Friday, May 18, 2012

FROM HISTORICAL TO CONTEMPORARY



My guest today is bestselling paranormal romance author, Donna Grant. I loved reading Donna's Dark Sword Series. When I learned she was moving some of her warriors to the future, or contemporary times, to fight evil, I was thrilled. I couldn't wait to see how these medieval warriors would adapt to modern times and to modern women. Oh, I could see some sparks flying with these stories. 


Her new series, Dark Warriors, has it's first book releasing May 22, 2012. It's Logan's (one of my favorite warriors) story and he's been brought to our time by Druid magic. I'm looking forward to reading these stories. But I was curious, as many of Donna's fans are, what made her decided to move her series into modern times. Donna chats a bit about what was behind the change.  


I've fielded so many emails over the past few months regarding my move from historical/paranormal to contemporary/paranormal.  First, let me say, the Dark Sword series name might have ended with DARKEST HIGHLANDER (Jan 31, 2012), but the story continues in the Dark Warrior series.

Same characters.  Same story line.  Just a different time period. J

Some of you may be asking why I did that.  Well, I’ve always liked to push myself as a writer.  I feel that’s how writers grow and expand.  I had every intention of continuing the series in medieval times, but then a strange thing happened.

It was contract time, and I really wanted back-to-back releases.  My amazing publisher was all for that, but I had to do something different with the series.  Now, you have to understand, I had already written one of the books for that contract we were negotiating and was half way through another.

So, imagine my surprise when my editor asked what I thought about bringing the Warriors forward in time.  It wasn’t something I had ever considered, but my editor had never steered me wrong, and I trusted her.

After a two hour phone call where we talked over every aspect of me keeping the series in historical (which they would have done) or moving it to contemporary, I made the very scary decision of time traveling my Warriors to present day Scotland.

I had to totally rewrite Logan’s book (MIDNIGHT’S MASTER – May 22) and scrap the part of Ian’s book (MIDNIGHT’S LOVER – June 26) that I had already written.

I don’t think I’ve ever been more frightened than I was that next day when I pulled up my files to start work.  I had dipped my toe into contemporary before, but never for a full book.  Would I be able to do it?  Would my historical voice of my books be able to carry the contemporary sound?  Would I fail miserably and end my career?

Remember when I told you I liked to push myself?  Well, it also helps when you have as wonderful an editor as I do.  She told me she had faith I could do it, so I dove right into the story.

The entire time I kept thinking it was the worst book ever.  Every day I would walk out of my office, my husband would take one look at me and pour me a glass of wine.  When I finished the book, I so dreaded reading over that first draft for my revisions.  But…I was shocked to find it didn’t suck as much as I thought it did.  By the time I turned it in, I was excited.  Really, really excited. 

Because of the deadlines I couldn’t wait to hear from my editor before I began Ian’s book.  Once more I was half way through when I got her email saying she absolutely loved it. 

I remember gathering up the family that night and going out to eat to celebrate.  I was prepared to have to do another rewrite, or at the very least have major revisions.  But my editor loved it.  I still have that email and pull it up occasionally to prove to myself that I can do something that is scary and could potentially be a career ender.

The book is set to hit shelves in a matter of days, and I’ve never been more nervous about a book release.  The real test is you, the readers.  Will you love it?  I know many readers were very upset with me leaving the historical setting, but I’m not done writing historicals.  I love them too much.  Yet…I’m having so much fun with my contemporaries. 

The heroines are stronger than ever, and it’s freeing to be able to say modern slang without having to wrack my brain to come up with a medieval term. 

The best part, however, is watching my alpha heroes thrown forward to modern times and dealing with the modern women.  Just imagine the first time they see a car or a toilet.  And the first time Logan finds Gwynn’s pink razor.  Now that was a fun scene to write.  Ah, but to see those modern women dealing with medieval Highlanders.  Who’s going to win the battle of wills? J

MIDNIGHT’S MASTER…available in stores and online

A MYSTERY OUT OF TIME

Gwynn Austin has no idea why her father has disappeared on a mysterious trip to Scotland.  When she goes on a desperate mission to search for him she finds more than she bargains for in a ruggedly handsome, wickedly exciting Highlander who exudes danger and mystery.  And when she discovers her own link to Scotland, she’ll have to trust her heart to help lead her…

A LEGEND IN THE FLESH

Propelled through time by powerful Druid magic, Logan Hamilton uses his immortality and powers of the god inside him to help prevent the awakening of an ancient evil in the modern world.  He never expects to find help in the form of a beautiful, alluring, and all too tempting woman whose passion and strength matches his own.  Together, Logan and Gwynn must fight for their love – before a demon from the past destroys them both…EXCERPT






To find out more about Donna please visit her website at www.donnagrant.com.  To read more about the Dark Sword and Dark Warriors series, see pics of the Warriors, take the quiz, download wallpaper, search characters, or watch the book trailers, please visit www.donnagrant.com






Wednesday, May 16, 2012

DONNA GALANTI— CHARACTERS ARE WHO WE WANT





It's my pleasure to have suspense author, Donna Galanti visit with us today. She discusses characters and how readers may view characters in their heads and might not match what the author had in mind as they wrote the story.

