Spirts, Romance and Murder... Afterlife by Cecilia Corona #ghosts #romance

So happy to be able to let everyone in on how I came up with the idea for my story Afterlife.

My new story Afterlife is featured in a Valentine's Day Anthology: Be My Everything.

Let me start off with the description of my story, then we can get to how I came up with the idea to write it!

About the Book:
Scotlynn Marjun, a psychic medium, is finally turning her life around when she opens up her shop called Afterlife where she helps clients – both living and dead – find peace, but then a past love shows up to shake things up. Marshall Kingston is rich, handsome, and a real charmer, but when his stepmother plans his murder, he seeks his ex-girlfriend’s special talents to bring justice to his family. Murder. Mayhem. Ghosts. Valentine’s Day promises to be an adventure of a lifetime.

Now for how the idea came to be. 
I am a Massage Therapist and I believe in ghosts. Lets just get that out there before I go any further. One day at work, while I was massaging a client, I kept feeling something brush up against my leg and it kept freaking me out. So of course my mind instantly goes to there must be a ghost in the room.

I laugh now at myself for thinking that. I mean why would a ghost be inside the Massage Room? When I get up from my stool, I feel something brush up against my leg again. When I look down, I realize it's the sheet! I couldn't help but silently giggle at myself. At this point my writer's cap goes on and my mind starts racing with ideas.

After leaving the room, I had the idea of a woman who is a Massage Therapist who could not only see ghosts but is also a psychic. The rest of the story fell into place when I started writing. I really enjoyed writing this story. Scotlynn has to be my favorite woman character I've written thus far.

Scotlynn is smart, gorgeous and very strong willed. Everyone loves a strong female heroine and I feel Scotlynn fits that description. 

I plan on writing more stories with Scotlynn and I can't wait to share them with you.

Check out my links below to my social media accounts as well as my website and make sure you join my newsletter mailing list for all the updates! You can find all my other stories I've written there too.

Join me every Friday on my website for my Reading Corner, where I write about my favorite books from some of my favorite authors.

Not sure if you want to read one of my stories? Join me on Sundays for #snippetsunday for snippets of my stories and find out what catches your interest.

Until Next Time.  Thanks for stopping by.

Cecilia Corona Website

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Tricky Time Travel Writing by Sarah J. McNeal

Writing Time Travel

I love to read a good time travel story. I also love to write them, but writing time travel is not easy. As an author, I realize time travel writing is tricky. It’s not just about researching a time period where the character is going to go or, even more difficult, taking them into the future and creating a believable world from pure imagination. But I believe above all other things in a time travel story there has to be a meaningful reason to take a character into another time. Something has to happen in that other time that is significant to the story plot and outcome—something of great importance to the characters.

And then there is the way to get to the other time period. It can’t be just any old thing. It has to be thought out and believable. If your readers find the transition to another time incredible, the whole story will seem contrived and lose the meaning you intended for it. If it’s done too easily without affecting the character in some way it will be unbelievable. Confusion, worry, the subtle dawning on what has transpired has to leave the character feeling something. It may require physical distress or mental anguish, but it can’t just happen without some consequence to the character.

I read a time travel once where the heroine could go and come through a specific portal with ease, whenever she wanted. This ease and control of the heroine to do this took away the worry and the consequences for the heroine and, in my opinion, ruined the story’s intensity.

LECENDS OF WINATUKE TRILOGY

By Sarah J. McNeal

Paranormal novels filled with adventure, magic, evil creatures and undying love for 99 cents

DARK ISLE, Book 1

The legend begins when love and evil collide.

LAKE OF SORROWS, Book 2

The legend continues with a curse, a quest and undying love.

THE LIGHT OF VALMORA, Book 3

A quest for an enchanted light...a Gypsy’s love...and a warrior’s sacrifice to save Valmora.

Buy Link 

In my paranormal trilogy, Legends of Winatuke, my characters travel from the world we know in present day to another dimension in which the time has stopped in the medieval period. They must have the magical sphere, the Rock of Ages, in order to travel to that other world to help their friends fight against the witch-queen. Without the sphere, they’re stuck wherever they might be. There are consequences. None of the technology they possess can pass through the barrier between dimensions. They must fight with medieval weapons only. Physical consequences occur they must contend with as well. For a time the travelers feel drained of energy and experience physical discomfort from their journey.

