Let Me Check ‘Charms of the Feykin’ and . . .

Posted on September 23, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz
Ron Burgundy

Ron Burgundy

So, I was running around all morning and Legends of Windemere: Charms of the Feykin was in the 45,000 range with rankings.  Came home, unpacked groceries, reported parent/teacher info to others, checked dinner plans, ate lunch, and sat down to write.  First, I had to check the book just on a whim:

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,438 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

  • #45 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > Men’s Adventure
  • #59 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > Men’s Adventure
  • #66 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > Women’s Adventure
Yahoo Image Search

Yahoo Image Search

Glad I finished my soda before this because I didn’t see it coming.  Thought, I’d spend a lot more time dancing around the low and mid 100’s.  I mean, this was a really great jump and it’s even higher on the connected Hot New Release lists.  I believe it’s #8 on the one connected to Men’s Adventures.  Now, I will admit that I would have liked to be on the Fantasy lists too, but this is just as good.  Honestly, my hopes of getting onto a list where 8 of the Top 10 are Harry Potter aren’t very high  This continues the trend of Legends of Windemere books showing up on Top 100 lists within their first month, which is something I’m proud of.

So . . . Guess I’ll go back to writing with a smile.

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Grab your copy of CHARMS OF THE FEYKIN now!

Sorry.  Couldn’t hold that one in.

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7 Ways to Anger a God (Survival Not Guaranteed)

Posted on September 23, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz
God from Monty Python

God from Monty Python

If you live in a world where gods and goddesses are around then you might want to know how to avoid angering them.  That isn’t this list.  Here we have 7 surefire ways to piss off a deity that has the temperament to show up at your door and turn you into a balloon animal.  Though warnings have been added to avoid responsibility.

  1. Let’s go with the obvious: peeing in their temple.  This is especially disrespectful with water deities.  I know it’s tough with all the waterfalls and trickling noises.  Just hold it in or ask where the bathroom is.  If the choices are between embarrassment or holy wrath then the first option is usually the best.
  2. Request for something bad to happen to the god you’re praying to.  It really doesn’t work that way.  Yes, it would be funny to see the God of War trip over his own foot in the middle of a battle.  That doesn’t mean you keep asking him to do it like he’s your personal circus clown.  We’re going to include requesting goddesses to have wardrobe malfunctions here too.
  3. Snack on the edible sacrifices and gifts that other patrons have left at the temple.  This is why you eat before going to pray.  Those grapes are tempting and the roasted cow smells delicious.  Not to mention there’s usually alcohol around for both sacrifice and holy ceremonies.  Still, it isn’t like this stuff will go to waste.  If the god or goddess doesn’t show up to eat then those who live in the temple do stuff with it.  This is basically theft and the victim probably has a history of vengeful acts.  How attached to your toes are you?
  4. Ask the goddesses to be your girlfriend, wife, servant, or concubine.  Do I really have to explain why this is a bad idea?  Let’s be fair and admit that it isn’t a good idea to do this to the gods either.
  5. Declare a holy war against a deity and their followers.  Now this might seem like an obvious mistake, but it takes a lot of work.  You need to follow proper desecration protocols and pick a flashy symbol for your army.  Just kidding.  Break a few temples, kill some of the priests, and then you have an enraged immortal baring down on you like you’re the dinosaur who happened to be standing where the asteroid hit.  Come on, we all know there had to be one really luckless bastard on that one.
  6. Say the wrong name when praying.  You thought saying the wrong name during sex was bad?  At least your girlfriend/wife doesn’t hurl lightning or turn people into earthworms.  Then again, she might if you live in Windemere.
  7. Claim to be a god or goddess of something that is already taken.  This one takes time because you need to build up a following.  Best to learn some magic or set up some miracles to gain influence.  Within a few years, you’ll be on the verge of replacing your target within the pantheon.  Then, you’ll be killed.

Make Gabriel and the other gods of Windemere happy by checking out their hard work in Charms of the Feykin!

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Special Promotion – Davey & Derek Junior Detectives Series, Book 1, The Case of the Missing Cell Phone!

Posted on September 23, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz

jjspina's avatarJEMSBOOKS

Multi-award-winning book – click on cover for link!

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Special promotion for Davey&DerekJuniorDetectivesSeries,Book1, The Caseof  theMissing Cell Phone, on Amazon beginning September 24, 2016 – October 1, 2016 $1.99 for kindle copy!

