Guest Post~Mahoney by Andrew Joyce

Release date: May 19th 2019
Publisher: W. Birch & Associates
Purchase: Amazon

Synopsis via Goodreads:

In this compelling, richly researched novel, author Andrew Joyce tells a story of determination and grit as the Mahoney clan fights to gain a foothold in America. From the first page to the last, fans of Edward Rutherfurd and W. Michael Gear will enjoy this riveting, historically accurate tale of adventure, endurance, and hope. 

In the second year of an Gorta Mhór—the Great Famine—nineteen-year-old Devin Mahoney lies on the dirt floor of his small, dark cabin. He has not eaten in five days. His only hope of survival is to get to America, the land of milk and honey. After surviving disease and storms at sea that decimate crew and passengers alike, Devin’s ship limps into New York Harbor three days before Christmas, 1849. Thus starts an epic journey that will take him and his descendants through one hundred and fourteen years of American history, including the Civil War, the Wild West, and the Great Depression.

~GUEST POST~

My name is Andrew Joyce and I write books for a living. Shane has been kind enough to allow me a little space on her blog to promote my new book, Mahoney. So I thought I might entertain you with a story about the publishing business.

My first book, Yellow Hair, was a 164,000-word historical novel. And in the publishing world, anything over 80,000 words for a first-time author is heresy. Or so I was told time and time again when I approached an agent for representation. After two years of research and writing and a year of trying to secure the services of an agent, I got angry. To be told that my efforts were meaningless was somewhat demoralizing, to say the least. I mean, those rejections were coming from people who had never even read my book.

“So you want an 80,000-word novel?” I said to no one in particular, unless you count my dog, because he was the only one around at the time. Consequently, I decided to show them City Slickers that I could write an 80,000-word novel!

I had just finished reading Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn for the third time, and I started thinking about what ever happened to those boys, Tom and Huck. They must have grown up, but then what? So I sat down at my computer and banged out Redemption: The Further Adventures of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer in two months. I had them as adults in the Old West. Then I sent out query letters to literary agents.

A few weeks later, the chairman of one of the biggest agencies in the country emailed me. He loved the story and suggested a few changes. They were good suggestions, and I incorporated about 80% of them into the book. We signed a contract and it was off to the races, or so I thought. But then the real fun began: the serious editing. Seven months later, I gave birth to Huck and Tom as adults. And just for the record, the final word count was 79,914. The book went on to reach #1 status in its category on Amazon (twice) and won the Editor’s Choice Award for Best Western of 2013. The rest, as they say, is history.

But not quite.

Now we come to the crux of the matter. My readers really enjoyed the book. Reviewer after reviewer said they would love a sequel, but given how I ended the story, I could not envision that being possible. Then I started getting emails and phone calls from my agent, badgering me to continue the adventure. At first I ignored him. Finally, to stop the badgering, I started MOLLY LEE, a “sort of” sequel. It’s a stand-alone book, a parallel story, if you will. (Molly was a minor character in Redemption.)

Then, of course, I had to do a sequel to the sequel, hence RESOLUTION: Huck Finn’s Greatest Adventure.

After I got done with Huck, Tom, and Molly, I turned my attention to my first novel, the one I couldn’t sell to an agent. I whittled it down from 164,000 words to 132,000 and published it myself. And guess what? It won Book of the Year from one outfit and Best Historical Fiction of 2016 from another.

So, I reckon the moral of the story is: Stay true to your vision, but along the way, it’s all right to conform to the norms people try to place on you.

~EXCERPT~

The reflected firelight flickered across awestruck faces and mirrored in the eyes of those who listened as stories were told of yesterday’s indignities and tomorrow’s aspirations. The look in those yearning eyes spoke of hopes and dreams. The laughter heard around the fire conveyed a sense that somehow it would all work out. For a few short hours, on Saturday nights, in the deep woods of a place none of them had ever heard of before, the constant fear that lived within their hearts was banished from their lives. 

In time, they would prevail. Their sons and daughters would one day stand straight and tall as proud Americans, as proud as their fathers had been to be Irish.

