HERE BE NEWS for Monday May 16, 2022

 

                            

Monday May 16, 2022 

Welcome to HERE BE NEWS, where each monday we bring you all the latest from the fantasy romance authors at Here Be Magic:

Thursday May 12, 2022: Deborah Bailey discusses Creating New Worlds For Your Stories.

           

Find your new favorite story. Limited time only https://books.bookfunnel.com/romanceinku/nxqwqe4fca

ZONATON
Sci-Fi Romance
by Linda Mooney
Word Count: 54.9K
Narrated by Audrey Lusk
Length: 6 hrs, 1 min
Hear a Sample
$3.99 e / $9.99 p / $19.95 a

She was the child of his heart. Then she grew up to become the love of his life.

A hundred years ago, the last people of Earth landed on planet AR617b. It was their only hope after being forced to flee the dead planet that was once their ancestral home. 

The native inhabitants of AR617b, known as gerons, are sentient creatures that resemble a cross between dragons and griffins of old Earth lore. When they initially tried to destroy the settlers, a deal was made to ensure both species' survival. It was decided that each year, every five-year-old human child must take The Walk across a hundred meter field. If they don't stop or run, they will arrive safely on the other side, and be allowed to grow up and have families of their own. But if they break the rule, the gerons will kill them. Unless, by a strange quirk of fate, a geron decides to Pair with the child, taking and raising the human as its own.

Emmala took The Walk, and found herself adopted by one of the older gerons, an immense silvery-white creature named Zonaton. For the next fifteen years, he cared for her, protected her, and loved her. But now Emmala's real family wants her back, and they will do everything they can to have her returned, even if it means killing Zonaton, and starting an all-out war with the gerons.

 

What neither the settlers nor gerons realize is that there is another alien species watching and waiting for the two combatants to go into battle. Because when they do, that will be the aliens’ cue to destroy everyone and claim AR617b for their own.

Warning! Contains green fire, arrogant assholes, plunderberries, child abuse, rectangular spaceships, shadows on the wall, and a love so great, it defies death. 

Excerpt and Buy Links

Bring It Back(List) - ZONATON, a Sci-Fi Romance by Linda Mooney

ZONATON
Sci-Fi Romance
by Linda Mooney
Word Count: 54.9K
Narrated by Audrey Lusk
Length: 6 hrs, 1 min
Hear a Sample
$3.99 e / $9.99 p / $19.95 a

She was the child of his heart. Then she grew up to become the love of his life.

A hundred years ago, the last people of Earth landed on planet AR617b. It was their only hope after being forced to flee the dead planet that was once their ancestral home. 

The native inhabitants of AR617b, known as gerons, are sentient creatures that resemble a cross between dragons and griffins of old Earth lore. When they initially tried to destroy the settlers, a deal was made to ensure both species' survival. It was decided that each year, every five-year-old human child must take The Walk across a hundred meter field. If they don't stop or run, they will arrive safely on the other side, and be allowed to grow up and have families of their own. But if they break the rule, the gerons will kill them. Unless, by a strange quirk of fate, a geron decides to Pair with the child, taking and raising the human as its own.

Emmala took The Walk, and found herself adopted by one of the older gerons, an immense silvery-white creature named Zonaton. For the next fifteen years, he cared for her, protected her, and loved her. But now Emmala's real family wants her back, and they will do everything they can to have her returned, even if it means killing Zonaton, and starting an all-out war with the gerons.

 

What neither the settlers nor gerons realize is that there is another alien species watching and waiting for the two combatants to go into battle. Because when they do, that will be the aliens’ cue to destroy everyone and claim AR617b for their own.

Warning! Contains green fire, arrogant assholes, plunderberries, child abuse, rectangular spaceships, shadows on the wall, and a love so great, it defies death. 

Excerpt and Buy Links

Creating New Words for Your Stories

 

Usually, I create words for my fantasy and science fiction worlds, but it can be a challenge to come up with them. Often I research topics I'm basing stories on, and then that helps me to decide.

For instance, for my latest book, Blood Red Moon, one of the main characters is a Templar. One of the supporting characters is the Templar third in command, a woman I only identify as the Seneschal. That rank would've actually been the second-in-command. But I liked the sound of the word.

No, I didn't create that word. Instead, I used one that already existed and was a good fit for the story. If it's possible to use an existing word that works (and if you can use it in your work) there's nothing wrong with that.

