New Feature: Favorite Blogger of the Month!

Dear Readers,

As a reader who loves romance of all genres, I am addicted to the many awesome book blogs I found on the internet. When I started to publish my own books, I sent my work to bloggers and began to correspond with them. I found that they are not only crazy about books, but also invest a considerable amount of love, time and effort to keep their blogs going (most of them without any financial gain). They read and review books, publish interviews, author spotlights and giveaways and are very helpful when it comes to bringing writers and readers closer together. Readers love to hear something personal about their favorite authors, and we writers enjoy nothing more than comments from book lovers who enjoyed our work. 

This is why I decided to start a new feature: The Favorite Blogger of the Month. We read so much about authors, I think it's about time that we also learn something about the bloggers. Starting this month, I'll interview the people who are responsible (in a good way ;-)) for some of the best and most informative blogs out there. Many of them will also be a part of the first Indie Romance Convention 2013, so I hope they'll tell us a bit about their plans for this event (I am very happy to be one of the attending authors). My Favorite Blogger of September is my friend Laurie Garrison, owner of Bitten by Paranormal Romance. Welcome to my blog, Laurie! 

Please tell us about yourself and your blog.  
I have a wonderful husband, one daughter, three cats, two dogs, three rabbits and a host of all kinds of birds and squirrels I feed in my back yard. I love baking and trying new recipes. I’m an animal lover that won’t buy any products tested on animals. I also love playing video games. The Sims PC games are my favorite but I love Need for Speed, so I love getting on my Ps3 and playing race games with all of my friends.

I started reading again after Twilight came out. It wasn’t long before I hit authors like Sherrilyn Kenyon and J.R Ward. After that I started up a blog just to keep my reviews. My blog is a modest compared to a lot of others but I want to keep the paranormal romance first and far most, so that the PNR authors have a place to show themselves.

Which genres do you read in private? What are your most favorite books of all time?  
Anything I read is wide open so everyone can see. My top favorites are, Pleasures of the Night by Nina Bangs, Night Play by Sherrilyn Kenyon, Grave Sins by Jenna MacLanie, Thief Anitra by Lynn McLeod, Blackmailed by Annmarie McKenna and Wickedest Witch by Eve Langlais

With all those books being offered to you, you surely must be a bit picky about what you read. What intrigues you most in a story? Are you influenced by a good blurb or cover?  
ROFL. I wish I could be picky the sad fact is I take what the reviewers won’t take, or if I don’t have enough reviewers I’ll take almost anything. Reason is I hate to have an author miss out on being featured on my blog, even if I don’t like the book because I know someone will. The surprising fact is, I end up likening a lot of them, but if I would have read the blurb or any reviews beforehand I would have passed the book up. Sometimes I think people can be too picky and miss out on something wonderful because it’s hard to give you the whole take on a book in just a few words in a blurb.

What intrigues me the most is how the romance is carried out! I am a sucker for a couple that can come together against all odds, fall in love and have a HEA. It’s amazing but some authors can’t do this they, either focus more on the story or action and lose focus on the romance.

No, covers and blurbs doesn’t influence me one bit. I do like some covers better than others but I have never bought a book just for a cover.

How on earth do you find the time to manage such a busy blog besides your job and family life?

Let’s just say some things goes undone LOL. I have been lucky over the last month though because I have had an inflow of some wonderful reviewers that are enjoying reviewing, so I getting a bit of free time, yay me!! But I it’s just a little, I still don’t have enough to play my video games. I think my Ps3 friends things I dropped off the face of the earth, as a matter of fact, one even messaged me asking if I did. LOL.

Be honest: Is it easy or difficult dealing with us writers? I know that we can be an unorganized, sensitive lot sometimes. (You don't need to tell names …)

Over the last four years, I have only had to deal with two authors. One was fine after I took off her review. The other well that was a different story she pissed me off so bad that I wrote a post on my blog about it. Yea, no one calls my reviewer the devil and gets by with it, even if she was referring to all reviewers being the devil. But the thing was that woman was all over all of the blogs causing problems. Other than that all of my authors are wonderful, they’ll work with me in any way that I need them. Heck some will even come up with a post for me at the last minute. So, I feel very fortunate to have my great list of authors that comes to my blog all the time.

You will be hosting the first Indie Romance Convention next year! Please tell us how this awesome idea originated, what you expect from the event and how readers can attend.

How it originated is rather a long story because this is something that I had been toying with for years. My thing was I didn’t think I could pull the authors, so I kept pushing it back until this year. I did write a long post on the Indie Romance Convention blog about how I came about the idea so everyone is more than welcome to read it.

http://indieromanceconvention.blogspot.com/2012/07/about.html

The 2013 convention is going to be on a small scale because I want to get a feel of what these authors needs are. Yes, I have and will always say Indie authors are different and they need to have their needs met. I am someone who is going to meet those needs and make this an event every year where they feel comfortable to come get the help they need and spread the help and be able to meet their readers in a different level that they never could before.

