Pitch Wars - #PimpMyBio

I'll probably fluff this out from time to time. I have been mostly focused on getting my entry ready for Pitch Wars. As a result, I hadn't thought about participating in PimpMyBio. But here goes --

Who am I?

I am a mom of two, a 13-year-old daughter and a 10-year-old son. I work full-time outside of the house as an attorney. I have degrees in law, of course, and multiple degrees in business.

Our household is a British-American one. More specifically, I am American and my husband is a citizen of the United Kingdom. As a result, our children are dual citizens. I met my husband while attending the University of Sheffield, while I was studying for one of my law degrees. During that time in addition to doing my best to be a hardworking law student, I traveled throughout England and Scotland (Wales, I didn't get to - a disappointment). I also traveled to France (a bus ride through from Calais), Germany (Munich - gorgeous city), Italy (Rome and Milan), and Belgium (Brussels and Bruges). Some of my best memories are of driving through the Highlands in Scotland. Yes, I did endager a bunch of people by trying to learn to drive on the other side of the road. It was also districtating passing by such beautiful landscape and having to keep my focus on the road.

I don't know if this makes me unique in any way, as a Pitch Wars hopeful, but I am a self-published indie author. Although I know some authors look down upon self-published authors, I have no regrets about self-publishing. It has allowed me an incredible freedom to write whatever I want without worrying about publisher preferences or thoughts as to what might sell. So, I hope my status as an Indie isn't held against me. However, it is what it is and I don't want to get into that debate, nor am I going to justify why I chose this path (at least not beyond the freedom issue). Suffice it to say that I respect each person's choice of path as the one best suited for him or her and I hope others will treat me the same. I have noted a handful of other indie authors participating as well, so that does give me comfort.


Why PitchWars?

I came upon PitchWars for the first time last year when the results were being announced. Even though I had no hat in the ring, I watched the preannouncement shows. It rose my curiosity and inspired me to dive in and learn more. As a result, last year, I decided that should I have a manuscript ready in time for the next PitchWars, and not long before PitchWars, I might enter. It was "might" because, in addition to my concern about being accepted as an Indie, I would also need to have a manuscript ready in a closely-timed fashion. There was no way that I could write a book months in advance and sit on it. I would suspect other hopefuls might not want to sit on a manuscript for long without querying to agents.

That being said, if my book is selected for PW, I am committed to being patient and to seeing the process through - wherever it leads. Moreover, I know the odds for getting selected are high, so I would consider myself very fortunate to be able to work with an experienced author and to learn how to be better. I am a firm believer that we can always learn more and improve no matter how far we have come and how much experience we have. For me, I have no illusions that I am the best - not by far. I know I have weaknesses and I work hard to find the means to address them and improve. I am always seeking for my next book to be better than the last, and I am always seeking ways to learn new techniques. So, I would be very grateful and honored, if I am chosen. If not, of course, I will go on and may very well participate again next year.

Why I Write?


As to the big question of why I write - that is a hard one to answer. There is just no one answer to that. One reason is that I have always loved books. I was that kid (many, many years ago) that read the whole book as soon as it was handed out in class. I was that kid that stayed up late to finish a book. I am that adult who has read The Mists of Avalon multiple times - including while studying for the bar exam (as a reward to keep me going).

Also, I write because I want to create. I find it rewarding and also stress relieving to immerse myself into a character and his or her story. It is also amazing when someone enjoys the story and reports that back to me.

What do I Read?

I have read books from or about: classic English Literature, Fydor Dostoyevsky, Ian Fleming, legal thrillers, romance novels (not anymore but in the past probably 60-100), Nancy Drew, fantasy, and non-fiction topics of interest. I also really love finding really old books to peruse. I once found a book from the early 1900s in a Catholic College's library (in the basement) about ghosts, demons, etc. (a shocking find) that included some really interesting views. I think I might go back someday and get that book and use it as inspiration for some fantasy tale - but I digress.

My interests as a reader is directly correlated to my writing style. I like to write my books the way I like the books I read to be. I am very interested in a character's thoughts and motivations for doing things - much more so that what the room the individual is in looks like. That might be why I enjoyed Fydor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment so much.

If the story interests me, I can be very forgiving of my pet peeves appearing in a book if I love the story. One example is that I loved a particular fantasy series, but I didn't like the over-description that was in that book. If it needed to be described to understand the story, it was good, but I really didn't need two pages of description of the contents of a house to understand that it was cluttered. That being said, I would never post any negative review of that book to reflect that I felt the description was more than I liked. I feel that you can't please everyone and I can't expect a book to match all of my tastes perfectly. So, if an author has hooked me with a clever story and likable characters, I'm generally all in. By the way, I love that author that I used as an example without providing the name  and will read anything she writes.

How do I create? 

I first start with an idea for a character and a challenging situation for that character to be in. Once I feel like I know the character well, I start putting him or her in the situation.

