ICARUS Release Today!

I'm excited to announce that today is the release day for ICARUS by J.S. Chancellor. To celebrate, the author and her publisher, Rhemelda, are hosting a "Twitterview" where anyone can hop into the action and ask questions. This event will rock the Twitter world for more than 10 hours as J. S. shares not only her love for this novel but also her passion for the writing craft. Anyone will be able to ask questions of J.S. Chancellor on Twitter using the hashtag #Icarus. Be sure to follow @Rhemalda and @Jschancellor on Twitter to be part of this awesome event.

About the Book:

ICARUS is a paranormal romance: a love triangle between vampires who need a substance called Icarus to process light. In this richly drawn world, Jessica Slate is kidnapped by vampires who claim that Trinity, her “bad boy” lover, is the Anti-Christ and they take away her source of Icarus. With the clock ticking, can she escape her kidnappers—or will she discover that she belongs with them and that they’re right about Trinity after all?

J.S. Chancellor is the popular author of the Guardians of Legend trilogy (Son of Ereubus, Blood of Adoria, and Eternal Requiem). ICARUS is the first book in The Kindred series. Matthew Robert Best called ICARUS, “… a refreshing take on an otherwise exhausted genre, leaving me more than a little pleasantly surprised …. Such a fun read, with much more substance than I’m accustomed to in paranormal fiction.”

About the Author:
J.S. Chancellor, whose personal motto is, “woe is the writer who mounts their merit on the masses,” started writing stories when she was still in grade school, and finished her first fantasy novella at the age of 14. She drafted chapter one of the Guardians of Legend trilogy when she was a freshman in high school, sitting on a stool in front of a piano bench, in her parents’ den. It wasn’t until she was 25 when a resident at the apartment complex where she worked lovingly made a casual remark about her procrastination that her passion for fantasy fiction took center stage. Since then she’s focused all of her efforts on writing, to include leaving her full time job in September 2009 and actively maintaining a blog dedicated to the art of crafting fiction. She currently resides in Georgia with her two beloved dogs.

Interview with Jessica Bell

It's my extreme pleasure to have Jessica Bell, author of the new novel String Bridge, to my blog today. First, a brief introduction:

Jessica Bell is a literary women's fiction author, poet and singer/songwriter who grew up in Melbourne, Australia, to two gothic rock musicians who had successful independent careers during the '80s and early '90s.

She spent much of her childhood traveling to and from Australia to Europe, experiencing two entirely different worlds, yet feeling equally at home in both environments. She currently lives in Athens, Greece and works as a freelance writer/editor for English Language Teaching publishers worldwide, such as HarperCollins, Pearson Education and Macmillan Education.

In addition to String Bridge, Jessica has published a book of poetry called Twisted Velvet Chains. A full list of poems and short stories published in various anthologies and literary magazines can be found under Published Works & Awards, on her website.

From September 2012 Jessica will be hosting the Homeric Writers' Retreat & Workshop on the Greek island of Ithaca, home of Odysseus.

So, without further ado, please welcome Jessica!

Rosie: First, congratulations on your novel coming out. I really enjoyed it.
Jessica: Thank you! I’m so glad.

Rosie: Can you tell us a little how this novel came to be? What was your inspiration in bringing this story to life?

Jessica: Even though music doesn’t define me as much as writing does, it is still a big part of my life. And the idea for the book came about when I was thinking about a time in my life when music was all I ever wanted to breathe. Even though my priorities had changed, I still wanted to write about the power music has over someone who is so passionate about it. But I think music could be replaced by any sort of passion in String Bridge, because basically the story is about needing something more than you need yourself.

Rosie: How long did it take you to write String Bridge? From inception to its current state?

Jessica: I spent about five years writing it because it went through about seven different revisions. Although it wasn’t the first thing I’d ever written. I was still learning along the way. And you know what? It still doesn’t feel finished to me. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night with ideas on how to improve it. That can be a bit annoying actually, because now it’s impossible. Ha!

Rosie: Like Melody, the novel’s MC, you yourself are an Australian ex-pat living in Greece. What brought you to Greece in the first place?

Jessica: My step father is Greek, so I’ve pretty much grown up with the best of both worlds (Australia and Greece). I’ve been coming here since I was two years old.

