Justin's Sermon of the Week (2nd week of March)

You know I have to tell you about this individual, my dad.  Because hes really a big deal.  My father is the creator of the universe.

Yes, he's a big deal.

I can't know or understand this creator, this strange, curious, bizarre and mystery being that made all things. 

But I'm so curious about him.

And all these things hes made.  This ball of the light, the sun, that this ball of earth we stand on twists around it, all set up just right to allow for breath to enter my lungs and heat to come down and keep me warm.  My father keeps me warm.

And there is something else behind all that physical stuff.  That's love.  Love permeates every moment.  Love is my dog napping on my lap right now.  And she loves me, and trusts me so much she can just lay here and rest with me.

Does God love you?  Yep, yep he does.  Whether you believe that he exists or not, he does exist, and he does love you.  That's unconditional love.

And I'm not saying that I don't have an earthly father, I do.  And I love him and honor him, but I know from scripture, that's the word of God, that when I take Jesus into my life I am no longer a child of earthly parents, but God himself is my father.

What does it mean to take Jesus into my life?  The name "Jesus" is so overused and misused in our American culture that it's lost almost all it's meaning sadly.  The meaning remains, that is the true meaning, but when someone hears the name who doesn't necessarily follow Jesus or know scripture, it can cause a feeling of jadedness.  A feeling full of past prejudices, or times in the past that the name of Jesus was used improperly, and has now been associated with "hypocrite christians" and "arrogant judgemental people."  And there are certainly plenty of people out there who are like that.  They give poor testimony to the infinitely powerful name of this incredible figure in history.

Giving our life to Jesus, what does it mean?  It means going into scripture, the New Testament of the Bible and studying how Jesus lived.  More so it means accepting that Jesus paid the price for all the sins of humanity for ALL TIME on the cross.  And believing that he is the son of the most high God.  Once we do this we are reborn, our old self dies.  As we were dead in our sins. 

We receive the holy spirit, a force that speaks to us on doing right and guides us through a Godly life.

What a cool thing hm? 

It never seemed real to me.  Honestly, it never did.  I read about it, I knew about it, and even saw it in my family.  I couldn't explain it, but I had my own conclusions and misconceptions about what was "really" going on.

Then it happened to me.  I remember hearing somewhere that I wouldn't need anyone to tell me who God was when, and yes WHEN, he showed himself to me. 

I didn't know what that meant, but now I do.  God comes to each of us in a way we PERSONALLY can understand. That's how much he loves us.  He comes to us on a basis of our outlook and understanding of life.  He checks how we see perceive things, and makes himself real to us within a realm of thinking we can understand. 

And that's a real blessing.

It's a real blessing to have God in my life, to have Jesus in my heart.  Because that hole in my chest that was there my WHOLE LIFE is now filled.  I can feel it right now.  I can check for that emptiness and it's not there.  It's filled.  And I can be happy now.  It's not perfect, and it's hard.  But theres real peace in it. 

Let's go to God in prayer:  Father I ask that these words fill up the minds and the hearts of those reading.  That they would go to your word, the Bible and seek out their own unique understanding of the truth within those pages.  Father I ask that you bless these fine people, and give them peace, truth, and wisdom.  And Praise you Father, because you do.  We know all things work for good in the lives of those whom serve you.  Thank you Father, for your love and kindness to us, your creations, your child.  In Jesus name, Amen. 

Interview with Author Stephen B. Pearl

Stephen B. Pearl.

3 Links:

My website: www.stephenpearl.com

My You Tube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/channel/UC14QVfS9kiuc6sK7P3-yOmg/videos?view=0&flow=grid

Face Book: http://www.facebook.com/StephenBPearl

Give us a quick introduction on yourself and your book.

            Hi all. I’m Stephen B. Pearl remember the B if you Google me, it makes it easier to find me. I’m a fiction writer who thinks of himself as an okay kind of guy. Though I’m constantly surprised by how many folk mistake polite and easy going for sucker. They tend to learn the difference when they mess with something I care about. I’ve written several novels and have published four of them at the time of this writing. I’ll have two more novels published by the end of 2013. I also have stories in a verity of anthologies. I was a lifeguard for longer than I like to admit and trained as an Emergency Medical Care Assistant in my youth. I’m a better than average backyard mechanic and home handyman, an incurable girl watcher and hopelessly faithful and in love with my wife, who can drive me round the twist faster than a rocket car.

            The odd skill mix above comes in quite handy in my writing. My studies in metaphysics were applied when I wrote Nukekubi, my Paranormal Action Adventure, while in Tinker’s Plague the skill set I gave my Tinker, a doctor of general applied technologies, is a greatly exaggerated version of my own.

What inspired you to write your first book?