I don't outline. I am a panster. If I were to outline, I would die - I mean it. (No, not really, but I don't think I can write that way). As I write, I generally know where the character is going. However, I don't necessarily know the specific points in the journey along the way, although I usually have a general sense of the ending. The order in which I write that journey also varies, although I usually start with the beginning. I write the scenes as I know them. They may be in the beginning, the middle, or the end. Sometimes when I am about halfway through, and the ending becomes clear to me, I stop and write the ending. Then I write the middle with a clear eye as to how the story is ending. Sometimes, I stop and go back and scrap an idea and write a new one, or sometimes I add a step in the journey.

It is really exciting to me when my characters surprise me. I also like to add layers to the story and hidden messages. I would really like my books (most of them at least) to have something in them that causes people to think and that inspires discussions.

I also tend to write more mature MCs in my middle grade in the sense of intelligence. Not to brag - but I tend to use my own children as models. They are bright and very interested in intellectual discussion. So, I find it hard to think of children, intellect-wise, as other than little adults. That being said, as a Mom, I cannot include certain topics in my book and I abhor violence and gore. If something aggressive is needed, I tend to try to include just enough that the point is made. After all, I can't offer sanitized books to today's kids. They would find those boring. At the same time, if someone wrote me a review and said that I freaked his or her kid out with my writing, I would feel bad. It's just the way I am.

My favorite MC is the quirky kid who just doesn't fit in for some reason or another. Those kids, to me, are hereos.

The Beauty and The Book Contest

I have entered the cover of Janetta and the Book Thief into a book cover contest at www.beautyandbook.com.  The book with the most votes in each category will be displayed at the Frankfurt Book Festival for voting for overall best cover.  Please consider heading over to the site and voting for Janetta and the Book Thief.  Just enter "Janetta" in the search box to display the book's page and voting link.

A Few Words About Janetta and The Book Thief (maybe more than a few)

Although this post is about Janetta and the Book Thief, my newest book, I am first taking a few moments to address my delay in posting.

I love writing stories and experimenting to build my skills. I find writing stories to be not only a fun and rewarding past-time but a truly therapeutic endeavor. As of late, I have had little time to spend with my writing because family situations have required all of my time. However, I am first and foremost above everything else - a mom. So, as I'm sure is the case with other moms, my Mom duties had to come first.

As to Janetta, I have two topics I would like to cover in this post. First, I wanted to talk about the inspiration for the book.

Admittedly, I first came up with the character, a girl who loves to read books so much that she would rather do that than socialize. After conceiving of Janetta, I developed the reason for why she was that way and then weaved the significance of that into the story. Ultimately, it's not solely her personality that makes her like books more than people, but it is because of her past history of having been bullied. I see her as a person who finds books to be a refuge from the bullying problem she has experienced. In reading, she can take herself to other places and other circumstances and use it as an escape.

For those adults among us who were bullied as a child, we all know how that impacts a person. It leaves lifelong scars that affect how we trust others and how sociable we are. Janetta has nervous emotions that make her a little hesitant of others but it also gives her great understanding and empathy for others who have been bullied. In this book, she gets an opportunity to meet another person with a similar experience to hers and to use that understanding and empathy to make things right for that person. She gets to be a hero.

Please note that I intentionally did not provide the details of how bullying may have occurred in fairy land. In fact, none of the fairies in this book actually engaged in any intentional bullying. However, they unwittingly participated when if they had asked questions they would have realized what they were doing was not right. They also made assumptions that continued to effect an exclusion of the bullied fairy.

So, fairy land - just like the real world - is not a perfect place. Somewhere back in this fairy's history he was bullied and excluded. These experiences led to him pulling away from others even more until he was outside of all groups and all alone. He is fortunate to have someone like Janetta, with empathy and understanding, help the fairies see what is going on. It changes his life and provides him with a group of supportive friends. However, having a group of supportive friends doesn't on its own address the bullying issue just as it doesn't in the real world. I may decide to address that bullying in a later book. However, I haven't decided that yet.

The second topic is that I have had some struggles with how best to format the Ebook version. Books without images inside tend to be more versatile and less likely to have formatting problems from platform to platform if they are kept simple and created as flowing text. Unfortunately, with images, formatting is much more difficult and can yield more unexpected results.

I initially thought that a fixed format was the best way to form this book. However, although it looked good on my screen, the format didn't carry over well into Epub or Mobi formats.  One such problem was the overlapping of images over some of the text. I kept trying to overcome the format problems, but I just couldn't figure out how to do that. I would fix one issue, and then another would come up. Nothing seemed to work.

I almost reached a point where I could have decided to either give up and pull the ebook format for Janetta, making it no longer available for sale, or pay someone to format the ebook format. However, I decided to give it one last try with flowing text instead of using a fixed format. After many different attempts, I finally found the solution - at I hope so. It turned out to be a lot simpler than I would have thought.  What I did was to anchor the images as if they were characters.