Rosie: Tessa, Melody’s daughter, is so well written. As you wrote this, you seemed to really understand and connect with the minds of young children. How much time do you spend with children under the age of five?

Jessica: I used to teach 6-7 year-old kids in an English school here in Athens, but overall my time spent with them was not more than 45 minutes at a time, a couple of nights per week, over the time frame of about a year.

I remember quite a lot about being that young, so I think my own experiences as a four-year-old, mixed in with a few instincts helped me to create Tessa. For those who don’t know, I don’t have kids, so I sometimes doubted whether Tessa was going to be a successful character. I’m so happy she is!

Rosie: Throughout the novel, Melody struggles to balance her love life, her parenting, her music, and her career. As a writer and a musician, you must also have similar struggles in your life. How do you find balance between all the different facets of your life?

Jessica: I don’t think I struggle too much in comparison to those that have families. Sometimes I complain that there isn’t time to do everything I want to do, but I think that’s because I want too much. So it’s not a matter of balance for me, it’s a matter of slowing down and giving myself some quiet time where I don’t have to do anything. I find I really need those moments to revive the stamina and keep up with my day job and my novels, poetry, and song writing, and of course, spending quality time with my partner.

Rosie: There are several songs written within the text of the novel. Do these songs appear on the album that you recorded to go with String Bridge? Are there other songs on the album? How long did it take you to write the songs to accompany this novel?

Jessica: Yes, the five songs that appear in the book are on the album, plus four extras that I wrote for it to become a full-length CD, rather than just an EP. It took me about a month to write them all. Mind you, I didn’t work on it every day and some songs took me days to perfect and others about ten minutes. It’s up and down like that with song writing.

(an interjection: You can access the soundtrack through iTunes, Amazon, or Amazon UK)

Rosie: Can you tell us a little about your experience working with Lucky Press? And how did you come to connect with them?

Jessica: This is a whole other blog post. Luckily, for those who are interested, I’ve already written one about it! Just go to: http://thealliterativeallomorph.blogspot.com/2010/11/why-i-believe-small-presses-are.html

Rosie: I saw on Facebook a few weeks ago that you’re considering forming a band. How would you describe the music that you play?

Jessica: Visceral atmospheric grunge I think is the best way I can put it.

Rosie: What kind of upcoming projects do you have planned? Either musical or literary?

Jessica: My second novel, Bitter Like Orange Peel, is about a twenty-five year old Australian archaeology undergraduate named Kit, who doesn’t like to get her hands dirty. She feels misplaced and comes to the conclusion that meeting her father, Roger, will make some sense of her life, despite him being worth the rotting orange rind in her backyard. Well, at least that’s what she’s been conditioned to think of him by the three women in her life: Ailish, her mother—an English literature professor who communicates in quotes and clichés, and who still hasn’t learned how to express emotion on her face; Ivy, her half-sister—a depressed professional archaeologist, with a slight case of nymphomania, who fled to America after a divorce to become a waitress; and Eleanor, Ivy’s mother—a pediatric surgeon who embellishes her feelings with medical jargon, and who named her daughter after intravenous. Against all three women’s wishes, Kit decides to find Roger, but in doing so, discovers he is not the only rotten fruit.

My third novel, Muted, is set in Arles, France, in a totalitarian society where it is illegal to wear clothes. In some streets, it's also illegal to sing without accompanying instruments. Concetta, a famous Italian a cappella singer from before “the change,” breaks these laws. As punishment, her vocal chords are brutally slashed and her eardrums surgically perforated. Unable to cope with living a life without song, she resolves to drown herself in the river, clothed in a dress stained with performance memories from her hometown, Milan. But Concetta's suicide attempt is cut short as someone grabs her by the throat and pulls her to the surface. Is it the busking harpist, who encouraged her to feel music through vibration, acting as saviour? Or a street warden on the prowl for another offender to detain? From this moment, the reader will discover how Concetta came to be in this position, and what will happen to her after the suicide attempt.

Muted will explore a variety of themes such as overcoming loss, coping with mental illness and disability, dealing with discrimination, loss of freedom, inhibited self-expression, motivation to succeed, escaping oppression, expression through art and music, self-sacrifice, channelling the thoughts of the deceased, and challenging moral views and values.

