Deborah J. Lightfoot

Hi Mat!
What a lovely and humbling surprise -- you've made my day! I'm beyond delighted to think my ramblings had even a tiny part in encouraging your writing. It IS therapeutic to chat with other writers. I haven't participated in a critique group since 2012, but I'm still in touch with several serious writers, and we talk shop from time to time. I also started a Bookstagram account. I didn't expect it to be very valuable, but in fact it's connected me with writers from around the world, who are frank and forthright about the difficulties of writing fiction, and the near-impossibility of making a living at it. Still, those of us who are obsessed with language keep on writing it down ... at great length. 😁

Thanks very much for your kind note. We all need encouragement in the crazy world of books. I've enjoyed a lot of it lately, from my kind beta readers for Waterspell Book 4, and from total strangers who have been so kind as to rate and even review my books at Goodreads, Amazon, and elsewhere. I'm so happy to think I helped you along the way, in any small manner.

Take care & keep in touch,
Deborah

Hi Deborah.
I was thinking the other day, I never thanked you.
A long time ago, and I mean a long time 2004, we got talking because of an article of yours I came across about loving old words and bringing them back into use.
I really enjoyed our discussions, and they indeed influenced my already existing love of the language. I was working – well slaving away - at my magnum opus, Annis. Which then was growing exponentially into a tome of a book.
Something essential for fantasy authors, I think, and something recently has underlined that for me.
I’ve just been watching the Wheel of Time on TV, books that I avoided back in the day because of negative criticism from friends. I must say that the ideas seem good. It lacks something at its heart, though that might be due to lousy script and screenwriting and the usual butchering that happens in transferring books to screen. One thing, however, truly made me laugh; ‘The Trollorcs,’ which, as an invented name by the author, is appallingly bad. Kind of thing one might expect from a teenager running a bad D&D game. Really? He couldn’t have come up with something better and more imaginative than Troll+Orc? And sounds, in character dialogue like the heroes, are being pursued by the ‘Trollops.’ It screams to me of lack of research, as we both know, there are so many exciting and cool names out there for monsters.
Well, enough of my ramblings. I wanted to thank you for your encouragement back then, it was wonderful to speak to a fellow writer, and it made a significant difference to my work.
It took me about 25+ years to do, but Annis is now finished and out there in the world. Not my first published book, but my third! I got so stuck along the way that I wrote parts one and two of a Steampunked Science Fiction series, The Dandelion Farmer. But Annis is now done, and so is about half of book two (and there are no Trollops in it!).
So thank you again for your encouragement.
Mat McCall

Gracious! Goodreads makes it exceedingly difficult to update the cover of an ebook. The Waterspell trilogy now has lovely new covers, created by Vila Design at https://www.viladesign.net/ , but in attempting to upload a new cover to Book 1 of the series, I seem to have ended up with no cover at all. Therefore, for the sake of safety, I'll refer you to my website, where you can see all of the new covers in detail: https://djlightfoot.wordpress.com/shop/ Thanks for taking a look!

I've never used the "Comment" box at the bottom of my Goodreads page, so I don't actually know where this message will go or who is likely to read it. But I can't keep quiet -- I must share my news:

The trilogy is complete! WATERSPELL Book 3: The Wisewoman (Kindle Edition) is now available at Amazon.

And through March 10, all three books of WATERSPELL are available at Smashwords (in Nook as well as Kindle format) for half price. Enter coupon code REW50 to get a 50% discount.

I'm a bit dizzy this week, realizing that I've FINALLY finished the writing. This story has consumed me for a very long time. To celebrate, I'm actually doing things like getting together with family and meeting friends for lunch. All of that "normal behavior" kind of went by the wayside during the years of my obsession. LOL

Thanks much for your interest and support!