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Guest Post…Why I Write for Boys

Mikko Azul, author of Askari (Book 1 – Child of Muralia Trilogy) joins us today with a guest post why she writes for boys…

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Boys: The Forgotten Heroes of Young Adult Literature

Since the publication of Twilight and the subsequent exponential explosion of the Paranormal Romance genre in the YA marketplace, heroes of the epic fantasy have nearly become extinct. Rare are the newly-published tales of conquest by a young hero over his personal, metaphorical or, heaven forbid, actual demons. Despite the recent success of such movies as The Lord of the Rings and their encouragement of real-life heroes to find kinship between the pages of the original books, boys and young men are still largely ignored in the YA marketplace. Why is this?

After speaking to over 50 literary agents and a handful of YA publishers, I got an answer…one that disturbed me greatly. In their esteemed opinions, boys over the age of 13 don’t read books. Really? Why not? The demographic data shown to me by the agents indicates that boys at or over the age of 13 are into sports, girls and…you guessed it…video games. I think there are a couple really good reasons for this. First, there really aren’t a whole lot of great books being published right now that will appeal to boys of that age. With the exception of a handful of really great titles in the Middle Grade level including Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson series, Michael Scott’s Nicholas Flamel series and Jenny Nemmo’s Charlie Bone series, there are few that portray strong male leads that our young boys and men can aspire to or identify with. Even so, these are all written for younger boys at the middle grade level. How do we capture the interest and excitement of teenage boys? I’m not convinced that teenage boys aren’t reading…they’re just getting their books in the specific genre sections instead of age level sections of the book stores. Go to any Barnes and Noble or, better yet, Powell’s World of Books and see how many teens and men are roaming between the sci-fi/fantasy aisles.

I can see the attraction to video games. Boys and men are, and will always be, warriors at heart. Where else can they possess amazing physical prowess with magical abilities and opportunities to wield extreme weapons? Where else can they triumph over adversity or overcome incredible odds? Video games totally rock! But, they’re so expensive that they aren’t accessible to everyone who would want them. The athletes who excel in the courts and on the fields at the Junior and High School level are excellent role models, but the recognition is limited to the talented few. Perhaps another venue for the rest of our kids who aren’t superstar athletes and who don’t have access to the expensive newest video game craze would be a return to the escapism of the written word. One that would appeal to our culture’s forgotten heroes…boys. The trick is how to get boys to sit still long enough to make their way through 300+ pages of text!

Personally, I have four boys; one with ADD, one with ADHD and two with the natural attention spans of gnats. Writing in such a way to keep my boys interested and engaged has always been a challenge. My oldest son gave me the key: keep it moving. He had a good point. Stan Lee of Marvel Comics gave me the best advice for writing for boys, “Take your guy, your main character, and get him into trouble…just keep getting him into trouble. Everything follows from there.” So, after writing a book that should appeal to boys, how do I convince them to read it?

I’ve found one way: a teacher at our local junior high school read my book Askari and was so excited about finding a book that she was certain would appeal to her struggling readers that she wrote a grant and ordered copies for each kid at the junior high school. We are working together on a curriculum that incorporates the elements that they need to pass their proficiency exams using a story that (we hope) will keep them interested and entertained. Perhaps if we can get our foot in the door by starting with a captive audience, we can remind publishers and book sellers that our young male heroes are still out there and reading the stories that are worthy of their valuable attention.

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About the Author: I’m a reader and writer of fantasy adventure novels. My first work, which still doesn’t have a satisfactory title, won the San Francisco Writer’s Conference indie publishing competition. So…they’re generously paying to have this first novel published! Writers tend to work in a vaccuum…no input, little useful support and oftentimes marginalized. Winning this competition was a huge boost of confidence for me!

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Want to know more? Check out the links!

Website: www.mikkoazul.com

Look out for Askari – Book 1 in the Child of Muralia series

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meme…Indie Author Spotlight – Melissa Mickelsen

Indie Authors Spotlight is a BRAND NEW weekly meme that will be held on every SATURDAY in the month. It is hosted by Beckie @Bittersweet Enchantment & CYP @A Bookalicious Story.
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This week’s spotlighted author is Melissa Mickelsen…

Melissa Mickelsen was born and raised in Georgia. She currently lives in Germany with her Air Force husband and two cats. Melissa loves hiking in the mountains, eating strawberries, reading, reading, more reading, and really good barbecue. Nightingale is her debut novel.

She began writing in high school and has published a few short stories in online magazines. After graduating from the University of Georgia in 2007 with a degree in Art History, Melissa worked in various jobs, such as a mental health technician at a large hospital and as a serials assistant in a medical library, before pursuing a master’s degree in technical communication and information design from Southern Polytechnic State University.

