Achievements Rock!
No, I’m not talking about the achievements you can earn while playing games on the XBox 360 although those are awesome too. I’m referring to accomplishing things that have either been difficult to finish or even start. The goals that you set but every once in a while something gets in the way making it nearly impossible to start/finish. However once you actually get through it, you feel this incredible rush that only makes you want to shout to the world that you did it! That kind of achievement. In my case, I had been stuck on the sequel to Frozen Reflection; Quaking Tower. With Frozen Reflection I got to know the characters pretty quickly. Bianca pretty much appeared in my mind jumping up and down screaming, “I’m here! Write my story! I’m ready!” Alphonse however was more difficult. I thought I knew him well to start, but discovered there was more to his personality that I previous expected. In fact I wanted to kick him a few times for his attitude. (If you have not read the story and want to know what I’m talking about; go HERE or HERE to buy the ebook! It’s only $4.99!)
Quaking Tower however is a different story, literally. Until now, I didn’t really understand what was going on with my lead male. Because the circumstance for this story is rather different compared to its predecessor I had a bit of difficulty finding the right tone for the setting as well as deciding what aspects I wanted to stay true to and which ones I wanted to twist around. I’m also trying to keep the personalities separate from Bianca and Alphonse. They’re two different characters and should be treated as such. I seem to have a better idea of who they are as well as how to start the story. Where it goes, I don’t know. I’m excited to find out what will be happening next though. Until then, I’m enjoying the journey.
The Tale Continues…
Chapter 5 has been posted for Spark of Vengeance. The Keepers struggle with an important decision. Will they let fear take control?
Next Week…
In A Tail to Remember, Tucker, still reeling over the day’s events discovers that his aggravation has only just begun. Will he still go on the arranged date or escape to Alaska? Find out next time!
Happy Easter!
For those of you who celebrate the holiday, we hope you had fun. We did. For those of you who don’t, we hope it was a nice day regardless. Ours was.
Sorry For The Delay…
The official date for this week’s post was pushed back a day due to the holiday, though some material did get posted on time. This week’s content was Chapter 12 of A Tail To Remember by LJ Gastineau , as well as the first two rough chapters of Doris Ross’ Descent Into Darkness: His Command, the fourth installment in the series. With the launch of His Command, the last chapters for His Beast have been pulled from Doris’ site and sample chapter have been put up.
What Else Is Going On
Tricia Sparks is preparing a few stories for publication later this year. Doris Ross plans to release the unabridged version of Descent Into Darkness: His Beast by 5/6/12. At the moment, she’s endeavoring to finish the map rendering for the story. LJ Gastineau is currently working on the sequel to her new release, Frozen Reflection.
In case you haven’t looked at our update schedule, we’ve changed things a bit. Content will be going up once a week from now on, so be sure to check back regularly or look up the schedule for when your favorite story will be updated.
Happy Easter! Happy Update!
I’m currently watching my chinchilla, Zidane literally eat his Easter basket. It’s a cute sight! He started on some of the bundles of sticks, then tried two of the different flavored cookies and is now chomping on the basket itself. It’s actually his first Easter with us. I’ve been trying to celebrate holidays with him the best I can which usually consists of chin-friendly chews like organic dried baby rose petals and a vine heart for Valentine’s Day and green colored chews like loofah and bamboo finger traps for St. Patrick’s Day. He’ll probably get a bunch of finger traps for Independence Day since when he chews on them it resembles confetti. Needless to say he’s having a good day despite his poor behavior yesterday (he knocked his food bowl upside down). I teased him about the Easter bunny not bringing anything because he was a bad chinny. Of course he didn’t take me seriously. I’ll be in an Easter parade in Saint Augustine, FL later this day before spending time with family for the holidays. Happily enough I got TWO Lindt bunnies this year; the only type of milk chocolate I like. It’s so smooth and creamy.
New Today!
Chapter twelve is now available for A Tail to Remember. Kallie is still reeling over the day’s events and ends up with an unexpected surprise. I think Mittens reminds me a bit of Zidane. Especially in this chapter. Next week will be a new chapter of Spark of Vengeance.
E-Book!
Just a reminder, Frozen Reflection, book 1 of my young adult fantasy series, The Crystal Garden Saga is available as an e-book on the Kindle, through Smashwords,on Drivethrufiction, and from Lulu. It’s still currently pending for the Nook and at the iBookstore although there are several formats available through Smashwords. If you want to experience a different twist to a fairytale favorite, be sure to check out Frozen Reflections. It’s available for $4.99 at the previously mentioned vendors. Click on the names for the links.
Hello April!
It’s a new month, Doris is playing a creepy hidden object game entitled Shiver: The Vanishing Hitchhiker Collector’s Edition from Big Fish Games. She just got a call in game where a raspy voice said “I’m watching you.” That plus the creepy soundtrack, weird children’s drawing of dead people and other “surprises,” makes this posting rather challenging. If you like spooky games, then add this to your list. The second game Shiver: Poltergeist is also good she says.
Updates
As listed on your updated schedule for posting new content, LJ has posted chapter 4 to Spark of Vengeance. She has her first young adult novel, Frozen Reflections epublished on Smashwords, Amazon, and Lulu so if you are interested in a copy please purchase it from one of those three distributors. It should be available for the Nook and iBookstore in the relative future. Here is what one reader has to say about the book. “Just finished your book. I truly enjoyed it, great twists! Congrats Lisa, well done!!” See LJ’s page for more info on the book itself.
Also, next month Doris will have the third book of Descent into Darkness: His Beast ready for epublishing. She’ll share more info on that in the future.
