From the Backlist: "Writing the Story -- Just a Trip on the Open Road" by Pamela Palmer

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"Plotter or pantser" is one of the vital decisions all writers must make --- and also a question our Supernatural Underground authors get asked a lot. 

Here's Pamela Palmer's take in terms of her own writing. Enjoy!

Writing the Story -- Just a Trip on the Open Road

by Pamela Palmer

I used to think I was a plotter. Or maybe I just wanted to be a plotter since it appealed to my control freak side. The idea of sitting down to write with a thoroughly plotted outline at my fingertips enthralled me. I imagined that marvelous document, each chapter broken down into detailed scene-by-scene action, emotion, and descriptions, with character goals and conflicts spelled out in perfect clarity. Writing would be a snap, I thought. 

Then I tried it. And failed. Miserably.

I spent months creating that brilliant outline for one of my early books (a Scottish historical that will never see the light of day). But at the first critical turning point in the story, all that meticulous planning fell apart. The hero, who had come roaring to life in the first few chapters, simply refused to react to that pivotal moment the way I (and my beautiful outline) required him to. I could have forced him, of course. And he and anyone who read the book would have hated me for it. So I didn't. I let him react the way he needed to, which sent the story spinning in a direction I'd never foreseen. And all the meticulous planning I'd done from that point forward had to be scrapped.

So, I tried again, carefully plotting the rest of the story from that point on, convinced it would work now that I understood the hero better. Wrong. Within a few chapters, he was glaring at me, arms crossed, a mulish set to his chiseled jaw. No way in hell was he doing what I'd intended. Again.

I'd love to say that after two failures I'd learned my lesson. Nope. To paraphrase one of my favorite fictional characters (Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum), I try never to make the same mistake more than two or three times. Eventually, I figured it out. For me, traveling through a story is a lot like traveling by car along roads I've never visited before. Yes, I can grab a map and plan the route ahead of time, in detail, but all I'm doing is guessing the best way to go. We've all done it--chosen a route that appears to be quick, or short, or interesting, only to find the reality anything but. That 'straight shot' through the city has us caught in traffic so thick we haven't moved for an hour or that 'short cut' between two highways turns out to be little more than a track through the mountains where we can hardly tell the roads from the driveways.

Planning the trip ahead of time is all well and fine, but it's not until I get into the middle of it that I'm able to see where I really want to go.

I still plot, because my stories are too complicated to simply dive into without any plan. But my plotting these days looks more like a trip itinerary that reads: Atlanta to Cincinnati to Denver to Albuquerque. The highlights only. I refuse to plan the details of how I'll get from Cincinnati to Denver until I reach Cincinnati. At that point, I'll look at the situation (how much time I have, how much money, what the weather looks like, and how the traffic reports are stacking up), and make my decisions based on up-to-the-minute data. And even then, I'm okay with things changing. If a road looks good, I'll take it. If not, I won't. No commitments. No meticulous pre-planning. And if it starts to make more sense to switch Albuquerque with Denver, that's okay, too.

...

To read the full post, click here

Pamela's website is here

From The Backlist: "Supernatural Sidekickin' " by Kim Falconer

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We do love us a backlist post -- and this one from Kim Falconer is Grade A! We invite you to read on and enjoy. :-)

Supernatural Sidekickin'

This month, I want to explore the qualities of a 'good' sidekick/wing woman/man, what traits they have, their roles in the storytelling and how to write them.

Buffy -- & the Sidekicks!

What Sidekicks Are Good For

Back story: A well written, three dimensional sidekick can help with back story, allowing the reader to see and hear about things that came before page one without wading through heavy exposition. We see this in Star Wars with the sidekick Chewbacca, where his adventures in the past with Han Solo help shape our understanding of the man. Also in the sidekicks C-3PO and R2-D2. We learn much about the world through their commentary.

World Building: The sidekick can represent a culture or social group as Gimli and Legolas do in Lord of the Rings. Gollum, a 'minor' character, but with a major goal, provides a talking point for the long and complex history of the ring. What life was like in the past, the roots of the hobbits as a people. He is kind of an 'anti-skidekick' to the anti-hero Frodo.

