Friend Friday: Angie Lofthouse

Guest Post by Angie Lofthouse. If you want to meet her in person check out her webpage HERE and see if she's coming to a Costco near you :)



Rebellious is not a word usually used to describe me. But when it comes to my journey to publication, rebellion seems to be the name of the game.


First of all, everyone knows that you won't publish the first novel you write, right? It's true. Except my book that just came out, Defenders of the Covenant? Yep. First novel I ever wrote. Okay, let me explain. I started out writing short stories. I'd been writing for about four years when I wrote Defenders. I submitted it around for a while, got a lot of rejections and shelved it. For ten years. During that ten years I wrote more short stories. Lots and lots of short stories. I even got a bunch of them published. I honed my craft on short stories, so when I pulled out that novel again after ten years, I was ready to turn it into something really great! So it's true you won't publish the first thing you write. I sure didn't!

Then there's the unspoken rule that you cannot combine LDS fiction with science fiction. Actually, I didn't know about this rule until after I'd written and LDS science fiction novel. Oops. My bad! When I started submitting again, I was told over and over by people who know what they are talking about that there is no market for LDS science fiction. I refused to believe them. I feel very blessed and fortunate that Walnut Springs decided to take a chance on it. I guess it's marketability is still being proven, but I love how when I tell people my book is an LDS sci-fi novel, their eyes light up. It makes me smile.

So, there you go. I guess I'm a rebel after all! Go ahead and be a rebel too. Chase those impossible dreams. You'll get there if you never give up!

To learn more about Defenders of the Covenant, visit my website!

Friend Friday- Selah Janel

Guest Post by Selah Janel a blogger and author of Mooner (Amazon, B&N, No Boundaries) and The Other Man (ARe, B&N, Amazon)

Genre Fiction Fun

I’ve tried to deny it for the longest time, but it’s unavoidable. I apparently can’t quote space-operas, can’t proclaim my undying love of Cthulhu, can’t go on and on about the significance of fairy tales and folklore, and can’t give on-the-spot dissertations about vampires without admitting that I maybe, just maybe, might be a teeny-tiny, little bit of a geek. Kind of. Nah, I’ve always been enthusiastic about imaginative things; if they involved other worlds and heaps of detail, I generally went nuts over them. It’s a trait that continues to this day, though I’ve generally calmed down and don’t bolt across a crowded room to glee all over the place about a new movie, album, book, or whatever (Except at cons. I still tend to let me inner geek out at cons quite a bit.) It’s probably inevitable that I started writing. Granted, as a kid I could’ve cared less about terms like urban fantasy and horror, but I was obsessed with the what-if of a situation even then. Plus, I grew up in the eighties, a grand era when every toy had five million accessories and its own television show and even cartoons like the Care Bears had enemies that suspiciously resembled the Necronomicon.

I love genre fiction because there’s so much freedom in it. Every time that we think an area’s been tapped and there’s nothing more to say someone else comes along and points us in a new direction. Think magic has been tapped because Harry Potter’s over? Well may I point you to the works of Tolkein, C.S. Lewis, Yeats’ fairy tale collections, Inkheart, Holly Black’s graphic novels and teen titles, and the Belgariad? Seeking other vampire fiction to fulfill your bloodlust? Might I suggest Interview with the Vampire, The Sonja Blue series, The Lost Boys, Lord of the Dead, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Fat Vampire, or any number of night-crawling titles? For those that either aren’t satisfied with Hunger Games or for when that age bracket grows up there’s always Battle Royale. There’s Star Wars, Star Trek, Stargate, Battlestar Galactica, Farscape, and Firefly for the sci-fi crowd. Horror extends from Stephen King to Clive Barker to splatter punk and gore to psychological and thriller. And for those who just want something different and otherworldly there’s Dr. Who and the entire works of Ray Bradbury and Neil Gaiman. There are always options and it’s popular to rant about how everyone’s copying each other and nothing’s good. Granted I can be a little cynical around the edges at times with certain titles too, but we’re actually incredibly lucky to have so many choices that reach to the ends of possibility and back. What’s even better is that for every idea that’s put out there, there’s still room for more. As long as there’s imagination and someone willing to watch or read it, there’s always going to be room for genre fiction and film.

There’s something about the unexplained and supposedly impossible that’s just amazing to me. It doesn’t matter if it’s expressed in gorgeous magical ways or dark and sinister – there’s just something beautiful in the what if. What if there’s someone else out there in the universe that we just haven’t met yet? What if magic is just waiting to be discovered and we haven’t rubbed the right lamp or said the right words yet? What if we’re all just a hair away from losing who we really are or claiming our rightful place as heroes? There’s so much that can be done with the what if! I love it – and I totally reject the notion that genre works aren’t as legit as “real” literature. The very fact that the general, everyday public can enjoy and relate to it is awesome, and so many genre stories carry amazing metaphors and emotional journeys.

