Monday, May 16, 2016

It's an Honor Just to be Nominated

I subscribe to this service called "mention" which scours the web for my name and alerts me when somebody mentions me. I do this so that if a review of my book appears on somebody's website I can link to it on my blog. So I get an alert today that my name was mentioned somewhere, I go to check it out, and it turns out my novel, Shared Disbelief, has been nominated for the 2016 eFestival of Words eBook Awards in the category of best mystery novel.
My name is right next to Mark Dawson's! That's crazy!

Spectrum Books Interview of Yours Truly

A few weeks ago, I sat down with Nadine Matheson, host of the Spectrum Books Podcast, for an interview. We discussed my mystery books series, electronic formatting of graphic novels, my podcast, and some upcoming projects I'm working on. The show is available for download on iTunes or directly from Nadine's website.

Then we turned the tables and I interviewed her for my podcast, Thrills and Mystery. We discussed her books and upcoming projects; and I turned the table on her, asking her the Spectrum questions, a set of questions about the subject's likes and dislikes she asks every interviewee. You'll be able to hear that discussion when it drops on May 30th, so don't forget to drop by the Thrills & Mystery website and subscribe so you'll be sure not to miss it. But for now, check out Nadine's interview of me.

Saturday, May 7, 2016

Guest Post: All I wanted to Do Was Write a Historical Novel by Andrew Joyce

Editor's Note:
This is Andrew's second visit to my blog. The first time was just about a year ago, but that post was hijacked by his dog, Danny. After reading today's post, maybe you'd like to take a look-see at Danny's post from last year. Here's a link. Andrew's book, Resolution, will be on sale June 7 through June 9 on Amazon only. The normal price of $3.99 will drop to $0.99. Now, let's hear from Andrew


  My name is Andrew Joyce, and I write books for a living. Dave has been kind enough to allow me a little space on his blog to promote my new book, RESOLUTION: Huck Finn’s Greatest Adventure, so I thought I’d tell you how it came about. It all started way back in 2011 . . .
  My first book was a 164,000-word historical novel. And in the publishing world, anything over 80,000 words for a first-time author is heresy. Or so I was told time and time again when I approached an agent for representation. After two years of research and writing, and a year of trying to secure the services of an agent, I got angry. To be told that my efforts were meaningless was somewhat demoralizing to say the least. I mean, those rejections were coming from people who had never even read my book.
  “So you want an 80,000-word novel?” I said to no one in particular, unless you count my dog, because he was the only one around at the time. Consequently, I decided to show them City Slickers that I could write an 80,000-word novel!
  I had just finished reading Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn for the third time, and I started thinking about what ever happened to those boys, Tom and Huck. They must have grown up, but then what? So I sat down at my computer and banged out REDEMPTION: The Further Adventures of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer in two months; then sent out query letters to agents.
  Less than a month later, the chairman of one of the biggest agencies in New York City emailed me that he loved the story. We signed a contract and it was off to the races, or so I thought. But then the real fun began: the serious editing. Seven months later, I gave birth to Huck and Tom as adults. And just for the record, the final word count is 79,914. The book went on to reach #1 status in its category on Amazon—twice. The rest, as they say, is history.
  But not quite.
  My agent then wanted me to write a sequel, but I had other plans. I was in the middle of editing down my first novel (that had been rejected by 1,876,324 agents . . . or so it seemed) from 164,000 words to the present 142,000. However, he was insistent about a sequel, so I started to think about it. Now, one thing you have to understand is that I tied up all the loose ends at the end of REDEMPTION, so there was no way that I could write a sequel. And that is when Molly asked me to tell her story. Molly was a minor character that we met briefly in the first chapter of REDEMPTION, and then she is not heard from again.
  So I started to think about what ever happened to her. After a bit of time—and 100,000 words—we find out what did happen to Molly. It is an adventure tale where Huck Finn weaves through the periphery of a story driven by a feisty female lead. Molly Lee was my second book, which achieved #2 status on Amazon.
  Now I was finished with Huck Finn for good. Now I could go back to my first novel and resume the editing process.
  But not quite.
  It was then that Huck and Molly ganged up on me and demanded that I resolve their lives once and for all. It seems that I had left them hanging, so to speak. Hence, RESOLUTION: Huck Finn’s Greatest Adventure. Here is the blurb from the back cover of the book:

It is 1896 in the Yukon Territory, Canada. The largest gold strike in the annals of human history has just been made; however, word of the discovery will not reach the outside world for another year.
By happenstance, a fifty-nine-year-old Huck Finn and his lady friend, Molly Lee, are on hand, but they are not interested in gold. They have come to that neck of the woods seeking adventure.
Someone should have warned them, “Be careful what you wish for.”
When disaster strikes, they volunteer to save the day by making an arduous six hundred mile journey by dog sled in the depths of a Yukon winter. They race against time, nature, and man. With the temperature hovering around seventy degrees below zero, they must fight every day if they are to live to see the next.
On the frozen trail, they are put upon by murderers, hungry wolves, and hostile Indians, but those adversaries have nothing over the weather. At seventy below, your spit freezes a foot from your face. Your cheeks burn—your skin turns purple and black as it dies from the cold. You are in constant danger of losing fingers and toes to frostbite.
It is into this world that Huck and Molly race.
They cannot stop. They cannot turn back. They can only go on. Lives hang in the balance—including theirs.
  The three books are stand-alones and are not part of a series. They can be read in any order. RESOLUTION is available as an eBook and in print. Both versions are available on Amazon.
 There you have it. Now, if you nice people will just go out and buy RESOLUTION, perhaps Huck and Molly will leave me alone long enough so that I can get some editing done on my first novel.

Thanks for having me over, Dave. It’s been a real pleasure.

Monday, May 2, 2016

Common Sense: Book 2 in the Lupa Schwartz Series, May Sale

For the remainder of the month of May, the eBook format of Common Sense will be on sale for 99¢ on Amazon's store. This is so it can coincide with the Mystery and Thriller eBook promotion co-op which several authors have recently formed under the guidance of Renee Pawlish. Details on the promo can be found here

Basically, several mystery and thriller writers have determined to put one of their books on sale for the dates of May 13 & 14. Some, such as myself, have decided to go a little longer. Book one in the series is still FREE and can be downloaded for reading in advance of book two if you haven't done so just yet. Or if you have read book one and have been waiting for an opportunity to pick up book two on the cheap, well, here's that opportunity.