Powerful and Enchanting, Voodoo Priestess Edna Ersland has spent the majority of her life trapped under the watchful eye of her overprotective Grandfather, and Grand Vampire in his own right, Seth Ersland. But when her childhood friend and first love returns to their quiet coastal town a newly transformed Werewolf, it’s up to Edna to keep him safe from Seth and the brigade of Holy Warriors responsible for hunting his kind to extinction just a decade prior. And, if it wasn’t already hard enough keeping them both alive, an ancient, generational curse emerges, threatening to obliterate her from existence at every turn.
Self-Sacrificing and gentle, Byron Lee-Wallace returns to his hometown of Warwick after his overtly religious and abusive father is murdered by loan sharks, excited to reunite with his long lost love. When he happens upon a woman being mauled to death by a trio of ravenous Werewolves, he is left bloody and clinging to the remnants of his sanity, and his humanity. With mutilated bodies turning up in the streets all over town and his own mania brought about by the full moon, he can only blame himself for the recent carnage. But, when Hunters called in by Seth himself turn their sights on Edna, the monster he fights to suppress has no choice but to come out to play in defense of his Mate.
With the most dangerous immortals in existence stalking them through the streets of Rhode Island, their chances for survival are slim. But Edna isn’t the type of Witch to just throw in the towel, and her enemies are in for a world of hurt if they think otherwise. Armed with a deadly curse and an ancient, Inuit Wolf spirit, Byron and Edna are in for the fight of a lifetime and only fate will decide if they make it out alive.
If killing them with kindness doesn’t work, try Voodoo.
Winterbørn is a standalone AMBW Paranormal Romance Novel.
Brokenhearted and easily defeated, Nancy Weyr is fresh out of prison after a ten year stint for the murder of her abusive father. Her life has been hell and, as she leaves detention and enters the Criminal Justice System as a parolee, it’s about to get a helluva lot worse. With a vengeful Parole Officer on her heels and the threat of life in prison looming over her head, running from her problems is all she can do to stay alive. But, just when things can’t possibly go any further downhill, she’s abducted by a Demon and taken deep into the bowls of downtown Seattle.
Angelic and ruthless, Vikar the Decayer rules his Kingdom with an iron fist. A Necromancer serving a Dark God, it is his sole mission in life to cleanse the human world of sinners by sacrificing them back to the void. But when one of his Demonic sentinels returns with a tiny, terrified woman with hair like wildflowers, it’s clear that something in his system is terribly broken. He keeps her. And he heals her. But their newfound love comes at a cost.
With the Elder Wizards plotting mutiny and his empire crumbling before him, it’s up to Nancy to save Vikar from those who want his throne. And his life. Submissive and crestfallen, strength isn’t something she has in abundance. But when it comes to saving the one she loves, there’s nothing she won’t do to keep him safe. Even if it means unleashing a brutal side of herself she hoped to never see again.
Dead Like Me is a standalone AMBW novelette. This is not a novel.
Available Friday the 13th. Preorder your copy today!
Let me start off by saying that I adore my readers. I am in love with any person who takes time out of their schedule to pick up one of my stories and spend even the shortest amount of time in my worlds with my characters. As an author I love reviews, I love hearing about what you liked and even what you didn’t like about my stories, because most of the time we’re on the same page. But when your reviews become punishments for your personal preferences (the story wasn’t long enough, it wasn’t written in a style I liked, the woman on the cover is too light-skinned etc), they become a problem that affect me as an author and you as a reader of my future work.
Reviews are lifeblood for authors. They effect algorithms that put our books in front of more people and they give you, the reader, a voice when it comes to our work. But in this age of social media and being able to anonymously vomit opinions onto the internet, it’s becoming a trend to mindlessly bash, attack and demean authors and their work via “reviews”. Which is not okay, especially if you LIKE said work.