This is easy, if corny. My wife, or to be accurate the woman who is now my wife. I was smitten and started writing this horrible fairy tale type fantasy with her as the beautiful princess. Princess, yea right, maybe if you think Leia and Fiona. I like smart capable women and Joy is all that and more. So I wrote this horrible book which at the time I thought was wonderful. It took a few years for me to see how bad it really was. It did however accomplish its most important task. We’ll be twenty seven years married this November. The book also showed me that I could do it. After that it became a process of learning to write well.

Do you have a specific writing style?

Yes. Fast paced and adhering to an internal logic. By this I mean that if I am writing magic the magic will be consistent within the structure I define in the book. If someone has trouble levitating a pebble on page five they won’t be levitating a bolder on page two hundred unless a rational, such as additional training, is given. I assume my readers are intelligent people with a fair general knowledge and do my best to respect that intelligence. I also like to keep the pace up. I hate it as a reader when I have to drag myself through page after page where nothing is happening, so I try to keep something going on, which isn’t to say I don’t let the tension dip and rise, I do. If you have nothing but high stress it desensitizes the reader. I feel it important to have a peek and valley structure for the tension in a book with each succeeding peek higher than the last until the conclusion. In this way the reader feels the high stress peeks more because the valleys sensitize them to the effect.

How did you come up with the title?

Tinker’s Plague was easy. The lead character is a Tinker, Doctor of General applied Technologies, and he is dealing with a Plague.

Nukekubi was named after the book’s antagonist. Nukekubi are a form of Japanese goblin that separate their heads from their bodies and fly around scaring people to death.

Worlds Apart was self evident, since the male and female leads are from two parallel earths.

Haven’s in the Storm, well the army of monsters invading my lead character’s world is known as the Storm and Ackdominel, my lead character, has to lead the human survivors to the haven the wizards have prepared for them.

I tend to be a bit of a pragmatist when it comes to titles.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?

Yes.  You want more than that? Read the books and if I’ve done my job right you’ll get the message without even knowing I’ve given it to you. The first job of fiction is to entertain. If fiction can do more than entertain that can draw it across the line from good to great, but first it must entertain. Any message I include will be woven into the world and characters there for you to ponder or not as you wish.

How much of the book is realistic?

Gods, this varies. The Magic system in Nukekubi follows the principles of the Western Esoteric System with the power level bumped up. So some aspects will be recognizable to people who study such things.

Tinker’s Plague is a very realistic extrapolation of where we will be in about two hundred years time if we don’t do anything to fix the mess we’re making now. The science in it is pretty solid.

Worlds Apart, the stuff about Wicca and the witch burnings is quite accurate but it is a story about a wizard that travels between parallel universes and flies around on a magic carpet on his world where the laws of physics are different. I took a lot of latitude with this one while staying consistent within the book.

Haven’s in the Storm, though it is a fantasy universe and they are fighting ogres and trolls and the like the military formations and armour types are fairly accurate to our own world of the late fifteen hundreds.

Are experiences based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

Sometimes. When my wizard from Worlds Apart, first sees Alcina, the Wiccan priestess from our world, he is charmed, stunned, enthralled. I’ve had that effect twice in my life. With all due respect to her husband one of those times was when I saw Alyson Hannigan on the screen. The other, and more important, was when I first saw a picture of Joy, my wife, on her cousin’s wall. Joy knows about Alyson and looks on with amusement.

I do use a lot of my own emotional responses. For me writing is like method acting. I find something inside that parallels what my character is feeling and bring it to the fore in myself so I can put it on the page.  

What books have most influenced your life most?

Lord of the Rings: It gave me my moral code and taught me that good can triumph if good never quits, and good need not be lily white to still be good.

Dune: It taught me how to think and that the mastery of self was a matter of practice, learning and will.

Comic books: again with the never quit but also that one person can matter. A hero isn’t a hero because he puts on a leotard or has a fancy power; he or she is a hero because of the choices he or she makes.

The Dragon Riders of Pern Books: “What has been done can be done,” and not a direct quote, but the idea that while you never throw the first punch by the gods you through the last one.

If you had to choose, which writer would you consider a mentor?

Jim Butcher. His Harry Dresden Wizard for Higher books are brilliant. He is also a heck of a nice guy, or at least he seemed so during the rather brief time I spent with him and his lovely wife Shannon at a con a few years ago.

What book are you reading now?

I just finished one on Norse Mythology and am starting one on Celtic Myths and legends. I also have Ira Nayman’s what once were Miracles are now Children’s Toys on the go and Jim Butcher’s Ghost Story. One book for my car. One for the WC. One by my bed.

What are your current projects?

