Want an Underdog Doomed to Surviving in a Hostile Environment?

   Slow writing week, but I managed to read three books -- given added reading time while waiting for the Christmas cookies [gifts] to bake. Skimmed one book with flat character development but got drawn in by two Yasmine Galenorn books. Flight from Death won my reading derby this week because I thought the characters were more original, even though it's an Otherworld spin off. Maybe because Flight is complicated ghost story featuring a dragon and the other book felt like a predictable urban fantasy.

   Galenorn has a talent for creating three dimensional characters. She layers enough quirks and problems on her characters to make them live and breath. More important, their quirks add to the twists, turns, and suspense of the plot--even when the lsupernaturals land well within fantasy norms. Yeah. Galenorn's characters break cliches.

   What's more, even her secondary characters stand out as individuals. One example, the all important lore-resource character has flaws that both make him more likable and ratchet up the danger in the plot line when he makes mistakes in judgement So, much for the all-wise guru.  [Sorry if you think that's a spoiler.]

   Imagine. Shimmer, an orphan blue dragon exiled to the earth plane without most of her magic for a stupid adolescent-type prank/revenge on a bully, must survive in a world where supernaturals are tolerated on the edges. So, she broke the rules in a society that favors clan, lineage, and wealth above all. But being indentured to a vampire private investigator?????? I really liked that twist. The kid's definitely an underdog, errrr under dragon.

   Flight from Death the the first in a new series for Galenorn. Loosely set in the Seattle of her Otherworlds fae/multi-sup series, it looks like she is letting the book gets its legs under it without playing into the previous saving-the-world-from- the-nasties plot. The book takes us to Port Townsend, Washington where ghosts riddle the town, including the house where a former vampire friend of the boss wants to open a bed and breakfast for supes. Only there is something nastier than discontented ghosts haunting the place, and Shimmer proves she more than just another urban fantasy pretty face with attitude.

   Liked that Galenorn managed to recycle her Otherworld world so it felt new rather than a rehash.

   Recommended. Oh, I felt there were a few missteps where Shimmer exhibited fad/fashion knowledge too subtle for the length of time she'd spent on earth, but these were minor glitches. Overall, the read gallops. A great start for a new series with an intelligent protagonist.

Read excerpts and more reviews on Amazon and at B&N Nook.

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My Writing Rut

What writing?

   Granted I revised an originally drafted chapter to fit the Pillar, the current main character of On the Run. Since I had two such chapters in the que, it should've been a breeze to pound out both of them last week. Didn't get that done. Can only blame baking cookies. At least, I spend very little time in stores trying to find gifts for family.

   Still, it feels good to finally be using material written last spring when I had an entirely different main character for On the Run.

Love Stories with "Weres"? What Happens When the Shifter's Just Another Preternatural in the Crowd?

Decided to talk about weres today. 

I don't have enough fingers and toes to count all the configurations were-animals take in fantasy, paranormal, and horror fiction. But when I saw Dark Heat, I thought it might offer something different. So I bought Donna Grant's paranormal romance. Think I even did a little happy dance in my head as I hoped to discover another Christine Feehan or Karen Marie Moning. [Yeah, I know now Grant's got many, many books in print.]

On the rack, the book had a lot going for it, not the least the sexy chest with a dragon tattoo plus the promise of power, fury and passion ... and hunky were-dragons. What's not to like, especially when a newcomer MC is stranded in the Edinburgh airport? Her brother who was supposed to pick her up, didn't show, like her luggage. Got hooked skimming the first chapter and bought the book.

Glad I did. [Surprise? After that opening?] Grant gave me a great idea for recycling the short stories I've been self-publishing to build my so-called author's platform. Yeah, grouping related [or unrelated] short stories into a book isn't new. But Grant did it with so much finesse the stories almost tied together as a novel. The connected plot line managed to add enough twists and turns in a lovely Highlands setting to keep the pages turning.

What I didn't get was well-rounded characters. Oh, the different romancing couples displayed superficial differences, like jobs and hair color, but there was nothing stark enough to move the characters beyond their cliched roles. Nothing to make them stand out in bold relief. No quirks. No idiosyncrasies.

This pip-squeak writer's opinion. A competently written book that doesn't quite make four stars. 3.5 stars***

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What was my big project last week besides writing a 3,500 chapter for my Dark Solstice Turning Point novel about when the Marches of the Far Isles almost shatters under the weight of Half-Elven bickering? I rushed to finish it so I could submit it to my critique group. Yeah, they slammed parts of the execution and my endings. ... I'm bad at endings the first time around. In reference to chapters I mean the hook that leads the reader into the next chapter, but story conclusions also tend to be abrupt the first time around.

That said, the big pain in the behind of my week-end was reworking ... yet again ... my Half-Elven website. My intention was to do a little revision to improve the SEO. I think I improved the meta-tags [even if they're obsolete]. But huge chunks of my week-end disappeared.

You can see what I accomplished by clicking HERE. Actually, you won't see most of what I did, but the uniform type-face, I hope, and fonts should be apparent. I'll make a bet you'll find spots where my "saves" didn't take.

My goal is to raise the site's alexa rating. Once it was 900,000. Now it's around 1,650,000 -- all because I neglected it while building my author website and didn't add new material.