Guest Blog by Kadin Seton

I first met Kadin when we did  R.B. Wood’s Wordcount podcast back in April 2011. As a former corporate woman myself, I related to her immediately and thought she’d be interesting to know. It’s great we’ve stayed in touch, and I’m thrilled to have her as my guest blogger.

Please welcome the lovely, Kadin Seton, as she gives her interpretation of “new beginnings.”

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When Eden proposed that I fill a guest spot on her site, my first thought was that I’m not much of a blogger. Then she mentioned her January theme: New Beginnings. I thought about my life and realized those two words perfectly described the direction I was headed in this year. Eden is very wise!

My writing history is filled with years of scripting long dry training documents… and for fun, several dozen short stories.  Like everyone, I dreamed of writing a novel… you know, something really great.

As the years whizzed by (as a side note, I find it totally unfair that time accelerates exponentially as you get older), I hit a huge valley in my life. Three people close to me were diagnosed with cancer and one didn’t make it. Yet for some reason, during those emotionally nightmarish days, I was finally able to put on paper the book I longed to write. Admittedly it wasn’t great, but after years of dreaming about it, I finally did it! Yay! I even hired an editor and received some incredibly useful feedback. Yet it all came to a halt as I slammed into a brick wall.

What happened you ask? Well, the literary demons showed up. No one had warned me about the little gremlins who tell you that your work sucks and you should just throw it out. Tiny evil voices that whisper things like… don’t embarrass yourself by letting anyone actually read this junk! I soon realized the demons were right (stupid me!), so my novel sat on a shelf and collected dust. I felt stuck and permanently stalled-out.

I should also mention that losing people you love and/or seeing them suffer through illness, puts a whole new perspective on your priorities. In the past, I worked in the fast paced business world. It was a world that wasn’t always pretty, but it paid well and as an extra bonus, provided a steady stream of stress that jeopardized my own health. After some serious consideration, at the end of 2011, I reorganized my priorities and accepted a new job. I decided to walk away from the high stress environment, take a BIG pay cut, and work for a non-profit company. I was excited by the concept of giving back, rather than taking.

Learning a totally new industry, and a complicated one at that, was much harder than I expected. Yet, as difficult as the change was, I immediately noticed that I wasn’t stressed out. Coincidently, as 2012 rolled around, it suddenly occurred to me that the literary demons had moved out. No more creepy voices telling me I sucked.  Where did they go? I had no idea, but they were gone. Furthermore, I didn’t feel pessimistic about my novel any longer and I couldn’t wait to dive back into the process of rewriting. Words, ideas, character arcs… seemed to fall into place without the usual self recrimination.

As 2012 unfolds, an interesting sensation of being at peace with myself has emerged. It occurred to me that finding ‘new beginnings’ wasn’t about making an annual new year’s resolution. It’s not about losing weight, exercising more or promising to walk the dog daily. It’s bigger than the short term resolutions we make, and then break, each year. It’s about pointing your life in a direction that gives you balance and satisfies your soul.  I guess the literary demons are abhorrently repelled by notions like that.

As I feel myself grow happier with my chosen direction, I can see my writing loosening up as well. My words are more candid and ‘from the heart.’ With a little luck and some elbow grease, I hope to have my book, Descent Into Darkness, published later this year.  If you’re curious, the tale is a post-apocalyptic science fiction adventure which takes place in the not-too-distant future. The story centers around a young girl who comes of age during very dark times. No literary demons allowed!

May 2012 be a year of new beginnings for you too… and good health.  From the bottom of my heart, I wish everyone a year of good health!

Connect with Kadin

Kadin Seton is a professional trainer who teaches management and leadership skills.  She loves her new job working for a large non-profit company and is proud to be giving back to society.

Kadin also enjoys reading and writing science fiction and can periodically be found on The Word Count Podcast at www.rbwood.com.

Look for her book Descent Into Darkness, later this year.
Follow Kadin on Twitter at: @kadinseton

Guest Blog by Maxwell Cynn

October’s been an incredible month for one of my favorite authors, Maxwell Cynn. 10-22-11 was the official release date of  his novel, The Collective, which I reviewed and loved, and he’s been all over the place promoting his book. Additionally, he celebrated a milestone birthday (5o), and he looks more handsome now than ever, damn!

I’m honored to have Max as my guest blogger for his birthday month. Please read more about this fascinating man, and don’t miss the free stuff he’s giving away! 

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Eden does a great series of author profiles called Inside The Author’s Mind.

