubtedly the most richly detailed setting I’ve created, and the best part is that I know some of its juiciest and darkest secrets, which the reader won’t be privy to until future instalments (unless they pick up some of the subtle breadcrumbs I’ll be dropping throughout, not only in the Verragos Tapestry entries, but also in some of my other releases.) To quote my website: The world of Verragos is rich and colourful, dark and bleak. From the lush and verdant Palominos Pastures to the magnificent Bleeding Falls. From the snowscapes of Thylea to the treacherous Stone Jungles at the farthest reaches of the world. There are places on Verragos to please the fairest of souls, and the cruelest of hearts.
That being said, I would also love to visit the Earth of 200,000 years ago to witness Cosmos descend from the stormy skies, and listen to his hilarious conversations with his First Man. Many of the worlds of my short stories I would not like to visit, as they are often bleak, dystopic, rotting horror-filled nightmares, either literally or psychologically. Even the story When Gods Awaken would be my idea of hell, which is precisely why I decided to parody the creation myth in the first place.
Q: Where you have lived and what you have experienced can influence your writing in many ways. Are there any specific locations or experiences that have popped up in your books?
A: Absolutely. There’s always at least a grain of my own personal experiences in each of my stories.
Bleak ‘93 is set in what was a polarising year for me personally – at once both devastating and fantastically unforgettable. As for the story’s characters and setting, throughout my life I have witnessed too many people to whom the parents in Bleak ‘93 are far too reminiscent.
The short story Falling, featured in From Grains To Galaxies, is based on a dream I had when I was four or five years old. At least, my adult brain tells me it was a dream now. Perhaps it wasn’t!
Island in the Sands is also loosely based on a dream I had, this one being when I was about seven or eight years old.
Moses Garrett and Angerland are strongly based (in foundation) on the town in England I used to live in until several years ago, and a particular moment in a specific alleyway. The character of Moses is also loosely based on certain elements of myself.
Not many of the characters in my stories are moulded from people I’ve known, but many of their characteristics are of course based on people whose lives have brushed past my own, or affected me in some other way, be it for good or bad.
Final thoughts?
Anyone interested in learning a little more about me, my books, the Encyclopedia Verragos, and a bunch of other stuff including a blog and a gallery of my sketches, can visit my brand new website here. There are also links to my Kindle and paperback releases on Amazon and Createspace, as well as free PDF downloads of (at the moment) three of my releases – Bleak ‘93, Moses Garrett / Angerland, and Night of the Taking (complete with the full first chapter of my upcoming novel.)
Thank you so much for your time. I wish you the very best of luck! Let’s chat again soon.
A: Thanks, Vanessa. I always love a good interview! Next time I’ll bring Battenberg cake, and camphorwood for the fire.
Sounds like a plan to me! 
Author Biography
Scott Kaelen writes in the genres of fantasy, science fiction, horror, humour, speculative and contemporary fiction, poetry and non-fiction. His releases include the prose and poetry collection From Grains To Galaxies; the religious parody and criticism collection When Gods Awaken; and the short story Night of the Taking, the first instalment into his epic fantasy series, the Verragos Tapestry.
His current projects include a collection of tough-themed essays and a novel entitled The Blighted City, the first major release in the Verragos Tapestry series following the introductory Night of the Taking.
As well as the pen, he is also modestly adept with the pencil; his work includes concept character designs for his characters, and sketches of famous personalities.
His other interests include sci-fi, fantasy and horror (in written word, and on the small and big screens), etymology, psychology, computer RPGs, deep Earth history, palaeontology, geology and cosmology.
He’s also been known to flosculate.
Though thankfully not too often.
R elease Blurbs
When Gods Awaken – The beginning is a good place to go wrong, some say, but there’s a certain deity who omnipotently disagrees. Forget all you thought you knew about the first moments of existence, and prepare to have your beliefs played with, tickled, spanked, stretched across spacetime and shattered into so many irrelevant motes of stardust. Travel back to before creation itself, and witness what happens… When Gods Awaken. This definitive edition of When Gods Awaken is chock-full with bonus material, but remember: Be not desirous of his dainties, for they are deceitful meat…
Bleak ‘93 – Callum Fisher’s life with his parents has been a survival from one bleak year to the next, and it needs to change. A particular day in 1993 seems just like any other day in Callum’s miserable life, but soon he will discover that the biggest of changes take only a moment of bravery.
