You know how everyone says when one door closes another one opens? At the time, you find this statement obnoxious as all get out because a) you don’t really know what the future holds, it certainly hasn’t been a cakewalk so far, and b) the thought of change is unbearable. You feel like your life is falling apart and everyone around is feeding you clichés like they’re made out of kale or quinoa or whatever the trend health food is right now. You don’t want kale clichés, you want double-chocolate fudge realisms, and you want them now. You just want things the way they were, but then something happens, a moment, an instant that sets you out on a path toward happiness you never knew could exist, and suddenly you think, huh, I don’t think I want double-chocolate fudge anymore. I think I’m in the mood for this heaping serving of strawberry cheesecake sitting in front of me…with a side of kale. And a pair of split pants, but we won’t get into that right now.

Graham Glenn may have tossed her in, but Oliver Finn made her feel again.

***

Penny in London releases August 1st!

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Come listen to the Penny in London soundtrack

Okay, so I read approximately two to three books a week and the majority of them are Indies. As I’ve said before, I’m a firm believer in Indies. Don’t believe me? Here, check this out. “Jane, Get Me Off This Crazy Thing!” Moving on…there are sooooo many authors to choose from. The first thing I did, was grab my Kindle and started rummaging through my last ten novels. I found that a lot of my choices were parts of series. So, I’ve decided to choose three Indie authors that have gotten me addicted to their series.

Here we go! Buckle up, Buttercup!

M. Leighton’s Madly Series

Madly is your average nearly-eighteen year old girl—for a mermaid princess, that is.

Madly James is thoroughly enjoying her internship in Slumber when the unthinkable happens—there’s a prison break in Atlas, Madly’s home beneath the sea. A traitor has set free eight Lore, the spirits of what humans know as fairy tales, and they are making their way to Slumber to awaken their descendants.

The first spirit to arrive is that of Ulrich Wolfhardt, a man that was once obsessed with wolves and a young maiden he would follow through the woods. After a bite from a wolf, Wolfhardt’s obsession with the girl became an unnatural hunger and the young maiden’s grandmother cursed him with a fate worse than death. And now he’s back…with a vengeance and a bite that can infect others as well.

Madly must learn the identity of Wolfhardt’s descendant and stop him before he kills again and spreads his curse across the earth. But the only person strong enough to help Madly is Jackson, the Sentinel who vowed to protect her and the one person capable of breaking her heart. Can Madly resist forbidden love long enough to save the world from Wolfhardt? Or will she have to sacrifice her heart and her destiny to save the ones she loves?

Courtney Cole’s The Bloodstone Saga

Seventeen-year old Macy Lockhart thought she had it all figured out.

As a Keeper in the ancient organization, the Order of the Moirae, she literally holds fate in her hands. She lives over and over in lives that end tragically; all to further the good of mankind as she does her part to control destiny.

But there’s one lesson that she hasn’t learned well enough. Nothing is ever what it seems.

Startling new revelations about her identity surface and Macy realizes that she’s more important than she ever imagined. As she struggles to grasp her new reality, everyone she loves is threatened. Is she strong enough to save them all?

Jennifer Laurens’ Heavenly Series

I met someone who changed everything. Matthias. My autistic sister’s guardian angel. Honest. Inspiring. Funny. Hot. And immortal. That was the problem. What could I do? I did what any other girl would do-I fell in love with him. Zoe’s sister darts in front of cars. Her brother’s a pothead. Her parents are so overwhelmed; they don’t see Zoe lost in her broken life. Zoe escapes the only way she knows how: partying. Matthias, a guardian sent from Heaven, watches over Zoe’s autistic sister. After Zoe is convinced he’s legit, angel and lost girl come together in a love that changes destiny. But Heaven on Earth can’t last forever.

Ready for the next ride?

In the style of Will Ferrell, “I’m singing! I’m on my blog and I’m singing! I’m on my blog and I’m siinngginnggg!“

So, instead of spending my time wisely and writing a bunch of words for you to read. I decided to waste time and create these:

Duh, duh, duhduhhhhh! The Glassheart Chronicles Dance Troupe! To promote our Anthology, we’ve  gotten together and spent many grueling hours preparing these promotional dance routines. Enjoy!

So, our first performance of ‘The Glassheart Chronicles’ Dance Troupe features Authors Wren Emerson, Fisher Amelie, J.L. Bryan, Courtney Cole, and Amy Jones.