I had the pleasure of being interviewed for that series awhile back. When she invited me to guest post as promotion for my latest novel THE COLLECTIVE I was thrilled. The story involves a computer virus that uses flashes of light on the monitor to brainwash users. In keeping with the theme of Inside The Author’s Mind I thought I would explore what was in my mind and the psychology behind THE COLLECTIVE.

I was born in October of 1961, the year C.G. Jung died. His writings, in the Collected Works, have influenced me immeasurably, along with other great visionaries such as C.S. Lewis and author/philosopher Richard Bach. In Jung’s essay THE UNDISCOVERED SELF, written shortly before his death, he warned of the oppressive nature of collectivism on individuality, which he considered essential to the healthy expression of the human spirit. Throughout his writings he spoke of Individuation as the path to wholeness. The essay is as timely and important today as it was then.

In THE COLLECTIVE I took as my premise that battle between collectivism and individuality — between tyranny and freedom. In Jung’s day, Nationalism, Communism, and a host of other political ideologies were the enemies of Individuation. Today we face peer-pressure, political correctness, and the growing socialization of the internet. We are being brainwashed into the ideal of collective thought, group think, which is anathema to individual thought and free expression. We stand at a crossroads, as Jung warned over fifty years ago, between sociological collectivism and individualism.

Social networks are, of course, all the rage today. I’m connected to more networks than I care to count. The idea of the internet bringing us together, pooling our resources, our knowledge, our insight, is the bright and shining future — or is it? Jung warned that, as part of the group, “…the individual is nothing but a unit which repeats itself ad infinitum and could just as well be designated with a letter of the alphabet.” The internet has worked to connect us, but it also serves to reduce us to statistical norms — usernames and profiles. In the amorphous “Cloud” we become less real, less individual.

Countless authors have explored this idea — Orwell in 1984, Bradbury in Fahrenheit 451, among many other greats. Their dark heroes had as their redeeming quality the simple act of maintaining their individuality in a world which accepted only homogenous drones. In their dark worlds, political correctness was defined by the state and enforced with an iron fist. In our modern world the drive toward collective thought and statistical norms are defined by the “mob” and enforced through sociological peer-pressure. Individualism is counterpoised to the ideals of modern progressive thought.

In THE COLLECTIVE I posit a group who use the internet, and a computer virus known as Nemesis, to brainwash the masses into collective thought. The goal is an homogenous, peaceful society, but the outcome is the suppression of individuality. The champions of individuality are not often the most respected individuals in our modern society — hackers, criminals, punks, anarchists — but they are individuals. My protagonist, Dr. John Peterson, is a decidedly Freudian criminal psychologist who reluctantly becomes the voice of Jungian Individuation.

Romance is a strong element in the story, as it is in everything I write. The two female leads represent what Jung would call the protagonist’s Anima — the one demure, compliant, and safe, representing the need to belong and to enjoy peace and normality while the other is strong, rebellious, and dangerous, representing the souls need to assert individuality. Throughout, John is torn between these opposites, stumbling forward toward his own Individuation. He and ArchAngel (the program designed to battle Nemesis) represent the singular Man, while The Collective and Nemesis represent the plural Man or societal group.

I hope you enjoy THE COLLECTIVE, and I hope it gives occasion for thought and debate over the future of our social development. I strongly recommend reading Jung’s Collected Works, and at the very least THE UNDISCOVERED SELF. As a free society we have the choice of nurturing individuality or accepting a Borg-like collective unity. It will not be governments who subjugate us, we bring the chains of oppression willingly on ourselves in order to fit-in. To paraphrase Franklin, “Those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither.”

The Collective Blurb:

Imagine… You have a virus on your computer. It’s tracking everything you do and sending that information to the Collective. It can’t be detected by any virus scan or blocked by any firewall. If you have a microphone, they are listening. If you have a webcam, they are watching you. But they aren’t just watching. Flashes of light from your monitor are communicating with your subconscious. You are being brainwashed.

Dr. John Peterson discovers the virus and embarks on a mind altering search for the origins of the infection driving his patients mad. He discovers the Collective, and they discover him. A battle rages between the Nemesis virus and the ArchAngel network with the fate of mankind in the balance. Will man succumb to Nemesis and become drones of the Collective or rise as billions of individual archangels to light the world with freedom? One man, one woman, and a network of hackers hold the key.

