If you like to read interesting posts and win stuff: Visit the Mid Summer Dream Fair! My post is called The Stage and it’s coming up at the end of the month.
If you want to win a paperback copy of the Day of Sacrifice Omnibus: Sign up on Goodreads or…sign up on that big sign up widget thingy over in the sidebar there.
If you want to get two monthly newsletters about new releases from the Indelibles and the Pacific Northwest YA Authors: Click the link for the Indelibles and for the PacNWYAAuthors to sign up.
Row80 update: I’m making decent progress on the pen name stories and I purchased an e-book cover, so that’s a done deal. I thought of yet another funny story for the BABD blog…and someday I might actually write it and the other 17 stories I have to put on there. I haven’t worked anymore on Found.
With the kids out of school and my husband only working away from home three days a week, I just can’t get anyone to leave me alone. If I didn’t have to pay for a new roof in July, I’d seriously consider renting office space and putting the kids in day care for a few hours every day!
Whenever people interview me they always ask how I manage to write books and stay at home with the kids. It’s a friggin’ MIRACLE that’s how. I have no idea. It just gets done and never in as timely a manner as I want.
Cheri Lasota has now released the paperback of her YA historical fantasy, Artemis Rising. The story is unusual, mixing two different mythologies into a complex love story exploring the nature of belief and self-discovery.
The e-book is on Amazon,but if you’re interested in winning a paperback copy, please fill out the form at the end of this post!
The Story
On the voyage home to the Azores Islands, Eva accepts the pagan name of Arethusa but learns too late that her life will mirror the Greek nymph’s tragic end. Her mother reveals that her destiny lies with Diogo, the shipowner’s volatile son. But Eva has a vision of another…
When the ship founders in a storm off the coast, Tristan, a local boy, saves her life and steals her heart. Destined to be with Diogo yet aching for Tristan’s forbidden love, Eva must somehow choose between them, or fate will choose for her.
A Conversation with the Author
Q: How did you conceive of Artemis Rising?
A: This is a difficult question. How does anyone come up with a creative idea? I generally don’t understand the mechanism which allows me to breathe life into characters and weave plots and develop universal themes within the context of a historical setting. I am truly only grateful that I’m paying attention long enough to write it all down. Some days it comes easily, some days I think and think and nothing comes to me. But Artemis Rising? Wow, it is a mish- mash of all my longings and fears. It is an amalgam of all my hopes for the future and my memories in the pleasures of the past. It is a laundry list of my most treasured interests and passions. It is also complete and utter fiction. Does that answer your question?
Okay, something a bit more specific. I used to live in the Azores Islands, a profound privilege that went by far too quickly. But the place and its people have stayed with me some fifteen years later, and I knew that no matter what my book would eventually be about, I would set it on Terceira Island, one of the great loves of my life. The setting being carved in stone, I wondered what to write about for the plot. No answer forthcoming, I played on the Internet (what else is a writer to do?). I remember looking up the meaning of my favorite name in all the world, Tristan. That’s when I stumbled upon the Arthurian legend of Tristan and Isolde. Ooh, did I revel in this delicious story! Mad love and longing, knights and ladies, treachery and tragedy—what’s not to love? And then another day, perhaps months later, I was researching mythology. Can’t recall why. I came across the story of Alpheus and Arethusa and noticed strange similarities to the Tristan and Isolde myth. Something just clicked in my mind. I thought, what would happen if I squished those two myths together? What if they became the subtext to my own story. . .? And my mind went racing on with the possibilities.
Q: Is there a genre that you enjoy reading that you would never attempt writing? (Mine’s Steampunk.)
Occasionally I read scifi, but I don’t think I’d ever attempt it myself. I’m a little terrified of the research involved in the science of scifi. I’d secretly love to write a space opera, because astronomy endlessly fascinates me. But oh! I can’t imagine trying to create an interplanetary drama complete with spacecraft and lightspeed. Just the thought—gah!
Q: How has being an editor helped/hurt your writing?
Sigh. I really wish I could turn off my Inner Editor. She’s been a living hell for me for years, stymying my creative endeavors and enabling my procrastination. So it’s been a detriment in many ways. On the positive side, it’s been incredibly useful when it came time to editing the novel. My knowledge of grammar, punctuation, rhythm, and structure has been a wonderful asset through the long process of creating this novel.
Q: When did you start skiing?
During the winter season, I work out my writing frustration with a little downhill skiing. Or rather a lot. I slalom race now and my obsession is now speed. If you knew me well, you’d find this amusing given how slow I am in all other aspects of my life. Well, except driving. But that’s another story. I started skiing when I was a shy thirteen. I was terrible then. And terribly afraid of going too fast. I took a break for a decade and picked it back up when I moved to the Northwest. Now I ski most every weekend during the season. Love it!
Watch Dr. Veronica Esagui’s interview of Cheri Lasota on the Author’s Forum:
The Artemis Rising Blog Hop Giveaway: Enter to win one paperback copy of the newly released Artemis Rising! (US residents only please.)
