Library Request Exchange: An update

By T.W. Fendley

In January, we launched the "Library Request Exchange" on The Writers' Lens (see link at the top of the right sidebar). Here's how it works:

1. We exchange book info: Author, Title, Publisher, ISBN, genre/subject
2. Then you put in a request at your local library for my book, and I put in a request at mine for your book.

Simple, right?

Well, I quickly discovered there's a learning curve...why am I not surprised?! Two quick lessons I wanted to pass along are:

• Authors/publishers must take steps to make their books library-accessible through services like OverDrive or Library Direct.

• Print providers and ebook providers aren't necessarily the same, so it may be good to submit a patron purchase request for both.

I decided to submit my first requests from the Library Request Exchange only for ebooks. That's what worked for my book, ZERO TIME, and I was a bit leery about requesting too much because I know libraries have limited budgets. What I learned was that print books are handled through a different department (with a different budget/book provider), so perhaps there was no advantage to submitting only the ebook request. I've since requested the print books, too. I've got my fingers crossed.

Of the four ebook requests I submitted, three were "not available" on OverDrive, the ebook database St. Louis County library uses. (I haven't yet heard about the fourth book). The librarian explained that "not available" means the publisher or author hasn't licensed that ebook to libraries for lending.

According to OverDrive's website, the digital marketplace contains over 1 million downloadable titles from more than 1,000 publishers. Their download service for libraries provides ebook, audiobook, and other digital content to millions of library users. As a reader, I LOVE the OverDrive app. It's my preferred way to listen to audiobooks (using a little gadget that allows me to connect the iPhone to my car speakers)--much more convenient than CDs. One of the reasons I signed with my publisher, L&L Dreamspell, was because they distribute to OverDrive. 

But what if you want your book in libraries and you're self-published or your publisher doesn't yet distribute to OverDrive? Ripley Patton shared this excellent blog post from Behind the Lines that talks about how OverDrive works (or doesn't, as the case may be) for indie authors. It looks like you need at least five titles to become listed. That info was from a couple of years ago, though, so perhaps the situation has changed.

Another author listed in the Library Request Exchange said she's never heard of OverDrive; her books are licensed through Library Direct.

When I searched for "Library Direct," I found Smashwords began distributing to them last year. In an Aug. 8, 2012, post on blog.Smashwords.com, Mark Coker said Smashword's library pricing option allows authors and publishers to control library pricing. He believes that gives indie authors a strategic advantage over traditionally published authors whose books are "handcuffed by the library-unfriendly policies of the large publishers. The ultra-competitive pricing will also allow libraries to stretch their limited budgets while at the same time enabling them to acquire large collections of indie ebooks."

Smashwords authors also can have their copyrighted books listed at Open Library, DRM'd, for one checkout at a time. Checkouts expire after two weeks. It can only be checked out by one person at a time. To check out a book, a reader must register for an account with Open Library. (See more)

Anyway, I'll keep you posted on how the Library Request Exchange is going. Don't be shy-- list a book that you'd like to see available at libraries. I was interested to see Library Journal's Patron Profiles service, in conjunction with Bowker, stated "50% of all library users go on to purchase books by authors they first discovered at the library..." Yay, libraries!

And if you know how other indie authors/publishers sell to libraries, please leave a comment and let us know!

H.C.Beckerr: Chri-Fi author brings together faith, facts & fiction

Welcome to H.C. Beckerr, author of HILL OF GREAT DARKNESS. He resides in the St. Louis area, and I met him through the St. Louis Writers Guild.
   Over the past ten years, he has served as an interim pastor at a small Baptist church, an associate pastor, as well as a youth pastor in the St. Louis area, all the while working on his first Christian-based, science fiction novel.
   A love for the outdoors as well as a love for mystery and the unknown things of life was fostered in his early childhood by his many visits to an archeological site not far from his home known as Cahokia Mounds. This is where the idea for his Christian-based science fiction novel was spawned, nurtured, and brought to life.
   Being a man of faith and family, as well as having a love for his country, is at the epicenter of all that entails this simple mid-western man. He can be found on:

