Tag: #writing

The Silver Portal, by David J. Normoyle: A Review

Five weapons of power. Magic gone wrong, and instead of five trained warriors bonding to WeaponsofPower-Final-Smallthe weapons, five disparate young people from across the land become the weapons-bearers. Magically linked to the weapons, each must learn its powers and its responsibilities, evade those who want to use them for ill, and find each other across a wide and dangerous land. David J. Normoyle’s book The Silver Portal, the first book in a planned series, introduces us to the five protagonists: street urchin Twig; would-be-adventurer Lukin; noble Suma; Mortlebee, outcast from his religious community, and rebellious Simeon. Each character stands as individuals; each has their own difficulties with their unexpected weapons. Struggles with trust, ethics, personal convictions and the expectations of upbringing are central to each character’s growth and development through the story, but not in a heavy-handed or preachy way. Instead, these dilemmas are an integral part of the story, handled for the most part deftly and naturally.

The writing is competent and fluid, and at the right level of difficulty for the young-adult target audience. Readers are introduced to the history, politics and magic of the world in a gradual manner, often learning along with the characters. Although in a couple of places I found myself wishing for a deeper understanding of the history, enough is given to flesh out the story and the motivations of characters.

I found the plot a bit rushed towards the end, given the fairly slow development of during most of the book. But as part of a series, the pacing may be less uneven when the book is read as an introduction to the world and the characters rather than a stand-alone story. Overall, 4 stars, for a worthy addition to young-adult fantasy.

A Guest Post from John A. Autero, author of The Scorpion

It’s common knowledge that humans have access to more digital media than ever before. Five hundred television channels, streaming movies, You Tube, ebooks, music in mp3 format or from streaming services… it’s everywhere. It’s wonderful that we have such a huge number of choices but I think something happened along the way. The huge volume of available digital media has caused it to lose its perceived value. Today, people fully expect this type of media to be free to the public.

Want to listen to the latest Lady GaGa album? Don’t worry, someone has tossed it onto You Tube for everyone to enjoy free of charge. At least until You Tube discovers it and takes it down, soon to be replaced by someone else in no time. If you don’t want to use You Tube, there are a number of sites to pass music and movies free of charge. I can’t tell you how many times I have seen people watching newly released movies on their laptops that they received for free. Love to read books but have a small budget? Sure, you can go to your local library, but why? Jump onto Amazon and grab a free copy of something interesting. I’ve seen people with tens if not hundreds of e-books on their Kindle that they downloaded for free. How did this happen? Where did this way of thinking start?

Here’s my guess.

Technology has allowed artists (musicians, writers) to make themselves visible to the public with as little as a click of a mouse button. In the old days, record companies ruled the music industry with an iron fist. They determined which bands made it and which ones didn’t. The few that did make it, sold millions of albums and filled huge arenas and those that didn’t were left to play at the local bar on Saturday night. But today, a band can set up a website and promote their music to the entire world without the help of a record company.

The publishing business has followed the exact same route. An independent author can write a book and easily toss it onto his/her own website, Amazon or Smashwords without the help of a publishing company. And this is great. As mentioned, this gives the public a huge variety to choose from and allows artists to be discovered. But as time has progressed a pattern has appeared. Four or five years ago, you would see indie e-books on Amazon for $4.99 or $3.99 [U.S. Dollars], with main stream published e-books coming in around $7.99 or $8.99. This makes sense to me since the quality of the indie books might not match that of the mainstream books. OK… I get it. But as time has passed, the price of the indie books has dropped and today most indie books are $0.99 or free. If an indie author sticks his e-book onto Amazon for $4.99, forget it… no one is going to look at it, because the public knows they can get another book that may be just as entertaining for free.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m an indie author. I run promotions where I give away ten or fifteen e-books over a weekend to try and increase readership and get reviews. But I believe that authors (and musicians) that provide their work to the public free of charge on a permanent basis, send the wrong message. I personally don’t write books with the sole purpose of generating income. I enjoy writing and I like to see people enjoy what I write. But I firmly believe that there should be a value attached to my work. Even a program like “Kindle Unlimited” that gives the perception of a free service, puts a value on a book through a subscription fee. (On a side note – I think KDP Select which gives an author access to Kindle Unlimited is a bit too restrictive over the long haul, but could be used for a period of time when a book is first released to draw attention and get reviews.)

My hope for the future is for artists to realize that the way to increase readership is not to lower the price of their goods but to make them better. Come up with a really good song or a really good book and people will notice. I don’t expect to become wealthy selling the few books I have written, but I feel they have a value and the public should provide me with the small amount I am asking for, to enjoy my book.

Let me know what you think?

John A. Autero is an indie author of speculative and techno-thriller adventure novels. An
engineer by education, John employs a technical style of writing that combines existing technologies with those that are yet to be developed. John enjoys anything sci-fi, automotive, heavy metal and ballistic. Always a fan of government conspiracies and black-ops, stories like The Terminator and The X-Files are always on his list of favorites. John was born in the United States and has spent his entire life there, where he happily lives with his wife and pets.  The Scorpion is his latest book.

