Blog – Page 15 – Kit Campbell Books

In the Depths of Character Exercises

Where did I leave you, squiders, before I forgot Tuesday existed? Oh, right. With the grand plans that I was going to have an updated revision outline and be ready to dig into actual revision.

Well, we haven’t gotten there. But there are definitely ideas swimming around, on that front.

When I found the notes for the revision that I did before Hallowed Hill took priority, I also found some character notes I’d started.

You see, back in, uh, 2017, I think, my sister and I went to the Pikes Peak Writers’ Conference. Which was a bit of a mess emotionally, for me, but I went to some good panels and reconnected with other writers I knew, and so forth and so on.

One of the best panels I went to was run by a writing acquaintance of mine, Stant Litore. I don’t remember what it was about (though, hold on, I’ll check the archives here…) Aha. I did a panel by panel breakdown, good job me. The panel Stant did was called Bringing Characters to Life on the Page. Anyway, long story short (too late), I was so impressed by the panel I went and bought his book on the subject, Write Characters Your Readers Won’t Forget.

This is a short book full of character exercises and, at some point between May of 2017 and whenever I started poking at Book 1 again, I did the first couple of exercises with both Dan and Lana and then gave up on the whole thing.

(I am not and have never been great with writing exercises, which is probably a failing of mine.)

Anyway, since they were literally on the page before my revision notes, I was reminded that I own this book and, since a lot of the beta feedback I got was specifically about Lana (we talked about that two weeks ago), I thought, hey, I should run through the book and do the exercises and focus specifically on Lana and see if I can fix the whole thing that way.

Except, of course, this is taking a while. I’m on exercise 11? of 40. The last few exercises have been on character work in general instead of character work in specific, which is less helpful, so I may jump ahead to save time. Characterization is not a weakness of mine, so I’m finding this section a bit tedious.

Still, it doesn’t hurt to be reminded of things.

Anyway, that’s what I’m up to. Maybe next week we’ll be outlining, but who knows with the turkey holiday (I must procure a turkey) coming up and the small, mobile ones being out of school. Monday, at least, I’m thinking of proclaiming Sewing Day, where the smaller, mobile one and I will finish the Loch Ness Monster stuffies we started over the summer, I will finish my mending, and the bigger, mobile one can work on the cloak he so desperately wants (we bought the supplies for it a few weeks ago).

Thoughts on character exercises, squiders? Any you’ve found especially helpful?

Promo: Jarrod and the Demon’s Knight by P N Burrows

Good morning, squiders! Today I’ve got an urban fantasy novel that sounds fun for you!

Dark Urban Fantasy

Date Published: 05-02-2022

photo add-to-goodreads-button_zpsc7b3c634.png

The wizard, known simply as Jarrod, has been living covertly amongst humans for over a decade. As a Professor at the University of Magic on his own planet, Prushal, he is ostensibly on Earth to research humanity’s ancient magic. But the university’s council no longer trust his motives and want him back.

Jarrod’s peaceful guise as an expert in historical artefacts is shattered as he becomes embroiled in a series of gruesome demonic murders where he becomes the prime suspect. With pressure mounting, he doesn’t have much time to confront the demon’s knight, and clear his name. An unlikely alliance forms between Jarrod and Detective Widcombe as she and the wizard work to uncover the real murderer and the evil he is unleashing on mankind.

About the Author

P N Burrows lives on a rather wet mountain in rural Wales. Phil has worked in a variety of roles over the years from IT Consultant to a Business Advisor. In his spare time, he loves to read and particularly enjoys crime thrillers. He also enjoys working his way through a comprehensive bucket list that he and his partner have created; they can frequently be found dancing the Lindy Hop.

P N Burrows has also written a 5 book science fiction series starting with the Mineran Influence and a children’s diversity picture called Emily and Her Mums.

