JUDI FENNELL—MAKING THE ORDINARY MAGICAL

My guest is the magical Judi Fennell. I just finished reading Magic Gone Wild and I have to say it's my favorite of the Genie books. This story is a genuinely fun read. It made me laugh, go awww a time or two, and I really love Vana and Zack. The chemistry between them is hot but there were some great moments of bantering and laughter. I also genuinely liked Vana's sidekick, a colorful phoenix called Merlin. He was pithy, had some great one liners, but he also had some sweet moments and he added to the story rather than detracted. For sure I love how Judi took an ordinary place and made it mystical. Isn't this cover gorgeous? 

I'll be putting up the Review shortly but I can already tell you it's worth the read and it will make you laugh and feel good as you read it. I don't know if it's Vana's pink smoke or creating magic via a kiss, or her term "holy smokes", could be Merlin, but all the magical ingredients come together so well and make the story so very entertaining! My Amazon Review

Hi Sia, and thanks for having me back to talk about my August release, Magic Gone Wild!

For those of you who have read my other books, you know that you’re in for a trip to somewhere magical, whether it’s a hidden merman’s lair off the coast of NJ or Atlantis, or a magical city in the Sahara desert, you’re going somewhere exotic, right?

Not this time. This time you’re going to northeast Pennsylvania, to one of the old steel towns. Why? Well, it’s actually a place our family visits. We have family in the area and we go up to visit, hike the canyon, swim in the swimming holes and creek (pronounced “crick” up there), stay in the cabin, and eat at Mike & Mary’s. Great family time in the outdoors with lots of hiking, fishing, and kayaking.

What a place for a genie to end up, right?

That little town will never be the same again. Actually, it hasn’t been the same for a hundred years when her previous master took the fall for her, um, shall we say magical mishaps?

Vana, short for Nirvana Aphrodite, and yes, she knows that name is not only a mouthful but impossible to live up to, might have, you know, jumped the gun (er, bottle) a bit on becoming a genie back in the day and didn’t quite finish her training.

The magic… it’s off.

And it did a number on her previous master’s reputation, one the new hero, Zane Harrison, has been trying to live down his entire life. It’s not easy to grow up as the object of ridicule. There was the pink square window in the church his great-grandfather built, or the story of the grist mill that went rolling around town on its own, the flying blueberries, and of course, the infamous vanishing-staircase incident. Zane’s sick of dealing with it so when he inherits the home, he comes to town to get it ready for sale.

Then he meets Vana and his world is turned upside down. (Don’t ask.) She’s beautiful, she means well, but she can’t seem to do anything right.

Well, okay, maybe there’s one thing she can do right. But with the hide-and-seek-playing gargoyles, the anthropomorphic furniture, the crazy stuff that happens in her bottle, and Merlin, the gender-inquisitive, cross-dressing phoenix, who’s always bursting (literally) in and out with his pithy words of wisdom, Zane’s afraid that not only won’t he be able to sell the place, but that maybe he’s suffering from the same affliction his great-grandfather was: Genie-itis.

When I start writing a story, I usually have the opening scene and a basic outline of the plot. I usually know my characters fairly well, though they always surprise me. But as I started this one, knowing that we weren’t going on any fantastical journey, I was a bit worried what my readers would think. Would it be the same experience? The same fun?

And then I wrote it. OMG, I had sooooooooo much fun writing this! Because, in the end, the story is about the characters. For all that we put them in fantastical situations or magical cities, the story is all about the characters. Vana and Zane have the same sorts of problems to overcome on their path to happily-ever-after as my other heroes and heroines. The pursuit of love and happiness, that falling in love feeling…

And, well, yes, maybe I did throw in a wee, tiny trip to the top of Mt. Damavand for a visit with the Fates. Those three had me laughing while I was trying to type fast enough to keep up with them. Now THEY were some characters!

So how to make the ordinary magical? Have the characters fall in love. After all, isn’t that the best magic of all?

• I always love hearing people’s falling-in-love stories. Care to share yours below?

BUY: AMAZON, B&N, INDIEBOUND

MAGIC GONE WILD BY JUDI FENNELL – IN STORES AUGUST 2012

Every Time She Uses Magic Something Goes Terribly Wrong...

Vana wishes she hadn't dropped out of genie training. Now she's determined to get a grip on both her genie magic and her life. But the harder she tries to fix things for her intriguing new master, the more she drives him crazy...

Except There's Nothing Ever Wrong About Him...

