F is for Family: A to Z blogging challenge

Family, in one sense or another, is one of the most important aspects of human life. Whether we mean our parents, our children, our significant others, our pets, our friends, or something else entirely. Family was a vital part of writing Going Through the Change, both for me as the writer and for my characters.

For me, writing this novel represented a change in our family dynamic. If I was going to take myself seriously as a writer, I needed to finish things and submit things. That meant I needed a shift in home life. I needed my children to respect my writing time, and my husband and children to help balance home responsibilities to free me for some writing time. I definitely could not have written this book without the loving support of my family.

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For my main characters, family was a major theme. Linda Alvarez was a forty-eight year old grandmother when her life took a super-heroic turn.  Adjusting to the changes in her life was no small feat! Helen Braeburn's family had recently gone through changes of another sort--divorce and estrangement. So, she was vulnerable, without the support she might once have relied upon when her changes came. Patricia O'Neill had always been a lone wolf, but her best friend, Cindy Liu, was her sister under the skin. When Cindy betrayed her trust, it hurt to the core. Jessica Roark's children saw her fly, and it changed their world and hers.

Family shapes who we are. How the people closest to you react can change your life, for the better or the worse. Lucky for me, I've got a good one.

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!

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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

E is for Emeralds: A to Z blogging challenge

In Going Through the Change, I got to play with that comic book mixture of science, mysticism, and magic to explain why the crazy stuff that happens happens. The origin story of each woman's power involves a highly individual combination of factors. Good golly but this stuff was fun!

Would the tea have made Jessica weightless if she weren't a cancer survivor? Did Patricia's transformation have something to do with her red hair? Was it something in Linda's or Helen's family history?

Dr. Liu's experiments draw from traditional Western medical knowledge, Chinese medicine, astrology, herbology, chemistry, homeopathic remedies, and, my personal favorite: gemstones. In particular, Chinese emeralds.

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As a child, when my class field trips or my family went to the Museum of Natural History and Science in Cincinnati, Ohio, one of my favorite parts was always the gemstones. I like that part in the museum more local to me now, too: The North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences.

It's fascinating how things that are essentially just pretty rocks have become so valuable. Even more fascinating are the ones believed to be cursed or to have magical properties. I guess I never lost my childhood fascination with gems. It was cool that it showed up in my novel!

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!

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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

D is for Dr. Liu: A to Z Blogging Challenge

Dr. Liu is my "villain" in Going Through the Change. "Villain" gets quote marks here because I'm not a big believer in black and white divisions of the world. My "bad guy" isn't all bad and my "good guys" aren't all good. Everyone I write is decidedly gray. It's just how I see the world.

Cindy Liu does some bad things, no question. She's responsible for more than her fair share of chaos. But it's not that she set out to hurt others. That wasn't her purpose.

Like many a mad scientist, she found that moral lines became blurred for her over time. She was so focused on the ends that she had trouble seeing what might be wrong with her means. That's what made her interesting to write.

Here she is as drawn by +Charles C. Dowd . I love what he did with that pedantic finger.

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!

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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

C is for Curiosity Quills: A to Z Blogging Challenge

Curiosity Quills Press will publish Going Through the Change on April 23 (20 more days!).  Time

will tell, but I've got a very good feeling about my relationship with CQ. Everyone I've been associated with has been warm and kind and professional, from the acquisitions editor who first accepted my work, to the artist who designed my cover, to the editor who polished my words till they shone, to the marketing folks who are helping sell the darn thing, to the other Literary Marauders (house authors). Curiosity Quills is an example of why the "small press" is taking the traditional publishing world by storm.

I first heard of CQ through an online acquaintance who had published his book with them (Matthew Graybosch, author of Without Bloodshed). I was curious enough to check them out online, and knew I had found a potentially good home for my work when I read the CQ Literary Manifesto:

So, to my writer friends out there, I recommend looking to the small press. To my reader friends out there, tired of "safe" books, I recommend looking to the small press--in particular, mine! Thanks for taking a risk on me, Curiosity Quills!

