Tag Archives: #RRBC_Community

Welcome to Day 8 of the “SMOKE ROSE TO HEAVEN” Blog Tour! @SarahAngleton @4WillsPub #RRBC

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The Best Old Book

I’m a sucker for a good thesaurus. I realize that may make me sound like one of the most boring people on the planet, but just hear me out.

About twenty years ago or so, I was living life as a recent college graduate and newlywed professional in the camping industry, a job I truly enjoyed but rarely miss. We didn’t have any children yet and when my husband’s burgeoning career came to an anticipated crossroad, I found myself with a good opportunity to pursue a different professional path.

That’s when I went back to grad school at the University of Missouri to earn my master’s degree in literature and creative writing. Before I could do that, however, I had to take the Graduate Record Exam (GRE).

The first step was, of course, to buy one of those big test prep books—you know the ones that are as thick as an old-fashioned New York City phone book stacked on top of the “S” volume of the Encyclopedia Britannica that still collects dust on the shelf in your parents’ basement? Yeah, that’s the one.

It’s been quite a few years and I’m unfamiliar with the test format now, but one of my biggest concerns then was the analogies portion in which I would be asked:

If shoe is to apricot, then rodeo is to______.

a. Golden Retriever

b. Grecian vase

c. central heating

d. toothbrush

Except replace all the words in the question and answers with ones you’ve never heard of before.

The Great Big Book of Test Prep recommended studying with a thesaurus. So, I bought myself another book that weighed roughly the same as your run-of-the-mill anvil and got to work. I looked up the words from practice tests and any grandiloquent words I came across in my pleasure reading. Soon I had whole families and clusters of new, slightly pretentious, words to which I could attach at least vague meaning.

And I had become a huge fan of Mr. Roget.

Since then, my collection has expanded to include multiple generations of recently updated thesauri, a handy pocket version, and an early edition from 1866, about fourteen years after the original 14,000-word masterpiece compiled by Peter Mark Roget.

Of course there are several online versions available as well, but I rarely write without a print copy of a thesaurus nearby. Because I write a great deal of historical fiction, the oldest one in my collection especially comes in handy.

My most recent historical novel, Smoke Rose to Heaven, benefited greatly from Mr. Roget’s assistance. His marvelous book and its descendants helped me to put the final polish on the 19th century world my characters inhabit. It served to pepper their language with quaint, but still accessible, words as they galloped across their lush historical landscape occasionally stumbling over an abandoned child, a lost manuscript, or an assassin.

And that’s why I’m a sucker for a good thesaurus. Also, the answer is C, which I’m sure you already knew.

Book Blurb:

New York, 1872.

Diviner Ada Moses is a finder of hidden things and a keeper of secrets. In her possession is a lost manuscript with the power to destroy the faith of tens of thousands of believers.

When a man seeking the truth knocks at her door with a conspiracy theory on his lips and assassins at his heels, she must make a choice.

Spurred by news of a ritualistic murder and the arrival of a package containing the victim’s bloody shirt, Ada must either attempt to vanish with the truth or return the burden she has long borne to the prophet responsible for one of the most successful deceptions in US history.

Protecting someone else’s secret may save Ada’s life, but is that worth forcing her own demons into the light?

Author Bio:

SARAH ANGLETON is the author of the historical novels Gentleman of Misfortune and Smoke Rose to Heaven as well as the humor collection Launching Sheep & Other Stories from the Intersection of History and Nonsense. She lives with her husband, two sons, and one loyal dog near St. Louis, where she loves rooting for the Cardinals but doesn’t care for the pizza.

Social Media Links:

https://www.facebook.com/sangletonwrites

https://sarah-angleton.com

Sarah is giving away 5 e-book copies of SMOKE ROSE TO HEAVEN and all you have to do for a chance to win a copy is to leave a comment below.  
To follow along with the rest of her tour, please drop in on her 4WillsPub tour page.
If you’d like to take your book or books on a virtual blog tour, please visit us at 4WillsPublishing.wordpress.com and click on the VIRTUAL BLOG TOUR tab.
Thank you for supporting this author’s tour and also the blogger of this post!