Contrast: The sidekick can have different values, ethics, goals and motivations, making for a contrast to the main protagonist. Damon Salvatore in The Vampire Diaries, for example, hasn't much of a moral compass. At all. His buddy Alaric Saltzman, however, does, and watching that friendship grow is a measure of the main character's arc and emotional evolution.

Alaric & Damon

Humor and wit: The protagonist has to be pretty serious at times, playing it 'straight' as they work out how to fight the baddy, retrieve the lost treasure and save the day. The sidekick, however, is free to use wit and humor at times when the hero cannot. We see this in Buffy the Vampire Slayer with Xander (one of Buffy's many sidekicks). She may be in deep emotional angst and he can pop a one-liner that lifts the moment without throwing away her feelings.

Xander & Buffy

Throw-aways: Similar to wit and humor, there are times when a scene is too intense, deep or meaningful and the sidekick can be just the one to lighten it all with a 'throw-away' line. Clive and Ravi do this on iZombie when Liv is too deep into the fact that she is dead, turned into a zombie and has to eat brains to survive. It can turn a scene around in a flash.

Liv, iZombie

Freedom of Speech: The sidekick can say things the hero might be thinking, or wish they could say, but can't. In the Quantum Enchantment Series, Rosette has a sentient familiar, a temple cat who links with her telepathically. She might be having a conversation with a mentor or rival while her familiar does a running commentary on the whole thing, adding a new element to the scene.

The "Quantum" series

Sympathy: The hero may also relate to the sidekick in ways they can't to others, allowing the reader to gain more compassion or understanding. This works especially well for main characters that are not fully sympathetic. Eric Northman's compassion for his progeny, Pam, is an example from True Blood, aka Charlaine Harris's Southern Vampire Mysteries.

Eric, True Blood

Writing the Sidekick

The first question to answer when developing a sidekick in the story is why are they there? They have to move the plot forward, be part of the part of the story. They also have to have their own GMC - goals, motivations and conflicts, internal and external. In a shorter work, these won't be explored to a great depth, but with novel length stories and series, there is room for these subplots to be woven.

...

To read the full post, click here

To check in on Kim, go here.

From the Backlist: Forbidden Fruit (And Don't We Love It!)

Art by @horseman09 on Instagram 

Today's spotlight from the Backlist was written June 26, 2010 by the spectacular Fantasy author Karina Cooper. Her thoughts on contemporary monsters and why we love-fear-love them are timely, and well considered. 

Hope you enjoy!

Check out Karina Cooper on Goodreads!  

Forbidden Fruit (And Don't We Love It!)

by Karina Cooper

 

We've all met the forefathers of the paranormal world. Bram Stoker's Dracula, George Waggner's The Wolf Man, and other early prototypes of the much-maligned fur-and-fanged world have been ingrained in our racial memory almost as deeply as a fear/fascination of fire.

Think I'm joking? Don't worry, I am... mostly. While there is no (credible) evidence of fanged cavemen stalking the Neanderthals of ages past, there is, instead, a like fascination with the things that go bump in the night. We have loved to hate vampires who creep through bedroom windows, cheered when the werewolves have been put down by silver bullets (carefully crafted from one's father's melted down watch, natch), covered our eyes when the blood-bathing witch was burned at the stake and the souls of her cursed victims set free.

If you're here, then you share that love with me.

And perhaps you can answer a question that has always interested me: How, in all that is (un)holy, did vampires go from this unfortunate child of the night to this blessed hunk of blood-love? Where in our society did we decide that being stalked by furry-faced flesh-eaters was not nearly so fun as being seduced by them?

I have a theory, gentle (and not so gentle) readers. My theory is this: We as a species, a culture and a shared memory are routinely fascinated by the forbidden. From as majestic as the ancient tales of locked gateways to heaven to the mundane as being told we shouldn't touch the stove, we are drawn to that which we cannot have... 

 

Read the entire POST. 

