Thursday, December 22, 2011

Interviews...

I've done a couple of interviews, though only one is out right now. The other one comes out in January (on my birthday--yay!). The one that's out already has been so for about a week and a half, but it didn't even occur to me that I should post about it--duh! Anyway, here's the link:

Interview + Ebook Giveaway With Blkosiner's Blog

So you should check it out. It was a lot of fun and Ms. Kosiner is very nice.  FYI: You have to scroll past the book summaries for both books before you get to the interview.  Also, the site is holding a contest/giveaway thing for ebooks of both Moon-Linked and Moon-Ache, but I imagine everyone reading this already has them.  However, if you have friends who don't have them, you should tell them to enter--I think there are three weeks left on the contest.  And I will let you know when/where the January 5th interview is available, so stay tuned!

Happy Holidays!

xxErin

Friday, December 9, 2011

It's December?

So, I've lost about 2 weeks. I moved 4 hours away to Austin, Texas. It's been the absolute hardest move I've ever made (and I've moved around a lot). The last couple of weeks have been filled with nothing but packing and cleaning and other moving preparation nonsense, so I haven't been able to write or play my guitar or anything really.  I've never been more exhausted (did I mention the new place is on the 3rd floor?--the balcony is amazing, but the stairs were not our friend when we lugged up the contents of a 17-foot Uhaul). We got everything in here yesterday, so today was the day I always look forward to, the day where I get to unpack and set all my stuff up and organize things. It's exciting and fun and always my favorite part of moving. Except I woke up this morning with a mind-splitting, nauseating migraine. If you're one of the unfortunate souls who suffer from real migraines, you know how crappy they are. Your life stops and you just want to die. So I spent the day in bed, nursing this beast and just staring at all my still-packed stuff. Take a look at this:


It doesn't look like much, but those pictures only just begin to capture the mess.  It was actually worse than that yesterday. Luckily, I got a little done last night, but it's still pretty much a disaster. Hopefully, I will rise in the morn' with no aches in the head and my full range of motion returned to me (my poor, little muscles). Once I'm settled, I can get back to work on Book 6 and that other book I'm working on that I can't really talk about.

That was my roundabout way of apologizing for being so absent on this blog right on the heels of releasing Moon-Ache. That was sucky of me. But I hope you guys are enjoying/enjoyed/will enjoy Book 2 and don't forget to tell everysinglepersonyouknow to read it.

On Book 3...

I thought it would be fun to engage you in a game of speculation. For those who have read Moon-Ache, what do you think is going to happen in Book 3? The fact that it's called Moon-Burn should give you a bit of a hint, but if it doesn't, pull something out of your hind-quarters and do some speculating anyhow.  Leave a comment detailing what you think will happen next in March's story.  Or don't, whatevs.  But I encourage you to think about it anyway.  Because it's fun to think about it.  Be a detective--or a scientist--and do some hypothesizing.

That's all for now.  Good luck and Godspeed.

xxErin

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Hey, I published another book! + Update

It's official!  MOON-ACHE is for sale in the Kindle Store!  Like Book One, it's only $0.99 so what are you waiting for?  Get it now! *Cheesy 90s Commercial Dialogue Cliches Over* Man, what a relief to have it out--now I can throw all that neurotic self-inflicted pressure into worrying about when Book Three is going to come out;)

Get Moon-Ache on your KINDLE now by clicking this link!

And get it on your NOOK by clicking here!

Also, the Moon-Linked paperback is now $8.99, so >get it now< and then March can live on your bookshelf.  Wouldn't that be lovely?

Something to be aware of: I'm not going to make print copies of Book Two unless there is real demand for it.  It seemed most people were getting Moon-Linked from Kindle, so I don't see a need for spending all that money on printing Book Two if no one wants it that way.  However, if you would like it in print or some other form, then I would like to direct your attention to the Left.  You should see a Poll in the top left corner of this page.  Take it, participate, contribute, be heard!  If you let me know there's a need, I will try and see to it as best I can:)

Enjoy Moon-Ache--I'm really proud of it and I hope my hard work shows.  Spread the word, tell your family, tell your friends, acquaintances, strangers--even your arch-enemies!!

xxErin

**UPDATE: The Polls are closed for now, but your votes are under careful consideration by, well, just me.  I have some exciting things planned for the near-future, maybe things you won't even expect...

Oh, you know, just a cover-reveal and stuff...

I'm not gonna embarrass myself with that drum-roll fiasco again, so let's just do this.






Isn't it beautiful??!!  It turned out way better than I even imagined it--a testament to the artist who did it (seriously, super hero, guys, super hero)!  Ryan Wieber is a good friend and amazing computer magician/graphic fx artist extraordinaire and it is a twenty-four carat truth that he is one of a very select few people I trust 100% to get a job done right.  If you don't know who he is, you should.  His website:


So yeah, that's the cover of Moon-Ache--can you believe it's here?  I can hardly believe it myself!

So, I guess the last little thing I need to address is the tiny matter of the release date.  Here's the sitch: I'm doing all the work to get it on Kindle myself this time around (someone else did Moon-Linked for me, so I haven't had to deal with this stuff till now) and I'm not sure how long it will take but it will probably be ready within the week.  I will update this post when I have a better idea of how far away I am from actually hitting the 'Publish' button.  But I have been working on everything all day (yesterday now, I guess) and I think I'm getting close.  Sadly, I'm not a robot, so I have to get some sleep now.  My brain says, "Power through--sleep is for fools!" but my body keeps saying, "Hey, f*ck you, Brain!  The rest of us are tired!" so I'm putting me and my limbs to bed now.

That's all for now--happy Sunday, friends!

xxErin

PS. Dude, Moon-Ache is almost here!!!


**UPDATE! I have hit the publish button, so now it's just up to Kindle.  It should take anywhere from 24-72 hours to be available for purchase.  I will, of course, announce the official debut, so stay tuned!

