And Then There Were Two by Kitty Bucholtz
July 22, 2023 by Kitty Bucholtz in category It's Worth It by Kitty Bucholtz, Writing tagged as Kitty Bucholtz, middle-grade fiction, self-publishing, writing
When I got married 33 years ago, I knew there would be a lot of combining things in our lives. John taught me to enjoy comic books and Dungeons & Dragons. I helped him discover a couple chick flicks he could watch multiple times.
What I didn’t expect to share was my identity as a writer.
At first, it was really difficult for me, a middle child, to share a place I’d carved out for me. (Middle children out there, I bet you understand.) But over time I not only got used to the fact that my animator husband had started writing middle grade superhero stories, I decided to help him get them published.
Insert long story here about sending the book out to agents. (Many of you know this story.) So John decided he’d follow me and self-publish.
And since I’m a book coach and help people not only finish their books, but self-publish their books…yup, I had another client! (This one pays with kisses and backrubs and…ah-hem…moving on!) So as we insert another long story here, I’m now officially a publisher since I publish two authors. Whoa!
Let me know if you’d like to know how that’s working and I’ll make a point of writing it all down and posting it here. Meanwhile, I’m doing the publisher thing and promoting a book! 😀
Life as a Teenage Superhero is free through the end of today, Saturday, July 22, 2023, on all Amazon stores that sell ebooks. (I never thought I’d have to add those last three words, but the new Amazon store in Sweden doesn’t sell ebooks yet!) If you enjoyed the Harry Potter books, you might love Life as a Teenage Superhero. And if you have kids or grandkids from about 8 years old and up, they may love it too! (Also available in Kindle Unlimited for the next 90 days.)
We’ve got John’s second book in the 11-book series, Get a Half-Life, up on pre-order on Amazon with new books in the series coming out every 2-4 months. One of the new things I’ll be doing this year is creating a second print edition that is specifically for dyslexic readers! It’s a busy and exciting time to be a writer — and a publisher!
Janet Elizabeth Lynn and Will Zeilinger Featured Authors
July 21, 2023 by marianne h donley in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Featured Author of the Month, Partners in Crime by Janet Elizabeth Lynn & Will Zeilinger tagged as 1950s Crime novels, Author Interviews, Chatting with Authors, Janet Elizabeth Lynn, The Skylar Drake Murder Mystery Series, Will Zeilinger
July Featured Authors
Janet Elizabeth Lynn was born in Queens and raised in Long Island, New York. She is the author of murder mysteries, cozy mysteries and with her husband Will Zeilinger, 1950s hard-boiled detective mysteries.
Will Zeilinger has lived and traveled the world and has been writing for over ten years. His novels range from mystery to romantic comedy and those 1950s hard-boiled detective mysteries with his wife Janet.
Partners in Crime
Together Janet and Will write the Skylar Drake Mystery Series. These hard-boiled tales are based in old Hollywood in 1955. They have an E-book How it Began: The Skylar Drake Mysteries available from Smashwords.
Their world travels have sparked several ideas for murder and crime stories. In their next adventure, they will team up using the penname E.J. Williams for a new mystery series set in the 1960s. Their first novel in the International Crime Files, Stone Pub is in the works.
Chatting With Authors
In addition to writing novels, Janet and Will have a YouTube Channel, Chatting with Authors featuring informal Zoom interviews with authors of various genres. We encourage readers to check out all their videos.
This creative couple lives in Southern California . . . and yes, they are still married, and they even blog together at The Married Authors.
The Skylar Drake Mystery Series
Janet Elizabeth Lynn and Will Zeilinger Featured Authors
July 14, 2023 by Janet Elizabeth Lynn and Will Zeilinger in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Featured Author of the Month, Partners in Crime by Janet Elizabeth Lynn & Will Zeilinger tagged as 1950s Crime novels, Author Interviews, Chatting with Authors, Janet Elizabeth Lynn, The Skylar Drake Murder Mystery Series, Will Zeilinger
July Featured Authors
Janet Elizabeth Lynn was born in Queens and raised in Long Island, New York. She is the author of murder mysteries, cozy mysteries and with her husband Will Zeilinger, 1950s hard-boiled detective mysteries.
Will Zeilinger has lived and traveled the world and has been writing for over ten years. His novels range from mystery to romantic comedy and those 1950s hard-boiled detective mysteries with his wife Janet.
Partners in Crime
Together Janet and Will write the Skylar Drake Mystery Series. These hard-boiled tales are based in old Hollywood in 1955. They have an E-book How it Began: The Skylar Drake Mysteries available from Smashwords.