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Thanks again, Eden, for allowing me to mount my soapbox on your blog. And thank you, readers, for your interest in my work — and hopefully buying my books. You can find me on social networks everywhere through links on my website, I would love to connect with you.

FREEBIES from Max!

Keep reading to find out more….

I also encourage you to post your comments below. If you include an email address I’ll send you a little eSwag I developed for the release of THE COLLECTIVE. Specify if you want the Windows7 version or non-windows7. And if you would like a FREE copy of my previously released cyber-erotic novel CybrGrrl you can download it at Smashwords FREE during October.

Use coupon code ER56K at the checkout.

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Thank you so much for the giveaways, Max, and congratulations on all the well-deserved success of THE COLLECTIVE!

Maxwell Cynn is a novelist, freelance writer, amateur coder, webmaster, and Indie publisher who writes deliciously romantic speculative fiction and blogs book reviews on a wide range of genres. His website, with links to all of his social media connections, can be found at:  MaxwellCynn.com

BUY LINKS for The Collective:  

Amazon        Barnes & Noble       Smashwords

Guest Blogger – Tim Queeney

This month’s guest blogger is Tim Queeney. His new book, George in London was featured recently on my blog, and he’s been kind enough to return and write something as part of my  September Humour Month.

Of course, he’s an expert in the field of humor. I’ve been a fan of  Tim’s satirical news site, Height of Eye for some time now and encourage you to check it out.

Please welcome the wily and witty, Tim Queeney.

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What makes someone attractive? The obvious answer is looks — the hot bod and the pretty face (or the hunky bod and the handsome face). But there is another type of attraction, too. Sometimes we are captured by another person’s wit, charm and charisma. They are just so damn fun, funny or engaging, we don’t care so much what they look like. Remember that guy or girl in school who was no beauty but had the opposite sex hanging on their every word?

The idea of differing physical and verbal attractiveness is perhaps most famously played out in the story of the 16^th century French soldier Cyrano de Bergerac. Cyrano is witty and charming but has an enormous nose that limits his visual appeal. He must woo the beautiful Roxanne for a man who’s a hunk, but also a dolt. Cyrano remains hidden, feeding wonderful lines to the hunk, who repeats them as if they are his own. Cyrano burns with desire even as he crafts his lovely language. He wishes that Roxanne could only see the beauty of his words and choose him over the hunk, no matter that he has a prodigious proboscis (of course, if Cyrano’s nose is that big it does raise the question of the sizing of his other body parts – perhaps Roxanne is missing out on something good here).

In my novel, George in London, I have fun using this idea for a nighttime scene where one man woos a woman for another and a double case of mistaken identity occurs.

One night during his adventure in London, the 19-year-old George Washington believes he has been summoned to a moonlit meeting with the beautiful French countess Sophie. She waits for him inside her coach, parked next to the somewhat suggestively named Marybone Basin. But Washington is too  nervous to speak for himself, fearing he will say the wrong thing and drive her away forever. Darius Attucks, an African American mariner, is George’s companion on their trip to London and it is Darius who hits upon a scheme to woo Sophie. Darius will speak for George — who he calls “Geo” — until the countess eagerly invites George into her coach for an amorous encounter.

In his playful exchanges with the woman in the coach, Darius uses the language of war as a metaphor for sexual conquest. He likens sex to the siege of an 18^th century Vauban fort. During such a siege, the attacker digs a series of steadily closer trenches that bring the attackers nearer to the very heart of the fort. The defenders attempt to defend the fort with cannon fire, but they must be relentlessly accurate in their cannonades. Because as the trenches get closer, the attackers set up their own cannon that can destroy the cannon inside the fort. If the defenders’ cannon is knocked out of action, the fate of the fort is sealed. The attackers can dig their covering trenches right up to the walls and then rush the fort’s defenses and overwhelm it.

But enough military history already! Below is the excerpt from George in London with Darius playing Cyrano.

“The dark of night approaches and soon we will hide in the folds of its cloak. Since I carry none of the emotion that burdens you, let me speak for you. She will stay within the coach while I converse with her. Given the quality of my education, my facility for English rhetoric is excellent — certainly better than your own. She need never know that it is me who speaks to her. You will wait and when she bids you enter, so you shall.”

“It does have a certain genius,” Geo admitted. “Though I must protest the assertion that you speak the King’s English better than me.”

“How could the son of a pig farmer from the swamps of Virginia have better speech than a man educated at the finest school in New York City? The idea is preposterous on its face.”

