Guest Posts

Guest Post with Helen Hollick, author of The Kingmaking

February 27, 2009 by Darlene

Today it is my pleasure to welcome Helen Hollick, the author of The Kingmaking to Peeking Between the Pages. The Kingmaking is a wonderful piece of historical fiction that keeps you captivated for hours. I really enjoyed this novel and you can see my review of it here. Now let’s join Helen as she talks about how she came about writing historical fiction and her interest in it…

I had no interest in history at school. The history teacher used to read out of a very dull book, in a very dull voice. I do not remember one thing she “taught” us. The only lesson I looked forward to was English. Mrs Llewellyn brought passion to the subject and suggested exciting novels to read. She encouraged my writing and spent time showing me how to make my essays better.

I was always writing. After leaving school I got a job as an assistant at my local library. While working there I re-discovered Rosemary Sutcliff’s wonderful novels set in Roman Britain – Eagle of the Ninth, Frontier Wolf, Mark of the Horse Lord etc, and then Mary Stewart’s Hollow Hills Trilogy, and I discovered Arthur.

I had never liked the traditional Arthurian stories. I could not accept that King Arthur of the Medieval tales was so poor at being a king. He became King, obtained a beautiful wife and then disappeared in search of the Holy Grail, thereby abandoning his Kingdom. Surely he would have foreseen the Lancelot/Guinevere affair? I also detested Lancelot and those goody-goody knights – none of it seemed real history – so the tales were not of interest to me.

Mary Stewart’s novels included an author’s note in which she stated if Arthur had existed he would have been a post-Roman war lord. I liked that idea and read as much about the ‘real’, more interesting Arthur as I could.

I searched for novels – but became so frustrated with most of them. They were not how I saw things. I was so annoyed at one portrayal of Gwenhwyfar that I threw the book across the room.

That is what made my mind up. I was going to write my ideas of what might have really happened.

There would be no knights in armour, turreted castles or Holy Grails, No myth, no magic. No Lancelot, no Merlin. Instead, I went back to the early Welsh legends of Arthur and his wife, Gwenhwyfar. The legends turned out to be far more emotionally exciting than the Medieval stories. This Arthur was more plausible. This Arthur was real.

It took me ten years to write – but the publication of the Sourcebooks edition of The Kingmaking proves I did it!

Thanks so much for joining us today at Peeking Between the Pages Helen. I look forward to the next novel in the Pendragon’s Banner Trilogy.

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Guest Post with Bruce Skye, Author of Grayrider & Giveaway

February 24, 2009 by Darlene

I’m very pleased today to Welcome Bruce Skye, author of Grayrider to Peeking Between the Pages. I really enjoyed his novel and you can see my review of it here. Stay tuned at the end of the guest post with Bruce for a giveaway. Read on to gain some insight into what Bruce thinks about creativity and writing.

Why Not? by Bruce Skye

To be quite honest, I have no idea how someone can write fiction successfully and not be creative. Robert Kennedy said “Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say, why not.” If writers can’t think that way, how can they can they devise the kind of plot twists, in-depth characters and suspense my novels have?

To show what I mean, let me share portions of just a few of the reviews of my fantasy novel Grayrider:

His great character development and strong story line make this a great read.
Grayrider was a very good read with lots of twists to the story. I really look forward to another book from this series.
The story line moves at a fast pace and keeps the reader very involved. I found that I could not put the book down.”

I write what I do for the simple fact I’m a creative person. I’m happiest when I’m working on a novel, in creating new situations the heroes must deal with. And it is always a challenge to give new depth to a protagonist and make him or her more real for the reader. Even though I write fantasy, making the characters—both bad and good—real for those reading my words is important. That adds a great deal to the suspense of the plot.

Creativity is essential to write good novels. I can’t see how you can do it otherwise. Another reviewer commented about me:

I think this series has potential as Mr. Skye has a very creative imagination that will allow the adventure to continue to grow in original ways.

She’s right. My imagination is quite vivid and I try to make every novel in this series a very different story from the last. The second volume of the Deathsong Chronicles is a direct result of the climax of Grayrider. And the third is a very stark contrast to the first two. And in all of them, I work to keep my readers on the edge of their seats.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

A former technical writer, detail is important to Bruce Skye. His research for the Deathsong Chronicles included medieval armor and fortresses, as well as Celtic names and magic. “If you create a world, it must be consistent. And that’s what I strive for Grayrider’s world to be. I’ve built a database of material for each of the Deathsong Chronicles. Those databases aid me in keeping the world the same from book to book.

“When I wrote Grayrider, I followed the advice of Stephen King. I did not write the book following any sort of outline. I have no more idea than my readers do when I write a novel what will happen in the midst of the story. It makes it more exciting for both the readers and myself.”