Their world travels have sparked several ideas for murder and crime stories. In their next adventure, they will team up using the penname E.J. Williams for a new mystery series set in the 1960s. Their first novel in the International Crime Files, Stone Pub is in the works.
Chatting With Authors
In addition to writing novels, Janet and Will have a YouTube Channel, Chatting with Authors featuring informal Zoom interviews with authors of various genres. We encourage readers to check out all their videos.
This creative couple lives in Southern California . . . and yes, they are still married, and they even blog together at The Married Authors.
The Skylar Drake Mystery Series
The Dog Days of Summer, Birthdays, and Buttered Noses
July 13, 2023 by marianne h donley in category From a Cabin in the Woods by Members of Bethlehem Writers Group tagged as birthdays, buttered noses, dog days, Family, grandparents, hot, Summer
The Dog Days of Summer isn’t just an expression that indicates summer days so hot dogs are driven mad. It’s an actual astronomical event when, Sirius, the dog star rises in conjunction with the sun. The Dog Days are listed as starting on July 3rd and continuing through August 11th.
In my family, the Dog Days of Summer marked the beginning of birthday season. I have three brothers and three sisters. Then there are my children, nieces and nephews, in-laws (or as we insist out-laws) and now the grandchildren and grandnieces and grandnephews. A significant number of them have birthdays in July and August.
Birthdays
Birthdays around our place were always a bit different. With so many relatives we seldom had friends to our birthday celebrations. We rarely severed cake but rather baked from scratch (including the crust) birthday pie. There were favorites – quite a few apple pies, pumpkin (made three days ahead of the feast and refrigerated to the proper coldness), lemon meringue, peach, and rhubarb for my mother.
And when my mémère (French for grandma) was alive, if it was your birthday, you got your nose buttered. It was supposed to make you side through the year to your next birthday.
Now Mémère assured us this was an old French custom, but I never met any other family who practiced nose buttering–even the few friend of mine when we were growing up who also had a mémère and
Buttered Noses
So, a few years ago I googled it. Sure enough, other families butter noses, but the articles I read listed the custom is either Scottish or Irish. I suspect Mémère would be upset by these claims as she was very proud of her French ancestry even though the family arrived in the New World well before there was a United States. She and Pépère spoke French at home, and my dad and his siblings didn’t learn English until they went to school.
I must admit that she frequently got things wrong. For example, she was also very proud of being born on June 13th and every year would tell us that she just missed being born on Friday the 13th (it happened to be a Saturday that year because it was a leap year). But when she died my aunts found her birth certificate. She wasn’t born on June 13th, that was the day she was baptized. She was really born two days earlier and forever celebrated her birthday on the wrong day.
Wrong day
My aunts were upset, but I would like to think Mémère would not have cared if she had ever noticed. She was happy to have a pie baked by my mom, and she would laugh her head off when we would sneak up and butter her nose so she could slide through another year.
Does your family have different birthday customs? What are they?
Some of Marianne’s Short Stories are in the following books
How To ReStart Writing After A Prolonged Break
July 12, 2023 by Denise M. Colby in category The Writing Journey by Denise Colby tagged as Denise M. Colby, writerslife, writing processHow do you restart writing after taking a prolonged break? Do you jump in to a daily quota right away or start slowly one time a week working on your manuscript? Do you spend time reading what you wrote, first? Or, do you start writing a new scene to work with something fresh? Do you start a completely new project, or go back to the one you were working on before?
I don’t think there is a wrong way to restart writing, but there may be ideas we can use to help us get back into strong habits right away. I’d love to hear what you’ve done. Share them in the comments below.
As I am writing this blog post, I’m facing this very thing, restarting writing. I took a few months off to enjoy my sons’ graduations (college in May, hs in June) which I wrote about in last month’s blog post, and now I’m ready to write and edit again. As I started working on a few scenes over the weekend, the time flies. And I need to it to be quiet around me, which is hard to do with everyone home. All of these thoughts made me realize I need a game plan. And I couldn’t remember what I did before.
One thing I’m truly thankful for is my critique group. With a possibility of a weekly submission, I have a built-in deadline to help me complete a task. This is a huge motivator to restart writing.
Next I need to figure out when everyone will not be home, or I need to go somewhere to write. I love my large monitor, but maybe getting out the house will be exactly the best approach.
Denise is writing a western historical series set in 1869 California. She’s in the middle of editing the first book in the series, a full-length novel as well as a fun rom-com novella, with a few side characters.
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