Gareth S. Young - - 1000 Trillion Suns

Hello everyone! Regina West here. How are you all doing? Today, I’ve donned my leather boots and my favorite corset and whipped the Spartan into submission so that I could take over his blog! He's currently whimpering in the corner. (There, there, Gareth. Yes, you may kiss my boot. Such a good little Spartan.) Kidding, kidding. Mostly. I met Gareth on Twitter where our first conversation was about music and playing guitar. I made the mistake of bragging that I knew how to play a Scottish folk song, and he promptly challenged me to record myself playing it. Although my strumming fingers went numb at the mere mention, I, nevertheless, recorded the song (about 50 times until I got it right) and sent it along with apologies for my clumsy playing. True to form, Gareth was gracious and supportive and forcibly overlooked all my missed notes, a kindness I very much appreciated. Since then, we’ve talked about everything from writing (obviously) to olives (he hates them; I lov...

Where there are Jedi, there are Sith; for every Gryffindor, a Slytherin and in a world where there is chocolate there are also creepy, multi-legged, speedy, crawly things, which run up pant legs and bite you on your ghoulies. (special thanks to ten year old me for the word ghoulies). And, for the purposes of this blogpost, where there is a writer, there must also be an EVIL TWIN! ...MWAHAHAHA... *cough* Okay, maybe not EVIL per se, but, writers do talk to themselves a lot. (Some of them are only capable of holding conversations with their characters!) So, with another book to be released in a matter of moments...and likely wrapping up another by the end of this interview...I welcome back to my corner of space - CAREY HEYWOOD - the wonderfully sweet, and sweet-toothed author of STAGES OF GRACE. Gorgeous cover!! Only this time she's not getting the questions... ...this time I'm going to talk to her EVIL TWIN and ask all the weird crap I deleted from the last interview...

Editing.  Wait! Don't run away, I've brought some help today so, there's nothing to be scared of. Writers discover quickly that writing is basically made up like this: Planning, scheming, ruminating, procrastinating - 10% Actual writing of story - 10% Editing, rewriting, editing again and again and again - 2356% Ok. Maybe my math isn't very good but, the point is, writers spend more time rewriting than writing. Editing is a huge component of the process and it's a horrible drain on your time and your will to live. Luckily, there are peculiar people out there who actually enjoy the process. They live in caves and forests and can be lured from their hiding places with the promise of a good story. These people are called EDITORS. I've been fortunate enough to lure an EDITOR onto my blog. Her name is Danielle Fine, and she might be able to help you produce the story you've always wanted to tell... Danielle Fine Q - Congratulations on your ...

With somewhere just over 4500 followers on Twitter, it starts to get really difficult keeping up with EVERYONE. The trick is to create LISTS, and that way you can break down your followers into easier to manage chunks and keep up with how they're doing with the writing. Laura Diamond is an example of someone I followed for a while but didn't keep up with very well until I got her on a Twitter List. And I'm glad I did. Smart and funny, it turned out that not only was she a published author but also a psychiatrist! I thought it only fair to invite her over to the blog, have her sit in the comfy chair and ask HER a bunch of questions! Here's what the analysis uncovered... Laura Diamond Q - Hi Laura, tell me a little about your new story Tsavo Pride. TSAVO PRIDE is a short story about the famed man-eating lions of Tsavo. In my story, the lions are rogue shape-shifters fighting to stop the British invaders from stealing their territory and ruining their way of ...