REVIEW: Lay Death at Her Door / Elizabeth Buhman

TITLE: Lay Death at Her Door
AUTHOR: Elizabeth Buhman
PUBLISHER: Red Adept Publishing
AVAILABILITY: Purchase links on publisher's website (click here)

GENRE
Thriller/Mystery

REVIEW
Disclaimers first - I'm a fellow Red Adept Publishing author. Neither Red Adept Publishing nor Elizabeth Buhman asked me to write this review. The opinions are mine alone.

Lay Death at Her Door opens with a jarring confession: Twenty years ago, a man was murdered and a girl was raped, and the girl's testimony put the killer behind bars. She lied. Now 42, Kate Cranbrook finds that the past has come back to haunt her. The man convicted of both the crimes has been exonerated due to new evidence, and everyone wants to know what really happened. And Kate knows. But it's a secret she'll take to her grave.

The novel, told from Kate's first-person perspective, is written as if Kate herself sat down at the end of the story to write her side of it. And Kate is an incredibly unreliable narrator. She has her own motivations, and they don't include telling the reader the truth. And yet, bit by bit, the real story of what happened comes together, all building up to a shocking twist.

Buhman has crafted a skillfully constructed narrative and a truly memorable protagonist. You won't forget Kate. You'll probably hate her by the end, but she'll stay with you long after the book has ended. Kate is a manipulative storyteller whose deftness with words makes her sympathetic despite her general horridness. She's selfish, arrogant, elitist, and very possibly a psychopath (in the clinical sense - she doesn't seem capable of compassion). And yet you almost don't notice at first because of the way Buhman presents Kate's point of view. Kate is a perfectly rational person, and it's easy to see why she does the things she does.

Lay Death at Her Door has been called a thriller, but it really falls under that somewhat ill-defined crossover between thriller and women's fiction - along the lines of Gone Girl. Unlike a traditional thriller, Lay Death doesn't follow its protagonist through danger and mystery. Much of the story is devoted to depicting Kate's uncomfortable relationship with her father, Pops. There's a Grey Gardens-esque vibe to their relationship. Kate is a grown woman with a career, and yet she still feels compelled to live at home with her controlling father. But there are also elements of a crime novel through the reopened investigation into the twenty-year-old murder... and a new one that occurs right on Kate's doorstep.

All in all, this is an intriguing and addictive novel that may make some readers uncomfortable, but makes for one fascinating read.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elizabeth Buhmann is originally from Virginia, where her first novel is set, and like her main character, she lived several years abroad while growing up. She graduated magna cum laude from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, and has a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Pittsburgh. For twenty years, she worked for the Texas Attorney General as a researcher and writer on criminal justice and crime victim issues.

Elizabeth now lives in Austin, Texas, with her husband, dog, and two chickens. She is an avid gardener, loves murder mysteries, and has a black sash in Tai Chi.

BNG FRIDAY: Helen of Mars by George Ebey

Every Friday until its publication, I'm going to blog something about Brave New Girls: Tales of Girls and Gadgets, a YA sci-fi anthology featuring tech-savvy heroines. The goal is to encourage more girls to enter Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math professions. All revenues from sales of the anthology will be donated to a scholarship fund through the Society of Women Engineers.

Today, I'm spotlighting one of the stories that will be featured in the anthology.

TITLE
Helen of Mars

AUTHOR
George Ebey

STORY DESCRIPTION
Helen's father hoped to find his fortune by sending a robotic rover, controlled from Earth, to

mine Mars for precious ores. After the machine is attacked by the Marauders - ruthless rover pirates that steal the caches of others - her family stands on the brink of ruin. But Helen has never met a machine she couldn’t fix, even one that’s fifty million miles away. Though saving the rover - and her family - will take every trick she knows, she's more than ready for the challenge. And she's determined to teach the Marauders how to play fair - a lesson taught at the tip of a miner’s drill. 

WHY WE PICKED IT
Helen couldn't have been a more perfect protagonist for a Brave New Girls story, with her brainy determination and unshakable spirit. I also love the idea of commercialized Mars rovers - the whole concept had me hooked.

