Visit every blog that participates in this fun blog-hop and collect 12 words (hidden in the text of the posts between 6 asterisks (such as ***different words on each blog***)
If you visit every blog on the list at the end of this post and collect the 12 words, you'll have a quote about writing.
Prizes:
Grand prize $30 gift card
or one of the 3 smaller prizes: $5 gift card each.
How to enter the contest
Visit every blog from May 12-17 on the list below and find the hidden word in each post. On May 17 at the last stop of the 6 days long blog-hop you'll be directed back to this post.
We will add a Google form where you can enter the 12 words long sentence which you'll collect word by word from each blog.
I
had read about keeping a ‘Yay’ journal a few weeks ago in one of my magazines.
The purpose is to find all the good things that went right in your day—be it
big or small. This concept is to promote positive thinking by having to list at
least three things and building up to as many as you can muster. The end result
is that it will cause one to not only see the little things were actually just
as important as the bigger things but your list will get longer and longer. And
the magic is that positive brings positive and you’ll find that your days
actually do look brighter.
Okay—so
I thought I’d give it a go and see what happens. Why did I feel as though I
needed this? I was in a slump, feeling low and literally no motivation to write.
I also was fighting off a bout of depression. I figured this just might be the
tool to get me looking on the brighter side and would boost my mood to get my
juices flowing.
I
have to admit, it was hard for me to start this process. When my husband asked
me what I wrote in my journal I had to tell him I couldn’t find anything to
‘Yay’ about.So with that I went back
and really had to analyze my day. I did manage to come up with a few small
events. It was hard to even find one. Pretty say, I’d say. As the days went on
I began to find more things to list and my mood lifted. I actually began to
realize smaller things that I would never have given a thought to before would
be the ones I would consider of value to list in my journal.
My
daily list has increased from three items to at least 7 or more! I have to say
this concept is working—at least for me. My mood is brighter and I feel so
blessed to see so many good things that have occurred in my day that I never
would have thought were so valuable before.And the real beauty is going back over the past few days and reading all
of the ‘Yays’ from the previous days.
And
with that, I can now list another ‘Yay’ now that I have finished this little
blog.
In 2011, I found myself traveling down a road I never dreamed I would. I have written poetry as long as I can remember. I write whatever comes into my head. All feelings, all problems faced directly. Some were based on personal experiences, others just on observations of the world. I usually write in the first person, so no one would feel targeted should they happen upon one of my notebooks and read a poem. I wanted everyone to know they were not alone, even if I would not let them see my words. Because of one teacher, rarely would I let anyone outside of my immediate family see my scribbles. My daughter, Jasmine did send one of my poems out for a contest. When it was selected to be published, she felt she had proof my poems should be in a book. I let her send them off and when no response was ever received, I declared the proof on my side. She read every thing I wrote and never stopped encouraging me to put them out into the world. But, I never let her talk me into sharing again.
After her passing, I joined Facebook in an attempt to connect with her profile to share with her daughter when she grew up. I found friends who helped me cope with my heartache and loneliness. A chance share on social media of a poem led to the publication of my first book, Voices In My Head. The whole experience seemed like a whirlwind. So many friends supporting me, encouraging me to put my words out there.
Their continuous spurring on was fed by my daughter's voice whispering in my mind. Even from her perch in heaven, she was still urging me to publish, to share my thoughts with the world. In her memory, and to quiet my friends, I did publish. I had no idea how many poems should be in a book, so I just put every one on my computer inside. With a feeling of excitement and dread, I sent my heart out into the world.
The pats on the back from my internet friends fed my ego and I almost started to believe I might be a poet. Perhaps I really did write good poems, ones that would give hope to the reader. As the novelty of the new book faded, the blinders I had been wearing disappeared. Finding readers willing to purchase my poems was not going to be easy.
