Please check out the authors below and share them if you like on social media and help them out.
Good karma goes a long way. If you belong to an Author group help spread the word about our free author interview series. We have started a new Facebook author group that focuses on author interviews and podcast interviews. Come Join us!

Scott Donnelly 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I live in Grove City, Ohio with my wife and three children. I work full time, and love hockey, horror movies, Seinfeld and crab Alfredo. I have written close to 20 books, but my more recent ones are the ones I am super proud of.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is called The Whool. It’s a horror tale about a mysterious entity that terrorizes a small midwest town. The inspiration for The Whool came from my love of horror, and more specifically, fear of the unknown. Not knowing what’s coming next in a book, a movie, or in life is scary. I wanted to create a story that the reader wouldn’t be able to predict. I purposely kept the public synopsis vague as well to add to the dread of what’s within the pages.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I jot down notes all day long. Whether it’s character names, ideas, quotes, etc. They are never in any order, and appear to be a giant, jumbled mess. Even I don’t remember what half of them are, or what they mean.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Agatha Christie’s book, “And Then There Were None” was my greatest literary influence. I’d never read a book before that that had kept me guessing and trying to figure out an impossible mystery before. I have strived to replicate that feeling in my own way, and hopefully one day I’ll write something that will blow someone else’s mind as well.

What are you working on now?
I am working on a follow up to my book “The Ice Ghost”, which was the first book in my action/thriller series, “The Red Echo Series.” I am also writing the last entry in my science fiction adventure series, “The Scout Brooks Saga”, as well as a few short stories in some upcoming anthologies, “Pulp Reality” and “Tales of the Weird and Strange.”

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Posting on Facebook and Instagram have helped some, but I’m always looking for a larger mass.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep writing. Don’t be discouraged. It’s a hard thing to do. But if you have fun doing it, don’t stop.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Write what you know. Don’t try to write something that you’re not familiar with. I tend to write stories that I’d personally want to read. Not what I think people what to read.

What are you reading now?
Currently I am beta-reading books for other indie authors.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Hopefully some conventions and shows to help get some physical copies in circulation, and meet with readers and other writers.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
“And Then There Were None”, “White Shark” and “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe”

Author Websites and Profiles
Scott Donnelly Amazon Profile

Scott Donnelly’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile

Heather Bell 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Hey, I’m Heather! I’m very shy. I live in the countryside with my family and several pets. I love reading, writing and playing the guitar. I have written 2 short children stories.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The Tale Of Lucky. I wrote it in the mind of a dog.

Author Websites and Profiles
Heather Bell Website
Heather Bell Amazon Profile

Heather Bell’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Mike Sherer 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I have 2 published novels and a novella published as a stand-alone book. ‘A Cold Dish’ is an adult revenge fantasy. “Shadytown’ is the first entry into a Middle Grade paranormal adventure series. My novella ‘Under A Raging Moon’ is an adult horror.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
‘Shadytown’ is my latest. I wanted to write a suspenseful fantasy adventure for a young audience. I enjoyed creating young characters I could develop over a lengthy series. Although this book stands alone with a definite ending, it can lead on to many more adventures. Writing it was a balancing act between crafting tense situations that would hold a reader’s interest, yet keep it from being too dark for young readers.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I stare at a blank red brick wall while I write. It’s in a corner of my basement where I can escape from all distractions. That wall has become a screen for me to project all the action taking place in my head. It really helps to just stare at it.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Thomas Pynchon is my god. I’ve read everything. Also, Neal Stephenson, I’ve read everything of his. John Updike is another, especially his Rabbit series. Several others would be Joyce Carol Oates, Ray Bradbury, Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series.

What are you working on now?
A science fiction novel titled ‘Flatlanders’. It’s very early in, I haven’t even finished the rough draft yet.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
goodreads, Facebook writers groups, Twitter’s writers groups.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep writing. Never stop. Never give up. Engage with other writers, in person through local writing groups if possible. Scour the Internet for informative articles – there is a lot of good free info out there.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
DON’T STOP WRITING!

What are you reading now?
‘Horns’, by Joe Hill.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Find an agent. It would probably be a big help. I don’t know for sure as I have never had one.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
‘V’, ‘Gravity’s Rainbow’, ‘Mason and Dixon’, and ‘Against The Day’. You can read these tomes by Thomas Pynchon over and over and still not glean everything that is tucked away between the pages. He is such an incredible writer.

Author Websites and Profiles
Mike Sherer Website
Mike Sherer Amazon Profile

Mike Sherer’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

AYSHI GANGULY 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Listen to Young Adults: Master the art of Listening and Communication, Improve Parenting and Understand Teenagers of the new age.
I would say, the inspiration has always been the circle I have been raised with, within family, amongst friends, both!

What authors, or books have influenced you?
A thousand splendid suns, Khaled Hosseini anytime , Agatha Cristie.

What are you working on now?
My second book- on mental health

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Write your heart out.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
IF NOT NOW, NEVER.

What’s next for you as a writer?
INTERNATIONAL RECOGNITION

 

Phillip Bell 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
My name is Phillip Bell I was born on February 23, 1987, in Jessamine County Kentucky. I love to write action, crime novels, and children’s stories. I have written five books.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The Case Of The Unforgettable Case By Police Sergeant Lee Kramer What inspired me was a thought came into my head.

What are you working on now?
A Day And A Life Of A Country Boy

 

Author Websites and Profiles
Phillip Bell Website
Phillip Bell Amazon Profile

Phillip Bell’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Marcus Breathnach 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’m an Irish author, I’m 35yrs old, 6ft tall I’m as nerdy as can be, I work out for research purposes and I dance and sing when no one can hear or see me.
My passion is creating expansive worlds where the reader can explore and lose themselves in however they see fit.I’m fascinated by folklore from around the world more so now that science has gotten to the point that the lore is almost factual.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The last book is Paramour Unbound, and it was inspired by a few factors that came together at the perfect time.
1/ I was in a dark personal place and it set the tone for one of the subplots
2/ I had happened to stumble across a Terry Pratchett speech on YouTube.
3/ A woman I was falling for asked me to finish the draft, for her. I of course said yes.

It all came together within the space of two weeks and from it came my personal favourite body of work.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I try to simulate the atmosphere of the scene(s) by recreating thunderstorms, rain fall, arranging my garden to simulate a forested area feeling. I could just listen to YouTube effects but I personally find it more intising to be in the thick of it.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. – The Discworld series by Terry Pratchett. – The Neverending Story by Michael Ende. – A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket.

The tone of these books and style of writing the worlds created the characters their all done so well and are so expansive and in-depth.

What are you working on now?
I’m working on the 3rd book of the Eiru Saga series currently Untitled and am recording videos for my YouTube channel. Once lockdown is over I’ll be arranging a local book tour as well as a little surprise I’m working on for my readers.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I had some serious trouble with this at first but I’ve found Wix.com to be very helpful and easy to use as a base platform but promoting is tricky.
Amazon, Twitter Instrgam is great for promoting your book
Facebook is great for advertising your platform (website) which can house links directly to your books.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
a blank page can be daunting so fill it quickly, editing happens once you’ve stopped writing.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
“in order to have the things tomorrow others won’t have you must do the things today others won’t do”

everyone wants the gold at the end of the rainbow but very few want to work for it or make the sacrifices for it. I was always told to think long term when reaching out for the goal.

What are you reading now?
I’m reading The Counterfeiter’s Daughter by Victoria Marswell. So far, it’s a great read I won’t give anything away but suspense, adventure & thrills its really good.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Only 4 oh wow. I want my library with me um, I’m a big Terry Pratchett fan so I would bring.
1/ The Last Hero A Discworld Fable by Terry Pratchett.
2/ The Hogfather by Terry Pratchett.
3/ The Wolfman by Jonathan Maberry.
&
4/ The Neverending Story by Michael Ende.

if I can sneak a 5th book along with me it would be “Stephen King the Langoliers”.