Carl Prescott series on sale

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Carl Prescott and the Vengeful Gods will be published on February 11, 2020. To celebrate the launch of book three, the first two books will be on sale starting tomorrow, February 3rd. If you’re interested in a compelling fantasy with a strong sense of magic and wonder, this is your chance to try out something new and different. As a story written for the young adult fantasy genre, these tales are suitable for all but the youngest readers.

The stories are about four teens who have hidden talents that have begun to blossom. Those abilities put them in serious danger from others with similar yet opposite motivation. The pace of action and adventure accelerates from the beginning through the final chapters, with the outcome always in doubt.

As in #INDIE author, I hope you will check them out. Free previews are available on Amazon.com for all of my books. If you choose to read one or more of them, first thank you, and I would really appreciate your honest review. Of course, you can always reach out to me personally with any questions or comments. As well, you can follow me on my website and on Twitter to discover what else I am up to. With a price below $1.00, books one and two are really good deals. Happy reading!

Carl Prescott and the Vengeful Gods #RRBC

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Book three in the Carl Prescott series arrives in just two weeks! At the end of book 2, Carl Prescott and the Demon Queen, our hero learned that even though it is not possible, the priest and priestess who had joined Sylvia in the group hug, did form a new universe. As book 3 begins, Carl learns that several of his friends and professors have been sucked through a wormhole and are now in the other universe. Carl Prescott volunteers to venture there as well in order to save them. Sylvia chooses to join him on his new quest. Here is the description from the back cover:

When Carl Prescott stopped Sylvia, the Demon Queen, from destroying our universe, he sincerely believed his life could get back to normal again. Yet the duties of the Invisible Hand never end. Somehow, the priest and priestess who helped Sylvia did form another universe, and many of Carl’s friends were sucked through a wormhole and are now stranded there.

In order to rescue their friends, Carl and Sylvia must venture through the wormhole to enter the false universe. Their journey is fraught with danger as the God King and God Queen are not alone. Even though Carl carried Sylvia, Gabriel, and Constance out of the gravity wave, somehow they are in the false universe too. Another riddle that must be resolved before they can escape back to the real world.

The action and danger become more intense as Carl endures one outrageous challenge after another. To make matters worse, the existence of the false universe contradicts physics, and has already begun to come apart. Hopefully, Carl and his friends will not fizzle out of existence along with it.

This is how I would explain the plot:

Vengeful Gods takes a first peek into the possibility of another universe. Many friends of our hero have passed through a wormhole and become prisoners of the gods who created the false universe. Since they were not truly God, their creation has an expiration date that approaches quickly. The task becomes more complicated as Carl learns the truth of the false universe. In order to fulfill his obligation to Emmanuel, he must find a way to bring everything that slipped through the wormhole back home. Otherwise, anything remaining will cease to exist, including him and his friends. To make things worse, the gods of the false universe do not foresee their coming extinction, and will do anything to stop and destroy their only chance for survival. 

Carl will face his worst fears, but Aida, Grace, Barbie, Burt, and Sylvia will be there to help and provide some much needed perspective. Even though Carl Prescott has crossed the Rope Bridge and accepted the truth of physical reality, now he has to learn what that truth means for him and existence itself.

As with all the books in the series, Vengeful Gods is action packed and full of surprises, many of which are unpleasant. Old and new friends, including the Rope Bridge, will be there to help. But even when his journey ends, it begins again.

This series is all about discovering the true nature of our existence and connection with the Most High. At this point, I believe book 4 will be the last in the series. Keep an eye out for Carl Prescott and the Riddle of Satan’s Cube.

Great News about #RaveReviewsBookClub

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Happy New Year, friends and fellow story-lovers! My dear friends and fellow authors in the #RRBC_Community have a new home for the new year.

 
I’d like to invite you to visit the ALL-NEW RAVE REVIEWS BOOK CLUB at our new location > RaveReviewsBookClub.wordpress.com.

-If you are an author looking for amazing support, #RRBC is the place for you! 

-If you are looking to grow as a writer, #RRBC is the place for you!