At present I am editing Tinker’s Sea, the second book in the tinker series. Each tinker book is a standalone set in the same post apocalyptic world. There is some character cross over but you don’t need to start with book one to follow the stories. I need to get started on a story for the second in the Morbid Seraphic series of anthologies, and I’m just about to put fingers to keys on a comedic cyber punk piece tentatively titled Cats. That is if I can ever get my head out from under all the promotional stuff I’m doing.

Name one entity that you feel supported you outside of family members.

Ra, my primary God. I know it makes me sound like some Pagan version of a holy roller and that is a bit embarrassing because I’m not, but I think most people of faith, no matter what they choose to name the divine, can understand this. There is a quiet strength that you need not shout to the world or push on others that comes from being in touch with the divine. No one has a monopoly on it, it doesn’t matter what you name it and it isn’t in any book. It doesn’t mean you have to deny science and natural law, it simply is. 

Do you see writing as a career?

Yes. I kinda went from wanting to be an astronaut to wanting to be a writer.

If you had to do it all over again, would you change anything in your latest book?

Not in my latest one but in Tinker’s Plague I use a type of wind turbine that is now outdated. I’d love to update some of the technologies. That is always an issue in science fiction though, and I’m not so dated that people would actually notice. I just know and I’m a perfectionist about things like that.

Do you recall how your interest in writing originated?

Hundreds of millions of words. Books upon books. Comics that threatened to make the floor collapse. The fire is stoked with the works of others that are distilled into new forms and pass out through ones fingertips onto the keyboard.

Can you share a little of your current work with us?

Keep in mind this is a rough draft. It’s still a couple of edits away from being complete but this is an excerpt from Tinker’s sea. To set it up Tabby, the tinker, has made port at a lighthouse station on Lake Huron just as the tail end of a hurricane is blowing in. A ship is floundering off the cost and because she is a coast guard reservist she is helping with the rescue effort. The Wave Mistress is Tabby’s boat.

Tabby and Burt hurried along the path hanging onto the rope at its edge. Sleet and hail mixed with the rain making everything slippery and stinging their faces. Reaching the pear they saw two people in heavy weather outfits readying the rescue boat. Tabby spared the Wave Mistress a glance.

“We set?” demanded Burt.

“The engine’s giving trouble again,” replied a female voice.

“Shorting grounded thing!” Burt rushed to where a hatch had been opened at the stern of the boat. Tabby followed him. The bio-diesel fuelled four hundred horse power engine sat below decks and whirred ineffectually as a man at the bridge depressed a button.

“Stop before you kill the battery,” shouted Tabby.

“Shorted thing. Not enough emulsifiers in the bio-diesel. Fuels turned to jelly. Exhaust dumps waist heat into the fuel. If it starts it’ll keep running,” explained Burt.

“Get me a plumber’s torch. I’ll heat the lines and maybe we can get the fuel to liquefy.”

Burt grunted and pointed to a torch that was clipped to the inside of the engine compartment. “I’ll handle the last of the prep.”

Tabby played the torch’s flame along the fuel line and filter. As she worked she felt someone clip a safety line onto her weather suit’s belt and heard the sounds of final preparations.

After a pair of minutes that felt like days Tabby called, “Try it now.”

The starter whirred then the diesel sputtered to life.

“Close the hatch,” Burt’s voice cut through the storm.

Tabby obliged and the life boat pulled away from the dock then cut into the swell. The rise and fall of the waves bounced her in her seat and between the rain and dark she could barely see the point of the bow.

“Where the shorting hell are we?” demanded a male voice from the wheel.

“Keep it steady, Zain. Follow the pings and triangulate.” Burt’s voice was even. Tabby glanced at the man sitting beside her, there was an air about him she’d not seen before.

The small boat crested a wave then crashed down.

“Rescue one, do you copy? Over,” demanded Candy over the howling wind.

Burt pressed a button mounted on the neck of his heavy-weather suit. “This is rescue one, we copy. Over.”

“I have you both on radar. They’re about three hundred meters from your location east by north east. Can you see anything? Over.

“No visual yet.”

Tabby grabbed Burt’s arm and pointed off the starboard bow.

Burt nodded. “Correction, we see the hull. Am closing, Over and Out.”

“Understood, Over and Out.”

The rescue boat’s engine slowed as they fought the waves to close with the sinking ship.   The ship was awash and human figures scrambled on top of the wheel house and crates that littered the deck. The lifeboat was smashed in half its bow and stern dangling from the winch lines. Several crates slid over the sinking wreck. A man in rain leathers clung precariously to what remained of the mast.