 

Enjoy!

 

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Speculative Fiction (Fantasy/Thriller/Sci-Fi/Urban Fantasy) for adults and teens.

 

 

We're a group of best-selling authors providing news, reviews and interviews from the darker, more speculative side of fiction.

Fiction that makes the heart beat faster...

 

From The Backlist: "What Love Means" by Kim Falconer

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It's backlist time -- & we love this post on "What Love Means " by Kim Falconer.

Time to share it again, we thought. So here it is! Enjoy!!

The "Quantum" Series

What Love Means

by Kim Falconer

I find it fascinating that the English Language has only one word for love. We love our cars and cats and pancakes. We love our new job, the latest film and the computer that never lets us down. We love our gardens, sports, family and our lovers, but the feeling for these ‘loved ones’ can be quite different. Still, we say the same thing: I love . . . Not so in other cultures. The ancient Greeks, for example, had four different words for love with different meanings and different ‘locations.’

Love as Epithemia translates into words like horny or randy. It’s a physical, sensual, sexy love that’s hard to resist. Animal attraction. Chemistry. You know the kind? It’s tactile and felt in the body. It wants to get close, to touch and explore. It wants to have sex because that’s the only thing that will put the fire out!

Love as philia is a friendship love that brings creative inspiration. There can be a deep sense wanting to be together in companionship and co-creation. Philia is felt in the heart. We can write characters that have a feeling of philia for each other and it really screws things up if they do have sex. Or if one character is feeling the philia and the other is on fire with epithemia. These make great problems for convoluted story lines!

Love as Eros is felt in the soul. Eros is a god from which we get the word erotic, but to the ancient Greeks it was much more than just ‘sex’. The original definition of erotic (of Eros) is a situation when two or more people come together in such a way there is a lasting transformation. By this definition, sex is seldom erotic, but it can be. The Eros relationship is heady, intense, obsessive. It always leads to growth and change.

Love as agape is a divine love felt in the spirit. It may not need the body conneciton to feel fulfilled. This is also tantric, sex that opens the mind to another level of consciousness. Agape can lead to transcendence where characters move beyond their earthly limitations to become more than they ever thought possible.

Stories that contrast these kinds of love can be deeply moving because they speak to our own subtle and complex longings. One character feeling the ‘brotherly love’ of philia may be confronted by their companion’s erotic fire. Someone with the reverence of agape may not know how to face pure epithemia head on. It’s not unrequited love, exactly (it doesn’t have to distance characters) but it brings trouble and that’s exactly what we want in a good read! Mixing up the love keeps the stakes high and the dynamics flowing!

... 

What a great post! To read the original, click here

To check in on Kim, try these links:

AKWilder.com, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and KimFalconer.com. 

Throw the bones on the AKWilder.com site -- see you there!

Kim also writes as AK Wilder

From the Backlist - The Magic & Wonder of Trees

Fantasy Trees from Artstation

 
It's that time again as we explore the plethora of insights, tips and entertainment that is the Supernatural Underground Backlist. This one features a post from Helen Lowe, written back in November 2017! Join us as we dive into a veritable sub-genre of arboreal fantasy, but remember, enter only if you dare...

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The Magic & Wonder of Trees in Fantasy

by Helen Lowe

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"Enter these enchanted woods, you who dare..." 
- George Meredith, 1828-1909

Today I'm taking a look at the part trees play in Fantasy literature and whether authors in the genre have taken the Victorian poet's advice to heart. :)

Overall, it appears we have.

Ents, of course, are probably the most famous “trees”, or in their case, treelike beings, in Fantasy literature. They feature in the second and third books of The Lord of the Rings trilogy and played a major part in The Two Towers film, with the attack on, and destruction of Isengard:

“Pippin looked behind. The number of Ents had grown — or what was happening? Where the dim bare slopes that they had crossed should lie, he thought he saw groves of trees. But they were moving! Could it be that the trees of Fangorn were awake, and the forest was rising, marching over the hills to war? He rubbed his eyes wondering if sleep and shadow had deceived him; but the great grey shapes moved steadily onward.”

