Tag Archives: Last Winter Red

Review of Make Believe Anthology

Are ya looking for Romancing Your E-Reader?  25 Ebooks Up for grabs!  Click Here to Enter!

ChristmasFiligree

Yay!  (I hope)  There is another review scheduled for today!  Please hop on over to Kindle and me http://www.kindleandme.com/2012/12/blog-tour-make-believe-by-ja-belfield.html and let me know what they said!

Thanks!

ChristmasFiligree

Make BelieveFor The Love Of Christmas CoverWhy all the hullabaloo? Well, it’s to promote my two new releases “Make Believe” and “For the Love of Christmas”

That’s why!

And don’t forget to click on “Enter to Win” for a chance to win your choice of the two titles! Yay!

Oh, I almost forgot… A few random commentors along the tour path will win their choice of anthologies, too. So be sure to hop on over and say “Hi”

ChristmasFiligree

Hop on over and send me some love!

Click on over to see Emily’s interview on Mywithershins

Check out today’s Review:  http://www.kindleandme.com/

ChristmasFiligree

Visit my Anthology buddies!  They are celebrating too!

Jenny Keller Ford

J.A. Belfield

Kelly Said

Lynda R. Young

Terri Rochenski

Janelle Lee

Dani-Lyn Alexander

JenniFer_EatonF

Advertisement

Yay! My First Character Interview! Jump into the head of Emily in Last Winter Red.

Are ya looking for Romancing Your E-Reader? 25 Ebooks Up for grabs! Click Here to Enter!

ChristmasFiligree

Oh My Gosh! I am so excited for today’s post because I’m not being interviewed today… my character Emily from Last Winter Red is being interviewed by Susan Rocan. I’ve never done this before, and I am so excited to sit down and get into her head, and answer questions from someone living in this century.

This was such a hoot! I really hope you enjoy it. Please hop on over and step into the mind of a woman who lives in my Dystopian world of Last Winter Red from the Make Believe Anthology.

Oh! And if you’d like to see Susan’s Review of Last Winter Red, you can check it out Here. Two for the price of one! Yay!

Enjoy!

ChristmasFiligree

Make BelieveFor The Love Of Christmas CoverWhy all the hullabaloo? Well, it’s to promote my two new releases “Make Believe” and “For the Love of Christmas”

That’s why!

And don’t forget to click on “Enter to Win” for a chance to win your choice of the two titles! Yay!

Oh, I almost forgot… A few random commentors along the tour path will win their choice of anthologies, too. So be sure to hop on over and say “Hi”

ChristmasFiligree

Hop on over and send me some love!

Click on over to see Emily’s interview on Mywithershins

ChristmasFiligree

Visit my Anthology buddies! They are celebrating too!

Jenny Keller Ford

J.A. Belfield

Kelly Said

Lynda R. Young

Terri Rochenski

Janelle Lee

Dani-Lyn Alexander

JenniFer_EatonF

What are you working on today? Sunday Speed Snippet – Last Winter Red – What’s Your Speed Snippet for today?

Wow.  Tomorrow is Release Day for the Make Believe Anthology.   When I signed that contract, it seemed like the date would never get here, but here we are. **she bites her nails**

I figured, in honor of the release, I’d give you a Sunday Snippet from “Last Winter Red.” In this passage, our main character Emily is crying in the next room after finding out the man she was interested in is married.  To rub salt in the wounds, she listens to this conversation through a closed door.

“George,” Lori’s voice stopped his steps. “She’s been here three times since the wedding, and you never mentioned we were married?”

“I guess it never came up.”

“Never came up?” A pause hung in the air. “It didn’t occur to you that she might have an ulterior motive to her visits? You’re the one who told me Reds are brainwashed into having unhealthy numbers of children. You should have known she was looking for a husband.”

George’s sigh permeated the wooded slats of the door. “I needed that medicine, Lori. She was the only one willing to bring it out here.”

“You used her?”

“Does it matter? She’s not bringing any more.”