Contact Links

Purchase Links

Excerpt:

Damn it, he told the truth. She was sure this was an insurance scam. Someone had tipped off the crooks and this man, in his retro burgundy suit, was hiding something. She could smell it. He wasn’t fazed by her questioning. He was too calm and he’d conveniently turned up after the break-in.

‘I like to know the facts, Mr Wentworth. I observe and I learn. I’m sure you’ve seen it on TV, it’s called police work. It helps to solve cases.’

‘Please, call me Jarrod.’ Jarrod smiled up at the detective. ‘Close your eyes and describe me.’

‘What?’ She stared at the man, wondering if she should ask one of the uniformed officers to join her. Weirdos, I always get the fucking weirdos, she thought.

‘I want you to prove that you are as observant as you claim.’

‘No,’ she answered, as a uniformed officer knocked on the open door. The policeman proffered a computer tablet. Should she ask him to join them? ‘Thank you, John.’ She rolled her eyes at her colleague and dismissed him. She could put this creep down if he got handsy.

Closing the office door, Detective Widcombe could feel the old man staring at her. A shiver went down her spine.

———-

If this sounds exciting to you, squiders, check it out! See you back here next Tuesday for more Nano misadventures!

Killing My Darlings

Hey, squiders. You’ve probably heard the term “kill your darlings” before. Some people take it to mean that you have to get rid of anything you truly love about a story to make it better, but what it really means is that you have to look at everything and, no matter how much you love something, if it’s not helping tell the story, it’s got to go.

My brain gets in this weird rut every time I start a revision. A “this is the way the story has to go and I can’t possibly figure out a different way it can go, even though this way has problems” rut.

It is ridiculous. I have gutted so many stories. I have added characters, removed characters, smooshed multiple characters into a single character, changed people’s personalities, motivations, arcs. I have taken out what at one point felt like essential plot points, and I have rerouted entire subplots. Or taken out subplots. Or added new ones in.

And, especially looking at Book 1, which I have written three entire drafts of (the first one being 93K, the most recent 116K)–nothing should be sacred at this point. I have removed characters and renamed other ones. I have changed people’s roles in the stories and done personality triage. I have added in a ton of subplots over the years, and the only real thing that is the same from the initial draft to the current draft is where the book ends.

Yet my brain still goes into the “HOW CAN I POSSIBLY CHANGE THE WAY THE STORY GOES; THE STORY GOES LIKE THIS” mode every time.

It may be because each draft the story gets ever closer to actually working. The first draft…had so, so many issues. It was a first draft, to be sure, but it was also my first draft. The first complete novel draft I’d ever finished. It was never going to work as it was. If I recall correctly, I wrote half of Book 2 and had to stop, because I’d written Book 1 in such a way that the story was irreparably broken, and there was no way to get from where I was to where I wanted to be.

I had a number of partial drafts before I decided to rewrite the whole thing. The second draft was infinitely better! I wrote drafts of Book 2 and Book 3 (still, arguably, both fairly solid despite the changes I made on the third draft) with no issues. And the third draft fixed many more problems.

It is somewhat infuriating to still have problems.

Because Draft 3 included a number of major changes, and because the book is fairly solid, I think that may be why I’m getting such strong “NO THE STORY CANNOT CHANGE” vibes at the moment. Or it may just be that I get them every major revision and I don’t remember because it’s been a hot minute. Hallowed Hill didn’t need any major changes, just some clarification and a couple of subplots that needed to be evened out, so I didn’t go through this then. And I’ve been working on and off on revising this version of Book 1 since, oh, 2017 or something. So this may also be the longest I’ve been on a particular draft of Book 1 as well.

I did find my notes from earlier in the year when I started ramping up the revision (before Hallowed Hill got moved up in the publication schedule and I needed to switch projects). Which is good, because I totally forgot I was going to move the plot point from Chapter 6 to before the story starts. Ha. Haha.