The registration opens on October 1, 2012 which is now less than a month away. All readers have to do is go to the blog and click on register and go from there. But this will be changing in the coming months because we will be moving soon to indieromanceconvention.com. As soon as the designer is done, things will be moved but the blog will stay up and if you plan on attending please join the blog because this will be a good way to learn about authors you don’t know.

http://indieromanceconvention.blogspot.com/2012/07/registration.html

Just for fun - some quickies:

Favorite movie: Weekend at Bernie’s 1 and 2

Favorite TV series: Big Bang Theory and Once Upon a Time

Favorite singer/band: Stephen Tyler/ Areosmith

Most beautiful male celebrity: I always liked the guy that played Aries on Xena, Kevin Smith, his accident was very unfortunate.

Sexiest fictional hero ever: Devereux, from The Vampire Shrink by Linda Hilburn

Best fictional villain ever: I can’t recall the name of the villain but I remember the book he was crazy. Deadly Heat by Cynthia Eden, I have never run across a villain like him.

Best fictional heroine ever: Cin Craven from Wages of Sin by Jenna Maclaine. Her hero Michel would be my second pick of the sexiest fictional.

Your secret beauty tip: This is so not my department LOL.

Your secret favorite cooking/baking recipe: (full recipe or maybe online link)

I have so many, it’s would be hard to choose. So I’ll just pick the one I am stuck on baking at this time, even my daughter loves this. http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/cinnamon-bread-recipe

This bread is really good hot and it’s great using it the next morning as French toast.

A Word or Two about Fanfiction

Dear Readers,

Fanfiction, or more commonly, "fanfic" has recently risen from the internet underground and is on everyone's lips, especially since the success of former Twilight fanfic Fifty Shades of Grey and its two sequels, which dominate the book charts in many countries as I write this.

For you people out there who don't know what fanfic is, or have never read any: According to Wikipedia, it's "a broadly-defined term for fan labor regarding stories about characters or settings written by fans of the original work, rather than by the original creator." In other words, fans use the characters, worlds and settings of their favorite TV show, movie or book to write their own fiction. If you take a look around popular sites like fanfiction.net or archiveofourown.org, you'll find fics for nearly everything, ranging from Harry Potter via Supernatural, Twilight and Sherlock to True Blood (the latter two are my favorites, I'll admit).

Since these sites are almost completely uncensored and unlimited, there are stories from countless writers, many of them even underage. For people who love to read I can only recommend giving fanfic a chance. Some of them are surprisingly well-written, while others are painfully awful. Explicit erotic sex scenes (the gay-themed ones are called "slash") are quite common, but occasionally there are hidden gems among them, much better than some published erotica. Sometimes you can't help but wonder how a 16-year-old would know about some practices they describe so vividly. But in the end, it's a wonderful thing that such talented young people spend their spare time creating stories. Maybe some of them will become famous and successful writers later on, you never know.

Naturally, not every creator of an "alternate universe" is very happy about people who use copyrighted characters and worlds without asking, especially when erotic content is added (often between protagonists that were never meant to couple by the original writer, for instance Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy). J.K. Rowling publicly stated that she was ok with fanfiction as long as there was no pornography or racism. I absolutely agree with her opinion on racism, of course. But when it comes to sexuality, there is no limit to teenage fantasies. 

No matter what you do, they'll continue writing and reading it anyway. But maybe that's just their way of dealing with the chaos their hormones cause in their bodies, and this is not the worst way of coming to terms with it, don't you agree? Creativity can never be wrong, as long as you don't hurt anybody with it. Personally, I'd be very pleased if readers felt strongly enough about my books to write fanfiction. It's a great compliment for an author, and a sure sign that readers love to get completely immersed in one's fictional world. It means that you succeeded in the most important goal a writer can achieve.

Although I wrote other stuff before and have been working in the romance publishing industry for some years, fanfiction was what originally brought me the first spark of writing "Bound to the Prince". Originally, I wrote the first few chapters as a fanfic for Prince Nuada, the compelling tragic villain from the movie Hellboy - The Golden Army. But soon I felt that the character I imagined was so much more, and very different from the movie figure, and I felt like creating a fantasy universe of my own. So I kept writing, but didn't use any other characters or locations from Hellboy. At some point I renamed my prince Elathan (an old name from Celtic mythology, meaning "The Golden Warrior", which I found befitting for my hero. By the way, you don't pronounce the "t", the correct pronunciation is "Ela-han", just for those of you who read my book. ;-)).

A beautiful thing about writing fanfiction is the close relationship you have with your readers. They are people who share your passion about what you're writing, and they give you wonderful, invaluable feedback, helping you to improve constantly. I learned so much during that time. At the beginning, I felt a bit self-conscious about my own writing, but I kept posting more and more since those awesome friends asked me to - and I've kept all their precious comments until today. I encourage every aspiring writer to try fanfiction first, if you are afraid of beginning your own first novel yet. I promise it will be the best lesson in writing you'll ever have.

