12 Days of Christmas Day 12

It's the twelfth day! Also, doomsday! Seems we're all still here... It's been a long twelve days but I'm really enjoying finding new indies to read and giving away prizes! I had exactly 11 people yesterday, who don't already have a copy of Mystic~Lily, comment! So, congratulations to: Tom A, Jamie C, Santa F, bashashhazbaz, Becky F, Sherry J, Sandi T, Felicia T, Kate B, Brian B, and Leonardo N!! I'll be in touch to send your prize!

Now, a few announcements!!
Mystic~Shelia released today! The third book in the Mystic series is now available for purchase! More about it:
Synopsis:
After a horrible accident takes the lives of her parents, Shelia Morgan is placed in the care of her Aunt Ivy and Uncle Melvin. For six years they work her like a slave. On her twelfth birthday, Uncle Melvin makes Shelia an offer that will destroy her life.

When she turns 19, the ugly truth about her past comes out during a therapy session, Uncle Melvin is arrested, and she's placed in the sights of everyone in town. Hurling insults, objects, and threats, the townspeople side with her uncle and call Shelia a liar. She loses her job, her boyfriend, and her freedom in one day. When a girl named Markaza shows up and tells Shelia she's part of a group of young women destined to save the world, Shelia begins to dream of a new life and true freedom from her personal demons.

She tells the jury her story and boards a plane destined for New York and her new life. Once there, she meets Bronya and Lily: Two other young women with special powers they must learn to harness in order to fight an evil that will rise on December 21, 2012, and destroy the world.

Markaza boards a plane to Atlanta to save the life of a young lady named Melody before her mind destroys her from the inside out. As Markaza fights for Melody's life, Shelia, Lily, and Bronya throw themselves into their studies and learn that even power from within can get out of control.

Read these rockin' reviews! Indie Reviews and Heather's Book Chatter to find out what others are saying!

Click here to buy it on Amazon for just $3.99 or here to buy a paperback for just $8.99.

Second announcement! Starting today and running through December 25, you can pick up a copy of Mystic~Bronya FREE on Amazon!!!! Click here to go grab yours!

Let's get started on today's fun! Friday, December 21 - Twelve people who comment will win an e-copy of Mystic~Shelia!!!

Before I tell you how to enter, I'll do a recap of the indie books pitched thus far. The last two winners will be announced this afternoon at 5pm EST.
Without further ado, here they are:
Andrea Buginsky - The Chosen Amazon link $0.99 *WINNER*
Michael Cargill - Underneath Amazon link $3.30 *WINNER*
Jennifer Lafferty - Offbeat Love Stories and More Amazon link $0.99
Jacques Antoine - Sen No Sen Amazon link $4.99
Brian Bigelow - Horror Bent Amazon link $2.99
Seeley James - The Geneva Decision: Pia Sabel #1 Amazon link $5.99
LJ - Fighting Destiny #1 Amazon link $3.99
Eric Dulin - Condemned (Deus Ex Machina Series) Amazon link $2.99 *WINNER*
Deborah Armstrong - Forever Love Amazon link $3.49 *WINNER*
Kate Baggott - Love From Planet Wine Cooler Amazon link $4.99 *WINNER*
David Manuel - Killer Protocols (Richard Paladin Series) Amazon link $3.99
Aaron Saylor - Sewerville: A Southern Gangster Novel Amazon link $3.99
Ryan Astaphan - Travelphan: Fear, Faith, & Glory in a Journey Across Asia Amazon link $7.99
Michael Meyer - Deadly Eyes Amazon link $2.99
Ginney Etherton - Looping in Limbo (Lainey Tidwell Series) Amazon link $2.99 *WINNER*
S.J. Hunter - Longevity Amazon link $2.99
Felicia Tatum - The White Aura Amazon link $2.99
Brian Author Levene and Anon Beauty - The Other Girls Get Lucifer Everyday Amazon link $4.99 FREE today!
Troy Jackson - The Elementals Amazon link $4.99
Rebecca Elswick - Mama's Shoes Amazon link $3.79
Angela Graff - The Awakening Amazon link $2.99 *WINNER*
Hayley Linfield - The Truth about Dandelions Amazon link $5.99
Tom Abrahams - Sedition Amazon link $2.99
Sarwah Osei-Tutu - Bingo: One Woman's Journey Through Life Amazon link $4.99
Marc Nash - Time After Time Amazon link $2.99
Mark Mackey - Kristen Flemings in a Ghost Story Amazon link $0.99
Jamie Canosa - Dissidence Amazon link $3.95
Elizabeth Los - Second On the Right Amazon link $2.99 FREE today!
Sherry Jesberger - Aislin of Arianrhod Amazon link $1.99
Leonardo Noto - Intrusive Memory Amazon link $4.99 *WINNER*