Back then, I also made a list of problems and potential fixes, which includes such gems as “Problem: First part of book feels disjointed; Fix: Giving Lana internal conflict will help, as will, hopefully, war already being declared” but also things like “Problem: Chapter 8 sucks; Fix: ???”

Good job, past!me. I’m very proud.

I think the next step forward is to look at my subplots and the main plot, and look at what ABSOLUTELY must happen and what is changeable, and move things around in an outline form until it looks right. And then I can rewrite as necessary and, fingers crossed, the book can finally, FINALLY be ready to move to the next step, which will be submission to agents and publishers.

Wish me luck! And cross your fingers that I shall be able to quiet the “OH NO DON’T CHANGE THE STORY” voice enough to get all my ducks in order.

I’ve got a promo for you on Thursday, squiders, and I’ll see you back here on next Tuesday (hopefully with a completed, updated outline).

The Plan for November (and the Revision)

Happy November, squiders! Or IS IT. (I don’t know. Just being dramatic.)

I went to the Nano kick-off party, as I said I might, and I got three years worth of stickers, talked to some lovely people, was a unicorn, and made myself sick by drinking coffee after 10 pm. I had thought I’d leave right at midnight, since I’m not actually writing, but no one else did and then I felt weird, so I hung out for an hour reading back over Book 1, and then I came home and couldn’t sleep (probably because of said coffee. I’d say I’d learned a lesson, but I so rarely try to drink coffee after 10 pm that I doubt it’ll stick).

It took me a few days to get all the way through the current draft (which sits at 116K words), but I am done now and ready to move forward.

My general plan goes something like this:

Read through story (done!)
Go through beta comments
Make revision plan
Do revision

I got through the chapter one beta comments and part of chapter two before I had to switch to Hallowed Hill, but I’m going to go back through them.

(As a side note, it amuses me that HH went from premise in late August 2021 to published in Oct 2022, where as I originally said I was going to write this trilogy in 1998, wrote the first draft of Book 1 in 2004/2005, and continue to still be having to poke at it, all these years later. Arguably it could be said that this is because I have improved as a writer over the past twenty years, though also arguably, a 50K Gothic horror novella is not as complex as a currently 300K+ high fantasy trilogy with many many characters.)

I did see issues, though, on my readthrough. That’s to be expected, or else I would not be revising it yet again.

There’s a fairly major plot point that the first step of is missing (probably got lost in the last revision). Weird vestiges of things I took out. A surprising amount of typos, even for me. And, of course, the disjointedness of the first part of the book and so forth.

When I ran the beginning of the book through the critique marathon, I did ask if people had suggestions on how to fix the disjointedness, and one of the suggestions they made was that one of the two viewpoint characters doesn’t have much internal conflict, so her chapters feel lacking, while that wasn’t the issue with the other viewpoint character.

One of the weird things about working on a story for so long is that things get lost. Things change. And some things get worse when you try and fix other things.

I was 14 when I created these characters. (Said characters were also 14 at that point, though they are not any longer.) I decided I was going to write the Trilogy because I spent a HUGE amount of time making up backstory for a character I was going to play in a Star Trek roleplaying sim. And then the ship only ran for a year and a half, and I was like, well, I put all this work in, and this is a really good story, so instead of, you know, moving the character to a different ship and continuing to play her, I was like, “The only solution here is to write an Epic Fantasy Trilogy and move everything out of the Star Trek universe since I can’t publish original stories there.”

As you do.

There are two viewpoint characters, Lana and Dan. Dan started off as an antagonist–I think he may have been supposed to be the main antagonist at one point–so it’s kind of weird that I included his viewpoint at the beginning anyway, in retrospect. As the story has evolved over the decades, he’s become an equal protagonist to Lana, so I’ve spent a ton of time working on him. Giving him an internal arc, making sure his actions–even the questionable ones–have forgivable motivation behind them, making him a complex character with flaws and strengths and goals.

And Lana, I just…didn’t.