-If you are looking for a community where your peers push for your success just as hard as they push for their own, #RRBC is the place for you! 

When visiting, we ask that you #follow our site so that you’re kept up-to-date with all the awesome news that we’ll be sharing in 2020.  

If you like what you see after looking around the site, then please, JOIN US!  We’d love to have you!

Welcome to Part 3 of “THE MEREST LOSS” Blog Tour! @ StevenNeil12 @4WillsPub #RRBC

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Welcome to day six of Steven Neil’s “The Merest Loss” Blog Tour. Enjoy another amazing #RRBC writer.

Getting to know Steven Neil, the author of THE MEREST LOSS.

A story of love and political intrigue, set against the backdrop of the English hunting shires and the streets of Victorian London and post-revolutionary Paris.

The Publishing World

  1. How did you decide how to publish your novel?

I decided early on that I would by-pass the traditional publishing route and publish independently. I decided that provided I could find a publisher who could guarantee the production of a finished book indistinguishable in typesetting, style, quality, look and feel to a mainstream publisher that this would be the way to go. I also looked at the economics of publishing and realised that if an agent, a publisher, a distributor and a retailer were all taking a cut there would be little left for the author. This way I keep a larger percentage of the book price and I still own 100% of the rights if we ever go to film!

  • What was your experience with your publisher?

I was happy with the final paperback from Matador as it is professional and has high production standards. The typesetting is good and the ‘look and feel’ is what I wanted. I didn’t find them that easy to deal with and with hindsight I could have done things at lower cost. The copy editing and proof reading wasn’t very good and it was expensive. Having said that Matador have helped me to get my book and eBook out there and post production they have been better to deal with.

  • What would you do differently if you publish work in future?

I would control all of the process. I would break down the component parts and source them separately and project manage things myself.

  • Do you have an agent and if so, what has been your experience?

I don’t have an agent. I had some interaction with prospective agents early on and whilst it would be unfair to tar them all with the same brush, I found them to be unhelpful. This rather confirmed my view that I didn’t want one. Sorry, agents. Maybe I was unlucky.

  • Where do you sell most of your books?

Independent booksellers. They give me a fair return and provided I manage the delivery of books, the publisher doesn’t take a cut. I have to sell paperbacks and eBooks through Amazon to garner reviews but they take 60-65% discount on books and basically rip authors off.

  • What sells most: kindle or paperback?

Paperback outsells Kindle 5:1.

  • Do you support independent bookshops?

Yes, absolutely. Independent authors should support independent booksellers and vice versa.

  • What advice would you give to a new author, publishing for the first time?

Don’t even think about publishing until you have an independent development edit done. Publish independently and shop around for the services you need. Ask for testimonials from authors and speak to them before committing.

  • Can you make money out of publishing a novel?

It depends how you calculate it! I have made a reasonable income from my novel but I am retired and have other sources of income. I wouldn’t want to rely on writing to support my lifestyle. If I costed all the time I have spent on researching, writing, publishing and marketing my novel at an economic rate i.e. the rate I could have earned if I had done something else, I would say I haven’t made any money and never will! Unless I sell the film rights to Netflix, of course. I am a successful (from a critical viewpoint) author, however, and that counts for a lot.

  1. What would you change about the publishing world?

The dominance of Amazon is bad for authors and I would like a world in which we all sold our books through independent booksellers. Frankly, I don’t think that is going to happen.

© Steven Neil

THE MEREST LOSS is available in paperback and eBook in the UK, US, France, Canada and Australia.

Follow Steven Neil on https://twitter.com/stevenneil12 for information on how to purchase the paperback through an independent bookseller in the UK.

Book

The Merest Loss by Steven Neil ISBN: 1788039718

Blurb

‘A story of love and political intrigue, set against the backdrop of the English hunting shires and the streets of Victorian London and post-revolutionary Paris.

When Harriet Howard becomes Louis Napoleon’s mistress and financial backer and appears at his side in Paris in 1848, it is as if she has emerged from nowhere. How did the English daughter of a Norfolk boot-maker meet the future Emperor? Who is the mysterious Nicholas Sly and what is his hold over Harriet?
Can Harriet meet her obligations and return to her former life and the man she left behind? What is her involvement with British Government secret services? Can Harriet’s friend, jockey Tom Olliver, help her son Martin solve his own mystery: the identity of his father?’