Geo grudgingly conceded my point and soon we were in place near the lady’s coach. The coach lanterns were weak and the footmen who attended the countess were happy to see the tall, young figure of Geo step into the light. They had been told of his arrival, so they quickly repaired to the far side of the coach to commence games of dice and to drink gin. Geo then stepped back into the shadows and I stepped forward.

A female voice called out through the yellow curtains that masked the coach windows. “Who is that without?” The timbre of the voice was rather different than what I had expected from the countess, but there was no time to delay.

“’Tis I, my lady,” I replied.

“Ah,” she gurgled contentedly. “I am most pleased you have come.”

“How could I do otherwise? To gaze once again at your beauty would draw me from the farthest reaches of Araby or even from darkest Africa.” Geo frowned at my mention of Africa, supposing perhaps that I might give myself away, but I waved him off. He could be such a dolt.

“When I saw you today, I was taken with your manly prospect,” she said. “Little did I realize you also had a tongue of silver.”

“As you say, my lady. I possess a tongue of silver to sing your praises, ears of diamond to hear your wishes, a heart of gold to treasure your love and a root of the firmest British oak with which to be of service.”

She laughed and her hand started to open the curtain.

“Pray, my lady, wait further before drawing back the cloth,” I said quickly. “I am sensible of great delight in prolonging the moment of first entry.”

She was not adverse to my suggestion, though she pretended to be so. “Shall we banter like this all night? I grow warm here in my coach.”

“It would be a pleasure unsurpassed simply to continue this intercourse ’twixt us ’til old Sol peeked over the world’s edge,” I said.

“Would be pleasant, true, but I’d be consumed by the heat of my blood, which rises apace. You must climb aboard and make bodily plain the sweet ecstasy of your words. Do you so mercilessly tease the girls of America?”

“In matters of Venus, as in matters of Mars, there can be no quarter given. First must the citadel be besieged and made ready for the final thrust. When the wall is breached, then the attack can be consummated.”

“Oh, indeed,” she sighed. “You have most assuredly effected a breach, sir, and my inner keep lies open for your triumphal entry.”

I smiled in the dark at her eagerness. “Even now my forces strain forward, tight against their constraining trenches. The trumpet is up, ready for the final signal.”

A sigh of frustration came from within the coach. “Damn it! You must rush forward into the breach now! I will brook no further delay!” With this, she flung open the door and leaned forward with her arms outstretched.

I had expected to see the pretty young face and comely figure of the Countess d’ Abbeville. I was instead confronted with another woman entirely. She was older and rather more shopworn than the countess. Leaning forward with an attitude of lustful abandon, a position underlined by her loosened clothes, bare skin and flushed complexion, was none other than Fanny Chase. My surprise was so great I found myself momentarily struck dumb.

And to be fair, the surprise for Lady Chase must have been equally great. Instead of a tall, dashing young white gentleman, she was confronted, instead, with a shorter, somewhat more weathered (though I like to think still dashing in my own way), African man. Though she knew me as well as she knew Geo, Lady Chase reacted as if she had seen Beelzebub himself. She screamed wildly as she attempted to quickly tighten all the items of her clothing that she had loosened.

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George in London available for Kindle at Amazon

Website 

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Goodreads


Thanks Tim for sharing your humorous excerpt!  To my readers, have you had any funny encounters with mistaken identity? Please comment and let us know!

Guest Blogger – Les Floyd

This month’s guest blogger is Les Floyd, a writer from Carlisle, England whom I first mentioned on my blog last month with my story “Taxi to India.” Les inspired the tale. Why? Because I’m inspired by people who have a unique voice, and there’s definitely something unique about Les.

He describes himself in the following way:  After decades of sleepwalking through life, I’ve finally woken up and realised the greatest dreams are achieved with open eyes and a conscious mind…

Les is a writer of unwavering eloquence, and his words have touched people all over the world, including me.

“Lesism,” the name of his blog, contains writing that is incredibly personal, honest, and devoid of judgement.  After reading a post he wrote last month called “The Norway Atrocities, Amy Winehouse, Judgement & Compassion,” I came up with August’s theme of “Passion and Compassion” and invited Les to be my guest blogger.

There are very few people who can elicit the full spectrum of emotions from me merely with words—Les can.

I’m honoured to host Les on my blog, and the timing could not be more fitting given the topic of his post—the riots going on right now in England.

You’ll no doubt feel the compassion and the power behind his words.

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London’s Burning

“It is sad to think that these people are thinking of only the next moment, and the moment they have created is a nightmare.”