Monday, November 7, 2011

News and Other Things That Qualify Less as News Than as By-the-By Intimations

Book Two, Book Two, Book Two...I can't tell you anything.  Certainly not anything concrete.  But I will allow this: It is coming.  And this: Soon.  Obviously, I wouldn't be blogging just to remind you that the book is in the same boat it was in a month ago.  Obviously, there is a reason for this post, a happening that sparked my elation and motivated me to speak (or type).  Let me just say I have full confidence in the SUPERHERO who's doing the cover of Moon-Ache and I know, when I finally see it, it's going to be great.  It may be slightly different from the cover of Book One, but equally as lovely, I'm sure.

Now, you might not think any of that was news at all, but let me clarify this--I could not, under any circumstances, have posted that paragraph a week ago, or even a day ago.  The plain truth is I didn't know for sure if the cover would be seen to completion at all this year.  Now, it is an almost-guarantee.  So, this year, but no date yet because I don't want to get myself into trouble and have to retract something later; I hate retractions.

But, it's coming.  Soon.  And it's such a good stinking book, too (if I do say so myself, which, so what?).  Seriously, I love Moon-Ache.  It's, to me, a perfect second-book-in-a-series book.  I may have already said this at some point (I definitely have outside of this blog) but Moon-Ache was my favorite for a long time.  Basically it remained my favorite until I wrote the last few chapters of Book Four, at which time the two tied for favorite.  Now with Book Five in the running, I don't know what to think, but anyway, the only thing you need to take away from that declaration is that if you liked Moon-Linked, you're going to love Moon-Ache, and even if you didn't so much like Moon-Linked...you're going to love Moon-Ache.  Wow.  That's some serious swagger I got goin' on there.  But I worked hard on Book Two and I had come pretty far as a writer by the time I finished the final draft, so I'm confident in its quality.

Now what about those by-the-by intimations, you may be asking?

The first is that I'm kind of cheating on my whole 'take time off of writing in order to consume art' plan.  I'm def consuming, but I'm also writing things.  I stand by my profession that I'm not ready to start writing Book Six of Lone March; I can't start it till I've gotten myself to the proper mental/emotional place, in order to evoke the desired atmosphere.  So what am I working on?  Another little series I've had on hold for over a year.  When the idea first came to me, I wrote the initial three pages, then wouldn't let myself look at it or even think about it till now.  What decided me was my excitement over finding an artist to illustrate a children's book I wrote, the story of which is related to the series I'm talking about.  I won't go into all that yet, because not only is it extremely premature to talk about that children's book, but this artist is pretty much my art-soul-mate, if that makes sense, and as such, she deserves her own post, so when it's time to talk about that, I will be devoting an entire blog entry to her work and style and why I love it and so on.

The second is that I would like to reveal the genre/style of this little series, just to tease you a bit;)  At this point, I see it as four books total, and it will be aimed at the middle grade audience (ages 8-12) but older kids and even adults who are into this style of storytelling will def, def, DEF enjoy the books as well.  It's got some rather dark elements and deals with heavy things like death, only the main characters are kids, so it's kind of in between audiences really, which isn't exactly commercially viable, but I don't care because this story is so very, very special to me.  I guess you could call it a coming-of-age tale in a way...kind of...but mostly I think it's a 'caper' story.  And it's very British, as in England.  If you like Roald Dahl, Jane Louise Curry, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Lewis Carroll, Neil Gaiman, etc., you will enjoy my forthcoming __________ series.  Sorry--can't reveal the title yet!!  (But just know that even the title is lovely...maybe I'm biased...oh well.)

The third and last intimation, which is no doubt the one you will be most interested in, is that I would now like to plop the SYNOPSIS OF BOOK TWO, MOON-ACHE, into the space below.  Watch out--here it comes!

I looked up into the looming, baleful faces of eight were-ravens.  They stood around me, hunched over, with watchful, probing eyes.  I tried to scream, but I was too weak to make noise.

Her name is March Greeley Howe.  And she’s a were-wolf.  After escaping her captor’s den, and being rescued by an unlikely ally, March finds out what’s been happening in Glenbrook since she’s been gone.  Life will never be the same since Elliot’s take-over, and the last she-wolf in the world has some tough decisions to make.

In the midst of being forced to master her Lupine form, she is thrown back into her old life, with all the fear and uncertainty that went with it.  Besides being torn between Ethyn and Greyson, March fails to make sense of her hesitation in trusting Avery.  With both home and school upside-down, she tries to find solace in her friends, but soon learns she stands apart, and the divide only grows with each day of her double life.

In Book Two of the Lone March Series, March Howe meets some new faces and sees old ones in new ways.  She grows up fast when she has to make decisions no one else can, and embarks on a mission that will redefine her place in the pack.  Will she balance her were and human lives before the last of the were-wolves throw everything into chaos?

 So there you have it.  Moon-Ache in a nutshell.  Man, now I wanna reread Book Two, after reading that summary for the first time in ages!  But, I gotta stay focused so I can't--and speaking of which, I gotta go get back to work on the _________ series;)

xxErin

PS. I swear you'll get more news on Moon-Ache as soon as I do!

Friday, October 28, 2011

Tie Yer Dress an' Roll Yer Sleeves, Let's Jig fer Joy this Christmas Eve!

Okay, I know it's not Christmas Eve, but I needed the end to rhyme with sleeves and nothing else fit the meter of the line, so bite me.  Not really, that hurts.

THE POINT IS: I finished the first draft of Book Five!!!  At 4 AM (morning before last) and I could not feel more relieved!  Book Five was H.A.R.D.  And also, in some respects, the easiest yet.  (If you're just now learning how fickle my emotional state is when talking about my books, that's your own fault.)

It was so...I better not say.  No, I can't.  No, REALLY, I can't.  Even talking about how it made me feel might give things away.  But, I will say this, it turned out exactly like (possibly better than) I wanted it to.  And it's all been planned from the beginning.  So, I feel good about it.

Oh yeah, and I can tell you this, too, it's the longest book so far.  By nearly a hundred pages.  Who knew it would take that long to tell this part of the story?  I sure as heck didn't.  But, there you have it.