To be fair, Lana has changed since the beginning draft too. (One beta, after the first draft, stated that she wanted to punch Lana in the face.) She’s less stuck-up, less braggy. As you can imagine comes from a character that a 14-year-old made to play herself, she had some Mary Sue-ish qualities. But I haven’t done very much character work on her because, once the Mary Sue issues were resolved (fairly easy, done by draft 1.5, if I recall), she was fine. Benign. Maybe even a bit bland.

But a bit bland isn’t going to cut it, not anymore. And worse, compared to Dan, she comes off as boring.

It was a slog to fix Dan, I’m not going to lie. But I’m really happy with him, in this most recent draft. He’s memorable, he’s sympathetic. No one who has read the most recent draft has suggested killing him off to put him out of everybody else’s misery.

(There’s still some work I’ve got to do, to still make him sympathetic for Book 2, but that is a problem for future!Kit.)

Lana should–knock on wood–be an easier fix. It’s really just a problem in the beginning, before she understands what’s happening in the plot. And she’s not moving from being an antagonist to a protagonist/love interest, because she’s always been that.

I’m hoping, as I go through the beta comments, an easy and appropriate fix will present itself. Otherwise, I have some vague ideas that I could poke out (though perhaps the most logical has its own issues, because it’s similar to some of Dan’s issues and I don’t want the repetition).

Wish me luck, squiders.

(Oh, and if anyone knows if there’s a way to change goals on the Nano site from word count to literally anything else, let me know. I put in a revision goal and wanted to do time, but couldn’t figure out how, so now apparently my goal for the month is 1500 words instead of minutes. Whee.)

(Also, they email me like every day to be like “Start Your Nano Project!” which is not going to happen, because if you select Nano it won’t let you change off the 50000 word goal.)

MileHiCon Aftermath and a Look at November

Oof, sorry for going all radio silence all week, squiders. Everything is fine! Except I’m avoiding editing my SkillShare class, not sure why. I think it’s because I feel like I need it to be quiet and I keep getting distracted by other things. Who knows.

MileHiCon went well! I got less things done around my panels and stuff than normal, which I think is because I had more panels, and also because I didn’t get to doing my research for the panels before the con. They moved Fall Break on us and so I had the small, mobile ones all week, so that was a bit distracting.

(Also, apparently I’m out of copies of Hidden Worlds. I didn’t think to check the stock on the older books before the con, so that’s on me.)

Basically all I got done was some pages in my sketch travel journal about our Scotland trip. (Shhh, pay no attention to the fact that it’s been almost five months since we got back from Scotland) and the panel research that I should have done earlier.

Oh well. It’s fine. Always good to see everyone and make new connections, and I sold a good number of books too.

The panels were kind of a mixed bag. The Night Vale panel was fun–I love Night Vale–but it wasn’t reader’s theater so much as round robin reading, where we all sat in a circle and read for a bit before passing it on to the next person. Didn’t seem to be any reason to have panelists, honestly. I’ve never been to this particular panel before because it’s at 10 pm and normally I’m out of the Con by 8 or 9 at the latest (if I’ve stayed for the costume contest and literacy auction), and, to be honest, it felt very late to me and I don’t know that I would do again in the future.

The Flash Fiction Chopped panel was the best of the bunch. It was a flash fiction writing contest set up somewhat like the Chopped cooking show. So each round the audience gave us a character, a setting, and a conflict, and then we got a few minutes to write based off of those prompts. Each round someone was cut, based on audience vote. There were four of us, and, hey, I won! One of the other panelists had won a Hugo, even. Now, I realize that this is completely arbitrary, and that in this particular case with these particular prompts I was able to write a better story than the others, and in other circumstances someone else probably would have won, but it was a big boost to my confidence and now I can say I beat a Hugo Award-winning author in a writing contest.

