Conda V. Douglas's Blog: Conda's Creative Center, page 4

  The Mall Fairies Boxed Set
Tis the season, when authors are working maniacally hard to promote/sell their titles. One useful instrument is the eBook boxed set or bundle. Why? Read on.

1. You will expand your readership.

Because they love to read, readers are always looking for a bargain. Book bundles provide that bargain. For example, the book bundle above provides the first two novels in my Mall Fairies series, plus a stand alone short story, for an estimated 602 pages of reading, all for $1.99!

They are also looking to discover new authors with little risk. Bundles provide that, whether with a single author as above or with several other authors as in another bundle I'm in, Sirens on Death Starke Blvd. 

With five authors and four mysteries, and 825 pages for $1.99, why not?


Sirens on Death Starke Blvd.
I know this is all true because as a reader, I often buy bundles.

2. You will add to your brand.

Book bundles are one strong way of promoting your brand, especially when you have a one author (you) bundle. It's another way of having the readers find you. It sends out the message that you are not a one book wonder and can be trusted to provide more reads, always important to readers.

If you are in a bundle with other authors, your brand is strengthened by association with those authors' brands. For example in Sirens on Death Starke Blvd., it is obviously a mystery genre bundle, and if you like one book, you'll like another. It brands me as a mystery author.

3. And least thought of: Oddly enough, bundling my books led me to more story ideas! I never expected that. But seeing three of my Mall Fairies books together reminded me of what the whole series was about...and what the next could be about, or wait, here's an idea for another short story. Sometimes revisiting the prior work provides inspiration.

So dear readers, do you buy book bundles? If you're an author who has a book bundle out? If so, provide a link in the comments!

Just released! The Clock Strikes Midnight by Joan C. Curtis
Tips for Using Animals in Your Stories
I love to read about characters who have pets. Whenever there is a cat or a dog in a book, my interest peaks. I do not, however, like it when animals do things that are superhuman. I don't like for the animals to talk nor do I like it when they solve crimes. The one exception for me was the fascinating book, The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. The author wrote the entire book from the dog's point of view. He did a great job of getting into the mind of the dog. The dog couldn't do super-dog things, but he did see things from a dog's perspective.What I don't like is to see animals hurt. When an author uses an animal to demonstrate a character's cruelness, I consider that a cheap method. I loved The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, but I hated when Stieg Larsson killed a cat. After experiencing what this killer did to women, why kill a cat? It was unnecessary.
 Joan's cat CaramellaTo contrast this misuse of animals with a great demonstration of how to use an animal to show a character's humanity, William Boyd in OrdinaryThunderstorms created a sociopathic villain with a dog. As the book progressed, it became clear that the dog jeopardized the killer's life. He had to kill it. I skipped ahead because I couldn't experience him shooting the dog. I’m a total wimp as far as animals and children are concerned. Once I skipped ahead, however, I realized the dog was still alive. The villain couldn't kill the dog. He did abandon him, but at a home where he knew the dog would be cared for. What an amazing thing for Boyd to do! Although I disliked the killer, the author showed a bit of humanity that still remained in this villain--a multidimensional character. That's awesome writing. In my own books, my characters have animals. In The Clock Strikes Midnight both main characters have pets. Janie has a yellow lab named Charlie and Marlene has a cat named Nellie. Neither play prominent parts, but both demonstrate each character’s compassion for their four-legged creatures.To all the authors out there, I say, please don't kill your animals to make a point. Find a better way to do it!

Dr. Joan Curtis is an award winning writer who has published 5 books and numerous stories.

"There is a feeling of the great southern author, Fannie Flagg in The Clock Strikes Midnight," said the Rabid Reviewer. "Curtis beautifully highlights the complexity of relationships when mental illness is a player. She, in a move nothing short of brilliant, introduces us to the mother as a teen. Eloise's internal dialogue is fascinating. Her development shows how a young girl spirals out of control...

Thank you, Joan, for being on my blog today with your great post! Readers, any questions for Joan or tales of stories with animals gone horribly--or wonderfully? 