“Help, help,” the cry was faint against the wind. Bracing himself against the railing Burt stood and scanned the water. “Five degrees to starboard.” He clutched the ring buoy gauged the wind and threw it. The line snaked out then the ring splashed into a trough in the waves. The water carried it up then the line intersected a figure struggling in the water. The survivor grasped the rope and Burt hauled her towards the rescue boat. The rope slipped between her fingers but she caught the buoy and clung to it with all her might. Burt grabbed her arm then Tabby gripped her other one and they hauled her aboard. Tabby bent to inspect the woman while Burt turned to Zain.

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?

Finding time to write. It seems there are always a thousand things getting in the way.

Who is your favorite author and what is it that really strikes you about their work?

J.R.R. Tolkien, he was a master of the language. Often his work reads like poetry and he exemplified the best of the human spirit. I don’t write like him but there is beauty in his work.

For Living authors Jim Butcher. Harry Dresden is the modern knight errant in a dirty trench coat battered and binged and still trying to do the right thing despite the fact that the very people who should most admire him ridicule and look down on him.

Do you have to travel much concerning your book(s)?

This is increasing as the scope of my sales increases. At present I try to keep it within a couple hours of home for economic reasons. Though the Library in Bakewell Debenshire England has a copy of Tinker’s Plague. I was in town visiting my mother in law. Interestingly enough Worlds Apart is set largely in Bakewell.

What was the hardest part of writing your book?

Turning off my inner editor long enough to get the idea down. First I have to write it then I worry about making it good and that can be a challenge.

Did you learn anything from writing your book and what was it?

Writers are delusional masochists. Is that encouraging enough? Actually, I always learn from writing my books because I believe good fiction must stem from fact. I research things constantly to bring them to the page. I am currently trying to market a book set in space where we have effective interplanetary ships but no faster than light travel. I spent a lot of time boning up on solar sails and ion drives. It was fun.

Do you have any advice for other writers?

Get out while you can. It is not what you think and it will devour you. If you are already addicted, and it is an addiction, write the story you want to write. Don’t worry about the in thing because by the time you’ve written to meet the trend the trend will be over. Write what you want edit edit edit and get others to critique your work. Be open to guidance and if you make it big toss a quarter in my cup. I have a feeling sitting on a park bench with my recorder and a hat will be my retirement plan.

Do you have anything specific that you want to say to your readers?

Thanks. If you could do me the favor of penning an honest review and posting it on the web I would appreciate it. Amazon, Good Reads even Face Book anyplace. Visibility is everything in this industry and this is how you can help small time authors grow so we can keep bringing you the books you love.

What were the challenges (research, literary, psychological, and logistical) in bringing it to life?

Which book?

Research: I’ve written a lot of things fairly close to home. Ray, my male lead in Nukekubi, is a lifeguard by profession. I was a lifeguard for more years than I care to think about.  The sustainable energy technologies in Tinker’s Plague were drawn from my long term hobby of sustainable energy. So I made things a little easier on myself, but I still did a lot of research.

Literary: I happen to be severely dyslexic. As I type this rough draft word is making it look like a rainbow of colored squiggly lines. I fight for each sentence and edit, edit, edit. This is the hardest element for me. I have a gift for storytelling, a very good oral vocabulary, and, if I say so myself, a fair mind. However, for me the nuances of spelling, and to a lesser extent grammar, are a struggle. Of course knowing this I work very hard to see that it is not reflected in the finished product.

Psychological: Because of how I write I have been in tears as I typed. Remembering what it was like to be called a “Stupid stupid boy,” by the abusive school teacher when I was little so I could bring that to the character of Andy in Tinker’s Sea and make that pain come to life. Drawing forward the exhilaration you feel when you compete with death itself and win more life for the person you set out to save. It is a rush to set your skill and training against death and win. In the end we never triumph but to keep the score even for another day that is a power trip that kicking a ball between a couple of posts just can’t match. So it can be a challenge to go to these places but one that is well worth it.

Logistical: This is a pain in the backside when one writes in the real world. I lucked out with Tinker’s Plague because the Guelph area was perfectly suited to the story I wanted to tell. With Tinker’s Sea I was forced to write around the geography a lot more. Sadly, with Nukekubi half of the wooded gully I used for one of the scenes no longer exists. It was my playground as a child.

When writing in a made up world you have a lot more latitude for where you place things though being married to a geologist I have to justify my mountain ranges and lakes with plate tectonics and ancient glaciers. But what ya gonna do?:-)

Interview with Author Joe Carvalko

We Were Beautiful Once is a psychologically complex courtroom novel that builds an intriguing web of events, creating a sustained sense of anticipation from chapter to chapter in the mold of John Grisham’s The Pelican Brief, where trial lawyer Nick Castalano tries to uncover the fate of Roger Girardin, MIA during the Korean War, and discovers he may have been murdered in a POW camp by Trent Hamilton, a politician (sights on becoming governor) and businessman. Before the war, Jack O'Conner, Hamilton, Girardin and Julie, Girardin's girlfriend and Jack's sister, hung out. In part the story follows the lives of the survivors, who after the war, with Roger's disappearance and Jack and Trent having spent years in a North Korean hell-hole, change dramatically, notably Jack goes through life teetering on the edge of insanity (believing he may have killed Girardin) and that his murderous act will be discovered by his sister, who waits her entire life for Roger’s return.

http://www.amazon.com/We-Were-Beautiful-Once-ebook/dp/B00BH1L8IY/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1361354128&sr=1-4&keywords=carvalko

http://www.carvalko.com

What inspired you to write your first book?