Hopefully, my solution will turn out to work well, and my formatting problems are over. Regardless, it will not be perfect because the text will end earlier than I like on a given page. However, that is a small issue in comparison with the other problems that I have had.

If you happen to read the ebook and see a formatting problem that affects readability, please feel free to reach out to me. When you do, please describe the problem and what device you were using to read the book. I would be most appreciative if you do as it would give me a chance to fix the problem.

Loch Ness Monster is Missing

As I am sure others did, I read today how the Loch Ness Monster hasn't been spotted in eight months. That, understandably, has many people worried.

If you've never been to Loch Ness, it's a must-have-experience to take a boat ride out onto the loch and look for Nessie. Hopefully, Nessie, if she exists, is just taking a little break and will be back.

I am a Nessie fan and fondly remember my visit to Loch Ness many years ago. From the boat, it's easy to see how Loch Ness gets its reputation. The water is only clear at its very surface where it ripples. Just below the surface, the water is so filled with peat that it looks black - dark and mysterious. As you stare across the water's surface, it's easy to imagine the ripples are evidence of a log-shaped being swimming just below the surface.

I've been so inspired by Nessie that in my fantasy book series for children - The Emaleen Andarsan - Emaleen meets a creature named Zidmon who is very similar to Nessie (is the creature, in fact, Nessie?). The creature travels all the way from its normal home in Scotland to the St. Lawrence River, just to meet Emaleen. Now, I wouldn't go so far as to claim that the creature in my book is Nessie but the book was ironically released in August 2016 - a little over 8 months ago.  Perhaps Nessie heard the story and decided to check the St. Lawrence River out.

Book 3 of the series is due out in a couple of weeks. During this book, Nessie has theoretically returned to Scotland as she doesn't make an appearance in this book. Later on, the creature might make an appearance in the Adirondacks in New York for book 4 but I'll make sure he returns to Scotland.

Baking Times

The day has come. My twelve-year-old daughter is now cooking and baking.

The day before yesterday she made banana bread that she had learned to make at school. She needed some help, but she accomplished the majority of it on her own. It was a proud moment for her when the banana bread came out of the oven. :)

The recipe was likely different than the one my mother used. My mother probably didn't use whole wheat flour or yogurt in her batter. But one bite of my daughter's banana bread brought back memories of the bread my mom had made. Along with that, I had a brief moment of joy as I remembered my mother whose loss I feel almost every day.

I had told my daughter about my mom's banana bread. I think it made her a little nervous that hers might not be as good. But I assured her that would not be the case. If held onto any doubts, when she saw the expression on my face as I enjoyed the first bite, they should have disappeared. And, I can't wait until she makes it again.


Today, we have a snow day - yeah for snow days! She has made me a banana strawberry smoothie. This, too, she learned to make at school. Like the banana bread, it was very tasty. 

My daughter wants to find other recipes to try. I'm so proud of her and her interest in making food. These skills will serve her well in life. I also look forward to trying out her creations. :)

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Footnote -

1. I have never made banana bread. I've often bought bananas for that purpose and then waited for them to soften. Unfortunately, I've always missed that window between the bananas being too hard and the bananas being mushy.

2. I have begun to teach her as well, but the school experience has encouraged her to try things on her own.

(Although these footnotes are numbered, you won't find the footnote numbers in the body. I don't know how to do that in this program. So these are general comments.)

The Peerless Seer's War

Although publication is still some months off, I am making progress on The Peerless Seer's War, the third book in The Emaleen Andarsan Series.

• The cover artist is working on the cover. She has submitted some draft designs that I am very excited about. I just can't wait to reveal the cover!

• I am also close to finishing my revising of the draft. When I do, it will go to my editor. Once the draft is with my editor, I will pick up work on book 4 (no title yet). I said "pick up" because I've already started it. I can't help it.

I also have some exciting events coming up that I hope to announce soon.

Book Sales Bingo

Well, it's not quite Bingo, unless it's the "coverall" game. 😃

Here's how I play -- Amazon shows me my weekly book sales of the paperbacks by geography (the ebooks don't show on this tracking). The page displays a map of the United States that's divided up into 100 sales regions. The regions in which I have book sales are shaded - the darker the shade, the more books sold. Of course, I like to see dark shades because that means lots of readers and I want to reach a lot of people with my books. After all, it's most fun when you have readers to interact with. But what I'm most focused on at the moment (more than darker shades) is filling the map in so that there's at least 1 book in each region.

As of now, I have 44 regions of the 100 covered. Although it may seem silly, I'll be extremely happy when all 100 regions are shaded.

Some of the regions are small, and others are quite large. I don't generally mind how big the region is that gets shaded in. But right now the regions labeled Denver and Albuquerque seem to be laughing at me. They are so much bigger than the other regions and they are blank. I'm going to have to do something about that. Anyone from these places? Hehe!

When I fill all of the regions in maybe I'll yell Bingo! 😂