• Facebook: pages H.C. Beckerr, Henry Martin, and HILL OF GREAT DARKNESS

• Email: hcm59@att.net 

• Blog: InsaneFaithNow at hcm59.wordpress.com   

What brings your writing into focus--the characters, the stories, the love of words? Wow! That's kinda hard to pinpoint. I would love to say all of them but, that would be cheating, wouldn't it? I do find that evolving various characters throughout a storyline is one of my favorite tools, but at the same time, the story (and/or back story) has to be evolving and deepening as well to accommodate or even facilitate the maturing of the characterization. They feed on one another. And yet, at the same time, they often can be at opposition...just like real life. I love to take situations (even outlandish or unbelievable) and make them real. Okay, okay...I've beat around the bush enough, so lets go with story since it pretty much entails everything. After all, I'm a story teller.

What is your favorite writing accessory or reference? Music, music, music!!! It drowns out life around me allowing me to climb into the story. Since I am writing science fiction, a lot of times I will put in sci-fi movie soundtracks as well as classical discs. I am careful to select music without words! I don't want to start listening to the music as much as being engulfed or driven by it. Its power, its passion....almost sounds like escapism and it very well be! But, for me...it works. Along with music, one little tool I always have by my side is a book from 1921 titled Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms, a really cool help that I found buried in an antique (or as my sweetheart calls them 'junk') store way up in the Wisconsin Dells back in 2005. What a resource!!!... and a lot easier to use than a Brontosaurus...um, I mean a Tyrannosaurus...hmm, that's not it either...Thesaurus, that's it!  Yes, a lot easier to use than one of those.

How much fact is in your fiction? For Hill of Great Darkness there is a lot, I mean a whole lot, of fact in the story. In this area of the U.S. (the St. Louis area) there are legends and folklore galore! From a disappearing Indian culture to giant, winged reptiles that had a taste for human flesh. Even coming into more recent times, there are the stories and fables of coal mines, lost, even haunted, silver mines, and  the Gates of Hell themselves. This area is replete with story fodder! The Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site is the epicenter of the mysteries of this area as well as at the very center of HOGD. There was so much research of the Mounds site done in order to help make this Sci-fi, or as I like to say Chri-fi, to designate the Christian theme, a more believable, more solid story.
   My goodness, I have spent days upon days at this incredible place ever since my childhood soaking in the mystery and majesty of the area. In 2005, I met extensively with one of the Mound's site managers to probe, test, and acquire every bit of knowledge that I could. And it's not just the Mound's site...it's the whole region that is involved. From Alton to the Collinsville/Caseyville area and from Scott Air Force Base to St. Louis the story unfolds and spreads out its tendrils to Huston and Tehran. Um, and that's not even mentioning the planet Saturn.
   Oh! And speaking of Saturn, there was a lot of science that was researched for the ride...but I mostly twisted that....that's why it's called science- fiction! Or, you could even call it fantasy. Most of all, simply put; it's a fun ride! You know, T.W., I've read your book, Zero Time, and there are a few commonalities in our stories...really cool!

What do you think readers will like about your book? You know, I like to think of HOGD as a classic sci-fi storyline. the simple story of a brand-spankin', shiny, new spacecraft on her first real mission with a radically new test engine when (surprise!) something goes wrong. And, it's a story about tomorrow, not a hundred years from now. In fact, we're still driving Jeeps, VW's and Humvee's The year is 2037 and we're gearing up to (finally) go to Mars.. Trouble is, we pass by Mars like she's a state trouper hiding behind the billboard sign along the highway....ooops! How did we get here?  Then we find there is something very dark hidden on the Earth...or should I say in the Earth.
   So, there you have pretty much the basic stuff about my little adventure, um...except for the fact that it has a definite X-Files ending. You know, government cover up and all that good stuff. The kind that screams; sequel!!! Which, by the way is in progress even as we speak....

