Well, it finally happened. I missed an IWSG post (May). But before I delve into that, let me thank our host, Alex J. Cavanaugh, and his awesome band of co-hosts: Beverly Stowe McClure, Tonja Drecker, Tyrean Martinson, and Ellen @ The Cynical Sailor!
June's question: What's harder for you to come up with, book titles or character names?
That would be character names, for sure. In my first novel, every main character ended up with a name starting with the letter J: Jody, Janie, John, Jasper, and Jahoshaphat. Okay, maybe not the last one, but you get the idea.
Come to think of it, that first novel also went through three title changes (Black Days to A Glass Half Full to The Destiny Thief), so maybe I have trouble with both. I've come up with some humdingers of titles for stories that have yet to be written. I'd tell you some, but I'm afraid you might steal them I'm saving them.
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In this weekly blog hop, we express our thanks for the small (or not so small) things in life with our wonderful host, Lexa Cain, and her cohosts, L.G. Keltner @ Writing Off The Edge and Tonja Drecker @ Kidbits Blog.
1. New releases by writer friends, specifically this one by C. Lee McKenzie:
SOME VERY MESSY MEDIEVAL MAGIC
By C. Lee McKenzie
Pete’s stuck in medieval England!
Pete and his friend Weasel thought they’d closed the Time Lock. But a young page from medieval times, Peter of Bramwell, goes missing. His absence during a critical moment will forever alter history unless he’s found.
There’s only one solution - fledgling wizard Pete must take the page’s place. Accompanied by Weasel and Fanon, Pete’s alligator familiar, they travel to 1173 England.
But what if the page remains lost - will Pete know what to do when the critical moment arrives? Toss in a grumpy Fanon, the duke’s curious niece, a talking horse, and the Circle of Stones and Pete realizes he’s in over his young wizard head yet again...
Release date – May 15, 2018
Juvenile Fiction - Fantasy & Magic/Boys & Men
$13.95 Print ISBN 9781939844460
$3.99 EBook ISBN 9781939844477
C. Lee McKenzie has a background in Linguistics and Inter-Cultural Communication, but these days her greatest passion is writing for young readers. When she’s not writing she’s hiking or traveling or practicing yoga or asking a lot questions about things she still doesn’t understand.http://cleemckenziebooks.com
Links:
Barnes & Noble - https://www.barnesandnoble.
Kobo - https://www.kobo.com/us/en/
iTunes - https://itunes.apple.com/ca/
Barnes & Noble - https://www.barnesandnoble.
Kobo - https://www.kobo.com/us/en/
iTunes - https://itunes.apple.com/ca/
Kindle - https://www.amazon.com/dp/
Foyles - http://www.foyles.co.uk/witem/
If you're curious about how one completely misses IWSG day, here are the gory details:
Last month, my dear daughter came home early from school on a Tuesday (before I could compose my IWSG post), because her contact was irritating the busakas out of her eye. (Don't ask me to define busakas, although shockingly, there is a Twitter account @busakas. Dang it. Why are all the good made-up words taken? Why?) Anyway, when it didn't resolve over the next hour, I took her to the eye doctor and discovered she had an infection. Off to the pharmacist we went to fetch the drops to be applied to the eye every couple of hours. For two weeks. (Did you read that in iambic pentameter? Bravo.)
One problem solved, but another soon reared its head. You can't wear contacts with an eye infection. So did we pull out her backup eyeglasses? Nope. She didn't have any. Why? Because one stubborn teenage girl refused to even consider buying glasses once contacts came into the picture. Grrsniks. Learn from my mistake, parents of self-conscious teens.
The next day,Wednesday (IWSG day), we went back to the eye doctor for a follow-up exam and then off to EyeMart Express. They were awesome. We picked out two frames, and the girl was posting a Instagram poll on which ones looked cooler in less than 2 hours. (My pick lost 17 to 0. Sigh.)
On Thursday, daughter number two had, by complete coincidence, an eye doctor appointment, which dragged on for almost three HGTV shows, due to some extra tests they needed to run. (Man, I miss cable.)
3. Ryan Plumbing and Heating
In addition to our magical opthalmalogical marathon (say that three times fast), we had the usual overload of homework, instrument lessons, and oh yeah, the air conditioning died. This prompted not one, not two, but three different visits by our local air and heating guys plus a major repair job, which necessitated a quick and dirty clean-up of a very cluttered basement, not to mention a fascinating discussion on the pitter-patter of little feet.
Oh no...
Computer time? Forget about it. June will be different, I'm sure...
One week after writing the above post: Yep, so far it's much worse, but I'll save that for later.
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Have you ever missed an IWSG post? Life ever steal your writing time away when you really needed it? Any new book releases to share? Made up any words like Grrsniks? (FYI, it's available as a Twitter handle. You're welcome.)