Yours truly,

Deborah

*****

Besides her published novels, Deborah Court wrote two True Blood fanfic novellas exclusively for EricandSookielovers.com. You can also find them here:

Piece of Glass (A vampire love story, set in the present and the Viking era)

The Dark Queen (Sequel to Piece of Glass, a vampire New Orleans murder mystery)

Deborah Court's Movie Review: Snow White and the Huntsman

Beware: This review contains mild spoilers! - "Mild" because: Hey, it's Snow White. You know what happens. (If not, seriously consider grabbing a copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales and do some essential reading.) If you'd like to watch the movie completely uninfluenced, please stop reading right now and come back later. Ye have been warned.

Since I saw the first teaser trailer of "Snow White and the Huntsman", I was very excited about this movie - especially after the second trailer, which showed a scene where Snow White encounters mythical creatures like tiny fairies and a white stag in the forest. I'm also a big fan of Charlize Theron and couldn't wait to see her as the evil queen. Yesterday, the wait was finally over: I couldn't believe it myself when I was successful in convincing my husband to go watch this movie with me - although it really wasn't his cup of tea (he would have preferred Men in Black 3 but bent to my iron will).

Visually, the movie is stunning, even if it had a very distinct Lord of the Rings look. When Snow White, the Huntsman and the dwarves walk across a magnificent mountain landscape, the air shot looks ridiculously like The Fellowship of the Ring walking towards the mines of Moria. I wouldn't have been surprised if Legolas and Gimli had been among them. Charlize Theron, as I expected, really rocked the boat in her role, she was painfully beautiful, regal and wonderfully evil without overacting. Kristen Stewart has the perfect looks for her role, but I am not sure about her style of acting Snow White. 

She was a wonderful Bella in Twilight, playing that young girl who is uncomfortable with herself and angry at the world, but in Snow White, she needed to deliver the innocence that's so important as a counterpart to the clever, scheming queen. She played the part well, but I was surprised by how few lines she had to speak, which seemed peculiar since she was the main character. Chris Hemsworth (a great actor and always a joy to look at) and the rest of the elaborate cast (it was great fun to detect the famous actors hiding beneath heavy dwarf make-up) did their best, too, but even they couldn't ensure that the viewers felt emotionally moved - which brings us to what was really lacking in this movie: A good script.

While all the elements of a fantasy story - heroes and villains, a quest, exotic landscapes and magic creatures - were there, what was lacking was: a) a good, satisfying love story (Snow White has two gorgeous guys to choose from -Thor and the handsome priest who fell in love with a mermaid from Pirates of the Caribbean 4. Hello? Where is the romance, emotional conflict, scenes that sizzle with physical tension?) and b) dialogue and characters that deeply moved the audience. Some lines were so boring and meaningless that I waited for the characters to say something else.

Here's an example: Snow White has just killed a villain who intended to rip out a vital organ from her body (slightly changed to avoid spoilers here, villain could be male or female); let's pretend for now that it's the liver.

Villain: has just delivered a very evil and hateful speech before our heroine kills her (or him) and breaks down, sputtering black blood and aging rapidly

Snow White: *watches villain with tears in her eyes* "You can't have my liver."

Me: *waits and listens*

Snow White:

Snow White:

Snow White:

Me: *waits and listens*

Me: I can't believe it. This was her final line in that scene. You can't have my liver. Wouldn't Snow White say something in addition to that line, something cool, clever, or even with a hint of black humor, to give this great villain the good-bye she (or he) deserves? What about this: "You can't have my liver - or other vital organ -, because it already belongs to the unbelievably handsome Huntsman who's madly in love with me and will be warming my bed every night while you rot in hell, you evil b*tch. (or insert suitable male cussword here) Besides, I was always more beautiful than you. You should have wiped the dust from that blind old mirror of yours before you made him choose who's the fairest. Oh, you're already dead. Good. Guard, throw her over the castle walls for the ravens to feed on." *rips crown from deceased villain's head*

And where, may I ask, was the final, passionate kiss that everyone wants to see at the end of a fairy tale? Instead, all we got was one of the male protagonists (I won't tell which one, not wanting to spoil your fun) - washed and combed for once, coming around the corner while Snow White watches him with tear-clouded eyes and a yearning look on her pretty pale face.

Me: Finally! Now grab and kiss her before you carry her to her chamber, you strong, sexy, handsome ..

Movie: *cuts to black, end credits*

Me: What the …? Are they kidding?

Husband: Let's go! *look of relief on his face* I think I need to watch a splatter movie now.

Me: I think I need to rewatch Thor now to recover from all the Chris Hemsworth lady boner teasing without results. And all three extended editions of Lord of the Rings.

If you like dark fairy tales and epic fantasy, go and watch Snow White and the Huntsman! This dark fairy tale is visually exquisite, entertaining and a good action-driven fantasy movie. What you shouldn't expect is too much depth or a romantic love story. It's one of the films that makes you think what could it have been if there had been a bit more of a background story. Now excuse me while I put on a low-cut black dress and start commanding over my own little kingdom here at home. I wanna be a badass queen, too! This makes me think of Galadriel's words in Lord of the Rings:

"In the place of a Dark Lord you would have a Queen! Not dark but beautiful and terrible as the Morn! Treacherous as the Seas! Stronger than the foundations of the Earth! All shall love me and despair!"