About the Author

Andrew Joyce left high school at seventeen to hitchhike throughout the US, Canada, and Mexico. He wouldn't return from his journey until years later when he decided to become a writer. Joyce has written five books. His first novel, Redemption: The Further Adventures of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer, was awarded the Editors' Choice Award for Best Western of 2013. A subsequent novel, Yellow Hair, received the Book of the Year award from Just Reviews and Best Historical Fiction of 2016 from Colleen's Book Reviews.

Joyce now lives aboard a boat in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, with his dog, Danny, where he is busy working on his next book, tentatively entitled, Mahoney: An American Story.

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Guest Post ~ Samuel Wardwell on Retribution, Prison, and Adapting to Change

Release date: January 9th 2018
Publisher: MCP Books
Purchase: Amazon

Synopsis via Goodreads:

Marc Ransom is innocent, but after a major misunderstanding he's in prison and making...questionable company. His new cellmate isn't just a cat burglar; she's a woman, and she's ready to leave.

This is America's first co-ed prison. It's a high-tech joint where thugs rule, robot guards roam, and cameras see everything. And now, two complete opposites are trapped there together.

But life in prison isn't an option. Corrupt authorities want Marc gone. Gangs have marked the burglar, Linda, for death. Seeing no other way, the unlikely cellmates become a 'brain and brawn' duo by pairing his strength with her street smarts.

In forcing themselves to cooperate, they might just find freedom, redemption, and romance in the unlikeliest of places.

~GUEST POST~

Technological advancements and societal changes throughout history have always fascinated me. It is my belief that both have a dynamic effect on each other. 

A decade ago, I found myself locked up in a Georgia prison. I started to think about how our culture might handle the imprisonment of its citizens in the future. Because our society is moving to make everything equal, our prisons could soon be co-ed.

One of the major concerns I had during this unfortunate time in my life was being assaulted. I realized that this would become worse if a prison environment was co-educational. How would the authorities keep the men and women apart? It was while thinking about this that I started to develop the idea for the Retribution series.

With advancements in battery and GPS technologies, self-locating devices have become commonplace. In the Retribution series, the use of wrist and ankle bracelets make it possible to locate an inmate. They would create a magnetic field around the prisoner. The battery pack built into the ankle bracelet would allow me to solve the issue of inmate contact. The bracelets would stop the physical assaults that have plagued prisons throughout history. They would also prevent the members of the opposite sex from co-mingling. The wrist bracelet acts as both an I.D. and location device. The larger ankle bracelet would house a taser-like technology. With this, an electrical jolt capable of increasing its voltage would be possible. The longer the two people wearing the devices are in contact, the greater the shock the two would suffer. 

I then thought about what it might be like to live in such an environment. This is when I created the primary characters in Retribution, Linda and Marc.

The character of Marc is loosely based on myself. Many of the incidents that happen to Marc during his incarceration mirror incidents that actually happened to me while I was in prison. I also weave into the story how my arrest happened and why the legal system had completely let me down.

Linda is a different story. Linda is based on a good friend of mine from the past. She was a risk taker, and ended up getting involved in a horrible situation that led to her death. In the book, I dramatized her life; however, I kept her heritage, intellect, and acrobatic abilities as part of Linda’s character. In the story, Linda chooses to use her skills to become a very successful cat-burglar early in life.

The Retribution series is about how Linda and Marc end up meeting in Georgia’s first co-ed prison. The story follows two very different people who inadvertently save the other’s life. They develop a mutual trust and cautiously become friends. They are targets for assassination and marked for death. They choose to do the only thing that can save their lives: escape from one of the most high-tech prisons ever created.

I am an architect by training. An architect's job is to create and manage the work on buildings or structures. Computer technology has grown by leaps and bounds over the years. I believe there will soon be a need for an “architect” of sorts to manage and design complicated technology systems in various companies and organizations. In the Retribution series, this person would be a computer architect. In my story, Marc holds this coveted title.

Marc’s background and Linda’s amazing physical abilities allow them to create a plan to defeat the prison's technology. They figure out a way to trick the system into not realizing that two inmates are about to escape.