And now, on the threshold of Book Six, at the precipice of the plot points therein, to which I have been looking most forward for a year and a half now, I announce that I am taking a small reprieve from my literary excursions.  Why, you may ask?  Well, I'll tell you.  Because I want to consume for a while.  I want to delight in the fancies of art, which, I indeed do concurrently with writing, but now I want to do so exclusively, in order to cleanse my mental palate and prepare for what comes next.  It's so exciting--the list of books/films/albums/essays/speeches/tv shows/artists' portfolios I have wanted to explore and study for decades (literally plural--God, am I that old?) is finally being compiled in the physical world and not just my brain juice.  I am making the most awesome Excel spreadsheet of art study you've ever seen!  But, probably you haven't seen one at all, because I am the only (huge) dork who has ever made such a thing.  I don't care.  I'm so excited.  And I'm not just allowing myself the time, but I'm obligating myself to do this.  I finally get to finish reading the Brontes and Poe and Virginia Woolf and...we could be here a while.  So I don't know how long this will take, I may take a month off, which doesn't seem like much to any of you, since I'm technically still 4 books up on you, but that's a really long time for me to not be writing.  (I don't know if I can do it, honestly, and that's why I'm not setting a time frame.)  Usually--actually, with every other book before this, I finish a first draft, then the NEXT day, I start the first draft of the next one.  I can't help it, I'm always so excited.  But, not this time.

Book Six is already so incredibly close to my heart that I want to make sure I do it justice.  There is a very distinct and real possibility that Book Five marked a turning point in the series, the likes of which cannot be undone, diluted, or hidden.  What's more, I want Book Six to be different, to stand out, to carry its own weight, if you will.  Its themes will be autonomous and at least partly self-containing.  Meaning Book Six will stand out even amongst subsequent installments.  There's no way around it.  Every book is going to be different and this one especially.  I think every writer thinks about the Harry Potter Factor to some degree (the flow of the series, the common themes, the proverbial nature of a well-developed world with fully-dimensional characters) but as far as keeping every book in this series on the same time measure, I confess it's not going to happen.  Perhaps with other series I write.  There is one series I'm writing that will definitely have that common, proverbial, rhythmic nature throughout.  It's just not Lone March.  So, while each book will continue to maintain the overall arc of March's story, they will also be quite individualistically styled.

So, this break could be two weeks or a month or maybe a couple of months (doubtful I can hold out that long) but whatever it ends up being, I want you all to know it's for the good of the writing, so that I can give March the story she deserves...Especially after Book Five.

WHOA!!!!  Did I just totally and completely drop a hint about a book you won't read for at least another year and a half??!!  That's mean of me.

Anyway, I'm off to finish my Art Studies List.  If any of you would like to offer a recommendation for a book/film/band/basically anything that inspires you, feel free to leave a comment with your faves:)

Happy Halloween!!

xxErin

P.S. Even though it's not Christmas Eve, we can still do that jig thing if you want.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

Snip, Snip; Paint, Paint.

 
Had my hairs dyed a whole different color.  Never ventured outside of the blonde realm.  Bleached it three times and highlighted it once, but always been a blonde since the day I was born.  Finally found my balls and did what I've wanted to for a long time now.  Result: Perfection and Happiness.  You can't really tell till you get right up on it, but it is red, like red-red.  I just love it.

So, as I said, I've always been blonde, and I left my fiance that morning and was going to return in the afternoon with red hair.  Well, you can imagine what I did.  Naturally, with my current border-line obsession with Twin Peaks, I just had to walk through the door and say, "Hi, Trav, it's me...Maddy."  I've been walking around with the creepy Maddy smile, occasionally slipping on my big nerdy glasses, that really do look just like Maddy's, and sneaking up behind him to say hello.  It is proper fun.  He keeps telling me to stop.  I think he's just double-creeped out because he says I look scarily like my sister now (who has dark hair and had bangs for a long time).  Either way, I'm having all kinds of fun with this.



Happy Saturday.

xxErin

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Part the Third...

Boy oh boy, what a day.  Spent part of the day (which was dressed in a lovely, dreamy, steady, slow rain) dancing between reading HP:7 The Deathly Hallows, and working on the final chapter of Book Five of The Lone March Series.  After that, the epilogue (which, incidentally, was the very first scene I envisioned for this book) and then the first draft is d.o.n.e.  So much excitement--ooh, for those who've been reading my blog from the beginning, let us say so much folperlacion;)

Anywho, I spent an unfortunate amount of time this afternoon/evening running errands and doing necessary tasks for financial sustentation, so sadly, I have not been able to finish the book today and complete my goal of starting this blog with, "It seems rather fitting and auspicious that I am uploading the final installment of Chapter One, Book Two on the very day I have completed the first draft of Book Five."  Oh well.  Technically, the statement is in the blog now, so I did get to say it, even if it's not true.

So I am intending to copy and paste the last section of the chapter straight out of my Amazing-Colossal-Man-sized Word document right into this here blog, but first, I wanted to get real with you guys for a sec.  I don't know if that's the right term, but it felt good, so I typed it.  Here's the thing that I want to say: These books I'm writing about this March chick are literally, 100%, genuinely getting better and better with each new installment.  I know you're thinking, "Biased much?" but really, I know it to be true.  It's based on many international statistical analyses.  That's not really true.  But it is a conclusive fact.  Yes, I realize no one can dispute me, seeing as I'm the only one who has actually read every bloody word of every bloody book (and knows the plot for the next three bloody books) but I cross my heart and hope to die--when you all have read them too, I know you'll agree.  So much excitement--oops! folperlacion.

Probably I didn't need to put all that in a blog, but I did need to get it off my chest for some reason and I'm not gonna erase it.  So there.

*Ahem*

And now, for the final installment of Chapter One from the Upcoming Moon-Ache, Book Two in The Lone March Series...

Da-du...um, how do you do a drum-roll in text?  How do you type a drum-roll?

Oh well.

