What If. . .

 

This quote was posted on The Writer’s Circle, a group that posts about writing stuff on Facebook (click the picture to go to their page). It inspired a conversation among my writer friends, in which one friend told me about a “what if?” writer’s conference she attended. The speaker gave them the following writing prompt:

• In 12 words or less, starting with “what if” ,  charismatically describe your book so everyone will want to buy and and read it.

Sounds simple enough. But here’s the funny bit-it’s not. 

Here is what I came up with for The Gatestone Chronicles: Fayling

• What if you were the only person who could fix magic?

It isn’t a bad sentence, but would it sell my book? It doesn’t really hit at the real story, does it?

Okay, let’s try again.

• What if a human could save the universe from fairies?

Hmm. I like that one better. Closer to what the book is about, but it vilifies the fay a bit too much.

One more time.

• What if saving one life could magically alter the course of fate?

Okay, well it isn’t perfect, but to be fair I have to keep it to twelve words, so it will do.

 

What about you reader? Tell me what you came up with in the comments below. Happy Writing!

Throwback Thursday

Oh what the heck, I’ll post a day early so I can remind you of my book, Tilted Tales under the guise of the pop culture phenomenon, throwback Thursday. Cheers!

 

Inner Magic

Every living being carries magic at its core,

Even those who never did a mystic thing before.

 

Don’t commit to memory shifty lines of magic spells.

Don’t mix yourself a brew of sense-offending smells.

 

The magic that I mean takes so little skill to cast.

Bet my worldly fortune that you’ve used it in the past.

 

It doesn’t take a wizard to figure what this means:

Loving is a power that is written in your genes.

 

 

 

 <————-Click me!!!!!!

Buy me.

A Year

I have officially been blogging for one year. It is a fun thing, to look back and review my own accomplishments. When I started out, I wasn’t even sure I wanted to blog. My brother, Izlain was a member of the Newbie Blogger Initiative(which has an event about this time every year) and encouraged me to get blogging. I had recently decided to write full-time, but was very disorganized and uncertain about my goals. My blog helped me focus on the work at hand, and I began writing about writing. It took me a while to figure out a schedule, and even now I sometimes have a hard time sticking to it. But blogging helped me focus on my career, and in December 2014 I released my first book, Tilted Tales. My second book, Fayling, will be releasing this summer, and my third by the end of the year. (read a bit about it on my website.) My blog helped me take myself seriously. I have since created my own website, created a professional Facebook profile, and opened a Twitter account.

But my one-year blogging aniversary reminded me where it all began.

So today is a salute to blogging, and to other bloggers. If you have something to contribute to the world, then I encourage you to blog.

Gatestones

A rock, Just a rock

A solid chunk of earth.

A place, just a place

No telling what it’s worth.

 

A gate? Oh, a gate!

It opens by your hand

A portal, a path

Connected by a strand.

 

Darkness, so dark

Goes on for days and days.

Reaching, extending

In a million different ways.

 

See now? I see it

A place to touch the floor.

Solid, hard surface

Same stone like that before.

 

A rock, Just a rock

But oh, it’s so much more!

Not stone, but Gatestone

A world-connecting door.

Plot Decisions

 

 

Ah, to romance, or not to romance? That is the question I have been presented with this week.

You see, I was aiming at a urban fantasy without any lovey dovey stuff. Partly because I was afraid my attempt at literary smootchy-smootchy would end up super cheesy, but also because I wanted to focus on Jeremy-my leading fellow- and not who he is kissing. I have invented a politically unstable world, and thus far I have focused heavily on that. But as you may know, writers invent characters, and then those characters seem to do whatever the heck they want to do, regardless of your original intentions. So now I find myself battling the seemingly natural progression of a budding relationship between two of my people.

I took the issue to several of my writing buddies, and a funny thing happened. None of them had an issue with an underlying romance. Nobody thought it was cheesy. Most of them didn’t know why I was even asking, thinking I’d done it on purpose. Do you know what did happen? I got pretty divided camps on who Jeremy should end up with.

Huh.

As it it turns out, I have written myself a bit of a love triangle, without realizing I had done it. So I had a choice. Let it work itself out as I go along, or try and snuff it out. When I talked to my hubby about destroying the bit of romance, he protested. Loudly. I got a stern, “what does it matter if there is romance in it?” lecture. Oh, and he tried to say he didn’t care which girl Jeremy ended up with, but he had a lot more positive things to say about the witch. . .

Sooooo. . .

Apparently the romance stays. But I am going to blow some stuff up. You know, just to compensate. =)