Lots of people are willing to say you write well and they really love your work, as long as they are able to read it for free. Testifying to how much work and money goes into publishing seems to fall on deaf ears. Although many will pay big bucks for a cup of coffee, spending money to help support a friend's dream is a completely different matter. Even suggesting they could help in a way that is free, like telling people how much they enjoy your work or just sharing your promotions appears to be imposing too much.
Still, I tried to believe in their praise. The dream of being understood dangles like a carrot in front of my eyes. Publish again, they said. A second book will get people to buy the first one. Well, I did publish again 2 years later. Then I tried a sample book 2 years after that. Funny, despite little interest, I published 2 more books. This year, I finished the series that started with Voices In My Head. The tribute to my daughter's dream. "QUIET! Please?" and "Silence" will join "Voices In My Head" and "They Won't Shut Up". My personal viewpoint, my life in rhyme, collectively called Jasmine's Wish, finally fulfilled. Will any care, probably not many. But I will know I did my best to fulfill my daughter's dream and she will be smiling as she looks down on me.
JASMINE'S WISH
My daughter's wish At last fulfilled Path to success Mostly uphill
Obstacles found Along the way Kept my desire My faith, at bay
Her opinion Kept me going Though my doubt was Overflowing
It took her death To make it real Poems no longer Would I conceal
As she looks down I hope she knows My love for her Forever grows
I dedicate These books to her Fulfilled this wish Only for her
She's now a star I wish upon Shining on me As I move on
Jasmine dear You shine so bright Hope these tomes bring You some delight
I learned English as an adult and the comma became my worst nightmare when I started writing.
Where it's needed and don't need it?
I rely on the editors to catch my mistakes, but I really should use my cheat-sheet more often. I bet my editor would have fewer headaches.
I will continue sharing my cheat-sheet next week about the use of the pesky comma.
But this week let's talk about some of the pesky rules:
Apostrophe
Normally, an apostrophe symbolizes possession: "I took Mandy's purse."
Apostrophes can also replace omitted letters: "I don't, I can't."
When used as a possessive pronoun: "The dog had a toy. I took its toy."
For the shortened version of "it is" use the version with the apostrophe: "It's raining outside."
Fewer or less?
We use "fewer" when discussing something countable: "Fewer than ten people saw the flying object."
We use "less" for intangible concepts: "I spent less than one hour coloring the picture."
Dangling modifiers
These are ambiguous, adjectival clauses at the beginning or end of sentences that often don't modify the right word or phrase:
"Rotting in the pantry, our Mandy threw the onions in the garbage." The structure of this sentence implies that Mandy is a zombie rotting in the pantry.
But when you place the modifying clause right next to the word or phrase it intends to describe:
"Mandy, threw the onions, rotting in the pantry, in the garbage." Then we know the onions went bad in the pantry and not Mandy.
Me, myself, or I?
Me and I always function. as the object.
"My friend and I went to lunch."
"Sara asked Betty and me to go hiking."
"I ate five apples."
When you've referred to yourself earlier in the sentence: "I made myself breakfast."
Who or whom?
It's not always easy to tell subjects from objects but to use an over-simplified yet good, general rule: subjects start sentences (or clauses), and objects end them.
"Who is a bully?"
"Careful whom you call a bully."
Lie or lay?
This is a pretty confusing rule:
The word "lay" must have an object, so we don't say: "I'm going to go lay down." Someone lays something somewhere: "Mandy lays her pen on the table."
You lie. Unless you lay, which means lie but in the past tense:
PresentPast
LieLieLay
LayLayLaid
Next time we'll talk about nor versus or, than versus then, irregular verbs and a few other things, and I will continue sharing the pesky comma rules cheat-sheet. Don't miss the posts!
In this short story collection I mentioned a few stories about the humorous part of learning a new language along with stories from my nursing years.
Nathan and Paul have a bully problem. Billy, the school
bully, has chosen them to be the target of his aggression. Paul along with Sir
E. Robert Smythe of the Galactic Safety Council discovers the root of Billy’s
issues and strives to convince the bully to change his ways.
