Goodreads Authors/Readers discussion

I thought it would be of interest to writers and readers to have a place to showcase writing.
I'm currently working on a story set in the small south-western town of Yarloop in Western Australia.
Yarloop was once the hub of the timber industry in the region.
My story is a fictional tale of family, acceptance, forgiveness and love.
What are you writing? Or, what would you like to read about?

Hi Jeanette, your book sounds intriguing.

I've just finished writing and editing my sequel to Star-Crossed Rascals. I'm still deciding on the title to the new book. It's a chapter book for reluctant readers, so it's a bit gross. It's set in rural NSW and a trip to Sydney.

The characters are quite mischievous and I'm not sure if I may have to change a few things. I may need the permission to write about one of the places that they visit. I'm not sure if it's legal or if I can use a particular building on the book cover or write about it. So I'll have to check it out.

Tears of Min Brock
While doing the shameless promotion of my new YA fantasy book, I'm working on finishing the fourth book in the series. And then there are those other bits and pieces of tales and lore zipping inside my head...maybe aspirin will help!

I'm writing my follow-up to my humor sci-fi book, There Goes the Galaxy. Right now I have a very, very rough draft of the first five chapters. SO rough, I should wear gloves when touching the printed pages and use hand-cream afterwards. :)

But I'm trying to keep my critical brain at bay while I just progress forward with it, to get the ideas out there.

The thing about writing sci-fi/fantasy humor is so much requires a twist of fresh ingenuity-- all names are made-up and need to be both reasonable and clever. I'm creating species, and slang and all that good stuff. So it takes time to do it well...

Time and coffee. :)

Jenn wrote: "I'm writing my follow-up to my humor sci-fi book, There Goes the Galaxy. Right now I have a very, very rough draft of the first five chapters. SO rough, I should wear gloves when touching the print..."
Totally get your dilemma. I'd say fantasy/sci-fi is the toughest genre because you have to start with a fresh slate!

I'm into an epic fantasy, and still hoping to finish by the end of november, maybe sooner. I also have a paranormal cooking, but I focus on the fantasy now :)

Kudos to you fantasy/sci-fi writers. I wouldn't know where to begin.

Patricia, it's usually okay to write about real-life places as long as you don't implicate real people. I always google names too, to make sure they don't belong to famous/infamous persons.
Pictures/photos are another thing entirely. Check for copyright.
There are some good organisations such as Shutterstock where you can buy photos.

Thanks Jeanett. I take my own photos. The ones you can buy even have some copyright and you can only use them once.

I contacted the venue and asked if I could use a photo I took of their building. They said they would have to approve it. It's The Sydney Opera House, so I have to be careful. the characters are totally fictitious, but the venue isn't. I don't think there are any famous people with the names Pollyweena Grubble or Gertie McDougal. LOL. If there were such kids, they would be banned from The real Opera House.

This is a slap-stick humour story for reluctant readers, so I'm not sure I should use the Opera House. They might not like it.

I'm editing the third book in my Maeve Kenny series, about an Irish couple running a winery in New York's Finger Lakes region. Must get it out to the editors before November, because I'm starting a family saga then for NaNoWriMo Help! Why am I doing this to myself? :D

Jeanette wrote: "I thought it would be of interest to writers and readers to have a place to showcase writing.
I'm currently working on a story set in the small south-western town of Yarloop in Western Australia.
..."

I'm writing a novel called Love's Flaming Torch. I registered for this year's NanoWrimo and I'm planning to write the first draft to this novel (50,000 words) in November. The story is about a fireman with a pyromaniac past who falls in love with a girl named Mary Reilly. Sadly, the fireman dies when he heeds the call to Tower South on 911 and Mary is left devestated by the loss of Eric without ever having the chance to tell him how much she loved him.

I am working on a sequel to my novel Roses of Winter. I am also recording A Hole Without Sides as an audiobook.

Patricia, you're novel has me intrigued, but if it doesn't feel right, don't do it. You don't want to be worrying about it the whole time.

MaryPat, my current WIP is also about vineyards and wineries. Good luck with NaNoWriMo. You'll amaze yourself, I'm sure.

Mary, your novel sounds like a tear-jerker.

Murdo, you seem to be very busy. Both your novels sound interesting.

J.E. wrote: "Jenn wrote: "I'm writing my follow-up to my humor sci-fi book, There Goes the Galaxy. Right now I have a very, very rough draft of the first five chapters. SO rough, I should wear gloves when touch..."

One of my friends is writing a Western, and I'd say she's got it equally or more difficult than I do, because she's determined to be very historically accurate. The hours of research she's done... the books she's read to find out what she needs to know... it's amazing.

Writing well is never easy.

