FREE e-serial contest for historical/contemporary/paranormal/urban fantasy/future romance

http://www.dorchesterpub.com/Dorch/SpecialFeatures.cfm?ID=2685

cash prizes; publishing contract; FREE to enter; each serial installment should be about 500 words

10 QUESTIONS FOR…Dr. Linda Seger (Making a Good Script Great & new book!)

Author interview with LINDA SEGER

I’m a script consultant, speaker and seminar leader, and author of 11 books, including 8 on screenwriting and three on spirituality. In 1987, my first book, MAKING A GOOD SCRIPT GREAT, was published. It became an industry standard and is used throughout the world. That book opened up the world to me, and led to giving seminars in 31 countries around the world on screenwriting.

My educational background includes a ThD (doctorate of theology) in Drama and Theology from a seminary in Berkeley. I call it the least marketable degree in the world, since it’s an odd combination, and the drama people didn’t want someone with a theology degree and the theology people thought I was probably too dramatic for any job in theology. I finally started my own business, first out of desperation, and then I realized that I was very suited to being an entrepreneur. When I created the job of script consultant, it didn’t exist. I based my work on my doctoral dissertation on “What makes a script work?”

Since 1981, I have focused on the script consulting work and seminars. In 2002, my husband and I moved to my dream house in the mountains right outside of Colorado Springs in Cascade, Colorado. Around that time, I realized I wanted to expand my work to include books and speaking in the area of spirituality. My latest book is on spirituality and success.

1. Tell us about your latest book.

The book is called SPIRITUAL STEPS ON THE ROAD TO SUCCESS: Gaining the goal without losing your soul. It’s written from a Judeo-Christian perspective, although I believe the spiritual issues are universal. When I began my business, I decided to try to apply spiritual principles, and my own relationship to God, to my work, hoping that I could make a living while also being spiritual in the difficult, competitive world of Hollywood. I found the issues were different than I expected. Some of the chapters in the book  discuss “Becoming Important”, “Meeting the Seven Deadly Sins”, “Developing a Sense of Smell” (so one becomes wise at sniffing out the scoundrels), being “Willing to be Blessed”, and combining one’s contemplative life with the very active life of someone in business.

 2. How did you get started as a writer?

I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was 10, and began writing short stories, and then poetry shortly after that. I wrote my first novel when I was 13, which took three months to write, and then wrote more short stories all through college and into graduate school. When I started teaching screenwriting and discussing my theories, participants in my seminars kept asking, “When are you going to write a book about this?” I finally did, and then my agent asked when was I going to write another book. I realized that I loved writing non-fiction, and I am now writing both screenwriting books and spirituality books. Since 2008, I’ve written 11 books, and just signed a contract for another screenwriting book, and am now trying to sell a proposal for another spirituality book.

3. What does a typical day look like for you?

I generally start my day eating breakfast at the computer and reading my emails. If I’m on a tight deadline, I then write one to two hours, and then turn to my other work, such as the consulting work and emails. If I’m not on a tight deadline, I might write later in the day. It depends on how much creative work is necessary for the writing, and how much is more research, or thinking time. If I have reading and research to do, I tend to do that later in the day.

I usually write two mornings a week. I’m clearly a morning writer, and if I need to, I’ll get up very early, but usually I’ll start writing about 8 a.m. I wrote my 9^th book, a book on theology and politics, in five months, working five to six mornings a week, while keeping my business going. But usually I ask for a year to write a book.

Two afternoons a week I go out to ride my horse. If I’m writing, I use the driving time to think about an idea or a chapter, or think about a consulting problem I’m trying to resolve. Several times a week I also go to the pool. Usually my writing time is 1-2 hours.

4. Describe your desk/workspace.

I have the dream workspace. I have a small cabin on our property, which is in the mountains (in the first mountain town west of Colorado Springs.)My computer is by the window, and I look out over hundreds of pine trees, magpies, sometimes deer. The cabin is large enough for a table and two bookcases and several file cabinets and just about anything I need.  And it’s just 29 steps down a small hill from our home. I have little knick-knacks on the window ledge in front of the computer that inspires me. One is of a Nordic sailing ship that I got from Norway that encourages me to go to big and new horizons. One is of a unicorn, that tells me I can be original and one-of-a-kind. I have a red metal lion from South Africa (very small, obviously!) that encourages me to be bold. A little Savorski piano that encourages me to sing my tune. An angel. Some sea shells. And a mug that has the Prayer of Jabez on it..that asks God to bless me and expand my territories.

