New reviews are up!

Under Romance: Heart Fire by Rose Mackie and Strong Enough by Jana Richards

Under Science Fiction: Imago by Greg Belliveau

Under Mystery: Murder with Darjeeling Tea by Karen Rose Smith

Under YA: Skandar and the Unicorn Thief by A.F. Steadman and Shinji Takahashi and the Mark of the Coatl by Julie Kagawa

Under LGBTQ+ for Adults: Fireman’s Carry by Andrew Grey

Birthdays: Anatole France (1844), Gertrude Chandler Warner (1860), John Millington Synge (1871), Dorothy P. Lathrop (1891), Howard Mumford Jones (1892), Tristan Tzara (1896), Berton Roueche (1910), Garth Williams (1912), Kingsley Amis (1922), Carol Bly (1930), Diane Middlebrook (1939), Tracy K. Smith (1972)

Anatole France won the 1921 Nobel in Literature.

Dorothy Lathrop won the 1929 Newbery Medal for “Hitty, Her First Hundred Years”

Howard Jones won the 1965 Pulitzer for Nonfiction for “O Strange New World”

Tracey K. Smith won the 2011 Pulitzer for Poetry for “Life on Mars”

Quote: “Your readers expect a story, a story that answers the question, ‘So what, why do we care about what this person has done?’” – Diane Middlebrook

Tip: Many people confuse the words then/than. “Then” refers to time (we will do this first then that) while “than” is a choice (I’d rather do this than that)

Jumpstart: Take the first line from any book and write it into a paragraph, first as a mainstream book, then as a mystery, horror, science fiction, fantasy, and romance.

This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. Rose Mackie will be awarding a $30 Amazon or B/N GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour. Clkick on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

*The planet Falosia has an excess of females. The planet Verit has a surplus of males. The best of each have been put forward to start a new colony and find mates, in a last desperate attempt to save both worlds. A scorchingly hot sci fi, alien romance. *

Denara barely survived her disastrous first attempt at marriage; for years she threw herself into her research, giving herself time to heal. When the opportunity arises to take up a position on the colony, she decides to take a risk for the chance to live, and love, again. Lucius has spent his life under the heel of the ruthless Matriarchs of Verit. Tasked with leading the males of the new colony, he reluctantly accepts the assignment. The last thing he wants is to tie himself to a scheming female through mating, but nothing could have prepared him for meeting Denara. Sparks fly, but can they overcome their pasts to find love? With the political machinations of two planets vying for control over the colony, perhaps together, they can bridge the gap between their worlds.

What to expect: Glorious world building, spicy alien romance, friends to lovers, enthusiastic consent. Recommended 18+ due to sexual content.

Read an Excerpt

“Would you like to see a trick?” He blinked in surprise. “What?”

“A trick? Something that Falosians don’t often show outsiders?” Not waiting for his reply, she stood up and walked to a nearby bush that bore large buds. “I have been analysing some of the flora that the bio teams have been bringing in, and if I’m not mistaken, this is a fruiting plant.”

She reached her hands out to cup one of the buds, and bent to place her lips next to it, whispering, bathing the bud in her breath. Lucius moved next to her, staring in rapt interest. He reminded her again of a huge jungle cat, eyes bright with curiosity. A few moments passed, and she opened her hands to show a peach-coloured fruit, covered in fuzzy blue hairs. She plucked the fruit, pulled her laser knife out, and sliced a section away to reveal the dark blue pearls within.

Lucius leaned in to sniff, his eyes flicking to hers at the sweet smell.

“Go on, it’s perfectly edible. They will start appearing on our normal food rotation soon, now that we’ve confirmed they are suitable for our digestion.”

He took the offered fruit and scooped out some of the pearls, dropping them into his mouth and popping them with his teeth. As he did, his mouth was flooded with a sweet, slightly spicy juice. “I suspect they will be very popular. This would make an excellent fermented spirit.”

Denara laughed. “I will start mixing hangover cures.”

“How did you do that?”

Denara smiled archly. “I said I’d show you a trick, not that I’d show you how I did it. You can’t expect me to show you all my secrets at once.”

About the Author:Rose Mackie (she/her) is an Australian author who writes and loves sci-fi romance, paranormal romance and fantasy romance. Born in Scotland and living in Perth, Western Australia for the past 15 years, Rose loves nothing more than to hang out with her family and rescue cat, and create magical worlds of imagination.

All Rose Mackie books have an element of spice, kick-ass heroines, enthusiastic consent and happy endings. Rose has been writing for as long as she can remember, but has recently published her first book, Heart Fire. It still spins her out that people are reading the weird stories she makes up in her head!