HILL OF GREAT DARKNESS: She was the pinnacle of human engineering looking more like an expensive sports car than a spacecraft. And she was fast!

   The spacecraft MAGELLAN was the first of her kind. Built entirely with private funding she was mankind's first real hope of reaching out to the planets of our solar system.

   Her first and only mission, was to test a new propulsion system for a simple five second burn to see how far she would go...

   Then something went wrong.

   This is her story.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Hill-Great-Darkness-H-Beckerr/dp/1449717950/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1351469199&sr=8-1&keywords=Hill+of+great+darkness
Also available at WestBow Press and virtually anywhere online.

________________

This is T.W. Fendley. Thanks for reading and commenting on The Writers' Lens.You can find out more about me at www.twfendley.com.

Lens on: Pitching

Writer's Digest Conference Pitch Slam 2011

Lens on: Pitching

By Brad R. Cook

I wanted to focus The Writers’ Lens on pitching to literary agents, publishers, and editors. In 2011, I had the great privilege to attend the Writer’s Digest Conference in New York City. After returning I wrote an article for The Scribe, St. Louis Writers Guild’s Literary Magazine, titled The Mechanics of the Perfect Pitch. I’ve updated that article so I could include it in the Lens On: Series, but what I learned still applies.

The Mechanics of the Perfect Pitch

By Brad R. Cook from the Spring 2011 issue of The Scribe

            The Missouri Writers Guild Annual Conference is a month away, are you ready for your Agent Pitch? No. Calm down, breathe, it’s going to be okay. Pitching is easy when you know what you’re doing.

            I had the pleasure of attending the Writer's Digest Conference in New York. It is famous for the Pitch Slam, a two-hour event held on Saturday where a writer has two hours to pitch to as many agents as possible. It was the craziest thing I have ever been a part of, every three minutes a bell rang and you had to get up. When I attended in 2011, 55 agents and 650 writers filled the room. Now that is the Super Bowl of pitching, there won't be anything like that at the MWG Conference.

            So what makes a great pitch? If you were at the November 2010 St. Louis Writers Guild workshop with Chris Richman of Upstart Crow Literary you would have heard about the various types of pitches. Chris helped everyone master the Elevator Pitch, a short 25 word sentence that describes the book. It is often called a Log Line. At the MWG Conference you’ll have seven minutes but what do you do with them?

Here are a few tips I picked up, I hope they help.

 1 – Do mention –  The Hook

                                      Is it complete,

                               Word Count,

                               Genre,

                               Main Character,

                               Main Plot,

                               One or two subplots, but only if important,                                                      Elevator Pitch (25-35 words)

                               Log Line ([Book] meets [Movie])

                        This is exactly what the agent will be listening for.

2 – Generalities and Clichés will kill a pitch  

            Say what’s different rather than why it’s the same as another book.

3 – Don't use all your time

            You want time to talk about your book, but you also want to give the agent a chance to ask questions. Half for pitching, half for discussion.

4 – Be positive - remember you're trying to sell yourself.

5 – Practice, practice, practice 

            Say it in the mirror, tell a friend, write it down. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Heck even if you’re not ready for publication, practice pitching in front of agent anyway (just make sure you tell them when it will be done)

6 – It is the work that sells not the writer  

            Focus on why the book is good, not yourself. Unless you’re writing non-fiction then it’s all about you and your platform.

7 – Don’t ramble or get bogged down in the details  

            Be specific but be concise.

8 – Don’t giveaway the ending or get tied up with back story

            Make the agent read your book to learn the juicy tidbits, and you only have a few minutes so focus on the story – unless you’re writing non-fiction.  

9 – Don’t expect the agent to take a proposal or query letter

             They have limited suitcase space

10 – Rejection isn’t about you; it’s about the writing or the industry

             Maybe the agent just picked up a similar book, or maybe they don’t represent that genre. The point is that the agent isn’t putting you down. They are just not the right agent for that material. If you are rejected, remember, there is always another agent – so get ready to pitch to them! 