5. Favorite books (especially for writers)

I love Anne LaMott’s writing, especially Bird by Bird. Years ago, I read a Journal of John Steinbeck’s that he kept while writing East of Eden, which is my favorite book. I think the journal was called the East of Eden Journal…really fascinating about his process.

6. Tell us 3 interesting/crazy things about you

I bought my first horse when I was 58, although I had been doing horse-back riding one-week vacations for about 12 years by then. I’m now competing in reining, which is a difficult form of western riding.

I am totally in love with Colorado, and have been since we first came here when I was 13. I remember the first time we entered the mountains, and I determined to live here somehow. It took many, many years.

I’m a Quaker. Many people find that interesting.

7. Favorite quote

From Maria Von Trapp in SOUND OF MUSIC, (although I think someone else said it first): “God never closes a door without opening a window.” I call Maria my favorite theologian.

8. Best and worst part of being a writer

The worst part is to keep trying to sell one’s ideas. Even when one is known, the selling still is a waiting game. On the other hand, I have a wonderful agent.

Best part – being able to work with ideas, and seeing people’s lives change as a result of ideas. I love to work with words, and as time has gone on, I have paid more attention to alliteration, internal rhymes, and having fun with words. I love working with the style of a book – and becoming better at making writing decisions about style. How funny should I be? How surprising? Should I be a bit outrageous? How tender? 

9. Advice for other writers

Writing is a process, and becoming good at it doesn’t happen overnight. True, we might do a very good job on our first book, perhaps because it’s been percolating for many years, but sustaining being a writer demands some kind of mastery over the craft and the ability to have found your own voice.

And it demands being honest and authentic. That means telling the truth, whether it’s fiction or non-fiction. 

10. Tell us a story about your writing experience.

Well, no crazy ones, but I have written sections of my books in very interesting places. I wrote part of my book, WHEN WOMEN CALL THE SHOTS, in the Beijing, China airport, while sitting on the floor against a column with my hands through all my personal belongings – purse, backpack, etc. My plane was delayed, so I used the time to write. Once I wrote  at the L.A. Airport while it was evacuated (the wing where I was waiting was the only area not evacuated, but we weren’t allowed to leave.) Once, when I was working on a book during an airplane ride, the plane landed and the man next to me looked at me and said, “I have never seen anything like that! You concentrated and never lost focus for 3 hours straight!” So, I can write just about anywhere.

Where can people buy your book?

My website is the name of the book: www.spiritualstepsontheroadtosuccess.com

My blog is being created, but will be part of this website.

The book is readily available on amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com, and will probably be in various Christian bookstores as well. Perhaps in other bookstores.

Readers can also visit my other Web site, www.lindaseger.com for photos, speaking engagements, information on my other books, etc.  

 

 

10 QUESTIONS FOR…(Scottish time-travel adventure) novelist Roy Tomkinson

Author interview with Roy Tomkinson

I was born and live in Wales, UK; grew up in a mining village near to the coal mines, which was a feature of the landscape at that time, and was a great influence on my early life. I am married and have three children, who now make their own way in life, and I must say, doing very well at that.

I attended the University of Wales Cardiff and read Economics, later, I specialized in Financial Services, and set up my own company, a lot of the work was to do with compliance and regulation. The work was demanding but interesting, and I immensely enjoyed the work for many years, but there was always a little voice whispering to me to write a novel, which of course I ignored, I was earning far too much money to think about writing.

Five years ago, the whisper turned into a shout, and finally I made the plunge, sold my large house, my business, purchased a smaller house, set up my study, and started to write, living of my savings.

I have two other books in print, “Of Boys, Men and Mountains” and “Anger Child.” I do very little freelance writing now, but in my last profession I used to frequently write articles linked to financial services and compliance, but now I am a full time writer/novelist and concentrate inside the parameters I have given myself.

1. Tell us about your latest book.

 My latest novel, just published, hardcover, by Strategic Publications is called, “The Tour.” A group of people from a diving club in Wales decides to go to Mull in Scotland on a diving holiday. And so, the adventure begins:

When four members from the Coral Diving Club on a trip to Mull, an island off mainland Scotland, discover a Spanish Galleon, nothing can prepare them for what is about to unfold. The course of history is at stake when they are thrown back in time to 1526 amidst the warring Scottish Clans, the Mac Dougalls and the MacLeans, and must fight their way back to their own time.