Hi,

I'm writing a story about British time-travelling assassins. Have published two short story prequels to the main book which I'm still working on. :-)

I actually just finished the first draft of the second book in my YA science fiction/horror series. The first book is already available: The Foxfire Chronicles: Shadows of Past Memories )

Now, I'm waiting for November to start writing again...NaNoWriMo!

I am currently working on writing the sequel to "In His Love."

A few weeks ago I made the decision to change directions on the route I was pursuing with it, so it is back to the starting point. Luckily I have a terrific prologue to start from!

Gayle wrote: "Hi,

I'm writing a story about British time-travelling assassins. Have published two short story prequels to the main book which I'm still working on. :-)"

Are you really sure they are prequels...?

Well I realise that prequels are usually published after the main book but they were finished, edited, redrafted umpteen times and ready for publishing, so I thought 'why not?'

Forgive me I was being silly - prequel/sequel they are all the same in time travel stories are they not?

I know what you mean. Were they too long to include as part of the main book?

lol, I guess you're right, they are!

No, they weren't too long, at all. The first one clocks in just over 3100 words, and the second is a bit longer at over 14200 words.

The prequels deal with some of the supporting characters from the main book, and tell how they ended up being time-travelling assassins. :-)

I've still to write a third 'prequel', but I think I'll wait until I publish book 1, and then publish all three prequels as an Omnibus. :-)

Sounds like a good idea, as you may end up with a full size book that way.

That's the plan. ;-)

By the way, and as I am nosying around here, I may as well add that I am, on and off depending on real life, working on another science fiction and fantasy story. I am not sure if it is a sequel, but it does fit in the same universe and chronological-wise after all my other books. If I finish it, and there are no guarrantees, it will be another long one.

Good luck with it! (ruddy real life getting in the way, lol)

Great topic! What writer doesn't want to talk about their WIP, the "people" they know that no one else does, and all the exciting things going on... which are stifled into a computer?

My current project is a Regency mystery with some sweet romance. It is about an eccentric woman who spends her time in a dusty attic room with a chest labeled "For the Skylark". Her grown twins, Dante and Evangeline, have been raised on the country estate under strict and strange household Rules. They are not even familiar with the rules of society! Dante begins to long to leave the property, but Evangeline wants him to stay home, obey Rules and leave well enough alone.

I am writing very little at the moment. Family, work et al mean I am scraping a few minutes here and there, and that does nothing for the continuity. Bought a lottery ticket tonight so I could buy a place in the Rockies and another in the Philippines, and then have the time to get in a few thousand words a day. If that fails, I'll have to stick to the early alarm clock...

Pia wrote: "A Nickel For Your Cosmic Thoughts (because life has become more expensive)

--Yes, that's the title of one of my works-in-progress."

Love the title!

I am working on the sequel Dantalion Of The Goetia: The Summoning. www.fantasyromanceoccult.com I am participating in some great October Spooktacular Book Giveaways... please check out my site and follow the Book Blogs...:)

I'm working on book 3 of the Sinners Series as well as a stand alone novella

I just completed the first three books of the Bluegrass Series (Bluegrass State of Mind, Risky Shot and Dead Heat) and wanted to do something different. Some of the secondary characters in those books are the three elderly Rose sisters, Lily Rae, Violet Fae, and Daisy Mae Rose. I am taking some time off the romance/crime of the series and doing a Rose trilogy. I tell the story of who they are and the loves they lost and then gained. I am having a ton of fun with it!

Well, we're a busy bunch. Sounds like there are some good books in the making to add to my 'to read' list.

I'm preparing to use NaNoWriMo to get moving on the sequel to my recently published science fiction novel Twin-Bred. (No clue what its title will be....) Once NaNo is over, I'll haul out the general fiction novel (tentatively titled Reflections) that I roughed out during Camp Nano in August, and start editing. Somewhere in there, I need to finish editing a sci-fi short story, The Baby, and start writing more stories on the same theme (human cloning) and set in the same story-universe.

This is a busy group, and everyone's ideas and works-in-progress sound so interesting, I just want to go racing off in every direction, reading everyone's excerpts and blog posts and ....! I'm sort of in a rest stop on writing right now because I put the novel I was editing and re-writing aside to let it "cool off" for awhile, and so that I could start the research and reading for the novel I'll start in November (NaNoWriMo!). But I have written a couple of blog posts for the novel I am marketing now, and also for the book signing event I'm doing on Oct. 30th.

Mari wrote: "This is a busy group, and everyone's ideas and works-in-progress sound so interesting, I just want to go racing off in every direction, reading everyone's excerpts and blog posts and ....! I'm sort..."

Yay! Another Wrimo! I'm very excited for November. Best of luck to you!