—Catherine Holmes, Hackney, London

There is a heaving, psychic tsunami of negativity churning through the streets of England and further across the United Kingdom… in the metropolises and smaller cities, as well as in the towns, villages and hamlets of these lands.

Far away from the flashpoints of rioting, there’s anger, hate and seething outrage directed towards the perpetrators of these crimes… to the point of calls for martial law and the summary execution of rioters and looters.

Representatives from the 2012 Olympics have been bemoaning the damage being done to the image of London, just a year before the games begin.

Undoubtedly, there will be people from other countries who are cancelling their flights and holidays to the UK, this year, in fear they’ll get caught up in the chaos.

But let’s put this into perspective..?

London is a colossal metropolis of 7,825,000 souls, sprawling over 607 square miles (1,572 sq km) of South East England, yet from news reports – both nationally and internationally – you’d think the whole city was burning and that everyone who lives there was either rioting and looting or in deep peril.

There are just a few thousand people, amongst a current population of 61,838,154 in the UK, who are actively involved in these disturbances.

As dramatic as the footage may be, the proportion of buildings that have been burned down or damaged is very, very, very small in the grand scheme of things. As a gauge, there are 2018 schools in London – at the heart of communities with thousands of other buildings in their areas.

Although, of course and absolutely, I have huge, heart-felt sympathy for those people directly affected – particularly business owners who, most likely, have been struggling just to stay afloat in the aftermath of the recession, and have seen all their hard work reduced to ashes – this is most definitely a media storm in a teacup.

And this has become entertainment for the masses. People are watching television tonight, hoping that the rioting continues, so they can continue to mete out their judgement and share their sense of outrage and moral superiority with friends and on social networks.

I heard on the bus today, from a young woman and mother: “Shoot the fuckers. Fuck ‘em. Seriously. Disrespectful little bastards. Shoot them.” As she was saying these words to her friend on the seat behind, her little boy was sitting beside her, and he didn’t bat an eyelid to her language. He was obviously quite used to it.

My brother said basically the same thing, though his preferred method of dispersal was baton round, or rubber bullets, which were used extensively in ‘The Troubles’ in Northern Ireland; dark times that we don’t want to see a return to.

And a few messages I saw on Twitter:

“Get the army out, do the country a favour and just shoot them.”

“If you break the law, you should automatically forfeit your human rights.”

“Greenwich Council will seek eviction of any tenant proven criminally guilty of involvement in #LondonRiots”

This is the collective ego at work, on two fronts, both in the ‘pack mentality’ we see in the groups of rioters, and in the wider general public – the vast majority of whom are not affected by these events at all… but they have chosen to take this drama onboard as their own.

What purpose could indignation, anger and judgement serve for someone living in, say, my home city of Carlisle, which is just about as far from London as you could possibly get in England?

Is there anything these people can do to change the events that have happened, or are perhaps happening right now?

No.

Millions of people across the UK have adopted this problem and have amplified the negative energy of the riots a thousand-fold.

You can’t fight fire with fire.

You can’t fight negativity with negativity.

A very wise friend wrote to me on Twitter, earlier:

“The youngsters are depraved. And there is adult thuggery there too. How do we fix that?”

This is a statement of fact, rather than judgement. And a question that is difficult to answer.

How can we fix this right now? To be honest, I don’t think we can… right now.

This is an open wound that will close, in time, and in the aftermath of this chaos, we simply have to – as a nation – look at why it happened at all, then enact positive and productive measures that offer opportunities that bring about real change to the fortunes of the sort of people who are out on the streets, causing so much damage and disruption.

Locking them all away for a few years is not going to help, in the long term. It doesn’t help that we are in a global financial crisis, but these events aren’t part of any true class war. Even when the UK was going through its boom period, there were still sections of society that were marginalised.

If, twenty years ago, the nation had invested in these communities – in training and education and jobs – the events of the past few days simply wouldn’t have happened.

You have to remember these people are human beings. It’s perhaps true that a  leopard can’t change its spots, but we are not leopards. We’re an adaptable, brilliant species and inside all of us is the ability to achieve great things, on a grand and humble scale and everywhere in between.

Help people realise their potential and you’ll change their families for generations.

The Small Business Consultancy, in London – founded by Amar Lodhia – works with young people from ‘hard to reach’ backgrounds to help them set up in business – people just like those you see rioting in London.

TSBC has had huge success inspiring, encouraging and supporting them to work towards achieving their dreams; towards a better future for themselves, their families and their communities, which in turn benefits their local economy and the nation as a whole.