If you're like me, you get crazy enthusiastic about the holidays and holiday desserts and end up buying two or three of those big honking cans of pumpkin. No worries!   The Mall Fairies Sweet Tooth Cookbook to the rescue with several recipes for pumpkin, including the one below, as a pumpkin-y taste. One reviewer said, "What a delightful change from the usual cookbook genre! The author creates little vignettes to introduce a reason for the creation of each recipe." Plus The Mall Fairies Sweet Tooth Cookbook is free today only here.

(Conda's note: this story is about the pixies that are introduced in my new release, the second in my Mall Fairies' trilogy, The Mall Fairies: War, out now. Enjoy meeting Flit and the rest of the pixies!)
FLIT AND THE PUMPKIN BREAD AND BARS AND...
"What, in the Big Digger's name, are we going to do with an entire pumpkin?" Cheer, the leader of the pixie clan glared at Flit. Cheer sat straight on her rock—okay, throne, as she insisted it be called—and leaned forward.Flit fingered the hem of her mouse skin cloak. She'd thought that Cheer would be pleased with what Flit and her friends had managed to find tucked away in a human's garden and haul home. There were times when she hated her part time job of scavenger—Dumpster diver—provider of foodstuffs for the pixie clan. She gestured at the human's fist-sized pumpkin. "It's a tiny pumpkin." "For human's maybe, not for five-inch-tall pixies. For pixies, it's big enough for all of us to live on for a week."Flit nodded. "Exactly."Cheer slumped on her rock. "My fault for sending a healer out instead of a hunter.""Pumpkin is very good for you," Flit the healer said.Cheer sighed. "Right, but I'm sending all the complaints your way."… Three days later …"Roast pumpkin, pumpkin soup, cold pumpkin soup—no more!" Digger, Flit's best friend, stood in front of a large group of angry pixies confronting Flit."But—" Flit looked over at the pile of cooked pumpkin, the rather large pile of remaining cooked pumpkin.Digger saw her looking. "Yeah, I hate to waste food too, especially food I helped you drag home and then cook, but we're making an exception this time." The other pixies nodded in agreement."But—" Flit cast her gaze around as she tried to think of a way to use up the pumpkin—her gaze fell on the stack of honeycomb freshly stolen from a hive. Aha."What if we had it for dessert instead?" Flit asked. "Dessert?""You know, make up some pumpkin bread or bars with acorn flour and the honey—""Yeah, yeah, that sounds—delicious," Digger said. The other pixies nodded again."And it's healthy too," Flit had to add.
PUMPKIN BARS
Ingredients:
2 cups flour2 teaspoons baking powder2 teaspoons cinnamon1/2 teaspoon nutmeg 1/4 teaspoon cloves (can be omitted, but why?)1/2 teaspoon ginger1 teaspoon salt1 teaspoon baking soda4 eggs1 and 2/3 cups sugar1 cup vegetable oil (I use canola)1 teaspoon vanilla1 large can (15oz) pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
Sift dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, ginger, salt & soda) and set aside. In a large bowl, combine eggs, sugar, oil, vanilla and pumpkin until light and fluffy. Add the dry ingredients, gradually. Mix well.
Spread batter in a greased 15x10x1 baking pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 – 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool completely.
For a richer dessert, frost with one of Grandma MacDougall's frostings (recipes follows Molasses Cake recipe in The Mall Fairies Sweet Tooth Cookbook). 

Enjoy! And dear readers, do you have any recipes to share for this most glorious pumpkin season?