Author Websites and Profiles
Marcus Breathnach Website
Marcus Breathnach Amazon Profile

Marcus Breathnach’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Olivia Anthony-Uzoeto 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
My creative writing journey started with poetry, right from when I was nine-years old! A poem I wrote in school, ‘Street Party’ won the 2011 Poetry Rivals’ competition. I won more poetry awards over the years, including ‘Ten of the Best.’ I quickly grew restless with poetry and wanted something more; I started on short stories, with two short stories winning runner-up’s in competitions. Since then, I have written a fictional book for my Extended Project Qualification at A-level in which I received an ‘A’ grade. I have now self-published my best piece of writing, ‘Red, Green & Gold,’ which is set in a world that directly mirrors our own, including covid-19 at the centre of its plot.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is ‘Red, Green & Gold.’ It was inspired very suddenly, so I’m afraid I can’t say what specifically urged me to write it! The moral debate at its core developed as I wrote- it’s all very controversial, which I like! Books readers can discuss are always the best types of book.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I tend to write better when lying on my stomach or standing up, oddly enough!

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Terry Hayes’ ‘I am Pilgrim’, ‘The Five People you meet in Heaven’ by Mitch Albom and Cassandra Clare have all influenced me incredibly! I also adore comedic authors such as Derek Landy and Louise Rennison, whose books I constantly re-read and totally recommend!

What are you working on now?
I am currently polishing up a research-driven story I wrote two years ago, on Jack the Ripper. I’m excited for everyone to fall in love with Edward Silverwood, my loveable new protagonist.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Promoting my books on social media and asking friends and family to add your promotion onto their own social media, so it spreads further.
My Instagram is @liviaau_456

Do you have any advice for new authors?
DON’T over-edit and doubt yourself! If you like what you’ve written, take the plunge and get it published!

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
“You don’t write the story; the story writes you.”

What are you reading now?
‘The Lucifer Effect’ by Philip Zimbardo. It is not a light read, though!

What’s next for you as a writer?
I’m going to keep writing! It’s something I’ve been doing almost my entire life. Perhaps I will release some short stories, but I don’t know yet!

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
‘I am Pilgrim’ and any ‘Skulduggery Pleasant’ or ‘Georgia Nicholson’ books!

Author Websites and Profiles
Olivia Anthony-Uzoeto Amazon Profile

Gerald Hogg 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am originally from Bedford in England but I grew up in Middlesbrough. When I was four years old, in the mid-1950s, my parents took me to Jamaica to live which must have planted in me the seed to travel, as I have been travelling ever since. In the capacity of my job as a chef, I have travelled the world working in hotels and restaurants, gold mines, cruise ships, Antarctic supply ships, custom patrol vessels, rig tenders, and oil tankers and I have also lived in Australia, Jamaica, Bermuda, Singapore, the Falkland Islands, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and the USA. I retired to Thailand in 2017 and now live on the beautiful island of Koh Samui where I travel extensively throughout South-East Asia doing research for books in my “Retirees Travel Guide Series.”

There are five books in the Retirees Travel Guide Series

The Retire in Thailand Handbook (The First Six Months)

A Retirees Guide to South East Asia, (Cambodia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Laos)

Same-Same but Different, (In Search Of the Perfect Place to Retire In Thailand)

Retirees Guide to South East Asia, (Myanmar, Singapore, Bali and Malaysia)

The Ten Best Countries in the World to Retire and Grow Old Gracefully Disgracefully
I have also written a biography: You Will Never Amount to Anything, and a novel The Deptford Mask Murders, Which is a true story of how fingerprints were used for the very first time in 1905 to convict Alfred and Albert Stratton of murder.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Thai Died…Murder in Paradise…Coronavirus Has Come to Koh Samui but so has another killer.
I started to write this book in April 2020 when I was in self-isolation after I contracted the coronavirus. For me, the virus was just like a normal dose of the flu but for millions of people around the world, they were not so lucky. While I was in lockdown and seeing the effect the virus was having on the world I decided to write a suspense novel that was centred on Covid-19 that would highlight the difficulties and frustrations that any police force would face when trying to solve a major crime during the worse pandemic in over 100 years, when most of the population, except for essential services were told by their governments to stay home to stop the virus from spreading. The book is about a murder of a young English girl in Koh Samui during the corona pandemic here in Thailand, with links going back to the notorious Ronald and Reggie Kray the foremost perpetrators of organised crime in the East End of London during the 1950s and 1960s.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Being of a certain age I didn’t grow up with computers but I have certainly adapted to them since I started writing books. I do most of my writing thanks to the wonders of Wifi sitting on a beach or around a swimming pool in Thailand or some other Southeast Asian country. Quite often when the sun is going down my inspiration is helped along with a cocktail or two.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
The first books I remember reading were the Just William series of books by Richmal Crompton. As I matured I read everything Charles Dickens wrote and all of The Hobbit series of books by J. R. R. Tolkien, I also loved Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. My daughter was born in 1974, and as she grew older I would read Watership Down by Richard Adams to her at bedtime. Looking back now it was probably a little scary for a little girl, but she loved the book as much as I did. Being at sea for much of my life, books were an important source of entertainment in the few leisure hours that you get working on a ship. I would read everything that I could get my hands on, from Agatha Christie to Ernest Hemingway, from Nevil Shute to Leslie Thomas. My favorite authors of today are James Lee Burke, Elmore Leonard, Dennis Lehane, Kate Atkinson, and Khaled Hosseini. I also like to read any travel-related books especially anything by Michael Palin and Bill Bryson. I don’t think any author actually influenced me; I just loved losing myself in a good book.

What are you working on now?
I am taking a well earned rest and plan to drive around Thailand to get inspiration for my next book in the Retirees Travel Book Series.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I have recently published a website as it seems a necessity in this day and age. Apart from that, being a retiree and of that certain age I am not very knowledgeable about computers and social media, so I rely on word of mouth and hopefully my publisher getting my name out there. I know I must be missing out on many selling opportunities but I find the whole social media thing rather boring and time-consuming.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
As I am a new author myself there is not much advice that I can offer. Just keep doing what you’re doing; even if you don’t get published you’re still improving your mind, enjoying what you’re doing and fulfilling an ambition. My brother John, who was a much better writer than I will ever be, tried most of his life to get his books published and never succeeded. I wrote my second book in 2017 (the first book I wrote was never meant for publication) and I was offered a publishing contract for it within a few months of releasing it on Amazon. What I discovered since becoming an author is that getting a book published is quite often down to luck, being in the right place at the right time and of course writing a great book.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
“Travel whenever you can. The greatest experiences are seeing other cultures and getting a real perspective on life and the lives that other people lead”. Which is the way I have always tried to live my life.
When I was in Cambodia recently researching my book, I spoke with a lady who was just forty-two years old the same age as my daughter. Her father was arrested, imprisoned and later killed by Pol Pot’s henchmen for the crime of being a teacher. When she was one year old, with her mother, older brother, and sister, they were forced marched 330 kilometres from their home in Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville to work on a communal farm. Her mother died along the way of sickness and malnutrition and she was separated from her brother and sister, and she would never to see them again. She was taken in and raised in impoverished conditions by another family who had befriended her mother on the long march south. Being born in Cambodia during those murderous days she had not had the opportunities in her life that my children or grandchildren have had. She had no education, no real family, and had been working as a prostitute since she was fourteen years old to survive. It certainly put everything in perspective for me. You don’t see the real world by watching it on the television.