Pro–football player Zane Harrison finally has control of the family estate and is determined to put to rest his grandfather's eccentric reputation. Until he discovers that behind all the rumors is a real, live genie who stirs feelings in him he's never known before. The more Zane tries to help Vana harness her powers, the more her madcap magic entangles his heart... EXCERPT

Judi Fennell is the award-winning author of six light paranormal romances, including a trilogy of Mermen-inspired love stories, and three genie-inspired romances. Wild Blue Under won the PRISM Award for Best Light Paranormal from the Paranormal Chapter of Romance Writers of America. A former corporate meeting and convention planner, Judi now writes full time around the hectic schedules of her husband and teenagers. She lives in suburban Philadelphia, PA. For more information, please visit http://www.judifennell.com. You can also find Judi on Facebook, Goodreads, and Twitter.

Creation, Destruction, And Re-Creation.

~Sia McKye~

Ominous clouds boil up on the horizon and the winds begin to blow. In no time at all, the storm is all around you. Jagged forks of lightning flash against the charcoal skies, and thunder vibrates through your bones and shakes the house.

Storms can be an assault to the senses and even tricking them. You watch in morbid fascination as trees bow in the wind and buffet your house. Above the sound of the thunder you hear a loud crack and you watch in incomprehension as the massive top of a tree breaks off and blows by your window, like a mere tree branch. Your eyes can’t believe it or the shock of watching trees come down like matchsticks. Falling trees close by feel like an earthquake—especially when more than one falls in succession. The blankness of your mind quickly dissipates and you’re running for cover.

Watching the raw fury of nature is, by turns, exhilarating, and awe inspiring, and humbling. It’s also terrifying. It’s the essence of creation. Creation starts with elemental and raw materials and builds something. Sometimes that first involves destruction of the existing, forever changing the visible material and recreating it. Creation, annihilation, and re-creation.

That’s true whether you are doing something as simple as breaking eggs to make a cake. Melting sand to make glass, or dynamiting a granite wall to make a tunnel. When writing or taking a situation, personality trait, building a story, or using words to change the face of a political structure. Words have power. The right words can make things clear or obscure, build or destroy depending upon how you use them.

It’s not always easy to take the raw ideas of a world and make it viable. Creating people for those worlds from a mere thought is both exhilarating and scary. Have you used the raw materials properly so those characters live, breath, and react, in the landscape of your world? Or have created paper dolls; stiff, unresponsive, and cumbersomely move them around your world by telling it all. Is your world real enough, so that the reader feels like they opened a door and stepped into your world seeing the wonders and able to connect emotionally with the people you’ve created?

If you’ve done your job correctly, your readers react become connected to the characters. The reader has moments of fear, worry, and anger. Their hearts speed up trying to outsmart the villain, the heart melts when the hero gets the girl. They feel satisfied emotionally after reading and participating in your world or story.

There are times when you look at your created world and realize it’s not feasible or you look at the paper doll you’ve been moving around and see you need to revise, terminate, and recreate. Painful and frustrating—especially if you understand the world isn’t working as you saw it in your mind, or a character doesn’t fit or is reacting hokey.

Writing is a labor of love. The force of creation requires energy. As we wrestle with our world and characters, choosing the right words and scenes, we feel limp when we're finished. If we’ve done the job correctly we also feel ecstatic. Have you ever gone back and read something you’ve written and feel a sense of awe with how it all came together? That tingle that tells you you’ve done a great job? It’s exciting, it feels good and you’re flying high.

Then comes your critique partner or your editor. Trepidation and excitement reign. Putting the finished piece on display requires courage because in the stark flash of lightning, flaws become apparent. Critiquing is also a form of creation, destruction, and recreation. It breaks apart the raw materials and reshapes them. You watch in morbid fascination as chunks of your manuscript are ripped away.

If done correctly, something better is recreated. If done incorrectly, you feel buffeted by the harsh winds, torn, and broken. You’re looking for shelter from the storm.

What makes you run for cover? What makes you feel buffeted and torn? Critiques? Rejections? Revisions? Deadlines?

Conversely, what gives you the feeling of exhilaration and awe? Pull up chair and grab a cup of your choice and let's talk about it.

***

Sia McKye has spent over twenty years in marketing and promotion. She's written and published various articles on writing, marketing, and promotion. She's a Marketing Rep by profession and also writes fiction. Sia has completed a single title romance trilogy and is busy at work on a fun paranormal series.