AUTHOR BIO
George Ebey got his start by taking his once-vast collection of action figures on epic journeys though countless lands full of exotic wonders and hidden dangers. Today, his action figure collection is much smaller, though several still stand guard on his writing desk, ready to take up arms and march into the fray at a moment’s notice. George was born and raised in Ohio, where he still lives with his wife and

an ornery cat named Ollie. When he’s not writing or playing with his action figures, he enjoys being outdoors, studying history, and searching for new and interesting places to explore.

THOUGHTS ON BRAVE NEW GIRLS
"In a perfect world, the problem of gender inequality wouldn’t exist. I hope that Brave New Girls will help bring us one step closer to that world."

Website: www.georgeebey.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/George-Ebey-Author/232696100087081?ref=hl
Twitter: @Ebeybooks
Blog: https://blogofthephoenix.wordpress.com/
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/George-Ebey/e/B002BM1NT2/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_2?qid=1420759810&sr=8-2

BRAVE NEW GIRLS will be released in Summer 2015! Sign up here to receive a notification when it's available to order.

The Birth of a Novel

by Bryan W. Alaspa

First off, I just wanted to thank Mary here for allowing me to be part of her blog. It's a great thing to have fellow writers as friends and, of course, she is more than welcome over at my blog any time she wishes.

It's a weird thing being a writer. People often look at you a bit funny when you mention that you are one. They want to know where you get your stories. They want to know here those ideas gestate and mutate and become real. They wonder how often you write, and how much. How many words makes a novel? How do you know when it's done? How do you edit the work and when is it ready for publication or to shop around to publishers? How do you do it? What's the magic?

The truth is that there is no magic to it. It's just something you can do if you're a writer. I was born with it, I guess. Even before I knew what writing was, I was the kid who made up the games and scenarios my friends and I played, acting as a kind of director and screenwriter for whatever it was we were doing. It's why I could spend hours and hours playing all by myself, too, without being bored. The stories were there, wild and crazy. Maybe it means I never grew up.

I would love it if there was a website or Story Store somewhere that I could go to and pick up the various elements of a story and then just assemble them at home. Maybe a literary IKEA, but such a thing does not exist. The ideas I get for stories come from a variety of places.

For me, most of the time, these days, it takes me two or three months to write a novel. For some that's fast and I know quite a few who work on a novel for a decade or more. What I call the creation is the actual writing of it. Sometimes a story will bounce around inside my brain for years before I can sit down and write out a story that even tries to make any sense.

Take my latest work - The Lightning Weaver. It started with my wife who said that there had been a few times in her life when lightning had struck very close to her. She had so far, luckily, not been hit, but it had been close. She called herself a Lightning Bringer and I thought that was a marvelous idea for a story. It kicked around in my head, like a rock in a rock polisher, tumbling and turning for years in search of a story. An idea is great, but without characters, a beginning, middle and end, you don't have much.

It was years before I realized that the novel would feature a young girl who appears to bring lightning to her whenever a storm comes. It took years for me to realize that she would develop the ability to control that electricity and years for me to realize that she would be one of a race of people known as Elementals and that the story of the Lightning Bringer would be the first in a four part series.

It all just kind of fell into place one day when I was on my way to the grocery store. It happens like that sometimes.

It was a publisher who said that the title of The Lightning Bringer didn't quite work so well. I went back and forth with them until we came up with The Lightning Weaver and I realized she had been a "weaver" more than a "bringer" from the get-go. It pays to have good friends, too.

It took a while for this story to get written and edited and now ready for you to read. It's the first of four, and the second novel is already done in first-draft form and the third one will be started sometime in 2015. It's a fantastic journey filled with adventure, thrills, chills, bad guys, good guys and lots of fun (I hope). I hope you'll take the journey with me

See, that's the thing about being a writer. You nurture that story for a long time and then you just have to let it go out on its own. It has to stand and fall on its own. You, as the writer, might have birthed it, but now it has to go find its own place.

That's the hard part, but with this story, I think it will find a home. I think you'll like it.

Thank you for your time

You can find Bryan Alaspa's new novel The Lightning Weaver in Kindle and print editions here: http://bryanwalaspa.com/books/the-lightning-weaver-the-elementals-part-one/

How to Write a Blind Character In One Easy Step

by J.S. Bangs

Writers are always told to "write what they know." I think this is terrible advice, unless I interpret it like Ursula K. LeGuin did:

As for “Write what you know,” I was regularly told this as a beginner. I think it’s a very good rule and have always obeyed it. I write about imaginary countries, alien societies on other planets, dragons, wizards, the Napa Valley in 22002. I know these things. I know them better than anybody else possibly could, so it’s my duty to testify about them.