What are you reading now?
I have just finished reading To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee. I first read it when I was about 18 years old. Now in the age of BLM, it is as current today as when it was written in 1960

What’s next for you as a writer?
Doing research for my retirees series of books and a follow up book in my new Thai Died series of books.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Blah Story by Nigel Tomm. It’s reputed to be the longest book ever written. I am not sure if I would enjoy it but it has 7312 pages so it would last a while whilst waiting to be rescued. It’s probably cheating but I would take the boxed set of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. How to Survive on a Deserted Island by Tim O’Sheid would be invaluable and for a little light entertainment Adolf Hitler; My Part in His Downfall by Spike Milligan.

Author Websites and Profiles
Gerald Hogg Website
Gerald Hogg Amazon Profile

Gerald Hogg’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile

Helen Anslem 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’m a young writer from Africa. So far I’ve published just one book.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Lovely and it was inspired by movies involving serial killers. The book is my attempt to tell a story involving death from a different point of view.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
No

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Nora Roberts.

What are you working on now?
I’m currently working on the first book in a series [A witche’s Grimoire] about curses. The book is called the Curse of Aves Borough

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I don’t really have a specific one yet.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
It’s going to be hard. It’s going to be very hard but there is no greater agony than bearing an untold story.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
It’s not going to be easy, if it were in fact easy every body would do it.

What are you reading now?
I’m currently reading a very old book, The Lord of The Rite

What’s next for you as a writer?
I just want to keep doing what makes me happy, writing.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The fall of Shane Mackade by Nora Roberts, Key of light by Nora Roberts and Harry Potter and the chamber of secrets by JK Rowling.

Author Websites and Profiles
Helen Anslem Website

Helen Anslem’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Alex Richwagen 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I love writing in my spare time outside of my corporate life. I have a family of 4 with two young children as my wife and I reside in Clearwater, FL. I’ve written 4 books and have another on the way to publish later in 2020 around Corporate Leadership.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Investing Should Be Easy, Second Edition. I wrote the first copy and published it in 2015, but with so many changes in the world, the investment community, and frankly the global economy, I need to issue an updated version.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I listen to music when I write, it’s my calming practice as a set distraction.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
There are too many to count, but I feel like every year with more experience, my writing style changes a little bit. I would say with my exposure to Corporate America and folks in senior leadership, I try to eliminate fluff and get to the point faster.

What are you working on now?
Promoting my latest published book to get it into as many hands as possible.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Still learning haha

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Set a goal and stick to it. 30 pages in 30 days and just write, don’t worry about correcting. Just get the words on paper

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
If you don’t have anything nice to say, you shouldn’t say anything at all

What are you reading now?
Several books, I go through about 25+ books annually, along with Fortune and Mens Health magazine, along with lots of kids books to my kiddos.

What’s next for you as a writer?
keep up with my content, publish UnEntitled, a book on Corporate Leadership.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Hmmm, I’ll have to think about that one

 

James Cosgrave 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’m a 27-year-old Vancouverite who works in HR for a health insurance company. I grew up in the suburbs of Albuquerque and spent nearly my whole life there until college. I like the desert but I wanted a change of scenery and to get out and explore more. Books were my main form of escape and I read a lot in my teen years, especially Gothic, horror, and mystery novels. I started writing short stories in high school and dreamed of writing my own book for years. I had a few attempts at writing one over the years in college and beyond, but kept scrapping them. It was my girlfriend (now fiancé) who pushed me to complete one a few years ago, and now I’m proud to have finally published my first novel Anathema this week!

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My first novel is a murder mystery/romantic thriller called Anathema. It’s inspired by my lifelong fascination with secret societies and my love of Gothic fiction, set at a fictional elite university in the Albertan Rockies. As a kid I loved reading up on groups like Skull and Bones and Bullingdon; they sounded so mysterious and interesting! There were no such clubs in my college town and I often wondered during university whether being in a secret society would’ve made my undergrad experience better. I found the clique culture at my school to be very toxic and tiring, and the destructive aftershocks of gossip and favoritism felt inescapable in the tight-knit community of my school. However, it later struck me that exploring how awful clique culture is would make a good backbone for a Gothic novel set at a university, and that a secret society could be in the center of it. Usually in these types of stories the secret society is pure evil and those opposed to it are portrayed as angels. I wanted to read a story a little more nuanced than that. What if the secret society in the book wasn’t all bad and those opposed to it weren’t all good? What if the socially awkward, lovebird protagonists were members of the secret society instead of crusading against it? What if they were actually very into it, almost fanatically devoted, and when someone who opposed their group got murdered, they ended up under suspicion? The more I thought about it, the more I realized this was a book I really wanted to write. The school in the novel and the titular secret society are amalgamations of different real universities and organizations that I came across in my research, mainly those in the Ivy League and the U.K. But there were a few I took inspiration from in Canada as well. Writing about university was much more exciting when I added cults and murder into the mix. My own undergrad experience was very tame by comparison!

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I’m a very early riser. I like to get up around 4am and start writing as soon as I’ve had my first cup of coffee. I just can’t seem to write in the evenings as well as the mornings, but I’ve got to get to work at a reasonable time, so I was only able to write for a couple hours every day, save for weekends where I would write from 4 to 10am while only pausing for breakfast. At that rate, it took me over half a year to get the first draft done and I spent another year revising the book with beta readers and a professional editor I hired.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca is one of my favorite novels, and the adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock had a profound effect on me (I saw it before reading the book). Both most certainly influenced Anathema and there are references to the story and characters placed throughout. One of the characters is even named Joan by her parents after Joan Fontaine and is partially inspired by her character in Rebecca. Other than du Maurier, I usually read an odd mix of literary fiction and airport thrillers. For every F. Scott Fitzgerald or Jonathan Safran Foer novel I read there’s a Dan Brown or a Stephen King. Despite the dark academia theme, I didn’t actually read Donna Tartt’s The Secret History until after I’d finished the first draft of Anathema, but I really, really loved it.

What are you working on now?
Honestly, I think I need to take a break from writing for a little bit after finally publishing Anathema. It’s been a long, grueling process to get it done but I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I’m still new to this, but so far Awesome Gang seems pretty good!

Do you have any advice for new authors?
The most helpful thing I think I could say is to just keep writing. Writing a book might seem like a mammoth task, but if you keep writing a few thousands words here and there (hey, even a few hundred words here and there!) they will start to add up. And eventually you will have a complete draft, which is one of the greatest feelings in the world. Revision is the same thing, just one draft and round of beta readers at a time. It might take years, but if you stick with it, you will get it done. It’s like that old saying: Slow and steady wins the race.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
A wise friend once told me: “Don’t ever let other people get you down.” When I was younger, I used to be guided a lot by a fear of what other people would think of me. They bullied me, tore me down, and spread rumors behind my back. I eventually realized this friend was right. The best way to live your life is to not worry to much about what other people are going to judge you for, and to just be yourself. It sounds cliché, but it’s so true. Be respectful of others even if they’re not respectful of you. Rise above them and don’t let them get to you, because that only gives them power.

What are you reading now?
A short story collection called the Darkling Halls of Ivy, edited by Lawrence Block. It’s a bunch of dark academia mystery stories written by major crime writers and I’m really loving it so far. Reading it has been a nice cool down from Anathema.

What’s next for you as a writer?
I do have ideas for another Gothic novel, possibly something either a modern Southern Gothic or Urban Gothic. And I wonder about maybe writing a sequel to Anathema years from now, picking up on the surviving characters and seeing what’s happened to them.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Oh, tough call. I’d probably say Rebecca, The Secret History, The Great Gatsby, and Bonfire of the Vanities. If you’re going to be stuck somewhere, you’d want books that you can enjoy re-reading again and again. I think any of those would make being stranded a bit more bearable.