When Billy runs away from home, Paul goes after him. Billy’s
dad, the cause of Billy’s anger, finds the boys and threatens them. They are
rescued but not before each are injured and Billy’s dad escapes.
During their recovery they learn more about each other and
face Billy’s dad once again. Can they overcome their differences and confront
the bullying going on in their school in before someone gets seriously hurt?
Excerpt
Paul plopped on his bed and stared at the computer screen.
Mom had grounded him and said no computer time, except for homework, for a
week.
He tried to
explain what had happened without ratting out Billy, but hadn’t been
successful. He didn’t know how long he could keep this up. Sooner or later
something was going to have to change. “I wish there was someone I could talk
to about this,” Paul said out loud to no one, “but mom said no computer time so
I can’t even call Nathan.”
While brushing
his teeth he thought about the great uneaten lunch mom packed, and the paper
airplane Billy threw. He didn’t even see what was on the note before Mrs.
Chrinshaw took it from him. It wasn’t until he was in Ms. Harris’s office that
he got a glance at it and saw the monster that Billy had drawn. He had to admit
Billy was a pretty good artist and wished he could draw like that. The only
thing he could do well was run fast, and climb trees. There wasn’t much chance
to use those skills in school, unless running away from Billy counted.
Well no use
worrying about it now. He might as well try and get some sleep. Paul pulled the
blanket over his head and switched on the flashlight he had under the pillow.
Grabbing the book he was reading for school, A Neverending Story, he finished a
chapter before falling asleep.
The bed shook and
a bright flash of light startled him awake. The book fell to the floor as he
threw his blanket off. Sitting on the foot of his bed was a creature unlike
anything he had ever seen. Paul wasn’t sure whether to be afraid or brave. The
purple and lime green creature had the head of the family’s Saint Bernard, the
body of a large jack rabbit and the tail of a lion. A bowler hat sat on his
round head and a monocle graced his one eye. He wore an orange vest with a chain
and watch attached to it. In his hand he held a jade blue parasol.
“You asked for
someone to talk to,” the creature said in a proper British accent.
“I did? Oh yeah,
I guess I did. But what…who are you?”
“Quit blubbering,
Paul, we don’t have much time.”
“You know my
name? Who are you?”
“Of course I know
your name. As to who I am, Sir E. Robert Smythe, Senior Safety Ambassador for
the Galactic Safety Council, at your service. You may call me Sir E. Robert. I
have come from the planet of Gwill. Queen Sage realized you were in trouble and
sent me to aid you. Now tell me about your problems.”
Paul proceeded to
explain everything that happened. When he finished, the creature sat on the bed
in silence for several seconds and Paul began to wonder if this was real. He
pinched himself. “Ow, that hurt.”
“Of course it
did. Why would you hurt yourself?”
“I thought maybe
I was dreaming.”
“This isn’t a
dream. Humans can be so obtuse at times. Now be quiet while I think.” They sat
on the bed a few more moments and the creature started to talk. “We seem to
have a twofold problem here. First, this Billy person has some anger issues. We
have to discover the source of his angst and then we can better confront what
is bothering him and put an end to his torturing you. Second, I sense that
Morton the Morph has a hand in this and Queen Sage will need to be notified
posthaste, before we can begin to solve the problem.”
Before Paul could
respond there was a flash of light and the creature disappeared.
“Hey, wait! Where
did you go? I still have questions.”
A voice echoed in
his room. “I will be there when you need me.”
Paul punched his
pillow and pinched his arm again. “Not a dream. Not much help either.”
The next morning,
he met Nathan and they walked to school together. Paul told Nathan about his
dream, or at least what he thought was a dream. He still didn’t believe that
Sir E. Robert Smythe had been real, even though he had felt the pain of both
pinches to himself.