Although she does not write full time, that is a goal for the future. Nightingale, published by Hadley Rille Books, is hopefully the first of many. The novel tells the story of a young girl, taken from her family and held enslaved by the man that killed them. She is forced to kill, to become an assassin called the Nightingale. Though the girl is young, she has the strength of steel and vows revenge. It might be easier if the vaunted General Astin Talros, the king’s most trusted Weapon, did not haunt her trail.

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In a land of vast, dark forests and clustered cities, cardeai and anthelai live in uneasy proximity. Forced deep into the wilds, the anthelai are feared and hated. They are not people in the eyes of others. They are seen as monsters, demons, and servants of the dark god Enas, master of the hell-like Plains of Centura.  Halfbloods, the children of the two species, are extremely rare. The blood does not mix easy, but when it does the result belongs to neither side. Outcast, anathema, pariah.

Carfuinel, an anthehome in the far north, has seen two such beings in its long existence. The first died in infancy, but the second, a stronger-willed creature, survived. Shielded from the animosity of others by her parents, the child thrived. Until the day when everything changed forever.

The half-anthela, half-cardea girl, after having seen her home and family destroyed, vows revenge on the man responsible. The odds are weighed heavily against her. She is young and brash, and trapped by the power of a small green stone that binds to her the whims of her tormentor. He transforms her into a most deadly assassin, hoping that her demon-like presence at his side will pave the way for the domination of a kingdom. But the girl, now called the Nightingale, has a steely strength that refuses to crack.

She has lost her home, family, freedom, and even her name. But she is stronger than anyone realizes, and she will not break easily. Her captor, and even all of the cardeai kingdom of Caesia, would do well to remember that.

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Want to know more? Check out the links!

Twitter https://twitter.com/#!/mmickelsen

Facebook http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nightingale/157095704391800

http://melissamickelsen.com/

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Indie Author Spotlight…Sara Zaske

Indie Authors Spotlight is a BRAND NEW weekly meme that will be held on every SATURDAY in the month. It is hosted by Beckie @Bittersweet Enchantment & CYP @A Bookalicious Story.
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The Author…This week’s spotlighted author is Sara Zaske.
Sara Zaske has lived a variety of places including eight years in Oakland, California where The First is set. A former journalist, she currently works as a freelance editor and writer in Berlin, Germany. She also hosts the book blog: YA Fantastic Book Review [link: http://sarazaske.wordpress.com] Occasionally, she still dreams of California.
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The Interview

Your book sounds like a genre-bending read – where did your inspiration for it come from?

I wondered how ticked off dryads, mythical tree spirits, might be if I dropped them into the the modern world. But dryads in Greek myths are kind of wussy, always running away from lustful gods and turning into things, so I took it up a notch and made up my own more powerful group of magical people who are closely connected to nature.

The genre smash is my attempt at better defining the book. The term urban fantasy doesn’t tell you much: all it means is there’s a magical element, and it takes place in city. By eco-thriller, I mean that the book centers around the theme of environmental responsibility and then, I threw in a lot of action and life-threatening peril in the story–you know, to make it fun.

Please tell us in one sentence only, why we should read your book.

Magic, romance, friendship, wild animals, environmental destruction–all under the golden glow of the California sunshine–what more could you want?

Any other books in the works? Goals for future projects?

I am revising my first novel (Yes, ironically, The First is my second novel). It’s about a girl with an uncontrollable fire talent who gets abducted by a dragon.

Then I have a really scary ghost story in my mind that I need to get on paper, so I can stop thinking about it. It’s kind of creeping me out.

What inspired you to want to become a writer?

Fairy tales. My mother read to me every night, but after she left and turned off the light, I’d still want more stories, so I started making up my own.

What’s one piece of advice you would give aspiring authors?

Seek out and learn to use criticism. Find people–not relatives, spouses or good friends–who will read your work and tell you honestly what they think. My writing group continues to help me really grow as a writer.

Which authors have influenced you most and how?

Two of my current heroes are Ursula Leguin and Margaret Atwood.

I love the way Ursula LeGuin uses fantasy and science fiction elements to get at larger issues in the “real world.” Plus she’s simply a great story teller. Margaret Atwood has a fantastic, sharp sense of humor, and she’s not afraid to write in any genre.

I can only walk in their shadows, but I strive to be like them by incorporating important issues in my stories while placing a premium on humor and story telling.

Give us a glimpse into a typical day in your day starting when you wake up till you lie down again.

Oh no, it’s too boring. Just cut to the montage of a typical working mom juggling caring for kids, editing for clients, housework, writing, errands, etc. Life is full. Some days I don’t get to actually sit down at the computer and write–fiction anyway. But I make a conscious effort to write in my head during every spare moment. That way when I do get screen time, I know what I want to say. It does make me a bit dreamy sometimes though, and I’ve been known to get on the wrong train and go several stops without noticing.