Yes, a review, whether positive or negative is your right as a reader to leave. But not reading descriptions and going on to leave off-base negative reviews on work that someone slaved over is just plain wrong. If you’re going to leave a review, at least have an informed opinion about the product. Because while it may have taken you ten seconds in a fit of anger to write, it will haunt and affect that authors career and future work for a lifetime. Let’s put it this way: if you worked hard on building a toaster and I told people not to buy it (by leaving a one star review) because it wasn’t a refrigerator, you would probably be upset.
Take for example my most recent Dragon God Erotic series. It’s my first real foray into the erotic short hemisphere and I genuinely enjoyed writing these four short stories. That being said, plenty of people are responding positively to them as well. Like all erotic stories they are meant to tease, to stir up emotion and get the blood pumping. They’re not really something you sink your teeth into story wise. But I pride myself on my world building and my character creation which means you’re going to get a bit of both in anything I write. Even if it’s only 8k words. And most of my readers new and old understand that.
Except for a few reviewers who don’t seem to get that they are not full length novels. I use the description and the “from the author” section of the amazon page to explain that they are indeed short stories. Amazon even has a handy little section beneath the description that tells you the page length of kindle books. You have plenty of warning before you buy and start reading the work. You even have the option of refunding the title.
That being said, why leave a negative review behind on a story that you admittedly like but want to see more of? That’s really not going to make me, or any author want to keep putting themselves in a position to be exposed to such devastation. And it’s not going to help the stories you love see continuations or expansion either. Quite the opposite, actually.
I said all of this to say that, reviews are wonderful things, ESPECIALLY when they are scathing and pointing out every plothole, annoying character, flaw and instance of purple prose. But when they are used simply to lash out at an author, to punish them because something didn’t go your way, they’re really affecting us both negatively. So I implore you, be constructive, but think before you review.
My number one tip for writers who want to spend less time slacking off on the internet; build a bible. Create a folder on your computer that has links or downloads of all the information you’re going to google or go looking for online. This includes:
Story templates
Name generators (I recommend Fantasy Name Generators and 20,000 Names or just keeping large lists of masculine and feminine names in a word doc on your computer)
Settings (You can’t have every location in the world stored on your computer but a direct link to Wikipedia is a good idea)
Wrap them all up in a specific folder and every time you feel like opening your browser “just for a sec” you’ll find everything you need there.
2. Reconnect With Your Goals
The only thing standing between you and your success is you. And that’s true for any industry, career or creative path you’re going to go down. Reconnecting with your personal goals is a sure fire way to get your procrastination under control. Why are you doing this? Why do you want to write that novel? Why is being successful important to you? Why do you want to be an author? List these reasons down and really reflect on why you started your journey as a writer in the first place.
For more tips, tricks and sneak peaks into the life of an author battling the endless distractions that come along with having internet access visit acgreenlee.com. And don’t forget to check out the Dragon God Erotic Series exclusively at Amazon!
Words that have plagued writers since the first one decided to put pen to paper. I struggle with enormous self-doubt. I’ve yet to get paid for a piece I’ve written. I’ve been published which is a huge accomplishment but not if you want to make a living at it. I’m currently writing a romance/suspense novel and I know that first drafts are mostly crap but I still wonder will anyone want to read this? Will the finished product be good enough? I’ve had enough people tell me I’m a talented writer and I’ve also gotten rejection e-mails and letters. So yes, I know what that feels like to be on the end of you’re not good enough spectrum.
I read something today that said, “it’s not the fear of writing that writers are afraid of. It’s the fear of writing bad.” I find these words to be very true. No one wants to be categorized as a “bad” writer. But what makes someone a “bad” writer? Critics? If no one buys your book? I can think of writers who have written poorly and sold millions of copies and writers whose books were brilliant and whose sales were not so great. I guess what it depends on is if your happy with your work. If you go out there and write your absolute very best then it doesn’t matter how many books you sell. Hopefully you do sell a lot.
I read something else today that said, “Self-doubt kills more dreams than failure ever will.” These words too, I think, are very true. You can’t let yourself get in the way of your writing. You must set aside those thoughts of self-doubt and self-criticism.
