Authors, Kai Strand & LA Dragoni

This month I’m exploring the making of a book cover. So far this month I’ve shared the progression of a couple covers as I worked with digital artists and I shared my experiences working with an illustrator. This week I want to share the experience of covering a series. Even though I have The Weaver Tales series, it didn’t start as a series, so I didn’t go into it knowing the covers had to relate. Plus each of book in The Weaver Tales series is a standalone. When it came time to work on a cover for King of Bad, book 1 in my Super Villain Academy series, I knew that there would be more books with the same theme. But I still didn’t understand what it meant to make the covers look like a series. Not really. I would love to say that I approached the cover of King of Bad knowing how the over all story arc would progress over the next two books. But I mostly didn’t. Instead, I approached King of Bad with my blinders on. Looking only at the single book and it’s single cover. The...

For more info & for a complete list of blogs, visit the #IWSG site Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! The co-hosts for November are: Tyrean Martinson   http://tyreanswritingspot.blogspot.com/ Karen Walker   http://karenfollowingthewhispers.blogspot.com/ Denise Covey   http://dencovey.blogspot.com/    Stephen Tremp    http://authorstephentremp.blogspot.com/ Please be sure to visit their sites to thank them for hosting! *** Today I'm insecure about book signings! I have an event coming up in a real live bookstore. I've done bookstore events before and I really, really enjoy them-when people show up! Those of you who've had events before know it's hard to attract guests to book signings, plus this one is t...

The book that hit #7 on the Amazon bestsellers list of superhero fiction just got better! Today's the official launch of the 2nd edition of King of Bad - Super Villain Academy book 1. Not only that, but the series is now also available in a box set. Jeff Mean would rather set fires than follow rules or observe curfew. He wears his bad boy image like a favorite old hoodie; that is until he learns he has superpowers and is recruited by Super Villain Academy – where you learn to be good at being bad. In a school where one kid can evaporate all the water from your body and the girl you hang around with can perform psychic sex in your head, bad takes on a whole new meaning. Jeff wonders if he’s bad enough for SVA. He may never find out. Classmates vilify him when he develops good manners. Then he’s kidnapped by those closest to him and left to wonder who is good and who is bad. His rescue is the climactic episode that balances good and evil in the super world. The catalyst – t...

Watch out. Things are about to get really bad Excerpt from Super Bad : After sliding the card out of the envelope, she stared at it for so long Lexa finally said, “Well?” Sandra glanced at her friend before frowning again at the card. Finally she handed it to Lexa and stared at the flowers. Seeing you last night was as refreshing as the clean smell after a rainstorm. —Set Lexi’s lip curled up. “What does this mean?” “I’m not sure.” Sandra spoke tentatively. “He obviously has a thing for weather.” “And you,” Lexa said. “Maybe.” Lexa rolled her eyes. “What do you mean, maybe? He became a stalker at the party last night, and now he’s sent you your very first flowers.” Sandra shook her head. “There’s something…I don’t know.” A thought somewhere deep in her gray matter teased her, but kept getting overridden by images of Set’s beautiful face lowering toward hers in the dark of the hedge cave. She mentally scolded herself to focus, but then she remembered...

If you'll be participating in Cyber Monday, I wanted to let you know about a couple deals I'm offering on my print books. First, have you visited my MARKETPLACE ? I recently set up a storefront through Square, which allows me to offer signed copies of my books. In order to celebrate the recent release of THE LUMPY DUCKLING, I'm offering 10% off your order when you get a complete set of the Weaver Tale series. These books are written for 9 - 12 year old readers. They are individual stories, all set in the same fictional village of word weavers (storytellers). The softcover are $9.95 each and the hardcover are only $15.95 (already discounted from the Amazon price). But the 10% discount applies to the complete order, so load up on all my books or several copies of a favorite story to share with the kids, teachers, librarians in your life. As long as you have one complete set of the Weaver Tales series on your order, you qualify to use discount code #WTSDISCOUNT upon chec...

Three Times A Charm is on hiatus, because I haven't been recruiting. Feel free to contact me if you're an author, illustrator, editor, blogger, publicist, publisher involved in children's publishing and would like to be interviewed. So instead, I'm talking about the craft of writing. Creating a character arc is difficult, but crucial to the enjoyability factor of your story. Creating an arc over a series is even more challenging. In order for your readers to care, your character has to change and grow during their story. A friend of mine posted a picture of a scene from my book, Polar Opposites , on my Facebook page and the status called the characters in the scene, “Assholes!” Awesome! I squealed and clapped. Why am I okay with this? It’s the emotion behind the post that thrills me. Yes, literary characters can be jerks, too. And, as is the case in the scene my friend highlighted, it is often intentional. So many things have to come together to shape th...

The responsibility of a book's promotion lies with the author. Even an author who has a publisher that promotes or a huge following of readers who automatically buy every newly released book, has to keep their finger on the pulse of their book's success and step in when sales flag. Because of that, we often search for new ways to spread the word. That is exactly what I did when considering how I wanted to approach promotion for POLAR OPPOSITES, book 2 in my Super Villain Academy series. I collected votes about supers and super powers before my book signing for King of Bad . I wanted to collect more votes through my website for the second book, but knew I would have to do something to drive people to my site. I got a new tablet for Christmas and that gave me the idea to take my promotion to the streets and record an interview series that I could post through YouTube. But I knew nothing about making videos. Turns out there is an app for that (thank goodness!). My tablet has W...

I'm so excited to bring you the cover of POLAR OPPOSITES: Super Villain Academy, Book 2 The supers are balanced. Academies have altered their curriculum to teach both sides of the super power spectrum. All’s well in the super world. Right? When Mystic kidnaps Oceanus, Jeff learns it isn’t all right. Turning to the newly balanced supers for assistance, he panics to find they’ve done nothing to rescue Oceanus. When no ransom request follows, he worries Mystic’s plan never included returning his girlfriend. Frustrated, he’s forced to work with the only super willing to help. Oceanus’ ex-villain, ex-boyfriend, Set. Mystic isn’t the only one hiding something. Nothing about Jeff is balanced. Temper flares result in scorched clothing or flying furniture, and his charm has become an indiscriminate people-magnet. Jeff is convinced, or maybe just hopeful, that his lack of control is directly related to Oceanus being gone. But will he and Set find her before Jeff loses contro...