Twenty-five years ago I tried a case against the government demanding an accounting of Roger Dumas a Korea War soldier it claimed was MIA. The trial followed years of cover-up by the Army and the CIA, however, I won the first Federal court ordered reclassification of a U.S. soldier from MIA to POW. A documentary "Missing, Presumed Dead: The Search For America's POWs" narrated by Ed Asner details my trial efforts. I fictionalized the events drawn around the case as tried, delving into the issues of PTSD and generally converting it into a mystery with many characters of a wide-expanse of time.

Do you have a specific writing style?

Here is what Da Chen wrote: “Carvalko writes with such convincing realism and lyricism that I was at once brought into the landscape of his literary vision and grip of his storytelling.  His prose is wiry and wise, steely yet soulful. His tales are tethered to real life, lived and thoroughly pondered.  In right light, he is a cross between James Patterson and Scott Turow, only wiser and much more generous.”  Chen is New York Times bestselling author of Colors of the Mountain, a memoir, Brothers, a novel, and My Last Empress, a novel.

How did you come up with the title?

It speaks to the deterioration in body and soul of those silently ravaged by war.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?

We abandon our children to demands that draft them into senseless wars and use their hands and minds for mayhem’s sake, and only in the accounting of those who survive into old age does it become apparent how beautiful they once were.

How much of the book is realistic?

Having tried many cases I use experiences from actual trials and create dramatic courtroom testimony that parallels events on the battlefield and in the prison camp. The juxtaposition of the courtroom and the battlefield makes the real seem surreal. In some sense it has the feel of The Rack, a 1956 movie where Paul Newman portrays an American soldier who collaborated with the Chinese while being held in a prison camp during the Korean war; or A Few Good Men where Tom Cruise cross-examines Jack Nicholson in defending Marines.

In addition to my knowledge of the trial, I researched the Korean War and use this in setting various battles, troop movements and troop surrenders. I have firsthand knowledge of the story’s settings, having made visits to Korea, working for a short while with the highest level of the Korean Department of Defense in Seoul. I am also a Cold War veteran of the Cuban Crisis, the Vietnam era and served in the Air Force with veterans of the Korean War. So, my story tracks the Korean War with a high degree of fidelity. There are many books about war, however relatively few about Korea. And, the recent success of James McBride’s The Miracle at St. Anna (WWII) leads me to conclude that there also may be a sizeable interest in the war that preceded Vietnam.

Are experiences based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

Base on the search for Roger Dumas, my experience growing up in the 50-60s in a rust belt town, my life as an 80s trial lawyer.

What books have most influenced your life most?

Jose Saramago’s the Blind, Hemingway’s Farewell to Arms, Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude

If you had to choose, which writer would you consider a mentor?

Saramago

What book are you reading now?

Saramago’s The Elephant’s Journey

Are there any new authors that have grasped your interest?

Da Chen

What are your current projects?

Writing a memoire in Poetry—The Interior

Name one entity that you feel supported you outside of family members.

MFA program at Fairfield U.

Do you see writing as a career?

Yes

If you had to do it all over again, would you change anything in your latest book?

Would have pared down a few pages, would have been even more lyrical, but many publishers apparently do not prefer it as much as they prefer pulp.

Do you recall how your interest in writing originated?

I came from hard-headed disciplines, engineering, science and law. My career was filled with successful and failed inventors, corporate flights of fancy, mergers, law suits and high rollers who gamed the system. Since I was a very young man, my retreat had always been creative nonfiction, fiction and poetry.

Can you share a little of your current work with us? Here is a short poem from The Interior

SIDE ROAD

Odysseus and Penelope

At nineteen, rebellious, blackboard jungle funk, joy

rheostat—zero. Dig-it Daddio?  Cool gloom,

smog in the noggin, stumblin’ through soda-jerk jobs,

joined Uncle Sam. One last time, me, my Chevy,

Penelope, blue ’52, skirts, whitewalls,

’47 Caddy V-8, two glasspacks, cruised

the drag, leavin’ behind drive-ins, S.S. Kresges,

the spent on Railroad Ave., the rich on Country Club

Road, landmarks memorized so like Odysseus,

I could return to the familiar and old, but

after “the War” it took fifty years to come back by

then town’d vanished in the wake of pot-holes, fifty

gallon drums, fast food wrappers, my Penelope,

raindrops streakin’ her windshield on a cloudless day.