Other words I used in the book were from languages, such as, Latin and Spanish. For instance, the phoenix character is associated with a vampire. She's referred to as a blood, or sanguis phoenix. Sanguis, being a Latin word for blood.  The phoenix associated with gold is referred to as an aurum phoenix (aurum is Latin for gold).

In my novella, Heart of Stone, I only ended up creating one word, "Malida." The reason I created it was because I wanted to use it during a conversation between the hero and heroine. Willem, the hero, uses that word to refer to the heroine's grandmother. The grandmother is a former queen of the province where the story is set. In the aftermath of a war, the heroine, Leesa, and her grandmother are (as far as they know) the only remaining members of the royal family.

When Willem asks Leesa about her grandmother he calls her Malida, a term of endearment meaning "great mother." For Willem to know that name, he would have to have known more about the family than he's admitting.

Sometimes words come to me easily, other times I have to do a lot of brainstorming. It all depends on how the word feels to me and whether I think it's a fit. It can be a challenge to find (or create) the perfect word or phrase, but when you hit on just the right one, it adds another layer to the story world.

 

HERE BE NEWS for Monday May 9, 2022

 

                            

Monday May 9, 2022 

Welcome to HERE BE NEWS, where each Monday we bring you all the latest from the fantasy romance authors at Here Be Magic:

Thursday May 5, 2022:  Nicole Luiken shares a little of her writing process in Beginnings. 

                       

New!

BREACHERS: Kamrose and Cross
Book 4
Contemporary Fantasy/ Paranormal Romance

By Linda Mooney
Word Count: 29.1K
$2.99 e / $9.99 p

For a limited time, you can get the ebook for $1.99 by using discount code SWORD.

This offer good only when purchased from my Gumroad site.

They are the cause of many legends, myths, and fairy tales. And they still live among us.

Human bones are showing up in various concrete structures, all stemming from a site that has been shut down for years. Where exactly are they coming from?

Olmsly Morrow thinks it’s more than just foul play by humans, so he calls on Trenna Cross and Reece Kamrose, although Reece has no idea why he’s been tapped for a super-secret government job. He’s just a farmer. Right, and Trenna is just an actress as well.

In truth, Trenna is also a coh, having trained all her life to fight Breachers. But Reece is not; he has no “abilities.” So why was he called and partnered up with Trenna? Whatever the reason, they’re committed to solving the murders of the gang members, and ridding San Antonio of its otherworldly infestation.

Through it all, Trenna and Reece know there’s an undeniable connection, and how nice would it be to be with someone who truly knows who and what she is? But a relationship could never last between the two, right? They’re too far away, too different from each other…or are they?

Warning! Contains chainmail, a Celtic cross, a choice between barbeque or Mexican food, a haunted cement factory, and two people who discover by accident that they were meant to be together.

Excerpt and By Links: https://lindamooney.com/Breachers.htm 

Beginnings

 My current work-in-progress is a novella called Unscripted based on a short story I wrote some twenty years ago called Without a Cue. 

It has a cute, somewhat quirky premise: everybody in this fictional world is delivered a script each day that they then have to follow. Only, of course, something goes wrong and the main character has to go off script to their great dismay.

I'm just starting the third draft, which is when I focus in on the nitty-gritty sentence level and analyze each scene. The beginning scene is the most important one in any story as it has to introduce the character and world as well as hooking the reader. I  thought it might be interesting to show a little bit of my process so here's an annotated excerpt from the first page.

EXCERPT

Chapter One

Something about the bus driver snagged Chris’s attention as he boarded the city bus on Monday morning. It took his sleep-deprived brain a moment to realize what the oddity was: she lacked the silver R on her forehead that should have marked her as a Robot. 

[ANALYSIS: The first sentence is okay, but doesn't have as strong a hook as I  would like, only raising the minor question of What snagged his attention? It does a basic job to informing the reader who the main character is, what he's doing and when he's doing it. The second sentence is better, first raising the question of Why is Chris sleep-deprived? and then alerting the reader than this is a science fictional world in which Robots are regularly bus drivers as well as raising the question of why this bus driver isn't a Robot.]

The beige City Transit uniform and peaked cap identified her as the driver, but her hair burned a garish red and the curls brushed her shoulders. Robots had utilitarian, short haircuts. They kept silent and focused on their job, their stares vacant. This woman made eye contact and spoke to him.