Dead Cool, the second in the Shara Summers Mystery series.
It's my pleasure to have mystery author Sara Jayne Townsend on my blog today. Thank you for visiting, Sara! Without further ado...
The Complicated Love Life of Shara Summers By Sara Townsend                                     I always said I don’t write romance novels.  I don’t like reading romance novels – I have always held this view that too much romance detracts from the action.  But lots of people like love stories, and even I will agree that sometimes a love interest can add a bit of spice to a sub-plot.
When I created my amateur sleuth Shara Summers, I made her a 30-year-old straight single actress with a fairly relaxed attitude to casual sex.  It was logical to assume there would be men in her life.  I also decided that a slightly chaotic love life would make for a more interesting character than someone in a happy and stable relationship, especially since this was a character I wanted to take through a series.
So I had already decided that Shara would have relationship problems.  However, I did not anticipate when I set out to write DEAD COOL, the second book in the series, just how chaotic Shara’s love life was going to be.  The book begins with the re-introduction into her life of her Canadian ex-boyfriend, David.  Shara is now settled back in England and thinks David is behind her and far away, in Toronto.  But then he turns up on her doorstep – literally – begging her to audition for the sudden and unexpected vacancy of backing singer in his new band, which is about to embark on a European tour.
It soon becomes clear to Shara that David isn’t quite as over their relationship as she is.  But she’s more interested in the band’s guitarist, Jake.  And then when the band’s front man is killed, the handsome detective constable investigating the case seems far more interested in Shara than perhaps he should be.  And what of Richard, the actor that Shara was seeing at the end of DEATH SCENE?  She’s ignoring his calls – but why?


This isn’t a love triangle I’ve put my poor character into.  It’s more a rectangle.  It seems the path of true love is not destined to run smoothly for my amateur sleuth.  But from a reader’s perspective, I think it’s far more interesting when it doesn’t.


Sara-Jayne Townsend is a UK-based writer of crime and horror.  She was born in Cheshire in 1969, but spent most of the 1980s living in Canada after her family emigrated there.  She now lives in Surrey with two cats and her guitarist husband Chris.  She co-founded the T Party Writers’ Group in 1994, and remains Chair Person.
The first two books in her amateur sleuth series about Canadian actress Shara Summers, DEATH SCENE and DEAD COOL, are available as e-books from the MuseitUp book store: http://museituppublishing.com/bookstore/index.php/our-authors/70-our-authors/authors-t/420-sara-jayne-townsend
You can learn more about Sara and her writing at her website at http://sarajaynetownsend.weebly.comor her blog at http://sayssara.wordpress.com.
 

Sirens on Death Starke Blvd is out! Available everywhere! Tons of great reading!
Released today! I've found that bundling eBooks is a great way for readers to find new authors and for authors to find new readers. I often buy these myself, lots of reading for cheap! What could be better? I love this new publishing world. Here's one that includes my award winning mystery, Starke Naked Dead, plus three other five star mysteries. 

In Starke Naked Dead, the gossiping women of the Widows Brigade in the new ski resort of Starke, Idaho love a good scandal—this time it’s a murder mystery, and a stark naked corpse! One reviewer said, "Funny small town murder mystery, that will have you trying to figure out who did what!"

In Death Scene by Sara Jayne Townsend, British-born, Toronto-based, actress Shara Summers turns amateur sleuth when her sister is stricken with a mysterious illness. One reviewer said, "Looking for a genuine character in real circumstances with a puzzle to unravel, read Death Scene."

In Sunshine Boulevard by JQ Rose, who or what is killing the seniors on Sunshine Boulevard? One reviewer said, "Baby Boomers are coming into their own as Snowbirds. J.Q. Rose brings them into the realm of Crafty, Amateur Detectives with LOTS of time on their hands to devote to this new passion...solving murders."

In The Sound of Sirens by Heather Fraser Brainerd and David Fraser, having narrowly survived an encounter with murderous black magic, private investigator Josie P. Cates has settled into the humdrum life of her new profession. But she now faces a challenge far more terrifying: spending a week with her mother.One reviewer said, "The Sound of Sirens (José Picada, P.I. Book 2) by Heather Fraser Brainerd and David Fraser is a marvelously entertaining read for people of all ages."

Dear readers, do you buy bundles? If you do or don't, why?

For more on the authors, visit their blogs here:

J.Q. Rose-http://www.jqrose.com
Fraser and Brainerd-http://drivingblindproductions.wordpress.com/
Sara-Jayne Townsend-​http://sayssara.wordpress.com/

My humorous romance short story A Crispy Rice Christmas out in audio and eBook.