Sentient trees also feature in CS Lewis’s Narnia series and I’ve always loved the scene in Prince Caspian where Aslan reawakens the trees that have slept as a result of the Telmarine invasion:

“What Lucy and Susan saw was a dark something coming to them from almost every direction across the hills. It looked first like a black mist creeping on the ground, then like the stormy waves of a black sea rising higher and higher as it came on, and then, at last, like what it was — woods on the move. All the trees of the world appeared to be rushing towards Aslan.”

Sometimes, however, it is not a forest but a single tree that features — like the world tree in Mary Victoria’s Chronicles of the Tree series, which is first encountered in Tymon’s Flight:

“To starboard of the vessel…stretched a vast and furrowed mountain of bark, so wide that it’s curvature was almost invisible and so high that both its summit and its base were lost to view. The immensity of the wall was broken by a profusion of spoke-like limbs, the largest many miles in length. Several hundred feet above the dirigible the trunk culminated in the gently rising plateau of branches and twigs that made up the Central Canopy’s crown.”

Read the full article HERE...

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Helen Lowe is a novelist, poet, interviewer and blogger whose first novel, Thornspell (Knopf), was published to critical praise in 2008. Her second, The Heir of Night (The Wall Of Night Series, Book One) won the Gemmell Morningstar Award 2012. The sequel, The Gathering Of The Lost, was shortlisted for the Gemmell Legend Award in 2013. 

 Daughter Of Blood, (The Wall Of Night, Book Three) is her most recent book and she is currently working on the fourth and final novel in The Wall Of Night series. Helen posts regularly on her “…on Anything, Really” blog and is also on Twitter: @helenl0we

'the delicious threesome' by Cindy Pon -- More 'From the Backlist' Goodness!

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Our own Supernatural Underground backlist that is -- and today's fabulous reprise is from the wonderful Cindy Pon. 

Needless to say, we think it's a lot of fun. So much so that we just had to highlight it for you again today.

the delicious threesome...or is three a crowd?

by Cindy Pon

as a tween, one of my favorite series
of books was the single title historicals
(like "jacqueline" or "caroline") and it
always showed the teen heroine on the front
cover flanked by two boys. two boys that she
must choose between. i loved those books,
formulaic as the love triangle may have been.
the new period in history always made it fresh
enough for me to read almost every title in the
series. of late, there's been some discussion
on the love triangle within the young adult genre.

The Twilight effect...

is it overused? tired and worn out? o

the threesome configuration one of the best

ones to read for increased sexual and romantic

tension? like so many things in the young adult genre

that i attribute to "the twilight effect", the series really

put the love triangle at the forefront of YA reader minds. ...

*when two men love a woman.

...

so what about you? how do you feel about
love triangles? do they work for you?
what threesome novels are some of your favorites?

To read Cindy's original post in full, including all about two other trio-a-licious teen Fantasy series that she loved, plus the 27 fun and sometimes impassioned comments on the subject of love triangles in books, click here.

And to find out more about Cindy Pon, her books, and what she's working on now, go here. 

From The Backlist: "Reasons Why You Never Want to Make an Author Mad*" by Karina Cooper

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We love our awesome Supernatural Underground backlist -- and this post by Karina Cooper, now writing as KC Alexander, is a lot of fun. Enjoy!

Reasons Why You Never Want to Make an Author Mad*

KC Alexander

by Karina Cooper

Come on, you've seen us. We're all very lovely people, us authors. We smile at the cameras, sign books, hug fans, and so on. Surely, making an author mad must be akin to swatting at a dust bunny, right? I mean, what are we going to do? Cry into our keyboards?

Well. Sort of.

See, yesterday I found myself in the middle of a task that I do actually need for this current run of books I'm plotting. And as I scrolled through pages and pages of data, I thought to myself, Karina, it's a damn good thing your profession is what it is.

Because how else am I to explain why my internet history is full of information on modern day torture techniques?