Those books look great! I've got samples of them all and a number of you have made it through this far in my process. Remember, if you pitched before, you're still in the running.

Here's how to enter today:
Go enter the giveaway on Goodreads for a copy of Mystic~Shelia and go tag the book on Amazon. Come back here and leave me a comment telling me about the last book you read and what you thought of it.

******ATTENTION******
I'm doing things differently today! Since it's the last day of the giveaway, the FIRST TWELVE people to comment will win!

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo  

Doomsday and Prophets

Happy hump day, good people of the blogosphere! If you make it through today, you only have two more days until the weekend. Can I get a, "Holla!" and a showing of hands if you're excited?

But wait! Another day passes and that brings us one day closer to Doomsday! Does anyone remember when they thought the Earth was going to experience some cataclysmic shut down on 12/31/99 at midnight?

 Why is it, every few years, we have some person who decides they must find a way to scare the crap out of a billion people by bringing forth a Doomsday prophecy? What if the Mayans just got tired of writing down dates? Maybe they didn't know what would happen when the planets "aligned" on 12/21/12 and didn't want to assume. After all, you know what happens when you assume things!

I see Venus, Mars, and Jupiter moving ever closer together in the night sky and think about what I know of Astronomy. It eases my mind. I'll share something you may not know: The sun will be in alignment with the center of the galaxy but the planets won't actually "align." See, planets travel around their ellipsis and can come into "alignment" every so often when viewed from an overhead perspective. But if you were to look on a 3D model, you'd see the planets are on different planes so can never truly align perfectly.

Imagine it like this:

• You have 5 steps leading up to a door.
• That door is the sun.
• Mercury and Earth are on step 1.
• Venus and Saturn are on step 2.
• Mars is on step 3.
• Jupiter and Neptune are on step 4.
• Uranus and Pluto (not even considered a planet now) are on step 5.

Sure, you can put them all in a row, but they wouldn't actually be aligned. Do you see my meaning? Please don't take this as these are the planets that are aligned and blah blah blah. I was just using words to create a visual representation. After all, I'm a writer!

Why the heck is she talking about Doomsday? Great question!

In my Mystic series, the young ladies who are going to save the world must battle an evil that will rise on 12/21/12. Markaza is the prophet who's seen the end and knows what to do to stop it from happening. But it's no astronomical event that will cause the disaster, but our own dumb selves. I'm not going to tell you what the monster they must fight is borne from because that'll just ruin the whole series. What I will tell you is: I believe what I write in my novels has a very good chance of happening.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?

Wait a moment and hear me out! I'm not talking about a Doomsday prophecy. What I'm alluding to is much bigger than that.  I see it happening all around us more and more every day. If we don't find a way to stop it, we're going to run our own race into the ground. We'll destroy ourselves and have no cosmic event to blame for our end. Maybe, just maybe, a group of people will emerge that can save us. But we have to want to be saved.

What do you think will happen on Doomsday? How do you use prophets in your writing?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Woman v/s Women

Happy Black Friday, good people of the blogosphere! Today, I'd like to talk about that pesky word woman and the plural form women. I see this mistake so often, it's all I can do to not rip out my hair and bang my head on my desk. So, please be so kind as to read on and save me from uglification (holy crapballs, that's a word!).