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!
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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

B is for Biology: A to Z Blogging Challenge

Biology, as they say, is a bitch.  Especially for women. So many of us feel as though we lose years to the caprices of deep-seated urges and desires that there is no logical support for. We cry when we don't want to. We feel unreasonably angry. We fight cravings for things that are bad for us. What woman hasn't felt betrayed by her own body at what time or another?

These ruminations about the role of biology in my own life were one of the threads that eventually became part of the tapestry of my novel Going Through the Change: A Superhero Novel. (22 more days till release!)

As the title should suggest, Going Through the Change is about women going through menopause. Of course, as the subtitle suggests, their symptoms and complaints are, well, a little unusual. You'll get to meet the characters more fully in other posts this month, but biology was cruel in her own way to all my main characters.

• Patricia is itching for a change, and boy does she get one!
• Jessica tried to lighten her mood and ended up weightless.
• Helen's internal fires burned so brightly they destroyed her condo.
• Linda's little hair problem wasn't going to be solved by a trip to the peluquería this time. 

Writing about my own anxieties about going through The Change through this superhero story was really cathartic for me and I hope it will be for my readers too!
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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!

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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

A is for April 23: A to Z Blogging Challenge AND #IWSG

I was always going to write a book. Ask anybody. As far back as kindergarten in those "what are you going to be when you grow up" talks, author was always on my list (admittedly so were things like living in outer space and owning a unicorn).

It's kind of funny then, that it took me so long to get serious about it. Like "finish things" and "submit things" kind of ambitious. But I finally did. It was my birthday gift to myself two years ago: I promised to write every day.

And now I'm counting in mere days to the release of my debut novel: Going Through the Change, A Menopausal Superhero Novel comes out April 23, 2015. 

It's an auspicious day--William Shakespeare's birthday, the anniversary of my first date with my husband, and just a few days before my birthday. Amazing!  That's not to say I'm not still insecure--it's scary when your dreams come within reach, that's why so few people really reach for them: Fear of Failing. 

My A to Z postings this month will be about the book and my experiences in writing it and seeing it published. Thanks for reading and helping me celebrate!

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!
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This posting is also part of the Insecure Writers Support Group blog hop. To check out other posts by writers in a variety of places in their careers, check out the participant list. This group is one of the most open and supportive groups of people I have ever been associated with. You should check them out!

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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

Cover Reveal: The Black Oracle: by Michael Cristiano

THE BLACK ORACLE


Publisher: Curiosity Quills Press
Release Date: May 25, 2015


Cover Art: Alexandria N. Thompson


On a post-apocalyptic Earth, humans are not alone.


Joachim is a hunter. Though generations have passed since the Great Death, something has evolved in the trees beyond the giant glowing mushrooms, mutants that want to see human entrails spread along the jungle floor.


And now they've taken Joachim’s wife.


To get her back, Joachim will have to give the leader of these demons something in return: immortality. A creature knows when he is going to die, after all. Plunged into a world of magic and darkness, Joachim must find the only woman in who knows where the ingredients are. She is a prophetess known as the Black Oracle living in the realm of Zalm, but she’s a little preoccupied at the moment. She leads a rebellion against the ruthless High Council, and when Joachim seeks her out, he too finds himself consumed by her struggle.


In a story of betrayal, prophecy, and bloodshed, Joachim has ten days to retrieve the ingredients and return to Earth all while evading the High Council’s army, one that wants the Black Oracle and her associates killed — Joachim included.

Add it to your to-read list on Goodreads!

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Michael Cristiano is a Canadian writer. His relentless obsession with fiction began long before he could even spell the words 'relentless obsession'. Growing up in endless suburban sprawl, he spent most of his childhood getting lost in fantastical masterpieces and attempting to be published by the age of thirteen.


When he isn’t writing or reading, he can be found planning his next backpacking trip around the world. He is a recent graduate from the University of Toronto with studies in Foreign Language and Linguistics. Previously, he attended a Regional Arts high school where he majored in drama. He is fond of all things dramatic.


Michael currently resides in the Greater Toronto Area and he is using his years as a twenty-something to establish what he hopes will be a long career in writing. The Black Oracle, his debut novel, is due for publication on May 11, 2015.

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