Greatest Mistakes, Successes and Gnocchi!

Hi guys,

I'm over at Erica and Christy's blog talking about Zyan Star (naturally), my greatest mistake, greatest success, something other things, and most importantly, my gnocchi recipe!!

Pop over and say hi!

TTFN!

Gargoyles and Soul Thieves - An Interview Swap with Rebecca Chastain!

Hi, guys! A few weeks ago, I got an email from a fellow urban fantasy author asking if I wanted to do an interview swap. I love stuff like that, so I jumped on board right away. Rebecca and I have chatted quite a bit since then, and she's super cool and so are her books! Gargoyles and elemental magic are the feature of her latest series. Oh, and she's an Amazon bestseller, so that's rad. Are you ready? Rebecca's answers below, and my answers about the Zyan Star series over on her blog!

She looks badass, right?!

Me: Gargoyles and elementals together? Yes, please. What else can you tell me about your Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles series?

Rebecca: If you took the United States in the early 1900s, added in a population who can all wield varying levels of earth, water, air, fire, and wood elemental magic, and topped it off with multifarious mythical creatures, you’d have the world of the Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles. Within this magic-saturated setting, I built my story around an ordinary woman, because I’ve always felt that no matter how fantastical the world, the best stories involve relatable characters making tough decisions.

Mika is a midlevel earth elemental who has worked a lot of late nights as a freelancer to hone her skills with delicate quartz projects. Her goal is to leave her dead-end quarry job and open her own artisan shop. Unfortunately, her carefully constructed five-year plan—and years of hard work—are jeopardized when a baby gargoyle bursts into her studio and begs for her help on a desperate mission.

As you can probably guess, she can’t say no to a baby gargoyle. Could you?

When you built the world for Magic of the Gargoyles, how did you start?

I start every story by opening up a fresh Word document and typing everything that comes to mind in a non-stop brainstorming session. A lot of…we’ll call it “fluff” comes out in these session, but there’s nothing like that moment when a spark of an idea ignites into an entire story. With Magic, it was baby gargoyles. The moment I pictured a housecat-sized gargoyle, I knew I had to write the story. After that, I researched quartz and mythical creatures, but mostly I focused on building a magical world that would be fun to romp around in for a few novels.

If you could manifest the magical traits of one of your characters, what would it be?

Mika’s elemental abilities, definitely. She can alter the structure of quartz with her magic, shaping it into incredible masterpieces. Plus, she’s the one that gets to help baby gargoyles…

Have you ever traveled (or have plans to) in the name of research, and where?

I don’t know if this counts, but my Madison Fox series is set in my hometown. In essence, every errand run around town could be construed as research.

What are your reading habits these days? Do you have rules about what you read while you’re writing?

I do have rules! While writing the Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles, I refused to read anything with gargoyles in it. In general, I try not to read anything in the genre I’m writing, and when I’m deep into a writing project, I often skip fiction entirely and focus on nonfiction. I have an idea for an alternate history fantasy that may or may not ever happen, so for the last two years, I’ve been reading tons about the world around 1492. I’m now a font of weird facts. For instance, did you know there were no earthworms in the United States before colonists started carting in soil from England? They’d been killed off in an earlier ice age, and those in warmer climates farther south had never burrowed back up this way. 

And here's a synopsis of Magic of the Gargoyles:

To help a baby gargoyle, Mika will risk everything.

Mika Stillwater is a midlevel earth elemental with ambitions of becoming a quartz artisan, and her hard work is starting to get noticed. But when a panicked baby gargoyle bursts into her studio, insisting Mika is the only person she’ll trust with her desperate mission, Mika’s carefully constructed five-year plan is shattered.

Swept into the gritty criminal underworld of Terra Haven, Mika jeopardizes everything she’s work so hard for as she attempts to save the baby gargoyle from the machinations of a monster—and to stay alive…

From the imaginative mind of international bestselling fantasy author Rebecca Chastain, Magic of the Gargoyles is a spellbinding adventure set in a world full of elemental magic and adorable gargoyles that is sure to enchant young adult and adult readers alike.

Want to pick up a copy? (sure you do - 99 cents!)