There are two primary characters in Storm Bride, and both of them differ from me in important ways. For example, Saotse is an old blind woman. I am neither old, nor blind, nor a woman. Fortunately I was able to find the following guide on the internet:

How to Write a Blind Character In One Easy Step

1) Close your eyes. Now you're blind! Write about what it's like.

2) What do you mean, step #1 wasn't enough for you?

3) Well, you could do some reading about writing blind characters. Then do some more reading. Look at these techniques for helping a blind friend around. Talk to someone who's blind.

4) Get some helpful friends who will look over your manuscript and let you know every time you've had the blind character do something improbable or impossible for a blind person.

5) Finally, close your eyes. Now you're blind! Write about what it's like. But this time, you have a little more context and a little deeper understanding of what's going on. You'll probably still get some things wrong, but you'll have to live with that.

The other primary character in my book is Uya, a young pregnant mother. This was a somewhat different matter, because I just can't go out and get pregnant for the purposes of writing research. In the first place, this would make for an awkward conversation when my child grew up and asked me where babies come from ("from brainstorming, sweetie"), but more importantly, I'm not actually a woman. Mother Nature is a totally sexist about this and does not make any exceptions to the "no pregnancies for men" rule. However, I do have some advantages:

1) My wife has been pregnant twice. I can ask her lots of questions.

2) I have some writer friends who have also been pregnant, who were willing to look over my manuscript.

My wife, bless her heart, gave me lots of reference points for how pregnant women look, walk, pee, think, complain, pee, hurt, and pee. My wife was very adamant about the pee. According to her, in the last stages of pregnancy you never really get to where you don't have to pee, you just hold it for varying lengths of time. From some of my female writer friends, I learned about how a nursing mother is actually much hungrier than a pregnant mother, and learned a variety of ways to describe the way a very pregnant woman walks. And, again, I got another mother-writer to read my manuscript and comment on it.

Once again, I probably got some things wrong, but I have to live with that.

I also had a front-row seat to see both of my kids get born. Hoo, boy. Those experiences also got their way into the book, but you'll have to read it to find out more about that.

STORM BRIDE by J.S. Bangs

When Saotse rode across the treacherous ocean on an orca at the bidding of Oarsa, Power of the Sea, the blind maiden believed she had been chosen for a great destiny. But she hasn’t heard Oarsa’s voice in decades. Aged now, she has found her place among a peaceful, long-lived people, though her adoptive sister, Uya, still blossoms with youth. Then, pregnant Uya is kidnapped, and the rest of her family is slaughtered when an army of mounted warriors strikes the defenseless capital, leaving Saotse grief stricken and alone.

After Saotse finds refuge with strangers in a distant village, a new Power makes contact. Saotse embraces the opportunity to bury her bloodthirsty enemies in vengeance, but wielding the Power’s bitter magic could cost her everything she is.

As war escalates and allies flock to her side, Saotse believes she finally understands Oarsa’s purpose for her. But the Powers may have set events in motion that even they cannot control, and the fates of gods and men alike hang in the balance.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Storm-Bride-J-S-Bangs-ebook/dp/B00QXSSXC0/

Barnes & Noble:  http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/storm-bride-js-bangs/1120979559?ean=2940150232723

Kobo: https://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/storm-bride

Apple: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id951366590

Google: https://play.google.com/store/books/details/J_S_Bangs_Storm_Bride?id=CcT4BQAAQBAJ

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22817022-storm-bride

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Timothy Owens

An interview with Timothy Owens, author of The Hobbymen.

 

Hi! Welcome to Zigzag Timeline. Can you tell us about your background as an author?

Certainly, and thank you for having me.  My name is Tim Owens and I have a writing problem.  I have this constant compulsion to write and read what other people have written.  It got so out of control I eventually just ended up self-publishing things I had written for the world to see.

