Free Doomsday Brethren Story from Shayla Black
August 17, 2009 by Melissa · Leave a Comment
Hey, everyone! If you have not tried Shayla’s Brethren series, here is your chance to try it for free. She has a free novella up at her site today. Fated tells the story of Ronan, one of two very rowdy twins. I think the story gives you a good taste of what the whole series is like, and it’s FREE, so you can’t lose. Here is a tidbit, and of course, (c) 2009, Shayla Black:
Chapter One
© Shelley Bradley LLC
August 2009
There’s a bloody unwelcome sight.
Ronan Wolvesey wandered into his usual haunt, The Witch’s Brew, with his twin brother, Raiden, close behind. The rowdy London pub always drew a noisy, unusual crowd: athletic types, businessmen, goth girls…and many of magickind’s unmated. A surprise, considering its owner was pure human.
It was that very human Ronan now watched, all swinging golden curls and enormous blue eyes, as Kari Keswick leaned over the bar, her brief blue t-shirt exposing a band of soft skin at her midriff. She spoke to another wizard, a big dark-haired one with gray eyes and the look of a predator. Tynan Someone-or-other, he’d been told.
Fighting a gust of wind, Ronan slammed the little pub’s door. Kari didn’t look his way. Instead, she gripped Tynan’s shoulder as she looked into his eyes and smiled softly.
Bloody hell! He feared this wretched feeling poisoning his blood was the emotion humans called jealousy. He’d rather swallow battery acid.
“Your eyes will burn holes in her if you stare any harder,” Raiden murmured.
“He’s been here too often this past month, talking to Kari.”
“Why do you care? It’s not as if you’ll spend tonight alone. In fact…” He looked away. “I see two splendid possibilities by the window. Come on.”
Raiden saw such possibilities every place they went, and rarely was he wrong. Ronan knew he would not spend the night alone…but he fantasized about spending it with Kari. If he approached her now, she would likely refuse him—just as she had for the past two years. Until now, he’d assumed Kari didn’t want to cross that human-wizard line. Given her present company and their coziness, it appeared her refusal was more personal.
“In a moment.” Ronan headed for the bar.
Raiden grabbed his arm. “She’s not for you. Forget her.”
Ronan refused to concede defeat. “Shove off.”
“She’s hardly the most beautiful female you’ve ever seen. Last week’s blonde was more stunning by half. What was her name?”
He had no idea, and that was the problem. He grew weary of waking up in a different bed, beside a different body every morning. At just ninety, he was young by magickind’s standards. He couldn’t live this way for another ten minutes, much less eight or nine centuries.
“There’s something about Kari,” Ronan confessed. “I’ve nearly gone mad trying to discern it.”
“The fact she said ‘no,’ a word you never hear?” Raiden shrugged. “Plenty of other lovelies. Pick one and move on.”
As if all women were interchangeable. For Raiden—and the rest of the Wolvesey clan—they were.
“Chat up the girls by the window, then. I want to pop over to the bar, say hello.”
Raiden rolled his eyes. “Be quick. Besides, she looks…busy.”
At that, Ronan turned back to Kari to find her laying her soft pink lips against the big wizard’s cheek. She looked so delicate and fair against his strong, sun-bronzed jaw. Then Tynan grabbed her hand and squeezed.
The sight ripped a hole in Ronan’s chest. He clenched his jaw so hard, it was a wonder he didn’t grind his teeth into powder.
Stalking across the bar, he yanked out a stool near Tynan’s. It screeched across the old stone floor. Still, Kari did not look his way.
To his left, the heat from the brick hearth flamed to ward off the coming winter’s chill. Heavy alternative rock played in the background as some wizards laughed at their attempts to play billiards without magic. Human females at the end of the bar toasted something with stout red wine. Ronan scarcely noticed any of it. As always, Kari drew him in utterly, her smile shining as brightly as her golden hair. Her otherworldly blue eyes seemed to take up half her sweet face. A glance at her bowled him over.
There was something…fresh about her. Almost pure. If he could figure it out exactly, maybe he could rid himself of this odd obsession.
“Kari?” he called.
She blinked several times, then tore her gaze from Tynan’s. The other wizard released her, giving her permission to greet him. Was she bedding the wanker? In love with him? The thought screamed across his brain like a battle cry.
“Ronan.” She sidled down to his end of the bar. “A scotch?”
“Double, no rocks.” He glanced down at Tynan. “New…friend?”
“I see your brother has already made yours for the night.” She looked just over his shoulder at his brother with a sarcastic twist of her pretty pink lips. “I hope you’re in the mood for a brunette tonight. It appears she’s yours by default. Raiden always takes the redheads.” Then she looked at her watch and whistled. “Quick work. That’s a record, even for him.”
Ronan grimaced. He didn’t like coming here to find women, but his twin insisted nowhere else was more expedient or target-rich.
“I don’t care who Raiden’s found. He can have them both. I came for you,” he confessed.
Kari reached behind her for a glass on the shelf. “We’ve been over this. I won’t spend the night with you.”
“Why? It’s not because I’m a wizard.” He glanced at Tynan. “Clearly.”