That's right. Let's talk about reason number one: We know how make you scream. We've researched it down to the last details—certainly not for ourselves, oh, no, but what out characters know, we know. And if we're carrying around a character who is an inquisitor, or a character who was tortured, or worse, we know.

Would we use it? Oh, of course not, officer! We'd never use this information for evil. We're entertainers, not in the business of making the things we know actually happen. Right?

Heh. Heh heh. Right.

Reason number two to avoid making us angry? We know how to hide the body. We've thoroughly researched it. Currents, erosion, garbage truck route details, you name it, we know it. We're a little obsessive when it comes to details, you might have noticed. After all, how else can we guarantee that the extra we offed in chapter 4 doesn't come to light until chapter 15?

The devil is, in fact, in the details.

And speaking of details, let's talk about reason number three: we know things about weapons even the movies get wrong. In that obsession with details, we'll travel all over the information highway to get the facts. Which means we know what kind of weapons a SEAL carries, we know which weapons jam underwater and which can fire in below freezing temperatures. We know which bullets will turn your brain into so much pink mist and which will leave a neat little exit wound, and which sniper rifle will make this easy.

We know about ninja stars, and the different kinds of knives. We know which guns have suppressors and which can be made to have suppressors, and that the potato suppressor doesn't actually work.

Oh, and I certainly don't mean we'd use these tidbits of terminal information on you! I mean characters, of course! We know how to kill characters. As I said, we're in the habit of making up stories, not in shaping reality. Rest easy, dear reader.

Unless, of course, you'd like to make us mad...?

Which brings us to reason number four: Odds are, we have fans in the police department. No joke! If it's not the boys in blue who love us, it's the women. Or the wives. Regardless of who or how, the reality is, we have people who would love to give us alibis.

Wouldn't any of you give me an alibi if I rang you up one day? "Hey, listen, I'll make a character of your choice and thank you in the acknowledgements if you just tell these nice people where I was yesterday. You know, at your house. Watching Friends. And eating cheddar cheese."

Then there's reason number five: You remember school, when there'd be this rumor going around about "that girl" who did this one horribly embarrassing thing, and you knew—just knew—that everyone was talking about you?

Imagine having a character based on you. A character who reveals all your secrets—or makes them up. A character who is murdered in the most grisly way. Or a character who survives, but gets exactly what he or she deserves?

Yeah. In our worlds, baby, we're the gods. And we will talk about you in our godly land of godliness.

You don't want that, do you?

So there you are. Five very good reasons not to piss off your favorite authors. Or even your not so favorite authors. 

...

To read the full post, including comments, click here. 

To find out more about what Karina's doing now, visit her on kcalexander.com

From The Backlist: "Unhealthy Obsession?" by Jocelynn Drake

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We love our awesome Supernatural Underground backlist -- and this post, where Jocelynn Drake poses the Unhealthy Obsession? question is an excellent example!

Jocelynn Drake

Unhealthy Obsession? 

by Jocelynn Drake

It’s just after midnight and I should be heading to bed, or at the very least settling in with a book to relax.

Instead, I’m surfing the net and obsessing about all the little things that I love. And I’m wondering if it’s unhealthy. I mean, everyone needs a little distraction in life. A little escape. Most of the time, I escape into the worlds of my own creation, but sometimes I need someone else’s world.

Obsession #1: Batman

My long-time love affair with Bruce Wayne started when I was young, watching the Adam West/Burt Ward Batman and Robin show. At that time, I loved Robin, but then I was very young and foolish; not realizing the wonderfulness that is the complexity of Bruce Wayne. My love cooled over the years until the early ‘90s when the Adventures of Batman and Robin cartoon was released. The art was beautiful and the stories were surprisingly rich for a 30-minute afternoon cartoon show. I fell in love all over again. Batman had taken on a gritty, darker feel. He had finally become the tortured soul that most of us have come to equate with Batman.

