Wattpad Favorites: Mission Macabre by Kevin Gebhard

Time to get your Halloween groove on, folks, and get reading!

Kevin Gebhard's first foray into vampire fiction is a guaranteed hit with Mission Macabre, free to read right now as it's being serialized on Wattpad.  When a vigilante detective teams up with a sexy vampire, it only means a whole new brand of justice to hit the city!

Wattpad Review: The Body by TheAlvarezChronicles

Sometimes there are stories that just grab you and don't let go at all, and The Body by Robert Alvarez or @TheAlvarezChronicles on Wattpad does just that.  From the moment we're introduced to the case, we know that we're in for a wild and bumpy ride.  A girl is missing, and the detectives on the case immediately sense that she's not just missing: she's dead.

The suspect list isn't long, and there aren't exactly any surprises as in, whodunnit?  That's because we're investigating the case along with the detectives.  It's not just about catching the killer, it's about building a strong case against him.

The Body is a non-fiction account of an actual case (as far as I know) and Alvarez knows what he's talking about.  It's a riveting read and one of the best on Wattpad, hands down.  But you don't have to take my word for it.

Book Review - Working Stiff: Two Years, 262 Bodies and The Making of a Medical Examiner

Look what just came in! Working Stiff by @drjudymelinek #amreading #research #nonfiction pic.twitter.com/0tKInbDaNM

— Liz Madrid (@LizMadridauthor) October 6, 2015

Working Stiff: Two Years, 262 Bodies, and the Making of a Medical Examiner by Judy Melinek
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

One of the first shows I fell in love with a child was Quincy ME even if at that time I had no exact idea what a medical examiner's work really entailed. It was my mother's favorite show, along with Murder She Wrote and so we all sat in front of our one TV set on Sunday nights and watched it. If I had any questions about what an ME does and how he/she gets there, Judy Melinek, MD answered all my questions, and then some. I always knew that CSI and all those other shows depicted many of the job description wrong, but what makes for good work practice (bright lights, caps, gowns, face masks, and months before getting toxicology reports) doesn't necessarily make for good TV. But behind the Gil Grissom's and the Temperance Brennans of TV was dedication to their jobs, and I love seeing that in books like Working Stiff.

Working Stiff: 2 years, 262 bodies and the making of a medical examiner is Judy Melinek's journey to being a medical examiner where two months into the job, she is among those responsible for doing the autopsies on the 9/11 victims. I remember the containers she talks about because I remember walking past them among the throng of people making their way to "Ground Zero" then and always wondered what was inside. I still remember the makeshift memorials people put up months after.

I honestly could not put this down - although I did so I could make dinner and sleep and do some work in between. I finished it at about 3am and my only advice is, if you're at all squeamish, don't read this right before bed. The one death that stays with me the most is the one that gave Melinek nightmares and I won't spoil it for you - but you'll know it when you get there.

I'm giving it 5/5 because I love her style of writing. It's far from too technical and there were times that it felt like she were just telling me how her day went which brings back memories of my best friend telling me about what they did in med school that day while dissecting a cat cadaver in her backyard. I also felt for her whenever she talks about her father, who committed suicide when Melinek was just a teen.

View all my reviews

Can You Really Pitch Your Novel on Twitter? Apparently, Yes

A few months ago, I read about someone who sold her screenplay on Twitter for up to six figures.  When I told one of my massage client this, he asked, "how could anyone pitch anything using only140 characters?"

Well, I had no idea either.  And when an author pitch event happened on Twitter a month ago and everyone was telling everyone not to favorite any of the pitches (that's reserved for the publishing house; if they do fave your pitch, then be ready to submit your manuscript), it scared me enough not to even understand what was going on or how it worked.  Two fellow authors did do the event and their pitches got picked.

So anyway, as of this morning, I can now say that I do have an idea on how it's done.  And it's not as nerve-wracking as I thought it would be, though narrowing your blurb to less than 140 characters can be tricky and you'll need to craft a few versions of them to tweet out.  I only tweeted the best one I could come up with out of 6 versions.

What is nerve-wracking is when your pitch does get faved by a publisher, as mine did during this morning's pitch event.  It got faved five minutes after I tweeted it.

So what's next? Well, I'm supposed to send them the first four chapters of my manuscript and they'll let me know if it's good enough for them or not.  I still need to see what else they'll need besides those chapters and work from there.

And whether or not the outcome is positive or not, I did get to learn what all the pitch madness is all about on Twitter and not be overwhelmed or intimidated by it when it happens again.  And to answer that question whether someone can really pitch a novel or a screenplay in less than 140 characters?  Yep, it can be done!

Growing Pains of An Indie-Author

I'm still trying to navigate this overwhelming new world of marketing for writers, especially self-published writers like me.  There's so much to do that I have to keep a notebook and jot down all the notes, all the websites, all the tips that everyone else swears will work to promote your book - turns out I'm such a visual-kinesthetic learner that I have to actually jot down, scribble, sketch the ideas on paper before it makes its mark a bit more permanently than just plain reading or watching some how-to video on Youtube.   And while my notes are constantly growing, the toughest part will be the execution of these tips successfully.

And in the process of the execution, there will be mistakes.  And because I'm easily distracted, there will be lots of mistakes.

Take Loving Ashe for example, which is going through a re-release party of sorts in mid-November, when the paperback version will be released.