            The goal is to hear those glorious words – send me a partial, I want to read that, but remember, publishing is long road and this is just the first step. Good luck with your pitches!

Do you have any tips for writers agonizing over their pitches? Add to my tips, can I get an 11, 12, and 13… Let us know in the comments.

Brad R. Cook is a historical fantasy author and President of St. Louis Writers Guild. Please visit www.bradrcook.com or follow me on Twitter @bradrcook https://twitter.com/bradrcook

St. Louis Reflections http://www.stlbooks.com/B009271-1211-51/Review.aspx

To learn more about St. Louis Writers Guild, visit www.stlwritersguild.net, Saint Louis Writers Guild on Facebook, or @stlwritersguild on Twitter.com

For information on Missouri Writers Guild and its conference, visit www.missouriwritersguild.org or follow them on Twitter at @MoWritersGuild 

The 2013 Missouri Writers Guild Conference

The 2013 Missouri Writers Guild Conference

By Brad R. Cook

Conferences are the backbone of the publishing industry. It’s the best place to meet a literary agent or publisher, the best place to learn about current industry trends, and they are the best places to learn from professionals about where this crazy industry is going to be in five years.

There are several great national conferences held by organizations like Writer’s Digest, Romance Writers of America, Romantic Times, Bouchercon, SCBWI and many more, but a there are also some amazing regional conferences, and one of them happens to be right here in Missouri.

So what is the difference between a regional and national conference? In a word, people. The national conferences easily attract over 500 attendees, but regional conferences have about that half that attendance. Now, I’m certain some people would argue that the bigger conferences bring in bigger names and they’re kinda right. But that isn’t always the best way to learn. When you’re one of 300 people in a banquet hall it can be hard to get your questions addressed. The regional conferences have breakout sessions of 50 people or less. Just like with class sizes, the smaller crowds allow for more specialization.

The other differences are things like cost to attend, travel expenses, contests, critiques, and the specific services offered, but these vary for all conferences. I suggest thoroughly researching each conference you wish to attend before deciding.

There is another secret I’ll pass along… the regional conferences still attract the industry leaders. Top agents, publishers, and authors don’t just go to the big conferences; they attend many of the regional conferences. So if you can’t afford the big conferences, or if you’ve never been to a conference and want to see what they're all about – may I suggest something like the Missouri Writers Guild Annual Conference.

Allow me to showcase one of the best regional conferences I have attended.

Missouri Writers Guild

2013 Annual Conference

Bringing Writers Together!

April 26-28, 2013

at the

Sheraton Westport

Lakeside Chalet

191 Westport Plaza

St. Louis, MO 63146

Here are some of the speakers listed to attend.

Kathleen Ortiz, New Leaf Literary and Media

Pam van Hylckama Vlieg, Larsen Pomada Literary Agents

Carly Watters, P.S. Literary Agency

Jita Fumich, Folio Literary Management

Joan Lynch Luckett, Assistant travel editor, Midwest Living

Kristina Blank Makansi, Publisher and Editor, Blank Slate Press

Lela Davidson, author, Blacklisted from the PTA

Grant Clauser, poet and poetry teacher

Janet Cannon, Technology Instructor

Geoff Morrison, freelancer and e-publishing expert

Sarah E. Fine, author and psychologist

Robin Colucci Hoffman, Get Published Coach

Steve Yates, author Morkan’s Querry

With

Banquet Keynote Speaker, Jane Henderson, Book Editor for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch

and

Early Arrival Seminar “The Shy Writer Reborn” with C. Hope Clark, editor of Funds for Writers Inc.

Plus, David Lucas and I will emcee the Open Mic on Friday Night!

If you want to learn more about the speakers, schedules, contests, pitch sessions, book signings, and more please visit - http://www.missouriwritersguild.org/Conference2013v9/index.htm

or visit their blog and hear directly from the speakers – http://mwgconference.blogspot.com/

If you are interested and want to know more, St. Louis Writers Guild is having a workshop this Saturday to help prepare for the conference.