How many times have you been irritated by actors chosen for the movie a book you've loved?


Books. They fill a need. We create the faces of our characters in our mind. We create their stage, their world. No one else visualizes our books like we do. The people, places, and events in them.

 

I fell in love with Lord of The Rings as a teenager, decades before the book hit the big screen. Aragorn, also known as Strider, was my first crush. I knew his face, his stance, his body. He was so in my heart that I dressed up as him for Halloween. Brown woolen hooded-cloak, darkened face, cracked leather boots. I strode down the hall at school, face hidden, my cloak swirling behind me as if I parted the foggy woods I dashed through on a perilous mission. This only validated the fact a therapist had once said that my problem in life was that I wanted to be a boy instead of a girl.

 

Hmmm. Not sure about that considering I also wanted to be Laura Ingalls Wilder. We had hogs too and I fattened them up with apples and slop. Then on slaughter day I got to keep their tails to roast and eat, just like Laura did. My mother drew the line about blowing up their bladders like balloons so I could play with them. And I really did believe that if I stayed in a closet long enough it would open onto another world that was just like Narnia.

 

Anywho, I get mad when movies are made of my favorite books with super stars. I boycotted The Bridges of Madison County because Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood played the main characters. They weren’t the people I envisioned as those characters (but I do love me some Clint though). How dare they! Then there’s the Jason Bourne series by Robert Ludlum. Really? Matt Damon as Jason Bourne? That’s just wrong. He’s too young, blond, and looks like a boy scout. Put him in a Disney flick (oh, wait, they did.) I’ll stick with the books.

 

And have you often debated with someone about scenes in a movie, and then realized you never saw the movie? It turned out to be the movie you created in your mind. Worth the argument I would say.

 

I discovered recently that readers see the characters in my book, A Human Element, different than I do. I purchased iStock photos of my main characters, Ben and Laura. Two friends told me I was wrong. That’s not Ben, they said. He wasn’t dark enough, cruel looking enough. They were right. The other man appealed to me, yes… but he wasn’t Ben. When a friend and I argued about the kind of person Laura was she said I was wrong. Laura didn’t cry too much in the book at all. I was told she had to be that way because she is a healer and sensitive. Okay. Okay. Too funny.

 

So whoever you envision your favorite characters to look like and speak like, they are yours. Cool, right? Then I guess I must accept the fact that my readers will darn-well envision my own characters as they please. Yep. We get to keep them just how we want them for ourselves. No one else. You can visit them, always. They don’t change. They don’t leave you. They are the perfect friend or lover.

 

Books. They fill that need of going home. When we feel lost we can go home to them. To our past, our first love, our childhood, our first broken heart. They are a safe haven for our unique memories. And no one can take them away. They are…ours.


Donna is giving away one ebook copy of A HUMAN ELEMENT. Just comment to win! Winner will be picked by Random.org and contacted by the author. Giveaway is international. (trust me when I say, you'll want to read this book)

 



BUY: AMAZON, B&N, CREATESPACE-print
SMASHWORDS
HUMAN ELEMENT by Donna Galanti


One by one, Laura Armstrong’s friends and adoptive family members are being murdered, and despite her unique healing powers, she can do nothing to stop it. The savage killer haunts her dreams, tormenting her with the promise that she is next.

Determined to find the killer, she follows her visions to the site of a crashed meteorite–her hometown. There, she meets Ben Fieldstone, who seeks answers about his parents’ death the night the meteorite struck. In a race to stop a mad man, they unravel a frightening secret that binds them together. But the killer’s desire to destroy Laura face-to-face leads to a showdown that puts Laura and Ben’s emotional relationship and Laura’s pure spirit to the test.

With the killer closing in, Laura discovers her destiny is linked to his and she has two choices–redeem him or kill him. Excerpt



“A HUMAN ELEMENT is an elegant and haunting first novel. Unrelenting, devious but full of heart. Highly recommended.” 
Jonathan Maberry, New York Times best-selling author of DEAD OF NIGHT



MY REVIEW 4 of 5 stars false


Donna Galanti is the author of the paranormal suspense novel
 A HUMAN ELEMENT (Echelon Press). Donna has a B.A. in English and a background in marketing. She is a member of International Thriller Writers, The Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group, and Pennwriters. She lives with her family in an old farmhouse in PA with lots of nooks, fireplaces, and stinkbugs. Visit her at:



Donna Galanti Website 
Donna's Blog
Donna’s AuthorFacebook page for news and updates!
Goodreads





Monday, May 14, 2012

MONDAY MUSINGS: FIRST LOVES




Alex Cavanaugh has suggested using today as a First Loves Blog. His ‘inquiring mind’ wants to know what our first love was in movies, songs, books, and person.

