The name ‘Dracula’ is a name synonymous with vampires: the handsome, seductive aristocratic Count of Bram Stoker’s novel is the image that first comes to mind upon hearing the name. Most people have also heard the name Vlad the Impaler, but it’s rare to find someone who knows that they are one and the same person. Known in Romanian as Vlad Ţepeş and in Turkish as Kazıkulu Bey (The Impaler Prince) Vlad III ruled three times as Voivode (from the Slavic for warlord) of Wallachia. A member of the House of Drăculeşti, a branch of the House of Basarab Vlad gained the name ‘Dracula’ from his father, also called Vlad who was known as ‘Dracul’ or ‘The Dragon’ due to his membership in this chivalric order under the patronage of King Sigismund of Hungary. This Order was sworn to fight the Ottoman Turks…
Olivia Stocum’s new novel Dawning has been officially released! For the cost of a mini skinny vanilla latte, purchase your copy at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00DYSM6DO or go to Ms. Stocum for more info and THEN to go Amazon :)
I’ve never liked beating my own drum, but as writers we have no choice. So I will make my own drum roll here as I announce that Dawning (which many of you have heard SOOOOOO much about that you’re either waiting in eager anticipation, or you’re ready to smack me up-side the head) has now gone live.
Scotland, 1599 . . . He abandoned her. She had failed to be enough for him. The empty space he left behind hollowed out her heart, and she wondered what to do with the rest of her life.
When Ronan leaves the clan to seek his fortune, Triona MacAlastair fears she will never see him again. Four years later, a threat against her life forces her to depend on a mysterious, cloaked rogue known as Blackhawk.
She knows he is capable of protecting her, but what is he hiding? Why does he…
Writer beware, indeed! Since I’ve been blogging, I’ve read countless posts warning writers about Author Solutions. It appears that the Penguin-Random House has enabled AS to extend its evil tentacles toward even more unwitting writers. Their activities sound so much like “white collar crime,” I wonder how they get away with it. Then I realize, it is “white collar crime” and that is how they get away with it.
Readers, meet Marie Bailey, who won the recent Yesterday Road T-shirt giveaway. Marie was kind enough not only to don the shirt rather than slipping it into a local Goodwill bin, but also to provide this photo of her actually wearing it.
Drop by and read Marie’s engaging blog, 1WriteWay. She is always thoughtful and sincere as she describes her writing life, and she’s probably the most generous re-blogger out there.
Here is the second installment of Ten Top Lists of What Not To Do by Marie Ann Bailey of 1WriteWay at http://1writeway.com and John W. Howell of Fiction Favorites at http://johnwhowell.com. These lists are simu-published on our blogs each Monday. We hope you enjoy.
10. Do not bring your cat. For one, the interviewer may be allergic to cats. For another, the cat may take that opportunity to gift a massive hairball on the interviewer’s desk.
9. Do not go on a bender the night before. The interviewer may not take kindly to you smelling like a vat of fermenting wine or worse adding a hairball of your own making to the desk.
8. Do not choose this as an opportunity to express your inner punk by sporting a blue Mohawk hair style. With your luck, the interviewer will likely be a former Marine who will want to shave off that blue hair personally with a dull jungle knife.
7. Do not show up wearing your gardening clothes. This may confuse the interviewer as to whether you’re there for the interview or you’re just one of the landscape crew.
6. Do not offer as one of your weaknesses that you are a procrastinator, even if it is true. In response, the interviewer may procrastinate about whether to tell you that you don’t have the job.
5. Do not take the opportunity to go through the interviewer’s desk if you are left alone during the interview. Chances are the interviewer will be back before you know it and accuse you of stealing the change kept hidden in the bottom drawer.
4. Do not tweet during the interview. While you may think tweeting is evidence that you are “hip” to social media, the interviewer may tweet later that you are a social idiot.
3. Do not complain about your ex-spouse or ex-lover or ex-anything during the interview. Such disclosures will only make the interviewer wonder what you will be like as an ex-employee.
2. Do not come to the interview and say “I’ve applied for so many jobs. Which one is this?” Chances are the interviewer will counter with “I’ve had so many job applicants. Who the hell are you?”
1. Do not hug the interviewer at any time before, during or after the interview. At best, the interviewer will simply turn red-faced and throw your resume into the “Do Not Call Back” pile. At worst, the interviewer will sue you for sexual harassment.
Ana Deschanel has made a terrible mistake. The only chance of protecting the other people involved is to flee New Orleans, the only home she has ever known, for the quiet solitude of Summer Island.
Summer Island, Maine (population 202) is not the tranquil escape Ana imagined. The locals are distant and cold, especially her neighbor, the reclusive veterinarian Jonathan St. Andrews. Her only lifeline is the kind but odd caretaker Alex Whitman. Showing up at all the right moments, he warns her she is completely unprepared for a Maine winter. As the first winter storm approaches to whispers of an island shutdown-…
‘I heard this typing. I went down in the basement of the UCLA library and by God there was a room with 12 typewriters in it that you could rent for 10 cents a half-hour. And there were eight or nine students in there working away like crazy.’
This was Ray Bradbury, speaking about the genesis of his most famous novel, Fahrenheit 451, published in 1953. According to the writer himself, he went to the bank and got a heap of change in dimes. Then he went to the basement and started to put dimes into one of the typewriters, topping it up every half-hour. Nine days later, he’d written a short story, ‘The Fireman’, which would develop into Fahrenheit 451. And the rest, as they clichaically say, is history: the novel has been studied and analysed – and, most importantly of all, especially given its subject-matter, read
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Marie at 1 Write Way 