Rose has fallen in love with writing, and loves seeing audiences connect with her work and characters, and hopes you’ll love them too!

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See my 4 Sparkler review under the Romance page!

Birthdays: James Branch Cabell (1879), Arnold Toynbee (1889), Erich von Daniken (1935), Mireille Guiliano (1946), Bruce Sterling (1954), Tina Rosenberg (1960), Daniel Clowes (1961), Wells Tower (1973)

Erich von Daniken is best known for “Chariots of the Gods”

Tina Rosenberg won the 1995 Pulitzer for Nonfiction for “The Haunted Land: Facing Europe’s Ghosts after Communism”

Quote: “With fiction, there’s no reason why everything you write shouldn’t be amazing. Nobody’s stopping you from making up better stuff.” – Wells Tower

Quote: “A book, once it is printed and published, becomes individual. It is by its publication as decisively severed from its author as in parturition a child is cut off from its parent. The book “means” thereafter, perforce, — both grammatically and actually, — whatever meaning this or that reader gets out of it.” ― James Branch Cabell

Tip: An opening to your story is not the place to put backstory. This will not pull the reader in. Backstory can come later. Check your opening. Does it start with action that invites the reader in, or backstory?

Jumpstart: Write a love letter. Not just any love letter, but from one person who is caught in a disaster and knows s/he is going to die to their secret love—someone nobody knew about, including the recipient.

Birthdays: Nella Larsen (1891), Marguerite Henry (1902), Samuel Beckett (1906),
Eudora Welty (1909), John Braine (1922), Erik Christian Haugaard (1923), Seamus Heaney (1939), J.M.G. Le Ciezio (1940), Rae Amantrout (1947), Christopher Hitchens (1949), Michel Faber (1960),

Marguerite Henry is most famous for her “Misty of Chincoteague” stories.

Samuel Beckett won the 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature.

Eudora Welty won the 1973 Pulitzer for Fiction.

Seamus Heaney won the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature.

J.M.G. Le Ciezio won the 2008 Nobel Prize in Literature.

Quote: “I can’t think of a case where poems changed the world, but what they do is they change people’s understanding of what’s going on in the world.” – Seamus Heaney

Tip: Delete redundant modifiers. Don’t “look up” at the sky. The sky is up. Just look at it. Don’t sit down. Just sit.

Jumpstart: You’ve purchased a painting of an old castle with a figure in the tower window. You’re not sure why you bought the piece—it’s not even very attractive, but something drew you to it. Upon closer inspection…

A Note from Vicky: If you have been promised a review, it is coming. Honest. It just may take a little longer. I have been overwhelmed with requests, with my own writing, and with a project I took on months ago that has taken a lot more time than expected. I promise. I put a lot of effort into my reviews. They are not just “I liked this book” type reviews. Please be patient. Reviews are coming.

Birthday: Hardie Gramatky (1907), Beverly Cleary (1916), Carol Emshwiller (1921), Alan Ayckbourn (1939), Tom Clancy (1947), Scott Turow (1949), Gary Soto (1952), Jon Krakauer (1954), Elliot Ackerman (1980)

Quote: “The truth of the matter is that the people who succeed in the arts most often are the people who get up again after getting knocked down. Persistence is critical.” – Scott Turow

Tip: Like redundancies, may writers pad their work with wordiness. Check out wordy phrases you tend to overuse. Some to look for: for the reason that (because); both of them are (both are); until such time as (until); the true fact is (the fact is)

Jumpstart: Go to the engagement/wedding section of your newspaper and pick out several couples. Write brief character sketches for the people. What are they really like? Why are they together? Mix and match couples and give them different mates. Why those?

Birthdays: Dean Acheson (1893), Glenway Wescott (1901), Leo Rosten (1908), David Westheimer (1911), Peter O’Donnell (1920), Anton LaVey (1930), Mark Strand (1934), Thomas Harris (1940), Dorothy Allison (1949), James Patrick Kelly (1951).

Dean Acheson won the 1970 Pulitzer in History for his memoirs.

Mark Strand was the US Poet Laureate 1990-1991.

David Westheimer’s book “Von Ryan’s Express” was made into a movie of the same name.

Quote: “You must understand that when you are writing a novel you are not making anything up. It’s all there and you just have to find it.” – Thomas Harris

Tip: The beginning sells your book. The ending sells your next book. Check your beginnings and endings. Are they compelling? Do they draw the reader in and finish everything up neatly? Please don’t leave your readers hanging.