Sit Down and Pitch

Saturday, March 2, 2013

10am to Noon at the Kirkwood Community Center

For more information visit www.stlwritersguild.net

Brad R. Cook is a historical fantasy author and President of St. Louis Writers Guild. Please visit www.bradrcook.com or follow me on Twitter @bradrcook https://twitter.com/bradrcook

St. Louis Reflections http://www.stlbooks.com/B009271-1211-51/Review.aspx

Reading Guilty Pleasures

A book that's a coffee table, did I mention I like coffee table books!

Reading Guilty Pleasures

By Brad R. Cook

We all have them… though we may only admit it to certain people. They’re the novels we can’t stop reading, the books we keep buying more of, and the covers we rest in our laps so no one will see. Guilty pleasures, the dark chocolate of the book world.

Some, like comic books, have moved from hidden pleasure to mainstream literature. Others, like erotic novels, became some of the bestselling titles of last year. Maybe, these secret, guilty pleasures are really everyone’s favorite books, and we shouldn’t have to hide their covers when waiting at the doctor’s office. There are many cover avoidance tools from the book within a book, to the paperback fold over.

But…

E-readers have made the consumption of guilty pleasures so much easier. No one needs to know what we’re reading, and there is no cover to give us away. Plus, the lower price point means we can snatch up more of this brain candy without so much of the guilt.

The beauty of the guilty pleasure is that they allow our minds to have fun. We call on our brains all day long, but when we read something just for the fun our minds get recess. It’s universal everyone loves recess – ask any kid. Yes, this means that fanfic is the recess of literature.

I read a lot of books that are not within my usual genres. I love it, from friend’s books, novels to review, as research for author interviews, magazine articles, essays, and more, it’s one of the joys of being a writer. We all read what we want, but I’m not referring to a favored genre, a guilty pleasure is genre you like but don’t want everyone else to know you like.

So, what is your favorite guilty pleasure read? Let me know in the comments or use tell us on Twitter using @writerslens

My guilty pleasure reads – I have two… that I’ll admit too  

Really Old Books (I recently reread The Three Musketeers)

and

Coffee Table Books (I stalk the oversized bargain racks at bookstores)

Brad R. Cook is a historical fantasy author and President of St. Louis Writers Guild. Please visit www.bradrcook.com or follow me on Twitter @bradrcook https://twitter.com/bradrcook

St. Louis Reflections http://www.stlbooks.com/B009271-1211-51/Review.aspx

Ripley Patton answers WL questions, offers free GHOST HAND ebook

Happy Valentine's Day! Today's guest author, Ripley Patton, is offering free ebook copies of GHOST HAND as part of Kindle's Book Love event from today (Feb. 14) through Feb. 16 at http://amzn.to/Vhsb9y

GHOST HAND: Olivia Black just discovered that her ghost hand, a rare birth defect, can do more than light up a room. It can reach into people and pull things out. Things from the darkest depths of the human psyche never meant to exist in this world. 

Olivia can pickpocket the soul. 

But she can’t control her ability, or the strange items it extracts, and the only thing between Olivia and the men bent on taking the power of her hand is a boy she barely knows and doesn't trust.

AND NOW...a little about the author, Ripley Patton. She lives in Portland, Oregon, with one cat, two teenagers, and a man who wants to live on a boat. She is an award-winning short story writer and author of Ghost Hand, a YA paranormal thriller and the first of a three-book series known as the PSS Chronicles. To find out more about Ripley and her fiction, visit her Website, or find her on Facebook or Goodreads. 

What brings your writing into focus? For me, writing has always been about creating meaning. From the first poem I wrote at age thirteen when my mother died, to book two of the PSS Chronicles I'm working on now, I write to make sense of life, and ideas, and the world. When things are confusing, or hurt me, or seem random, I need to write them into story because only through story do they suddenly become whole and sensible to me. 