“Don’t ask me again. Please.” She slammed the glass on the well-worn bar between them.
Ronan grabbed her hands. They were soft and fragile, and at a mere touch, desire burned him alive, eating at his composure. “You’re like a fever to me. I need to touch you.”
“That line work for you often?”
Kari thought the admission he’d had to choke out was a ploy? He scowled. “It’s not a bloody line.”
She shook her head, blonde curls brushing breasts he’d dreamed about touching, and extracted her hands. “Like any fever, you’ll recover from it.” Kari then withdrew a bottle of scotch, filled the glass, then shoved it his way. “Six pounds.”
With a sigh, Ronan shoved his money across the bar. “I simply want to talk to you.”
“No, you want to shag me. And then forget me as you have every woman you’ve ever met here and shagged for the past two years. The notches on your bedpost are long, as is the line. I have neither the time nor inclination.”
With that, she turned away and headed to the other end of the bar.
Bugger!
Raiden motioned him over, and Ronan went, pasting on a smile. He glanced at the brunette. Pretty enough. Nice mouth. Small hands. Maybe he could close his eyes and pretend she was Kari. It would hardly be the first time. But now that he knew wizards weren’t off limits, he vowed someday—soon—that he would have Kari for a night.
Writing Wednesday-Increasing Your Writing Speed
August 12, 2009 by Melissa · 5 Comments
I know there will be people who’ll say that speed is not important, quality is. I agree with this, but I think any writer who wants to be regularly published needs to learn how to write at their optimum speed. The first thing you have to understand is that this is something that is very individual. Each person writes at their own speed and no two people will function the same way. Keep that in mind as I progress along in my explanation.
The first thing you need to figure out is what kind of writer are you and where do you function best. For me, I am a vomit writer. What that means is I throw it all down on the page, then go back and fix it. I rarely have good descriptions, and most of the time it is mostly dialogue and little else. Other writers cannot go on without perfecting a page or a chapter. I know some writers who only write three pages a day, but at the end of the day, those pages are perfect.
Now, when I decided to increase my speed, I did it the fitness way. Yeah, you read that right. See, to increase your number of situps, they suggest you add one each time you do it. Then, before you know it, you wil get up to a bigger number. My suggestion is to add a page to your writing average(or you can do it by words) each day you write for a week. Each week do this. If it sounds simple to you, that is because it is. Now, the tricky thing is finding your stopping point. I used to average 10 pages a day. When I got behind because of illnesses for me and members of my family, it was hard to get to the point again. I have finally returned, sometimes getting up to 15 unedited pages a day, but it has taken me two years.
Now, why did I tell you to figure out what kind of writer you are? Because you need to know your limit. I can write between 10-15 pages a day, where a friend of mine writes an average of 6-8. What is interesting is that we both can write a book in the same amount of time. That means that she is slower because she edits as she writes, I do not. My editing time is much more extensive after the book is done in rough draft. So looking at the overall picture is important.
You know how you write…you know how many pages you want to write a day, you have your goal, and you are ready to go. Now…YOU HAVE TO WRITE. Talking about it is fine, but getting your butt in the chair and getting to work is the most important thing. When I embarked on the journey, I joined a group called Survivor Writers. We committed to writing 3 pages a day, five days a week. So, you had to write 15 pages a week. That was huge because I had a 7 yr old and a newborn, so carving out that time was essential. It also did something else. It made me commit to writing each day, or at least a normal five-day work week. It is another reason I like #writegoal on Twitter. Each day you write you have to commit to that work. Keeps you honest.
One more thing to keep in mind. If you start having back problems, neck pain, or headaches, you might need to slow down. At one time I could do upwards of 20 pages a day. Unfortunately, I now have Degenerative Disc Disease, and a screwed up neck. So, I waited too late on that one and am learning to live with 10-12 pages a day. If you are not healthy, you can’t write.
It is important to look at your writing time, to figure out how long it takes you to write a book. When you get published–and you wil if you aren’t already, just don’t give up–you will need to make sure you know what you can and cannot write. It will make it easier on you and on your publisher.
Even if you can only do the three pages a day, five days a week, think about what you will accomplish if you do commit to that. In 10 weeks, you have a novella. In twenty, you have a category legnth book, and in 25, half a year, you have a single title. Now if you increase that to 30 a week, think of just how much you can accomplish!
Creating Character Depth
August 5, 2009 by Melissa · 3 Comments
Whether you are a pantzer and a plotter, you need to have some kind of idea about your characters before you begin. Even when I was a complete pantzer, I did character worksheets. Granted, I use mine sometimes just to keep track of hair and eye color. Especially in a series. It is hard to remember when you have not spent time with a character in a year or more.You can skip down to the bottom for some links and downloads for them, but what I want to write about today is how creating character depth can help create conflict and a richness to your overall plot.