You can find a list of participatingblogs here.
First Loves is a topic can cover pages. Alex said we couldn’t take pages, drat the man anyway. So I must do the best I can in fewer words. Keep in mind; falling in love with something isn’t the same as loving it. It’s a first.

BTW-MY MUSIC COMES ON AUTOMATICALLY. SCROLL DOWN TO THE BOTTOM OF THE BLOG AND CLICK THE OFF BUTTON SO YOU DON'T HAVE THE MUSIC AND THE CLIPS BELOW PLAYING AT THE SAME TIME.

FIRST MOVIE

I’ve loved a lot of movies. Everything from Call Of The Wild to Star Wars, but the movie I have to say I fell in love with enough to watch countless time and know much of the dialog is Princess Bride (in that context, I’d have to say my second is Star Trek, The Voyage Home). One reason I love Princess Bride is because it takes a common theme of fairy tales and mixes it up. It tells the fairy tale backwards—it begins where most fairy tales end—the commoner becomes the princess and is slated to marry prince charming. Great twist.  There are so many scenes in this movie I admire—just love the layers in this story. There’s Vizzini’s use of inconceivable, the battle of wits between Vizzini and Wesley, Inigo Montoya’s mantra, and I could go on, but here is a scenes I absolutely love.



MUSIC

When it comes to music, it’s basically the same, too many songs I’ve loved. As a kid I fell in love with a musical storyteller. I loved the stories this man sang. Trust me, when I say, he packed a lot of emotion, conflict, heroes, and villains into a 4-minute song. Marty Robbins sang songs that I could listen to repeatedly because they were good stories. One of my favorites, was Big Iron (a funny anecdote to this is when I was little, I thought it was Pig Iron. My dad heard us singing it and corrected us, lol! Teased us unmercifully for years later).


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BOOKS

The first stories I remember hearing, as a little kid, Hiawatha (loved the rhythm of the words) and Heidi. This is how I was introduced to Treasure Island, My Friend Flicka, Big Red, and The Call of The Wild. I would beg for those stories. My mother never read cutesy stories to me; she read books, an installment at a time. I’ve always been a voracious reader and I have a list longer than I am, of books I loved. I have to say, the series I fell in love with was The Dragonriders of Pern, by Anne McCaffrey, a fine Celtic storyteller. I found The White Dragon and read that one first. When I realized it was #3, I went back and bought the first two volumes. I’ve read every book in that series that Anne McCaffrey wrote—didn’t like the ones her son wrote as much.  There are times I go on a Pern vacation. I love the characters and the setting. I LOVED the dragons and Master Robinton—I cried when he died and I still do. The second series I fell in love with is Roberta Gellis, Roselyn Chronicles—ah those were the joyous epic historicals I loved.

PERSON

You know? I can’t remember my first crush as a grade schooler. I think part of that was my parents’ directive and the fact I was a tomboy. I was much too busy running around with the guys and working with my dad to deal with crushes. But I do remember my first crush as a teen. His name was Paul and he was a senior when I was a freshmen and he lived up the street from me. French, six foot one, blue black hair, gold eyes, and a smile that would melt an igloo.  Parents squelched that quickly. Didn’t want their barely 15-year-old hanging around with a guy who was almost 19 and with ideas they didn’t want me to have. Can’t say as I blame them.

But I do have a first love of a person that is precious to me. The day I looked into my son’s dark eyes I fell in love. Children can do that to you. But for me, it was even more special. You see, I had lost several babies prior to my son’s birth. Ten years worth of anquish and loss. I had always wanted to be a mother and with the difficulties I had carrying a baby beyond the first trimester it was fast looking like it would never happen. The last one I lost, at four months and too young to live crushed me in spirit. I remember praying; Father, if I can’t carry them, please don’t let me get pregnant again. My heart can’t take anymore.

This my son and I from a couple years
ago, before I got sick.
That prayer was on February 25, 1993. My son, Jake, was born February 24, 1995. Almost to the day. It was a scary pregnancy and I was terrified something would go wrong. There were some problems, but this time, a miracle. A healthy baby boy, 7 lbs. 12 ozs, and 21 inches long. Great joy then, with my little man, great joy now. And this is also why Mother’s Day is very special to me—more than any holiday. I celebrate this holiday because of the greatest gift ever given to me, my son. I got the title of Mom.

Nothing can beat that in this life.