Hopefully I’ll create a soundtrack for this one too.

Rosie: And one random question: If you were a bumblebee, what kind of flower would you most like to hang out in and why?

Jessica: Um … I don’t like flowers much because I get really bad hay fever … Aaachooo!!! You know of any flowers with an air filter installed?

Thanks, Jessica!

If you're interested in Jessica's novel, be sure to stop by on Nov. 18 for my review of novel, String Bridge. Would you like a teaser? Check out her book trailer.

Interview with Michelle Davidson Argyle and MONARCH Giveaway!

I can't begin to tell you how excited I was when I signed up for my first ARC—a copy of Michelle Davidson Argyle's debut novel MONARCH. When it came in the mail, I was giddy with excitement. And, honestly, since then I've read the novel twice because I enjoyed it so much (come back next Wednesday for my full review). So, to be able to interview Michelle as well is a great, exciting honor for me.

Also, because this novel is so fabulously amazing, it HAS to be shared. Want to read it? Keep reading below for more information on how YOU could win a copy of MONARCH!

For those of you who don't know her, let's start with a brief introduction:

Photo and biography courtesy
of the author's website

Michelle graduated from Utah Valley University with a Bachelor's Degree in English/Creative Writing in 2002. Her short fiction has been published in the University of New Mexico's national literary journal, Scribendi, 2002, the Rose & Thorn Journal, 2010, Suspense Magazine, June 2011, and Stories for Sendai Anthology, 2011. She served as the editor-in-chief of Utah Valley University's literary magazine and has won awards for her short stories. She is also an editor/publisher of “The Literary Lab Presents…” series of anthologies.

Michelle is a mother, artist, and writer who lives in the Rocky Mountains with her sword-wielding husband and energetic daughter. She writes contemporary, literary, and fantasy fiction. Cinders and Monarch are two of her published novels. The Breakaway will be released in 2012 by Rhemalda Publishing, and Bonded (which includes Cinders) will be released in 2013 by Rhemalda Publishing, as well.

Michelle likes peanut butter and tomato sandwiches. And cheese. Lots and lots of good cheese.

(Can I just say, me too! You can never have enough cheese!)

So a warm welcome to Michelle. *applause*


Rosie: First, congratulations on the release of MONARCH. It's a wonderful novel.

MDA: Thank you! And thank you for interviewing me today.

Rosie: So much of MONARCH is influenced by monarch butterflies, and there's even information at the beginning of the book on how the reader can learn more about them. Is this a personal interest that you've had for awhile, or something that developed while writing the novel?

MDA: I’ve always loved butterflies, but the idea to include them as the main theme in a novel came about when I was reading Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. She has a section in there all about the monarch butterflies, and it’s absolutely brilliant and beautiful and it touched me in a way that really stuck. I got the idea to include monarchs in a novel, and of course I decided to include spies into the mix because I like to shake things up like that.

Rosie: One of the main characters, Nick, has worked as an undercover CIA agent in Brazil. How much research did you put into living the CIA undercover life?

MDA: I did quite a bit of research on the CIA, but there’s only so much you can find out about the CIA online! They’re kind of secretive about some things. So I turned to some biographies from former CIA officers. I loved one in particular – Blowing My Cover: My Life as a CIA Spy by Lindsay Moran because it was personal and entertaining, but full of some really great information.

Rosie: MONARCH is an edge-of-your-seat thriller, and I couldn't put it down. This doesn't happen to me very often. Unless it's a secret you'd rather not reveal, how long did it take you to write MONARCH, and how many rounds of revisions did you go through to get it to its current (amazing) state?

MDA: From conception to publication, Monarch took me seven years to complete. Actual writing time, however, is probably more like a year. I began the book in November of 2008 for National Novel Writing Month and submitted it to Rhemalda Publishing in October of 2010. That’s two years, but a good portion of that was also spent writing and self-publishing my novella, Cinders. Monarch  then went through edits with my publisher. I must say, however, that Monarch was a bit of a challenge for me. It was a complete disaster after I finished it in 2008. After a few revisions I chucked it all and rewrote the entire book from scratch. I’ve learned a lot from writing Monarch!