“Yeah, probably a
dream.” Nathan voiced his doubts. “But sounds like a cool dream. I hope it was
real. That would be totally cool.”
“I guess so,”
Paul said as they walked up to the school. “What am I going to do about Billy?”
“Let’s get in the
school before he gets here.” They headed toward the door and saw an old, beat
up extended cab pick-up pull into the driveway. A grizzled, middle-aged man
drove. Billy sat with him in the front seat and a small woman occupied the rear
seat. The man was yelling and smacking Billy’s head. The passenger side door
opened and Billy jumped out of the truck before it could speed away.
The bully ran
toward the door, noticing Nathan and Paul standing there. He pushed Nathan out
of his way. “What are you looking at, squinty eye?”
“Nothing. I
didn’t…see anything,” Nathan answered.
“Good thing. Now
get out of my way.” He pushed Nathan again and stormed into the school.
“Wow, did you see
that?”
“Yeah, that guy
was really beating on Billy. Do you think that was his dad?” Nathan said.
“Not sure. I’ve
never seen his dad. I didn’t even know he had a dad.”
Nathan shrugged
his shoulders. “Don’t be silly, everyone has a dad.”
“I know, I just
never heard him talk about his family.”
The two boys
walked into the school. Billy and his gang left them alone for the day, but
Paul still wasn’t happy. He had detention today because of what Billy did
yesterday.
To see more of my posts on dragons, characters and authors go here.
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The OAG gang has a small corner on Facebook where we exchange ideas and help each other with publishing and book promotion. Just as in many other group, we have active members and others who read the posts once in a while. And then a small group of members who read posts but stay in the background and never comment on posts or offer help to others.
We dedicate this weekend to the most active members who take a few minutes almost every day, read and share blog posts, interact with others, and help others with useful advice or just share the book promo posts to spread the news about other group members' books.
I tagged the most active members in a post in our Facebook group and asked them to introduce themselves and add their author links.
Click on the link below to read a little bit about the most active members in the comments of the post:
Please share the Facebook post, or this blog posts, on your social sites.
Let your friends know about this wonderful group of authors.
A few of the OAG group authors participated in a group video recently, enjoy meeting a group of writers from around the world on this page:https://www.authorerikamszabo.com/oag.html
Certainly, we all have in mind what makes us happy, and perhaps we are working towards a steady direction in our lives towards that goal: happiness.
Nevertheless, today my husband shared with me a post about the world and the real meaning of happiness. The post was actually a page of the book of Matt Haig “Reasons to stay alive.”
Here is a quote from that book shared on Goodreads:
“THE WORLD is increasingly designed to depress us. Happiness isn’t very good for the economy. If we were happy with what we had, why would we need more? How do you sell an anti-ageing moisturiser? You make someone worry about ageing. How do you get people to vote for a political party? You make them worry about immigration. How do you get them to buy insurance? By making them worry about everything. How do you get them to have plastic surgery? By highlighting their physical flaws. How do you get them to watch a TV show? By making them worry about missing out. How do you get them to buy a new smartphone? By making them feel like they are being left behind. To be calm becomes a kind of revolutionary act. To be happy with your own non-upgraded existence. To be comfortable with our messy, human selves, would not be good for business.”
I agree one hundred percent with the statements above, each of them is spot on, but instead of the word “World” I would perhaps use the word “Society.”
The world is not doing anything against people, the world is there and watches us hurting each other, trying to prevail over each other. Society is what we have been building, and that is what makes us unhappy.
I have to say that if everybody were like me, the economy, as we know it, would just collapse, as I live for one simple thing, enjoying the nature and life, and those activities are all free (or almost).
Despite this, I think that most of the people really fall into the trap of what society is expecting from them or what they think it expects from them. With this, they are falsely brought to believe that buying one object, wearing a certain dress, owning a certain car, living in a certain area will make them accepted. The reality is that unless people do not love themselves, accept themselves and start living confidently with themselves, they won’t be loved, accepted, and trusted by anybody else.
