Well, today is a very exciting day for me and I am thrilled to be have the opportunity to share my excitement with you.
Today is my BRD, my Book Release Day. GHOSTLY JUSTICE, my paranormal youth novel, is being released today. Actually Amazon and Barnes and Noble jumped the gun and it was up on their sites on April 12th. And somebody has already bought a copy. I have to confess. It was me. I couldn’t resist. I just had to have a copy on my ipad. I emailed a friend that it was out already and she bought one too. That’s two sold.
So, I’m doing the happy dance. It has been a long road but all the time and effort is worth it. When you go to your publisher’s site, in this case, Black Opal Books, or go to Amazon or Barnes and Noble and you see your name and the cover of your book, well did I say tingles all over.
Here’s a bit about me. Known as my official bio an picture.
Award-winning author, Bev Irwin, lives in London, Ontario, with three assorted cats. One that hid in her car when she moved from the farm and two others dropped off by her daughter on two different occasions. Her three children have flown the coup, but her granddaughter, Jasmine, is a frequent visitor.
As a registered nurse, she likes to add a touch of medical to her romance and mystery novels. She writes YA, children’s, and poetry. She prefers spending time in her garden, writing, and reading to being in the kitchen.
Her debut novel, WHEN HEARTS COLLIDE, a contemporary romance, came out in December of 2011 with Soul Mate Publishing under the pen name of Kendra James
That’s me and this is a bit about how I got here. The road has been long and full of twist and turns. There is so much work that leads up to this day.
First, you have to want to write, have to write, otherwise you could never stick with it to the bitter end. Not that the end is bitter, hopefully not, but getting to the end of any book is not easy.
There are so many challenges
First, you have to create a world that readers want to spend time in, characters that they care about, a plot line, or series of events that carry them along to that bitter, or sweet ending. You have to have a beginning that grabs the reader in the first few lines. There is even a book for that called THE FIRST FIVE LINES.
That sounds petty of readers not to give you more of a chance than that but everyone is so busy today that sometimes that is all you have. Not an easy task. Most writers do the beginning then go on to finish the book then come back to polish those first five lines. They read them over and over again just to get it the best it can be.
It’s always fun to start a book. You have a great idea. You get your characters into action, develop inner and outer goals and conflicts. Then you run out of ‘real’ troubles for your characters. And you have to have troubles. Who wants to read about a character who is a goody-two-shoes and does everything right. Boring.
We need to get our hero or heroine up at tree with a dog snapping at their heels so they have to stay up there for awhile. Then you might let them down for a bit (the dog fell asleep), but soon, you have to get them back up that tree with the dog awake and snapping again.
This keeps up the readers interest and keeps the pages turning.
This is hard work. It’s not easy to keep filling those pages and making every page interesting enough that readers don’t put the book down. They might just pick up another book and forget all about yours. Now that would be a bad thing.
So what do I do to help the creative juices flowing? As I live alone, I like having noise in the background, either a CD, or the television. I have a couple of ‘creative brain’ CD’s that I put on. I also have a hypnosis app on my itouch that I like to use. It has me sitting on my car as one of my goals to have financial freedom and have the car paid off. It also has a picture of me with Lee Child as my inspiration to be a bestselling author some day.
I think about the great plots in his book and it gets me thinking. I start with the ‘what ifs’. Try that for your story. It’s a great exercise to see what trouble you can find for your characters and which road will take them to the eventual resolution of the story.
I’m a registered nurse and I’ve worked in many areas of nursing which gives me a myriad of stories and ideas to draw from.
Think about your job, your co-workers, your family, your neighbors. I’m sure there will be a few story ideas and ammunition to keep your story compelling, and that important detail, the reader turning the pages.
So get out your pen or computer out and get your characters up that tree and see how long you can keep them there.
Hope you enjoyed my bit of wisdom and thank you all for coming and sharing my special day.
Here is GHOSTLY JUSTICE!!
Here is an excerpt
PROLOGUE
AMANDA
After all these years, I could finally feel something. It was as if a jolt of electricity surged through me, and my heart almost began to beat again.
At first, I didn’t know what caused it. I only knew an undeniable force drew me to my bedroom window. With each step, the tingle of fingernails tracking down my spine increased. The thought passed through me, maybe I should be afraid. But really, what was there to be afraid of? It couldn’t get worse. What’s worse than being dead?
I floated toward the window. Two girls were walking in front of the house. They looked about my age, maybe younger – fifteen, sixteen. I was drawn to the one with the dark curly hair. Her friend called her Daria. I reached out my hand, called her name. She looked up at the window. She sensed me. I knew it. I saw her shudder, but she kept walking.
I watched until they turned the corner at Colburn Street. Then the energy vanished and a profound sadness filled me. Even playing the piano held no joy that day.
I have to talk to her. But how?
I gave up trying to contact the living years ago. It became so tiresome—appearing in front of them, touching them, talking to them, yet never being noticed.
Until now.
Every day, I watch for her. Every day, I try to make contact. Every day I plead for her to look up at my window again. Two weeks have passed now. And every day, she hurries past; her gaze focused on the street ahead.
I must talk to her.
Daria is the first person I’ve been able to communicate with since the day I was murdered.
And here are pre pub blurbs
KUDOS for Ghostly Justice
Ghostly Justice by Bev Irwin is one of those books that can easily span the bridge between YA and adult fiction. Though the characters are teenagers and still in high school, like Harry Potter and Twilight, the story is fascinating enough to appeal to much broader audiences. Our heroine, Daria, is young, but she’s also spunky, creative, clever, and reluctantly courageous—my favorite kind of gal. And she is most definitely not pleased when she discovers that she is psychic and can talk to ghosts. Well, one ghost, at least…Irwin has added a well-rounded cast of secondary characters to help Daria in her quest, and together with a strong plot, excellent dialogue and a few surprises along the way, they all combine to make this book a very enjoyable read. – Taylor, Reviewer
Ghostly Justice was not quite what I expected when I learned it was YA. Even though the characters are teens, the subject matter—some of it anyway—was very adult. However, Bev Irwin seems to be a talented author and handled the sensitive issues with the same aplomb with which she did the scenes where her teenage characters break into an abandoned house. Daria, our very reluctant heroine, doesn’t want to be special. She especially doesn’t want to talk to dead people or to hear her best friend’s thoughts. She wants to keep clear of her mom’s creepy boyfriend, snag a hot, sexy boyfriend of her own—who doesn’t—and to be left in peace…The other characters in the book are equally well-developed and three-dimensional, the plot has some very nice twists and turns, and Irwin’s writing is superb. – Regan, Reviewer
GHOSTLY JUSTICE will be available on April 14th!!!!
www.blackopalbooks.com/
www.soulmatepublishing.com
www.amazon.com
www.barnesandnoble.com
www.bevirwin.com
And here is MISSING CLAYTON coming in June with Black Opal Books
kendrajames4 