Oh!  Don’t you just want to smack him upside the head!!!!

Okay, your turn!

1. Check the number of pages in your current WIP.

2. Go to http://www.random.org/ (or any random number generator)

3. Get a random page

5. Post a hundred or so words starting at the first full sentence on the page either below in the comments, or on your blog and link it below.

Let’s have some fun!

I can’t wait it see what you’re working on!

Help! I’ve been Kidnapped! Get me out of here! (And get a free copy of the Make Believe Anthology while you’re at it.)

Ha!  It’s me!  Thought you’d rid yourself of me, didn’t you?  Well you were wrong!!!!

I sat and twiddled my fingers, patiently waiting my turn, but Jennifer M. Eaton refused to interview me.  So now I have tied her up, and taken over her meager, unworthy website.

What?  You think the Little Blue Lady from Mars knows not how to run a website?  Well, if the scrawny author can do it, why not a formidable Martian like me?

Now where is that instruction manual?

What!  Did I hear a snicker?  Perhaps there are those of you who do not know my power?  I have taken over worlds!  This website will be no problem!

However, I am not completely heartless.  Well, I am… but today I am feeling charitable.  I realize the destruction of this little domain may poison some against me.  So, I will give her one chance.

Do you hear that?  One chance!

So, mere driveling humans, you must beg and plead for me to release Jennifer M. Eaton or you may never see her again.  Ha Ha!

Oh, you may see posts, but these were pre-programmed.  These posts will run out unless I, The Great Little Blue Lady from Mars agrees to set her free!

So, you might ask… What do you need to do to set her free?

Beg!  Beg I tell you.

Give me good reasons to set her free!  And if no one can come up with a good reason, then I will tire of this endeavor and just blow up her blog with her in it!

Wait, What?  Jennifer M. Eaton is rocking in her chair, struggling with her gag.  What do you want Jennifer M. Eaton?

Ha!  She is afraid no one will want to save her!  That’s good!  It will give me a reason to explode something!

Wait… what, Jennifer M. Eaton?  Oh!  She says that she will give a copy of the Make Believe Anthology, her publishing debut, to whoever convinces me not to blow her up.

Ha Ha!  She resorts to bribery, knowing that I am more than willing to blow this place up, just for the fun of it!

So, simple humans, start begging.  Tell me why I should not blow up Jennifer M. Eaton… and should one of you succeed, I will untie her, and you will get a copy of the Make Believe Anthology for free!

Let the begging begin!  I will give you three days to convince me.  On Saturday, October 6th, I will make my decision.

So humans, will you beg to have her back, or shall I let the explosions begin?

Your choice.

Lynda Young

Kelly Said

J.A.Belfield

Terri Rochenski

Jenny Keller Ford

 

Road to Publication #17: Getting the ARCs for final approval

Why is my blood pressure up today?  The Advance Release Copies (ARCs) for the Make Believe Anthology have been released.

They arrived while I was at work, and unable to download them.  I see a flurry of “Yay” and “high-fives” from a few of the other authors during the day as they review their own, and see the other author’s work for the first time.

They seemed excited.

I’m not excited.

Excited is definitely not the word for it.  I think nauseous covers it about right.

I think part of my problem is that the first 500 words were recently released.  I found a sentence in the wrong place.  My heart sank.  I contacted the publisher, and they said to go ahead and fix it for the first page release, and to make sure I fix it when I got the ARCs. Whew!

But now I’m worried about what else I might find.  Maybe I’m overreacting.  I hope I’m overreacting.

Okay.  Enough stalling.  I’m going to download it to my Kindle now.

Okay.  Wow.  So cool to see it for the first time.  I need to fix any errors in mine in the next two weeks and return it.  So… sorry ladies, but I will read yours later.

I flip to my story, and my gaze hovers over the cover page.  Yep.  That’s my name.  Feels good.

I flip to the next page.  Something’s wrong.  Have you ever stared at something, not even read it, and known something was not right?