I was going to title this post,”It’s Hard Out Here For A Pimp” because I believe I’ve already titled two posts Big Pimpin’, but then I thought I’d go with a non-pimpesque title. Besides, I’m not familiar with the current pimp climate, and for all I know it’s not that hard out here for one.
Right.
Anyhoo, I’m going to be on John Rakestraw’s Blog radio show tomorrow at 10:30 am West Coast time. If you’d like to tune in, the link to the show is here. If my writerly friends have any new releases they’d like me to mention, let me know in the comments and I’d be happy to give you a shout-out if I get some shout-out time.
I think I’ll predominantly be talking about the DoS stories and will be giving an update on what’s up with Takeover and the rest of the series. Sarah and I had a good discussion about them last night when we went to see The Help and I’m feeling swell about the whole thing.
I also wanted to let all my readers know that the second book in the Talent Chronicles, Heroes ‘Til Curfew is coming out really soon. If you haven’t read the first book, Hush Money, get on that and then pick up HTC. I beta read it and it’s simply awesome. Definitely a stay up way past your bedtime read.
That’s all for this evening, I’m off to decorate a parade float. Have a great weekend!
Behold. The Zellie Wells trilogy has all new covers!
I finally gave in to all the pressure from the road and transparent building haterz and put Zellie on the covers. I’m quite pleased with them and think my sister did an awesome job.
I’d been reluctant to put a person on the cover because I didn’t want to influence reader’s ideas of what the characters looked like. (That’s also why I don’t spend much time describing them except initially.)
For me, I know that when I’m reading a book, most of the time what I picture the characters looking like and the suggestion of what they look like on the cover don’t jibe. Maybe I’m weird that way. (In my mind, Peeta from the Hunger Games is the brunette and Gale is the blonde.)
But, then I got this Land’s End catalog in the mail and there was Zellie right on the front. The exact Zellie that’s in my head and she was posing with a cute brunette Avery-in-his-twenties to boot! My sister had someone to model her drawings after.
It was meant to be.
Thank you, Universe!
Another great thing that happened to me this week (don’t worry, it hasn’t all been roses) is that author Angela Carlie asked if she could interview me on her blog. She does a series on Fridays called (Someday) Famous YA Author. She asked great questions and is a super cool person. You guys should totally read her books. You can read my interview here.
And now for the dandelion part of my week.
ROW80 update: Glow’s not finished yet. I had my butt in the chair writing on it all week, but I hit a wall on Thursday. Chapter 19 made the Chapter 11 debacle look like a day at the fair. I rewrote it seven times between Thursday and Friday and then I had to give up and watch Kyle XY and eat cookies.
Things went better on Saturday. I managed to get my act together and fix 19 and then bust out 20 and 21. I’m halfway through 22, which is the big action-y showdown and then all that’s left is the epilogue.
I really wanted to get Glow out in June because my sales are tanking, (I’ve sold as many books this month as I was selling per day in March) but it looks like it will be out in July. This means the next DoS story will probably be out in August instead of July.
And then I’m taking a three-week vacation because I be burnt out.
On the upside, the tanking sales have forced me to do some actual marketing. I tweeted about The Toilet Business in a, hopefully, not annoying way all day today. That effort garnered me a new review and two copies sold. Yay!
Okay, that’s all the blabbing I can handle for today. I apologize for the paragraph I used the word “out” in 16 times. I was going to schedule this post to go live at midnight and it’s 12:13. Time for bed!
Round two of ROW80 starts on April 4th. To sign up, go here. I’m not saving anything up for it this time as I’ve already taken a little break before starting work on Glow, so I’ll just keep working on that.
So, yeah, GOALS: Finish Glow. Edit Glow. Send Glow to betas. Edit Glow again. Publish Glow. That is it. I’m all about the Glow, people.
Except: My brain is crazy and I had a fab idea for a rom-com at 3 in the morning the other day. Thus, there might be some noodling on The Five Engagements of Ruby McClure and I’ve also got the 4th DoS story, Takeover, to bust out at the end of this round.
But THAT IS ALL. Really. I’m not working on anything else!
Now for some links to things that other hardworking folks are doing:
Jessica Subject is a writer and book blogger who is celebrating the blogoversary for her blog, Mark of the Stars this April. There will be author interviews, reviews, guest blogs and giveaways aplenty. The schedule is here. My post is on April 25th. I’ve offered up e-copies of all of my books for the massive month-long giveaway. There are soooo many good things to win!
Today over at Electrifying Reviews, you can enter to win a paperback copy of Angela Charlie’s debut, Dream Smashers! It’s international, y’all!
Keyboard Hussy, (otherwise known as Evelyn Lafont) is having a party on Facebook to celebrate the release of her new book The Vampire Relationship Guide, Volume 1: Meeting and Mating. Check here for all the deets.