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?

Every piece of it is a struggle!

Who is your favorite author and what is it that really strikes you about their work?

Do you have to travel much concerning your book(s)?

Not now, having traveled to every continent except Antarctica and Australia. I anticipate traveling to venues to roll out the book.
Who designed the covers?

Eugenia Kim at GKGraphics

What was the hardest part of writing your book?

There are a lot of characters, lots of time periods, many settings, so getting the main character to come out of the weeds was hardest.

Did you learn anything from writing your book and what was it?

Do you have any advice for other writers?

Ernest Hemingway once wrote,

"There are some things which cannot be learned quickly, and time, which is all we have, must be paid heavily for their acquiring. They are the very simplest things, and because it takes a man’s life to know them the little new that each man gets from life is very costly and the only heritage he has to leave."

I believe in perseverance, seeking help, reading about and practicing what makes writing come to life--it takes one's entire life before we can measure just how far we get.

Interview with Author Julie C. Gilbert

Ashlynn’s Dreams youtube trailer
Ashlynn’s Dreams facebook page

Ashlynn’s Dreams

http://www.amazon.com/Ashlynns-Dreams-Volume-Julie-Gilbert/dp/1481827979/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360598509&sr=8-1&keywords=9781481827973

 This is the paperback link...it's got the full cover.

Give us a quick introduction on yourself and your book.

I'm a chemistry teacher who also writes YA, science fiction, and Christian mysteries. Ashlynn's Dreams is a YA book about a girl who gets kidnapped because she's genetically altered to be able to shape dreams.

What inspired you to write your first book?

The very first novel-length work will never see the light of day, and I think it came about mostly because I was rebelling against the deep meanings my high school English teachers wanted us to find in literature. The first book I'd count an actual book was Heartfelt Cases, which contained 3 novellas about FBI agents solving some tough cases that hit them personally in some way. That one started just because I wanted to write about a kidnapping. Mysteries have always intrigued me. At the risk of sounding crazy, the subject of kidnapping is fascinating. However, hear me out. In the real thing, the public tends to be helpless, which is not a nice feeling. I enjoy writing about kidnappings because in that case I have complete control over the ending.

Do you have a specific writing style?

I kind of like experimenting with style. Ashlynn's Dreams is in journal/ letter format. The Heartfelt Cases novellas are probably best classified as third person limited narratives. I have a science fiction series about the lives of the royalty on a planet called Reshner. That series mixes semi-journal-like accounts with third person semi-unreliable omniscient narrators (microscopic machines with god-like powers). I also have a fantasy story that mixes first and third accounts. No matter which style I'm working with, I tend to keep each section to just one character.

How did you come up with the title?

Jillian/Ashlynn is a Dream Shaper. I started the story knowing only that it would feature a kidnapping and feature Jillian, a character I came up with in a series of short stories. Her character voice popped out at me so strongly, that a few years back, I knew I had to bring her back for a longer project. I looked up girl names that meant "dream" and found Ashlynn. The title came out of me guessing at the core of the work. I'm not exactly sure if I had the working title most of the way or just at the end. I know the sequel's title gave me fits, but I think the first book's title came about easily.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?

Cherish what you have in friends and family. Life's unpredictable and bad things can happen no matter who you are or what precautions you take. You sometimes can't change things that happen to you, but you can control how you react to circumstances.

How much of the book is realistic?

If I had to throw a percentage out there, I'd say the book is 95% realistic. It speaks about genetic alterations that probably lie beyond the scope of current science, but it's plausible if not immediately probable. It's set in the real world, rather than a planet I made up.

Are experiences based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

 No, I don't know anybody who's had their child kidnapped, and thankfully, I haven't had a child kidnapped. I suppose that could be because I don't have any kids. I don't work in law enforcement either, though I admit that would be a cool career.

What books have most influenced your life most?

I think I have to go with series here. I grew up on Box Car Children, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, and a slew of Star Wars books. Mystery and adventure, overcoming impossible odds, etc... these things are emphasized throughout these series.

If you had to choose, which writer would you consider a mentor?

I don't personally know Taylor Stevens, but she sends out some decently helpful writing tips on a weekly basis, so I guess she wins the unofficial, hey-I've-never-met-you mentor award.

What book are you reading now?

I'm reading The Iron King by Julie Kagawa and Pulse by Patrick Carman. The first was given to me by a fan, and though not my usual fare, is well-written and generally great so far. The latter is very intriguing but I've got more nits with it, though to be fair it's an ARC.

