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I’ve been told for more than eight years that I need a newsletter to share news about my books with readers. I’ve ignored this advice until now. What can I say? I’ve had other things on my mind.
The past few days, I’ve been learning about newsletters and setting up the infrastructure to launch one. So far, I have the Sign Up form ready.
At this point in time, I will publish a newsletter twice a month: on the 1st and 15th. Over time, I imagine, like everything, this will change, evolve into something different.
What will go into my newsletter?
All sorts of things, including book launches, book sales, cover reveals, my writing progress, what I’m writing about now, interesting facts I uncover while researching for my books, and anything else book related. Don’t worry; the newsletter won’t be too long. I’m busy; you’re busy. Short is sweet.
Continue reading “Launching My Newsletter”Have you ever wondered where Dungeons and Dragons got it start? I had always thought Gary Gygax had been the creative mind who had dreamt up the game that transformed my youth. I had even put this in the front of Scattered Stones, the 2nd book in the Castle Keepers, series to thank Gygax. [NOTE: I will be changing this front material soon to reflect the truth.]
Gary Gygax for creating Dungeons & Dragons, my first real adventures in the fantasy world. If I had a dollar for every hour I played, I could build a castle.
Decades later, I’ve discovered I was wrong. But I’m not alone. The multi-million dollar industry has not been kind to the original creator: Dave Arneson. Many were led to believe Gygax had done it all. Now, even Gygax is being pushed out of the picture as the role-playing game continues to grow in popularity.
The Informal Game has taken the lead to correct this false narrative (or as some might call: deliberate cloaking of the truth). They’ve created a film revealing the origins of Dungeons and Dragons. Through researching the documented history and interviewing players of the original game, including Arneson’s daughter, they’ve uncovered the Secrets of Blackmoor – the very first role-playing game that gave birth to Dungeons and Dragons.
Watch the first two chapters on YouTube: Secrets of Blackmoor – The True History of Dungeons & Dragons.
Or dive into the full film at Vimeo or Amazon.
What if everything you knew about the history of Dungeons & Dragons was wrong?
6 Years, 12 Cities, 200 Hours of Interviews, 20,000 Documents and Photos: An unprecedented investigation into the history of D&D – the game that spurred a multi-billion dollar industry.
Be among the first to know the Secrets of Blackmoor.
Blackmoor is the name of a fictional world created by David Arneson. It is also the prototype of Dungeons & Dragons, the first published role playing game. Unlike other fantasy worlds, such as J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, Blackmoor is a living world that is being explored to this day. Secrets of Blackmoor investigates the origins of the role playing game, through candid interviews, archival footage, and newly discovered artifacts.
It’s time to set the record straight and bring Dave Arneson’s name back to the game. We can do that by spreading the news to all gamers who love Dungeons and Dragons.
Prefer to listen to this post?
No problem. I’m giving Anchor and Spotify a whirl.
To listen to this blog post recorded by Anchor, click here. If you want to hear it on Spotify, click here. Let me know what you think about it. No, that is not my voice, but he does read very well.
Prefer to read? Here it is…
Inspiration for stories comes from every direction for me. The inspiration for the current fantasy novel I’m writing came from having discussions with others, who, like me, played the original Dungeons and Dragons roll-playing game in the early 1980s. Instead of roaming the streets of our community and possibly getting into trouble on a Friday night when I was a teenager, I gathered with friends at our Boys and Girls Club. There, the director Peter Mortimer played Dungeon Master and sent us on quests and adventures.
From the age of 13 until about 18 or 19, we played every Friday night. Friendships were formed, skills were mastered and we walked away better for the experience.
While my first fantasy novel Shadows in the Stone was inspired by Dungeons and Dragons, it’s firmly set in a fantasy world of its own. The story I’m currently writing straddles both: this world and the fantasy world. It’s something I’ve always thought about doing but never did.
I want to have a blast writing it, and I’m going to share this journey with you. If you’ve ever played Dungeons and Dragons, I hope these posts and the eventual novel rekindles fond memories.
Currently, I have 33,079 words written for my current fantasy novel that will receive a title shortly.
There have been spans over the past 25 years when I’ve not written a thing. They usually don’t last long. A month or two. For some reason, I lack the inspiration to write. It has nothing to do with the story. It has more to do with the energy surrounding me.
