Throwback Thursday Teaser 5

The re-release of Crow's Rest is coming from Crow & Pitcher Press on May 22, 2018! As a way to pay tribute to its previous life as my debut novel, I'm sharing teasers and material from those early blog tours for the next several weeks.

Then, as the release day approaches, I'll switch gears and drive us right into the new release with all new teasers. So remember to check back here on the blog on Thursdays!

Throwback Thursday Teaser 4

The re-release of Crow's Rest is coming from Crow & Pitcher Press on May 22, 2018! As a way to pay tribute to its previous life as my debut novel, I'm sharing teasers and material from those early blog tours for the next several weeks.

Then, as the release day approaches, I'll switch gears and drive us right into the new release with all new teasers. So remember to check back here on the blog on Thursdays!

Throwback Thursday Teaser 3

The re-release of Crow's Rest is coming from Crow & Pitcher Press on May 22, 2018! As a way to pay tribute to its previous life as my debut novel, I'm sharing teasers and material from those early blog tours for the next several weeks.

Then, as the release day approaches, I'll switch gears and drive us right into the new release with all new teasers. So remember to check back here on the blog on Thursdays!

Throwback Thursday Teaser 2

The re-release of Crow's Rest is coming from Crow & Pitcher Press on May 22, 2018! As a way to pay tribute to its previous life as my debut novel, I'm sharing teasers and material from those early blog tours for the next several weeks.

Then, as the release day approaches, I'll switch gears and drive us right into the new release with all new teasers. So remember to check back here on the blog on Thursdays!

Throwback Thursday Teaser 1

The re-release of Crow's Rest is coming from Crow & Pitcher Press on May 22, 2018! As a way to pay tribute to its previous life as my debut novel, I'm sharing teasers and material from those early blog tours for the next several weeks.

Then, as the release day approaches, I'll switch gears and drive us right into the new release with all new teasers. So remember to check back here on the blog on Thursdays!

The Crow's Rest Blog Hop Kicks Off Today!

To celebrate the release of Crow's Rest on May 12, there's a bloghop kicking off today! You can read an excerpt featuring Avery's spooky encounters at Warren Castle, and we've encouraged the participants to share their own ghostly (or other strange) encounters, too.

And, there's a Rafflecopter to enter! You could win a signed copy of Crow's Rest, signed bookmarks, and/or swag. Go to a participating blog to enter. And don't forget you can still enter the Goodreads Giveaway until May 24!

Here's where you can find the bloghop stops:

Monday, May 11

Katrina at Bookish Things & More
S.M. Johnston and E.L. Wicker on Down Under Wonderings
Cassandra Sparks will be sharing on Facebook and other social media sites
Robyn Chause on A Ponderance of Things

Tuesday, May 12

I'll be posting on Operation Awesome
Laurie Dennison will share on her website
Alia on One Way or An Author

Wednesday, May 13

 Karen McCoy at The Writer Librarian
Zili at Zili in the Sky
Sneha at Devouring Books

Thursday, May 14

Raychelle Steele at Steele Reviews


There will also be some folks joining in on Twitter and other social media, so look for the #CrowsRest hashtag to find those. Make sure to check in with each stop and see what sinister stories they have to share!

Plus, if you would like to participate, you still can--just leave your own story in the comments on any stop, or go to the Crow's Rest Facebook page and look for the post where you can comment. Thanks so much for the support, everybody!

Corbin Teaser Tuesday

For this week's teaser, enjoy this portrait of a corbin--but beware that violet eye turned your way! Click to see it bigger

The release is only two months away! I'm just adding the book launch to my Events page, so make sure you go see where you can find me and Crow's Rest on the road!

Smexy Teaser Tuesday

Another teaser from Crow's Rest for your enjoyment today! Click on it to see it bigger

You can find all the add and buy (pre-order) buttons here

A Sneak Peek at Crow's Rest for Teaser Tuesday!

I've created a handful of teaser images for Crow's Rest, and will be posting them every other week through to the book launch! Here's the first one (click to see it bigger):

I can't believe that Crow's Rest comes out in three months! Things are about to get even crazier around here as I celebrate, and try to finish the sequel. I think I'll need to go sit out under that tree occasionally and take a break!

Road Trip Wednesday

I've been parked on the side of the Road Trip Wednesday for awhile, but today's topic caught my eye and I'm in! Road Trip Wednesday is a "Blog Carnival," where YA Highway's contributors and followers post a weekly writing- or reading-related question and answer it on their blogs. You can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.



This week's topic: Share a line from your WIP.

I'm working on the sequel to Crow's Rest (which comes out in 9 months!!) and my favorite line from No Man's Land (at least so far) is too spoilery, so here's my first paragraph instead:



If I’d known this was going to be an intervention, I would have dressed better. Not that a polo shirt and khakis would have lessened the sting of my mom sticking a “Hello, I’m Promiscuous” label on me or anything, but my micro-miniskirt wasn’t helping my defense.