Ddddddddrrrrrrrrrrrrruuuuuuuuuuuuuuummmmmmmmm-Rrrrrrroooooolllllll!!!

Chapter One, Part Three:


As I stared at my soup, I pictured Mr. Harper running into the kitchen to assemble a pouch of ice for me, and also making me soup just a few minutes before.  His kindness and concern for my safety were not exactly in keeping with the way the pack made the ravens out to be.  Sure, when I first met him and he’d been all intimidating—and even threatened me—I had the same attitude about him.  But then, he’d basically saved my life by telling me what I was and getting me to the people who could help me through my change.  Hell, there was no ‘basically’ about it—he did save my life.  And now, here he was doing it again.

Despite my gratitude, I couldn’t help wondering why.  Why was he putting himself through this for me?  Some girl he didn’t know.  Some girl who was just his son’s debate partner.  Some girl who had no connection to him other than being were.  But I wasn’t even a raven, like him—I was a wolf.  According to the wolves, we were supposed to be enemies.  Weren’t we?

I recalled what Quinn had said about not calling them by their names because they didn’t warrant that much respect.  And I remembered when the pack had come to get me, Elliot had said that thing about Mr. Harper wanting to be absolved (although, he had derogatorily called him ‘the bird’).

What did they mean?  What did Mr. Harper need to be absolved from?  Why did the ravens not deserve the respect of the wolves?

I could only assume that there was some kind of miscommunication going on.  Mr. Harper was taking care of me the same way Quinn would be, if he was here.  Regardless of what the men think, I had to take that into account.

Still, their opinion couldn’t be completely unfounded—it had to have been borne out of something.  So what did Mr. Harper need absolving from?

I had just decided to talk to him about it, when he returned with a zip-lock bag full of ice and directed me to stretch out on the couch.  But, after he gently lifted my ankle and propped it up on a pillow, laying the bag of ice on it carefully and sitting back down in the chair in front of me, I completely lost my nerve.  It wasn’t the time to try to get all in his business with personal questions.  He was being really attentive of me and I needed to appreciate that more.  So I just went back to concentrating on my soup.

He watched me eat for a while before finally speaking slowly.  “What do you know about what has been happening the last few days?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, gulping down a swig of water.

“There have been…incidents.”

I suddenly remembered Elliot’s confrontation with Quinn while we were still locked in the Cage.  He was bragging about taking control of the pack and letting them loose during the changes to run wild.  “They didn’t observe lock-down.”  I knew what that meant.  “How many?” I asked flatly.

He picked up my even tone and applied it to his own words.  “Twenty deaths.”

“Oh my God.”

“Mostly in the Tyler area.”

With that I wasn’t hungry anymore, so I put the near-empty bowl on the end table next to me.  I ignored the aberrant weirdness of Mr. Harper putting his hand on my knee when I saw his expression.  I had never seen him so benign.  It almost seemed out of place with his dark, angular features.

“March,” he said.

“What?” I asked, confused.

He pursed his lips and shifted his eyes between mine.  When he spoke, he spoke each word slowly and carefully.  “I need you to remember that your being here must remain hidden.  So when I tell you this, try not to be too…vociferous.”

“What is it?”

“It’s your parents.”

“What?—What about them?  What’s wrong?”

“They’re gone.”

I shook my head in disbelief.  Such a brief statement—only two words—and yet filled with so much weight.

“They got them,” he said.  “I’m sorry.”

I fixed my vision on the pattern of the Oriental rug beneath my toes, feeling instantly vacant and fuzzy.  It had a burgundy background swirled in gold strands around the edges with drops of emerald at each end.

“They…they can’t be gone,” I strained, but my voice sounded far away, even to me.  He didn’t respond so I looked up at him.  “They can’t be,” I repeated.

“I’m sorry.”

“You’re wrong.”

“I wish I was.”

“No.  There’s been a mistake.  They’re not gone.  Just missing.  We have to find them,” I said, throwing myself into a standing position, but he stopped me and pushed me back down.

“They were found in the front room of your house three days ago.”

He caught me as I began to slide off the couch and onto the floor, and moved, from his chair opposite me, to sit next to me on the couch, pulling my body backward into him and putting his arms around me while I felt myself being pulled away, till I knew I was completely absent—present in the room only in the physical sense.

Something about the pattern of that rug—about the shape of those gold swirls—seemed abrasive and made me feel assaulted, so I turned my gaze onto the banal print of a sailboat on a grey bed of water, framed and hanging on the wall, which, I thought abstractly, seemed out of place with the rest of the décor and was, admittedly, less than consoling.

Why?  Why them?  Why now?

I felt like I was falling through the air at a thousand miles an hour and everything in me screamed and begged me to stop, but I knew I was sitting as still as could be.

What do I do?  What can I do?  I’m a nobody.  I’m an orphan.  In the last three days I’ve learned that I’ve lost two sets of parents.  How many people have had to lose two sets of parents in the span of seventy-two hours?  What are the odds?

But I knew I didn’t care about the odds.  I was just delaying the act of grieving because I knew once it started, that would mean it was real.  Acknowledging the pain makes it real, and I didn’t want it to be real.

But they’re gone.

Then, suddenly, my tears made their grand entrance in one massive gesture and I heaved and sobbed silently after that.

I was crying so hard I could barely take a breath before I was blowing it back out in soft wails, so I stopped inhaling altogether for a while and just felt the pressure building up in my chest.  Somehow, it was soothing.

Seeing the uncharacteristic redness of my face, Mr. Harper said, “Breathe.”

But I couldn’t.  I didn’t want to breathe anymore.  I didn’t want to breathe ever again.

The End (for now)...(of Chapter One)...(Stay Tuned for Updates on Release and Other Info!)

xxErin

PS. Probably I could have just typed D's for that drum-roll, huh?  Eh...

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Part the Second...

Ready for the next exciting excerpt of Chapter One from the upcoming Moon-Ache, Book Two in The Lone March Series?

Thought so.

So...I guess I'll just be posting it now then...eh?

I mean, why not?  Right?

Yeah, I should post it.

Who's gonna stop me, ya know?