I guess the very best advice I can give you is to ignore the voices in your head that say Am I good enough? Is my writing good enough? Will this sell. And just write.
I am still at a complete and utter loss for words. I’ve attached the email sent by Mrs. Kim Burrows below because I am still firmly unable to process this. I was so worried when I released What’s Done in the Dark, because it was my first formal erotica effort. And it won a freaking award! I didn’t get first place, but that never matters to me. I am so completely honored and humbled that my work was even considered. I want to extend a big thank you to Literary Erotica Mag and a formal congratulations on opening their new website and having the courage to do so. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart for remembering me!
In light of recent world events I thought it pertinent to reach out to you, my family of readers, whose opinions I find absolutely invaluable.
I’ve written in the past that a community of writers can, has been, and in certain aspects always will be, a place of joy, happiness and support. Every writer needs their team. Their support system. The people who are meant to catch them when they inevitably stumble and need help finding their light again. That being said, there are unfortunately a lot of people I simply can’t associate within my community.
In the circles that I follow, and once fervently participated in, all I see are issues that cause me to grow increasingly disheartened. Every day I see posts that are blatantly racist. Posts that are blatantly sexist. Entire books built on played out stereotypes and tired tropes about people of color; the timid, shy Asian woman or the loud, ghetto black woman, or the spicy sex-crazed Latina…And it needs to stop. Things need to change. I am completely for writing what you want, but when you fail to realize how these microagressions give people the wrong idea, which negatively impacts the demographics you so carelessly write about, I can’t willingly be a part of it. That is to say, that for my own mental well-being, I can’t allow myself to be around it nor play a part in ignoring or supporting it.
As a person of color who writes fantasy, I’m a rare sight. And in a world where the characters, subject matter, and authors themselves are dominated by a primarily white demographic who are uncomfortable speaking about race, privilege, sex, class, and having conversations that would change their unknowingly insensitive, oppressive behavior, I’m obviously not welcome. And that’s fine by me. Because I don’t do what I do for other writers. I do it for my readers.
My wonderful, tough as nails, readers. You guys are my stars. You light up all the darkness in my world and chase the shadows away. That’s why I continue to produce content. That’s why I limit my interaction with others who intentionally, and unintentionally, write, do, and say things that affect my people and, by extention, me. Because of you, I don’t care about anything else except for delivering the content you’ve come to know and love. And so, I thank you. Continually. For your support. I can never hope to repay you enough.
You know, working is something we usually have to do, whether you’re a published author or just starting out. We start somewhere and sometimes it can be hard to maintain the passion for writing and working full-time; especially when at times you can only think about writing the days you’re working. Which is every day. And sometimes, you can be at a full-time job that tires you mentally; I was in that position a couple months ago. I used to work in a warehouse full-time and it was not the experience I wanted to go through.
Each day when I returned from the job I would be drained mentally from what I would have to go through. It wasn’t fun at all, I felt that my creativeness had completely been sucked out of me. It was hard for me to even write a sentence when I came home from a hard days work and that was every day. There are some things that we may be able to handle but this was not it; I started to become sick after awhile and that’s when I knew I had to officially leave.
And once I did, my mind started to become clearer, unfortunately, I could not take back those moments where I could have written. It was heart wrenching for me to go through something like that and lose my passion at the same time. No one, and I mean no one, should go through something like this. For me, it felt like I lost something within myself; I identify a lot with writing and it had calmed me in times of need when I needed it most. And for that to be taken away, I did feel like I lost my identity. However, once I had left that environment, I started to work in an office again, I could feel my mind dusting away the doors to Morus Academy (my mind palace), and pushing them open.
After a while, I started to reacquaint myself with my characters, but more importantly, I started to write again. I felt myself become happier with what I started to write and it wasn’t just writing Descendant of Aphrodite, but it was writing my short stories and The Journey to Writing blogs. This newer job gave me a sense of hope and now when I get home or I’m on my lunch break I can sit and finally write with a clear mind. When I take my hour bus ride to get to work or back home, I’m sitting there writing, I’m actually writing this whole post on the bus. Yes, working full-time is hard and at times difficult, especially when you’re working in a place that drains you completely.