Avery's voice is so much fun to write--she comes up with some truly hilarious takes on things. :)

 

Feel free to put a link to your post in the comments if you played along with Road Trip Wednesday. Don't forget to go to the YA Highway post and read all the answers!

Voices and Truths

After an unexpectedly-long hiatus while I dealt with some family issues, I'm finally tackling the revisions on Spirits from the Vasty Deep! Taking it in a completely different direction; I originally thought it would require a rewrite of about 2/3 of the book, but I now think there will be very few recognizable sections from the earlier versions.

But one part that's coming back is the New Adult slant; Olivia was originally 19 years old, but was changed to a younger age to better fit the Young Adult mould on the advice of several agents. At the time, there wasn't really a New Adult market, but Olivia's happy to step back into her slightly more grownup shoes.

So today was spent nailing down some of the worldbuilding and voice, and I kind of like what I came up with this morning. It's sort of Olivia's own take on her gift/curse:



No matter how sincerely I try to tell a person that it is impossible for me to lie, it only serves to arouse their suspicions that I am a liar.

Unfortunately, also claiming I can communicate with the spirits only heightens these suspicions.

But however incredible they may sound, both statements are indeed true—two sides of the same coin in a deal brokered with Death. As my long-ago ancestor found, no dealings with Death are ever straightforward, and this talent of speaking for the dead comes with a price.

To prevent our own human nature corrupting Death’s gift by falsely delivering a message from the spirits, a Caller must always tell the truth. No matter if their own life hangs in the balance, a falsehood cannot pass lips that speak the secrets of the spiritworld.

It was my father’s good fortune to be blessed with a Caller child whose talents are even stronger than her late mother’s, but not to have to labor under the yoke of perpetual truthfulness himself. For him, it opened up a world of deceptions and trickery, cheats and rascalry. For me, it was a life of shame and regrets, late-night departures from the windows of unpaid hotel rooms under cover of the angry mutterings of the townspeople.

Only escaping from my father's reach entirely could save me. But how can I escape my father, when even death doesn't truly part us? 

Special Valentine's Day Teaser Tuesday from Crow's Rest

Haven't done a Teaser Tuesday in a long time, but in the spirit of Valentine's Day I thought I'd share a first kiss. Not mine--this is from my WIP, Crow's Rest. Avery's recollection of her first kiss with Daniel:

Memory dropped me into that afternoon last summer, when we hid from a freak thunderstorm in the barn behind his place. We'd kneeled on the hay bales, each pressing an eye to the cracks in the weathered boards to watch the roiling clouds and flashes of lightning. We "oohed" and "aahed" like little kids at a fireworks show.

Until I noticed that I was the only one saying anything, and turned to find Daniel watching me instead of the storm. I could almost see the steam rise off his damp clothes, but he looked away once I was staring back at him. Like he wasn't sure if kissing me, as he so obviously wanted to do, was such a good idea.

Not a good idea? It was about friggin' time. I'd had a crush on him since he moved next door to Uncle Tam's seven years ago. We only saw each other during the summers and holidays, but I'd always felt like we could make it as a couple. And maybe he'd finally come around to my way of thinking.

"Well?" I asked, with one eyebrow cocked. But, for once, he stayed tongue-tied.

So I crawled over to his hay bale, and he looked truly terrified as I closed the gap between us. I laughed—a low, husky sound that I'd never made before—and leaned in.

Once our lips touched, Daniel's doubts seemed to disappear. He grabbed onto me like a drowning man, and we toppled from the bale.

"Hey!" I said, as my elbow and tailbone hit hard on the floorboards.

"Sorry," he mumbled, untangling our limbs.

"I didn't say you had to stop," I said, pulling him back in. "Just trying to avoid having my ass in a sling."

"My dad will have my ass in a sling if he catches us—" he'd started to reply, but I cut him off with a deep kiss, using plenty of tongue.

After that, our lips were too busy for talking. And were pretty much inseparable over the next few days before I headed home.


Happy Valentine's Day, and maybe you'd like to share your first kiss in the comments? Mine was a boy who said he'd give me his pocketknife if I kissed him, and I really wanted a pocketknife at 7 years old so I did. I remember feeling less warmth in that kiss than I did when kissing the back of my hand. Not a stellar beginning to my romantic life.

P.S. Not sure I want to fess up to that artwork, but it took me a whole minute so I guess I should say it's mine!
P.P.S. I posted this as part of the effort to revive Teaser Tuesdays on Absolute Write, but it happened to fit YA Highway's Valentine's Day Blog Lovefest, so I hopped aboard the love train!

Happy Halloween!

To celebrate Halloween, I thought I'd post a tiny teaser from Spirits from the Vasty Deep:


As I was drifting to sleep finally, I felt someone sit on the edge of my bunk and heard a woman softly singing in Spanish. "Mamá?" I called sleepily and reached out. But the hand that clasped mine was cold and dripping, and my nostrils filled with the scent of sodden wool and brackish water. I came awake and scrabbled against the wall, my heart pounding.