One way I boot that negative energy out of my life is by forcing myself to write 750 words a day regardless of the story. That’s not words for a blog post or an email. That’s of a story. Period. I can’t sink into a blog post like I can a story. There’s always solid ground to find. With a story, however, once I wade far enough into the quicksand, I’m captured, and I can’t escape. That leaves me inspired to write, and I easily reach 750 words, often more.
That’s how I’m feeling right now. While I’ve written a lot of words between January 1st and May, most were not in story form. That changed May 7th when I wrote the first few words to a new novel.
What is this novel about? Adventure. Quests. Magic. Friends. Dragons.
I’ll leave it there. I’ll share more in my next post. Right now, I’ve got to get back to the story. There’s only 31,436 words written, and I’m aiming for 100,000.
To listen to this recorded by Anchor, click here. If you want to hear it on Spotify, click here. This is something new I’m trying. Let me know what you think about it. No, that is not my voice, but he does read very well.
This spring has been extremely busy. There are days when I feel like a dozen energies are pulling me in the same number of directions. I rise in the morning wondering how many things I can get done before the day is exhausted.
Then there was Friday. I was up early, getting the tasks needing to be done completed because my Toggenburg doe, Willow, was due to kid, and my focus had to be on her.
Experience has taught me every birth is different. Some are easy, some are interesting, some are entertaining and some (like Sigma’s a few years ago) have me holding down back legs and being splattered with blood while a vet forces a uterus back into a screaming goat.
Knowing all this, I go into each birth with an open mind. I hope for easy, kid on the ground when I open the barn door in the morning, and the mother cleaning up the afterbirth coating the kid’s hair. Yet, we’re ready with plastic gloves that go to our armpit, clean rags to help clean off kids and the vet’s number on speed dial.
The journey started on November 23, 2021, when I bred Willow to Chippy, a Nigerian Dwarf buck. We’re getting out of Togs (Toggenburgs) and switching to Nigerian Dwarf. We have many reasons, but that’s not what this post is about.
Continue reading “A New Addition to the Herd”
My philosophy from the beginning of this writing journey has been to write books I enjoy reading. If these books found readers who also enjoyed the stories, then it made publishing these books worth the time and energy. Those readers are the ones I am writing for. I can’t write for all readers, so I don’t even try.
So when I come upon a positive review of one of my books, it makes me smile. I found one today, posted yesterday and for me, it reaffirmed the reason I do what I do. And that’s write books that I enjoy, not books on the latest fad, political statement or books similar to those on the best-sellers’ list.
What kind of books do I enjoy? Ones with adventure, a little romance, a little humour, hope even when things look tragic, hard-working people with good values, loving family, loyal friends, a good sense of home and entertainment. I like to create worlds we can escape to, ones that make us forget about the current state of the world around us.
Continue reading “A Five-star Amazon Review”There’s an old saying I heard many years ago: We must say good-bye before we can say hello. It’s a way of easing the pain of parting.
A similar saying applies to this time of the year: We must say good-bye to the old before we can say hello to the new.
Good-bye, 2021. You were a little unexpected, a little different, a little the same, a little exciting and a little disappointing. You were far from the hardest year in my lifetime, and you were far from the most difficult year in the past 100 years. Many people died. Many people were born. Many lost hope, and many became enlightened.
Hello, 2022. Not knowing what you’ll bring is a blessing and a curse. I’d like to be better prepared, but I guess I’m going to have to wing it like every year. Regardless of what you bring, the sun is sure to rise, rains to fall, winds to blow, snow to collect, flowers to bloom and birds to sing.
This post was supposed to be about the end. The end of the year, not the end of someone’s life. The post I had written needed only one more reading before it went live. However, that changed when I heard the news.
I was on my way back from picking up pizza from Frank’s Pizza in Stewiacke. It was for my youngest son’s birthday supper. On the Bokma Plains, the song ended, and the announcer came on. My finger was on the way to the button to put on another station to have non-stop music when I heard her name. My finger hovered over the button.
Betty White had passed away 18 days shy of her 100th birthday.
Her face instantly came to mind. I’ve been watching Betty all my life. She’d been acting longer than I was alive. My mom and I loved Golden Girls and saw every episode. In fact, Betty reminded me a lot of mom.
Now she’s gone. Just like that.
Continue reading “Where were you when you heard the news?”Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas wherever you are today.
Diane McGyver 