Month: March 2016

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The Great Smokies

Returned from the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee on Friday. I already miss them.

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Someday we’ll return to Townsend to complete the Middle Prong Trail and to Gatlinburg to hike to Grotto Falls. Far too much to do in this area when the goal is leisure and you take your sweet time waking up and having breakfast and sipping tea while morning departs.

My kids had a blast and have the injuries to prove it. Real life with early morning rush and schedules and traffic resumes tomorrow. I’ll be daydreaming about our next road trip.

Words added to THE CATALYST while on vacation: 1,176. Words since I’ve returned: 451.

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Amazon Giveaway of THE ALIGNMENT (Kindle version)

Tell your friends! Enter for a chance to win THE ALIGNMENT (Kindle version). Five winners will be chosen; it’s a 1 in 500 chance to win. No purchase necessary.

The Alignment-sidebarAncient feuds, forbidden love, magic and revenge. The Alignment Series is a pentalogy that spans three generations of two rival families and the people caught between them.

Enter for a chance to win the first book in the series today!

https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/91a47877b5561523

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THE CATALYST Update – March 17

I think I need to retitle this book PROBLEMS. I’m at 53,751 words and wow, there are problems. Problems on top of problems giving birth to problems. I’m not sure who’s going to resolve them all.

Wait, what? It’s up to me? In about 70,000 words or less? *runs*

Progress of THE CATALYST
First Draft: In progress, about 44% complete (53,751 words and counting)
My revisions: Not started
Professional editing: Not started
Proofreading: Not started
Formatting: Not started
Final proofread: Not started
Cover art: Not started

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Recommended Reads: UPROOTED by Naomi Novik

uprootedUprooted by Naomi Novik = a million wows.

I feel guilty for devouring it instead of savoring every word. What a perfect joining of fairy tale and fantasy, alive with magic in the story as well as the prose. The pace has a perfect ebb and flow, with scenes of high action tempered by slower scenes of vivid description that allow a moment to savor and breathe. The slower scenes pull you into a world that becomes more layered each time.

The characters are some of the best drawn fictional people I’ve read in a long time. And the world! It’s wonderful and frightening and built in such detail that when the conflicts explode, it’s breathtaking.

Uprooted is one of the few books I’d buy a paper copy of just to leave out on my nightstand, to be able to pick it up, flip to a random page, and lose myself just for a moment. It’s designed to not just consume, but treasure. If I didn’t have so many books on my To-Read, I’d read it again right now. And yes, there’s a love story threaded in, pulling tighter with each scene until you’re dying to see something give. It reminds me a lot of Beauty and the Beast, yet it’s so different, and so much more.

Fans of my books, I think you will love this one.

UPROOTED by Naomi Novik
Amazon | Goodreads | Naomi Novik’s website