They return to their own time, but Lanky quickly realises their existence is threatened when they realise they have unwittingly started a chain of events which seems unstoppable. It is down to Lanky and Jane to reverse the catastrophe of a time rift which is pulling time itself into the past, back to creation and beyond, and Lanky becomes aware, the only way to close the time rift is for someone to go back into the past and physically close it, but with little prospect of ever returning.

For one member of the party, who finds gold on the Galleon, lust, greed, and murderous intentions are the only way forward, and the stage is set for the drama to be played to its conclusion on the island of Mull in Tobermory.

2. How did you get started in writing?

I have always enjoyed writing, but it was not until I was on a live aboard boat on the Andaman Sea off Burma, that I started to give it serious thought. I used to go up on the top desk with my laptop when it was still dark, early morning, and write about what I could see and how I felt as the dawn broke.

I wrote many thousands of words over that coming two weeks, and I emailed them back to a friend, who told me I should write a book about my early childhood. She saw something in my rough writing, and encouraged me to carry on, and so my writing journey began in earnest. 

When I started to write seriously five years ago, I trawled to look for ideas, purchased books on how to be a successful writer until my mind was chock-blocked with ideas from other people who told me how to do it. Quite a few said – my friends included: It would be easier to go to the moon than to get a book published by a main stream publisher, I’m not talking vanity here. Most people, who knew me, thought I had gone mad. Many times over a meal they tried to talk, “sense” into me.

These are a few of the comments:

“You are giving up a real job, to write!”

“You can’t be serious?”

“I’ll tell you what? Do have a medical check. I’ll pay!”

“Writing! Writing! You mean full time, with no job!”

So the comments went forward. I listened, but equally, I shielded my mind from their negativity. I had made up my mind. I wanted to be a writer, and importantly, I was willing to pay the price. Believed it with a passion, had confidence in my ability and in me (myself Roy) to follow through. There is no substitute for action, and I had the will and I had the mind set to make it happen by action and belief.

I wrote out my plan. Not a long complicated one, short and to the point. A few words, something I could look at everyday, a measured plan, and here it is: somewhat elaborated and explained, and not the actual affirmations which I use.

They are personal to me, and no one sees them but me.

I forget about getting my work published, it just wasn’t important to me. I believed getting published would happen as a matter of course, and this, I believed with a passion, and told everyone so, there is no greater force than belief. It did happen in less than five years, three of my manuscripts are now published books.

At the start, I decided I would write ten manuscripts. The best ten manuscripts I could possible write, two a year, (I am now starting my tenth manuscript) and only then would I think about betting anything published. But I needed to stand out first from the crowd – my main affirmation, to be the best, of the best, of the best.

I searched out people who know what they were talking about to criticize what I wrote. I paid them, people I didn’t know, and who didn’t know me. I have three such people, not the same people, my work is sent anonymously to them.

That, to me, was the only way to get an objective view point. Some of the criticism I rejected, a lot I accepted, some hurt. It still hurts even today, and I still have my work criticized, but it was, and still is necessary. It always will be as far as I’m concerned. We grow far more from our mistakes that we ever do from our successes.

If I wish to improve my fitness when in the gym, it is no good me standing and talking about getting fit. I have to become active, to jump out of my comfort zone and meet the resistance head on, and then to work through that resistance until it becomes my new comfort zone, and then I, with my confidence grows.

I was out to learn the craft, and learn it I did over the years, but I know there is still a lot to learn.  I once read: If you haven’t been writing for at least 5000 hours – carry on, even then, you will still be learning. Forever you will be learning. This I found to be true, you never become a master without encountering resistance, and overcoming it.

I set a target, without a target there can be no aim. I made it realistic; I needed to achieve, to continually achieve it – my motivation: I like to feel successful. There is nothing more powerful for your personality than setting a goal and then setting about and achieving it.

In my case, I targeted to write 2000 words per day, 10,000 per week. I didn’t like working weekends, but if I failed in my objective, it meant I would have to work a Saturday or Sunday, and I had a lot of living to do every weekend, so I made sure I achieved my set goal.