Containing the equally tough-themed bonus poem Playroom.
Moses Garrett / Angerland – The past is plundered. The present rots with avarice and excess. In a time not so distant, a transitory altercation fuels Moses Garrett’s empty existence with reason.
When a good guy is pushed too far, you’d do well to run.
One dystopic vision, two versions – prose and poem.
This is the future.
From Grains To Galaxies – From Grains To Galaxies is an exploration of wonder and dread, beauty and terror. It’s a trek through the scenes of deep millennia, from sandy dreamscapes to apocalyptic nightmares, from Earth’s fiery beginning to it’s infernal end, from gleaming future vistas to the darkest era of the universe. It traverses life’s moments from birth till death, exposing a plethora of emotions and experiences between and beyond, in all their naked truths. It grabs the genres of science fiction, horror, contemporary and speculative fiction, epic and comic fantasy and slipstream by the fragiles and casts them into the forge, melting them at high temperatures.
Are your bags packed? Have you said your goodbyes? Then it’s time to start this journey. All that’s left is to open the forge and reach for what’s inside…
The Verragos Tapestry: Night of the Taking – Decades ago, the Volami opened the walls of their shining city of Midhallow and invited the surrounding tribesfolk to venture within. Now, the two races dwell together inside the city, not quite as equals, and watched over by the ever-present Retainers. A treaty, offered by the tribes to the Volami, was to seal their tenuous union during a long-held ritual. But it was a ruse. The celebrations became the bloodiest treachery the Volami would ever know, and set in motion events that would echo down the ages.
Includes the short story Night of the Taking, three Verragos maps, one character sheet, two creature sheets, and an exclusive full first chapter of the upcoming novel The Blighted City.
Links
Facebook Verragos Tapestry Page
Twitter Profile
Amazon Global Author Page Link
Google+ Verragos Tapestry Page
Interview – Artist, Katrina Sesum
As part of author Nancy Chase’s, “The Seventh Magpie” book launch extravaganza, I’ll be interviewing a series of participating authors. Check out all the interviews here.
Today I am very happy to have artist and illustrator of “The Seventh Magpie” Katrina Sesum!
Q: How long have you been drawing/painting either as a hobby or professionally?
A: Like most people I started drawing at an early age; drawing is universal amongst children, and I was no different. I continued to draw and make things for my own enjoyment as I grew up, and it was only when I began showing my work online that I started to seriously consider it as a career.
Q: What are some of the rewarding aspects of your work?
A: Sometimes I will get a comment, an e-mail or a message some other way from someone who knows nothing else of me but my art, and they will express to me their thoughts and views of a particular painting, matching perfectly with my own intent for the piece. For me, a major purpose of art is communication. In that way I see my art as like a beacon saying “I am here”, and it’s always nice when someone waves back, “I see you”.
Q: What is a typical day like for you? Or are there no typical days?
A: Even being self employed, I prefer to keep something of a regular, but flexible, schedule. I am always free to start work on something else if inspiration starts tugging, but having a timetable of sorts is a useful safety net for those days when making a decision is the last thing my mind wants to do and I can simply run on autopilot.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: Bookbinding is taking a lot of my time currently, but I’m always working on new paintings in the background. Moths are a current favourite, and I’m quietly working away on writing and illustrating some personal fairy tales.
Q: What are you currently reading?
A: I tend to have several books on the go at any given time. The current main three are Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, His Dark Materials trilogy, and Otter Country.
Q: How do you balance out the artist’s life and the rest of life? Do you get up early? Stay up late? Ignore friends and family for certain periods of time?
A: I’m introverted and very much a night owl, so I am often up late working alone. Night time is when I naturally gravitate to wanting to create. Day time is better spent on other people, and getting the business side of things in order, responding to e-mails, posting out work, etc.
Q: What do you do when you’re not art?
A: Baking is a favourite, along with roaming the woods and fields where I live. I’m also a fairly avid gamer.
Q: What is your creative space like? Do you have a designated space? What does it look like?