Rosie: One of the suggestions to writers seen around the internet these days is to write scenes that contain no more than 4 people. However, your climax scene not only has several important players, but it's also done so well that it doesn't feel crowded or confusing. Do you have any tips on writing group scenes?

MDA: As I always like to say, I don’t believe in rules like only including four people in a group scene (although I can understand that from a new writer’s perspective). Still, talk about limiting your storyline and storytelling skills. I tell the story how it needs to be told and the scene you are talking about in Monarch that meant including more than four people. It wouldn’t have worked otherwise because the entire point was to bring everyone together for that climax.

If I have any tips on group scenes I’d have to say plan everything out in every possible way you can imagine. For this group scene I drew out a picture of where everyone was, where they moved during the scene, and where they are at the end. I then had my husband help me figure out the fighting sequence (yes, I had to make it more complicated with fighting, hah!). I also told the scene from three different points of view over the course of several chapters, but that was what I had done for the entire book, so it worked.

These kinds of things in writing are completely dependent on the author’s skills, the point-of-view of the storytelling, the style of the novel, and other such factors. I don’t think there’s any magic formula for it except for practice and experience.

Rosie: What authors and/or books would you consider your strongest influences?

MDA: I adore The Awakening by Kate Chopin, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, and I also like Dostoevsky, Virginia Woolf, and Flannery O’Conner. Those are the classics I love that have influenced me. As far as contemporary, I’d say Marilynn Robinson, Tom Clancy and John Grisham. I’m kind of eclectic, can you tell? I’ve slowly been opening my door to more fantasy and I hope to add some of those to my favorites list.

Rosie: This is your first novel with Rhemelda Publishing. Can you talk a little bit about how you came to work with them?

MDA: I found Rhemalda Publishing when one of their authors, J.S. Chancellor, contacted me about reviewing my novella, Cinders, soon after it was released in 2010. She adored the book and when I looked up more about her I found her publisher and decided they might be a good fit for Monarch. After some intense revisions I submitted the book in October of 2010 and voila! Here I am. If only it was as quick and easy as I make it sound. *laughs*

Rosie: What upcoming projects do you have in the pipeline?

MDA: My young adult/new adult novel, The Breakaway, will be coming out next year (2012) from Rhemalda — hopefully late spring. It’s the story of a girl kidnapped by a family of jewel thieves. In 2013 my novella collection, Bonded, will be released by Rhemalda Publishing. This collection contains my novella, Cinders and two other fairy-tale inspired stories – Thirds and Scales. After that, I’m not sure. I currently have an idea for a young adult historical (possibly considered paranormal) novel set in Scotland. I don’t stick in one genre, can you tell? I hope that this project will release late 2013 or early 2014.

Rosie: And a random question to keep you on your toes: If the all the world were set up like Pangaea and all you could road trip anywhere, where would you go and why?

MDA: If all the world were set up like Pangaea I’d have to choose to visit anywhere by the coast! I dearly love the ocean.


Thank you so much to Michelle for letting me interview her. Once again, I'm very excited about MONARCH, and I want everyone to read it. Of course, giving away a copy to everyone would be an incredible (or incredibly expensive) feat. But, I can at least offer one copy for a lucky reader to win.

Want to win a copy of MONARCH for your very own? Leave a comment below. Want to be eligible for more entries? Tweet, Facebook, Google+, and LinkedIn links will all give you one extra entry toward winning. Just be sure to leave me links in the comments section, and feel free to tag me in any posts.

Entries close at 8PM EST (US) time on Tuesday, October 11. The winner will be announced here on October 12.

Good luck :)

Interview with Will Boast

I've recently had the pleasure of reading Power Ballads, a collection of short stories by Will Boast. I'm very excited to welcome Will to talk to us today about his new collection—now available—and life in general. Stop by on Friday for my review of the collection. But first, a brief introduction.

Photo courtesy of willboast.com

Will Boast was born in England and grew up in Ireland and Wisconsin. His story collection, Power Ballads, won the 2011 Iowa Short Fiction Award. His fiction has appeared in Best New American Voices 2009, Narrative, Glimmer Train, The Southern Review, The American Scholar, and Five Points, among other publications. From 2008-2010, he was a Stegner Fellow in fiction at Stanford University, and, this fall, will be a Charles Pick Fellow at the University of East Anglia in the UK.



