Deathbed Reading?

I’ve recently learned that my 93-year-old aunt’s health is failing. She is in hospice care, unable to swallow, and that means it’s a matter of time until her body uses up its reserves and she leaves us. That’s hard to face, and I know my own 93-year-old father may be in the same boat all too soon.

My cousin is sitting with her much of the time and reading to her. She said she’s reading Minstrels of Skaythe to her. They just finished The Tower in the Mist. My cousin loved it. I feel conflicted.

Did I think of my book as deathbed reading? Not so much. Yet, if it gives my cousin pleasure, how can I be sad? I can’t be with them from 1000+ miles, but I guess at least my words can offer some presence.

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MisCon Schedule

This is the SF convention I’ve been mentioning a bit recently. They haven’t sent me a formal schedule yet, but they have a tentative one posted online and I went through it looking for myself. (LoL) Here’s what it looks like:

Friday I’m on two panels. At 3 pm I have a Meet the Authors in Ballroom C; at 4 pm, it’s Dynamic Side Characters in the Rocket Tent. The hotel is small and they have a couple of large tents outside in addition to indoor meeting rooms.

Saturday, I have the Writer’s Workshop at 10 am. It’s supposed to be two hours, and I do have an idea for a character creation exercise. That’s the only thing they have me scheduled for on Saturday, so I asked if I could jump in on another panel, The Maternity Gap, at 3 pm in the Dragon Pavilion.

Sunday, I was supposed to leave around 3 or 4, but they have me scheduled for a reading at 6 pm. I asked to move it, and I asked to be let out of the panel they scheduled me for Monday. We’ll see how that shakes out.

In a funny way, MisCon will be almost the opposite from RadCon, last February. I had about ten panels at RadCon, and here I’ll be lucky to have four. Five if you include the writer’s workshop, but it’s private.

It will be a fun time, anyway!

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Loose Ends

I’m working on the last few posts for Queen Titania’s Court today. Some of the authors who contacted me have fallen off the map since. That’s a bit disappointing, but I can adjust. I hope to get it all finished and scheduled, so I can focus on MisCon, next weekend. We’ve had our reservations and memberships for quite a while, but it’s time to seriously prepare. So far I only know about the writing workshop. I need to print out the author’s excerpt and plan for that. There’s also supposed to be a book seller who will consign for indy authors. I need to find the details and decide what books to bring.

It’s supposed to be pretty hot today, so I’m bailing here to do yard work while it’s still a bit cool. Hope you all have a good weekend!

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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Wyrmflight, a Hoard of Dragon Lore

How’s about a little mid-month marketing! This time I’m featuring my blog collection, Wyrmflight: A Hoard of Dragon Lore, self-published in 2018. Some of you may have been around long enough to remember when I started this blog, back in the tail end of 2012. For the first 6 or 7 years, it was totally focused on dragons. After 2018, I needed a fresh direction, but I still had researched enough fascinating dragon lore to put together this collection.

Just like one of my novels, it’s packed with great stories, amazing characters, battles, drama, laughter, and many, many dragons. Unless you’ve been following me the entire time since 2012, I know you’ll find something new and surprising.

The book is available in all e-book formats for $4.99 and trade paperback for $17.99 U. S. dollars. Please check out the book’s hub on Books2Read, where you can purchase from your favorite e-bookstore. That is, any except Amazon, which wants to be special and have its own book hub.

Now, my one request. Reviews are more precious than any dragon’s gold. If you buy the book and like it, please do leave a review. And tell all your friends!

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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MisCon 2023

Coming up on Memorial Day weekend, I’ll be over in Missoula, MT for a SF convention called MisCon. It’s one of the longest running conventions in the region, and I’m super excited to be back again.

It’s been stressful to prepare, though. Usually by now I have a schedule of programs and I’m starting to mentally prepare. I really hadn’t heard a word this year, until just today. I’ve only been advised I have a writer’s workshop that will be one-on-one with an author. (For two hours! Wow, I’m not sure what I’ll do with that length of time.) Other than that, I have no idea what panels I’m on.

It’s freaking me out a little, honestly. I’ve done the programming design many times, and I always make sure to communicate frequently with speakers. At times, I wondered if I was communicating too much and they thought I was that needy. Having this experience reminds me why I did it that way.

Before then, I really do need to get moving on the actual layouts for Queen Titania’s Court. Then I can have that set up to begin over the same Memorial Day weekend.

Anyhow, this is where I bring in my school skills of being flexible and just going with it. The weekend will be great.

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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Why Do They, Part 3

There’s a book I’m reading where the author is kind of spoiling it for me. (No names, this isn’t about blaming and shaming.) They keep putting in lines like, “If only I had listened, how many people wouldn’t have died?” And I mean, a similar line to this three times in one chapter. The main character is saying it about their own military plans.