Our second performance of ‘The Glassheart Chronicles’ Dance Troupe features Authors Tiffany King and Nicole Williams.

Okay, I only have one published book and it happens to be a Supernatural Romance but I’m currently writing a novel that has no paranormal elements. So, I’m going to go out on a limb here and say I don’t write an especially specific genre but I will allow myself to be pigeonholed one particular way. I wear the label, ‘romance writer’. Oh! How I love to write about love!

So, why do I write about love?

Because it is why I live.  I live to love my God, my family, my friends. There is not a more satisfying, more fulfilling, more sensation driven happiness better than love. And that’s exactly what love is. A sensation driven happiness.

When you’re first getting to know someone there are first jokes, first car drives, first movies, first songs, first kisses, which are all phenomenal, by the way, but with love, you get third, fourths, fifths and infinities.  It’s the promise of infinity that is so beautiful to me. It’s a concept, I think, may be lost within today’s youth. I don’t think couples stick it out long enough to find out what longevity can bring them. Deeper love, deeper respect, deeper connections. You get to know one another so well you can read the other’s thoughts and feelings without them being voiced. This is love to me. Connection is love to me.

That’s why I try to write the love between my characters with a deeper connection. Nothing is superficial about them, and although, they are flawed, they still hold themselves to higher standards and strive to meet them. Elliott would do anything for Julia and I mean anything. There’s a conversation between the two of them in The Understorey where Julia tells Elliott that she can see that he would die for her and Elliott whispers in reply, “I would kill tigers for you, Jules. Of course, I would die for you.” Theirs is a selfless love which is the only way to love, in my opinion. When a love is so profound you wouldn’t hesitate laying down your life for that person, that is genuine love in the most true sense.

I also try to convey to my readers, especially my female readers, that when someone is honestly interested in you they would do anything to keep you safe, body and soul. I love it when my female leads get into some sort of predicament and the boys come to their rescue. I mean, I know it’s an antiquated concept so just go ahead and call me old-fashioned. Now, with that being said,  I do want to point out that my female characters aren’t pansies, either. They fight back, they’re strong and intelligent and each possess gumption, a trait, I think, every girl should acquire.

It’s important to me that my readers recognize that my female leads know their own value. I can’t tell you how many girls I’ve met where I walked away from the conversation thinking, ‘they don’t know they’re worth jumping out of planes for’.  It’s just another reason why I write romances. I write how romance should be and what the youth should expect from each other. I write for entertainment, of course, because love is just a blast but I also write so my readers know that it’s okay to demand only the best because that’s what we all deserve, the best.

This envelopment with Jules smothered all lingering agony from the wanting that had these past few weeks sat so stagnant in my heart. It was as if I had been wandering through the Sahara, with a canteen brimming with water and only allowed myself to drink one tablespoon a day, though my body suffered for gallons.

HelloGoodbye ‘When We First Met’

Fellow members of ‘The Lovely Hearts Club’:

You see, I am a Carni, an independently published author who ‘smells of cabbage and has small hands’. Well, I don’t own the latter traits. I’ll be honest, I just couldn’t stop myself from making the Mike Myer’s reference but I am an Indie. Now, I’m new to this whole game. I don’t really have a lot of experience and I am not a best seller, not yet, anyway. *wink, wink* But I have done my fair share of reading, novels and research alike.

When I decided to write my book, it never occurred to me how the industry works. The movies give a gorgeously, grandiose idea of what it means to become a published author but like so many movies, their facts are not facts at all. We can’t fall in love the first day we meet someone, forensic results don’t make it to the detective’s desk in a day, not everyone in the South is a horse riding, out-house using hick, and authors don’t get published by the first publisher they send their novel to.

In fact, I’ll give you the lowest low down of how it really goes down. Author writes amazing manuscript. They miss hair cuts, don’t eat right, become allergic to the sun, and all to pour their heart, their soul into their words. Then, voila’!  This is where the movies get it wrong. They don’t create six packages worth of five hundred sheets of paper, set it nicely into  a crisp manilla envelope, and send it to the big six. ie. Macmillan, HarperCollins, Simon and Schuster, Penguin, etc. No, their beautiful piece of art sits in their hands while they send e-mail after e-mail after e-mail of what we call an ‘agent query’ to literary agencies across the great United States, praying that they not only don’t get an ‘insta-rejection’ but that they also don’t get a, ‘Sorry, but your work lacks talent’ or ‘Sorry, we aren’t accepting new clients’ or ‘Blech! You just plain old suck!’ sort of response. Which, by the way, all authors receive. And we don’t just receive one or two rejections. Oh, ho, hooo! No! We receive them in droves. And it does something to your heart when you get them.