 

 

 

 

 

The Muse?

Sometimes the writing process is a complete mystery. I’m about a third of the way through the first draft of Empire’s Hostage, the sequel to Empire’s Daughter (which will be released in paperback soon, but that’s another post for another day). Lena, the protagonist, is hostage to a truce between the Empire and the lands to the north, and is feeling confused, frustrated, constrained…and also suffering a little bit of what we would call today culture shock. Looking to find a way to both condense a bit of relevant ‘history’ into something not boring to the reader, and to further delineate the differences between the Empire and Linrathe, the land north of the Wall, my brain suddenly produced – in about thirty easy minutes – a song which effectively did both. Sung by the party with which she is travelling, it fit perfectly into the chapter. But where did that come from?

What has your writer’s mind produced out of seemingly nowhere?

 

Collision Course

Skestrelometimes two parts of a life can collide unexpectedly. At my Monday morning writer’s group, which meets in the upstairs restaurant/bar of an independent bookstore, we had propped the patio doors open to let in the summer breezes. We’d all been working about an hour – this is a place for silent writing, not discussion or sharing – when I heard a high-pitched, rapid cry from the bar area. My writer’s brain disengaged, my birder’s brain engaged – that was the cry of a bird in fear of its life.

I and another writer ran for the bar area. Fluttering against the glass windows was a young kestrel. Pursuing a house sparrow, it had flown in the open door of the patio. The house sparrow was somewhere in the room, but our priority was the kestrel.

A sweater was found and thrown over the terrified bird. The other writer – herself experienced in bird banding – carefully carried it out onto the patio and let it go. I searched the room for the sparrow, but it was hiding somewhere.

About half an hour later someone came in from the bar area to say the sparrow was fluttering against the front windows. It was a simple matter to drop my cotton shirt over it, and carry it carefully to the patio. It vocalized the same rapid, high-pitched distress call the whole time I held it, but flew away as soon as I freed it from the confining cloth.

The chances of this happening are minuscule. Kestrels eat primarily insects, although small birds are also part of their diet; my guess is this was an inexperienced and hungry young bird that thought a house sparrow was fair game.

And when both birds were free again, my writer’s brain re-engaged and I went on to write 600 words of Empire’s Hostage.

photo by Dominic Sherony (American Kestrel (Falco sparverius)) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

 

Brexit, birds and boxes

The disruption to my writing life from the move has settled down, and the opportunities are emerging. My new city has a vibrant and supportive writers’ community, as I’ve said before; yesterday I went to my first ‘Genre Writers Group’ meeting in a downtown coffee shop. This is a brand new group, so it seems I made my move at a good time!

Six of us met at this first meeting, self-published and traditionally published, experienced and newbies and in-betweeners. We talked about plotting and planning vs free-flow writing; we talked about sales, and mostly we talked about publicity and marketing, exchanging ideas and opportunities. As a result of this, I sent an email yesterday afternoon and have been accepted to read at the next Chi Reading Series here. Put on by Chizine Publications, the Chiaroscuro Reading Series takes place in a number of Canadian cities every few months and focuses on fantasy, science fiction, and horror. I’m not sure what I’m reading yet – it will depend on the time given – but it’s a chance to network with other genre writers and to reach a larger audience. I’ll keep you posted!

I’m back to the Writing Room, the Monday morning quiet-space-and-coffee meeting, after an absence of six months. I made it back just in time to read at our spring open-mic night last week. I chose to read from Empire’s Hostage, which has been on the back burner as well for the last half-year, figuring it would give me the prod to get back into it. Which it did, and perhaps all the better for the hiatus – and perhaps too for the reactions and emotions stemming from the Brexit vote, which in some ways reflect the themes of the book: what is independence? Does a country stand better on its own, or as part of a larger unity? Where do concepts of love of country, love of leaders, duty, stand when allegiances shift?

In a different mode, I’m also writing a monthly birding column for our neighbourhood newsletter, and have been ‘coerced’ (not really) into the production team, which means I am learning desktop publishing software in my spare time. It’s a very different type of writing and editing, but it’s all writing.

I should get a review out in another week or so, and hope then to be back into a rhythm on those. I’ve started investigating paperback production for my books, and I’m looking into some creative writing courses, either at the university or at the local college, in the autumn. For the next two days, I’m giving my niece, who is heading off to university in Halifax in September to study journalism (another writer in the family!) a mini-vacation, exploring this city and environs, riding bikes, eating ice cream, hiking the river trails.

Somehow I think the boxes still languishing in the basement may never be unpacked…when will I have the time?

Coming home

At last. It’s been a long dry period without work on Empire’s Hostage; I lacked the concentrated time not just to actually write, but to think about where the story is going. The creative process and managing the logistics of moving just weren’t compatible for me. I managed a few blog entries, on Two Simple Lives and All the Birds of My Life, but nothing fictional.

But we’re moved in – we’ve been here ten days now: all the important boxes are unpacked, and my office and laptop are set up. I have time for long walks or bike rides, time to think, and today I started writing again. It feels unbelievably good, like welcoming back an old friend into your life, or, after a long absence, coming home.

 

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