Get in on all the fun adventures with twins Davey & Derek Donato! Go to link below.

https://www.amazon.com/Davey-Derek-Junior-Detectives-Missing-ebook/dp/B00X4RDMWO/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

Books 2 and 3 with plenty of magic and fun adventures for all available on http://Amazon.com/author/janicespina7

Click on covers for links too!

IMG_3651IMG_3576

Book 4 coming this fall with more adventures for the boys and lots of magic and mystery.

Happy reading!

Thank you for stopping by and for your kind support!

Remember : Reading Gives You Wings to Fly!

Blessings & hugs to all!

Janice

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Thursday Slow Down and . . . I Forgot

Posted on September 22, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz
Cover Art by Jason Pedersen

Cover Art by Jason Pedersen

Return to Windemere in Charms of the Feykin!

The opening promo meets two current needs:

  1. Promotes the book, which has been out for 8 days.
  2. Gives me a picture to put at the beginning.

I don’t know what it is about Thursday, but I rarely hit it with much energy.  This is a shame because it’s one of two days that I can dive right into writing when the kid is off at school.  Monday, Wednesday, and Friday are biking days, so I lose a little over an hour with that and the clean up.  This probably means I’m terrible at pacing myself or I take on too much every day. Could even be both, which is strange since I’ve managed to get to bed before midnight all week.  Even slept later, so maybe I’m actually getting more sleep than normal and my body isn’t used to it.

People tend to suggest a break, but that’s a double-edged sword.  I take a day to relax and things pile up to make the next day rough enough to drain the energy I regained.  Not to mention the rule that ‘An idle author is just asking for trouble’.  In the end, I’d rather work hard than let my attempt to rest get ruined by the idea that me sitting around is a sign I’m bored.  (This paragraph came out very much like a disclaimer.)

In the end, it is strange that Thursday is always the day where I’m dragging.  I could understand Friday, but it’s a little worrisome that I can’t even make it that far before being on the verge of collapse.  On the other hand, hearing the brewing tantrum behind me might explain things too.  My weekday mornings are never slow and steady, but a burst into action where I’m juggling email, blog, twitter, get kid dressed, kid’s breakfast, kid’s lunch, Wild Kratts, making sure the wife is awake to go to work, check dinner plan, and get the kid outside to hunt for acorns while waiting for the bus.  That’s the standard morning too, which doesn’t count appointments and meetings that occasionally turn up.

John Cleese/Monty Python

John Cleese/Monty Python

The Missing Topic

This was off the top of my head since I forgot what I was originally going to talk about.  It may have been book related, but I thought of it just as I was falling asleep.  There’s a vague memory of it being about book sales.  This might have stemmed from seeing a lot of posts this week about people not wanting to read or sales dying.  Charms of the Feykin is starting slow like the other books, so I’ve been drawn to this topic.  Still, I’m sure there has to be something and that’s what this missing topic might be connected to.  If I remember then . . . wait a second . . . oh, that’s good . . . Questions 3 might return next Thursday for this one.

Character from Some Old Pirate Movie

Character from Some Old Pirate Movie

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Fizzle the Drite, on Lisa Burton Radio

Posted on September 22, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz

Thanks for having me and Fizzle over. 🙂

coldhandboyack's avatarEntertaining Stories

Hi, and welcome to another edition of Lisa Burton Radio. I’m your host, Lisa the robot girl, and we’re going to try something a little bit different today. There is a character I’ve been dying to interview, but he’s kind of hard to catch up with.

Fizzle is a drite, and they can be kind of reclusive. If we don’t find him, I may have to think on the fly here for something to broadcast. I have a secret weapon though. I bought a beautiful basket of organic apples the last time I was at Whole Foods.

<Pop>

“OH! You scared me. Are you Fizzle?”

“Fizzle is Fizzle. Told to speak of self here. Uh . . . Fizzle small dragon. Fizzle live in woods. Fizzle leave woods to help friends. Tradespeak hard. Fizzle learn from tiny human. Fizzle love apples. What organic?”

