Giveaways will be located at the at the end of the post.
Fast Updates:
There was short story based on the Mythology of the blood inheritance quartet included in Ink and Sword magazines November (mythological themed) issue: November Issue of Ink and Sword magazine.
Ink & Sword is a small digital magazine that is dedicated to helping writers from all walks of life publish their work on a secure publishing platform.
Visit my author profile or check out some other amazing authors on: allauthor.com M.Ainihi:Allauthor profile
I will have a booth at Milwaukee Mighty Con – Comic Con. Stop by and say hello on Saturday February 16th from 10:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The Milwaukee Comic Con takes place at the Wisconsin State Fairgrounds Products Pavilion 640 S 84th St., West Allis, WI 53214. You can find out more by visiting this link:https://mightyconshows.com/show/milwaukee
Lost is currently being copy edited and will soon move on to proofreading.
Happy Holidays!
Characterization Related Quotes:
“Clever’s not enough to hold me – I want characters who are more than devices to be moved about for Effect.” ― Laura Anne Gilman
“In many ways, likability is a very elaborate lie, a performance, a code of conduct dictating the proper way to be. Characters who don’t follow this code become unlikable. Critics who criticize a character’s unlikability cannot necessarily be faulted. They are merely expressing a wider cultural malaise with all things unpleasant, all things that dare to breach the norm of social acceptability.” ― Roxanne Gay
“Good characters in fiction are the very devil. Not only because most authors have too little material to make them of, but because we as readers have a strong subconscious wish to find them incredible.”― C.S. Lewis, On Stories: And Other Essays on Literature
“There is tremendous life and personality in a name. It should be at least as agonized over as any character trait.” ― Travis Beacham
“You cannot have an effective protagonist who simply responds to events happening around him or her. Your protagonist must act, not just react.”— Rachelle Gardner, quote from Is Your MC Proactive or Reactive?
“Even if you find the bad guy generally repulsive, you need to be able to put yourself so thoroughly into his shoes while you’re writing him that, just for those moments, you almost believe his slant yourself.”— K.M. Weiland, quote from Maybe Your Bad Guy Is RIGHT!
“Characterization requires self-knowledge, insight into human nature . . . it is more than impersonation.”— Leon Surmelian, quote from the book Techniques of Fiction Writing: Measure and Madness (aff.)
“An author should know their character intimately, they should know their history, how they would react in a situation, they should know their look and mannerisms down to the smallest facial tick. Yet all of this need not be revealed to the reader.”— Aaron Miles, quote from On Character Construction
“Don’t just use visual details, but also include kinesthetic details, or how the character moves. Graceful, limping, stutter-step, lumbers, waddles, stomps.”—Darcy Pattison, quote from 5 Tips on Character Descriptions
“The key to creating better plots rests in a deeper understanding of character.”— Kristen Lamb, quote from Great Characters–The Beating Heart of Great Fiction
Definition of Characterization:
1: portrayal; description: the actor’s characterization of a politician.
2: the act of characterizing or describing the individual quality of a person or thing.
3: the creation and convincing representation of fictitious characters, as in a literary work.
1: the act of characterizing especially : the artistic representation (as in fiction or drama) of human character or motives
Characterization
Guest post by T.S Lieber
Every character tells a story:
Though a lot of my novels center around an element of good vs. evil, all have one thing in common: people. The most important story-telling device is your characterization. Your reader will remember the protagonist who moved him, the underdog he rooted for, the tear they shed when the hero sacrificed his life for love. Even the antagonist’s fall which they cheered will cause them to refer your book to a friend.
As authors, we need to connect with our readers. You can set your story in a fantasy world of unicorns or the future of spaceships and aliens, or just modern day political intrigue or mystery, but what makes the story great is the characters. To make them unforgettable, make them human. Have them root for their favorite baseball team. In Cemetery Road, the second book of my series, The Diamond Legacy, Mark’s love of the New York Yankees has already been established. When his nemesis chains him to the wall, it is Mark’s own autographed Derek Jeter bat which is used to shatter his knee, making the pain that much more personal. It can be a favorite food, TV show, music, anything which keeps us as humans enthralled and connected on a daily basis. In book four, The Seven Devils of Mary Magdalene, Mark’s daughters cling to a favorite childhood movie, The Three Musketeers, which they recall while trying to reconnect as life threatens to pull them apart.
Have your character go through an everyday crisis we can all relate to. In book three, The Eye’s Mote (The Tale of the 3 Sisters), Mark must try to balance time between his teenage daughters and his wife while running his own veterinarian clinic. Trying to please everyone in our lives is often impossible and your readers will sympathize. The jealousy of the children or an argument with the wife over dinner or laundry will bring a nod to your reader’s head. Been there, done that.