No one, that's who.

Because I have all the effing power.  So here it is...

Chapter One, Part Two:

It was a short trip to the Harper house, though it felt a lot longer for all the silence, which was inevitable due to three simple facts: 1. Avery Harper and I didn’t know each other very well, so everyday conversation was reaching, at best.  2. Mr. Harper was holding off on telling me what I wanted to know—how he knew anything that had been happening with the wolves.  I was impatient, but thankful for his rescue, and respectful enough to honor his request to wait for the answers.  3. Despite being within the safe confines of a large, automatic-locking SUV, I was still worried about being caught by Elliot, or whichever of the wolves was apparently so close behind me.  This fact kept me most silent of all.
Avery pulled into the driveway and killed the engine.  I hopped out of the big SUV, checked my coattails to ensure they were covering my bare back side, and followed Mr. Harper to the door.
“Wait here,” he said, cautiously opening the door and entering.
Feeling exposed, I looked behind me and all around to make sure I was alone.  The trees bristled and swayed lazily in the night breeze—the loudest sound in the whole neighborhood.  Though the street was lit with lamps, the houses lining either side were utterly dark and a bubble of still calm was draped around in every direction.  It was a bubble I knew would be easily punctured if they picked up on my scent.
The door opened abruptly and a hand came out and pulled me in by the shoulder.  Mr. Harper led me, with one hand on my back, directly into the front sitting room and quickly closed the door behind us.
The rich reds in the wallpaper and rug immediately engulfed me as I entered the room and almost seemed to brush me with warmth.  Whether from the wallpaper, or the suddenly still air (when I’d been used to the breeze during my escape) I felt my face flush in response and immediately my head started swimming with blood as it began to pump slower and slower through me to accommodate my now resting state.
Without an offer extended, I collapsed on the small, square loveseat, uninviting as it was in its under-stuffed austerity.
“Stay here.  I’ll find you something to wear,” he said.
“I can stand this a little longer.  First things first: find me something to eat.  I’m starving.”
He nodded and left me alone in the room.
I completely wanted to disobey him and go skipping up the stairs to see Ethyn because I smelled his amazing scent as soon as I walked through the door, but I couldn’t.  I was so tired and hungry.  And, now that I was through running and felt safe, my adrenaline was wearing off and fatigue and pain were starting to set in.  So I just laid there feeling the weight of my heavy lids as they fell, and I had to manually lift them open.  It was an arduous task and, finally, I gave up on it and left them shut only to have them open involuntarily when Mr. Harper gently nudged my shoulder some minutes later.
He had a bowl of steaming vegetable soup and a tall glass of iced water.  I took the bowl first and almost spilled it on myself in my hunger-crazed frenzy to bring it closer to my mouth.  The small thought crossed my mind that there was no meat in this meal, but I didn’t care—I just wanted food.  Besides, it would probably be best to go easy on my stomach for a few days, after having it empty for so long.  I scooped a spoonful and shoved it into my mouth without hesitation.
“Careful!  It’s—”
“Ahh!” I exclaimed and let the scalding, chunky liquid fall out of my mouth and back into the bowl.
“I warned you.”
“Not soon enough,” I retorted.
“Well, you didn’t expect cold soup, did you?” he asked, pulling a chair over to sit in front of me.
“Ugh!  This is torture!  I finally have food in front of me for the first time in three days and I can’t eat it!”
“You haven’t eaten in three days?”
“Duh, prisoner,” I said, pointing at myself.  “I thought you knew that.”
“I didn’t think they were starving you.  One would think they’d want to keep the last female were-wolf on earth in good health.”
“Yeah, well, I think Elliot’s plan involved me being as weak as possible without actually perishing.  I don’t know what would have happened to me if I hadn’t gotten outta there.”  I shuddered and blew on my soup.
“I’m sorry I handed you over to those criminals.  I thought I was doing the best thing for you.  Had I known they were such an awful pack, I wouldn’t have—”
“It’s okay,” I assured him.  “You did do the best thing for me.  If I hadn’t been heralded through my first change I would’ve died.  They’re the nearest pack around.  There’s nothing else you could have done.  And they’re not all bad.  Just most.”
Once I'd blown on it enough to keep from scorching my tongue, I slurped my soup.  (After spitting it out in front of him I figured why bother with manners?)  The warmth made it seem filling, but as time cooled it and the heat in my stomach subsided, I felt less and less full.
“What happened to your nose?” he asked, studying it with new concern.
“Huh?”
For a minute, I had completely forgotten about my self-inflicted accident.  During my escape, I tripped and fell, banging my head, specifically my nose, straight into the ground.
“Your nose is bloody,” he said.
I instinctively reached up and touched the under part of my nose to feel the blood, but it must have dried in the wind.
“They weren’t beating you, were they?” he asked incredulously.
“No, I tripped over a big log in the woods by the hospital while I was running away,” I explained.
He took my chin in his long fingers and tilted my face to have a better look at my nose.  “Does it hurt?”
“To be honest, I’m pretty numb all over right now.  Ask me again in ten minutes,” I said.
“So you’re okay then, generally speaking?”
“I’m okay,” I replied.  “My ankle is probably hurt pretty bad, though.  I think it got twisted in the fall.  Like I said, I can’t really feel anything, but running on it can’t have been good.”
“Let me see.”
I lifted my foot up to him and he put his palm underneath so I rested my weight on it.
“Well, I’m no doctor, but it doesn’t seem broken.  I’ll get you an ice pack.  You probably just sprained it,” he said, bounding up and out of the room before I could tell him not to worry about it.

Stay tuned for the final installment of Chapter One!

xxErin 

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Book Two is Approaching like the Many Creeping Clouds of a Thunderstorm...


...Because March is totally going to BRING THE THUNDER in Book Two!