Author Websites and Profiles
James Cosgrave Website

James Cosgrave’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile

Piyush Dholariya 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Piyush Dholariya is a PhD candidate of Psychology who is pursuing research on subjective well being with respect to spirituality and personality. He is an individual researcher who has published some research papers on the well-being of professionals about how one can change his viewpoint to live a better life. He is a public speaker and blogger who is writing for self-help techniques with the major topics of spirituality and meditation.

I wrote this first book; “Living a Life Worth Living”

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Name : Living a Life Worth Living

During my doctoral study on subjective well being,
I studied lots of factors for worth living and wellbeing of
life. I have talked with many people about wellbeing and
worth living. Eventually, I got many lessons for living worth
living. Those lessons I have summarised in 31 small notes
that may be helpful to people to live worth living.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Yes, I wrote syllabus for one private college, many blogs, research papers, translation of papers.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Dr. Abdul Kalam, Robin Sharma, James Joyce, Victor Hugo, Ivar Aasen, Benedict Anderson

Silent Spring, Who will cry when you die, wings of fire, Ulysses, Freakonomics, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind,Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking and many more

What are you working on now?
I am PhD candidate, doing research on subjective well being. How does people can live worth life and be happy. I am also writing blogs from my researches.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Mass emails, social media, readers, reviewers

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Yes, We have to always think about readers when we are writing, because book is for readers.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
We have to always think about readers when we are writing, because book is for readers.
Be consistent.
Do not use irrelevant things in writing.

What are you reading now?
The Art of Power Book by Thich Nhat Hanh

What’s next for you as a writer?
I am writing second book, which is also non-fiction, but I can not disclose name now.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Upanishads, Bhagavad gita, The power of Now, Thundering Silence: Sutra on Knowing the Better Way to Catch a Snake, The Long Road Turns to Joy

Author Websites and Profiles
Piyush Dholariya Website
Piyush Dholariya Amazon Profile

Piyush Dholariya’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Bennie Starink 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Hi i’m B.J Starink and well i have written one book. A dutch one Onbekende Neigingen and a english one Unknown Tendencies.. I’m writing part two in this moment right now.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Unknown Tendencies.
In my eyes it’s a fish swimming against the stream like a salmon, He doesn’t know if he gets there but he has hope.. My inspiration came when i had 5 jobs in one year and came to the conclusion that i can’t work under a boss. So i started to write this film script you might know where im heading: Unknown Tendencies.. But when i was in jail the idea came to write a book.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
i wake up at 06.00 and then i drink a few cups of black strong coffee i smoke a shitload of sigarettes and i start writing till 10/12.00. And when a idea pops up i write it down the very instant no matter where i am, it has to be written down..

What authors, or books have influenced you?
The author who influenced me is Stephen King. And a book that’s haunted me trough my early youth is and will always be: The mist.

What are you working on now?
I’m working on part two of Unknown Tendencies/Onbekende Neigingen. Homicidal Tendencies/Moord neigingen. And well i am very pleased on how this is going. I’m in page 123 at the moment, and i wanted it to have 200 pages so almost there.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
awesomegang.com

Do you have any advice for new authors?
if you can’t write or you struck a wall writing wise:

Don’t overthink it! The more you think about it how harder it gets to write down one single sentence.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
My mom saying: lieverd je hebt het tenmiste geprobeerd!

In English translation:

Honey at least you tried!

What are you reading now?
Mythos a book from Stephen Fry. It’s a really fun and awesome book about Greek mythology. I always was fasinated bout that stuff. If it’s Greek Norse or Egyptian (but more the Greek kind of mythology cause well im a halfblood Greek).

What’s next for you as a writer?
Letting people know my name. And thats not as easy as it might seem.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
1. The mist from Stephen King..
2. Mythos from Stephen Fry..
3. any Donald Duck Pocket..

Author Websites and Profiles
Bennie Starink Website
Bennie Starink Amazon Profile

Bennie Starink’s Social Media Links
Twitter Account

TANYA SMITH 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a new author. I have a Bachelor’s Degree in Pastoral Ministries with a Minor in Theology and Counseling from John Wesley University in High Point, NC; Masters of Divinity from Shaw Divinity School in Raleigh, NC; and is getting her Doctor of Ministry at The King’s University in Southlake, TX.

I am a mother of five and grandmother of thirteen, single and living in Jacksonville, FL. God saved me from a domestic violence relationship, not once but twice. He saved my life and in return I gave my life to His work. I have written and self-published two books this year.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is “Healed, Delivered, Set Free, Restored”. The trials I have life through inspired it and how God healed me.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I am getting up at 3:30am; I write at 4am, then walk for 6 miles at 6:30am, then I am back to writing.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
For my non-fiction books, I really don’t have any.

For my fiction books, I would say Danielle Steele, Stephenie Meyer, and E. L. James to name a few.

What are you working on now?
I am working on my first romance novel under my pen name. That has always been my dream job since I was a teenager.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I have been using Amazon and Facebook right now.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Stay focused. When first starting out, it is easy to get distracted. I started my first book in 2007 and didn’t finish it until 2019. I let life distract me. Never sell yourself short, you can do it.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Get a program to used to write with that edits and adds all of my outlines, notes, etc into one book project.

What are you reading now?
Becoming Michelle Obama

What’s next for you as a writer?
Finishing my first romance novel.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Fifty Shades of Gray – all of them or Twilight – all of them!

Author Websites and Profiles
TANYA SMITH Website
TANYA SMITH Amazon Profile

TANYA SMITH’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile

Laraba Kendig 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a scientist by training, but a writer at heart. I have always loved reading with a passion and turned my hand to fanfiction a few years ago. I write stories similar to the ones I enjoy reading. They are interesting but light, romantic but not steamy. I am a super fan of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, and have been having a wonderful time writing P&P variations, exploring how new circumstances affect the beloved characters. So far I have published two novel-length Pride and Prejudice variations plus one short story via Amazon. My books include ‘I am Jael’ and ‘The Blind Will See’.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is “The Blind Will See” and it is a Pride and Prejudice Variation, Regency Romance in which George Wickham, the antagonist, is badly injured and disfigured in a military training accident. Wickham is an interesting character in the original Jane Austen masterpiece; he is extremely charming and handsome and easily wins over gullible young ladies, but underneath he is a selfish snake. I was inspired to take away Wickham’s good looks, to force him to come to grips with the reality that he is not actually the center of the universe.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Guilty habits? Yes … chocolate and more chocolate! I don’t think I really have any strange writing habits. I write very quickly because I have children. I spend more time thinking than I do writing. I often find myself thinking about upcoming scenes while I am watching kids in the pool or lying in bed. I have a wonderful editor (my dear husband) and I can trust him to find most of my grammatical errors.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Too many to count! I adore reading and have since I was seven years old. I especially appreciate authors who can paint pictures with their words, like Dorothy Sayers, James Herriot, and Gerald Durrell. The latter is probably unknown to most people but wow, he is just amazing. I don’t pretend to write nearly as well as these folks but I have definitely learned from them. I have also read almost all of Georgette Heyer’s books; she is also an excellent author and most of her books are set in the Regency period, so I have learned much about that time and place in history through her. Oddly enough, the only Jane Austen I absolutely love is Pride and Prejudice, but I love it dearly.

What are you working on now?
I am writing a Pride and Prejudice variation called The Banished Uncle. It is about a long lost Bennet uncle (the elder brother of Mrs. Bennet) who comes back to England after more than 20 years in India. He was originally banished from his home for falling in love with the daughter of a local viscount. He is a diligent, intelligent man and he promptly begins interfering with the lives of the Bennets, Bingleys, and Darcys in positive ways. He also has a family of his own; his stepson is heir to an estate in England. The book’s main themes are class distinctions, communication struggles, personal responsibility for one’s actions, and of course, happily ever afters. And I it’s nearly done. Hooray!