I love Bruce Wayne/Batman because he doesn’t have any super powers. He’s just a man. Every night he pushes himself to the absolute limit while walking a fine line between good and evil. Handsome, strong, confident, determined, dedicated, brilliant, loyal, and secretly, very compassionate, Bruce Wayne makes my little heart stammer in my chest. The new DC Universe reboot, which will launch in September, has me concerned about what they will do to the Batman canon, but I know they will not change the soul of Batman.

I own a large collection of comics, graphic novels, movies, figures, and cartoons. One dream would be to publish my own Batman story.

..."

To read all about Obsession #2 and the full post, including comments, click here. 

To find out more about Jocelynn and her writing you can visit her blog.

From The Backlist: "Modern Day Faery Tales Drawn From Fantasy and Folklore"

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We love this post from one of Supernatural Underground's founder authors, the great Terri Garey.

It's a wonderful exploration of the origins and unique characteristics of the awesome that is paranormal urban fantasy.

We love what Terri has to say even more! So here goes:

Urban Fantasy: Modern Day Faery Tales Drawn From Fantasy and Folklore 

by Terri Garey

As an author with an all-too-vivid imagination, I've never had a whole lot of trouble with “suspension of disbelief”. Ghosts, near-death experiences, haunted houses - anything that frightens or intrigues me is very likely to end up in one of my books. 

I write Urban Fantasy, which is basically fiction that’s set in the real world, yet contains aspects of the supernatural or fantastic. Urban Fantasy was first defined as an acknowledged sub-genre in the late 1980’s and early ‘90s, but in my opinion, “Urban Fantasy” has always been around, from the earliest days when spooky stories were first told around warm fires on cold nights. Ancient gods and goddesses, elves, witches, faeries and werewolves. Dragons, trolls, giants. By the standards of the era (whether it be Classical, the Dark Ages, the Middle Ages, the Victorian, etc.) any of these stories could be considered Urban Fantasy, for they all involved a mixture of the real and the fantastic. Lewis Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Robert Lewis Stevenson's Jekyll and Hyde – these are all fictional tales that were based in the real world, yet include elements of the supernatural.

In Urban Fantasy, the supernatural elements are limited only by the author’s imagination, but certain themes, however, remain constant. These “literary tropes” are at the heart of every good fantasy novel, whether it’s Urban Fantasy, Sci-Fi Fantasy (Star Wars, Star Trek), Historical Fantasy (Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones), or Young Adult Fantasy (Harry Potter). 

1) First comes the over-arching theme of Good vs. Evil. The stakes can be as high as the fate of the world, or as simple as saving the life of one individual, but there is always a goal that serves the greater good. Whether the protagonist is a supernatural bounty-hunter who keeps demons from taking over the world, or a single mom who finds out her neighbor is a vampire, moral dilemmas—and the consequences of them—are a mainstay of Urban Fantasy.

2) Second is the journey of the self – protagonists often start out ill-equipped, or even unwilling, to deal with the situations they find themselves in, but through character development (which the author shows by their ongoing actions and insights), find within themselves the strength to meet ever-increasing challenges.
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3) Third is A Major Secret – one that puts the protagonist outside the realm of “normal”, but forces them to behave as though they were just like you and me. By placing the protagonist in an urban, “everyday” setting, the author creates a sense of kinship with the reader, fostering the much-needed suspension of disbelief.

..."

To read the full post and the comments, click here.

And to discover more about Merrie and her writing, visit her on: Terri Garey

From the Backlist - What Would Your Echo Be?

 

Hello Everyone!

It's time to explore the awesome backlist at the Supernatural Underground! 

Today we are sharing a post made on February 23, 2011 by the bestselling author Kimberly Derting. She has some fabulous new releases out now, but these oldies but goodies are based on a beautiful, eerie premises: What Would Your Echo Be? 

Check this out!

By Kimberly Dering, Feb 23, 2011

In THE BODY FINDER and its sequel, DESIRES OF THE DEAD, 16-year-old Violet Ambrose is drawn to the dead by sensory imprints that attach to them when they are killed. Yes, they must come to an untimely death to be left with one of these “echoes.” And the thing about the echoes is that they’re completely and totally random. They have nothing to do with how the person lived…or even how they died.