All joking aside (which is hard for me to do sometimes), I’ve been writing bits and bobs all over the place, but never seriously or for publication.  One day I just sort of decided to take the plunge and I sat down and put “Chapter 1” into a Word document.  I decided to go for self-publishing partly because of the freedom it offered and partly because I still work full-time and don’t have the time nor the money to do any large-scale advertising or get an agent.  It might sound cheap and lazy…and it is…but I wouldn’t have actually hit the “Publish” button if I wasn’t proud of the work I was putting out there.

One thing I like to emphasize is that I very much feel reading should be fun, so I try to inject that as much as possible into what I write.

What got you into writing?

Reading, mostly.  I loved reading at a young age, and I loved the idea of building these worlds out of nothing.  I was also into art, so I loved drawing and writing and creating my own stories.  I think the big turning point for me was in elementary school when we were asked to write a story about whatever.  I (of course) wrote a ghost story, and did the typical little-kid-thing of just explaining “this happened and then this happened and then…”, until the end of the story when for some reason I decided to describe how the grass felt against the protagonist’s skin as he sat on the front lawn.  It was like this epiphany moment, like I finally understood what all these other authors were doing.  I didn’t really and what I wrote was likely terrible, but it was a start and opened my mind up to serious writing.

My main influence for my current writing comes from little notes I would give to people with their Christmas presents.  They were just humorous little notes to elevate the rather thoughtless gifts, but the reaction I would get was positive enough it made me consider that maybe I had at least a small amount of talent here.  Just a little bit though.  An iota if anything.  A smidge.

What was the first idea you had for your book, and how did the story grow from there?

“The Hobbymen” came about slowly over the course of a couple of years.  At first it was just snapshots of characters: an encyclopedic bookworm, a rather violent nun.  There was no real substance there besides a basic idea. I didn’t know who these people were; I just wanted to get to know them.

I suppose you could say I’ve been writing the book my whole life though.  I grew up on monster movies and this love of Halloween, but I never really crossed that line into the deep macabre and only skated along its dark surface.  Monsters weren’t scary or deeply-meaningful to me, I just eventually realized how ridiculous they all were, and liked to have fun pointing out those ludicrous things.  Then it hit me.  What if these characters were looking for monsters, but we lampshade the whole thing right from the get-go?  Explore how stupid all the folklore can be in an irreverent romp that pays homage with tongue firmly planted in cheek.  It allowed me to write about a world I grew up on without dragging down the energy with pointless necessities.

And as an added treat, I took away any pretense of them being destined to do this.  It’s called “The Hobbymen” because they are literally doing this as a hobby.  No prophecies ushering them along.  Just three people who decided they want to do this.

Among your characters, who's your favorite? Could you please describe him/her?

Haha, this almost sounds like a loaded question, because my answer really says a lot about who I really am as well.  Of course I could cheat and say at times I love all of them the most, but I’ll play your game.

I think my favorite would probably be Demetrius (aka “Book” as he’s known by the others), especially since he was the first character I began to conceptualize.  He’s the resident “Book”, the know-it-all, the researcher.  He constantly has his nose stuck in something, trying to find answers or questions that need answering.  And he is entirely fed up with the world.  A lot of the times the brainy characters in books and movies are built up as social outcasts because they’re nerds or awkward or shy.  Book is just a straight up asshole (am I allowed to say that here?  I can change it to ‘jerk’ if we need to keep this clean).  He’s an outcast half because he’s into weird monsters and half because he’s just a rude person.  He doesn’t care what other people think of him.  He’s uncompromising in his view of the world (a viewpoint that realized early on how stupid some people can be and applied that default to everyone he sees).  I do admit I was tempted to dial him back a bit to make him more sympathetic, but his abrasiveness cracked me up so much I turned it up to 11 if anything.  That being said, of course he cares about things and acts that way for a reason, but as a writer you have to learn not to make excuses for your characters and let them be flawed.


What's your favorite scene from your novel? Could you please describe it?

This is a hard question to answer, mostly because a lot of the scenes are my favorite for different reasons.  I think my favorite one to actually write was a scene later in the book where the trio are exploring a ghost town and come across a golem.  For anyone not in the know, golems are traditionally seen as clay statues, built to serve their master in various ways.