The Seelie, Unseelie, and Beyond panel was fae-focused, as expected, but it’s good that I looked at stuff beforehand, because there was also an aspect where we were supposed to bring and read from a fae-related story. Now, I trolled through every story I’ve ever had published (surprisingly a lot) and I’ve never had an explicit faerie story published, partially because, well, I don’t really write them. There was, of course, the Changeling novel I spent most of 2020 on before giving up on it, but that had many issues (not least being that I was having issues getting the fae elements to be as alien as I wanted them to be), so that wasn’t going to work. I ended up doing To the Waters and the Wild (currently available in The Best of Turtleduck Press, Vol 1) which hints at fae and the Otherworld without being explicit about it. And the rest of the panel went fine, because I do actually know quite a bit about fae nonetheless. It felt all awkward though, because I sat next to Carol Berg and had a terrible bout of imposter syndrome (even though I’ve known Carol for years and she is very nice), so that was fun.

(Normally you can’t ever get on panels that ask for panelists to read their stories, because everyone wants to be on them, so I’m not really sure how I landed this. Maybe con staff just likes me.)

Beyond the 3 Laws of Robotics went, well, not great. Robotics is not my forte, and I don’t even use them in stories that much when I’m doing scifi, though I have read a lot of Asimov’s robotics stuff. And I did do a fair amount of research, about why the 3 Laws aren’t actually useful for programming, and alternatives that have been put forward instead, and some research on AIs and AI laws that have been passed, but I’ll admit it was pretty top level stuff, and I was sitting next to a guy who actively works in robotics and specializing in general AI. I always feel silly when I’m on a tech panel that I don’t really understand, because I’m invariably the only woman and 15-20 years younger than the other panelists.

(Con staff knows I used to be an aerospace engineer, so I feel like sometimes they just use me as filler on tech panels that they didn’t get enough interest on.)

All in all, though, a good experience. The larger, mobile one may actually build a Critter for the Critter Crunch for next year. We shall see.

Now, of course, we’re a few days out from November (and Halloween–I’m going to be a unicorn, one of those nice, warm fuzzy pajama type costumes) and we must, as always, acknowledge the omnipresent looming of NaNoWriMo.

Now, as perhaps you can guess due to the lack of posts on the subject, I’m not going to be participating this year. Well, I am, and I’m not.

Hallowed Hill has taken a lot of my time this past year–I outlined it in August, wrote it November through February, edited it in May and July, and spent August through now on publication and marketing. One one hand, yay, I got a book out in about a year! On the other hand, I’m a bit tired. And definitely not ready to start something new, not when I’ve got four books that need to be revised.

So I’m going to work on my Book 1 revision during November. I actually think this is going to go really well. It gives me an excuse to go to write-ins, which I’ve desperately missed the last few years. And if I set myself some sort of goal (is 50 hours too much? Probably. Maybe 25 hours), even if I don’t reach it, it hopefully gives me the dedication I need to make some real progress, or maybe even finish it up.

So that’s my plan. A little late in the year to really be digging into the revision, but oh well.

How are you doing, squiders? Thoughts about November?

WriYe and Horror

Catching up on my WriYe blog circle prompts, plus it’s an easy blog topic in the midst of convention planning, haha.

(Trying to figure out my last outfit for the con. Do I want something that says “horror writer” to go along with Hallowed Hill? Do I want to look professional? Do I want to look eclectic and artistic? Do I want to just dress like myself? Should I wear unicorn pajamas? Options abound.)

Here’s October’s prompt: Your thoughts on horror/gore/scary stories?

In general I am pro-horror, which comes as no surprise. I love ghosts especially, and am less enamored of other paranormal creatures such as werewolves, vampires, and zombies. I don’t read or watch a lot of those.

I’d say ghosts first–and ghosts are a major draw to a story for me–and eldritch horrors second, or really any story where you’re never really sure what it is that’s out there, if anything. And ghost-adjacent things are also good.

I am also fond of Gothic literature, though I do prefer there to be actual paranormal aspects, or at least a really juicy mystery or family secret. (One that’s not just dead children buried on the premises. God. I am so sick of dead children.)