Do you read time travel stories? What story was your favorite? Do you write time travel? What entices you to write about traveling in time? Do you find it complicated to write?

Sarah J. McNeal is a multi-published author of several genres including time travel, paranormal, western and historical fiction. She is a retired ER and Critical Care nurse who lives in North Carolina with her four-legged children, Lily, the Golden Retriever and Liberty, the cat. Besides her devotion to writing, she also has a great love of music and plays several instruments including violin, bagpipes, guitar and harmonica. Her books and short stories may be found at Prairie Rose Publications and its imprints Painted Pony Books, and Fire Star Press. Some of her fantasy and paranormal books may also be found at Publishing by Rebecca Vickery and Victory Tales Press. She welcomes you to her website and social media:

Website 

My Amazon Author’s Page

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The Wildings

Fantasy and Dreams Blog

Sweethearts of the West

Prairie Rose Publications Blog

On Writing a Damaged Hero by Lindsay Downs @ldowns2966 @RebeccaJVickery #romance

Writing a Damaged Hero

When Karen Nutt invited me to submit for the Be My Everything anthology I was ecstatic. My next problem, come up with not only a story but the hero and heroine. For those of you who are aware of my work I write regency cozy mysteries and romantic suspense. With that said, the story line came easy. Either a murder, kidnapping or some variation on one or the other.

The two main characters or at least the hero gave me problems. How can I created a damaged hero, Guy, Earl of Tining Abbey, while at the same time make him believable. Through a little backstory at the beginning of the book you learn of and how he was injured. Then you, my dear reader, learn why he retreated to his primary estate.

I should point out with his wound writing several scenes proved to be more difficult than I first thought. In particular, while at a ball and requesting a waltz from the heroine, Lady Julia. Once I was able to overcome this initial dilemma the scene became very easy to write. I will point out though, when many of the grand dames and matrons of the ton watched them waltz they weren’t happy. As you can plainly see from the following passage Lady Julia is a strong, determined young lady. (I put it in italics so as to separate it from the rest of this post.)

"M' lord, I've heard some of the ladies had been vicious in their words about you. When I first arrived from the houseparty several, who shall remain nameless, were still gossiping about your venture into the ballrooms. As I hadn't made your acquaintance yet I held my tongue. Now that we've met and I am under your protection, but not wishing to cause problems, if I hear anything untoward I shan't be quiet," Julia declared.

As you can tell from Lady Julia’s words she isn’t put off by the earl’s injury. This continues to puzzle Guy until he meets with her father, The Duke of Shamton. The duke suffers the same affliction, caused by the same enemy, French artillery, but in a different war.

Would I write another hero with an injury-yes. I believe in doing so adds strength to the character. 

About me-

I’ve been an avid reader ever since I was old enough to hold a red leather bound first edition copy of Sir Walter Scott’s The Lady of the Lake in my lap.

So it only seemed natural at some point in my life I take up pen and paper to start writing. Over time my skills slightly improved which I attribute to my English teachers.

My breakthrough came about in the mid 1970’s when I read a historical romance written by Sergeanne Golon, Angelique. This French husband and wife team opened my eyes to the real world of fiction. Stories about romance, beautiful damsels, handsome heroes and plots which kept me hooked. Of course, being a man, I had to keep my reading hidden from others as that wasn’t appropriate reading for men.

With this new found appreciation of the written word I took up other books and devoured them as a starving person would a plate of food. I them attempted to write again. I still wasn’t satisfied so I put it aside for years as other events entered my life.

Finally, in the early years of the new millennium I tried again to write and once again met with limited success. At least now I was able to get past the first page or two. Then, in 2006 a life changing event brought me back to my love, I took a job as a security officer. This allowed me plenty of time to read different genres.

My favourite was regency. As I poured through everyone I could get my hands on I knew this could be something I wanted to attempt.

Since 2012 when my debut regency romantic suspense released I was hooked and have, except for a few contemporaries, focused on this genre.

Since 2012 I’ve lived in central Texas. I’m also a member of Romance Writers of America and their local chapter.

Where you can find me-

Facebook- http://tinyurl.com/pgq8vzz

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Twitter- @ldowns2966

LinkedIn- http://tinyurl.com/e8t56

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Lindsay Downs-Romance Author- http://tinyurl.com/kvfz468

Amazon- http://tinyurl.com/ktem76c