What inspired GHOST HAND? Ghost Hand is about a girl who can pickpocket people's souls. She can reach into them and take out a token of their deepest darkest psychological issue. And I suppose that idea originally sprang from the fact that my husband is a therapist who works with troubled teens. Teens have a lot going on in their psyches these days, a lot of hurt, and baggage, and inextinguishable light. So, I sort of jumped off of the question, "What if someone could just reach in and pull that out?"

What's the highest compliment someone could make about your writing? Your writing touched my soul. That would be amazing, but nobody's said that exactly. I've had a few people say, "Your writing made me cry," and I hope they meant cry in a good way. And I wouldn't feel too bad if other writers said, "Damn, I wish I'd written that."

What do you think readers will like about your book? Well, I've been told it is a page-turner, the kind of book you can't put down until you've read the last page. And that is actually what I was going for. I also think that the paranormal aspect is really unique. I've never read or heard of a book with a premise even close to Ghost Hand's. Finally, I hope they'll love the characters as much as I do. I tried to create the kind of characters I love to read; flawed, sympathetic, complex, and realistic. Oh, and the ending is nice and round. It doesn't leave you hanging, but it does leave you wanting more.

If you could meet one of your characters, who would it be and where would you meet? Of course, I've met all my characters. I've met them on a daily basis for the last three years in my head. But if I could meet any of them in this world- the world outside my head- I think I'd meet Olivia sitting next to her dad's unmarked grave. And we wouldn't talk. We'd just sit, and that would be enough.

GHOST HAND | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads | My Website

________________

This is T.W. Fendley. Thanks for reading and commenting on The Writers' Lens.You can find out more about me at www.twfendley.com.

Kristi Petersen Schoonover: Characters bring focus to her writing

Welcome to Kristi Petersen Schoonover, whose most recent novel, Bad Apple, is a Pushcart nominee. Her short fiction has appeared in Carpe Articulum, The Adirondack Review, Barbaric Yawp, New Witch Magazine,Toasted Cheese, and others, including several anthologies such as Dark Opus Press’ In Poe’s Shadow. She has received three Norman Mailer Writers Colony Residencies and has served as a judge for New York City Midnight's short story competitions. She lives with her husband, occult specialist Nathan Schoonover, in the haunted woods of Connecticut and still sleeps with the lights on. You can find out more at www.kristipetersenschoonover.com.

Connect with Kristi

Website/Blog: www.kristipetersenschoonover.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/kpschoonover
Twitter: @KPSchoonover
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/kristipetersenschoonover
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/kpschoonover

The Writers’ Lens is about “Bringing fiction into focus.” What brings your writing into focus—the characters, the stories, the love of words? I’d have to say the characters. The inspiration for each of my stories is usually an odd item—a dollhouse crammed with bird bones, preying mantis-egg wedding favors—or situation: a chionophobic who can’t afford to move south, a church that charges $25 a word for broadcasting prayers above the pollution to guarantee they get heard and answered. From there, the characters just tell me who they are and what the significance of that item is in their lives, or how they respond to the situation—the plot, pacing, theme, motif, point of view and everything else is dictated by them. They define what each of my fictions becomes. And I’m perfectly happy to let them: when I’m writing that very first “vomit” draft, it just doesn’t feel like work.

How much fact is in your fiction? I put the greatest attention on setting, because writing has always been an escape to me. I want to see, smell, taste, touch, and hear that world that I’m in, and in order to do that, the setting has to be meticulously accurate—for example, one scene in my short story “Charlotte’s Family Tree” was set in Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in 1979. Once the initial draft was done, I spent countless hours researching what was there that particular year: which attractions were there and what they were called (because some names have changed over the years), which entertainment was going on, what the ticket system was like, every single detail—and that was exclusive of simply describing the smells and temperature of Florida during the season of the year in which the characters were visiting. I always try to set a story in a real place and be very conscientious about those details. Other than that, I make certain I fact-check the same things other writers do: what’s the procedure for bandaging a wound? For planting a tree? You know, the usual.