I strived, and I kept striving for perfection, in my early days I was very rarely happy with my writing. My first published novel, “Of Boy, Men and Mountain,” which is destined to become a classic. I wrote and rewrote it 17 times before I was happy. I looked upon it as a kind of apprenticeship. Each time I thought I had it, I would leave it a few days, reread, and rewrite, and then after many months I knew I had it, and I partied.

I read other authors; I studied their plots and characters. Every writer had something from which I was able to learn. That is what a story is, a plot and characters. I strived to make my characters alive, my plots realistic.

Indeed, to me, my characters are alive. Some become my friends, others I hate, but to me they are alive, and not just a bit of writing across the page. I didn’t realize this until quite recently. I was due to finish a manuscript, the third manuscript in a trilogy, two and a half years work: 500,000 words in length, yet to be published, no one has seen these three manuscripts as yet only my critics. Personally, I think they are my greatest work to date.

For two weeks, I went back over it, walked, studied, did everything, anything, but complete the last chapter. It was only a few thousand words, and then I realized. I didn’t wish to leave them. I was suffering withdrawal symptoms similar to bereavement. That’s how alive these characters had become to me.
I work out the plots and the characters before I start. A pat saying, everyone tells you the same, to plan, always to plan. I do the same. Do I stick with it? No, of course not, sometimes, something happens and Voilà! A minor character seems to talk to you, and it grows, and grows, and sometimes, I wonder who is in charge.

I’m not talking here about going off on a tangent. There must be a plan, if there is no plan how can you know when you are not totally on it. You can’t of course, so always I have a plan, otherwise, how can you deviate away from it. So that it how I started to write.

3. What does a typical day look like for you?

I get up around 8 am dress and breakfast; I’m at my work desk at around 8:30 and start work. I have my own study where most of my writing takes place, it’s my work area and separate from the house. When I am there, it means I’m working, and the message is, to leave me alone.

Around 11am I stop and have a coffee and a snack, and then work to around 1pm, have lunch, and work to around 3pm and that is it for the day. Normally, by that time my daily target is achieved, if sooner I finish sooner.

What about writers block you might ask. Do I get writers block: these word seems to be in almost every self help book on how to write. With multitudinous ways of what you should do to overcome the problem. More worry and nonsense are expounded here than the worth of it.

I relax, place the rough plot, and characters inside you mind, I mean deeply inside. They should already be there anyway. Let them become part of you, think about them as people, the locations as real, some are real, before you go to sleep, and let my subconscious mind do the rest. If not the following morning, definitely the morning after, the answer will be there, inside you mind just waiting for you to write it down.

I am ruthless with you time when I write. It is a job, and if other people, family included, do not see it like that, I tell them, and follow through. I do not get distracted. The greater you are able to control You, the greater you are able to control what you write and the more free time you will be able to spend with your family or at play.

Finally, I keep positive, I believe you only ever fail when you give up, and I look upon my life as a journey and not as a destination. They say writing is a vocation, I need inspiration. I’ve lost my inspiration.

Codswallop: I am doing a job, a hard slog job. If I were a farmer, would I say I cannot milk the cows today because I lost my inspiration? Or, I’ve got work block against milking the cows.  Rubbish, of course, no one would think that, writing block is no different.  I do a job, so I enjoy the journey, some days I need to work harder, and it’s a pain, but that is the same with all jobs. Also, I know, the more I do it the better I will become, as in any job. Provided I don’t make the same mistakes, and expect to see a different outcome.

4. Describe your workspace.

Nothing special, it’s just a work station. I work from a small study, looking out into a forest. My study walls are lined with books on three sides; a flat screen, a computer and printer are on my desk, with room also for a lap top.

Facing me on the wall is a large picture, a beach with a girl looking out over the water; with a smaller picture directly in front me of a listed building, hanging on the wall, just above my head. Within arm’s reach, are numerous dictionaries and other reference books which I sometimes refer to for information. The room is functional, the view from the windows delightful, everything works as expected, and there I write as I would if working from an office

5. Favorite books (especially for writers)

Like most things, over the years my tastes change, as they say: the only constant life is change. But I do have a few lasting favorites: George Orwell, Ernest Hemingway, Thomas Hardy, and Wilbur Smith, to name but four authors.