As I'm sure everyone reading this knows, I'm currently working on Book Five of my Lone March series--a mere four chapters away from finishing the first draft--while contemplating a third draft of Book Four. Yet, only the first one, Moon-Linked, has been published. Why, you may ask? Because of a measly little thing called the cover. Getting real, legit, profesh, covers is an expensive venture, but, I feel, totally worth it. You're not supposed to judge books by their covers, but, inevitably, people do. I, myself, have been guilty of doing so in the past. So, we (me and Travis, my fiance) have been waiting till we had the scratch. That time is coming (thank Gaia!) and I wanted to do a little teaser for Book Two. Obviously, I can't reveal the cover or even the photo of the lovely model we've chosen to represent March for the series...even though I have said photo...hehe...you can't see. Yes, I am evil. But also I'm not evil at all and here's why: Though I can't reveal the actual cover yet, I'm going to announce the color scheme and title...right...NOW!


So, you get the basic idea. Dark purple with golden-yellow lettering.  I thought about putting in the moon as it will appear on the actual cover, but decided nope, I'm gonna be stingy about that. To make up for this, I thought I would post an excerpt of Book Two. Now, here's the catch, first, I'm just going to put up the same excerpt that's found at the back of Book One, which, obviously, most of you readers have read, but, I wanted to give those who haven't read Moon-Linked, or, for some strange reason, didn't see the Book Two teaser, a chance to get properly teased. Then, some time very soon, I will post the next little bit of Book Two, then another bit, and another, till eventually I have revealed the whole first chapter. Yes, I could post it all at once, but what's the fun in that? I rather like the idea of dangling it just out of reach;)

So, for those who haven't read this excerpt, enjoy; for those who have, read it again and get excited like the rest of us (c'mon, don't be a spoil sport).

*Ahem*


A Sneak-Peak at

Moon-Ache…


My name is March Howe. And I’m a were-wolf. Until four days ago, I didn’t really know what that meant for me and the life I’ve had for the last fifteen years. But now, on the night after my first complete full moon cycle, as I’m running home, in an attempt to flee my captors, I know what it means. And I know my whole life has just begun to change forever.
 
All I could hear was the sound of my bare feet padding damply against the ground beneath me as I pushed myself to run faster. I guess it was a good sign that was all I could hear—it meant I had eluded them thus far.
 
But Graham’s voice was playing ever louder in my head: “March…you can’t…go home. That’ll be…the first place they’ll go.”
 
His words were adorned with spatterings of blood that pitched forth from his mouth and were lost against the bloody backdrop of his upper body.
 
I knew I shouldn’t be going home. But at this time of night, where else could I really go?
 
I peered down the street as I passed the first house of my neighborhood on the right. There was my house down the way, sitting silently in the darkness. I wanted to hasten my step, but I was already going as fast as I could.
 
Before I’d cleared another house, lights sprayed the ground in front of me, growing brighter and sharper as their range contracted and they moved closer to me. Headlights.
 
My first inclination was to dart off the road, in fear, but then I realized Elliot and the rest of the betrayers would be in wolf form to catch me, not a car.
 
I didn’t even have time to make the conscious decision to look before it was beside me and someone was saying, “Get in.”
 
I recognized the smell before the voice or even the sleek, black Escalade. It was Mr. Harper. I hopped in, almost forgetting I was naked, until the cold AC hit my chest and I shivered uncontrollably and popped my legs up in the seat to shield myself from both the cold and being seen.
 
“Here, you can have my jacket,” he said, throwing his left arm in my direction and implying I should pull the sleeve of his blazer off him.
 
I tried to do so with my elbow still tucked in to my body—I didn’t want to reveal any more of myself to him—but I couldn’t quite get it.
 
“I’m not looking,” he said, “go ahead.”
 
I tugged it fast and once his arm was free he pulled the other sleeve off and handed it to me. I gladly wrapped up inside it and fidgeted with the buttons to do them up as he spoke.
 
“I know you want to go home, but you can’t. They’ll be there any minute.”
 
“Are they really that close behind me?—Wait, how do you know anything about this?”
 
He didn’t answer me. Instead, he said, “For now, you’ll come to my house. For now. Then, we’ll figure out what to do next. But listen, Ethyn doesn’t know anything about this and I don’t want him to find out, so he can’t know you’re there. Alright?”  I nodded.  “Now what exactly were you thinking going back to your house? You had to know that would be the first place they’d look.”
 
“I did know. But all I could think was I needed to recharge and see my parents and talk to them about all this.” He looked at me, confused. “Besides,” I continued, “I didn’t know where else to go this late at night anyway—hey, wait a minute—I’m not gonna explain myself anymore till you do some explaining of your own. Tell me how you knew I was in trouble. Why were you in my neighborhood waiting on me?”
 
He stared blankly ahead. “It’s not the time, March. Let’s just get you hidden and safe right now.”

Stay tuned for the next exciting excerpt of Moon-Ache, Book Two of The Lone March Series!

xxErin 

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Writing, Empty Theme Parks, and David Lynch's Secret

Last night was the night I finally finished the last bit of the story of Laura Palmer's death. It took me about a week, with a detached and involuntary start, an enraptured, gluttonous middle, and a broken, soul-shaking, drawn-out end. I consumed the entire first season of Twin Peaks in one day, as well as the first two episodes of the second season. Then, at 2AM, I got so terrified by the ending, where Bob appears and crawls over the couch and coffee table toward Maddy, that I came to the conclusion that I wasn't going to watch anymore. I decided I couldn't handle it. "Trav," I said, "I'm an open vessel. You know this about me. I am highly sensitive to outside energies, but I have no defenses to keep out the negatives ones--that's a bad combination--and I just can't do anymore of this." Besides vowing not to finish the show, I actually went so far as to demand that Travis give me the answers and solve the mystery of who killed Laura and what the deal was with the red room and the black lodge, etc. and so on. Grudgingly, he did.

It was not long after this confession (which in reality was much bigger than that), that I announced I wouldn't be able to go to bed till I watched something that was comforting to me, something happy. Naturally, I chose Matilda. So, we stayed up and watched it (I quoted every word), and I felt a little better, and we finally got to tuck ourselves into bed at a quarter to five in the morning.