Anyway, as the scene progresses the golem wakes up and begins to fulfill its duties, which are a complete mystery to everyone as there is no master there to give orders.  It’s a frantic battle against a force of nature…or at least it would be except the golem moves so slowly it’s barely even a threat.  The confrontation turns into a quasi slow-speed chase, and it perfectly encapsulates the book’s tone of “This is amazing/dangerous/stupid all at the same time.”  The best part is the entire sequence was completely unplanned.  I realized during writing that I needed one more dot to connect certain events and came up with the scenario on the fly.  I ended up enjoying the bit so much as I was writing I finished the rough draft for the chapter in about 2 hours.  I’m sure there are probably better realized sections or better examples of well-constructed prose, but I couldn’t help loving this chapter because it was such a blast to write.

What's your favorite part of writing? Plotting? Describing scenes? Dialogue?

Dialogue.  Dialogue all the way.  In a way, these characters all became like my babies, and I got to see them grow and transform.  But like a poorly-shot reality show, I purposefully but personalities together that were meant to link and bounce off of each other every time they opened their mouths.  The world building and plotting are fun, but nowhere near as fun as starting a conversation and just watching as the words bounce back and forth, insulting, chastising, joking, praising.  It’s so gratifying seeing all the planning culminate in little character moments, no matter how mundane they may seem in the grand scheme of things.

How long does it take you to write a book? Do you have a writing process, or do you wing it?

Between work and personal commitments, it’s hard to find time to sit down and write, which is why the process for writing a book takes six months to a year for me (it would be about 2 months of actual solid work if I could get it).  But I think that time in between helps in a way.  My writing process is very much “percolate and pour”.  I’ll sit on a scene or an idea for weeks, running it over and over in my brain.  I outline everything mentally, because if I don’t remember it in a month’s time it wasn’t worth remembering (I will admit to stealing that trick from Stephen King).  That way when I actually sit down to write I can just let it all flow out onto the keyboard without much need to reconsider as I go.

I say much need because there is still some self-editing as it hits the page.  I’ll know the general gist of each conversation and scene, but I won’t have the specific wording all worked out beforehand.  It helps to make dialogue sound more organic, like the characters thought up their responses right on the spot as normal people do.  And as with the scene above, not every milestone will be plotted out beforehand, so I have some room to get a little crazy.

What is it about the genre you chose that appeals to you?

I’ve already spoken about my love of monsters, but it’s the fantastical elements mixed with the humor that I really love.  I definitely don’t take myself too seriously, and have been told I can be funny (though I don’t claim to be some great comedian), so humor seemed like a good fit for me.  But I lean more towards the absurd when it comes to humor.  Not random, but bizarre and sort of out there.  That’s why I leaned towards fantasy.  If I had written a humorous book about a bank heist, it would probably come across as sort of clunky and I wouldn’t have a point.  With paranormal fantasy, though, I basically gave myself free reign to go nuts and be as absurd as I could, because the weirder it got the more it forced the characters to try to ground themselves, and that dissonance (to me at least) creates great comedy.

Are there any books or writers that have had particular influence on you?

I’ve often wondered if the writers I most enjoy truly influence me.  I’ve grown up reading a lot of different types of authors (Stephen King, Michael Crichton, Charles Dickens, just to name a few) and while I take some inspiration away from each I never really see their influence in my writing.  If anything I take most of my influence from comedy writers like Patton Oswalt or the great minds behind Mystery Science Theater 3000.  That show in particular gave me my sarcastic, irreverent streak that continues to this day.  But book-wise?  Just plenty of things I have enjoyed, but not a ton of direct influence.  I figured if I didn’t have something different to bring to the table I shouldn’t even bother to sit down, you know?

Did you ever surprise yourself when you were writing your book? Characters who took on lives of their own? Plot elements that took unexpected turns?

By the time I actually sat down to write the book, I had stewed on the developments long enough that the overarching plot never deviated from its course.  The real surprises came in the form of what worked as I was writing and what didn’t.  Some things would sound funny or important in my head, but by the time it got to writing I would find something new in a conversation that just through the rest of the scene off the rails and make my original plan seem unnecessary.