With George Orwell, there is a message in his writing, perhaps, more so in the essays and articles than in his novels, though, “Nineteen Eight Four,” and “Animal Farm,” leaves a lasting and clear message on the mind. Favourite: “Animal Farm” and his collected writings, and especially the articles, which he wrote for Tribune.

Ernest Hemingway, again like Orwell, his message is clear, war is not about glory or honour but about death, destruction, decay, and he takes you inside the action, strips it bare, and shows it in all his nakedness, not many writers are able to do this as effectively as Hemingway. Favourite: “For Whom the Bells Tolls,” followed closely by his short novel, “The Old Man and The Sea.”

Thomas Hardy, who was a great follower of Charles Dickens, indeed, the influence of Dickens can be seen in his style. He was writing when women had few rights, and he highlighted that in many of novels. I some quarters he was pillared for his writing. Indeed, in “Jude the Obscure,” he had to tone down one rape scene in order to get it published, and even then, many influential people of his day found the scene of three dead children, two killed by the eldest, who then commits suicide, distasteful, and difficult to stomach that could actually happen in their cosy world.

His plots, I must say, are somewhat farfetched, but this is more than made up by this characterisation and prose, especially when writing about the agricultural classes. “Favourites: Two novels, “The Hand of Ethelberta,” and “Return of the Native.”

Wilbur Smith, the way he sets a scene is brilliant. In some ways, he reminds me of J. Fennimore Cooper especially the “Deerslayer.” This novel is full of the rich description of the wilderness of the North American continent during the early colonization period, and the ways he describes the forests, lakes, and topography of the land is breathtaking. But there the similarity ends. Smith takes it a stage further; his research is meticulous, especially in his novels on ancient Egypt. And his novels based in the African Continent. Favourite: “When the Lion Feeds”

6. Tell us 3 interesting/crazy things about you

1. In my early years, I left school with no qualifications against my name. Indeed, without as much as the word failure written next to my name on my school certificate. I could barely write, and my reading was even worse. To my shame, I was never in school to take any exams. Always, I bunked off from school whenever I had a chance.

Frequently I was caught, punished, but it made no difference, I did exactly the same thing again. When I did finally leave school, I travelled and did various jobs, any job really, to earn money. Finally, when I was twenty, I decided to learn, and a few years later attended the University at Cardiff where I read Economics and then into business where I excelled.

2. One of the dullest things I did was when I returned to the UK from Thailand, where I had been diving in the Andaman Sea for two weeks. Tired, I lugged my diving gear and my case through customs, when I was abruptly stopped.

“Anything to declare the Custom Official asked me.”

I was mortified. “No, I replied sharply. The indignity, as if I would do such a thing was written all over my face?  

“Open your case.”

“See, nothing.”

“The other bag, if you please.”

I emptied out my diving gear onto the table and folded my arms in defiance. The Custom Official picked up my diving cap, and to my horror, six watches fell out onto the table. I had forgotten all about them. He looked at me, then towards the watches now in front of us, and back towards me, his face a scowl.

“I… I… I… forget about…” I stumbled out the words. My positive stance gone, arms languishing loosely by my side, back humped, wishing the floor would swallow me up.

His stern face looked at me; it was prison for me I was sure. “Rolex I see.” He grunted.

I had to come clean. “I paid two pounds each for them in the market. I bought them to take back for a few of my mates, as a joke,” I replied with hesitation, stumbling over my words.

The custom official to my relief laughed. “Gullible I see; you were robbed. I wouldn’t have given one pound for the lot, let’s be having you through. I should confiscate them, they have a brand name on them, but they’re so bad… just take them and go,” he mocked.

From that day on, a few of my friends still call me, “Rolex Roy,” my humiliation complete.

3. One of my hobbies is going frequently to the gym and then to the sauna and steam room later to relax. On one occasion, a few years ago, I stayed in the steam room far too long, didn’t drink a lot of water, and was severely dehydrated. I came out of the sauna, went into the changing room, and I stared to dress as was normal, but my body was so dehydrated,  my mind just shut down on me.

Yes, I mean in went totally, off the scale, blank. A friend I had with me didn’t know what had happened to me. My mind was caught in a round lock and it had locked closed. I was saying the same things repeatedly, no matter what question he asked me.

Personally, can’t remember anything about it. He took my car keys off me and drove me home. There was still no improvement, so my wife took me straight to the hospital together with my friend. The doctor questioned me, and I was admitted, yes, you’ve guessed it, into the psychiatric ward. I slept through the night and the following morning I underwent a barrage of test until the two doctors were convinced I was now back to normal.