Now that it's Thanksgiving, "It's beginning to feel..." and to get everyone in the spirit, here's some fun stuff.

First, a gift with a small request attached. My humorous romance short story, A Crispy Rice Christmas, is, ahem, a Christmas story and in need of a few more reviews for the season. If you would be willing to give an honest review of my story on Amazon or Audible, I will gift the audiobook to you. Please just comment on this post. You may leave your e-mail address as follows: Name (at) email server which is yahoo, or whatever dot com (In other words, obscure your address.)

In A Crispy Rice Christmas, if Beth can't figure out a way to seduce her love's picky appetite, she fears her relationship is toast-burnt. She cooks up a plan only to have it boil over. What's a terrible cook to do? Can Beth brave a winter storm in search of a Christmas dish to save her relationship - or will the holidays be a distasteful disaster? One reviewer said, "You will need to read this funny story to see how she gets herself in and out of trouble. It's the perfect book to curl up on the couch and get in the Christmas spirit!"

Second, in honor of this story about a wretched cook, here's the easy, iconic recipe Beth tries to make in A Crispy Rice Christmas, with a photo of the dish that's turned out being considerably better than Beth's--despite the pink! (I was going for a Christmassy red and failed.)

Rice Crispy Cereal Bars


Basic Recipe:4 tablespoons margarine or butter or even coconut butter (oil)6 cups crispy rice cereal (can be the gluten free variety, if needed)1 16 ounce bag of marshmallows (fresh mini marshmallows work best)
In a large saucepan, heat the butter on medium heat until it melts. Add marshmallows and stir constantly until marshmallows all melt. Remove from heat. Add crispy rice cereal and stir well. Using a greased spatula, spread mixture in a buttered 15 X 10 inch pan. Cut into bars when cooled.

Okay, now for the variations:
Add vanilla or rum or orange or lemon extract, a teaspoon or two to the melted marshmallows and stir well for rum bars or lemon bars—well, you get the idea.
Add a cup of nuts, or raisins or any dried fruit, or a cup of chocolate bits (or a third a cup of each!).Add any spices you like, nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice, or cardamom.
Add mini chocolate chips, butterscotch chips or Add 1/3 cup of cocoa for chocolate bars.Or be daring and try adding a bit of cayenne pepper and hot sauce to the cocoa! Strange but good if you like it weird and spicy!
The recipe above was the inspiration for A Crispy Rice Christmas. Where do you find your inspiration? 
The cover for the eBook version of A Crispy Rice Christmas.

Join me in celebrating the upcoming release of Kathleen Kaska's fourth Sydney Lockhart mystery, Murder at the Driskill (Austin, Texas). Today she's kicking off her blog tour, “Travels to Austin: A Trip Back in Time, on Conda’s Creative Center. She's writing about famous, infamous, and legendary locales in Texas’ state capital. If you’ve ever been to Austin, tell Kathleen what you liked best about the city whose promo campaign is “Keep Austin Weird.” At the end of the tour, she’ll give away a signed copy of the book. To be eligible, leave a comment on each blog. 