“Oh my gosh, you’re so cute. For…

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The Creation of Windemere

Posted on September 21, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz
Dr. Evil

Dr. Evil

This post might be a little shorter than expected, but I was thinking about how every world has a creation myth.  At least, I think they should.  We have so many tales about the birth of the world that it’d be odd for a fictional world to not consider it.  Especially if there are gods who are probably responsible.  Windemere is such a place.

The first deity was Solar who went about creating Windemere and moons by following a dream.  Nobody knows where he came from or what drove him to create the world, but he did his job and went into a slumber.  He left behind his children who are the primordial deities.  These were led by Vir the Evil God, Ult the Good Goddess, Tavon the Despair Goddess, Canst the Hope God, and Gola the Magic Goddess.  As time continued and they created the organisms, landmasses, and systems, more deities appeared.  Some came from Solar’s dreams while others came about out of need.  Soon after this, the first Destiny God was named and would continue working with mortals until insanity set in.  This is what caused some trouble, but that goes beyond the creation myth.

Mortals don’t have much history prior to their existence and the basic ‘Solar and his children made the world’.  The rest tends to vary by species because they all appeared at different times.  The dragons, demons, and angels were first with disastrous results.  The demons were pure evil and wiped out the pure good angels while the neutral dragons remained out of the fight.  This event caused the creation of the Chaos Void to keep the demons away and the dragons were used as a basis for the other species.  This isn’t counting the more monstrous races.  Now, the next attempt was the creation of the Fireskins who helped give ideas for other species.  Out of the big races of modern Windemere, Dwarves and humans came next.  They were followed by gnomes, halflings, calicos, and orcs.  Vampires were an accident that also lead to the discovery of necrocasting.  Finally, the Hejinn were created and would go on to kick over the chessboard until they were defeated.  For those new to Windemere, they are the original, demon-tainted elves that the current species were born from.

So, what does this have to do with Charms of the Feykin?  All life was originally created in one area, which very few mortals have seen.  Only special individuals can reach the Birthing Lands and they have to do it a specific way.  At least one champion is about to find themselves in this holy place.  Though, there’s no way to know what is still up there waiting for company.  After all, not every creation of the gods was a success and they had to put the failures somewhere.

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Sundial by Sandra Cox

Posted on September 21, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz

coldhandboyack's avatarEntertaining Stories

Sandra Cox is one of the founding members of Story Empire, the collaborative effort I posted about recently. She’s here to tell us about one of her books that on sale right now for the incredible price of 99¢. Take it away, Sandra.

Time Travel Vehicles

If you could travel back in time and could choose your vehicle to get there what would it be? In stories, I’ve seen cars, mirrors, paintings used…the list goes on. For my time travel, I chose a sundial.

Sundials date back to thirteen century B.C. and at least one has survived from that time period. Over the centuries, can you imagine the energy that has been stored in that stone? Perhaps enough to carry someone into the past……

Blurb:

He came through time to find her.

As Sarah Miles drives down Eighteenth Street a stranger materializes in front of her car. She…

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#WW Penned Con St. Louis & Natasha Hanova Interview!

Posted on September 21, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz

Shannon A Thompson's avatarShannon A. Thompson

As you’re reading this, I’m probably packing books and trinkets and other wonderful goodies for Penned Con St. Louis! Last year, I attended this awesome convention as a reader, and I’m ecstatic to be attending this year as an author! Penned Con is on September 23 & 24 in St. Louis, Missouri, and I will be signing books, taking pictures, and just having a ton of fun with readers. (Click the link for tickets and more info.) I hope to see you there.

Natasha Hanova Natasha Hanova

On top of that, I’ll be sharing a booth with the wonderful and talented Natasha Hanova, so come check us out. We are on our way!

So, today, I’m breaking a blogging rule of mine and featuring an interview with this awesome lady!

Please welcome YA author Natasha Hanova! (Also, if you visit her website today, you can read my interview! Click here.)

Tell us…

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Smorgasbord Autumn Reading – The Donor by Stevie Turner – 99c until September 27th

Posted on September 21, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz
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Teaser Tuesday: Gathering and Hunting

Posted on September 20, 2016 by Charles Yallowitz

This is where the other champions are and is the start of another fight.  You’ll notice that there is something funny going on.  If this is confusing then I assure you that it’s supposed to be.  Part of the Charms of the Feykin story line is that a few heroes are acting strangely and the others need to find out why.  Though, I mention that in a few of the blurbs.  Hopefully, this one works out.

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