Give the right backing to one of these ‘feral scum’ (as I read them termed today) and a few years later, they’ll be a shining light in their community, leading others, through example, to set about bringing their own dreams to reality.

I hope the ethos of TSBC stretches all across this country and then on to other nations, because it will drive a cascade effect of immense positivity right around the globe, and that would go such a long way towards solving both the social and economic problems of our world.

In the meantime, practice compassion. Let go of your judgement of these people and remember that the flame of the human spirit in you is also burning in them. There are no greater or lesser souls in this world and there is no true evil… just the fog of circumstance, environment and upbringing, and the corruption of the dysfunctional mind.

I was in prison in my very early 20s – a story to be written up in my blog very soon – and perhaps if you’d known me then, some of you would have classed me as feral scum, too… but now? Well, I hope I can count myself as an example that there is always a chance for a person to make great changes to their lives, despite earlier failures.

Guaranteed, there will be faces in the crowds of those rioters who will go on to do great things with their own lives, too.

So, please… find it in your true selves to look beyond their actions and see the heart and soul of these people, who are just like you…

… they are far from beyond redemption.

“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” – The Dalai Lama 

Connect with Les

Blog 

Twitter

Facebook

Email: LesFloyd [at] Gmail [dot] com



Thank you Les for an incredible piece of writing. To my readers, I’d highly recommend you follow Les in his journey. He is currently hard at work finishing his book, and I personally can’t wait to get my hands on it.  

Please leave Les a comment in appreciation of his post here.

Guest Blogger – Wren Emerson

This month’s guest blogger is Wren Emerson, an author whom I met while drinking at the Twitter bar for writers, also known as #pubwrite. It’s a wonderful place for authors to converge and chat, drink, and surprisingly, not get drunk. How fabulous is that?

I talked with Wren about writing which eventually led to this guest blog. Knowing Wren has a quirky sense of humor, I was really looking forward to her take on this month’s theme of “night.”  It’s a great post and I hope you enjoy it.

Please welcome the delightful Wren Emerson.

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For as long as I can remember I’ve had two minds about night.

On the one hand, there’s always been something so comforting and welcoming about a summer’s night. When I was little we spent a lot of time with my father’s mother. She enjoyed things like camping and fishing and she could usually be counted on to fall asleep early with cable on and I spent many nights as a child sitting in front of her open screen door while a puff of cool breeze brought a slightly rusty, slightly dusty sent through the old wire mesh. I’d watch cheesy horror flicks with commentary from whatever the theme was of that particular “Up All Night” show. All very positive and cherished memories that I still love to recall twenty years later.

But once the warm summer air gets a bite and it’s too cold to enjoy sitting in front of a breezy door, the darkness becomes a lot more sinister to me. Suddenly those movies I loved so much all summer long started to seem a lot scarier to me and staying up all night taking well meaning advantage of my grandma wasn’t nearly as fun because I was really too cold to enjoy it. All the fun summer activities I looked forward to all summer were off the table and winter just meant that it got dark hours earlier.

I’m in my early thirties now. I’m well past the point where I should still be scared of the dark. I’ll admit it, I used to flip the light switch beside my bedroom door and all but leap across the room and under the covers. And this until I was in my twenties. I haven’t done that trick in years, but I still have my own special quirks.

I won’t look in a mirror after dark if I’m alone in the bathroom. I know that as soon as the sun goes down, all bets are off. That’s when you see the spooky dead person in the mirror behind you or accidently summon a vengeful spirit who will kill you and everyone you love.

I don’t sleep without a blanket or sheet across my hips and butt. I have no idea why. I assume because I must think on a subconscious level that monsters dig the taste of girl-butt.

I try not to look around in the dark. I read once that there is a phenomena in which people wake up to a pressure on their chest and open their eyes to see an old woman sitting on them. It’s called Hag Syndrome or something like that. Since I’m pretty sure that would drive me completely bug crap insane, I don’t risk it.

I also haven’t outgrown the things I loved so much about summer nights. I still feel like I could walk for limitless miles as long as I have the hum of evening bugs as my soundtrack. The first hot nights of summer make me long for an adventure so fiercely that my chest actually aches from the yearning. I write less fiction, but I fill more journal pages with my hopes for the future and memories of the past.