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I am a new author trying to cultivate an audience, so this is both a good question and a hard question. I have been writing and posting fanfiction for years, and I suspect my fans on those sites have been key to the success I have had so far.

I have just started a free monthly Regency Romance Newsletter where subscribers get exclusive content, here about special promotions etc. If you’re interested, go here: www.subscribepage.com/s1p4z6

Do you have any advice for new authors?
My biggest advice is write. Just write. If you feel like you have no ideas, or that what you are writing is lousy, write anyway. My favorite phrase is “You can’t fix nothing.” I have found it far easier to alter existing prose than to make it perfect on the first try. I guess I would add that if you are writing some form of fanfiction (like Star Wars or Lord of the Rings or yes, Pride and Prejudice) the online boards are a great way to get feedback from mostly sympathetic readers. There are some vicious turkeys out there, but I’ve gotten mostly love online. I cut my writing teeth in the Star Wars universe and I know I improved as a writer in that fanfiction kingdom.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
If you mean advice about writing, then I would say, as I said in the previous question, just write and then get some honest feedback. Do not try to get it perfect on the first draft.

What are you reading now?
Oh, hmmm, a lot. I am reading a Pride and Prejudice variation with a Groundhog Day theme, Madness in Meryton which is tons of fun. Double Armor by Richard Evans, which is a Christian devotional book. Like many a rabid reader, I have a bunch of stuff floating around on my Kindle that I have not read yet. I am reading an oddball cozy mystery about a woman who is electrocuted by a coffeepot but not killed, and when she wakes up she can talk to animals — it is called Kitty Confidential. I recently finished a long book about atomic accidents by Jim Mahaffey. I have an eclectic range of interests but I do not like dark thrillers or dark anything, really.

What’s next for you as a writer?
I expect to continue to write Pride and Prejudice variations. I may branch into science fiction too. I have so many idea, but I’m working hard to not get distracted until I have my latest one finished.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Honestly, I would probably go on Amazon and buy a couple of books about surviving on a desert island! Ha!

Maybe the complete works of Sherlock Holmes? Lots of good reading there! A Dorothy Sayers book, perhaps?

Author Websites and Profiles
Laraba Kendig Amazon Profile

Laraba Kendig’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile

Josephine Blake 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Hi there! I’m an author of Sweet Contemporary, Western Historical and Gothic Victorian Romance with over twenty published works.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book comes out on the 15th of September. It’s the third book in my Brides of Adoration series, called THE ARMS OF A STRANGER, and it was inspired by my love of this little town I created. The main character, Hannah, was a side character in the first book, and she desperately needed her own story.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I like to write as fast as I possibly can for 15 minute sprints and try to beat my totaly word count every time? But I don’t know how odd that is. LOL.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
EVERY BOOK I EVER READ.

What are you working on now?
The fourth book in the Brides of Adoration series. It’s still untitled, but it’s nearly complete!

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
OH. Man. Well. I like to publish in a series, and then once all the books are out, I run a lot of promo and ads on the first book the series and count on the trickle down buy throughs to help boost my income.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Don’t stop… believing!!! Hold on to that feeeeeeeeling!!!! (Seriously, ya’ll. You got this. Keep writing. Never stop.)

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
WRITE. But also, calm down. You can’t do everything. And I need to remember that daily. LOL.

What are you reading now?
It’s called Trusting Her Righteous Heart by Lorelei Brogan. I like to keep up on the other books in my favorite genres.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Well. I’m in two big huge multi-author series that will release later this year, and I want to finish my Brides of Adoration series. AND THEN… Regency romance, I think.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Harry Potter. (I’m gonna go ahead and count this whole series as one book, cause, ya know…. Choices. LOL)
My Jane Austen collection (Hey, still just ONE book.)
And probably something about how to escape from a desert island cause I NEED my people…..

Author Websites and Profiles
Josephine Blake Website
Josephine Blake Amazon Profile

Josephine Blake’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account
Pinterest Account

RAJENDRA PATIL 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a graduate engineer and post graduate in operation management. presently working as a AUTHOR,CONSULTANT ,TRAINER for establishing quality management system,environmental management system,occupational health and safety management system.i have more than 25 years of experience in above said field. i have authored 7 books on Quality management system, iso9001,ISO/TS16949,IATF,QUALITY PRODUCTIVITY IMPROVEMENT TOOLS,PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT THROUGH FIVE S, to name a few
My passion is to introduce spirituality into manufacturing sector and i am working on spiritual engineering to eliminate problems encountered by manufacturing industry in day to day life.
My objective is to help clients to save i n excess of Rs 10,000 crores in 10 years by implementing world class manufacturing solutions which are scientifically proven and spiritually driven

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
BASICS OF OCCUPATIONAL,HEALTH AND SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM Based on the requirements of ISO 45001

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
YES .I AM TRYING TO WRITE ON SPIRITUALITY IN MANUFACTURING

What authors, or books have influenced you?
YOU CAN HEAL YOUR LIFE – LOUISE HAY
YOU CAN WIN – SHIV KHERA
ASK AND IT IS GIVEN BY ABHRAM HICK
DNANESHWARI BY Dnaneshwar Maharaj
Autograhy of Bhagwan Rajneesh

What are you working on now?
PRESENTLY WORKING ON — A SIMPLE AND EASY APPROACH FOR ACHIEVING TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Write considering your passion and experience.Be original,genuine and the writings should be useful to humankind by one way or the other

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
WHATEVER YOU GIVES OUT , COMES BACK TO YOU NATURALLY.

What are you reading now?
Novels by Indian authors , Dr. BHAIRAPPA

What’s next for you as a writer?
TO BECOME WORLD CLASS AUTHOR by writing books which help the socially,economically deprived peoples to come out of crisis.the books will guide the confused/wrong doers to the right path

 

Michelle Edwards 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’m an international bestselling author publishing exclusively with Crazy Ink. To date, I’ve published ten solo books in under two years. In addition to writing, I’m an avid traveler. My books take readers on worldwide adventures into the paranormal and onto military bases.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The last book I sent to my publisher was Battle-Scarred. It’s part of a motorcycle club series (all books can be read as solo books or in order).
What inspired me to write this book was the veteran owned motorcycle club in Sebring, Florida. Veterans In Arms is a group of men and women who have served this country and have since started a club.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I have to have earbuds in my ears. Even if there isn’t any music or sound coming out, I have to have them.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
J.R. Ward and Erin Lee are two authors that have influenced me. I don’t think any one book has really done that, but boy do I have a lot of favorites!

What are you working on now?
Currently I’m working on finishing up Citrus Bay and Demonic Destiny. Citrus Bay is a part of the Soda Shop series (multi-author series with books that can all be read as stand alone books). It will be released February 2021.
Demonic Destiny is in the Possessed by Passion box set that will be released in March 2021.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I mainly use Facebook. However, I’ve been branching into Instagram more lately.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep writing. I know many people say that and it’s probably annoying to hear, but it’s true. I let people tell me I wouldn’t publish a book and that it won’t go anywhere for me. It caused me to stop writing for years. When I finally started again, I realized how much I love it.
So if you love to write, don’t stop. Keeping writing, keep pushing yourself.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
That not everyone is going to like your books and that’s okay!

What are you reading now?
I just finished The Rural Diaries by Hilarie Burton Morgan. I’m currently waiting on a couple of books to come in.

What’s next for you as a writer?
More writing, more books, and more travel. I have books scheduled out to 2022, so I’ll be busy!