So, without further ado, I'd like to welcome Will Boast.

Rosie: Congratulations on winning the Iowa Short Fiction Award. Can you tell us about the process of your being considered and how you found out about the award?

WB: Thanks! The Iowa Short Fiction Award has been around for about twenty-five years and, along with the Flannery O'Connor Award, is considered one of the most prominent book contests for story collections. In my experience, readers of literary fiction love short stories, but the publishing world, mostly based in New York, perceives them as a tough sell to a larger audience. (Mention your story collection around an editor or agent and watch how fast their eyes glaze over....) My agent felt that trying to publish my stories wouldn't be a good first step for me, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. I got lucky, because the Iowa Award was the very first place I sent my manuscript! The nice thing about the Iowa Award is that it's read blind and is juried and judged by writers. So, their primary concern, really their only concern, is the manuscript itself and whether it's a good and satisfying read.

Rosie: Which authors would you say have most influenced your writing? In what ways?

WB: Tough question! A few years ago I discovered (along with all the rest of the American reading public!) Roberto Bolano's novels and stories. I haven't tried to emulate him--because mimicking such a distinctive writer is probably a bad idea--but I love the way he creates an alternate world for himself in which all of his fiction takes place. His world is populated with writers and poets (mostly failed, failing, and distinctly minor writers and poets), some real, many more invented. So maybe I borrowed that approach for Power Ballads, but reduced the size of the world to something more like Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio. 

Rosie: Your short stories focus on different aspects of the life of musicians. What made you want to write about the music industry?

WB: I spent a couple years in Chicago playing music, going to see shows, working with musicians, and drinking with musicians. In college, I played a lot of music (too much, really), and when I moved to San Francisco, I became involved with the music scene here as well. The musicians I've met have all been dreamers, and their desires and obsessions almost always put them in compromised positions--financially, artistically, romantically--even the ones who have ended up having a lot of success. I knew that, for the most part, I didn't want to write about rock stars, because I find that story pretty boring. The musicians I most admired were the obscure and deeply uncool ones, and I wanted to write a sort of fan letter to them. That said, I don't really think of Power Ballads as ultimately being about music or musicians. Music is maybe just the way, the entry point, to address other things.

Rosie: Several of the stories in Power Ballads revolve around two characters, Tim and Kate. Have you ever consider expanding their story/stories into something longer? More of a novel format? In fact, 7 of the 10 stories directly or indirectly revolve around Tim and or Kate's lives. Why did you decide to include these stories in this collection, instead of focusing more or less on Tim and Kate?

WB: I think that Power Ballads is that longer thing! I'd been thinking about writing stories about journeyman musicians for a while and had a couple stories that more or less fit that bill kicking around. It was somewhat accidental that Tim found his way into as many stories as he did, and Kate came in even later. It seems like a story often has a life of its own, and you just end up following whatever thing seems the most vital or interesting or fun at the time. That said, both Tim and Kate appeared in "The Bridge," one of the oldest stories in the book. Something about Tim as a narrator continue to resonate for me, and several more stories revolving around his obsessions and short-sightedness ended up coming out in fairly quick succession.

Rosie: What other kinds of projects do you have lined up?

WB: I'm working on a novel and a memoir. I'm also trying to make a start in narrative journalism.

Rosie: Where else can we read your work?

WB: There's a list of publications and links to online stuff at willboast.com. Recently, I've had stories out in the American Scholar, the Literarian, Narrative, and ZZYZZVA.

Rosie: And a random question, just to keep you on your toes: If you could be any insect, which one would you be and why?

WB: Not being the most insect-friendly of people and despite the fact that getting stung is a bummer, I'd have to say a honeybee. No other insect goes to such obsessive extremes of behavior--forming a colony, building a hive, making honey, serving the queen. As a bee, you'd know your place in the world, and you'd get to feel useful.

Thanks so much, Will, for joining us today. If you're interested in Will Boast's book, again be sure to stop by on Friday for a review of Power Ballads or click on the link below.