After all this time I have to believe that my contradictory views of night are a fundamental part of who I am as a person. I assume that I’ll probably always cower under a pile of blankets all winter long or feel like I want to cry myself to sleep as I examine all the ways my life went wrong. But I’ve also been blessed to have my summer nights where I lay awake for hours just enjoying my life and remembering what it is that makes my life so very wonderful.

Thank you Eden for having me. I think it’s fitting that I wrote this post at night, during the summer, and that while I was writing I was grinning like a maniac as I thought about all the things that summer nights used to mean to me as a kid and all the things they mean to me now as an adult. I’m so glad to have had the chance to share that glimpse of me with your readers. Nothing makes me feel more blessed than to think about all the things I have in my life that are unique and wonderful and totally worth the sharing.

* * * *

All she ever wanted was a chance to settle down in one place.

Thistle Nettlebottom knows her life isn’t exactly normal. She travels the country with her secretive mother and bestselling author grandmother in a pink RV going from book signings to crazy research trips. She’s never been to public school or had a boyfriend, but she can pick a lock and hotwire a car. One day the phone rings and they set a course to a tiny town that’s not on any maps. Suddenly, Thistle finds her whole life changing.

She’s finally found the home she’s been searching for.

Thistle soon realizes that Desire isn’t like other towns and she’s not like other girls. The family she trusted has lied to her about everything her entire life and the things she doesn’t know about herself could cost her everything. Her legacy as one of the most powerful witches the town has ever seen has made her enemies that have been waiting patiently for a chance to destroy her. Thistle needs to learn to use her powers to protect herself before they succeed.

Be careful what you wish for.

Thistle has a power unique even among the magic wielding witches of Desire. She can wish things into existence. At first she enjoys the freedom of having everything her heart desires, but she soon realizes that her power comes at a terrible price. She’s losing her grip on her sanity at a time when she can’t afford any weakness. Her enemies are closing in quickly, but she might not have the strength to save herself.

I Wish… (The Witches of Desire) is available from:  

Amazon        Barnes and Noble

Wren Emerson was born on the mean streets of small town Kansas 30*mumble* years ago. She first put pen to paper at the tender age of 12 and wrote an epicly awful story. She then became publisher and editor in chief of a family newspaper which included articles written by indentured servants/siblings. It got rave reviews from all 8 members of her family.

Now in adulthood, Wren still enjoys bossing people around so she became overlord to a small army of minions; her true love, kids, a cat, and a dog. When she’s not plotting to form a dictatorship she writes. When she’s not writing, she plays video games, reads books, practices her iphoneography skills, and spends way too much time hanging out in #pubwrite on Twitter.

Connect with Wren on her blog and twitter. 

Thanks Wren for a wonderful post!  To my readers, please comment and share your thoughts about night.  What are some of your strongest memories about it?  Do you have any fears or rituals?

Guest Blogger – Draven Ames

Draven Ames is an author who writes in the horror genre. We’ve crossed paths over the blogosphere and social networks, and I’ve grown very fond of his support, kind words of encouragement, and writing style. Earlier this month, he invited me to write a horror story for his blog, and today, I’m happy to return the favor and ask him to write something for mine.

Please welcome the talented, Draven Ames, and enjoy his heartwarming post about summer—on this first day of summer.

Eden

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I love summertime with my children. They get to have friends over and go swimming nearly every single day. All the neighborhood children like to hang out, playing games with them as the parents ask how we deal with so many. The answer is simple.

We get to create memories with our kids.

Everyone tells their friends about the great time they had at the lake, or the time they had a big birthday party. Everyone remembers their best summer ever. We just try to make sure that their favorite summer happens every year. Each new spring comes just before a new chance to one-up ourselves from the previous year.

The kids love it. They are down at the pool like fish. They create friendships that will last them until they are our age. They are building their lives right now and we, as authors, have a chance to co-write those chapters.

And with all these new friendships, they aren’t trying so hard at school to create popularity. We are hoping all this playing, having their friends over a lot, will help keep them away from the drugs that are so rampant in Portland. There is an 80% poverty rate at their school, and we have met our share of druggy parents. A lot of kids have it pretty bad and can use the fun in their summer, away from the drama they have at home.

Children are our legacy. They are so much more than the books we write for immortality.

So that is what our summer is like here. Needless to say, there is a lot less writing going on.

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Draven Ames is a full-time Dad and ex-paratrooper.

His yet to be published, supernatural, horror novel, Bullets ‘Til Midnight received an excellent advance review from HorrorNews.net. Look for more from this incredible author in the near future.