My inspiration for Retribution was to take what I already knew about the world we live in and mix it with what I believe the future has planned for us all.

Our society will learn how to the adapt to the changes and inventions that are flooding us almost every day. The challenge I tackle in the series is how our future will affect us and what we will have to do to adapt.

Marc is an idealist who believes that things happen for a reason. Because of her life’s circumstances, Linda has to be a realist by necessity just to survive. These two very different people find themselves in many incredible adventures. Retribution explores how even the most difficult circumstances can be overcome with teamwork, trust, and eventual love.

About the Author

Samuel Wardwell is an American author of crime-thriller novels. His books include themes of crime, redemption, and corruption within the legal system. Wardwell lived a privileged life; he grew up in northern New Jersey, and went to college in New York City. He worked for many years as an architect and historian, but struggled with addiction. Samuel became a functioning alcoholic and made decisions he'd later come to regret. Today, he lives in Roswell, Georgia. He has been sober for over ten years.

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Guest Post & Giveaway: Full Circle by Regina Timothy

Release date: December 24th 2017
Purchase: Amazon

Synopsis via Goodreads:

Eight years after the 9/11 attacks, Samia-Al-Sayyid an Iraqi immigrant is living a quiet life in New York City after she fled her home to avoid imminent death.

She works hard for her cold, heartless, high-strung boss, loves her seventeen-years-old-son, and cherishes the close friendship she has formed with her best friend Susan.

Nothing can go wrong, or so she thinks – until the estranged brother she left back in Iraqi shows up on her door step. Then she finds herself in a cab, on her way to the hospital to identify her son, a terror suspect who has blown the city, and with it her boss’ husband, and her best friend’s son. With everything lost, she is forced to flee to Iraq where she confronts her past. Will she make peace with her past? Can she get forgiveness for all the damage she has caused?

Full Circle is a contemporary fiction tale of friendship, family, and hope. It explores the devastation of loss, the great capacity to forgive and the lengths our loved ones will go to protect us.

~GUEST POST~

First of all, let me say I’m greatly honored and humbled to be here – thank you so much, Shane. I welcome the opportunity to chat about my debut book Full Circle, a  contemporary fiction tale of friendship, family, and hope. 

My name is Regina and I grew up in Kenya. Growing up, I enjoyed writing assignments at school and was encouraged by a teacher to polish my skill. Instead, I ended up studying engineering and worked in the field for a while. I’ve always enjoyed writing essays and poetry but I never pursued it much until a few of years ago when I began writing Full Circle.

A great source of writing inspiration for me is what I observe around me. People, events, and sometimes things get me thinking. The War in the Middle East has been with us for almost two decades now, and there is no clear solution on the horizon. A lot has been written about the direct and indirect effect this situation has on the everyday women. I liked the idea of adding a new voice to these stories.

The story follows the main character Samia-al-Sayyid, a 33-year-old Iraqi immigrant living in the U.S. She overcomes a lot and works so hard to make a good life for her teenage son. In the end, it seems all her all her efforts are not enough. When I began writing the book, I wanted it to be about three different women living in three different continents and influenced by different cultures and beliefs. The idea was to bring the three women together later in the book and have them discover that despite their circumstances, they face the same trials imposed by society. 

Samia was the first character I came up with. The more I wrote about her the more her story became complex and I felt she needed a lot more space than a few chapters to tell her story. So I decided to dedicate the entire book to her and follow her journey. I brought in Melisa and Susan, to help Samia tell her story and bring out the original idea of the book that despite their different circumstances, they faced the same demons. 

It was especially important to me for the story to revolve around Samia and touch on her Middle Eastern background. There have been a lot of calls for diversity in the books being published. This is because research has shown there’s been a glaring lack of diversity in writers and the books being published in mainstream fiction. #WeNeedDiverseBooks and #WeNeedDiverseWriters campaigns have been running for a few years to call attention to the lack of diversity when it comes to the book characters and the writers who tell the stories. I felt Full Circle will play a small role in bringing diversity into our reading world.