The diagnosis, I was hallucinating due to being dehydrated, and because I am a relatively fit person, my body did not shut down as would normally have happen and go into a faint, but my brain did shut down. I was lectured by the doctor for staying in the sauna too long and advised I should always drink plenty of water after I had trained and when in the sauna. I can tell you, I felt such a fool, but my wife and my friend were really frightened by the experience. But at almost every dinner party it is mention, and believe me, they really take the Mick.

7.  Favourite quote

If you can’t have a good day, stay away for a bad one.

8. Best and worst part of being a writer

The best part is when I get up from bed, no travelling, look out at the day, see everyone else scuttling off to work, faces long, minds somewhere else, wishing they were still at home.  I, still in my dressing gown, eat breakfast, listen to the morning news, walk a few paces and start to work. There is no delay for me, stuck in a traffic jams or train, no battle with the weather. Just myself, my computer, and away I work.

The worst part: when I first started to write it was the loneliness, well not so much that, more the sudden shock of the different culture. Before, I was always busy. On the phone, schedules to complete, reports to write, lunches, speeches, traveling.

Continually I was in demand and on the phone. It makes one feel important; you are valued by your peers, and of course I was needed. I never thought I would miss it, but in the early staged I did, far, far more than I would have believed possible. The world I was then in had become a part of my life and I took it for granted.

Suddenly, there was nothing, no phone calls, no lunch dates, no traveling. Indeed, I even switched off my phone. I needed to be alone with my writing. My characters would now become my world when writing. I took me months to really be at ease with my new situation, but eventually, I adjusted, and now this is my world, and I am happy inside it.

9. Advice for other writers?

Don’t worry about getting a manuscript published, or initially about the money you hope to earn. Make yourself good enough and it will happen. Believe in it, visualize it, taste it, smell it, let it become part of you, glow with it, not against it, and believe, you must believe, and it will happen. 

Market yourself as a writer; too many writers think that it must to be left to someone else. If you believe in your writing, tell, shout it out, and be positive. Get an agent, if need be, be your own agent, use every way to tell the world who you are and what you are, doubt not, and it will happen.

Sell your work by selling yourself. Make yourself stand out, but first, you must stand up, on a stool if need be, you have a story, and you need to tell others about it. Otherwise, how will they know? If you lack faith in yourself, how can you expect others to have the faith in you, which you, yourself lack. Good luck with your writing, but remember, luck is something you make yourself. Show you are successful and other people will beat a pass to your door.

Attitude of mind, commitment, action and belief you must throw into the pot, and remember to always keep stirring, lest they harden and become unworkable. Finally, do not let negativity lessen your resolve; the world is paved with good advice on how to give up and to meet resistance with apathy. Good luck, stay focused to your task and go for gold. And remember, it is easier and less work to find stones in the ground than gold, which requires a lot more effort to find and dig out.

10. Tell us a story about your writing experience.

When I started to first write, my friends used to laugh and joke, they thought I was just lazing around, taking it easy, and I would go back to “work” and “business,” when this crazy notion I had of becoming a full time novelist was out of my system. Through the Welsh Arts Council in Wales, my first novel was published very quickly. Far quicker than I anticipated, I didn’t pitch the publishing company; it was a referral to get in touch with them which I did.

A few months later my first novel, “Of Boys, Men and Mountains,” was published. The printer mostly published welsh books, and there was little or no advertising with the launch, and even though it didn’t take off with a bang. Sale of the book is steadily increasing, and it is already relatively well know within Wales.

The crux: some of my gym friends bought and read the novel, there is no more taking the Mick now, they are all fans, and it gave me a lot of satisfaction when I was sitting in the hot tub talking to my friends, and a stranger walked in and joined us and started to talk about a book he had just read, and said it made him laugh and cry. Stating it was the best story he had read in a long while.

It was my book; it made me feel really good, especially when the others agreed with him, but not for me to get carried away, I had to buy a round of drinks later at the bar. They stated (sic) it was to keep my feet on the ground. I know sometimes your friends tell you what you want to hear, but it was not this time, when a few of them said my novel made them feel the same. One even admitted parts of the book makes him laugh whenever he thinks of it, and other parts makes him cry, he he’s a second Dan karate expert.