And yes, the characters took on their own dialogue at times in surprising ways.  The biggest for me was Sister Liliana’s phone call (you’ll have to read the book to find out the details).  I went into the phone call with no idea what was going to be said, only who was going to be talking.  Even now, when I go back to read it I don’t feel like I actually wrote that part.  It just took on a life of its own, and I sat back and watched as these two people spoke.  Which is kind of depressing, since I really like that part and in a way I can’t take credit for it.

Thanks for stopping by!

Thanks again for having me!

ABOUT THE HOBBYMEN

Sister Liliana has not been having the best of days. Between running away from the convent and then being thrown into a desolate prison, she has started to lose hope of having a fun Wednesday. That is until she meets two strange men with a rather peculiar hobby: Amateur Monster Biology. From ancient monsters to urban legends, Geoff and Book are out to separate truth from fairytale, no matter how bizarre or ridiculous that truth may be. And as they have found, there is truth in everything. Soon Liliana is caught in a whirlwind of adventure as they show her a side of the world she never thought existed, filled with fantastic creatures hiding in plain sight. But just as it seems her life is finally turning around, the group get a foreboding message from an unexpected, sinister source. Are the three of them in over their heads this time? Yes...the answer is yes.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Hobbymen-Tim-Owens/dp/1505283590

Barnes & Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-hobbymen-tim-owens/1119967479?ean=9781505283594

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22886980-the-hobbymen?from_search=true

FIND TIMOTHY

Facebook: www.facebook.com/thehobbymen

Twitter: @thehobbymen

Blog: juststopreadingthis.com

AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Alisha Nurse

An interview with Alisha Nurse, author of The Return of the Key.

Hi! Welcome to Zigzag Timeline. Can you tell us about your background as an author?

I officially became a published author on December 12th, 2014! I had been working on the novel on and off for three years. I love story telling but I hadn’t really considered becoming an author due to cognitive challenges I have as a result of fibromyalgia. In the end I just decided you know what, I’m gonna do it, even it means more work and takes longer.

What got you into writing?

I was going through a very bad depressive episode and I was searching for something to do to help me carry on. I had settled on the idea of writing a novel dedicated to my grandparents for their love. I have this thing where I have to finish anything I start so I thought writing a novel would be a good idea. Before that I only ever did creative writing in school. I however started blogging in my early twenties. It was compulsory for my university course and once I graduated I kept at it.

What was the first idea you had for your book, and how did the story grow from there?

The first idea stemmed from a dream. I have very vivid dreams and I remember that morning I woke up just enthralled by what I had seen in my sleep. The next thing I know I was scrambling for pencil and paper because I didn’t want to forget.  I then started thinking of how I could build a story around this dream I had had. I didn’t want to produce a story that was fluffy and superficial, I wanted it to have deeper meaning so I thought about some issues and things that are important to me and I crafted the rest of the story from there.

Among your characters, who's your favorite? Could you please describe him/her?

I really love the character called Loridel. She’s a supporting character, who is Gwragged Annwn, a kind of Welsh underwater faery who has contrary reactions to emotions. Loridel dresses in garments from the Tudor era, has pale skin and a crown of plaits. She’s enchantingly beautiful but her personality makes her quite peculiar. 

What's your favorite scene from your novel? Could you please describe it?

I don’t have a favourite but my most loved scenes are the ones where I got to really play with my imagination. One that tops the list is the part of the story where the group of friends is hijacked. The protagonist has fallen into a magical lake and her friends are in chaos looking for her but they also have to contend with this sinister faery who exaggerates everything. This quality makes her both spooky and hilarious. She is waiting for their boat to pull ashore and all seems lost. The friends are really despairing but they have to come to this place in order for it to get better. It’s the part where everybody learns lessons.

What's your favorite part of writing? Plotting? Describing scenes? Dialogue?

My favourite part of writing would be describing scenes, especially when I get to conjure up things out of this world. My least favourite would be writing dialogue. It puts me to sleep.

How long does it take you to write a book? Do you have a writing process, or do you wing it?

Well this one took three years with a lot of hiccups in between and health issues but I think the second will take less time. I’ll likely do it in three months time with all the edits. I try to create a rough outline so that when I start writing I have a guide but sometimes the writing process just does its own thing and I let it flow.

What is it about the genre you chose that appeals to you?

Fantasy has appealed to me since childhood. There’s just something about worlds without the rules and limitations of our own universe that draws me in. It’s a means of escape from the troubles of this life and it drives my imagination wild! ☺

Are there any books or writers that have had particular influence on you?