A: Messy, but efficient. Whatever I’m working on, I like to have all the materials close to hand, and not need to go in and out of drawers. I don’t clean up at the end of each day, I clean up at the end of a project. The items I use most, such as ink and pencils, never get put away and have become a permanent fixture of all my work spaces.
Q: Do you have a favorite brand, flavor, type of coffee?
A: A good gingerbread latte and I’m happy.
You can find out more about Katrina and her work here:
Website: www.katrinasesum.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/katrinasesum
Shop: http://www.etsy.com/shop/kaelycea
February 19, 2015
Interview – Author, Andy Peloquin
As part of author Nancy Chase’s, “The Seventh Magpie” book launch extravaganza, I’ll be interviewing a series of participating authors. Check out all the interviews here.
Today, I’m happy to have Andy Peloquin!
Q: What inspired you to get into writing?
A: I’ve always envied artists, with their ability to sit and draw for hours on end. They seem to draw their inspiration from everything, and they’re content to practice their art. I guess writing was sort of my way to be creative and tap into my inner artist–the one I could never let out with a pen and paper. I use my words to paint pictures.
Q: What are you working on at the moment?
A: It’s a dark fantasy novel–demons, assassins, the murder of innocents, secret religious orders, shadow police, torture, and death. I like dark fantasy, but instead of focusing on monsters and terrors in the night, I like to bring out the darker side of human nature. That’s what fascinates me so, and it makes for GREAT stories!
Q: How do you balance out the writer’s life and the rest of life? Do you get up early? Stay up late? Ignore friends and family for certain periods of time?
A: I’m a writer by trade and by hobby–copywriting/blogging as well as a novelist. I get up at 6 AM every day, sit down to my day job at 7 AM. I manage to fit in around an hour in the PM for creative writing, and then I get a bit of extra time on the weekends. I am religious with my schedule during the week, and it allows me to finish up my work early enough so I can get in a bit of time on the projects that have my heart.
Q: It’s one thing to write a book and another to edit it. How do you feel about the editing process? What was it like to edit your book?
A: I HATE editing. I’m sure most authors would agree. It’s not that I’m too close to the manuscript or that I don’t like making changes, but it’s that I want to be creative and come up with more crazy stories. If I have to spend weeks/months making edits on the same thing, it feels like time drags on before I can move on to the next project.
Q: Do you have a favorite brand, flavor, type of coffee?
A: The stronger the better! The stuff I drink is made in an espresso machine, with about 50% more coffee ground than normal. A couple of teaspoons of sugar, a LOT of powdered creamer (the rich flavor makes it all the better), and I’m ready to write.
The fact that I drink it so strong means that I limit myself to coffee only when I have a few hours of hardcore creativity to work off the caffeine buzz. During the work week, I’m a green tea guy.
Thank you so much for your time. I wish you the very best of luck! Let’s chat again soon.
A: It was truly an AWESOME chance to talk to you, and I hope that you’ve gotten to know me a bit better as well.
Bio:
Sherlock Holmes, the Phantom of the Opera, and Father Brown are just a few of the books that ensnared his imagination as a child.
When he discovered science fiction and fantasy through the pages of writers like Edgar Rice Burroughs, J.R.R Tolkien, and Orson Scott Card, he was immediately hooked and hasn’t looked back since.
Andy’s first attempt at writing produced In the Days: A Tale of the Forgotten Continent. He has learned from the mistakes he made and used the experience to produce Blade of the Destroyer, a book of which he is very proud.
Reading—and now writing—is his favorite escape, and it provides him an outlet for his innate creativity. He is an artist; words are his palette.
His website (http://www.andypeloquin.com) is a second home for him, a place where he can post his thoughts and feelings–along with reviews of books he finds laying around the internet.
He can also be found on his social media pages, such as:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AndyPeloquin
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/andyqpeloquin
www.linkedin.com/in/andypeloquin/
https://plus.google.com/100885994638914122147/about
https://www.facebook.com/andrew.peloquin.1
https://www.amazon.com/author/andypeloquin
http://www.amazon.com/Days-Tale-Forgotten-Continent-ebook/dp/B00J8U5JZO/