About the Author

Regina lives in a picturesque village in Kenya where she enjoys amazing landscapes, exotic wildlife, and beautiful sunsets and sunrises. She always had active imagination. By chance, she started blogging in 2010, which rekindled her love for writing and telling stories. When not writing she enjoys watching classic movies (she’s a movie buff), going to the theater and auto shows. 

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Guest Post & Giveaway: Isaura by Ruth Silver

Welcome to the IFB stop on Ruth Silver's Isaura Blog Tour. This is in celebration of her third release in her Dystopian series, Aberrant.

Release Date: December 4th 2013

Publisher: Patchwork Press

Purchase: Amazon

Synopsis via Goodreads:

SECRETS WILL BE REVEALED.

Olivia has little choice but to head into the dangerous Gravelands, as the new government wrestles with fixing the damage to society. If traveling through outlaw territory isn’t frightening enough, Olivia learns she has exposed her secret and is hunted by those she trusted. In a race against time, her life and those she loves are in jeopardy.

GUEST POST

---------------------------------

My inspiration to become a writer and the obstacles I faced

by Ruth Silver

Writing is the easy part. I’ve loved writing since high school. I started off with poetry, mostly about the boys I dated and the crap I went through with them. Teenage boys suck, plain and simple. I also loved reading fanfiction. I would read heaps of it in my free time. Eventually, I gathered the courage to try my hand at it. I found out that I loved it more than anything. Writing was fun. It was exhilarating. I was meeting new people, mostly online, but it was an experience like no other. I found something I was good at. I had friends that read my stories, and other friends that I wrote with.

So how did I go from geeky fanfiction writer to a young adult dystopian author? I love writing. Like I said, that’s the easy part. The rest of it, wasn’t so easy. I was running my own photography business. My favorite was shooting weddings, but I did some portraits, preschools, mothers groups and other events. It was fun, exciting, but also stressful. One day, out of nowhere when I was eating lunch, I had a hand tremor. It didn’t affect my ability as a photographer, thankfully. However, it did concern me. My grandmother, she had Parkinsons.

What started as a tremor turned into from one symptom, into two, into way too many. I was bounced around from doctor to doctor. Specialists couldn’t quite figure out what was wrong. I was assured that it wasn’t Parkinsons but they didn’t know what it was. They did an MRI, concerned it was MS. It wasn’t. They discovered my pulse was too fast and the next thing they assumed was thyroid. Every thyroid test came back fine. They put me on some medication to help with the tremor. Technically, I was already taking medication to help with my heartrate. In college, I used to pass out. Heck, in high school I was pretty much known for fainting. I never thought anything of it. I certainly didn’t think it was related.

You want to hear about obstacles? Oh there’s plenty of them. So the medicine made me lethargic. It was the first time I truly experienced writers block. I had nothing to say (in terms of words on a page). I felt drained, dead inside. I couldn’t function. I was exhausted. I went off the medication and my head cleared, but the rest of the symptoms now had developed. My pulse raced when I stood up. I went from the mid-seventies sitting to 126 standing. It was like running a marathon just walking around the house. I couldn’t stand heat. I’ve never been great with extreme temperatures, but if you ask me to go outside and it’s 85 out, I feel like I’ll die. No joke. I slow down when walking. I feel like my 93 year old grandfather. Hell, he walks faster than I do. My mind fogs. I can’t function in heat. To this day, I still can’t function in heat.

I was tossed between doctors. They found vitamin deficiencies. They blamed the tremor on B12. I had to start with shots to get my numbers up. Every week I had to visit the doctors office. Eventually, I had to give myself injections. When my numbers got up, the symptoms didn’t go away. Things were progressively getting worse. When I’d stand, I’d get hot. My stomach would hurt. I’d feel as though I was going to throw up. My body would tremble. I wondered if I was dying. If I had some rare disorder that would kill me, before I figured out what I had.