Blog     Twitter

Draven would love to hear from you!

What do you do for summer? What are your plans? Do you fish, camp or go to concerts? What is your favorite time of the year and why? What is your legacy?

Guest Blogger – Liz Borino

Each month, I hope to have a guest author write something for my blog. It will give my readers a chance to learn about other writers’ styles, while introducing new readers to my blog— a win-win situation.

Liz Borino was my very first guest on “Inside the Author’s Mind”  December 10, 2010 when her debut novel, Expectations, was released. It seems only fitting that she should be my first guest blogger as her newest book, What Money Can’t Buy, is moving up the Amazon charts. Congratulations Liz!

In keeping with the theme for this month, May Moves Me in Many Ways, please give a very warm welcome to Liz as she writes about what moves her.

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When Eden asked me to write about what moves me, I immediately knew the answer: words. It’s safe to say, as a writer, I’m definitely a logophile, a lover of words. I’m a writer. I better love words, right? The truth is, I find words to be magical. They have the ability to lift me up or tear me down very quickly. I’m sure I’m not alone in this. Writers, you know when a reader messages you to tell you they loved your book? When they tell you, you touched on something they always felt, but couldn’t express? Parents, how did it feel when your child said your name for the first time? How about that subject you struggled with all semester in school and finally, you get a “Good Job!” on a paper. Those are some very powerful words.

I’d love to share some of my favorite words/phrases and why they affect me as much as they do.

1.   Love:  Love makes everything beautiful. It’s what makes us see life in brilliant Technicolor. Think about it, without love, what are we doing? What’s our lasting impression on the world? That’s right, there would be none.

2.  Passion:  Passion goes hand in hand with love. It lights our fire, gets us excited, and gets things done.  Passion is wild, sexy, and exciting. It’s the feeling of reckless abandon, when you just know you need to be doing what you’re doing. Any other options are inconceivable. They don’t make sense. Why? Your whole heart is involved. Nothing else is important.

3.  Thank You:  Gratitude changes everything. It lets the other person know not only do you appreciate them, but they’re doing a good job. You’re a good friend, boss, employee, lover, whatever, you are delivering.

4.  I’m Sorry:  Sorry is probably the hardest thing to say, especially when you’re unsure if you’re in the wrong. Sometimes, though, even if you’re not, it fixes many situations when one person takes responsibility. And if you don’t? You could be losing someone very important to you. Worth two words to prevent that, no?

5.  Courage:  “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes it’s the tiny voice at the end of the day saying, I’ll try again tomorrow.” For some people, waking up and trying again takes courage. Rejoice when you can lift yourself up from your falls.

6.  Hope:  Hope is linked with courage. Hope is everything when it comes to living your dreams. You have to believe your passion will take you somewhere, or else why pursue it?

7.  Dreams:  Dreams are the picture you hold in your head of your ideal life. Your dreams give an end result to those passions. They make you smile no matter what.

8.  Heaven:  Odd word for a non-believer to be moved by, isn’t it? No, actually, I define Heaven as the space of love and peace. Something I strive to create for myself and people around me everyday.

9.  Success:  To me, success is feeling loved in the morning, safe at night, and warm and content in between. What more can you desire?

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Expectations depicts the struggle between what we desire for ourselves and our familial obligations. The struggle is personified by Chris and Matt Taylor, identical twins, who are trying to win their overbearing father’s approval and acquire their trust funds. Love, money, and desire collide as Matt and Chris decide what’s really important to them.

Amazon     Barnes and Noble

What Money Can’t Buy, the sequel to Expectations, finds the two couples, Chris and Aiden and Matt and Carley, eagerly anticipating parenthood. However, their personal struggles continue. Though Matt overcame his dependency on alcohol, new temptations present themselves. And with Carley on bed rest, these temptations put a greater strain on their relationship. Chris continues to deal with issues regarding his father. These issues increase with greater proximity.  When tragedy strikes, the best and worst in everyone is revealed. Can they stick together, or will their reactions tear them apart?

Amazon     Barnes and Noble

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Liz Borino is the debut author of Expectations and its sequel, What Money Can’t Buy published by Lazy Day. Throughout her education, including a Bachelor’s Degree from Hofstra University, she’s kept her stories to herself, but this only child is all grown up and wants to share them with the world. Her roots are in Bethlehem, Pa, but she loves to experience new cultures. As fun as that is, Liz likes nothing better than curling up at home with a good book or her work in progress.

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So, what about you, readers? What words affect you and why? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.