I do like working full-time and I do love writing, sometimes working full-time and being an Author goes hand in hand. You can’t change that at times, we all go through it when we’re all starting out. We want to shoot for the stars that are litter with Authors but it is a long way to land among them. And sometimes we have to start somewhere, whether we are making a career of writing or if we’re going into our jobs and just writing along the way. We all have ink in our blood and we all know that our lunches and getting off of work is exciting when we can finally break out our phones, tablets or laptops just to write. We set aside our jobs when our hour lunch comes around and we travel into the worlds we create and explore it until its time to set our world aside for work. We always have to remember that we must balance our job and our love for writing.
My only advice to everyone out there working full-time and writing is to never give up, to never lose yourself like I did. It’s not a good feeling and once that comes over you, it is a struggle to understand why it happens. But, we will continue to move forward and that’s what we must do, don’t give up on your dreams and don’t give up on writing. When you start a job it can be hard to get into a rhythm of balancing them out, but you will later down the road. That it will become this lovely routine of working, lunch, write, working, go home and write. We know that at the end of our work day that our characters are waiting, so giving up is not an option for us, especially not for them.
We work both ways whether it is through our passion for writing or through our jobs that we have for ourselves. It may seem impossible to maintain both, but it won’t be in the long run, just remember to breathe and to give yourself time to understand and adapt to your schedule. In the end, you will find a way and your characters will be there waiting for you with open arms and ready for the battles to come. So just breath, you’ll get through this, I did and I know you can.
Most of you probably know that I’m hard at work making the sequel to Bad Grades happen. Bad Intentions is barely five chapters in and it’s already shaping up to be one of my favorite stories I’ve written this year.
In the wake of Claire and Daniel’s story, Jung In is off to Syracuse New York to investigate Paragon Genetic Solutions and potentially free the psychics he met during his ten-year captivity. Disguising himself as Henri Kang, med student from Korea, he goes undercover as a Neurology student and enters a residency program at a hospital co-owned by Dr. Edward Chang himself. It’s at this hospital that he meets Neurologist Alice Morgan, a beautiful, curvy, doctor with more confidence and attitude than the law should allow.
With her backstory still being developed at this point only two things are clear; she’s more than likely an incredibly powerful psychic, and she absolutely cannot stand Jung In. Having been hurt before she’s pretty mean on purpose, both due to the fact that she doesn’t want to do the residency and she wants to keep her heart protected just in case she starts to fall in love, but the genius Jung In has already recognized that and is using it against her. He knows that, the more he catches her off guard with his flirting, the closer he can get to her. Now, he’s extremely attracted to her and has already confessed that to himself AND to Daniel, but he also knows that getting close to her could mean finding the information he needs to free those psychics. Which is still his goal, despite having a perpetual hardon for Dr. Morgan.
It’s interesting watching this story and its characters develop, especially the budding romance between the emotionally stunted Jung In and the emotionally reclusive Alice. She has her fair share of past trauma, but it’s nothing compared to the torture he faced while living as Chang’s personal psychic slave. The more I listen to them banter, the more I feel like I’m watching an old school Tekken or Mortal Kombat match. Either fight or kiss each other already!
And of course I didn’t have this problem with Daniel and Claire because it was clear from the jump that Daniel would stop at NOTHING to have Claire by his side. He knew he was in love with her before I did! And I created them!
If you haven’t read Bad Grades yet, I implore you to do so. You really won’t want to miss all the action and romance that led up to Jung In being freed and him finally getting his own chance at happiness. I’m so stoked that I chose him to be the focal point of Bad Intentions. I mean, Daniel can’t have all the fun, can he?
Grab Bad Grades on Amazon and jump into this story! At the price of just 99cents, what do you have to lose?