Insert Something Witty Here
The rainy weather has sapped my mind of the ability to come up with an interesting title to this post today. Normally I don’t mind the rain, except when it results in me suffering from a migraine. I’m currently at Doris’s place typing this as she plays a creepy hidden object game from Big Fish Games entitled Shiver: The Vanishing Hitchhiker Collector’s Edition. It has freaky children’s drawings of dead people all of the place as well as other spooky stuff, especially the music. If you like spooky hidden object games this one is recommended.
On To The Real Reason for This Post
Chapter 4 has just been posted for Spark of Vengeance. The mystery over the strange fire looms over the heads of the Keepers as the townsfolk point fingers. Next week will be a new chapter for A Tail to Remember.
In Case You Missed the Previous Announcements…
Frozen Reflection, the first novel of my Young Adult Fantasy series The Crystal Garden Saga has been published on Smashwords (available on different formats), Kindle, and Lulu. It’s unfortunately still pending for the Nook and iBookstore (there was a problem with the formatting which has been fixed.) Frozen Reflection is a story of a teenaged girl who on her sixteenth birthday discovers that there may be more to dreams and reality than she first though. It’s my first full novel that was originally used for NaNoWriMo last year. Unfortunately I hit a wall and was not able to pick the story back up until over a month later. Interestingly, the story wouldn’t have worked even if I had finished on time; it ended short of 50,000 words, the minimum requirement for NaNoWriMo. Now that’s it done however I will be working to have print copies available for Ancient City Con in July. I have also started on book two which I hope to have finished before the end of the year. I’ll share more on this in the future. This by the way is not a April Fool’s Day Prank.
Happy rest of the weekend!
Coffee Is An Author’s Best Friend
I have been in dire need of caffeine this morning! For those of you who haven’t read any of my posts since before midnight eastern time last night, I have epublished my Young Adult Novel, Frozen Reflection through Lulu and Kindle. It ‘s also currently pending for the Nook and iBookstore. I will post another update once it’s been accepted through them. I am so excited to finally have the first book of my YA fantasy series available for readers. This excitement unfortunately led to a partially sleepless night due to an adrenaline rush. Coffee has been a blessing this morning, even though it’s no Coffee Roasters of Florida coffee, the most awesome coffee ever!
Below is what the cover looks like made by the talented artist, Steven Young.
In Other Story News
Chapter 11 of A Tail to Remember has been posted so be sure to check out Tucker’s encounter with his evil ex Kayla. Next week will be a new chapter to Spark of Vengeance.
My YA Novel Frozen Reflections has ePublished!
As of right now the first book of The Crystal Garden Saga has been published through Lulu.com. It is also currently pending distribution through iBookstore and the Nook .It’s going for $4.99 since it’s a full novel. I’m currently working on getting it set up through Amazon for the Kindle as well. I am so excited! I absolutely love this story! If you decide to check it out, please let me know what you think. I’d love to hear some feedback. Thank you everyone who has believed in my ability to write. This is just a part of my dream come true. As a reminder, I’ll be having the story published in paperback for Ancient City Convention in July. I’ll provide more details on that later in possibly May.
Brief Update
Hope everyone is having a good weekend. LJ has posted chapter 3 to Spark of Vengeance. There will also be another quick update once her e-book, Frozen Reflection has been published so keep an eye out.
Be sure to visit us again next week for even more new chapters!
Short But Sweet
Happy Belated Saint Patrick’s Day! Today marks the first day of my new update schedule. Chapter 3 for Spark of Vengeance has been posted. Next week’s update will be A Tail to Remember.
Also sometime next week I will be e-publishing my Young Adult novel, Frozen Reflection. Keep an eye out for an announcement between now and next weekend!
The Shifting of the Lines: Paypal’s Revised Stance on Censorship
Today, the troublesome Censorship Wars have come to a partial end. Paypal has clarified that their ban is focused only on images pertaining rape, bestiality, and incest not ebooks limited to just text. This is what they state in their blog (you can read the full article HERE):
First and foremost, we are going to focus this policy only on e-books that contain potentially illegal images, not e-books that are limited to just text. The policy will prohibit use of PayPal for the sale of e-books that contain child pornography, or e-books with text and obscene images of rape, bestiality or incest (as defined by the U.S. legal standard for obscenity: material that appeals to the prurient interest, depicts sexual conduct in a patently offensive way, and lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value).
In addition, the policy will be focused on individual books, not on entire “classes” of books. Instead of demanding that e-book publishers remove all books in a category, we will provide notice to the seller of the specific e-books, if any, that we believe violate our policy. We are working with e-book publishers on a process that will provide any affected site operator or author the opportunity to respond to and challenge a notice that an e-book violates the policy.
To be clear, we have not shut down the PayPal account of any of the e-book publishers involved in this matter. PayPal is committed to working with publishers on a mutually acceptable process to address potentially offending books on their sites so that material with images that violate this policy cannot be purchased using our service.
What this means is as long as the ebooks contain no graphics depicting rape, bestiality, and incest that it is exempt from PayPal’s censorship policy. While this may not satisfy all writers and readers, it is at least a start. For those of us at Trinity Gateways who only focus on the written word, this is wonderful news. Now we will be able to share the stories in the form that is true to us with all our readers. To leave out such details as was mentioned in our March 3rd post, The Censorship Bomb, would have destroyed the stories completely. Those of us whose stories contained any of the three situations would have had to make a very difficult decision; either edit/rewrite the story, find someplace else to publish it, or shelf it forever. That choice thankfully, won’t have to be made. Now we can move forward without fear of being banned and our stories can be read in the way they were intended. Thank you everyone who took a stand.
To a degree we have won a single battle, but the war still continues. For other people who produce art, comics, and games they still have a fight to engage in. Until the war is completely over, we will continue to lend our support. After all, the arts no matter what form, should stick together.
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