HAPPY CELTIC NEW YEAR!



It’s that time of year again – the new year in the old Celtic calendar.  Each day, the veil grows thinner.  Every day from now for the next week to fortnight (and especially on October 29th, the night of the full moon), it is possible to contact the Shining Ones – the spirits of nature, as well as our ancestors and loved ones.  Go outside and listen.  Come inside and light a candle.  Let us all be conscious, aware, opening our minds and our hearts to those around us we cannot see. 

For the great gates of the mountains have opened once again,
And the sound of song and dancing fall upon the ears of men,
And the Land of Youth lies gleaming, flushed with rainbow light and mirth,
And the old enchantment lingers in the honey-heart of earth.
-          A.E. (George William Russell)

Wishing you and all your friendly spirits a . . .

Happy Samhain! 

THE NEW & IMPROVED NEXT BIG BLOG HOP



She’s baaaaaack.  Thanks to fellow blogger and literary genius, Crystal Collier, the Compulsive Creator, I have been tagged for The Next Big Blog Hop.  To be completely honest, I considered pretending like I’d dropped off the face of the earth.  But, while I am feeling pretty reclusive lately, I am NOT a party poop.  So, I will gladly play along and answer the ten questions about my most current WIP (or re-WIP). 

1. What is the working title of your book?
THE PATH THROUGH THE MIST

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

My personal move from L.A. to the rural west of Ireland.  (Write what ya know, right?) 

3. What genre does your book fall under? 
YA Time-Slip (slips between historical and contemporary)

4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? 
Hmmm . . . maybe: 

In the 5th Century:  Kaya Scodelario and Liam Hemsworth

In the Present:  Hailee Steinfeld and Landon Liboiron

5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

A teenager, miserable about moving to rural Ireland from Southern California, discovers her past life on a remote lake island. 


6. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
Please, dear God, deliver unto me an agency. 

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? 
Um, well, if you include all the research, and interviewing old people who know about the past and unpacking and acclimating myself to my new home and having to buy and get used to a new computer after my old one died . . . three years.  Is that a run-on sentence? 

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
It’s THE MISTS OF AVALON meets WEST SIDE STORY. 

9. Who or What inspired you to write this book?
 
Spirits from the past.  I get visits from dead people.  Sometimes they stay for lunch.  Leave their ideas behind, that sort of thing. 

10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

Have you ever found yourself in a new place and just known things?  Things you shouldn’t know, like where things are you’ve never seen or even heard of?  Or people’s names or place names?  There are a lot of possible explanations for knowing the unknowable.  This story explores one of them. 

And to:  
L.G.Smith at http://bardsandprophets.blogspot.com/
Dianne Salerni at http://diannesalerni.blogspot.com/
and 
Serena Lawless at http://www.solawless.com/

I say, ‘Tag, you’re it!"