Are there any new authors that have grasped your interest?

Of the books I'm reading, both authors are new to me, but I don't think they're new in general.

What are your current projects?

My last significant writing project started out with me trying to see if I could write paranormal teen romance. Although slim elements of the genre still exist in the work, I'd say it turned more into a fantasy/ good vs evil story. I'm trying to proof Nadia's Tears, which is the sequel to Ashlynn's Dreams. Also, I'm trying to proof the Reshner series, which is 3 novels long, so it's a greater time investment than the other series.

Name one entity that you feel supported you outside of family members.

I'm starting to feel more connected to writers I meet online at FB and other networking sites.

Do you see writing as a career?

I would like to, unfortunately, not many people know about my works, so I haven't figured out how to make a sustainable career out of it yet.

If you had to do it all over again, would you change anything in your latest book?

There are always sections I look at and can tweak the wording, but there comes a point when you've got to just back away and say it's done. 

Do you recall how your interest in writing originated?

As briefly touched on before, the writing thing might have come about initially as my way of rebelling against finding "deep meaning" in literature. If you want to go further backward in time, I'd say the love of writing came from a love of reading. Once you experience adventures and fall in love with characters, it's sort of natural to want new adventures and new characters to fall in love with. Although I must say, writing has the added bonus of control. Perhaps I'm just a control freak. I don't know. 

Can you share a little of your current work with us?

I usually include ch. 4 as an excerpt, but here's something from Danielle's perspective. She is Jillian's babysitter who was also kidnapped when the men came to fetch Jillian so she could enter her training.

ITEM 16: Danielle’s second journal entry

Item Source: Danielle Matheson, via 54 Post-it notes

I woke up with the headache of all headaches. Whatever that big jerk had shoved into my arm was like drinking hard and taking meth at the same time. (Not that I obtained that bit of knowledge via personal experience.) A very nasty kick in the head would have been kinder. In addition, my arm ached like I’d had a dozen shots and then pitched thirty innings of softball. My hands still stung too, but everything else hurt so much that that particular pain seemed negligible. I tried shaking my head, hoping that would clear away the pain. Big mistake. The pain morphed from not-so-good to very painful to excruciating. It felt like my brains wanted to leak out my ears. If that would have stopped the pain, I’d have been tempted to take the trade.

My first thought was, Owwwww. And my second thought was Jillian!

I think I said her name out loud, but I can’t be sure because I’m pretty sure I passed out again. I seemed to be doing a lot of that. I might have opened my eyes or just thought I did. It didn’t really matter because, like I said, I didn’t stay with it very long. I sensed another person in the room and had the sensation like I wanted to vomit before blissful nothingness slipped me past the headache.

The second time I woke up, I forced myself to lie still and finish the waking process with the least pain possible. Not that I could have moved anyway, since these people obviously had trust issues and had tied me up as well as giving me that wonderful naptime cocktail. My headache came back down to tolerable levels, though every heartbeat was like a dull hammer being slammed to the floor millimeters from my skull. My eyes felt all gummy like I’d slept for a month; my eyeliner must have melted or something.

I must look a scary sight.

I winced, partly at the head pain but mostly at the stupidity of worrying about my eyeliner at a time like this.

Someone had left a candle burning a few feet from my head.

Well, that’s dangerous.

Nevertheless, I let myself enjoy the candle’s comforting glow.

What do I do?

Thinking was hard, thanks to my drug-muddled brain. I spent a full minute concentrating on breathing deeply and letting my mind wander back through the last few hours, trying to ignore the clammy touch of my clothes against my skin. Futile as it was, I desperately wanted to find something I could have done differently to make things turn out better.

The tingly sensation in my arms reminded me that my first priority ought to be to get loose.

How in the world did Nancy Drew do this a dozen times?

If Nancy were a real person, she’d probably have brain damage from the number of times she’s been knocked out via good old-fashioned brute force. If this was the price one paid to be a detective, I’d have quit the first time a threatening note floated my way. But I hadn’t been threatened, neither had Jillian, or her family, to my knowledge.

What gives? Why me? I practically whined the questions.

A rumble from deep within my stomach made me resent the kidnappers’ lousy sense of timing.

Ten minutes, just ten minutes, and we would have been happily fed.

Frustrated, I flexed my arms, trying to loosen the bonds. I succeeded only in hurting my arms.

Use your senses!

I closed my eyes and listened, only to hear my stomach announce its empty state again. I sniffed in deeply, which was dumb seeing as I was currently on the floor and probably besieged by a million dust mites. It made my nose itch, but I squelched the urge to sneeze.

“The lady said she was gonna send Dustin in with some food,” Jillian said. She sounded strange, older and calmer somehow. Her voice was not defeated per se, but it held a calculating quality I’d never heard before from anyone, let alone a child.