The story I am working on right now is a children's short story/picture book that was inspired by some abandoned kittens that we took in. I want to write a story that shows the pain and sadness abandoned animals go through, but I want the story to be uplifting and inspiring as well. I believe if I help even one child grow up to be a responsible pet owner, it will be more than worth it!

Can't say I've read your novel, Kodai. What's it about?

I'm working on the sequel to my Feb. Special Edition book, His Most Important Win. I hope to hear soon that the sequel will go to contract. Nail-biting time.

I actually have three stories I'm working on. A second in a MG series, a YA paranormal romance and a story close to my heart...a fictional take on a local school bus accident where we lost three young people and a parent. A horrible tragedy but filled with life-changing miracles. Hopefully NaNoWriMo will kick me in the butt to get these stories well on their way! :-)
C.K. Volnek

Just published: Impediments, my third novel and the first book of The Sonnet Trilogy. Set largely in Switzerland between 1948 and 1955, it is a coming of age and love story complicated by family ties, gender stereotypes and changing attitudes toward sex.

Impediments

Working hard with my co-author on the sequel to The Apocalypse Gene. It's already sold. We better get crackin'!

About to start NaNo! I have two stories to write this year...lots of work. But, I'm very excited!

You can follow my NaNo progress on my blog: http://www.wordsoftheworlds.blogspot.com

I'm desperately trying to start a sequel to my book "lions of the grail". A lot of my readers want a sequel, and there is definately a story to tell around the actual historical events of the Scottish invasion of Ireland in 1315-theres battles, sieges, treachery and even canaballism-but my main problem is that the way the hero ended the forst book: He had achieved everything he wanted, and a couple of things he hadn't expected (a daughter, for example). so why the hell would he go back to Ireland and get re-involved in the war? Soon as I work that one out, I'll be good to go.

I'm working on revising my first novel. It follows a young woman as she returns to Argentina after years of living in the U.S. where she and her family sought refuge from the Dirty War. It's all about her discovering what really happened to her mother, who mysteriously disappeared during the height of the war and how this one thread of truth basically unravels her entire life and who she thought she was. In my opinion it crosses over between adult and young adult fiction but it is really different and I'm having trouble figuring out where exactly my book will fit in. I've had some fellow writers read it and their feedback has been mostly positive and after finishing my revisions, my next step will be to find an agent.

Does anyone out there know of an agent or agency that specializes in or is looking for young adult latin fiction?

Tim wrote: "I'm desperately trying to start a sequel to my book "lions of the grail". A lot of my readers want a sequel, and there is definately a story to tell around the actual historical events of the Scott..."

Hey Tim,

Relax about the sequel. It'll come. I just put Lions of the Grail on my TR list.

I'm now writing the first of my two NaNo novels for this year, and it's going great. Next will come the sequel to my upcoming release, The Ending. Very excited!

I'm writing the first book in my Hell's Belles series (Regency Romance with dynamic heroines who've run afoul of Society's conventions, and the heroes who love them)~

An Arcane con-artist and a Bowstreet runner join forces in Regency London to infiltrate the infamous Hellfire Club on a perilous mission of rescue and revenge. In the process, they discover that some magic is more than smoke and mirrors, and love is the most powerful sorcery of all.

--It's my project for my very first NaNoWriMo, and I'm really excited :)

Currently I am working on DAYTONA DEAD the third in my Laura Hamilton/Gerry series which includes DEAD ON ARRIVAL AND OVER HER DEAD BODY.

DAYTONA DEAD involves the honeymoon for Laura and Gerry when they stumble upon the hit and run death of her ex-husband Lou and once again Laura and Gerry are thrust into the mystery and just who turned him into road kill, and why.

Eryn wrote: "I'm writing the first book in my Hell's Belles series (Regency Romance with dynamic heroines who've run afoul of Society's conventions, and the heroes who love them)~

An Arcane con-artist and a Bo..."
sounds good

Writing a sequel to my historical mystery, Fallen From Grace.
After a cave-in, a miner is found dead with another miner standing over him with a knife in his hand. But the victim died from poison and not a knife wound.
Sheriff Sylvester Tilghman, still trying to convince his love Lydia Longlow to marry him, faces danger again in a plot involving gambling, gypsies, prostitutes and horse thieves.

Fiction is my forte (ha!), but recently a friend approached me and said she knew someone with an interesting story to tell...

'Susan's Brother' is about an abused dyslexic boy who was put in an adult mental ward at the age of nine years old. It's a true story and has involved extensive interviews with the subject (now 63 years old). So, I've had to learn to interview subjects on very delicate, very personal and emotional matters. One doesn't often see sixty-year-old men in tears as they recount very unpleasant childhood memories (unless one is a counsellor, and I'm not).

It's also led to opening doors for him with his son.

Despite the subject matter, Susan's Brother is an uplifting, positive story as told to me. I only have to convey that with literary genius now!