I have taught a few classes on this and I always push the idea that we all need to know our characters before we start. We might not know everything, and a lot of times in the course of writing the book you find out more. But, you typically have a general idea of their personality. You might have a charcter like Evan Chambers of A Little Harmless Obsession, my work in progress. Readers of the Harmless series know Evan from the last book, A Little Harmless Pleasure. He is cold, controlling and generally has the Madonna/whore complex for women. He sees women in those roles, with no in between. Readers of the series know that Cynthia changed some of those perceptions, and now he is dealing with that while I am writing the book.(yeah, I am mean, readers, not telling you much more) But, even before I had him take a supporting role in ALHP, I knew there was something in his past that caused this. As I dug, I found out that he had some demons to fight, as I am sure the readers expect, and part of his need for control in the bedroom has to do with events from his childhood.
Now, why did I seemingly start rambling about Evan? If you read back over it, you see that something in his childhood effects him emotionally and sexually. It has to be something pretty important to have those ramifications. (nope, still not telling) But, you can see where knowing about his childhood, his parents, any siblings would have ramifications on the character’s journey and the overall plot. His heroine, May Aiona, is a seemingly strong minded woman happy to take control–but because she has to. She had things happen in her childhood also. Not as horrible as the things Evan dealt with, but both of them had to grow up really fast. It affects the way they deal with each, how their relationship progresses and whether they will find love and happiness together.
I recently had to do a character worksheet on a book I had already written. Her Mother’s Killer was first written for NY, turned down everywhere, and I rewrote it for WCP, updating the plot and characters.(and thank God because the love scenes sucked, and not in a good way). I orginally wrote it four years earlier, and just changing the technology was a strain. But, I realized why it never got picked up in the first place years ago. Althea Johnson was so bland, I wanted to kill her and save the serial killer after her the trouble. It was before I did character worksheets and I saw just how much more I learned from doing one. Yes, I knew that her father and mother had been killed, she was going through a divorce, but digging under her skin with the character worksheet, I realized that she was a woman with a backbone. She did not have one when I wrote it the first time. This is a woman who was in the house when her mother was killed, was forced off the road, went through a nasty, bitter divorce, and still, she came back to face a killer. That is a woman with some–excuse the term–balls. But, there was one thing that I didn’t realize messed up the whole plot and ruined her as a character for me: she is extremely smart. In the orginal version, I have her traipsing around trying to find the killer herself. Her brother’s best friend is the local sheriff, but she doesn’t ask for, or want, his help. That’s stupid. So, going back over her character sheet, I realized that her motives and actions were just not right, and I think changing them added depth to her character and made the story better.
What does all this do overall? It adds to the plot, explains their goals, motivations, and conflicts–not to mention their reactions to events in the book. It does matter if the mother for a character was loving or cold, whether she was an honest woman, or if she was devious. Fathers are just as important. A father who abandoned the family would definitely have a different affect on the character as opposed to one who stayed behind. Of course, if that father stayed behind and beat the children, that would produce a different character. You can help the reader understand and care about your characters. Jenny Crusie’s Welcome to Temptation has two of my favorite characters: Phin and Sophie. Sophie has a habit of repeating movie lines when she is nervous, and it is an endearing quality. Granted, she is there under dubious circumstances and she isn’t being completely honest with the hero, but every time I would read a movie quote, I would laugh and then also have some sympathy. (In fact, Ms Crusie has a list of the quotes used in the book and I read over them today laughing and remember the characters and situations.)
Make sure that if you don’t know your characters well to begin with, you solve this problem before the end of the book. Because if you don’t know why your hero doesn’t trust women, or why the heroine wants control over her own life, then you’re reader probably would not also. No, you don’t need to know everything before you start–that’s boring for the author, lol. But make sure you find out and let your reader know. It is an important part of any goals, motivations or conflicts, and helps the reader care about your character.
Here is a list of good resources to come up with your own character chart/worksheet. You can come up with your own, and it will probably work better that way. Personlize it. Different authors will want to know different things, not to mention if you are a freak like me and write in so many different genres. A character worksheet for Mila in Hunting Mila would be vastly different than my character worksheet for Colleen in The Accidental Countess. But, remember, know your characters so you can help your readers love them as much as you do.
Mel’s Character Worksheet- please feel free to download this, change it up for your use. If you share with others, please send the original with my copyright on it.
Pamela Dowd’s Character Creation Chart
Tara K Harper’s Character Worksheet
There are many more worksheets out there, so you might find something you like better or come up with your own.
New review for Turning Paige
August 2, 2009 by Melissa · 2 Comments
Well, right after I sent out the newsletter, there was another review that came in for Turning Paige! And this one is wonderful.
Melissa Schroeder has written a wonderfully unique tale of magic and soul mates in Turning Paige. The Sweet Shoppe is a clever concept.
Bella, Fallen Angel Reviews, Five Angels
She has a ton of other nice things to say, so please check out the rest of the review.
Newsletter and Two Lips Scavenger Hunt
August 1, 2009 by Melissa · 2 Comments
I am still trying to get all my pics uploaded, but I had to stop to write up the newsletter. Make sure to join, if you aren’t a member already. I have some great things to give away, and I have a HUGE contest that I will announce next month.
You need to go to Two Lips Reviews and check out the massive third anniversary scavenger hunt. I am one of many authors giving away books.