Most of the businesses I write about in my Sydney Lockhart Mystery Series are based on real places from the 1950s (time in which the stories take place), many of which are still in operation today. Writing Murder at the Driskill was like taking a stroll down memory lane, since Austin was my home for twenty-five years; it’s where I went to college, launched my teaching and writing careers, and met my husband. It was only natural that I made Austin Sydney’s home as well. However, this is the first book where Sydney solves a murder in her very city.             When I settled in Austin in 1977, a certain entertainment venue became my favorite. Esther’s Follies, a live variety show named after film star and Olympic swimmer Esther Williams, had just opened and has been going strong ever since. A few of my friends wrote comedy scripts for the show and I was often in the audience showing my support. The Next to Nothing Live Theatre, although not necessarily a variety show venue, in Murder at the Driskill, is loosely modeled after Esther’s zany productions. One of my characters in the story, twelve-year-old, Lydia LaBeau, is forced to run the theatre when, Serge LaBeau, her murder-suspect father goes on the lam after he discovers the police are after him. At the time of his flight, he was in the middle of rehearsing a production called Hamlet at the Alamo. Lydia, being a Sherlock Holmes fan and a control freak, rewrote the script in her father’s absence, giving herself the lead role, and entitling it Sherlock Holmes at the Alamo. Enjoy the excerpt.            The curtain rose and “Sherlock Holmes at the Alamo” began. Since the battle at the Alamo took place more than fifty years before Arthur Conan Doyle created the world’s greatest detective, Holmes’ presence was the result of time travel through a tunnel under Crockett Street behind the mission. The opening scene had Lydia, as Sherlock, crawling from a manhole as an enormous Mexican army, depicted by a famous painting made to shimmer behind a thin fabric, gathered in the distance. Following her was Howie as Dr. Watson.             “‘What object is served by this circle of misery and violence and fear?’” Holmes said, looking over the future battle site. “‘It must tend to some end, or else our universe is ruled by—”                 “Santa Anna, by the looks of it,” Dr. Watson said in a Texas drawl that got a hardy chuckle out of the audience.             Holmes glared at her sidekick. Howie clearly stole the lead’s first scene. The production continued in the same vein with Lydia and Howie trying to upstage one another. The audience probably thought it was part of the script, but I’d hate to be in Howie’s shoes when the curtain fell.             When it was clear that Holmes would not be able to save the Texans, he offered to transport them into the future via the time-travel tunnel. Colonel Travis, Jim Bowie, Davy Crockett, and all the settlers who took refuge inside the mission, declined. They decided to stay and fight. When Holmes’ final plea to the Colonel to change the course of history fell on deaf ears, Holmes and Dr. Watson chose to join them in battle. In the final scene, as the great detective lay dying in a pool of blood, Dr. Watson (also with a bullet hole in his chest) chastised his friend and partner for getting them into a fatally impossible situation. Seeing another line-steal coming, Holmes pulled his revolver and shot the good doctor. The audience gasped; curtain fell.            “I don’t get it,” Ruth whispered.             “Just start clapping.” I shouted “bravo” a few times. Everyone joined me probably assuming they’d missed something too.             Tomorrow writer Lois Winston is hosting me at http://anastasiapollack.blogspot.com/I will be reminiscing about one of Austin’s institutions, Matt’s El Rancho.
Now here’s a taste of Murder at the Driskill.            You’d think that newspaper reporter Sydney Lockhart, comfortable at home in Austin, Texas, could stay away from hotels and murders therein. But when she and her detective boyfriend, Ralph Dixon, hang out a shingle for their new detective agency, they immediately land a high-profile case, which sends them to the swanky Driskill Hotel. Businessman Stringer Maynard has invited them to a party to meet his partner/brother-in-law, Leland Tatum, who’s about to announce his candidacy for governor. Maynard needs their help because Tatum is hanging out with the wrong crowd and jeopardizing his chances for winning the election. Before Sydney can finish her first martini, a gunshot sounds and Leland Tatum is found murdered in a suite down the hall. 



Kathleen Kaska writes the award-winning Sydney Lockhart mysteries. Her first two books Murderat the Arlington and Murder at the Luther, were selected as bonus-books for the Pulpwood Queens Book Group, the largest book group in the country. Kaska also writes the Classic Triviography Mystery Series. Her Alfred Hitchcock and the Sherlock Holmes trivia books were finalists for the 2013 EPIC award in nonfiction. Her nonfiction book, The Man Who Saved the Whooping Crane: The Robert Porter Allen Story (University Press of Florida) was published in 2012.
Webpage: Kathleen Kaska...cozy on up...Blog: Kathleen Kaska on Birds and Books 

Come join us at the Victory Branch Library on Saturday November 1st from 1pm to 3pm for readings from Demystifying Death , a perfect way to spend a Day of the Dead, by honoring the dead!
Jane Freund of Freundship Press and the Pixie Chicks Writers' Group (of which I am one) have produced Demystifying Death , an anthology of stories about the last great secret sin of our society: death. It happens to all of us. It happens to our friends, families, and pets. We all need to talk about and share our experiences around dying. And yet, still today in America, the subject is often taboo. 
Okay, enough of a rant, and Demystifying Death , with its myriad selection of poems, essays and short stories will provide a welcome opening of death's doors. And what better way to celebrate the Day of the Dead than by sharing stories?
I will be attending and reading from my (true) short story, Traveling Together, about a beloved aunt and cat, and would love to see you too!