What’s the highest compliment someone could make about your writing? An artist in any medium can be easily discouraged, I think, by rejection, lack of recognition, and other things of that ilk which are inherent in our profession. That said, I’ve always held that “if I reach one person, I’ve done my job.” So I take joy when I get a Facebook comment, an email, anything that notes someone really enjoyed a particular story, or it moved him, or it spoke to him on some level. The best reaction I’ve ever gotten came today, in fact. I just sent out my “Holiday” chapbook. My Aunt Delores, who has always encouraged my work, called me and all I heard on the other end of the phone at first was laughing. “I wanted to call you tonight, but I couldn’t wait!” She could barely breathe. “Oh, I just finished your story and I loved it! That ending is incredible! You got me again!” Yes, it’s a family member. But she doesn’t love everything I write, and sometimes she flat-out tells me she didn’t care for it. So this was a pretty huge deal for me, that I had her in such fits of laughter she couldn’t even talk. A visceral reaction, therefore, is the best kind of compliment I could get—it’s not just, ‘that was good,’ it’s ‘look what you did to me.’

What’s your favorite writing accessory or reference? Really sharp pencils with great erasers, a good movie score (The Perfect Storm, March of the Penguins and Gettysburg are a few favorites), the awesome Brookstone coffee cup heater my brother Chuck bought me several Christmases ago, and Yankee Candles (wondering? My favorites are Treehouse Memories, Christmas Cookie and Vanilla Lime).

If you could borrow one person’s zest for writing and/or life, whose and why? Hands down, Anais Nin. She was so passionate her words just pulse with it, and she has such a vibrant clarity it’s hard for me not to read something of hers and scream, “yes, yes, yes, you read my mind!” She cared nothing of what others thought and everything about what others thought of herself and her work; she was on the edge but amazingly in touch with her own tenuousness, and was so comfortable with what was in her own broken soul that she wasn’t broken at all. She worked hard, she partied hard, and when she didn’t have a pen in her hand, there was one scribbling in her mind until she could get one in her hand. I aspire to be like her: Writing is not what I do. Writing is what I am.

Read Kristi’s Work

A Sampling of Published Short Stories: http://kristipetersenschoonover.com/where-to-read-me/

Bad Apple:

Bad Apple (Direct from the Publisher, Vagabondage Press Books): http://bit.ly/BadAppleVagabondagePressDirect

Bad Apple (Print, Amazon): http://bit.ly/BadAppleKPS

Bad Apple (Kindle, Amazon): http://bit.ly/BadAppleKindle

Bad Apple (Nook): http://bit.ly/BadAppleNook

Bad Apple (Smashwords, All E-formats): http://bit.ly/BadAppleSmashwords

Skeletons in the Swimmin’ Hole: Tales from Haunted Disney World:

Print: http://amzn.to/SkeletonsPrint

Kindle: http://amzn.to/SkeletonsKindle

Nook: http://bit.ly/SkeletonsNook 

BAD APPLE: After an unfortunate incident on a Maine apple orchard, precocious teen Scree is left with a father she’s not sure is hers, a never-ending list of chores and her flaky brother’s baby. In a noble move to save the child from an existence like her own, Scree flees to a glitzy resort teeming with young men just ripe for the picking. But even as life with baby becomes all she’d dreamed, Dali-esque visions begin to leach through the gold paint…

Fans of THE HAUNTNG OF HILL HOUSE, THE LOVELY BONES, and CARRIE shouldn't miss BAD APPLE--a dark, surreal ride that proves not all things in an orchard are safe to pick.

50% of the author's royalties from the sale of Bad Apple are being donated to the American Association of Caregiving Youth, a non-profit organization for the support of children who are caring for ill, injured, elderly, or disabled family members.

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This is T.W. Fendley. Thanks for reading and commenting on The Writers' Lens.You can find out more about me at www.twfendley.com.