As a reader I love walking down all those roads of possibility. Admittedly I like to try to guess the outcomes and I’m always dumbfounded and pleasantly surprised when someone can stump me or get me to fall for a bait and switch. As a writer I love all the different winding roads that I can meander down with fantasy, urban fantasy, magic realism, and horror. It’s just as much fun coming up with the what-ifs as it is discovering them as a reader. What also gives me hope is that despite all the marketing that seems to push the need for the next big magical, other-world story, there’s a genuine desire from people who actually want to read fantasy, sci-fi, and horror. Call it an escape, call it a deft way of finding something that people connect with in a world that seems crazy most of the time, but I call it a powerful, wonderful trend that’s hopefully here to stay. 

Friend Friday: Heather Davis

Guest Post by Heather Davis, the Minivan Mamma who blogs at minivan-momma.com

WHERE IS PETER COTTONTAIL???

The magical and mystical entities that deliver such great joy to most of the children in the world seem to cause great trepidation to the children in our home.  

Santa Claus does all right for the most part – there was that one Christmas, though, when the “jolly ol’ elf” woke up our daughters playing Wii basketball. 

The Tooth Fairy is a forgetful but consistent soul who delivers her coin the morning after the tooth is evacuated, generally while the toothless one is crying really big tears over her cereal, wondering why her little tooth is worth nothing even though her sister’s last tooth got a dollar!

But the biggest slacker of all is the Easter Bunny.  Maybe it’s because he has Friday off or maybe it’s because the Easter Bunny goes to the brink of a diabetic coma thanks to those sinfully delicious peanut butter eggs, but there is something about Easter that brings the Easter Bunny to light as a shirker.

It’s because of the Easter Bunny that we have a hard and fast holiday rule at our house:  The Daughters must wake up Momma and Daddy before they do anything else. No tinkling.  No brushing.  No nothing until Momma gives the OK.

This rule was not arbitrarily placed.  It was mandated after a series of Easter episodes.  There was that one Easter that our daughters ran into the living room to discover that the Easter Bunny had left nothing.  They raced to our bedroom only to find their Easter baskets next to our dirty clothes hamper.  They also discovered a couple of peanut butter egg wrappers.  WRAPPERS!  That was the Easter they discovered that the ol’ Bunny had a thing for not cleaning up after himself.

On another occasion, the Easter Bunny suddenly woke at 3:17 AM with the odd feeling that he was forgetting something.  At 3:25, after a frantic search through the closet, it was discovered that the Easter Bunny had forgotten to buy basket supplies and made a quick little jog to the 24-hour super-galactic store to grab whatever leftovers were assembled on the clearance aisle.  (A bonus to this was that the items were marked down!)

And still another year, the Easter Bunny was making her way through a department store and grabbed a few basket stuffers forgetting that the owners of said-baskets were standing right beside her at that very moment.  When the basket owners questioned the Easter Bunny about said items, the Easter Bunny actually replied with, “These are for your baskets,” before realizing the surprise might – just might – have been blown!

This year, however, the Easter Bunny is ahead of the game.  After ten years of serving (or stressing) our family, he thought ahead.  Gift cards.  Easy, small and already bought.  I just hope he remembers where they are hidden before Sunday morning!

Heather Davis, Minivan Momma, has figured it all out. Follow along as she shares her tricks on how to juggle being a full-time, work-outside-the-home momma with two crazy, start-the-day-fighting daughters all while keeping her home neat and tidy, her toilets clean and her husband satisfied in bed (and not just on Saturday nights!).  OK – it’s only one “trick”. The trick is to ignore it all. Also, drink lots of sangria.  And laugh every day. You’re always welcome to laugh at her!  www.minivan-momma.com

Friend Friday: Melissa Lemon

Guest Post by Melissa Lemon, blogger at the Lemon Inkwell and author of Cinder and Ella.
http://cinderandellabook.com/
http://lemoninkwell.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/authormelissalemon

Why we can’t get enough of fantasy worlds—according to me.

Let’s face it.  Humans are lame.  We can’t fly or hold fire in the palm of our hands or wave a magic wand to thwart our enemies.  But I, for one, wish I could.  I think this is one reason that we love the fantasy genre and always will.  There is something inside of us that longs to be more than creatures subject to gravity and the laws of physics; something that hopes mystical creatures existed at one point and may again; something that wonders if there are worlds beyond our own and if we would just reach a little further...