I craned my neck around to see her, but it was awkward because I’d landed on the floor near the center while she was somewhere near the back wall, effectively above my head. I could tell the room was tiny, even though the candlelight led to lousy depth perception. Sometimes you can just sense things like that. It’s like the walls were all crowding purposefully close, trying to make us sense their presence. Or maybe the drug was just playing with my head.

“Are you okay?” I asked, trying to hold my voice steady. Nearly gave myself a sore throat for my trouble.

Why doesn’t she sound scared?

“Hungry,” Jillian replied. Her Southern drawl sounded longer through the semi-darkness. “This place is mighty creepy.”

“The whole situation’s creepy,” I agreed.

 

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?

To me, writing comes in phases: outlining, chapter building, proofing. Each phase has it's own rewards and challenges. Outlining is fun because you can see the skeleton of what the whole work could be. Chapter building is also fun because you get to see the actual scenes unfold and tweak the outline as you go. I love the excitement of seeing how the work shapes itself. Proofing is probably the most challenging because it can be tedious. You might have to read and re-read one paragraph 3-4 times to get the wording to sound just right. Then, when you're all done, you've got to read the whole work again because all the minor shifts have the potential for adding mistakes.

Who is your favorite author and what is it that really strikes you about their work?

Having to pick just one favorite author is something I'm just not really capable of doing. As a general rule, I like people who can make me laugh. Tim Downs, Vivian Vande Velde, and Lisa Lutz are people who can make me laugh. A sentimental part of me also likes Nancy Springer's Rowan Hood series for the adventure, danger, and bravery of the main character. Brandon Sanderson's works are ambitious and dare I say, even epic, but they're a huge time investment so not to be entered into lightly. Stewart Hill's Cry of the Icemark series answered the call for a cool female character who was strong, smart, and sassy. 

Do you have to travel much concerning your book(s)?

I'd be willing to travel a bit for my books, but I've not set things in motion for a book tour or anything. I'm actually the rather quiet sort of person who has a lot to learn about self-promoting. I've been revamping some older projects to turn out more kindles. To that end, I've started with new covers thanks to my friend, Tim Sparvero.

Who designed the covers?

Gee, I must have known this question was coming. Timothy Sparvero and I designed the cover for Ashlynn's Dreams (edition 2). It took us about 16 hours over two days to complete the project. I say us because I was there giving him feedback and helping with the design. He did all the hard work though. If anybody's interested in commissioning work, he does covers, character sketches, maps etc.

What was the hardest part of writing your book?

Proofing tends to be the hardest part of the writing process because it's the longest for me. I usually only write in the summer, so I force myself to stick to a 2000 word/day schedule. Often times, I get so into a work that I can double or even triple that goal though, so depending on the size of the project, I can write the rough draft in 21-ish days. Proofing, on the other hand, can take months, years even, depending on days I actually devote to a given project.

Did you learn anything from writing your book and what was it?

I wouldn't say I learned a lot from Ashlynn's Dreams, but I learned tons when writing the sequel. Nadia's Tears focuses a bit on human trafficking. When one of my students said "hey, human trafficking still exists," I did a bunch of research about the topic. Finding out she was absolutely correct, I felt I should bring the topic into the next work, which turned into Nadia's Tears.

Do you have any advice for other writers?

Get feedback on your work. Polish until you think the work is completely error free, then polish it again. Try reading it start to finish then random chapters, then start to finish again. That may help you focus on the story as a whole then grammar issues, then the story as a whole again. I'm always looking for feedback from readers of all kinds. Friends are good beta readers, but they're not all representative of the target audience. All writers have to build up a sort of tough skin, but the willingness to consider feedback is a vital skill.

 

Do you have anything specific that you want to say to your readers?

If you like a work, feel free to get in contact with the author and let them know. I've written to Nancy Springer and told her what I liked about her works. This is the age of the internet, contact's only an email away. Review works. Read new things. I read in a lot of genres: mystery, thriller, science fiction (okay so mainly Star Wars), historical fiction, etc. Let yourself be inspired by the things you read and talk about with people. I let myself be inspired by my student's comment about human trafficking being a problem in the modern world. In turn, I've had people tell me what they've gotten out of my works. That cycle is priceless: learn, share, learn.

What were the challenges (research, literary, psychological, and logistical) in bringing it to life?

All of those are sort of fun challenges for me. Looking up grammar rules is certainly a challenge because often times there are conflicting pieces of advice out there. The book raises a bunch of questions about the psychological fallout from a kidnapping, but I'm not sure it answers all of them. It's the first of several books planned, so there's time to get those answers. It's sometimes hard to write sad situations, but you push through and learn through the process.