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Rural Diaries, definitely.
Doppelgangers by Erin Lee & Lorah Jaiyn.
Lover Eternal by J.R. Ward.
The Wednesday Letters by Jason F. Wright.

Author Websites and Profiles
Michelle Edwards Website
Michelle Edwards Amazon Profile

Michelle Edwards’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account
Pinterest Account

Vuong Pham 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a 16-year-old Vietnamese studying in Singapore under ASEAN scholarship. I am passionate in writing things that can help other people, which is the main drive for me to write and publish my first book “From teen to teen: How to attain your best life”. Hope you will enjoy reading it!

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest and only book is “From teen to teen: How to attain your best life”. The main drive for me to write the book is to write a guide that is helpful, practical and realistic to help teenagers overcome their problems in life and achieve their goals. Another motivation that pushed me to write the book is the fact that there are many self-help books in the market but only a few of them are written for teenagers, and most are written by adults, so their view and experience may not be helpful or applicable to teenagers nowadays. Hence, from my own experience as a teenager as well as additional research, I’ve written and published my first book “From teen to teen: How to attain your best life” and I can’t wait to write more in the future!

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I like writing short stories which I came up with myself since I was in primary school. Most of them are quite simple and funny but there is always a moral lesson behind each story, and it’s fortunate that my parents still keep them pristine until today, which is a precious piece of my childhood.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
I love the book “How to win friends and influence people” by Dale Carnegie. He’s just a master in interacting with other people, and I hope to be able to write such masterpieces one day which can truly help other people and change their lives.

What are you working on now?
Currently I’m focusing on my study since my final years of high school are approaching, but definitely I will keep up with my writing passion and I aim to publish another book before I enter university. This time I will write a more friendly book with small anecdotes, and I will write it in Vietnamese first, then translate to English later, unlike my first book which I wrote originally in English.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I think Awesome Gang is the best site to promote your book. Not only they have a free promotion option, you can also pay a reasonable amount to get your book promoted and see great results. You can also try promoting your book on social media, which requires a lot of effort, but I think the result is really worthwhile.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep on writing, don’t give up! You will never be able to climb the mountain of success if you don’t take the first step. All authors have been through the same hardship you’re going through, and believe me, their success is the result of their tremendous amount of blood, sweat and tears.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Finishing writing and publishing a book is only half of the journey. Promoting and selling it is the other half.

What are you reading now?
I’m currently reading “The lean startup” by Eric Ries. Although it’s not that appropriate for my age I still find the lessons from the book somewhat applicable to my life.

What’s next for you as a writer?
As I mentioned earlier, I intend to write another self-help book soon, but it’s going to be a funny one filled with anecdotes, a different style which I really want to try out.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
“The Greatness Guide”, “The Alchemist”, “Deception Point”, “Once upon a cow”

Author Websites and Profiles
Vuong Pham Amazon Profile

Vuong Pham’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile

Michael Taggart 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’ve written 2 novels and published 4 photobooks so far. I really enjoyed photography but publishing photobooks is a bust. They are hard to format, huge downloads, and Amazon doesn’t like them.
Ever since I was a little kid I wanted to write a novel. When I grew up, we didn’t have a TV, so I got all my entertainment from reading. I’d check out a ton of books from the library, blaze right through them, and then beg my mom to take me back for more. I ran out of new books to read, so I’d read some of the better books more than five times. I started out on Westerns, because that is what my Dad read. Then I ended up with spy novels, but they can get pretty tedious if they aren’t written well. Next, I read fantasy and science fiction. Fantasy was what stuck, and I went through epic fantasy and high fantasy to urban fantasy and finally to litrpg.
I’ve also made 2 computer games (Hostile Takeover 1 and 2) and I have an Electrical Engineering degree.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The name of my last book was Melee Mage: Fledgling God: book 2. What inspired it was book 1! Lol.
Seriously, though, I’ve found an amazing world that just pulls me to write. It takes place in my home town of Louisville Kentucky and it follows a new mage, Jason, as he tries to figure out this new supernatural world he’s now a part of. It’s our world, current time, but with magic. The supernatural world is very different from our world of laws and order. It’s built more like the old west, where those with the most powerful magic make the rules and do what they want. Might makes right. The world is intense, but the friends he finds are the best. It’s easy to root for them.
We have Jason, the Main Character. He’s young and eager. Life has been very difficult for him since his Dad kicked him out of the house for being gay, but it hasn’t make him jaded or bitter.
Annabeth is an older Granny with kids and grandkids, who had her waker moment and is now growing younger. She’s living her best life and she’s making the most of her new found health and powers.
Sandy is a battle mage and the Head of Household. She had a great teacher and she wants to mentor new supernaturals and give a good start as well. She’s learning how to be a good leader but she doesn’t always get it right.
John is her lover and part Mountain Troll. He loves his ale and pulling practical jokes. He’s also in love with Sandy. He’s the earth to her fire.
Tyler is an incubus who eats bad emotions. He’s had a horrible past, but he finds himself strangely attracted to the optimistic Jason.
Bermuda Moses is a tiny black and white kitten that shows up to protect Jason. He’s a fierce defender with mysterious power, and cute as can be.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I like to write in the back room with the window open. I’ll put out cat food and enjoy all the birds, squirrels, cats, racoons and opossums that come along to eat.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Oh wow. So many. Louis L’amour connected all his Sackett novels together with the family. Each story stood on it’s own, but together they formed a bigger picture. Jim Butcher with his Harry Dreden series showed me how to create a great character, add humor, then make the world bigger and bigger over a series. That’s what I want to do with the Fledgling God series. Keep expanding the world and the magic so it feels fresh.

What are you working on now?
Book 3. This time the characters are getting out of Louisville and going to the Gathering.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I’ve tried Amazon advertising with limited success. It seems like it started out well, then got diminishing returns pretty quickly. The same with facebook advertising. I still haven’t figured out a good place to consistently plug the series.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Create a writing routine that helps you ease into writing. The world you envision is perfect in your head. As soon as you start to put it on paper, it becomes real. It also becomes smaller somehow. You have to figure out all the details and make it real and something that seems like work.
My writing routine starts with doing something productive. It could be as simple as putting away the dishes and taking out the trash. Then I write how I’m feeling in the moment. All my hopes and fears. It could be just a few sentences. I could be a whole page. It just gets the gunk out of my head. I always delete this so I have the freedom to write whatever I want.
After that, I read my page of affirmations. These change over time. They are just positive thoughts that remind me why I write, and that I can write.
After that, I open up my document and start writing! By that time it feels easy to get into the flow. It doesn’t take long to get in the mood, but it sure helps.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
You are in the right place at the right time to learn the lessons you need to learn.
This cuts through the drama, the noise, the upset – and gets me focused on what I need to learn.

What are you reading now?
Nothing. I’ve found I can’t read and write at the same time. I’ll write for a while, get to a good stopping point, and then read a bunch of books. Then back to writing again.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Writing book 3.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
By the power of Author Editing I’m going to change this to 3 or 4 series! (Insert evil laugh!)
I’d bring the Belgariad Series. The character development is so wonderful and it’s something you can read again and again.
Next, I’d bring the Harry Dresden series by Jim Butcher. He’s always getting into and out of trouble, so maybe that would inspire me to figure out a way to get off the island.
Finally, I’d bring The Blacksmith Son series by Michael Manning. The MC is fantastic at figuring out new applications of magic, so I’d appreciate that on the island. Maybe conjure some food, nice house, wifi, netflix, etc.