Don’t get me wrong; there are wonderful things we can do as humans, and sometimes they may even seem like magic (like when my kids cleaned the toy room last night by themselves in record time).  But I think for the most part, we live typical, repetitive, often mundane lives.  Perhaps this is enough for some, but many of us crave a little more adventure, and that’s why we read and write those fantasy novels.  They act like the fire escape outside our windows, but instead of leading to the street below, they sweep us off to some unexpected and usually charming—though at times fearsome— place.  We get to leave our world behind for a time and enter a world with trolls, magic trees, or evil witches that we have to destroy.  And when one book is over, we grab another, and the world is new again; there are more friends to meet, different obstacles to overcome, fresh heroes and heroines to fall in love with.

But maybe we have more in common with fantasy characters than we realize.  With all of the fantasy books I’ve read, not one character has been so good at what they do that they didn’t have to practice.  Sounds a little human, doesn’t it?  Usually they have families, problems, certain abilities or talents, and people who are trying to bring them down.  Don’t we all have a little bit of each of those things?  With fantasy, these elements of life are taken to a whole new level, but while on the journey, we learn how to deal with all of these things a little better.  We breathe easier because it is nice to believe that someone is going through the same things (or worse).  We don’t feel so alone.  We can climb back up that fire escape, crawl through the window and face our lives again.  It is a thing of beauty.

Sometimes I wonder if we came from a place where things were a little more magical, and if part of us somehow remembers that and longs to have it again.  Who knows?  Anything’s possible, especially in a fantasy novel.

(As I was typing this, my kids came running in the room, one pretending she was flying and the other riding a magic Pegasus.  I rest my case.)

What superhuman ability would you have if you could choose?

Friend Friday: Carolyn Frank

Editors Note: This was a major faux pas on my part. This was scheduled to go live on friday but something went wrong :( I feel terrible about that since it was a bit time sensitive. But I want to post it now and make a public apology to Carolyn.

Guest Post by Carolyn Frank a blogger and an author with her first book coming out! 

Writing and Reading Historical Fiction
by Carolyn Frank



     I remember, as a newlywed, hearing my mother-in-law tell stories of her mother growing up in the newly formed town of Tropic and playing in the nearby canyon—that being Bryce’s Canyon as we know it. That had always evoked fun day dreams. Several years ago my husband came across the hand-written memoirs of his grandmother, Hattie, Adair Jolley. A good friend of ours, Brad Westwood, the historian over acquisitions at the LDS Church History library, encouraged us to donate her memoirs to the library. In return he gave us a type-written transcription of the memoirs on CD.

     When I started my writing career, I drew from those day dreams, read Hattie’s memoirs in detail, and did a lot of research. The culmination of those efforts has come forward as my first novel, Promises. (My blog tour starts tomorrow. I’d love for you to hop on over to my blog and see what others are saying about making promises, and about my book).

     Studying about real people in the past has made history come alive for me. I have found writing historical fiction a very satisfying and rewarding pursuit. I love taking stories from the past of real people and intertwining them with fiction to make for a satisfying read. I also love to read this kind of book. In well written historical novels, not only anticipate being entertained with a good story, but I expect to learn about some, or many, tidbits of history. Some historical fiction novels perform, and many do not. Many I find, though touted as historical fiction, fit into the category of historic fiction, where the story is merely set in the past but all events are fictitious.

     What are your feelings about reading historical fiction verses historic fiction? Which do you find more intriguing? Or do you find them boring?

Friend Friday: Belinda Olsen

Guest Post: Belinda is a talented photographer that I have the pleasure of calling, friend. I asked her if she wouldn't take a minute to inspire us. If you want so see more of Belinda's work you can visit her website (which is art by itself) HERE

Belinda Olsen

Why would a photographer be a guest writer on a writing blog? (I can tell you it is certainly not because of my prolific writing ability!) Writers and photographers are both storytellers. One, by unfolding an experience through the written word and the other by literally capturing a moment in time.

 A more subtle answer was profound for me personally. *As creatives we need to get out of our own genre to look for inspiration.* It’s too easy to compare and limit ourselves when we only look to our own genre for ideas. There are several photographers I love to follow but only if they pass my ‘happy day’ test:

1. Am I truly inspired by seeing their work and leave with my own ideas?
2. Do I leave feeling uplifted and motivated to improve?

If the answer is no to any of these questions I honestly think twice before I visit again.

 There is beauty all around us. Why limit the way we see inspiration to what we are comfortable of familiar with? Stop your mundane habits and try something new today! Visit a local museum and watch how people interact with each other and how they experience the art. Lay in the grass and watch the clouds roll by with the breeze grazing your cheeks. Listen to a new artist and really hear how the melody tells their story. Go to a restaurant and see how the chef presents their creation with colorful, carefully placed garnishes. Have your child read to your their favorite book and listen to the different pitches and voices they use to articulate each character. 

Find inspiration in other mediums you love. 

I promise it will rejuvenate the way you express yourself.