Finish the sentence- one book I wish I had written is….

The Girl who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne Valente. Not that The First is like this book. It’s not. But I love fairy tales and Valente does something very unique in her book. I envy that fact that she got to spend her days writing in that imaginative world.

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The Book 

A young adult urban fantasy/eco-thriller, The First, follows 15-year-old Cassie Craig as she discovers that the strangest girl in her class is more than just a little weird. She’s part of a group of people who were here on earth long before us. Powerful people. And they aren’t exactly happy with the way we’ve been treating their planet.

The First is available for a free download on Earth Day weekend, April 21-23! Available on Amazon – so don’t hang around – grab your copy today!! 

[link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007UZ72K4]

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Want to know more? Check out the links!

Book Links: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007UZ72K4

Website: http://sarazaske.wordpress.com

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Guest Post…Where do you get your ideas?

Author Tony Talbot joins us today with a guest post on where writing ideas come from…

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It’s a common enough question, and one I think every writer probably has a half-different answer to. Some of them say from their own life experiences, some of them say from dreams or something they’ve seen or heard that sticks.

For me, it’s anything and everything I see, and most of the stuff that I dream. There’s a school of thought that says everything a writer sees never leaves their heads, but sits in there, waiting to bounce off something else. I like to think of it as my own solar system, the important stuff close to the star…and out beyond where the heat and the life is…ahh, that’s the good stuff.

There are comets out there, innocuous balls of ice and rock, dark against infinity. But give them a nudge, and they hurtle towards the planets, sometimes leaving a trail across the sky of my imagination. Sometimes they hit things. Wipe out whole continents, reshape whole planets and civilisations. Sometimes you think they’re going to smash into a planet only burn up in the atmosphere.

Here’s an example of one of those comets, one that left a bright streak but didn’t do much damage:

A month or two ago, I was eating in McDonalds with my wife on a Friday night, and sitting at the other end of this very noisy and busy restaurant was a woman at a table for two. Nothing very odd or spectacular about that, you would think, but she was wearing a wedding ring, and she was alone on a Friday night eating in a cheap restaurant.

Instantly, the questions about her started in my head: Who was she? Where were her husband and family (if she had one)? Why was she alone on a Friday night?

By the time I got home, the woman had stuck, and I managed to get a decent story out of her. Not bad for someone I never spoke to. And one of the pleasures of writing is this: Give this little snapshot to a dozen writers and they’ll come up with a different answer. That woman gave my little writing group a surprise party mistaken for an affair, a ghost story and a secret daughter. Just from a woman sitting alone at a table in McDonalds.

So next time you’re out walking somewhere, when you glance at something, glance again. You’ll never know when an image will stick and what you’ll do with it. Take that image and nudge some comets. Maybe blow out some continents.

You know, just for fun.

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About the Author: Tony Talbot was born in the 1970s and started writing in 2008 after a dream he had and couldn’t shake. American Girl was his third book, and he’s currently editing his next book and planning the book after, tentatively called, ‘Dome’.

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Want to know more? Check out the links!

Website: http://www.tony-talbot.co.uk

Twitter: @authortony

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tonytalbotwriter

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/author/tony-talbot

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Guest Review…Aladdin’s Samovar

Mikko Azul, author of Askari (Book 1 – Child of Muralia Trilogy) joins us today with a guest review for Aladdin’s Samovar by Lauren Sweet – let’s take a look at what she thought…

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Aladdin’s Samovar, by Lauren Sweet, was one of the funniest books I’ve ever read. Lauren Sweet takes paranormal romance to a whole new level in this triumphant debut novel! She masterfully combines the elements of paranormal romance with the impossibly fast-paced action/mystery/thriller elements. There are so many plot surprises and hilarious characters that it was truly heartbreaking to come to the end of the story. I’m anxiously awaiting the sequel!

Amber is a down-to-earth, hard-working girl who has to balance her flower-power mother’s paranoia of authority against the mischievous evil genie’s antics to entice Amber to make wishes for it to grant in whatever twisted way it sees fit. A simple wish to meet her absent father turns into a fast-paced race for sensitive data with the local Mob. Mousy Amber becomes Super Hero Amber as she figures out who is lying (everyone) and who she can trust (nobody) before getting herself killed, or worse, falling for the handsome genie.

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About the Author: I’m a reader and writer of fantasy adventure novels. My first work, which still doesn’t have a satisfactory title, won the San Francisco Writer’s Conference indie publishing competition. So…they’re generously paying to have this first novel published! Writers tend to work in a vaccuum…no input, little useful support and oftentimes marginalized. Winning this competition was a huge boost of confidence for me!

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Want to know more? Check out the links!

Website: www.mikkoazul.com

Look out for Askari – Book 1 in the Child of Muralia series