You can visit his website at http://www.bruceskye.com/.

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Gabriel, the exiled king of Rivalin, comes before King Airell to warn him the Ansgarian army will invade his kingdom before the night is over. Airell tells him he has no one to send. Gabriel wants revenge for the murder of his family by the Ansgarians. He decides to fight the incursion without help.

As this takes place, Deirdre (Airell’s daughter), flees the kingdom of Cynyr north of Boadhagh. She knows now her mentor, Morrigan, created the Ansgarian army her father has fought for years. She goes south to warn him of her. Because Deirdre does not believe in herself, the young sorceress has difficulty in performing magic.

Once she is reunited with her father, she tells both he and Grayrider about Morrigan. Her power is growing; only Gabriel’s magical sword may yet destroy her. He must go to Cynyr to fight her. He agrees if Deirdre attends him, seeking her counsel. On that journey they fall in love and foil many efforts by Morrigan to kill Gabriel by both armies and sorcerers.

Grayrider fights Morrigan and sees his beloved slain by the sorceress before he is finally able to kill her. He returns to Rivalin brokenhearted. The ending is a -complete surprise the reader will not expect at all.

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The Giveaway: In Honor of the Book Giveaway Carnival at Bookroom Reviews, my gently read hardcover copy is up for grabs. The rules are simple…leave me a comment with an email address and I’ll draw for a winner on Monday, March 9. This is open worldwide. Good luck!

Visit Pump Up Your Book Promotion here.

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Guest Post with Jennie Nash, author of The Only True Genius in the Family

February 4, 2009 by Darlene

I’d like to welcome Jennie Nash to Peeking Between the Pages. I had the pleasure of reviewing her novel The Only True Genius in the Family and loved it. You can read my review of it here. Read on to enjoy a guest post from Jennie on what she believes a true genius to be…

One of the strange things about writing a novel is that you do it mostly alone in a room. I sit here day after day in my pumpkin-colored office, typing away on my keyboard. (I just realized the other day that the print on the “L” key and the “M” key are starting to fade away, and this keyboard isn’t that old!) No one peers over my shoulder, and I create in the calm and the quiet, trying to get the scenes right and the dialogue right and the whole thing between the mother and daughter right. When the book is published, however, not many people ask about the dialogue or the scenes. They ask what the story means; they want me to talk about my story – which makes perfect sense. It’s the same thing I have spent my life as a reader doing – enjoying a story, immersing myself in it, and then coming up for air and thinking, so what’s the point? What does it all mean?
One of the questions I’m being asked about most often with The Only True Genius in the Family is what I believe true genius to be. A perfectly fair question, right? But a really hard one to answer! Philosophers and great thinkers have been pondering that question, or questions like it, for thousands of years. In coming up with what to say, I thought about my main character, Claire, a woman who is plagued by doubt about her ability to make art. She is caught between her famous photographer father and her painting prodigy daughter, and she is convinced that genius skipped a generation in their family. Claire could have bowed out of the family business. She could have said, “I think I’ll become an accountant, instead, or a marathon runner or a CEO of a multinational corporation.” But she didn’t. She felt called to make art, and she fought for the right to do it—a right that she had to grant to herself.

What Claire finds, in the end, is her own creative voice. Instead of worrying about her dad or her daughter or what anyone thinks, she just makes something because it feels right and good. That’s what I think true genius is: figuring out what you are meant to do, daring to do it, and feeling wholly alive in the process.

Jennie, thanks so much for stopping in at Peeking Between the Pages. I wish you every success with your novel The Only True Genius in the Family. It’s a wonderful novel! You can purchase Jennie’s book here in the US and here in Canada. You can also make a visit to her website here. Thanks everyone for popping in to read Jennie’s guest post. Leave some comment love for her if you’d like…

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Guest Post with Lloyd Lofthouse and Giveaway

January 27, 2009 by Darlene

I’m very happy to welcome Lloyd Lofthouse, author of My Splendid Concubine to Peeking Between the Pages today. I had the pleasure of reading his novel for the Pump Up Your Book Promotion and you can see my review here. So, without further delay, here is Lloyd’s guest post. Enjoy. Make sure to check in at the end of the post for the giveaway!

I’ve been writing and struggling to get published for four decades. I’ve heard it said that ‘close’ only counts in the game of horse shoes. I don’t agree. Close also counts in the writing game. What do I mean by that?

More than a hundred thousand new books are published each year. There are millions of books in print. On top of that, the average book sells only five hundred copies. Some sell more and many sell less. Also, most brick and mortar bookstores stock twenty to fifty thousand titles. There is a lot of competition for shelf space.