Jumpstart: Finish the following: There was a sense of anticipation (use: massage, tree, sand, clock)

Birthdays: William Hazlitt (1778), Joseph Pulitzer (1847), Mary Buff (1880), Clare Tulay Newberry (1903), Margaret Clapp (1910), David Halberstam (1934), Richard Peck (1934), Claudio Magris (1939), Penny Vincenzi (1939), Paul Theroux (1941), Martin Waddell (1941), David Adler (1947), Anne Lamott (1954), John M. Ford (1957),

Mary Buff (and her husband Conrad) was a four-time runner-up for Caldecott or Newbery medals

Clare Newberry had four Caldecott Honor books

Margaret Clapp won the 1948 Pulitzer for Biography for “Forgotten First Citizen: John Bigelow”

David Halberstam was a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist

Ricard Peck won the 2001 Newbery Medal for “A Year Down Under”

Quote: “The more you write, the more you’re capable of writing.” – Paul Theroux

Jumpstart: Go to a yard sale or secondhand shop and pick out one item of interest. Write a scene about it. What is its history? What happened that it is now for sale?

Tip: Think about your book. What will your ideal cover art look like? Find pictures of your characters and background and add them to your file for future reference.

Birthdays: Charles Baudelaire (1821), Jacques Futrelle (1875), Joseph Krumgold (1908), Lev Kopelev (1912), Leonard Levy (1923), Paule Marshall (1929), Fern Michaels (1933), Robert Clark (1952), Ken Kalfus (1954), Kate Heyhoe (1955), Margaret Peterson Haddix (1964), Sam Harris (1967)

Jacques Futrelle was an American journalist and Titanic victim.

Joseph Krumgold was the first person to win two Newbery Medals.

Leonard Levy won the 1969 Pulitzer in History for “Origins of the Fifth Amendment”

Robert Clark won the Edgar Award for his 1999 novel “Mr. White’s Confession”

Quote: “Inspiration comes of working every day.” – Charles Baudelaire

Tip: Tell your reader how a character feels, and you’ve given your readers a fact. Show how s/he feels and you’ve given them an emotion. Of the two, emotions are much better than fact. Go through your story and find where you’ve given facts vs. shown us their emotions.

Jumpstart: Your heroine is sitting in a park and a woman in a dark coat dashes by and drops a note in her lap. It says, “meet me here at midnight or he dies.” What does your heroine do? Does she get help? Who will die? Why? Will she show up?

Birthdays: Harvey Cushing (1869), Margaret Ayer Barnes (1886), John Fante (1909), Glendon Swarthout (1918), Seymour Hersh (1937), Trina Schart Hyman (1939), James Herbert (1943), Robert Kiyosaki (1947), Barbara Kingsolver (1955), Nnedi Okorafor (1974), Sara Shepard (1977)

Harvey Cushing won a Pulizer for his biography of Sir William Osler.

Margaret Barnes won the 1931 Pulitzer for her first novel “Years of Grace”

Tina Hyman won the 1985 Caldecott for her work on “Saint George and the Dragon”

“In a world as wrong as this one, all we can do is make things as right as we can.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, The Bean Trees

Quote: “The only way to become a writer is to sit still and write. Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It’s the one and only thing you have to offer.” – Barbara Kingsolver

Tip: All writing counts. If you can’t come up with a story to write, write a grocery list, a letter to your best friend or a relative, a to-do list – anything. Just let the words come. They may lead to something better.

Jumpstart: Pick two characters from a favorite book and describe their courtship but put a twist on it. For instance, make Rhett and Scarlett Yankees. How would their lives be different?

Birthdays: William Wordsworth (1770), Gabriela Mistral (1889), Gerald Brenan (1894), James White (1928), Donald Barthelme (1931), Iris Johansen (1938)

Gabriela Mistral won the Nobel Prize in Literature, the first Latin American to do so.

Quote: “It is by sitting down to write every morning that he becomes a writer. Those who do not do this remain amateurs.” – Gerald Brenan

Agents and editors do not like “wimpy housewives” or “Mary Jane” (also called Mary Sue) -a character who is too perfect with no flaws. Unrealistic characters—stereotypes with no thoughts other than what the main character in the story puts into their heads and no backbone until the last chapter. Make sure yours aren’t like this. Give them flaws and a backbone (when needed).

Jumpstart: You’ve been given a key that opens one of three chests. Inside one chest is a million dollars, tax free. A second one holds a powerful poison that will kill you instantly. The third is empty. How do you choose which one to open? What happens?