I love scary stories, where the scares come from the atmosphere, or the unknowing, or the mystery. Which is probably why I like ghost stories so much, especially ones where it’s the little things you really have to look for.

I am not a gore person. If a game or a book or a movie relies mostly on gore and violence, count me out. I don’t need that in my life.

(With books I’m a little more flexible, because I can skim through violence or gore if necessary if the story is worth it otherwise. Though I have found that if the story feels like it needs quite so much gore and/or violence, it doesn’t necessary have the legs to stand up otherwise.)

I mostly read or listen to scary stories (through podcasts or YouTube videos) and don’t really watch a lot of horror movies or television shows. I don’t necessarily scare very easily, but I do have an overactive imagination, and even visuals that weren’t especially scary in the moment tend to pop up at inconvenient times (usually the middle of the night).

(When I saw the Ring in college, I slept with the television on for three nights straight, because if the TV was already on it couldn’t turn itself on. Though I either saw or hallucinated a really disturbing episode of the Flintstones one night, so that’s a thing. And when I saw The Witches when I was six, I thought a witch was living under my bed for about six months, despite that not being an aspect of the movie at all.)

What are your thoughts on horror and scary stories, squiders? What’s your favorite scary movie? (I’m rather partial to The Village, which is not technically horror, I don’t think, and also has a very predictable twist.) Favorite ghost story? Especially share your ghost stories.

Prepping MileHiCon and Books!

It’s MileHiCon this weekend! They gave me an unprecedented five panels this year, though I had to drop one so I could take the larger, mobile one to the 20-lb Critter Crunch. I may have already told you guys this. There’s been a lot going on lately.

(The Amazon issues are mostly fixed, except reviews still aren’t showing up, alas.)

The ones I still have on my docket are:

Welcome to Night Vale Reader’s Theater
Flash Fiction Chopped
Seelie, Unseelie, and Beyond
Beyond the 3 Laws of Robotics

Once again, kind of a random selection of topics (and no moderation of any editing panels, if there are any). The Night Vale one is especially random, especially because it’s about four hours after the time limit I gave on panels, but I’m going to do it anyway because I love Night Vale and I also love doing Reader’s Theater.

I’m going to have to look at the panel descriptions and do some research on the rest, which is par for the course at this point. At least I am familiar with flash fiction, fae, and the 3 Laws of Robotics (I read a LOT of Asimov as a kid), so anything will be better than the memory one I was on last year where I had no business being.

I’m pondering doing either excerpts or bookmarks for the con, but seeing how we’re three days out, excerpts are looking a little better. Thinking about printing them out with a QR code on the back that links to the Hallowed Hill sales page. Also need to set up a Venmo account. But I did already send in my sales permits and order books, so I suspect I’m ahead of where I normally am.

Speaking of which:

The color’s a little off in the pictures, but I got my copies of Hallowed Hill to sell at the con, and they are gorgeous. This is definitely the prettiest of my books.

I’m excited for the Con! I always have a nice time catching up (both with friends and on work that it’s hard to focus on around day-to-day responsibilities–for example, I outlined a ghost story weeks ago that I’ve yet to get around to writing), and it’s relaxing to have the weekend to myself to occasionally sell things or do panels but otherwise just chill and take everything in.

Fingers crossed that everything gets done! It normally does, albeit somewhat last minute. I should be back on Thursday or Friday pre-con, though, so I’ll see you then, squiders!

Cozy Fantasy

Happy Thursday, squiders. I had a lovely birthday yesterday, but today’s been a mess.

One of the things I did yesterday, though, was sit and finish The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches, which was a lovely book that I enjoyed very much.

(The copy I read had a blurb on the front cover, which says “A warm and witchy hug of a book” – Tasha Suri, which is an accurate description of the story.)