Where can people buy your books?

My books, latest included, “The Tour” can be purchased on line from all major on line book retailers and from most book shops in the UK. “The Tour” is on sale (just released) in America and can be purchased at most retail outlet, which sells books, or on line including the website they have built for me.  

See web sites:

1. “The Tour” ISBN: 978-1-60693-682-5

www.strategicbookpublishing.com/TheTour.html

2. My blog page: “roytomkinson.blogspot.com” CHECK IT OUT ON GOOGLE.

3. Webpage: “Of Boys, Men and Mountains” ISBN: 0862438683

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=2lFm86R3YRQC&dq=roy+tomkinson&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=JqWUXfVvA2&sig=5BuFZcHGwpVBp0j8_QL03yOyWQw&hl=en&ei=5FMISsTjGKDUjAe91uDQBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2#PPP1,M1

4. “Anger Child”: 978095597360-4

http://www.gwales.com/rating/?isbn=9780955973604&tsid=3

10 QUESTIONS FOR…novelist Cristin Frank

Author interview with Cristin Frank

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cristin Frank…author, artist, wife and mother of two boys…well, maybe not in that order.

After earning her bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Rochester Institute of Technology, Cristin moved to the Midwest – a sphere of industry for consumer products – where she worked on ubiquitous brands such as Budweiser, Kraft and Ziploc. Reading The Onion and listening to This American Life in her free time kept her writing spirit alive.

In her late 20’s she met her husband and returned to her family in Buffalo. It was then that the sage experiences with her elderly family members inspired her first novel, which honed her writing and editing skills and manifested a career.

Clippings:

Author of blog blog.carrycargot.com

http://blog.carrycargot.com

“Does that come in Green?” by Cristin Frank http://www.findagreenstore.com/articles

5 Ways to Stress Less About Housework contributed to by Cristin Frank

http://www.sheknows.com/articles/808040.htm

How to Wow Others with your Organization Skills tip contribution by Cristin Frank

http://www.sheknows.com/articles/808052.htm

 

1. Tell us about your latest book.

Trimming the Blue Hairs is a book that will make you laugh and cry.

Ella, the main character, drops her stuck-up salon job to be the hero, going into the homes of the elderly to do their hair. She is emotionally and physically unprepared for the challenge but keeps at it through the inspiration of her boyfriend, zany best friend and elderly clients.

2. How did you get started as a writer?

I started in consumer packaging, writing and editing for companies such as Anheuser-Busch, Nestlé and SC Johnson.

3. What does a typical day look like for you?

When I’m not working my part-time job (out of my home) for a design agency in Chicago, I do housework to relax me and let my mind develop my story. Then I spend solid chunks of time getting it all into my laptop. Around this time I’m also sending pitches and gathering media contacts.

4. Describe your desk/workspace.

I do most of my writing in bed. As strange as that might sound (and don’t tell my chiropractor), I find there are no distractions there. I’m also so comfortable that I don’t want to get out, so I’ll keep working.

5. Favorite books (especially for writers)

Me Talk Pretty One Day – David Sedaris (he can tie together separate stories with great whit)

World Class – Jane & Burt Boyar

Writer Mama – Christina Katz

6. Tell us 3 interesting/crazy things about you

1. I’ve flown and landed an airplane

2. I cannot drink soda because the carbonation hurts my mouth.

3. When I have writer’s block I soak my hands in warm water.

7. Favorite quote

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom”

-Anais Nin

8. Best and worst part of being a writer

Best is being in control of your creativity. No one else can create your voice.

Worst is the uphill battle of marketing. You cannot stay behind your computer; eventually you must pick up the phone and start shaking hands.

9. Advice for other writers

Finish what you’ve started. All the powerful dialog and drama percolating in your head won’t get you anywhere until you get it all out. You don’t have to overwhelm yourself with writing a full outline before you start, map out a few chapters at a time and it can feel more manageable.

10. Tell us a story about your writing experience.

I once had no option but to bring my 5 year-old with me to a book signing. My son was a big help, holding up the book, calling it to people’s attention. But, if they ignored him, he’d feel really bad. A few times he called out, “Fine! Have a nice time with no book!”

Where can people buy your book?

Trimming the Blue Hairs is available at all major on-line retailers or on request through your local bookstore. You may read more at www.cristinfrank.com or watch the video book trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1E0Qd4YItY