Genres

Historical Fiction and Victorian Historical Romance

Bio

Steven has a BSc in Economics from the London School of Economics, a BA in English Literature and Creative Writing from the Open University and an MA in Creative Writing from Oxford Brookes University. He has been a bookmaker’s clerk, bloodstock agent, racehorse breeder and management consultant amongst other professions in his varied career. He is married and lives in rural Northamptonshire, England. The Merest Loss is his debut novel.

Twitter

@stevenneil12

IAN author page

https://www.independentauthornetwork.com/steven-neil.html

Email

stevenneil1@aol.com

Buy links

To follow along with the rest of the tour, please visit the author’s tour page on the 4WillsPublishing site.  If you’d like to book your own blog tour and have your book promoted in similar grand fashion, please click HERE. 

Sometimes It’s Bad to be Prescient

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A few years ago, I began my first dystopian future book series about young Jack Kennedy, an Iowa farm boy growing up in the early twenty-second century. There are a lot of dystopian stories out there, and I needed mine to be different. Due to my age (60+) and upbringing as the son of a US Air Force officer, I am conservative by nature. That was not true in my college days, but working in factories and companies around the globe for forty plus years will do that to a person.

I decided I needed a truly horrifying scenario, where virtually everyone lived in abject poverty while the politicians and super-rich lived in opulence in the secure domed centers of the massive and sprawling cities filled with tenements and shacks. The cities were surrounded by walls to protect the citizens from roving bands of criminals and terrorists who controlled the rest of our country. Farmers, like Jack’s parents, lived in small walled towns far from the perceived safety provided by the police in the cities.

In that future, the nation was bankrupted by the crooked politicians and their devotion to resolving climate change. Livestock was eliminated to preserve the climate. That created a problem. In a bankrupt country with the rich demanding their steaks and the poor desperate for anything to eat, how can a nation avoid a revolution? My disgusting solution: cannibalism.

National bankruptcy had eliminated all social safety nets. Social Security and Medicare were things of the past. The government had no money or will to care for anyone except themselves. Rather than let the old drop dead on the streets, why not convert them to meat for the citizens? First of all, people’s bodies are not in great shape at death. Kill them a bit younger when they have more meat on their bones. Money would then be allocated to purchase animal protein from other countries for the elite. Problem solved.

Sounds awful, right? Frankly, some of the scenes I wrote horrified me! Without a doubt, the fourth and final book was the most terrifying of all. But the books are not the subject of this post.

I purposely put that into my stories to shock and horrify readers. Now, it turns out not to be as far-fetched as I thought. Following are links to a few recent stories that make me realize I might have truly seen the future:

Link 1: Discussing that the flatulence from livestock really is a major cause of climate change:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/samlemonick/2017/09/29/scientists-underestimated-how-bad-cow-farts-are/#2456060278a9

Links 2 and 3: The super-high cost of the Green New Deal and Medicare for All are highlighted on these two stories. It should be noted that these two programs require the Federal government to collect three times as much tax as they do now. Look at your own tax return and see how makes you feel

https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/aoc-green-new-deal-cost-american-household

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/medicare-for-all-cost-184135544.html

Link 4: This story is from a Swedish scientist who claims we should consume the bodies of dead people and stop raising livestock to avert climate change:

https://www.foxnews.com/world/swedish-scientist-eat-human-flesh-climate-change

I do not know which news or websites you like, but these are just random selections from my search. There were many different links to choose. You certainly should do your own research.

As the title to his post says, knowing the future is not necessarily a good thing. I certainly hope my fantasy novels remain fantasy only. The only saving grace for me is that the first book takes place in the year 2121. I would be over 150 years old then, so if my dates prove prescient, the readers of this post have little to fear.

For those interested, the books in the Revolution Series are shown here:

Friends and #RRBC colleagues, please let me know if you think I am crazy or prescient. To be honest, I would prefer crazy.