Welcome to Stuff It Tuesdays: The Storetry Collaboration Challenge
I’d like to thank everyone for the fabulous contributions. I really enjoy reading all of the submissions and putting the ‘Storetry’ (a word that I created, part story, part poetry) together. I only wish I had more time to spend on it!
This is my sixth installment of the Stuff It Tuesday ‘Storetry’ Collaboration Challenge.
The Storm and the Darkness The House of Crimson and Clover Book # 2 By Sarah M. Cradit Expected Publication Date: July 15, 2013
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 Ana realizes that she may soon be cut off from the rest of the world.
After a surprising encounter with Jonathan’s brother, Finn, Ana finds herself braving the storm to return something to him. Unprepared for the Maine storm, she slips and falls onto the jagged rocks along the shore. The St. Andrews brothers find her in the nick of time, but she remains unconscious. As the storm worsens, the St. Andrews brothers learn there are other, more sinister forces at work closer than they ever imagined.
With no help from the outside world, they must find a way to protect themselves from both the storm, and the growing darkness that looms across the island.
About the Author
Sarah is the author of the Southern Fiction series, The House of Crimson and Clover. The series was born of her combined loves of New Orleans, family dramas, and the mysterious nature of love and desire. Her books combine elements of mystery, suspense, intrigue, romance, and even paranormal. She is always working on the next book in the series, and absolutely loves connecting with her fans.
Sarah lives in the Pacific Northwest, but has traveled the world from Asia to Europe to Africa. When she isn’t working (either at her day career, or hard at work at writing), she is reading a book and discovering new authors. The great loves of her life (in order) are: her husband James, her writing, and traveling the world.
Lea is wondering whether any one out there can recommend editing software. Now I’m interested too. I wouldn’t expect any software to take the place of a professional (and warm-blooded) editor. However, software might help with making my copy as “clean” as possible before it goes to the editor. Y’all have any thoughts on this?
I have been researching Manuscript Editing Software for the last few hours. So far I have found some interesting things! I even tested one out a little bit. I honestly think this might be helpful for me at the moment. Even if all the program ends up helping me with is pointing out certain words and phrases I use way too often.
I do know that this is no replacement for a real, professional Editor. But until the day I can afford one, I might as well do everything I can to edit my work. For now it shall be beta readers and Editing Software and whatever else I can find.
Have you ever tried Editing Software? What do you think of it?
Everyone, please welcome guest blogger and fellow author Katie Cross to crimsonleague.com today, to talk about her experiences with creative writing, characters, and novels.
Part of the first chapter involves a description of what I consider the most common and most counterproductive misconceptions about writing a novel.
To help pump people up for the release, I asked Katie to write about what she considers one of the major misconceptions non-writers and beginning-writers have.
How much does an author REALLY know what’s going to happen to her characters???
I’ll let Katie take it from here:
When I was a little girl, I would have given up my softball mitt to know who my future husband would be.
This has been an incredible week for me. I’ve been honored with two awards; an essay that I posted to The Community Storyboard was Freshly Pressed; and then I was invited to be an editor on The Community Storyboard. It’s perhaps a bit ironic that, right around this time, I had responded to a post by Victoria Grefer on the milestone of considering yourself a writer. Part of my comment was: “I’m still hesitant to call myself writer, but I’m getting there.”
Well, after all that has happened this week, I want to announce that “I’m there.”
I AM A WRITER.
It feels good to put this in writing. It feels so damn good.
I have to pinch myself. Sometimes I feel like I’m dreaming. I am a shy, sensitive introvert: someone who doesn’t make friends easily, someone who feels more comfortable with furry four-legged critters than people. I’m often inclined to think that people have more reason to not like me, than to like me. That’s just part of who I am. But since I’ve been blogging, I’ve been showered with awards from people I have never met. All I’ve done is commented on and liked your posts, followed your blogs, and tried to give support for your writing and other ventures when I can. And in return I get these awards.
Super-Sweet Award
Earlier this week, RunningToHerDreams honored me with the Super Sweet Blogger Award, my second one! And she is herself a super sweet and inspiring person, so please visit her blog.
Then Briana Vedsted created a new award and I’m among the first to be honored!
Now for the Rules:
Post a picture of the award somewhere on your blog.
List five things that make you happy.
Choose 5 people to nominate who have been a virtual shoulder to cry on, checked in on you when they knew things were rough, or has always been there for you.
Comment on their blogs to thank them and let them know you nominated you.
Things that make me happy:
1. My husband (OK, he’s not a thing but he’s the first and last and in-between in my happiness)
2. When any of my cats curl up on my lap
3. Giving hand-knitted gifts to friends
3. Writing
4. Reading
5. This community of bloggers
Briana already gave the award to two of my favorite bloggers, so here a few more of my favorites.
Lewis Carroll (1832-98) is celebrated around the world as one of the great purveyors of ‘literary nonsense’: his books Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1871) have entertained countless readers since they were published nearly 150 years ago. For many, the name ‘Lewis Carroll’ is synonymous with children’s literature.
But ‘Lewis Carroll’ was really a man named Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a mathematician at Christ Church, Oxford. As such, he led something of a double life: to the readers of his Alice books he was Lewis Carroll, while to the world of mathematics and to his colleagues at the University of Oxford he was (Reverend) Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a man who formed his pen name by reversing his first two names (‘Charles Lutwidge’ became ‘Lewis Carroll’).
There is a famous anecdote about Carroll and Queen Victoria. Victoria enjoyed Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland so much that she requested a…
Inspiring post from RunningtoHerDreams: “You can do anything you want to do. So set a goal and just keep putting one foot in front of the other, keep moving forward. It may, or may not take a while, but I promise you, you will reach that goal.”
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post, hoping to find a bitter rival out there on the Internet. I got a lot of response from eager goody two shoes wishing to make this a nicer place to live. Bunch of weirdos. I fought and defeated many nice rivals. Then, all of a sudden one of the my long time followers from the early days of my blog(a few months ago), some weird lover of grammar and good manners, told me that she was going to start an online magazine for nannies. She calls it Nanny Magazine. Ugh. I know what kind of magazine for nannies calls their magazine “Nanny Magazine”? Anyway, she told me that she needs some publicity for her magazine and she is doing a Kickstarter to raise money for it. The first thing I said was, “Kickstarter? I’m in. I love starting kick fights. It…
Marie at 1 Write Way 