Book Two of the Free Wolves Series Archives

♦Welcome to another edition of the Open Book Blog Hop!♦

Topic #39

Blog Roundup

Welcome back to another edition of the Open Book Blog Hop! If you’re new to the series, the authors included are always grateful for your reads and appreciate, even more so, when you share our writings with your friends. If you’re new to the series, welcome aboard. The authors will engage and impress you weekly, so be prepared to become a regular reader.

This week, the suggested topic was a blog roundup. What does a roundup mean? I admit I had to ask myself. It simply is what it sounds like: a roundup (or listing) of resources or articles that make up a useful series for use by our readers. Many of the readers are writers in their own right. Many are just curious readers who want to know about the process behind their favorite books. With this in mind, I chose to round up my series on Writing Historical Fiction.

Why did I choose this series? For the same reasons that I chose to write about it. Many authors write about writing. However, I never found a series, blog or article that really resonated with me as an author. There are so many to rifle through, and it get’s cumbersome to deal with. I realize that my series very well might have disappeared in the din. Instead of rehashing many of the old how-to’s that litter the internet, I instead illustrated how I came at Historical Fiction. I don’t tell writers how to write the next bestseller, and I especially don’t tell you how to write. Writing fiction isn’t about filling in the names, settings, and other such details in a formula. It is far more creative than that. What I do is get your mind percolating. I point you to things that you will need to keep in mind.

The series explores many of the things that are taken for granted in the process of writing. From research to citations, choosing a topic and even how to administer pieces of your plot, I give tips on the little things that will really make your writing immersive and interesting to readers. It’s up to you on how you sew it all together.

So here is a list of the 20+ articles in the series….

Let’s start, first, with my guide on publishing. It’s a short read about what you will need to do at each step of the process. It’s a priceless tool that I have put together for those who were in my situation several years ago: seeking information on how to get from point A to point B. Lot’s of articles talk a good game about telling you what you will need to do, but they never quite reveal the information. I am not afraid of sharing my experience and my thoughts. This article is me fulfilling a promise to myself that I would send the elevator back down for the next crop of authors, when I had made it to the goal. Keep in mind: publishing your book is not the end goal. It is a goal in the path. You’ll need to repeat the process, and also to find readers for your work via marketing. The biggest job is yet to come after you get your manuscript published.

But, before you even considering publishing, you’re going to need to write that manuscript. My series on Writing Historical Fiction can be used across genres. Just replace Historical Fiction with the genre of your choice, and switch up the resources, terms, etc. to fit. Interpolating is a requisite skill for writing, so get your critical thinking on, as well as your cognitive ability to make connections (intertext). For more writings on this, you should review my papers on the K Around the Web section.

The Writing Historical Fiction Series:

That’s quite a list! Make sure you do a search on my site in the Writing Historical Fiction section, because you will find a lot of great information that supports these posts.

Let’s hop on over to see what other authors are sharing on their roundups. Before you go, check out PJ MacLayne. She just released a book called Wolves’ Knight, Book Two of the Free Wolves Series. Check out the post about it here.

P.J. MacLayne‘s Blog

Born and raised among the rolling hills of western Pennsylvania, P.J. MacLayne still finds inspiration for her books in that landscapes. She is a computer geek by day and a writer by night who currently lives in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains. When she’s not in front of a computer screen, she might be found exploring the back roads of the nearby national forests and parks.

An InLinkz Link-up

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Wolves’ Knight is the second book of the Free Wolves series. The first book, Wolves’ Pawn, was meant to be a stand-alone, but the characters weren’t satisfied with that. There were too many stories they wanted told. Eventually, author P.J. MacLayne gave in and took the time to write the next in what will eventually be a string of books.

Blurb

Tasha Roeper knows what it means to protect your own. So when her friend, Dot Lapahie, CEO of Lapahie Enterprises, suspects that the Free Wolves are under attack, Tasha immediately signs on to lead the investigation and guard Dot.

But Tasha’s not convinced it’s the Free Wolves that are the target. She fears that her own pack—the Fairwood Pack—are the actual quarry and Dot is only a decoy.

The deeper Tasha digs, the more puzzles she uncovers.

Torn between tradition and a changing world, will Tasha risk everything to save a friend—including her own life—when old enemies arise?

Excerpt

“Ugly, isn’t it?” Dot asked. “But it was a gift, and it’s rude not to display it. I need to arrange for it to get ‘accidentally’ broken.”

“Did you try turning the face to the wall and putting flowers in it? Tasha set it back in the original spot.

“I tried putting a bouquet in it—once. I’ve never seen flowers die so fast. There must be something in the coating that killed them.”

Tasha wiped her hands on her jeans. She’d need to wash them carefully before she ate.

“It’s supposedly by a famous artist,” Dot continued. “But I don’t think I could even give it away.”

“Donate it to a charity.” Tasha picked up the monstrosity again and turned it upside down, looking for the artist’s signature. And promptly returned it to the shelf.

“Nothing to show the creator,” she said as she strolled over to Dot’s desk. She picked up a pen and scribbled something on the current page of the calendar pad, ripped it off and handed it to Dot. “Want to go get coffee?”

“What do you mean the vase is bugged?” Dot asked as they carried their coffees outside so they could talk without being overheard.

“I don’t know a whole lot about electronics, but I recognize a listening device when I see one. And that’s a bug, clear as day. Do you remember who gave the vase to you? And how long ago?”

Dot took a sip of her coffee, blowing across the surface first. “It’s been a few months. And I don’t remember where it came from. Why?”

“No wires. It has to be battery powered. How long the battery would last is not part of my expertise.”

“So what do we do?”

Tasha scowled. “With all the computer geeks here, you’d think someone would know about these things. Question is, who can we trust?”