The dim light from the corridor showed me I was alone in my bunk. A strange sensation crawled across my skin, over the entire length of my body. As if many spirits were trying not just to talk to me, but to grab hold of me as well. Never had the veil between the worlds felt so thin, not since the haunted room back in the boarding school.

That's when Ruby started screaming, in a long drawn-out wail of horror.


Hope you enjoyed it! Any plans to celebrate Halloween? We don't even get kids coming to our house any more, since it's on a dark country road.

RTW--Senses Working Overtime

Road Trip Wednesday is a "Blog Carnival," where YA Highway's contributors and followers post a weekly writing- or reading-related question and answer it on their blogs. You can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

This week's topic: The Five Senses. How you use them in your writing, how you are inspired by them, pictorial essays, that character with smelly socks, books that have used them well, the ones that are currently missing from your work, etc.

Since I pay a lot of attention to details around me in real life, I think I do a pretty thorough job of covering all the senses in my writing. Sometimes, too thorough--I had a crit partner complain about all the bad smells in my historical novel: vomit, sewage, rotting food, animals, etc. His complaint only made me more proud of those sections--I'd actually grossed him out with writing on a page!

But not all of the sensory descriptions are gross-out. I have some tender touches, gorgeous scenery, whispering ghosts, comforting smells like the love interest's balsam shave soap, and my favorite, FOOD.



In this last dive into revisions, I noticed how much I talk about food in Spirits from the Vasty Deep. How could I not, when she goes to such exotic climes as Spain, Jamaica, and Antigua? The MC, Olivia, is lucky enough to board with a fantastic cook and here's a little teaser section of when Olivia first arrives at her home (this one doesn't go into the taste and smell as much as other sections, but be glad because she's been seasick and vomiting):


The grand name of dining hall led me to picture a richly formal room, but it was quite the opposite. A large sturdy table, like you might find in a farm kitchen, dominated the room, groaning under the food laid out. Pottery dishes held the local fare of baked yams, fresh mangoes and melon, scones and clotted cream. Hard-cooked eggs, a cold chicken and loaves of dark, soft bread rounded out the meal.

"Are we waiting on others to join us?" I asked as Duncan held the chair out for his mother.

Before Mrs. MacInnes could answer, Duncan laughed out loud.

"I warned you she would put out a spread at tea to welcome me home. She believes I eat nothing but moldy salt pork and hardtack when I am at sea," he said in a stage whisper as he held my chair for me.

"Well, you are always thinner when you come back," she said.

"Only because sailing is hard work—not because I starve. I'm all muscle."

To demonstrate, instead of sliding Sonia's chair in he picked it up with her in it and placed her closer to the table. She squealed and said, "Otra vez." Instead of fulfilling her request of "again", he patted Sonia's shoulder and took his place beside his mother. As Duncan filled his plate, he did nothing to disprove his mother's notion of starvation. He took servings of everything, eating with impeccable manners—but much gusto. I confined Sonia and myself to the eggs, melon and bread.

"Aren't you hungry?" Mrs. MacInnes asked.

"I'm sorry we can't do justice to your offering, but Sonia and I suffered from the ‘mal de mer’ on the entire trip from Jamaica to Antigua."

"Then you are wise to stick to bland foods," Mrs. MacInnes said. "Are there any interesting new delicacies from the States you can share with me when you're recovered? I hear brown bear is popular in California."

I gaped at her, spoon raised halfway to my mouth. I had never even seen a real bear, except the stuffed one standing in the corner of my father’s study, let alone tasted one.

"Mother, surely you don't expect us to have a bear haunch in our baggage?" Duncan said.

"Of course not, young man, I merely thought she might have some good receipts to share." Well used to his teasing, Mrs. MacInnes did not take the bait. Perhaps she could teach me how to do that—he always seemed to be able to get the best of me with his banter.


Hope you enjoyed my tease! And no, that's not a typo above--they used "receipts" rather than "recipes" in this time period.

What about you--do you find yourself using one sense more heavily than others in your writing?

P.S. Don't forget, I'll be out of touch electronically for a bit. I've set up auto posts for the next two Mondays (including a recipe on the 15th--more food!)

RTW: Favorite Line

Road Trip Wednesday is a "Blog Carnival," where YA Highway's contributors and followers post a weekly writing- or reading-related question and answer it on thier blogs. You can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

This week's topic: What is your favorite line from your WIP (or from a book you read recently)?

From Spirits from the Vasty Deep, my YA paranormal/historical, it's still this one from Captain Lee:

"You're mightily well-preserved for a woman old enough to be Miss Herald's mother. Skin like a seagull's breast, you have."

For some context, I did tease from this section a long time ago, and it's still up on the blog.

For a great line I've read recently, I've been catching up on the Bloody Jack books, and there are so many great lines that I can't choose just one!