July 1st 2016 marks #IndiePrideDay, a day when the Indie Authors of the world unite to to offer a real alternative for readers and lovers of books by offering special discounts on their books. There is a huge Indie Author community out there and they’re determined to take indie books mainstream. What does this mean for you? Well author, Sharon Lipman is offering her paranormal romance novel, Bound to Blackwood for free this weekend! Yes, that’s right, a great book, totally free. A proud indie author herself, she’ll be supporting the movement on July 1st, and you can too. Download your copy of Bound to Blackwood now and follow the #IndiePrideDay trend on twitter for some more amazing indie books and discover some new-to-you authors. You won’t regret it!
Bound to Blackwood Blurb:
Would you surrender your
soul for the love of the King?
Lena, a vampire and a Guardian of the Order, has been honour-bound to protect
human souls all her life. Acting first and thinking second is what’s saved her
skin time and again in the war against the Fallen, but her disregard for orders
soon catches up with her when her boss is seriously injured. Forced to take
responsibility for her actions, Lena is thrust into the path of her very own
kryptonite; Thorn. The raw power of his soul calls to her and his mere presence
lights a fire within her that she cannot contain.
With Vampire magic waning and the race in crisis, can either of them afford to
ignore Nature’s call? If they do, the future of the race is in jeopardy. If
they don’t, they will both lose the most precious part of themselves. Their
souls.
Excerpt:
Small, delicate hands butterflied across his chest as she leant forward to nuzzle his
neck. His hips arched towards her and one of her hands dipped lower. His cock
jumped as she ran her nails over his crotch, his jeans doing little to dull the
sensation. It was all he could do not to come there and then. And they still
had most of their clothes on. That needed to change. Right now.
As if reading his mind, Lena reached for his belt, then his fly. She lifted herself
off him to pull his jeans down his long legs. She damn near broke his ankles
when she wrenched his boots off and threw them halfway across the room. But the
look of pure hunger on her face as she raked her eyes up his body was its own
reward. If it meant he got to see that look again, he’d let her break every
fucking bone in his body.
She stood, staring at him, wearing just her tight combat trousers. And those boots.
Gods, he loved those boots.
She bent down to start tackling the umpteen buckles stretching from her ankles to
her knees.
“Uh uh. Those stay on.”
Lena’s head snapped up. “What did you say?”
Thorn’s eyes sparkled as he stared at her. “I said, the boots stay on.”
More of an order than a statement, it sent a tantalizing shudder through her, making
her clench her thighs at the promise of what was to come.
“The boots stay on?” she asked, in case she’d misheard. She didn’t know Thorn
could be so playful. It excited her.
There was one small problem. “Haven’t you forgotten about these?” she
asked, tugging at her combats. She’d like to know how she was supposed to get
them off and keep the boots on.
Thorn came up off the bed. Towering above her, he grabbed the front of her trousers
and gave one hard yank. Lena wobbled forward but gasped as the fabric split at
the seams. One more pull and what was left of her uniform and her underwear
fell to the floor in tatters.
She stood there watching Thorn as he drank her in with hungry, golden eyes. His
gaze went up her body from her boots to her lithe legs and lingered at the top
of her thighs. I can be playful too,
she thought as she widened her stance, a coy grin pulling her mouth.
Thorn’s white-hot gaze shot to her face, his eyes boring into her. Such heat, such
hunger.
Lena couldn’t stand it any longer. She reached into his dark hair and pulled him in
for a kiss. The kiss was hard, both their fangs fully extended, both needing,
each starving for the other.
A huge fan of the
paranormal romance genre, Sharon Lipman started writing in her teens. It wasn’t
until she was in her thirties that she found a story she was desperate to
share. House Blackwood was born and Bound to Blackwood is her debut novel.
She was born in west London and grew up in leafy Surrey in south-east England.
A lover of all things British, except the weather, she now lives in Almeria,
southern Spain with her husband and an ever growing collection of dogs.
Fiction for the Masses 