With those odds, most writers can’t make a living. That ‘want-to-be a published author’ has to have a paying job to survive. Even after getting published, most have to keep working. In my case, I was an English/journalism teacher for thirty years. I’d get up at two or three in the morning after a few hours of sleep and write before driving to work in the sluggish morning traffic.

So, what is it that keeps someone like me writing? I believe the answer is knowing your work has entertained or touched someone that isn’t a member of your family or a close friend. Since I’ve attended writing workshops at Fresno State, Cal Poly Pomona, UCLA, etc, for me that was usually a creative writing teacher or another workshop writer. Marjorie Miller, the teacher out of UCLA, helped me find a major West coast agent to represent my Vietnam story, Better a Dead Hero—a novel I spent six years writing. No publisher bought Better a Dead Hero. However, one editor from a small traditional publishing house wrote that everyone in the editorial office read the manuscript and loved it. They just weren’t publishing Vietnam any more. As a matter of fact, they had stopped publishing fiction. That’s what I call ‘getting close’. Another word for getting close is encouragement—proof that you can write and tell a story—that someone out there you’ve never met will enjoy what you write.

Even with the occasional encouragement, it wasn’t always easy. Depression and doubt are viruses that plagued me as a writer. After reading a hundred rejections for something I sweated years to write, there were times I didn’t write for months, but I always returned to the keyboard and those early morning writing sessions.

Now that I’ve published My Splendid Concubine, a novel I spent a decade writing, the encouragement has reached a higher level. Powerful reviews like those from City Weekend Magazine; the Midwest Book Review, or the written comment from a Writer’s Digest judge along with winning an honorable mention in fiction from the 2008 London Book Festival helps build confidence. Also, bookstore owners and readers attending author events that read My Splendid Concubine said they enjoyed the novel.

Recently, I drove to Orinda Books to pick up a check from the owner for books placed on consignment. Orinda Books sold thirteen copies at full price—five remain. The local Barnes & Noble sold twenty. Bay Books sold all sixteen in stock. Last time I was at Clayton Books, fifteen had sold and a book club expressed interest in the rest. As I’ve discovered over the years, every little bit helped keep this writer on the path toward publishing. In a few months Our Hart, the sequel to My Splendid Concubine, will be ready. After that, a memoir, and I’m already half-way through the rough draft.

About the Author:

As a field radio operator, Lloyd Lofthouse was a walking target in Vietnam in 1966. He has skied in blizzards at forty below zero and climbed mountains in hip deep snow.

Lloyd earned a BA in journalism after fighting in Vietnam as a U.S. Marine. Later, while working days as an English teacher at a high school in California, he earned an MFA in writing. He enjoyed a job as a maitre d’ in a multimillion-dollar nightclub and tried his hand successfully at counting cards in Las Vegas for a few years. He now lives near San Francisco with his wife, with a second home in Shanghai, China. Lloyd says that snapshots of his life appear like multicolored ribbons flowing through many of his poems.

This link takes you to Lloyd’s ‘Vietnam Experience’ page filled with photos. He took many of them. Since Lloyd still has to edit the photos so they load faster, this page may load slow for older computers.

This link will take you to a media piece from a Southern California newspaper that Lloyd copied and posted on his Website that will give you an idea about his teaching years.

If you are interesting in learning more about Lloyd’s teaching experience, you are welcome to read about it at AuthorsDen. ‘Word Dancer’ is a memoir of the 1994-1995 school year. He kept a daily journal that year. He is using that journal to write ‘Word Dancer’. Everyday, when he arrived home, Lloyd wrote an entry in that journal. It sat on a shelf in his garage for fourteen years gathering dust. Spiders moved into the binder and built a nest. After all those years, Lloyd forgot he’d written it. When he was cleaning the garage, he found it again. Lloyd started reading, remembering and writing. Everything he writes in ‘Word Dancer’ happened. He’s using a primary source as his guide. Memory may be faulty, but a daily journal written the day an event took place is as accurate as it can get from the author’s point-of-view.

Accomplishments: Lloyd’s short story “A Night at the Well of Purity” was named a finalist for the 2007 Chicago Literary Awards.

As a teacher, Lloyd found satisfaction in the number of students that published nationally and internationally while attending his English and journalism classes.

Please visit Lloyd Lofthouse’s website here.

Thank you so much for joining us here at Peeking Between the Pages today Lloyd. It’s been a pleasure both reading your novel and having you guest post on my blog.

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Let’s move on to the giveaway now. I’m giving away my gently read, signed copy of My Splendid Concubine by Lloyd Lofthouse to one lucky winner. The rules are simple:

Leave me a comment here telling me you’d like to enter. Be sure to leave me an email address to contact you.
Read my review, leave me a comment on it and get yourself another entry.

This giveaway will be open worldwide. I will draw for a winner on Monday, February 2. Good luck everyone!

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