The formatting.  Oh, crud.  The Font in my title pages is important.  It gives an emotional impact… a “feel” of being outside.  They replaced it with a blocky, emotionless ruggedly bold text.

The first “first 500” that was sent to me to post on-line had the correct font.  Hopefully this will be a simple fix.

Before I really get down to reading, I receive an email with the instructions on how to notify them of changes, and what kind of changes will be accepted.  One phrase stood out.

“We won’t guarantee all your final changes will be made, but now is the last possible time for you to make them.”

Now my blood pressure is pumping because I never had the chance to “okay” a final completed version before it went to ARCs.  I have no idea if the changes that I discussed with the editor “piece meal” were inserted correctly BEFORE it was sent to copy editing.

Okay… Deep breath.  You have two weeks.  Just get it done so they have time to fix any errors you may find.

Oxygen anyone?  Nah—skip the oxygen.  I need chocolate.  And lots of it.

Road to Publication #16: Tchotchkes… Huh? Is that a typo? What the heck is my publisher sending me?

Okay, let’s just get this part out of the way… since it’s an obvious question:

tchotch·ke/ˈCHäCHkə/Noun: 1.A small object that is decorative rather than strictly functional; a trinket.

(Typically pronounced “CHACH-kee”)

Honestly, I had no idea what this was either.  I even had to look up the pronunciation.  I did see a mention of this odd word in my marketing plan, but I didn’t want to sound stupid and ask back then.

When the email arrived from my publisher, I stared at it.  Should I open it?  Is it Spam?  Was their email hijacked by some foreign based worm?  Honestly, I was worried.

But you know what?  Today is my Birthday, and it ended up being a big fat fun present!  Just For me!

Well, not really.  All the Make Believe authors got it, but it’s still like a present, dernit!

Inside was the artwork for a whole bunch of neat marketing pieces.

1.       Email signature tag

2.       Bookmarks

3.       Posters

4.       Trading cards/postcards

5.       Desktop art (for your computer)

Oh!  Oodles of good stuff.  This is the front of the bookmark.  Pretty cool, huh?

This is all so neat!  I can’t wait to figure out how to slap that signature-thingy into my email.  Good fun!

Oh, you know what?  Yesterday was my three-hundredth Post.  How wacky is that?  Who knew I’d ever have this much to say?

Road to Publication #15: My Goodreads page

Yay!  Another “Me” page.  This is starting to sound a little self-centered, but geeze it’s exciting to see yourself “out there” other than on your own web-site, where you are in complete control.

I’m not going to get into all that “tingly” stuff again.  But yes, this is incredibly cool.

Here’s the link to my Goodreads Author page.

Yep, that’s me with my own Goodreads author-page.  There’s a link right there to “Make Believe”.  The Christmas Anthology will be featrued here as soon as Still Moments Publishing releases to cover.  Anything else I am lucky to get published will also get listed under my picture and profile.

So cool.  Really.

Oh — Shameless self promotion — while you are there you can slip “Make Believe” into your “To read” list — if ya wanna 🙂

Road to Publication #14: Wow! It’s excerpt Time [She quakes with anticipation] Or is that FEAR?

Yay!  I finally have the okay to release an excerpt from my upcoming story Last Winter Red, which will be released December 3rd as part of J.Taylor Publishing’s Make Believe Anthology.

This is super-exciting stuff!

This is the first time I’ve seen my manuscript in a pretty long time, which is a little nerve-wracking, since it’s been in the hands of editors.  I haven’t even approved the finals yet.  **GACK**

Soooo… without further ado, here is the premier of the first 500 words of Last Winter Red.

Enjoy! (This is me, holding my breath)

Four Days Before Spring

Any less than forty-five vials wouldn’t be enough. Emily tucked the crimson cloth around the containers in her basket and continued down the long, stark corridor leading to Terra’s south exit. As usual, the hallway was empty; no one else would be foolish enough to leave the city, especially a few days before spring when the weather was so unpredictable.