When I first published Loving Ashe, it was to no fanfare at all. Why? Probably just excitement, but part of the reason was that I wanted to gather reader reviews on sites such as Amazon and Goodreads, even Smashwords.  Then barely one month after publication, I made the decision (as an experiment) to have the book exclusive to a Amazon's Kindle Direct Select or KDP for 90 days.  I figured, I'd see if that would help increase my sales.  It's also part of the Kindle Unlimited lending library.

With only one month left to go in the 3-month term, I've un-checked the box that says "Automatically renew this book to KDP in another 90 days..." because while there are sales, right now 1 book per day and sometimes 2, when I went to check my Smashwords dashboard, I found out that I made more money selling Loving Ashe on iBooks, Barnes & Noble, and even Scribd in less than a month than I have on Amazon.

And I also hate having all my eggs in one basket.

There are also many people who refuse to buy from Amazon, and from among my bodywork clients alone, I've counted 6 people alone.  That's 6 sales I would have lost - and am losing - while my book remains solely on Amazon.

So starting November 10th, Loving Ashe will be back up on Smashwords and made available to other retailers like iBooks, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, though I think Scribd is out of the running if Loving Ashe is categorized under Romance since they've pulled out romance books from their library. Turns out, romance readers were driving their company model to the ground - they were gobbling up more books in a month than was financially feasible.  I'm actually a Scribd subscriber and one who barely has enough time to read any of the books that I've earmarked in my library. Most of the books I read on Scribd happens to be Charles Bukowski's poetry - go figure.

Anyway, so if you haven't yet gotten your copy of Loving Ashe because you refuse to buy it from Amazon, which is the only place you can get it right now, don't despair.  November 11 (hey, that's 11/11!) is the date it will go back up to all the other online retailers and I'll be doing a happy dance then, too.  Now my only problem is figuring out how to get the paperback available from sites other than Amazon.  But then you can always buy that from me :)

A Writer Keeps Writing

Though Collateral is currently ranked at #3 under Mystery/Thriller category on Wattpad, it's not among the Top 50 semi-finalists in Harlequin's So You Think You Can Write competition this year.  Sad, I know, but I'm actually glad.  For one, it's not what Harlequin wants in a romance and I knew that already, not when it straddles chick-lit and romance that's set in a mystery.  

Still, while there is some disappointment (about 10%), there's a lot of relief going on inside this noggin (80%, while the last 10% is undecided).  Last night, I transferred the edited story from Word back to Scrivener and am ready to spend the rest of October doing a second round of edits for it, including a full rewrite of its ending.  

And then there's NaNoWriMo.  Loving Ashe was actually my NaNoWriMo novel last year and this year, it's Loving Riley's turn!

So being a writer, I write, right?  Or I'm not a writer.

The Inspiration Behind Loving Ashe

©Guylty

People often ask what led me to write Loving Ashe, and other than NaNoWriMo 2014, it started a year and a half earlier with a writing prompt about an elevator. At that time, publicity was in full swing for the lead actors of The Hobbit, namely Richard Armitage.  And after seeing a picture of him during one of the publicity events in New York, I wondered what would happen if my main character got stuck in an elevator with a handsome man whom she didn't recognize was an actor because she was feeling too guilty over something she'd almost done. A bit complicated, I know, but this was the premise for Elevator, the short story that was the result of the writing prompt.

A year and a half later, with the characters slowly coming into their own like fine wine, Riley Eames and Ashe Hunter were "born" just in time for NaNoWriMo14.  Ashe became much younger at 32 than Armitage (43) and Riley remained that magical age of 23 (kinda New Adult but kinda not).

The idea to keep Ashe an actor, giving Riley a little glimpse into his life in show business is based on my experiences as a massage therapist, visiting homes of people who worked in the business, from directors, producers, managers, agents and the actors themselves.  Some were older, and part of Old Hollywood as we know it now and some were even rappers who were also actors.  

The one thing that struck me about the actors though was that while they were known as one thing in the public eye, behind closed doors - even if those doors were mansions in Bel-Air or Sherman Oaks or Malibu - they were normal people like you and me.  Sure, they had more security, had game rooms larger than my entire house, and you often needed a map to navigate your way from one end of the house to the other.  But they were still normal. They had the same aches and pains as you and I do, watch the same shows and even read the same books.  They had their dreams, pursued them with a passion and had work ethics to die for.  But they also worried about their kids the same way I worry about my kids and most of all, they were just as insecure as you and me.  

It was a far cry from the tough, often bad-boy or bitchy image they portrayed on billboards, movies, or on talk shows.  

I'm sure there are many people in the "business" who aren't so nice, but so far, I've been fortunate.  In my case, it was meeting one man, a line producer, who got me "in."  So impressed was he with my bodywork (deep tissue techniques specializing in treatment of chronic pain, plus I do tend to talk when talked to), that he referred me to the star of the movie he was producing, who then referred me to the director of the same movie, who then referred me to another actor...and so on.  One person.  

These days, I've let go of the stars and the directors and the producers since marrying and starting a family but I can never forget the inside look they all gave me into their lives and their homes and their families.  The thrill of being recognized and called by your first name is something you can't describe, but at the same time, it's something you can't buy as real.  In the end, I was still their massage therapist and it was business.  I was also bound to client privacy so whatever they were willing to share with me was to remain with me and no one else.

Maybe they'll show up in my stories but luckily if something does, it's all pretty tame.  Or at least in my fiction it is.

Loving Ashe is now available to buy from Amazon.