A physician saw me for a sleep study. He read my chart. In high school I’d been diagnosed with Vaso Vagal Syncope for fainting. We explained to him how some nights in high school, I’d wake up and couldn’t walk. I felt paralyzed from the legs down. I would crawl to the bathroom, screaming for someone to help me. To walk, I had to put one leg in front of the other. He looked at the diagnosis and told me flat out, “I don’t know what you have, but what you’ve described is not Vaso Vagal Syncope. You should go to the Mayo Clinic.”

Months later, I took a trip to Mayo. I’m so thankful my parents paid for insurance during all this time. I’ll spare you the long details of Mayo. I was there three full days of testing and a bill for $10k. Thankfully with insurance, my 20% bill got reduced to zero, because I had no income. At this point I’d already started Aberrant. My head was clear, but emotionally I needed an outlet. I’d heard a little of Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS). I had some of the symptoms, the heart rate elevating upon standing, but the hand tremor I couldn’t figure out. At Mayo they diagnosed it as POTS, increased the beta blocker, gave me a secondary beta blocker if I needed it for wedding photography and then we went home. The hand tremor is part of POTS. Apparently doctors in Illinois don’t know this, even POTS docs. WTF. The reason for the tremor - POTS is like your body is in constant fight or flight mode. When you’re going to give a speech, what happens? You get nervous, so this is how you react: sweaty palms, hand shakes, heart races, voice quivers, stomach hurts. It explained my new symptoms. At this point I hadn’t done weddings in months. I wasn’t ready to close up business of my dream job, but I didn’t know what else to do. In the meantime I hired two associates to handle the weddings that I couldn’t do.

I went home from Mayo, with hopes that I’d be better. That the medication would be what I needed. For a few weeks, the feeling of hope helped, until well - it wasn’t enough. My heartrate hadn’t changed at all from the medication. I needed a doctor that knew what I was dealing with, and one that wasn’t in Minnesota. So, three months had rolled around, I asked other POTS suffers online and found out that a Neurologist specializing in Autonomic Disorders had justed moved to Chicago. He was a physician at Rush University. I called up, was delighted to get an appointment for the following month. By then, I’d finished Aberrant. I hadn’t quite known that I was going to get it published, but I was done the first book in the series. The story had taken shape based on my experiences. I knew that if there was any chance what I had was genetic, I didn’t want children. I could barely take care of myself. I would never want to bring a child into this world, that would experience what I was going through. 

My appointment with the Neurologist at Rush was the first time I felt like someone listened to me. Mayo was great, don’t get me wrong, but they didn’t put together the reason I have this disorder. At Rush, I was explained things that never quite made sense. I had Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. Mostly likely the hypermobility type. It explained why I can crack my arm and my neck without so much as trying. I have horrible scars from surgery and apparently I take forever to heal. I can sprain things by just sitting awkwardly, and the heat intolerance, it’s because of Autonomic Dysfunction (aka Dysautomia or POTS). My symptoms were a host of things that slowly, with each appointment were getting taken care of. I also learned I have Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS) which I still don’t quite understand. Other than I take the medication and I no longer feel like throwing up whenever I stand. (It has something to do with Histamines) II also don’t flush as bad as I used to. I still have rosy cheeks. I never need blush when I wear makeup. Naturally rosy, some people would kill for - I’d kill to get rid of.

After Rush, I slowly closed my wedding business, queried Aberrant and landed a publisher. At that point I knew the books would be a series and the next logical step was to become an author. It was something I loved doing and was capable of doing. 

So, that’s my obstacle: Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrom, and Mast Cell Activation Syndrome. It’s what made me give up photography. It’s what encouraged me to write, and what keeps encouraging me to write more.

About the Author

Ruth Silver first began writing poetry as a teenager and reading heaps of fan fiction in her free time. She has written under three unique pseudo names and penned well over a hundred stories.

Her love of writing, led her on an adventure in 2007 to Melbourne, Australia. Silver enjoys reading YA novels and sharing her favorite books with other readers. She runs her own book blog and also enjoys photography and traveling.

Her favorite YA genre is a mix of Dystopian & Fantasy which is evident in the upcoming release of her latest book, Aberrant. Slated for release April 2013 by Lazy Day Publishing, it is the first in a trilogy.

www.writeawaybliss.com | twitter.com/writeawaybliss

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