I guess that the real secret lies in looking inside ourselves and get to know our inner nature, that little stranger that is inside us, to which we never really talked for long enough.
I admit it that perhaps I also talk too much with myself, and that little stranger is no stranger after all. A personal suggestion is just to live the way each of us wants and forget about what everyone else says.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, I love all things fantasy and science fiction. Mix in a little romance and you've got me hooked. When I decided to write a stand alone romance for an anthology that I am part of, Moonlight Mist, I stepped away from shifters and turned to Ireland for inspiration. More specifically the fae and Tir Na Nog, or Underhill as most know it, were my muse. Who could resist beautiful creatures and a land of magic? Certainly not me. The result was my newest title Honor Bound.
Blurb
Liam is bored with everyday life in Underhill, the home of the Fae. When you’ve lived as long as he has few things hold any excitement anymore. When a mortal woman stumbles into Underhill all of that changes. She captivates him like none have in ages. Now Liam will stop at nothing to find her and make the mortal his. How far will he go to get what he wants?
Hallie O’Neil thinks she has it all figured out. She has a great career, serious boyfriend, and perfect New York apartment. Everything changes when an Irish Adonis walks into her work one afternoon. As hard as Hallie tries to fight it, Liam insists on inserting himself into her life. There’s something different about Liam that Hallie can’t figure out. Can she discover the truth before she’s in too deep?
Excerpt
Faolin gave Hallie her own room while she was visiting his Uncle’s home. He didn’t want to presume too much. It wasn’t surprising though when she slipped into his room after the house quieted down. Hallie always had a way of lighting his fire. After months apart though her touch was like an inferno. He hated having to return to Underhill even for that short amount of time. Being away from her was torture.
All of Faolin’s attention was focused on Hallie that night. He lavished every affection on her. Faolin brought her to the brink of ecstasy over and over before they both tumbled over the edge together. Hallie lay in his arms afterward content and beautiful. Faolin brushed the stray hairs from her cheek enjoying the fleeting moment.
With a slight growl of frustration, Faolin eased out of bed. He pulled on his pants and went downstairs. His aunt and uncle would still be awake. He found them in the library by the fire enjoying a glass of wine. His aunt studied him a moment, however, it was his uncle who spoke.
“I’m glad to hear the mortal pleases you.” His uncle smiled half laughing.
Faolin knew it meant they heard at least part of their lovemaking. At the moment he didn’t care. “She pleases me more than any woman has in centuries, uncle.”
His uncle stopped smiling, and his aunt set down her wine. “Can it be true?” his aunt asked studying him.
“Faolin I forbid…” His uncle started.
“Don’t, I beg you. When is the last time I asked anything of you?” Faolin asked his uncle.
His uncle snarled, “At least 300 years.” He let out a heavy breath. “It’s too soon Faolin.”
“At least grant me permission to pursue it.” Faolin offered his hand.
“You know the rules.” His uncle warned.
“Better than anyone” his aunt volunteered.
His uncle took Faolin’s hand “Agreed. I Faolin of Underhill swear that I will abide by the rules while pursuing Hallie O'Neil.”
“Honor and Magic bind thee.” His uncle said formally. Faolin felt the magic sweep over him. There was no going back now.
Honor Boundis part of a paranormal romance anthology Moonlight Mist written by many talented independent authors. It is available on Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, and other fine retailers.
I am a mother, pharmacist, and author. I love all things fantasy and science fiction. It should come as no surprise then when I say I write fantasy, science fiction, and paranormal romance. I've also tried my hand at horror once or twice. I enjoy watching anime and romance movies. Currently I am working my way through Naruto Shippuden. Summer is coming and school is ending which means I'll spend more time at home with my kids than at work thanks to PTO. If you read my bios or my blog I'll keep you posted on our travels. If you want to find out more about me check out my website, or you can find my books on my store.
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