Amazon, US                Amazon, everywhere

Rebecca's official bio:

Rebecca Chastain is the internationally bestselling author of the Madison Fox, Illuminant Enforcer series and the Gargoyle Guardian Chronicles, among others works. She has found seven four-leaf clovers to date, won a purebred Arabian horse in a drawing, and once tamed a blackbird for a day. Writing stories designed to amuse and entertain has been her passion since she was eleven years old. She lives in Northern California with her wonderful husband and three bossy cats.

Hit her up on the Internet!

Website 

Facebook

Twitter

Goodreads

Amazon author page

Hope you all enjoyed our swap! If you want to check out my answers to the questions, hop on over to Rebecca's blog. TTFN!

Paranormal Romance/Urban Fantasy Author Interview

Hi, lovely writer friends! Another installment from this month's issue of Raven Moon. I met J.R. here in the blogosphere, and she has a PNR novella out that's a really fun read (linkage below). Enjoy!

Author Interview
J.R. Pearse Nelson

What inspired you to become a writer?

I’ve always been a plotter. I have notebooks from childhood full of characters and plots, starting with a setting similar to Little House on the Prairie and developing into alien dystopias with sociological overtones. I fell in love with fantasy and romance over a lifetime of reading. The stories rattling around my brain range from space cowgirls to mythological fantasy, and I really want to try something post-apocalyptic. My writing tastes are as varied as my reading tastes.

Tell us about your path to publication.

I wrote my recently published novella, Tribute, in 2008. My first foray into paranormal romance resulted in a fun, full story…of fewer than 35,000 words. It wasn’t a good length for submission the traditional route. So I shelved it. I kept working, but nothing came out as clean and fun as that romance. In 2010, I learned about Smashwords and started considering the indie route. The publishing world is so dynamic right now; by early 2011 it was obvious the indie star was on the rise. I wanted in! I polished up my novella (length no longer being a consideration, yeah!), worked up all those publishing bits and pieces, got up my nerve…and clicked ‘publish’!

What led you to choose indie publishing?

Indie is so friendly. Smashwords, Amazon, Barnes and Noble – they all make it really simple to publish in an ebook format. The growth of ereaders and changing marketplace makes indie an attractive option. I also like the creative control aspect; I choose everything from where to make my books available to the cover. The flexibility to cross genres and provide different lengths is also great for a writer like me, since my stories tend to emerge at novella length and I can’t stick with a genre to save my life.

What marketing advice do you have as an indie author? Is there anything you think an indie author should do differently as opposed to a traditional pub author when it comes to marketing?

The marketing aspect is a constantly moving target. In fact, mixing it up is a strategy in itself. Try everything. Find places to talk to people who might like your work. Blogs, Goodreads, social networks. Marketing is going to be similar whether you’re traditionally published or self-published. For a writer like me, having just published my first book, the best advice is to write, write, write. I’m completing edits on my second book, writing my third book, outlining the fourth…and so on. This isn’t a sprint; it’s a marathon.

What have you learned from your experience that other writers should know when considering indie publishing?

Publishing takes work. Once the words are on the page, you have a whole process to get it out there. Many writers won’t like that part as much as they like writing. That’s true of the traditional route, too. Publishing, no matter how you do it, changes your relationship with writing. New demands on your time mean it’s easy to get bogged down by the to-do list. But being indie doesn’t mean going it alone – build a community and it’s much easier.

Thanks so much for sharing your journey with us! Here's a bit more about J.R. and how you can get ahold of her:

J.R. Pearse Nelson is an indie author of fantasy and paranormal romance. Her work is fast-paced, adventurous, and sometimes dark. Her novella, Tribute, is the first book in the Children of the Sidhe series. The sequel will be released in December 2011. While the genre of these novellas is paranormal romance, J.R. doesn't limit her reading or writing to one type of fantasy. She loves it all, from the epics to the dark beasties to the mythological, sociological side. An urban fantasy novel is in the works for 2012.

J.R. is a native Oregonian, living in the beautiful Portland area. She lives with her husband, two small daughters and the family dog. Self-publishing is the realization of J.R.'s life-long dream to write fiction for an audience. You can connect with J.R. online at her blog, twitter, and Goodreads. Visit www.jrpearsenelson.com.

Want to check out J.R.'s paranormal romance novella Tribute? Click here to get it at Smashwords!