“Good morning!”

She sounded so cheerful that Chris smiled back at her, though, of course, he didn’t reply.

[ANALYSIS: The second paragraph is mostly added detail, drawing a picture for the reader and explaining how the bus driver is different from a robot driver. The next two  sentences advance the plot slightly. I'm hoping the "of course he didn't reply" raises the question of why he didn't reply in the reader's mind. This is the first subtle hint to my big world-building hook that everyone is following a script. Not sure if it's too subtle, though.]

She winked. “I like you. Sit up front beside me.”

Chris blinked a little at the unexpected request, but his mind was too fuzzy to recognize the warning sign that something was wrong. Assuming that the driver must be part of a new Storyline that was starting, he collapsed onto the nearest blue vinyl seat, kitty-corner from the driver. His artist’s eye saw her as cartoon bird perched on her high seat.

[ANALYSIS: Nothing much has happened yet, but we get another big hint that something is wrong and Chris's commute to work is about to take an unexpected turn. The capitalization of Storyline is another hook to make the reader wonder about the world. Then I feed the reader a little more information about Chris: he is an artist. There's a fair amount of  information packed into the first six paragraphs, but it doesn't exactly start with a bang. Conclusion: it needs more work.]

And there you have it, a glimpse into a writer's mind during revision!

  

New! BREACHERS: Kamrose and Cross, Book 4, a Contemporary Fantasy/ Paranormal Romance By Linda Mooney

New!

BREACHERS: Kamrose and Cross
Book 4
Contemporary Fantasy/ Paranormal Romance

By Linda Mooney
Word Count: 29.1K
$2.99 e / $9.99 p

For a limited time, you can get the ebook for $1.99 by using discount code SWORD.

This offer good only when purchased from my Gumroad site.

They are the cause of many legends, myths, and fairy tales. And they still live among us.

Human bones are showing up in various concrete structures, all stemming from a site that has been shut down for years. Where exactly are they coming from?

Olmsly Morrow thinks it’s more than just foul play by humans, so he calls on Trenna Cross and Reece Kamrose, although Reece has no idea why he’s been tapped for a super-secret government job. He’s just a farmer. Right, and Trenna is just an actress as well.

In truth, Trenna is also a coh, having trained all her life to fight Breachers. But Reece is not; he has no “abilities.” So why was he called and partnered up with Trenna? Whatever the reason, they’re committed to solving the murders of the gang members, and ridding San Antonio of its otherworldly infestation.

Through it all, Trenna and Reece know there’s an undeniable connection, and how nice would it be to be with someone who truly knows who and what she is? But a relationship could never last between the two, right? They’re too far away, too different from each other…or are they?

Warning! Contains chainmail, a Celtic cross, a choice between barbeque or Mexican food, a haunted cement factory, and two people who discover by accident that they were meant to be together.

Excerpt and By Links: https://lindamooney.com/Breachers.htm 

HERE BE NEWS for Monday May 2, 2022

  

                            

Monday May 2, 2022 

Welcome to HERE BE NEWS, where each monday we bring you all the latest from the fantasy romance authors at Here Be Magic:

Tuesday April 26, 2022: Linda Mooney shares a vignette from Pink Moon.

BREACHERS: 

Holt and McKenna Book 1 

Linda Mooney

Contemporary Fantasy/ Paranormal Romance 

Word Count: 28.1K 

$2.99 e / $9.99 p / $6.95 a

Buy Links:  https://lindamooney.com/Breachers.htm

There are creatures from a parallel world called Breachers who, for hundreds of years, have been inadvertently pulled into our world. They are the truth behind the creatures normally considered to be mythic. Once on Earth, they cannot go back, and those who cannot cope become rabid. Murderers. And when they go berserk, they must be put down.

Jerrod Holt always wondered why he was selected to be part of the secret governmental organization. More perplexing is why his skills as a professional bodyguard are needed.

He discovers his partner assigned to help him bring down a Breacher is the one woman who had caught his eye the moment he saw her at their initial group meeting. Together, he and McKenna travel to Utah to confront a killer beast, not knowing that the terror will be all too real, and too damn close to home.

Warning: Contains smart ass remarks, unbearable cold, a nightmare come to life, toe loss, rabbit farming, a search for the truth, and an unconditional love that defies all boundaries.