The soft patter of footsteps came as her mother rounded the corner. The woman’s red dress stood out from the white walls and gray ceramic tiles, swishing at her ankles until she stopped. Her eyes narrowed, gaze settling on her daughter’s basket.

Emily continued toward the exit. “We’re not having this conversation again, Mother.”

“You can’t keep going out there. It isn’t safe.”

Emily reached the door and unlatched the lock. “I have to. The people outside need this medicine.”

“But what if you catch the disease?”

Emily sighed and released the latch. “I told you they medicate me each time I go to the village. I’ll be fine.”

Black ringlets fell over her mother’s brow as she shook her head. “You’re my oldest daughter. You should be setting an example, not traipsing around outside with the vermin.”

Pulling her crimson cloak over her hair, Emily tucked in her own dark tresses. “These people need my help.”

“You couldn’t care less about those people. It’s that renegade doctor you’re helping. It always has been.”

Emily lowered her gaze. Her mother knew her all too well. “My husband is dead, Mother. I need to find someone else.”

“That is the duty of the scribes. They’ll assign you another.”

“Who? When? I’m twenty-three years old. You already had four children by the time you were my age. If they were going to find another husband for me, they would have done so. I will not spend the rest of my life alone like a sorry Gray.” Emily struggled against tears threatening to break free. “George is a good man … a doctor and a Red. When his work is done, he will come back with me.”

“Did he tell you that?”

Emily blinked. “Not in so many words…”

“You are placing your life in danger for something that may never happen.”

“You taught me it’s our duty as Reds to be fruitful … to support the growth of humanity.” Emily quaked with angry resentment. “I have no children to show to the Council. I am nothing. I need to find a new husband.”

Her mother’s countenance didn’t change, and she offered no words of encouragement.

“I’m going, Mother. And this time, I’m not coming back alone.” Emily pushed the door open. A chill slapped her face.

“What if he’s contracted the disease?”

Emily’s hand tensed on the doorframe. “If he hadn’t been careful, he’d have been dead by now.” She stepped out and slammed the door before her mother could offer further argument.

Whooooosh… Okay, that was me breathing again.

Now I’m cringing. **GACK***

So…. What did you think? 😐

If you liked this, you may want to hop over to see what my lovely and talented co-authors have for you.  They might just have a little excerpt for you to read, too!

http://jabelfield.wordpress.com/

http://jennykellerford.wordpress.com/

http://terrirochenski.blogspot.com/

http://kellysaid.com/

http://lyndaryoung.blogspot.com/

Press Release. It’s all Kind of Weird, isn’t it? Details Revealed! FINALLY!

It’s weird isn’t it?  I never expected a press release. 

The funny thing about getting published is I needed to WAIT to tell everyone.  I could only say I was excited.  Well, the press release is out, so now I can talk.  All the details are below (A little boring for my style, but I thought you’d like to see it just like it went out to the news gurus.)

It’s pretty cool.  Here ya go if you want a looksie. 

Oh!  Notice the cover release is slated for May 21st!  So excited to show your guys!!!!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Make Believe Anthology authors revealed!

Five authors to be featured with J.A. Belfield in Make Believe Anthology from J. Taylor Publishing.

Apex, NC – March, 2012 – On December 3, 2012, J. Taylor Publishing will release Make Believe, an anthology of six short stories, ranging from contemporary romance to fantasy, written based on a photo prompt with a wintery setting and a woman in red.

“A photo prompt is one way to stir the imagination. As is evidenced by the six selected entries, each author brings a unique perspective, as well as to the twists and conflicts used to push the main characters one way or another,” says J. Taylor Publishing. “These differences, the broad range of ideas and writing style of each author determined their selection for the anthology.”

The anthology will open with Terri Rochenski’s Sacrificial Oath, a story of self sacrifice. J. Keller Ford’s The Amulet of Ormisez will follow—a story of success in failure. From there, Birthright by Australian author Lynda R. Young will delve into secrets revealed. Kelly Said returns to this anthology with Petrified, taking the reader on a journey of finding one’s purpose. Last Winter Red by Jennifer M. Eaton finds us in a post-apocalyptic world where not all is as it seems. Rounding out the anthology, is our headline author, J.A. Belfield, author of Darkness & Light and the to-be-released Blue Moon, with Escort to Insanity.