J.R.R Tolkien’s writing has really inspired and encouraged me to try to be the best that I can be and I hope that one day I can be half as good the storyteller that he was. I’m absolutely in love with The Hobbit. To Kill a Mockingbird is my next favourite. It’s really endearing and captures the essence of human nature – what makes us dark but also what makes us good. I want to be able to do that with my own writing so that story really pushes me.

Did you ever surprise yourself when you were writing your book? Characters who took on lives of their own? Plot elements that took unexpected turns?

Yeah I’ve surprised myself a couple times lol. It’s funny when that happens because you’re writing and you think you’re in control but then that happens. It’s like creating characters with freewill who end up choosing to do something that you wouldn’t have them do. This is what makes storytelling so powerful. It comes alive, sometimes taking a path of its own.

ABOUT THE RETURN OF THE KEY

16-year-old Eliza Aurelio grapples with her mixed race identity amid rising racial tensions on her little island. For their safety, Eliza’s grandfather sends her and her grandmother to a quiet town in Southwest England to stay with a relative. But this otherwise quiet town has been turned upside down by people mysteriously disappearing. Eliza eventually encounters a magical but dangerous realm accessible through a doorway in the town, and sees its connection to the abductions. She intends to put things right, only wanting to protect her family. To do this, she must return a stolen key to lock the open doorway. But Eliza has to overcome her own inner conflicts if she is to stand any chance of being successful and leaving the other realm alive. 

Suspenseful and enchanting, The Return of the Key explores the power of love, sacrifice and the journey to self acceptance.

AMAZON: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Return-Key-Alisha-Nurse/dp/0993145108/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1424921747&sr=8-1&keywords=the+return+of+the+key

GOODREADS: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24111558-the-return-of-the-key

FIND ALISHA

WEBSITE: http://authoralishanurse.com/

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Alisha-Nurse/1492365807708297?ref=aymt_homepage_panel

TWITTER: https://twitter.com/AliApow

INSTAGRAM: https://instagram.com/alishanurse95/

BNG FRIDAY: Panic by Tash McAdam

Every Friday until its publication, I'm going to blog something about Brave New Girls: Tales of Girls and Gadgets, a YA sci-fi anthology featuring tech-savvy heroines. The goal is to encourage more girls to enter Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math professions. All revenues from sales of the anthology will be donated to a scholarship fund through the Society of Women Engineers.

Today, I'm spotlighting one of the stories that will be featured in the anthology.

TITLE
Panic

AUTHOR
Tash McAdam

STORY DESCRIPTION
What would you do if all the lights went off, the doors locked and people started shooting?

Abial's not a fighter, but when the alternative is dying, there aren't really a lot of good choices. Street smart and quick witted, she figures if she can just get the electronic doors open, maybe she'll survive. If she had her datapad with her, it'd be a cakewalk, but without her beloved technology to fall back on, well... things might end badly.

WHY WE PICKED IT
This story has a really suspenseful atmosphere and an action-packed plot. It reminded me a bit of a graphic novel, which is always a bonus for me. It was also cool to see how the author handled the challenge of writing a scene where no one can see. And Abial's smarts aligned perfectly with the anthology's theme.

AUTHOR BIO
Tash spends most of the time time falling in streams, out of trees, learning to juggle, dreaming about zombies, dancing, painting, learning/teaching Karate, reading, and of course, writing. Being raised by hippie feminists, child-Tash did not realise that some people believe that women are inherently less capable of certain things. Since this belief is quite obviously ridiculous, the chance to join in an anthology aimed at spreading awareness of how biological sex has no impact on one’s abilities was welcome.

THOUGHTS ON BRAVE NEW GIRLS
Tash studied Multimedia Tech and Engineering at University, and there were huge and obvious gender imbalances in the student body. Kids can and will eventually not be programmed to believe that which bathroom they use has any effect on their future and careers. Hopefully this awesome project helps with that!

Website: tashmcadam.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TashMcAdam
Twitter: @TashMcAdam
Amazon: http://amzn.to/1vLFDDv

BRAVE NEW GIRLS will be released in Summer 2015! Sign up here to receive a notification when it's available to order.