Author Websites and Profiles
Michael Taggart Amazon Profile

Michael Taggart’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile

Jan Eleven 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I’ve been a storyteller since the age of 5. I would stay in my room for hours playing with my toys, creating movies and T.V. shows to play to myself or when my cousin came to visit. As a teenager, I become heavily involved with comic books, and since I’m an illustrator, I started writing and drawing my own comic books! I didn’t start taking my writing seriously until 2006 when I got the idea for a movie, which then became my first and only book thus far, Angelites. Besides that, I’ve been married for 10 years, raising two boys, I enjoy swimming and have been told that I’m a lot of fun at parties!

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is Angelites – Body of Persons Empowered. I have to say the whole title because I previously released Angelites back in 2013, credited with my real name. However, little did I know that there’s already an author with my name, in which he got credited by Goodreads for my book! It was a hassle to straighten out but ultimately it did get resolved. Therefore, to avoid repeat drama, I adopted my pseudonym, Jan Eleven. Also, the first Angelites was published with a ton of mistakes made by the editor I hired. I was forced to pull it off the market and rewrite, which took forever due starting a family and working a full-time job. What inspired me to write was reading so many superhero stories where the origin of their powers all became redundant. At the same time, I was getting tired of going to the movies and watching action stars doing unbelievable stunts and walking away with just a scratch! The idea just kind of hit me to write an action story with super beings who got their powers in an unorthodox way. Does that make sense?

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I would listen to classic soul music to write my action and fighting scenes! Why? I have no idea. I also listen to hip hop music when writing dialogue. That is because I want the reader to feel my words and me being an MC in high school I wanted to make sure the right words were used to get that feeling in my chest on the paper. I also pace and skip in my living room, mouthing out my ideas before I write. My wife would catch me from time to time and look at me like I’m crazy!

What authors, or books have influenced you?
For suspense and hard-hitting characters, I’ve been influenced by James Patterson books, namely the Women’s Murder Club series. My favorite one is The 3rd Degree. I look creating anthologies like Harry Potter, Twilight and Left Behind. The idea of bringing so much life to your characters by putting them in several stories that wraparound your grand arc is so exciting and makes me feel like I’m creating my own universe.

What are you working on now?
I’m working on a short story, which should be done around the time of the holidays. This story will serve as a teaser for the next book I’ll be working on next year. I hope to use this to draw in a new class of readers plus raise awareness for Angelites, hoping to increase sales.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
This is all still new to me, but the one site I’ve used is Amazon. I’m just now realizing that there are so much more platforms I could use to attract readers and get my book into the market. Before coming to Awesome Gang I had used Inkitt, which has gained me a few followers already.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Yes: patience, patience and patience. My mistake when I first released Angelites was announcing a release date before the book was finished. Everything was rushed, which is why I didn’t properly research good editors and the cover I designed was mediocre at best. Books are not written overnight. Just make a plan on when to write, goals on how many words to write a day and spend your energy telling your story perfectly. Authors can write hundreds of books because it’s their livelihood, but some became millionaires because of one.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
The best advice I’ve been given was whenever I have an idea for a story to write, make sure you have a beginning and an end first! Once I’m satisfied with those things then filling the void is the easy part. Still hard work but at least you have room to change and edit how many times you want because you already know where the characters are going.

What are you reading now?
Right now, I’ve been reading stories for my kids at bedtime. The one story that has actually grabbed my attention is The Terrible Two. So far the story is interesting and has clever jokes.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Besides the short story I’m writing and the novel next year, I’m not sure. Guess I’ll keep promoting and pushing my current products to see how far I can go. By next year I should know which avenue my writing should be traveling in.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
For the art, I would take Danger Girl graphic novels because I’m such a fan of J. Scott Campbell. For stories, perhaps Mankind: Have a Nice Day because I’m a wrestling fan and I love reading someone’s journey to success, sort of like a boost to keep my morale up when I start to doubt myself. I would take a Batman graphic novel, probably The Killing Joke, still runs chills up my spine!

Author Websites and Profiles
Jan Eleven Website

Jan Eleven’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account
Pinterest Account

James Dusenbery 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Oh boy.. Well, I have a colorful history and come from blue collar roots. I joined the Army straight out of high school. Became a Military Police officer, went to Airborne School, Air Assault school, and have been on multiple combat deployments in Iraq. I have seen many tragedies in the world, and my experiences have caused me a lot of pain. However, God has granted me a unique story and outlook on life and faith that I wish to share with the world. So that is exactly what I am doing with my first book.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Canon of Reason – Genesis. The name is inspired by Matthew 13:11, and I tell the story in great detail in my book. That verse has just stuck with me through life, and after a miraculous event during one of my deployments in Iraq, I decided I needed to tell some of my story.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I do most of my writing on my cell phone, during those few spare moments of time that I have as a full time provider, husband, and father of two boys. I also post weekly on my blog, canonofreason.com, and use it as source material for my books. I take those posts, clean them up and elaborate on them, then organize them in a way that is easily digestible.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
William Lane Craig, Ravi Zacharias, J. Warner Wallace, C.S. Lewis, and so many more. Not to mention the biblical authors!

What are you working on now?
My next manuscript, Musings of an Atypical Christian, deals with many of the tough Christian questions from my perspective. I intend to address more personal issues like evil, suffering in some unconventional ways.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
My blog, canonofreason.com, as well as social media networks like LinkedIn have been priceless.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Self publishing is tough, avoid it if you can! Also, build a social media following and partner with other authors to promote each other’s work. If anyone is interested, feel free to reach out to me on any of my social media platforms or just contact me on canonofreson.com

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Be Better. That’s it, just be better. I think of this as competing with myself. Wherever I am at in life, look at how I want to respond to the situation and ask myself how I could do it better. Then just do it that way. It helps me to avoid reacting on my emotions, as well as repeating the same mistakes or bad habits over and over again.

What are you reading now?
The Bible, The Works Of His Hands, and Crime and Punishment.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Shamelessly promoting my book, promoting my blog (canonofreason.com), and hoping to get a book deal for my next book… just in case anyone out there has some connections…

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Wilderness Survival Handbook, 99 Tips To Better Spearfishing, Underwater Foraging, and the Bible.

Author Websites and Profiles
James Dusenbery Website
James Dusenbery Amazon Profile

James Dusenbery’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Dr K N Bastola 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Although ,I have written a single author encyclopedia that uniquely contains more than 150 subjects and discusses the past, present and the future civilizations of mankind. It is not yet published but is discussed at womenspowerbook.org

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
It is this book “The Wuhan Coronavirus Saga: Post Global Social Financial And Medical Havoc Will COVID-19 Make us Extinct Like The Dinosaurs?”
I am used to writing. I have written many articles that are published in my website womenspowerbook.org True to the encyclopedia itself, there are articles on many subjects – a variety to the curious.
Not loosing the genetic trait, this ebook is also called encyclopedic by its readers!

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
As said above, yes I do. I love writing. Since my style is to write encyclopedic I have to write in a compressed manner. That style is said to be unique by the publisher like http://bit.ly/QC99M

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Not in the writing style.

What are you working on now?
In another ebook that asks the leaders of India, Brazil and the US to declare emergency in their respective countries!! The other one is about the marriage between Islam and the left!!

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
This is my first publication.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Truth and facts are very important in writing. Without freedom of expression there is no progress of societies. But it is not unlimited. But the nit has only two limits as suggested here http://bit.ly/UpV9XI

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Can’t say.

What are you reading now?
I love listening to TV debates.

What’s next for you as a writer?
To publish the encyclopedia.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
I would take my laptop, solar power and wifi!!