I spent the next several days trying to squelch the leftover fear in my mind and forget about the show. But I couldn't. If I wasn't humming the theme song, or speaking the words of the Fire Walk with Me poem, I was imagining turning a corner and seeing either Bob, or the giant, standing in the shadows, staring at me. Eventually, I decided that if I'd come that far and the images were already in my head, I might as well finish the story and see how it played out. So, two days ago we watched all but the last episode of season two, and last night we watched the finale and then the movie. In typical Lynchian style, it blew my mind and scared the piss right out of me.

My one complaint is actually a blanket complaint, covering a wide array of several tiny complaints. Most I won't get into; they would be nothing more than the insipid rantings of an overly-enthusiastic storyteller. But I will say this: the worst decision the network ever made (probably in the history of bad network decisions), was to reveal who killed Laura in the middle of season two. They totally jumped the shark! Everything after that (excluding the last episode, of course), was lackluster--nothing was scary, nothing was sexy, the fear and the mystery were gone and yet, unthinkably, we still had half a season to slog through (who gives a shit about James fixing the married chick's car and shacking up with her? who cares about Ben Horn going crazy and pretending he's a civil war general?). They took the piss outta the whole show when they told us who did it. As I told Trav a few episodes later (after the reveal), it's like going to a theme park with all your family and friends, and you have the best day of your life. And then everyone goes home, but somehow you've been left behind. All the lights are out now, the rides are turned off, no magical inviting sounds fill the air, the doors to the gift shops are locked, and you can't have anymore cotton candy. But the gates are shut and you're trapped inside, so all you can do is wait it out till morning, when the place reopens and someone comes back to get you. The theme park doesn't seem so fun and inviting when it's dark and empty.

But I kept climbing the mountain because of the promise that when I got to the top, David Lynch would be there to serve the cotton candy at the end. Boy, was it good too.

Unfortunately, this damn cotton candy is stuck on my fingers, in my teeth, my belly, my throat—it won’t go away!!

Thus I have discovered the secret to David Lynch’s uncanny ability to frighten and traumatize. As we’ve all no doubt learned through films such as Blair Witch Project, whose initial hype lay in its claim of real footage from a real happening, or the 1938 War of the Worlds radio drama, presented as news bulletins so the audience would be under the impression that the country was actually caught in an alien invasion, to truly terrify people, you’ve got to stay within the realm of reality. We’re all intrigued by films that start with the text ‘Based on a True Story’, especially if it’s supposed to be a scary movie. But Lynch creeps so beyond realism that his filmic experience very quickly starts to read as surrealism. The time he takes to trail the lens up a wall, along a telephone cord, around a room—it’s all to put the audience on edge; the last time it was so satisfying to watch one action drawn out like that was Cyd Charisse in Silk Stockings, taking 4+ minutes to change clothes!

I could talk about Artaud and the Theatre of Cruelty, I could probably even discuss Lynch's tendency to push both sound and visuals into expressionistic territory, but really I just want to talk about one aspect of his cinematics—indeed, the premiere aspect, as far as I’m concerned—that lingers in my mind and, quite frankly, haunts my soul. He has this way of depicting extremely mundane images in such a way that they’re turned upside-down and made into austere, abrasive, and aggressive distortions of their original—and still fully present—appearances. Through experimentations with color, light, shadow, pacing, meticulous sound work, the redundant and revolving rhythm that exists within the movement of one image on the screen—like a ceiling fan, a ribbon blowing in a breeze, or a car swerving endlessly down a curvy road—your eyes and ears can be thusly brainwashed and trained into seeing the world this way. Even after turning off the television, for nearly a week straight now, I have been trapped behind a Lynchian lens, unable to turn it off or change it—unable to do anything but filter my world through this expressionistic surrealism, where the daylight in a room suddenly takes on an eerie and hopelessly sad meaning, the sound of a running faucet is now an omen of destruction. The list goes on and on. The point is, though I may be doing a very poor job of communicating it, that by simply taking time to showcase the everyday, to capitalize on the ordinary, exploit the unremarkable, the basest of human emotions—fear—can be awoken in a very deviant and irrevocable way.

And now that I’ve gotten that off my chest, I’m going to utilize this frightening but inspiring feeling and go work on my book.

Have a lovely Wednesday.

xxErin

Thursday, August 18, 2011

"Hey, Listen!" - Navi

I just really need to tell someone about my dream last night because it's been tickling my brain all day. So, listen up computer-face-screen-to-internet-that-means-no-actual-people-will-read-this. Here's my dream in a big, messy, convoluted nutshell:

I'm me and I'm in this giant old school castle like hogwarts or some other equally old, fancy school, where there's lots of marble. The marble is this color:
And other colors, too, but mostly that one. It is some sort of school holiday or maybe school was closed on account of the weather? I dunno. There weren't many lights on, so the power could have been out. And the more I think about it, the more that seems right because I keep getting this sort of 'not right' feeling about all the lights being out. Does that make sense? Oh well. Anywho. So I'm walkin' around, doin' what I do in dreams, which is...well, walk I guess. And other stuff probably. And then there's this man who corners me in an alcove next to one of the
columns, and he starts talking to me about his son who is trapped in some other dimension for God knows what reason, and he's all lament-y and passionate and sort of antsy for some reason and then he asks me if I would like to help his son. Well, I'm a nice girl.
See?

I don't know if that actually proves anything, but rest assured, I am nice. I like smiling and making other people smile and seeing the positive sides of things. I have life-long dreams of helping people, which extend even into my dream-self. Which is why I said, "Duh, I'll help." So he takes me over to this painting on the wall--and this is where it really gets Harry Potter-y, because the people in the painting are moving--and he starts talking to me about who each of the people are and then he starts talking to the people--like, directly to the painting-people. And just like that they start transcending time and space and all that jazz and they're like, coming out of the painting in holographic form, all kinda blueish, like
But then I'm like, 'Hey, guys, why'd you come outta the painting if you just ultimately wanted us to go into it with you?' because that's what happened next--they came out and then we all just flashed inside the scene of the painting. But, I didn't actually say that to them, I just thought it, because I didn't want to be rude or disrespectful, plus some of those folks looked a little sketchy and I didn't really want to piss them off. But, honestly, why couldn't they have just sucked us in there with them instead of using whatever multi-dimensional-travel magic they had to use to come out of it. And why not just one of them instead of every-dang-body in the pict--okay, I digress, let's get back on track. Where were we?

