Mmm, my food choices seem to be right.

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Hollywood stars, or would be stars are now embracing the Atkins diet. This is welcome news to me as I am on modified Atkins regime. Gone are all processed foods. No bread, pasta, rice, or cereal. No tinned stuff. No milk, which is substituted by coconut Silk. I am losing weight and various health problems have disappeared.

I came across this little gem tonight. Makes a person think, aye? http://eatlocalgrown.com/article/12214-8-foods-even-the-experts-won-t-eat.html

I would point out that Canadian cattle are grass fed, not grain fed. The difference in flavor is very easy to discern, if we are foolish enough to shop at Walmart for meat products. (All their stuff comes from the States.)

In other news, the countdown for the release of Shadow Over Avalon is ongoing. Only fifteen more days before it goes live. I am so excited. Now, do you want a freebie? My publishers, Kristell Ink, have released Darkpire reaches for a very limited time as a free ebook on all platforms. This offer may not be repeated. Go get your copy now.

Thanksgiving.

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I have so much to be thankful for this year. Most of my family visited for lunch and it was so wonderful to have the them all over. Baby George was the highlight and he was an absolute angel.

I didn’t get done everything I wanted to do before they came. I had hoped to have my new drapes hanging, but found I had misplaced the hooks to get them on the rods. Ah, on the subject of rods. It is a well-known fact that most men will definitely get something done eventually. I have only been waiting nine years for the rods to go up to finish the drapes as I must have the drop measurement before the tops can go on. So very, very close to success. Now if I can only remember what I did with the hooks in those nine years?

Still, the renos are going along at a steady pace. We got rid of a manky old couch in the fall clean up and also a side table that was supposed to be an antique. Mmms, didn’t veneer stuff like that in the old days and I have always had my doubts. Water damage gave the truth and out it went. Now I have a coffee table and two matching side tables and a new couch matching the new ones in the family room, (downstairs ones courtesy of a Brick snarl up on previous product). It is getting there. The painting of walls is progressing slowly because the sitting room has high ceilings and I am still not100% after my neck injury. I have to do a little at a time, but am just aching to get started on the family room, which will go a lot quicker as the ceilings are normal. Yay!

In other news, Darkspire Reaches is now free on all the Amazons and will be for a limited time around and about the release of Shadow Over Avalon on Halloween. Don’t miss out on this offer. It may not be repeated.

http://www.amazon.com/Darkspire-Reaches-ebook/dp/B00DJE8RP4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1381792927&sr=1-1&keywords=darkspire+reaches

http://www.amazon.ca/Darkspire-Reaches-ebook/dp/B00DJE8RP4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1381793129&sr=1-1&keywords=darkspire+reaches

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Darkspire-Reaches-ebook/dp/B00DJE8RP4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1381793400&sr=1-1&keywords=darkspire+reaches

 

 

Darkspire Reaches ebook free!

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Just in time for the weekend, Darkspire Reaches ebook is free on Amazon.com. I hope it will also be free on the other Amazons soon. It is also free on Smashwords, Kobo and Nook. This is a limited time opportunity and will only run in the lead up to the publication of Shadow Over Avalon and for a week thereafter. Go get your copy now!

Indecisions.

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I am being seduced by the neat apps on mac. However, I am not in the market for a new machine anytime soon, having just acquired a new pc laptop. I would not switch over my desktop, as I have programs on there that I know are not compatible, but when a new laptop is needed, …. mmms, maybe. Only if the keyboard is a standard size though. This bears thinking about.

I am so lucky that my dear husband works in cutting edge research for a university. I get a heads up well in advance and will incorporate various delicious munchies in the next book, once this paper is published  and free for all.

It is so amazing to me that science fiction so closely parallels what is happening right now. Going back in history, there is Jules Vern and Aldous Huxley, to name a couple. What comes first? The science, or the sci fi? Don’t know, but it is fascinating.

TA DAH! Important Announcement.

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My publishers, Kristell Ink, in celebration of the upcoming publication of Shadow Over Avalon on Halloween,  have just released Darkspire Reaches as FREE on Smashwords. Over the next few days this will filter down to Barns and Noble, Nook and finally to Amazon. Can I please ask everyone to let Amazon know when the price on Barns and Noble becomes free? Amazon will then do a price match and it will be for all the Amazons.

I am really excited over how SOA is shaping up with the help of my amazing editor, Zoe Harris. This is a totally positive experience. Does happy dance. As per usual, there will be a few chapters of SOA released for free reading on Amazon when it goes live. In the meantime, I have the prologue and a few snippets up here, on my webpage. These are all previous to editing, although the changes will be minimal.

Come take a peek at my worlds.

Genealogy

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Digging for one’s past can be a two-edged sword. My cousin went to Australia to start a new life and he had a son. This son was unaware of any of his father’s family until his father died and he found a contact. This was not all he has found.