And, if you get the chance, please remember to tell everyone you have ever known that likes to read e-books that Glimpse is 99 cents for the month of April on Smashwords, Barnes and Noble and Amazon. That would be swell of you.
Now back to working on Glow. I finally got all the characters out of their respective cars.
Happy Sunday! This is our next to last ROW80 check-in for this round? Man, that flew by!
I haven’t done any writing since the beginning of the week, but I have been doing a lot of editing and formatting. Dormant is up on Smashwords and Barnes and Noble now. It’s still publishing on Amazon. Hopefully it will be up by tomorrow.
Also, check out this interview I did over at Lara Dunning’s blog. I definitely get interviewed about Glimpse and Glimmer more often, so it was nice to answer some DoS questions. I actually had to think about my answers.
That’s it for today. I’m recovering from staying up way past my bedtime at a disco birthday party last night. I taught a bunch of people how to do the Hustle, which should illustrate what a good time I had. I am looking forward to doing nothing the rest of the day, that is after I wash the entire bottle of hairspray I used out of my Jacyln Smith hair-do.
Indie authors! If you would like to donate/bid on items to help out our friends in Japan get on over to Indie Authors Relief Fund. I donated signed copies of Glimpse and Glimmer. It is incredibly easy to do and, frankly, the least we can do. To submit donations send an e-mail to: Kristie@KristieCook.com
In other booky news: you know how I was doing all of those interviews a couple weeks back? A new one (with a killer giveaway) posted this morning over at I’m A Reader, Not a Writer. I get a little bit silly.
It’s the Friday before Spring Break in these parts. Alas, we’ll be rockin’ a staycation at the Benefiel house, but hopefully I’ll get lots of work done and the kids will enjoy a week of pajama wearing. What are you all doing for your Spring Break? Let me live vicariously.
So, I may have panicked. I thought I needed the rest of March off, but what I really needed was to not be accountable to anyone but myself for a week. Apparently, that makes me get my act together. Hmmm. I told you all I would rebel against ROW80 eventually, whether I wanted to or not!
I finished Dormant yesterday after writing an awesome 5,508 words on Monday. I used Focus Booster, which is basically a timer, and it somehow tricks your brain into writing. (Or getting other tasks done, but like I’m going to use it for cleaning. I still have to have an excuse to get out of that.)
I’ve left Dormant alone for a day, so my goal for today is to read through it, fix minor things like typos or weird sentences and then send it to Sarah. As for the rest of the week, I’m taking a bit of writing time off, but I have Glimmer typos to fix and then I’ll re-upload it to all the various platforms. I might even fix the paperback too while I’m at it.
Yesterday, Day of Sacrifice got a lovely review from Lara Dunning on her blog. You can check it out here. She’ll also be reviewing Rebellion sometime this week and on Sunday she’ll post an interview with me as well as a giveaway.
On another note, have you all read Lori Brighton’s story, Wild Passion, in Kiss Me, Kill Me? Well, I loved it! Therefore, I am super stoked that Wild Desire is free on Amazon and B&N right now! Who knows why (she doesn’t) or for how long, so if you’re a fan, I’d snap that freebie up! Wild Desire is the second book, but the first book Wild Heart is only $3.19 on Amazon. Deals are swell.
That’s all I’ve got to report for today. Tonight I’m going to see The Adjustment Bureau. I have to admit that 85% of my excitement at seeing it has to do with Matt Damn in that hat. Ooh, lawdy.
Happy Monday? It’s a holiday…but most people I know have to go to work and the kids don’t have school. Helpful.
We’re swinging back around to Bri Meets Books on the Glimpse Blog Tour today. Zellie took some of the heat off of me and did an interview. She only kinda sounds like a dork in it, so you should give it a look-see.
And another thing, I keep posting the wrong thing to get people to LIKE the YA Indie Author page on Facebook, let’s see if I can get it right. What is this page you say? Indie author V.J. Chambers put together a FB page with all the RSS feeds from a bunch of indie YA authors’ blogs. If you’re an indie YA author and you’d like to be included, let me know and I’ll pass along your info. Okay, you can LIKE the page here.
Hope your day is great! I had grand plans to clean up the backyard while the kids played outside, but it seems our sunny weather has vanished. Oh, well. Maybe I’ll be able to get some writing in?
Today the Glimpse tour continues at Books Complete Me. There’s a fun interview for your perusal and a giveaway! I’m giving away e-copies of Glimpse and Glimmer at each stop on the tour and one set of paperbacks overall. The giveaway is international, so if you live in Japan or something and want print copies of my books, you should enter!
I hope everyone had a great Valentine’s Day! My sister had her baby late yesterday morning and I’m now an aunt for the third time! My new niece is beyond adorable and I just want to give her a billion kisses. It’s ridiculous.
Wish me luck braving the Ke$ha concert tonight. I’m going to be the second oldest person there, I’m sure of it.
I’m quite pleased with them and think my 