As an author, I’m not sure why you would do this. I think they’re trying to be foreboding and create tension around the outcome. For me, this spoils the tension instead. It’s telling us the plan will not go well, even before the character begins. It’s also a first-person narrator, so that character is clearly going to survive whatever happens. I don’t need to worry about them, and I should.

As a reader, I prefer being allowed to wonder. I mean, this character is a rash young man who’s wildly over-promising. You don’t need to tell me the plan will be a disaster. (And if the plan is not a disaster, then I will feel lied to.)

Anyway, as a writer with decades of experience, I would just urge my fellow writers not to do this. There is great power in letting the reader build anticipation for themselves.

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Speaking of fellow writers — as a WEA/SEA member, I stand in solidarity with the WGA. Stay strong, union brothers and sisters!

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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Woman At Work, May/2023

What’s Happening? It’s hard to believe, but we can see the end of the school year from here. It’s only 6 weeks in my district. That makes me a little frantic to help my kids learn just a bit more. Only problem is, we’re about to do the high-stakes testing that will take up four of those weeks. This is making the kids frantic, as their familiar schedules are switched around. We’re all just frantic, some days.

What I’m Working On. Queen Titania’s Court is only a month away, too. I’m gathering the contributions from all the authors, and also putting my parts together. I’m going with Orlik, one of the wyrmlings from Masters of Air & Fire. It should be fun to revisit his character.

What’s Next? There’s no word on reprints of The Seven Exalted Orders, so I’ve been putting together covers for Minstrels of Skaythe, Volume 2. This will collect the fourth and fifth Minstrels of Skaythe novellas. I’m not sold on that title, and may try to come up with something more intriguing.

Fun and Games. I’m mostly playing Skyrim these days. The 10t Anniversary edition added a lot of fun new content, and I’m enjoying it. Unfortunately, the new game I was trying keeps crashing. I enjoyed what I could play of it, and check back every once in a while to see if they’ve patched any of the bugs.

See you in the comments!

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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Reminder

That short story? I finished it. A quickie at just under 1,000 words. Now I discover that the anthology I intend it for doesn’t actually begin reading until November. Okay, fine. I’ll be super ready for it.

Meanwhile, I still need authors for Queen Titania’s Court! If you know a fantasy author, please mention it to them. This page has all the details. To see some of last year’s gala, start here.

Our weather has been turning out super nice this week, so I’m off to a garden show. Have a great weekend, all of you!

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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At It Again

I’ve been puttering around with a few projects these past weeks. I chose cover art, both for The Tale of the Drakanox and the second Minstrels of Skaythe compilation. I also did the titles for them. The first rough layout of the compilation is done, too. I still haven’t decided which of them to publish first, but at least that part is taken care of.

I’m also back to work on a new short story. My new publisher, Wolfsinger, has an anthology open. I’m putting something together for them. Besides, it will be another short story to check off my goals. This is only my second day working on it, but it’s been fun so far.

Other parts of life have been… not so fun. First my husband’s brakes needed work. Then my car’s radiator and head gaskets gave out. The brakes were bad enough, but my car is probably not worth it to repair. And a few days after that, our oven decided that maybe it will heat up and maybe it won’t. It seems to decide on a case by case basis. At least the stovetop is reliable, so we’re able to cook meals for ourselves.

I’m trying to think of my car as an opportunity rather than an obstacle. I’ve known for a while that I shouldn’t be driving a gasoline vehicle. I’d really like an electric one. Maybe this will give me the push to do that. It just takes time to find the right deal. Meanwhile, without a good car, I’m taking a bus to work. It isn’t too bad, except the bus gets me there barely in time and the ride home leaves consecutively with me getting off duty. I also had to stand/walk in the rain for 15 minutes yesterday.

Well, now this is discouraging me. Let’s get back to that short story, shall we?

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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Character Balance

This is something that comes up in role playing sometimes. You’re working with a group, but one or two players seem to consistently out-power the rest of the players. That’s been happening in my group recently, but gaming isn’t what I’m here to talk about. This is my writing blog, after all.

Gaming has taught me a lot about writing, though. When you write about a group of characters, it’s important to keep a balance between them. Each character has to bring a skill set that enhances the group. And each of them needs to have equal time on the page. Not only the whole group progresses through the plot, but the individuals need to grow also. It can be hard as the group becomes bigger.

Doing this was easier in my individual Minstrels of Skaythe novellas, but it became harder with The Tale of the Drakanox. I had between four and eight characters in each novella. That added up to something like 25 named characters in Drakanox. It was hard making sure each one had time on the page.

What can I say? I did it to myself by writing the series that way. In the end, I expect it’ll be worth it.

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Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my website, Facebook, Instagram and/or CounterSocial.

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