Reborn Blog Tour: Three Ways to Write Better

 

Three Ways to Write Better

1. Read. Yes, it's that simple. Read and read a lot. Stephen King said the tools of a writer involve reading and writing.
2. Write. Writing helps you grow as a writer. I suggest free writing and writing shorter works, such as flash fiction to help you practice writing. They're a great way to learn how to be concise in your words.
3. Learn grammar. I'm not saying you have to know the obscure uses for a comma, but you should know what a subject and verb are. Pick up a simple book on grammar and read it. Knowing the basics will help you write better and spot issues with your writing. After all, editors and proofreaders miss things too, and in the end, the quality of the work you put out is all on you, the author.

To save a kingdom, a prophetess must challenge Fate.

On the day of Yssa’s death and rebirth, the god Apenth chose her as the Phoenix Prophetess.

Sea serpents and gods endanger the young prophetess’s journey and sour the omens. Yssa is cursed instead of blessed, and her duties at the Temple of Apenth prove it. She spends her days reading dusty scrolls, which does nothing to help her forget Tym, the boy back home. But the annoying yet gorgeous ferryman’s son Liam proves to be a distraction she can’t predict, even though he rarely leaves her alone for two sand grains.

Her boring temple life screeches to a halt when visions of her parents’ murders consume her. Yssa races across an ocean to stop the future. If she can’t change Fate, she’ll refuse to be the Phoenix Prophetess any longer. Fate, however, has other plans for her and the kingdom.

Yssa must either accept her destiny or fight to change Fate.

Available in Ebook and Print!

To purchase: Amazon | Createspace | Google Play | iTunes | Kobo | Nook | OmniLit | Smashwords | Other Retailers

Click here to add on Goodreads.

The authors of Untethered Realms and I are giving away over $50 worth of books to one lucky winner. The giveaway is open internationally.

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A self-proclaimed bookworm, Cherie Reich is a speculative fiction writer and library assistant living in Virginia. Her short stories have appeared in magazines and anthologies, and her books include the horror collection Nightmare, a space fantasy novella collection titled Gravity, and the fantasy series The Foxwick Chronicles and The Fate Challenges. Reborn is her debut novel. She is Vice President of Valley Writers and a member of the Virginia Writers Club and Untethered Realms. For more information, please visit her website.

Summer Road Trip #Audiobook #Giveaway

In celebration of summer, M. Pax is giving away three sets of audiobooks. Each set includes: The Backworlds, Stopover at the Backwords' Edge, and The Renaissance of Hetty Locklear.

Make the road, make your travel, fun and entertaining. Contest runs through June 16th. Sign up below.

Books: A Uniquely Portable Magic

In just six words Stephen King has managed to capture exactly what a book is, which is why it's my favourite King quote. When we open a book to read, we're transported to another world. We're given a portal into someone else's life, realm, or world. Even if the book you read is non-fiction, you're still being given a glimpse of a life you don't intimately know.

A book is also something you can take almost anywhere. It's light and easy to transport. With the arrival of eBook readers, it's now possible to take dozens of books with you on a device that weighs less than a paperback novel.

Think about that for a moment. A few years ago your reading choices were constrained by what was available in your local book stores or online book sellers. You also had to consider where to put each new book you purchased. If I had kept every book I bought and read, there would be no room for anything else. Now I can still buy printed books from my favourite authors and have hundreds on my eBook reader. Our reading choices have and will continue to grow. Whatever the technological age brings next, I believe there will always be room for such a uniquely portable form of magic.

What do you think? What is your favourite King quote?

Ocean of Dust now on Audiobook

Ocean of Dust, by Graeme Ing is a YA Fantasy, previously published in paperback and ebook. But now, audiobook fans, you too can experience Lissa's adventure. The narration by Becky Doughty of Bravehearts Audiobooks superbly brings every character to life.

Fourteen-year old Lissa is snatched from her home and finds herself a slave on a trading ship traveling on a waterless ocean of nothing but gray dust. A feisty, curious and intelligent girl, her desire to explore the ship earns her the hatred of the cruel first officer, Farq.

Fascinated by the ocean of dust, Lissa becomes embroiled in its mysteries, sensing things that the crew cannot, while cryptic whispers in her head are leading her toward a destiny linked to the dust itself. Only one man aboard can help her make sense of her new talent, but can she trust him?

All is not as it seems, and she must unravel the clues before it’s too late. When a sinister plot casts her adrift on the barren ocean, her best friend is left in the hands of the treacherous crew. Everything hinges upon her courage, quick wits, and her ability to master her new talent.

Available from Audible, Amazon and soon, iTunes.

What inspires a person to write? Second passions & vision

I recently took pictures of my Catskills painting studio, where I often go to write. Since many of us have a second passion that helps fuel our writing, I thought I'd give you a glimpse into my second love--painting. Which, by the way, I haven't done since I decided to write full time. I knew that I needed to focus on one thing--the writing--to see it through to completion. And I'd already had an active painting career. A pictorial tour:

My writing table, with my paintings around it

My bird liquor bottle collection

My painting table

My painting of Castro & Khrushchev, from an actual event,
where they stayed at a hotel in Harlem and roasted a chicken
in their room during a UN conference!

One of my painted dreamscapes

Desk wall with my small grasshopper painting-the mom is
feeding the baby grasshoppers coke syrup. My son drew
the graffiti BARN sign for me

My pig signage collection, with a pirate cup
and a skeleton on a motorcycle

paint table with my Tesla painting (incomplete)

My latest novella, Model Position, makes use of my years as an artist. It's all about Sienna, an MFA painting student who's finding her way in the big, bad world. The dreamscape painting above is the kind of vision that relates to my passion for speculative fiction. Worlds not quite in ours, but in our alternate realities, in our hearts. The background for the Nikola Tesla work also has that quality.
Painting and writing are so intertwined, at least for me. My Reds creatures in Ruby's Fire and all of the weird hybrid plants came from the same place in me as my dreamscapes.

What about you? What's your special writing place like? Your secret virtual studio? Your second passion that fires up your first?