Now through October 14th, Book Bundles, 20 reads for under 5 bucks! Get Prodigies of Mystery II here at iBooks, 99 cents for three full length novels!
How are midlist and new authors going to stand out in today's overburdened publishing biz? Here's a few recent methods I've found successful.
First up: Book Bundles. My publisher is running a special on five bundles, one of which, Prodigies of Mysteries II, includes my cozy mystery Starke Naked Dead. As a reader, I've noticed that I often buy these bundles because there's a lot of reading for cheap and it's a great way to find new authors. As an author, I discovered that Starke Naked Dead is coming up in the rankings considerably while offered in Prodigies of Mystery II. A  great way to get noticed and to brand your author name and series.

Here's another great way to get your name out there, thank you, Lois Winston, for this great idea. Bake, Love, Write is a compilation of dessert recipes with authors' advice on love and writing, 105 authors in all. Lois Winston is donating the proceeds to a worthy cause. The eBook is for sale for 99 cents, that's less than a penny a recipe! My recipe is easy, cheap and delicious soda cracker pie. Again, I often find myself buying just this type of book because I love to cook, love inexpensive dessert cookbooks and love finding other authors to read. Plus, with 105 authors, there's oodles of cross-marketing going on!


There's a lot of controversy about whether to ever have anything free, even promo cookbooks. The detractors say that being free only means that you are giving away content to people who may never read it, much less review it. However, I think there is a place for free, especially if it's a certain sort of free book. I've downloaded free short stories about a series and then gone on to buy books from the series. With my promotional cookbooks, I have found that after they're free that I do get reviews, perhaps because a cookbook is something that people do read after downloading. Plus, if you have a lot of downloads of your free book, Amazon will heavily promote it once it's no longer free. So, here's one of my cookbooks that introduces my Starke Dead cozy mystery series, Starke Deadly Delicious , and it's FREE today, October 8th!

So dear readers, what do you think? Do you do the same with these promotions? Or not? Do you think they work? Or not? Let us know in the comments!

I often get asked one of the Sisters In Crime bloghop questions, "If you were to mentor a new writer, what would you tell her about the writing business?"
There is one important concept that seems simple but is difficult to understand and accept: If you are serious about being an author, then writing is a business. This is separate from the creative work of writing. They are two very different things. The more a writer is able to keep the two distinct, the more successful she'll be in both.
Whether you are a well-established name or pre-published, you are having a writing career. The business aspects of the career are your job in which you are the boss, CEO, CFO, and employee. What does that mean, really? It means that you must work to be your best advocate in your business decisions. It means that you must work to keep yourself apprised of this new publishing world. It means that you must work to promote yourself as best as you can. What it mostly means is the writing comes first and foremost always. In business terms, you can't sell what you don't have. You need product. (With rejections, it's helpful to think of your finished manuscript in terms of being product. After all, no one sells all their product all the time.)
The writing business can be frustrating, annoying and even heart-rending. Remembering that the writing biz isn't writing often helps reduce the pain. And the rewards far outweigh the struggle. May all you new authors succeed!
This blog post was inspired and created for the Sisters In Crime bloghop. You can find out more here, www.sistersincrime.org/bloghop.
Last, but perhaps most important: my great friend and great author, Kathy McIntosh, is also participating in this bloghop. She's the author of the comic crime novel in which there is “plenty of laughs in this page turner and plenty of insights that keep the story fresh and memorable.” So hop on over to her post about what she says to someone who says "Nothing against women writers, but all of my favorite crime fiction authors happen to be men," on her website here.
And dear readers, what do you think? Are you successful in separating the two aspects of being a successful author? Any tips on how to do so?