Woman is the singular. Women is the plural. When you confuse the two, you look uneducated. Period. Grammar Nazi or no, you need to not confuse the simplest parts of speech if you want people to take you seriously as a writer.

Woman - Examples of correct usage:
That woman left her kids in the car all day with no air conditioning!
Would you please tell a woman today how beautiful she is?
Woman, bring me another beer!
Get that woman a mop, because she needs to clean my floors.

Note the word woman generally follows the word a or the word that. Singular. Not they, them, those, we, or otherwise.

Women - Examples of correct usage:
Those women need to buy a clue; that dude isn't interested.
We have five women here today to speak on behalf of our project.
Hard working women are God's gift to the lazy men of the world.
Women, as a collective, need to be kinder to one another!

Note the use of those, are, collective, and five. All of these words give you a clue that we're talking about more than one woman.

Incorrect usage:
That women left her kids in the car yesterday while she went into work!
Would you please tell a women today how beautiful they are?
Those woman are hard working.

I'm hoping you're getting my point. Please please try and remember the difference. An easy way: Men is plural for man. Easy peasy.

What confusion drives you batty?

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

Write From Life

Happy FRIDAY, good people of the blogosphere! At the bottom of today's post, I'm gonna list all the fantastic rafflecopters I have going on my blog so you can enter to win! First, I'm going to address something not many people may know about: writing from life. So grab those pens/pencils and notebooks and let's get going!

 

Most of what we writers put on the page comes from life. We can't help it. If you find a particularly good book, you'll know the writer pulled it right from life and was honest on the page. Characters that seem amazing and well rounded were likely based on someone the person knows in the real world.

Pulling from life may seem like a risk. For some, it's a huge risk (especially when it's an expose) but they're willing to take it. Why? Not to make a million bucks, that's for sure. If you're an author, you know that's a one in a couple hundred thousand shot. They do it because they want to share their story, the people they know, or because their imaginations can't be contained.

Yes, they do really see you with purple skin, six horns, and an eye in the middle of your forehead when they look at you. Calm down, it's not a knock!

They write because they're compelled to write. Something inside of them pulls them to the keys where they simply must tell the story their brains have created. It all comes from life. If you end up as a character in a fiction novel, shake the author's hand; they thought you were interesting enough to write about. If you're the villain, maybe you need to look in the mirror...

Most of us write the truth as we see it. Sure, there's a fictional twist here and there if we're fiction writers, but you'll find that your true self will be exposed if you end up in the pages of a book.

Many of my characters have my personality flaws. As I write, I work through some of them. Others, I adore and want to keep. After all, to be human is to be flawed. However, there's a good chance that reading a book someone has written with you as a main character will teach you how to interact with that person or give you insights into your life you never considered.

Writers are students of human nature. We watch, examine, listen like hawks, and throw in a little fiction before writing it down. It's writing right from life at its finest.

If you're a writer, talk to people, observe them, get them to open up to you in ways you only imagined possible on the pages. You can do it; everyone likes to be listened to. Keep in mind that you shouldn't judge and before long you'll have a notebook teeming with profiles for great, rounded characters.

Now, without further ado, the rafflecopter widgets:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck, everyone!

Well, that's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo

200th Post Giveaway!

Hello, good people of the blogosphere! This is my 200th blog post! Talk about exciting! My stats are off the charts and I have my followers, fans, and friends to thank.

As a HUGE thank you, I'm doing a giveaway of all my books. That's right, even Shelia, the third book in my Mystic series. It won't be published until December 21st (doomsday) so this is a unique contest. International!

Enter below and win something :) Information/synopsis/cover art can be seen here.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Again, thank you all for visiting and being fans of my books and blog.

BIG HUGS!

That's all for today, folks! Until next time, WRITE ON!

Jo