I think I read on Stephenie Meyer’s website, or maybe I heard it in an interview of hers, I’m not entirely sure, but she said that she received a rejection letter that was incredibly insulting. They told her that her writing was basically not worth anything but as we all know, that agent was stupidly, ridiculously, outrageously wrong. It was proven in her record sales. The American youth likes her stuff. Duh.

Which brings me to the point of the blog, ‘Why Indie?’

Okay, so, basically, like most corporate machines, the big six and a lot of well-educated agents  are, unfortunately, completely out of touch with America and even Europe. This is a common attribute amongst many big companies and big government. They think they know us better than we know ourselves, which is, of course, ludicrous. I think Joe Konrath said it best in a blog he wrote back in March with fellow author Barry Eisler, “It reminds me of the golden age of television. You had three choices, ABC, NBC, or CBS. They dictated what you would watch. But that model no longer works for TV. Now there are hundreds of channels. And it no longer works for books, either. If you look at the current Top 100 bestsellers on Kindle, twenty-seven of them are self-published. Many of those authors were rejected by NY. Yet consumers are showing us what they want to read, and voting with their wallets.” (You have to read this blog. Firstly, because these two men explain ‘Why Indie?’ better than I ever could and it’s also the reason I chose Indie in the first place.) Ebooks and Self-Publishing – A Dialog Between Authors Barry Eisler and Joe Konrath

Anyway, but this isn’t the only reason the big six are considered antiquated. The big six are paper pushers, we all know this, but there is no denying the fact that people are no longer reading paper. People are reading electronically. Now, if the big six had jumped off their stubborn wagon and recognized the fact that people are changing with the technology they would have invented ereaders long before Amazon or Barnes and Noble ever did. Why? Because that’s what most money driven businesses do. They change the nature of their companies to fit their consumers. This isn’t the case with the big six. They actually think that the consumers should fit themselves around their needs instead of vice versa. It’s just such an unnatural idea. Which is why someone like Joe Konrath shut down a half million dollar offer from a big publisher in order to go Indie. He’s not an idiot. He knows where the money is. Paper is no longer the norm. That isn’t to say that there are those who prefer paper. Paper will always exist, but as Konrath so deftly points out in his blog, paper is no longer the norm.

So, the hundred million dollar question. Why push yourself through thousands of nearly impossible check points, to land at an agent’s doorstep, only to wait while they wade through miles of red tape to get a publisher to look at you, and if they accept you, wait a year before your book hits physical or virtual shelves, when you can just do it yourself?

Many say it’s because traditional publishers’ hands reach farther than anyone could possibly reach on their own. Which, for the most part, is true when it comes to physical shelves but let me ask you this? Where are the physical shelves, anymore? Borders is closing over two hundred stores. Barnes and Noble has the Nook, Amazon, the Kindle, Apple, the iPad. Physical shelves are now the minority.

Also, traditional publishers do little to no marketing for their authors. They expect the authors to do that. So, tell me, where’s the advantage?

Which is why I never sent one query out.

Many think I’m insane and maybe I am but honestly, I’m not afraid of a little extra work. I’m going to roll up my sleeves, write to my amazing book bloggers (whom, by the way, are the reason I sell books) and I will constantly stay aware of the industry and what my readers want.

And I will write. Books. Loads and loads of books…that I think will speak to the youth not what the publisher’s think the youth wants to read.

Plus, seeing the ‘Amanda Hocking/HP Mallory’ effect take place right in front of my eyes and reading Joe Konrath’s and Barry Eisler’s witty repartee was enough to convince me to try on my ‘Indie’ hat, which, by the way, fits quite nicely right now. Looks really good on a couple of others, too.

Try these mad hatters on for size,

Welcome to our Friday posts about all things YA Indie for authors, readers and reviewers!

We are a group of YA Indies that all post on the same theme each Friday. Binge on all the cotton candy and popcorn you want and get set for a thrilling ride! At today’s carnival we want to know who you are and share a little bit about ourselves.