I knew my cousin was a flake for the first water, but I had no idea this extended into his immediate family. The poor boy learned that his father had not bothered to marry his mother, now diseased. It is one thing if a relationship is out in the open and acknowledged for what it is. It is entirely another if it is purported to be one thing and is in fact another. How can a person do that to their own kid? No idea.

What I could do for this young man was to give him access to my Ancestry site so he may know of the origins of his roots. It won’t take away the pain of learning what he did, but it may help knowing the rest of his extended family aren’t flakes and welcome him.  So not impressed with my cousin.

Diets and prehistory.

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It was with enormous amusement that I read two opposing statements on the subject of what a caveman did and didn’t eat. There were the meat eaters on one hand, who stated that man ate few vegetables and mostly meat. The vegetarians had a contrary view. Both arguments were well substantiated and too fixated in independent philosophies to hold any merit. So, to get down to icky basics, and this is icky.

In the beginning there was a primate, who was more primate than man. Think chimpanzee, here. Given that it was going bald, it did need some sort of coverings, but the coverings came at a later date to dietary needs when the baldness and the cooling climate made this more imperative. Go look up the diet of a modern, wild chimp. This species isn’t the cute little fluffy who eats bananas and any other fruit going. This species will eat more or less anything, including maggots, ants, beetles, larva, rodents, reptiles, fish and  amphibians . If they could catch it and kill it, or at least eat it alive without a struggle, then they do and did. Chimps have developed tools for braining lesser creatures and breaking into nuts. They are omnivores, as are we.

Man didn’t suddenly emerge as the bison/antelope hunter, nor did he suddenly start digging for underground for root vegetables.  There are humans born now without canine teeth. This doesn’t automatically mean they are vegetarians. There are humans born now with larger canine teeth, but this doesn’t mean they prefer a liquid diet. It is just nature, doing her thing and trying to buck the odds. Bad luck for the dinosaurs there, as even nature can’t predict a honking great meteor hitting the planet.

Back burner project.

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To be honest, this is just one of my back burner projects, but it happens to be the one speaking to me the most. Here is the premise.

‘Wildenwold.

Ella, reeling from the sudden and unexpected ending to her marriage, is taken hostage by a man said to be an escaped and dangerous psychopath, but is he? He claims to be hijacked from another time. He backs his claim with a demonstration of magic: real magic, not legerdemain. 

Mordred, snatched from a battle with his ultimate enemy, tries to come to terms with a modern world beyond his comprehension. Weakened by what he considers cruel and unnatural treatment in an asylum, his goal is to find a place of wild magic. He needs to recharge his power to return to his battle. Mordred is not just a warrior; he is the sorcerer’s apprentice.

Not only law enforcement seeks these two. Each of them have their own dangerous and unwelcome threats. When the past meets the future, who will survive and how? Unless each of them can adapt to the unthinkable, they have no hope. Nor do others imprisoned in an ancient trap. This is a race against time, both linear and transitory. The winner takes all.’ 

Fifty thousand words in and about halfway there. I must say I am enjoying the research into this story, but this does not mean to say I am not working on other projects. The sequel for Darkspire Reaches is at 20k and going strong. I also have another urban fantasy at about the same stage.

My next book out the door is Shadow Over Avalon with a release date of October 31st and I am into edits with this one. Loving every minute of the process, too. Kristell Ink already have the finished book two in this series and book three is halfway there, though I haven’t opened the file for a coon’s age. I am told Sword of Shadows will be released sometime in 2014.

Sorry I haven’t been around much on the social media lately, but I am busy with the edits and am fighting a cold. So far, I am winning by a gnat’s whisker on the cold. The edits are doing fine and I really have to give my full attention to these. When I get a moment, I need to construct a blurb for book two in the Shadow series. Wish me luck and see you all on the other side. 

On Technology.

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I am beginning to see the advantages of a mac over a pc in the course of the editing process. Yes, I would really, really like all the smart keys. It still boils down to keyboard size for me. I have yet to find a mac that will accommodate touch typing.

Ok, so I am a dinosaur, who learned to touch type on a typewriter. Anyone remember one of those?  I avoided Microsoft laptops until the keyboard was of a compatible size. And yes, I have tried out macs and have found them too cramped for me.  Note, I am looking at the screen as I type and not the keyboard. Each finger has a certain stretch and a designated number of letters or numerals.  Cramping causes errors and is irritating as it wastes time. When I write, it is a flow I don’t want interrupted by having to stop and correct a wrongly struck key because it was too condensed. Maybe one day a mac could accommodate me? I hope this will be the case. In the meantime, this dinosaur will continue to put up with the short falls of Microsoft because the keyboards work.