Create subplots for your characters which center around our human foibles. In book one, Mortuary, Frank is in love with Dr. White’s young nurse, but she has eyes only for her boss who is in a tumultuous marriage. The marital problems are partly due to the jealousy the wife feels for the younger nurse whose infatuation is obvious. This creates tension in interpersonal relationships and can drive the story with acts of jealousy or revenge. We as human beings do not always act in a way that is most advantageous to us. Emotion sometimes gets the better of our actions. People can relate to their own passions in your characters. Someone who is always in control is not believable. We want to project our own sorrows or laughter on the characters we are sharing our valuable time with.
Every book should have a character who either goes through loss or has a life-changing experience or an epiphany. In book three, Stacey loses Mark to another woman, despite the fact that their marriage has been on a downward spiral since the children were born, but she is devastated by his betrayal, losing her family and her identity. In book one, Dr. White grapples with the enormity of what Dylan has been trying to convince him all along: the demons are real and they’ve infiltrated their hometown and their lives. When Dylan is killed, Dr. White becomes a believer in evil. He is converted to a new view of the world which changes him forever. In book 4, Pat is on his way to seminary school when he falls in love, an emotion he’s never known before and threatens his outlook on life. Maybe man cannot live by God alone.
Whether male or female, adult or child, we’re all human and we all want to identify with our fellow man… even if they’re alive only on the page of our favorite book.
More about T.S. Lieber:
Tom lives in upstate New York with his wife. Yes, she’s retired while he struggles to write on weekends and vacations. But he loves nothing more and looks forward to his own retirement when he can write full time. Meanwhile his wife indulges in his nomadic vacations and exploring the roads less traveled.
Tom is a budding world traveler and uses that aspiration in creating his worlds of demons versus man, angels versus God. Book IV of The Diamond Legacy is a construct whose inklings began in his youth. Decades in the making, the epic struggle for the world continues.
Check out his Diamond Legacy books on Amazon:
Mortuary, Cemetary Road, and The Eye’s Mote
His fourth book The 7 Devils of Mary Magdalene will be available next week!
Learn more about the characterization and the writing process:
udleditions.cast.org, reedsy.com, writersdigest.com, thebalancecareers.com
Giveaway-Paperback Edition
Missing
By: Ann Jones
Enter the giveaway here by clicking the link: Giveaway
View it here on Amazon by clicking the link: Missing
Victim? Runaway? Or Criminal? Detective Lyn Kramer is busy training Jud Hughes, a new detective on the force, when Gary Farnsworth shows up to report his wife missing. As the interview progresses, Lyn realizes the missing woman is none other than her own twin sister, Melissa. Lyn and Melissa have not seen each other since their parents died twenty-five years ago, when the girls were split up to live with two sets of warring grandparents. Lyn and Jud find mutual respect and a growing camaraderie as the investigation into Melissa’s disappearance deepens. Tensions reach a peak when the two detectives discover a trail of crimes linked to the missing woman’s family. Will Melissa be found? And if so, will Lyn have it in her to put her twin sister behind bars?
You can also enter the giveaway here:
Giveaway-Paperback Edition
Rise
By M. Ainihi
Enter the giveaway here by clicking the link: Giveaway
View it here on Amazon by clicking the link: Rise
When Amanda Garrett stumbles across a strange artifact in the woods, she has no idea of the dangerous secret it holds. The teen soon discovers that she has unwittingly released Erol, an imprisoned jinni, and whether she likes it or not, they are bound together until death. Amanda’s life soon begins to spiral out of control and she finds herself orphaned, kidnapped, and thrust into a terrifying reality.
Rise is a fast-paced (standalone) introductory novel to an alternate world where mundane humans are oblivious to the existence of the realms that separate them from other magical races.
When she feels, the darkness closing in around her, Amanda is not sure if she can hold onto a single speck of light, and soon she comes to understand that some secrets are better left buried.
You can also enter the giveaway here:
See this #AmazonGiveaway for a chance to win: Rise: A Blood Inheritance Novel. https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/0d7ca308bd14d356 NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Ends the earlier of Dec 9, 2018 11:59 PM PST, or when all prizes are claimed. See Official Rules http://amzn.to/GArules.
Extra giveaway – “Rise” Kindle Edition available here: https://giveaway.amazon.com/p/4e51a5269b5a4c97
You can also enter the giveaway here:
Check out these sites:
readersfavorite.com
leonardtillerman.com
writersdigest.com
bookchantedblog
touchmyspinebookreviews
tropicalmary.com
whizbuzzbooks
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