Oh, yes, we were going into the painting:
And then I find out the dude's family is royalty of some sort. And his wife is blue. Like this:
only, without the tentacle hair. And they all lead me into this room filled with shelves filled with tiny bottles filled with potions and that's where they tell me that the only way I can help the guy is by participating in a bloodletting ceremony.


And at first I'm freaked out, but in an almost indecently inexplicable instant (say that five times fast) I'm just like, "Eh, okay, let's go for it."

So then Christopher Mintz-Plasse
is the other son of the man and the little brother of the guy I'm going to help by giving my blood, and he takes me in his '91 maroon Ford F150 and he goes like 200 mph and I'm trying to explain to him that going fast makes me have anxiety attacks and such and he laughs at me and I'm thinking, 'Dude, you're Chris Mintz-Plasse--you're tellin' me you've never had an anxiety attack? YOU??' But I don't say that out loud because I'm concentrating on breathing. So it takes us like a million years (=40 minutes) to get where we're going, and then we go into this person's house who is not related to anyone and we have the bloodletting ceremony right there in the stranger's living room, which, by the way, is all white. So, needless to say, I'm freaking out the whole time that my blood is going to stain something in the room, even though it's not my room and I shouldn't care, I would still feel responsible because it is after all MY blood. Anyway, there are all these tubes involved and they're coming out of my arms and legs and taking my blood into these stainless steel bowls and carafes and then the people take the blood and throw it around the room (I'm wincing at the destruction of the white room like I do when I watch Tom & Jerry and they inevitably ruin the house in like, every episode--God, I hate that). Then they do an incantation and before you know it, the dude appears there and his family hugs him and they present his long-lost love to him and they're all, "Hooray! Now we can have a wedding! Huzzah and let's have some mead!" And no one says anything else to me and they just leave and I'm left there with my open wounds in the bloody white room of some stranger's house without a ride home, because of course Christopher Mintz-Plasse has left without me. It was so wham, bam, thank you, ma'am, you know?

Maybe I shouldn't have given those people my blood.

But the guy was happy that he was back with his long-lost love and the family was all crying tears of joy, so I guess, mostly, it all worked out. Except I still didn't have a ride home. Not sure how I got home as I woke up after that.

Anyway, pointless, strange, subconscious-mind-whispering-about-who-knows-what dream that ultimately left me unsettled and disappointed. I mean, they could have at least bought me a drink--no, no, they could have at least taken me back home! Even when you do a blood drive they give you a tee shirt! And a cookie so you're not light-headed after all the blood loss. I didn't get a cookie either.

Oh well.

So, now that I've gotten that off my chest, I think I'll get back to work.

xxErin

PS. There was a lot of blue in this blog. Some kinda symbolism or something...

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Today is today.

Watched this today on Blu-ray:


Had a bloody, barbaric, bitchin' time. It's funny that it helped my writing at all, since I happen to be in the middle of a super spiritual chapter.

Also, this is good for writer-type people, I think:


Calm Radio has already helped me immensely in the last two days since I started using it.

The porridge I just ate helped, too. Cuz my belly's full and ready to help me focus.

Look, don't pay attention to all my little nothings up there. The point of this blog is for me to say I've come to a decision. I'm going to go the way of Amanda Hocking and others, and set Moon-Linked, my first book, published in March, at 99 cents for the Kindle and the Nook. What have I really got to lose? Book Two, Moon-Ache, is still on track to be released this Fall some time, and I will be setting it at 99 cents as well. Cuz what's the point if you don't take a few chances in life, right? Our modern world is defined by experimentation.

Not until I wrote it above did I realize that I published in March, which happens to be my main character's name. Funny? Auspicious? Strange? Not worth mentioning? Dunno...

What a boring blog this is. My Eucalyptus Spearmint Stress Relief candle must be calming all the energy right out of me.

Ah, but my black coffee always fights the good fight, never turns down a battle of fatigue, never misses the chance to invade my sleepy system with its caffeine soldiers!

...Caffeine soldiers?

Perhaps I should go do something else now...

xxErin

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Hey, I published a book.

Go here to buy my book if you want to have something really cool to read:

https://www.createspace.com/3466432

I really just don't even know what to say (which is saying something for a girl who's written hundreds of pages throughout her life). Today I am elated. Today I am king of the world. Today I feel like Rambo. Or something.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Six days is a long time that's way longer than six days.

My second proof should be here in six days. I am both excited and nervous about this. There should be a word for these two emotions together. Like folperlacious. That's me.

Six more days of folperlacion before the essence of Erin Irvin implodes with pure joy. Or maybe pure chagrin. Let's hope it's the former. I'm babbling. But isn't that what these things are for?

In six days, if all goes according to plan, I will be legit. A real-live published author. I wonder if it will change my writing. I'm working on book four right now. It's a hard road I plow. (Does that make sense? Oh well.) Actually, it's a hard road March plows. Poor girl. As my dear friend, Caitlyn, once asked, "Can't anything go right for her??" Probably not, but there's always hope.

FYI: That last paragraph was really just me putting off what I really wanted to talk about, which is that Iamsofreakingsickofmyfirstbook. I've slaved over it--read it so many times I literally have the whole thing memorized. The Lone March journey started in June of 2009. It's nearly been two years. It's time. I mean, I'm working on book four for Pete's sake! But, the fact of the matter is, until it's officially published, I will continue to nitpick. So, come on, Createspace, throw me a bone! Or a book!

Anywho, I better get back to writing.

Thank you for your time,
Erin Irvin

P.S. I guess 'anxious' can mean nervous and excited...but it's more fun to type words that have squiggly, red lines under them.