It can be a sound (bells, music, the sound of glass breaking)

A taste (garlic, briny salt water, caramel)

A physical sensation (brain freeze, the sensation of feathers brushing over her skin)

Or a visual echo (a glow or a burst of colors)

I was asked at the launch party for DESIRES OF THE DEAD this past weekend, if I had an echo, what would it be?

Even knowing the rules (that it has nothing to do with the individuals themselves), I was still convinced that my echo would be something chocolate-related. I mean, honestly, how could it not be?

So I’m asking you, if you could choose your echo, what would it be... 

To read more about the amazing writer Kimberly Derting, visit her website, Twitter and FB.

From The Backlist: "What Happens When Writers Can't Sleep"

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Merrie Destefano

Today, we're excited to refeature another fabulous post from our Supernatural Underground backlist -- an intriguing insight into what happens when writers can't sleep, from the wonderful Merrie Destefano. 

Merrie shared this post in February 2011, but we think you'll enjoy revisiting it today, with a link through to the original for the full context, including comments.

So without further ado:

From The Backlist: What Happens When Writers Can't Sleep

by Merrie Destefano

Like most writers, I tend to over think things. Way too much. For the past several years, one of the things that has fascinated/terrified me is the whole process of falling asleep. I’ve analyzed and studied it to the point that sometimes I can’t go to sleep. (Insert silent scream here.) I will lay awake, trying to capture that moment when my waking self dissolves into my dreaming self, but it’s like trying to catch smoke in a bottle. And, as I already mentioned, one of the brutal side effects of all this is the fact that now I have trouble sleeping. 

Merrie's latest!

So what happens when a writer over thinks things? Especially if that writer can’t sleep?

She starts working on story ideas. About creatures who never sleep. Creatures who slip in your window in the middle of the night to steal your dreams.

.I mean, haven’t you ever wondered why you can only remember some of your dreams, while others you can’t remember at all?

All of my sleepless angst gave birth to my ... book—Feast: Harvest of Dreams—a tale of forbidden love and supernatural intrigue that mixes vampire and fairy lore to create a new paranormal creature. The book contains two interwoven love stories, one with the main character, a fantasy writer named Maddie, that will appeal to adults and one with a 16-year-old half-human/half-paranormal girl, named Elspeth, that will appeal to readers of YA ...

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To read the full post and the comments, click here.

And to discover more about Merrie and her writing, visit her on: www.merriedestefano.com

Enjoy!

From the Backlist: Never Give Up! Never surrender!

It's time again to explore the awesome backlist at the Supernatural Underground! 

Today we are sharing a post made on January 25, 2011 by the spectacular writer Kerrelyn Sparks. It's relevant to us now as she asks how we are all going with our New Year resolutions. Good Question?

Kerrelyn also shares how she didn't give up, back in the day, an attitude that shot her to the New York Times Best Sellers list.

It's inspirational!

... I believe in second chances. I'm on my second marriage (going strong after 22 years, yay!) And I'm on my second writing career. The first time around, I was a historical romance writer. I'd only been writing two years when I was offered my first contract, so I thought everything was buzzing along swimmingly. But then, my editor quit.

 

She was the only romance editor in this multi-genre publishing house, and I was the only historical romance author. With my editor gone, none of the other editors (all guys) wanted to touch a manuscript titled Insatiable and Saucy. They didn't want any more books from me. My agent broke off with me. After two years, the contracted book limped into bookstores with a new title For Love or Country. A bittersweet debut, for I was thrilled to see my book on the shelves, but devastated that my career was already over.

For two more years, I tried to acquire a new agent and sell another historical romance. I racked up more rejections as a published author than I had as an unpublished one. I found a wonderful agent who really believes in me, but even she couldn't sell an American-set historical when the publishers want them set in the British Isles. And that is when I realized I had to reinvent myself. A new beginning. A new subgenre. I wrote the first three chapters of How to Marry a Millionaire Vampire, sent it to my agent, and within a week, we had three offers...

To read the full post and the comments, click here. 

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