The book reminded me very much of The House by the Cerulean Sea, in that it involved the main character finding their place, love, and a family where they least expected it (in both cases, involving orphaned magical children in a house by the sea). That’s not a bad thing; I very much enjoyed The House by the Cerulean Sea as well.

I’ve taken to calling these types of stories Cozy Fantasy–and I’m not alone. (I checked Goodreads, and 32 people had shelved The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches as cozy fantasy, and another 32 had just shelved it under “cozy.”) These stories are typically contemporary, with some fantasy elements, and the focus is on healing–finding yourself, finding a place to belong, finding people to call your own.

They’re comforting. And I like them.

Back in the depths of lockdown I found a list somewhere on line, and I think it was something like “The Top 10 Non-stressful Manga” or something like that. From that, I found one called Otherworldly Izakaya Nobu. I’d consider this cozy fantasy too. In manga/anime, this is a Isekai story, which roughly translates to “portal fantasy” (a staple of fantasy in general, and a subgenre I’m rather fond of myself).

The basic premise of Otherworldly Izakaya (izakaya is like an inn, or a pub) Nobu is that someone found a portal between Tokyo and a fantasy realm, and decided to open an izakaya right next to the portal in the fantasy realm. So basically it’s just fantasy people wandering into the izakaya and having their problems solved by food.

It’s more interesting than it sounds.

With the world as unstable as it feels–impending wars, climate change, diseases, crime, and the list goes on–sometimes it’s good to read something that isn’t going to cause more anxiety.

Have you read anything in this genre, squiders? What were your favorite? (I’d love to read more of this, so please share!)

Promo: Stairway to Heaven by Alex Stevens

Good morning, squiders! Today I’ve got a very interesting-sounding fantasy novel based on angel mythology (something near and dear to my heart *coughcoughShardscoughcough*). Check it out!

Stairway to Heaven

by Alex Stevens

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GENRE: Fantasy

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BLURB:

Corporal Jack Graven should be dead. Murdered by a vengeful angel at his own father’s funeral, Jack is resurrected and returns to life carrying a terrible secret: he is the Archangel Gabriel reincarnated.

Jack’s not the only one with secrets. His older brother, Lieutenant Colonel Tyler Graven “Demon of Kyoto”, has just inherited his father’s fortune and legacy as Lord of War, with no intention of stopping there: Tyler will someday rule the world.

The brothers reunite their elite military unit, “The Four Horsemen,” with Tyler’s longtime flame Colonel Diana Levitas and the mysterious Lance Corporal Jin Xialong. Together they seek to uncover the truth of Jack’s past life and propel Tyler to his impossible destiny.

Thrust into a supernatural war, the Gravens find salvation through the Black Muramasa, a cursed black katana and the only weapon that can destroy immortals. As they uncover more mysteries behind the ancient blade, they come face to face with the Devil himself, but in the most familiar of faces. Their pasts, presents, and futures all linked, the Four Horsemen must end the war once and for all to survive with their souls intact. Failing could mean the end of the world.

A follow up to the explosive first book in the Ballad of Fallen Angels series, “Sympathy for the Devil,” Book 2 is an action-packed, gun-slinging adventure that packs the punch of a military thriller with high-stakes supernatural intrigue.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Excerpt:

“Make no mistake about it,” I continued. “You and your companions are caught in the middle of a war, a war of immortals. You need me just as much as I need you. As my disciples, the only change is your indebtedness to me. I would in essence be your master, and in return I will continue to offer my advice and protection. As it stands, I would say the two of you are quite indebted to me already.”

“What will we gain from this?” Jack asked. “I’ve never even considered the thought of pledging myself in return for information.”

“You gain an identity for yourself, and Tyler perhaps his soul. It will make sense once I’ve finished, this is for certain. You will also gain intimate knowledge regarding the immortals after your lives, but not without the assurance that I have my followers.”

Jack and Tyler faced each other then, seemingly sharing a silent moment of contemplation.

“Better the devil you know, little brother,” Tyler said at last.