“While J.A. deviates from the Holloway Pack with her short story, her characters are just as engaging and full of the paranormal, and we’re excited to have a return anthology author as well. In choosing the stories, we looked for diversity, unique and intriguing stories and solid writing. In this set of authors, we found it,” says J. Taylor Publishing, adding, “In fact, the stories are as different as the authors themselves.”

About J.A. Belfield One day, a character and scene popped into J. A. Belfield’s head, and she started controlling the little people inside her imagination as though she were the puppet master and they her toys. Questions arose: What would happen if …? How would they react if …? Who would they meet if …? Before she knew it, a singular scene had become an entire movie. The characters she controlled began to hold conversations. Their actions reflected the personalities she bestowed upon them. Within no time, they had a life, a lover, a foe, family … they had Become.
One day, she wrote down her thoughts. She’s yet to stop.
J. A. Belfield lives in Solihull, England, with her husband, two children, three cats, and a dog. She writes paranormal romance with a second love for urban fantasy.

About Jennifer M. Eaton Corporate Team Leader by day, and Ranting Writer by night. Jennifer M. Eaton calls the East Coast of the USA home, where she lives with her husband, three energetic boys, and a pepped up poodle.
Jennifer hosts an informational blog “A Reference of Writing Rants for Writers (or Learn from My Mistakes)” aimed at helping all writers be the best they can be.
Beyond writing and motivating others, she also enjoys teaching her dog to jump through hoops—literally.
Jennifer’s perfect day includes long hikes in the woods, bicycling, swimming, snorkeling, and snuggling up by the fire with a great book; but her greatest joy is using her over-active imagination constructively… creating new worlds for everyone to enjoy.

About J. Keller Ford J. Keller Ford is a quirky mother of four, grand-mother and scribbler of young adult fantasy tales. She has an insatiable appetite for magic, dragons, knights and faeries, and weaves at least one into every story she conceives. Her muse is a cranky old meadow gnome that follows her everywhere she goes and talks incessantly, feeding her ideas for stories 24/7.
When she’s not writing or blogging, the former Corporate Paralegal enjoys listening to smooth jazz, collecting seashells, swimming, bowling, riding roller coasters and reading. Jenny lives minutes from the beaches of the west coast of Florida with her husband of twenty years, her two sons and a pair of wacky cats and three silly dogs. The pets have trained her well.

About Terri Rochenski Terri started writing stories in the 8th grade, when a little gnome whispered in her brain. Gundi’s Great Adventure never hit the best seller list, but it started a long love affair with the fantasy genre.
Today she enjoys an escape to Middle Earth during the rare ‘me’ moments her two young daughters allow. When not potty training or kissing boo-boos, she can be found on her back patio in the boondocks of New Hampshire, book or pencil in hand.

About Kelly Said: Kelly enjoys life near the foothills of Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, in a city a mile closer to the sun than most. When she’s not hanging out with her Mr. S, binge reading on the weekends, or being pressed for playtime by the wet nose of her beefy bull terrier, she can be found tucked away in a quiet spot, huddled over her laptop, writing stories for young adults.

About Lynda R. Young Lynda lives in Sydney, Australia, with her sweetheart of a husband who is her rock, and a cat who believes world domination starts in the home. Lynda has an adventurous spirit and has traveled the world.
As a chaser of dreams, she found success as a digital artist and an animator, and now as a writer of speculative short stories. She currently writes novels for young adults.
In her spare time she also dabbles in photography and all things creative.

The cover for Make Believe, and short summaries for each story, will release on May 21, 2012.

About the Publisher
J. Taylor Publishing is an Independent Publisher who, thanks to the Internet, has a worldwide reach. Our debut authors are in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. The company produces print and electronic books. For more information about J. Taylor Publishing, please visit www.jtaylorpublishing.com.