“I tried walking away once, and it didn’t end well. He knew my name, a name I haven’t shared with anyone here,” Jack stated, turning in his chair to face Tyler. “I’m still alive, so I’d like the truth.”

“I guess we’re in, then.”

“Two,” I counted, displaying both fingers in the air. “Very well, then, my disciples. I will reveal everything you wish to know and more. The greatest story ever told.”

“Who are you really?” Jack asked.

“I am the fallen one,” I responded. “I am Lucifer.”

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Alex Stevens is a Marine Corps Veteran with two deployments and a graduate of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Interdisciplinary Studies program, a unique undergraduate degree that caters to students with various interests of study. He is also an advent traveler and philosophy enthusiast who has spent a lifetime studying religions, with a focus on Non-denominational Christianity. Alex spends most of his time going for walks, spending time with loved ones, and when the juices are flowing, writing. Fantasy fiction is his great escape from the mundane and he likes to create fantastical realities that are blended with non-fictional people, places, and events.

Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/DemonofKyoto

Amazon Book link:

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INTERVIEW:

What is your favorite ice cream flavor?

Anything with caramel.

Which mythological creature are you most like?

Phoenix

First book you remember making an indelible impression on you.

A (Kit’s note: Unfortunately it seems the rest of the answer was cut off, and I don’t have a way to access the author directly. I’m sure it was a good one!)

How do you develop your plot and characters?

I just write and whatever happens, happens. I often times write several stories that don’t really fit together and part of the challenge for me is to make it all make sense.

Describe your writing space.

Everywhere. Usually on a couch in the living room or in bed, but I’ve written on beaches, porches, in cars, everywhere.

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION and RAFFLECOPTER CODE

A $50 Amazon/BN GC will be provided to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

WriYe and Writing Courses

Hey, guess what I forgot to do in September?

Here’s the prompt from WriYe: Share your favorite books, courses, or websites you like to visit to grow your writing!

I’m firmly of the belief that there’s always more to learn about just about anything, and so I do periodically take classes, go to webinars, and read books about writing. Sometimes these books are specific to a genre or an area of writing, and sometimes they’re not.

I have found, though, that a lot of the stuff goes over the same ground, most of which is not helpful at this point (because I already know it). So something does need to be a little more unique these days.

ANYWAY though.

One of my very favorite writing books is Story Engineering by Larry Brooks. Pacing was long an issue for me, with many very badly jacked up first drafts (and some second drafts) in my past. This is the book that fixed all that for me.

Do you know how many pacing issues I had in my first draft of Hallowed Hill? NONE. This is hugely different than when I had to completely reconstruct the pacing on Shards to make the story make any sort of logical sense. I am cured, and this book is the cause.

(Seriously, this is the only note I got from the editor about my pacing for HH: “The pacing is good throughout, with a nice balance of Martie in problem-solving mode, moments of terror and despair, and enough support from expected and unexpected sources to keep her going.”)

The other thing that was very influential on me was Holly Lisle’s How to Revise Your Novel class. This taught me how to effectively revise, and it’s done in such a way that the steps are fairly easy to copy and use yourself, and I have used this on every book since I went through the class. (Including Hallowed Hill!) I have modified the procedure a bit, but this is a wonderful class if you’re having issues figuring out how to edit your own stuff.

(Holly also has a free class, How to Write Flash Fiction, which is also quite useful and has actually gotten me a number of sales on my flash fiction.)

There are a ton of other resources out there–so many great ones, really. It’s overwhelming, and you can (and I have) spent a ton of time (perhaps too much time) looking at stuff. You have to remember to balance your learning with your doing.

Oh, all right, one more. My favorite writing website is Fiction University. Janice Hardy runs this site (and also has a number of How To writing books and workbooks) and it’s been a go-to of mine for years. I don’t read every post, but there’s a lot of good stuff in there.

All right, well, those are my favorites! Any thoughts? What has worked best for you?

Books by Kit Campbell