Author Websites and Profiles
Dr K N Bastola Website
Dr K N Bastola Amazon Profile

Dr K N Bastola’s Social Media Links
Twitter Account

James Dusenbery 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Oh boy.. Well, I have a colorful history and come from blue collar roots. I joined the Army straight out of high school. Became a Military Police officer, went to Airborne School, Air Assault school, and have been on multiple combat deployments in Iraq. I have seen many tragedies in the world, and my experiences have caused me a lot of pain. However, God has granted me a unique story and outlook on life and faith that I wish to share with the world. So that is exactly what I am doing with my first book.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Canon of Reason – Genesis. The name is inspired by Matthew 13:11, and I tell the story in great detail in my book. That verse has just stuck with me through life, and after a miraculous event during one of my deployments in Iraq, I decided I needed to tell some of my story.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I do most of my writing on my cell phone, during those few spare moments of time that I have as a full time provider, husband, and father of two boys. I also post weekly on my blog, canonofreason.com, and use it as source material for my books. I take those posts, clean them up and elaborate on them, then organize them in a way that is easily digestible.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
William Lane Craig, Ravi Zacharias, J. Warner Wallace, C.S. Lewis, and so many more. Not to mention the biblical authors!

What are you working on now?
My next manuscript, Musings of an Atypical Christian, deals with many of the tough Christian questions from my perspective. I intend to address more personal issues like evil, suffering in some unconventional ways.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
My blog, canonofreason.com, as well as social media networks like LinkedIn have been priceless.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Self publishing is tough, avoid it if you can! Also, build a social media following and partner with other authors to promote each other’s work. If anyone is interested, feel free to reach out to me on any of my social media platforms or just contact me on canonofreson.com

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Be Better. That’s it, just be better. I think of this as competing with myself. Wherever I am at in life, look at how I want to respond to the situation and ask myself how I could do it better. Then just do it that way. It helps me to avoid reacting on my emotions, as well as repeating the same mistakes or bad habits over and over again.

What are you reading now?
The Bible, The Works Of His Hands, and Crime and Punishment.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Shamelessly promoting my book, promoting my blog (canonofreason.com), and hoping to get a book deal for my next book… just in case anyone out there has some connections…

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Wilderness Survival Handbook, 99 Tips To Better Spearfishing, Underwater Foraging, and the Bible.

Author Websites and Profiles
James Dusenbery Website
James Dusenbery Amazon Profile

James Dusenbery’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

David Angeron 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
Published Author: amazon.com/author/davidangeron
Certified Sport Psychology Coach (CSPC)
Certified Stress Management Coach (CSMC)
B.S. in Kinesiology
M.S. in Healthcare Management

CSPC & CSMC accredited by The Certification and Accreditation Board of the American Association of Drugless Practitioners (AADP)

Goals:
Serve God
Love and Honor Family
Help Others Succeed

I am a Certified Sport Psychology Coach and Stress Management Coach that educates athletes on the mental aspects of achieving excellence in sport. More than an educator, I help instill the lessons learned in sport and life, guiding athletes to reach their full potential.

I have 20 years of experience coaching Professional, College, High School, and Youth athletes. My years of research and implementation of sport psychology and learning how to work with athletes of different personality types has contributed to my success in getting the most out of athletes, showing them just how much more they have inside of them to give to their sport.

I credit much of my success to continually working on the mental game and bringing my unique experiences as a multi-sport athlete and professional baseball coach to sport psychology coaching.

Founder of Mental Master Training, LLC which specializes in Mental and Physical Performance training for athletes, I am also the national recruiting coordinator for MyTime Sports, LLC where I use the network built through my years as a professional baseball scout to help athletes advance to college and professional sports.

I currently have 2 books published. 1) THE MENTAL TRAINING GUIDE FOR ELITE ATHLETES. 2) IT’S MY TIME: Understanding College Recruiting and College Placement.

I am also working on 2 new books hoping to have them finished by Christmas 2020. 1) THE GREATEST TEAMMATE: Make Jesus Your Number 1 Draft Choice. 2) THE CHALLENGING ROAD TO SUCCESS.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
THE MENTAL TRAINING GUIDE FOR ELITE ATHLETES. I alway enjoy helping people reach and exceed their full potential. Writing this book was just another way for me to help more people worldwide achieve success.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
N/A

What authors, or books have influenced you?
THE COMPOUND EFFECT by Darren Hardy
GOOD TO GREAT by Jim Collins
ATOMIC HABITS by James Clear

What are you working on now?
1) THE GREATEST TEAMMATE: Making Jesus Your Number 1 Draft Choice
2) THE CHALLENGING ROAD TO SUCCESS: Set Goals, Track Progress, and Reflect on Your Journey to Success

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I am still learning about marketing my books. I currently use a lot of social media ads and amazon advertising.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
My advice is to be patient and stay committed. Its easy to be excited and motivated to start, but its a grid and takes a strong commitment to finish and complete a quality book.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
To be an effective leader, you must be trustworthy. If people don’t trust you, they won’t follow you. And if they won’t follow you, your organization won’t meet its goals. – Quint Studer.

What are you reading now?
FEARLESS by Eric Blehm

What’s next for you as a writer?
To keep writing and inspire people and to keep helping people improve performance through Mental Master Performance APP and mentalmastertraining.com

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Bible
FEARLESS by Eric Blehm
CAN’T HURT ME by David Goggins
UNCOMMON LIFE by Tony Dungy

Author Websites and Profiles
David Angeron Website
David Angeron Amazon Profile

David Angeron’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile

Alicia Reid 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am an educator in Alzheimer’s and Dementia. I am a former Alzheimer/ Dementia, Respites, Hospice caregiver. My products and services focus on Alzheimer’s and Dementia training preparing my students to be knowledgeable in the field. I have created 4 books and three e-learning coures. I prepare my students for working with Alzheimer’s and Dementia. Also one of my courses is built to prepare students to become Nationally certifed in Alzhiemer’s and Dementia.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
A Caregiver’s Guide: Alzheimer’s and Dementia
I had many caregivers ask me how to get started caregiving for Alzhiemer’s Dementia client and what guide could I give them.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
none

What authors, or books have influenced you?
none

What are you working on now?
I’m currently working on building more e-learning courses. I’m also promoting my courses and books for sales and recognition.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
https://www.facebook.com/serenityalzheimersanddementia

#dementia #alzheimers #memory #mind #thinking #serenity #herblove #herbalhealing #brainhealth #caregiversuport #caregiverguide

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Make sure you have a promtion budget set aside. promote before book launches.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Keep pushing. Promote be know! One of the Alzheimer’s Associations Reps told me they could be affilated with me because we work in same niche and my material was competitive because my material was built by me from stratch! whoooa that make me shock and woke me up. Hey I really ahve persoanl experiences to offer and brand. Share with the world. Little ole me competitive with an Huge Org. That gave me more drive than ever. It did mademe feel some type of way. I do need to be sponsored.

What are you reading now?
Im currently reading, The Caregiver’s Guide to Dementia: Pratical Advice for Caring for Yourslef and Your Loved one by Gail Weatherill, RN, CAEd

What’s next for you as a writer?
I will created more books and courses as the sales come in. My many focus is writing content that will GUARANTEE sell.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
My book A Caregivers Guide; Alzheimer’s and Dementia, The Caregiver’s Guide to Dementia: Pratical Advice for Caring for Yourslef and Your Loved one by Gail Weatherill, RN, CAEd, Vascular Dementia by Paulan Gordon, Suddenly your Elderly Parent cant live along by Lee Alley, Ph.D

Author Websites and Profiles
Alicia Reid Website
Alicia Reid Amazon Profile

Alicia Reid’s Social Media Links
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Nathan Marekera 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I was born in Harare, Zimbabwe, in 2000. I have always had a passion for writing since my early school years. Writing essays was my favorite hobby. In both primary and high school I won accolades for best essay writing. So far I have only written one book, my debut fantasy novel STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY: Volume 1, which is the first in a series.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest and first book is STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY: Volume 1. The idea came as an epic love story – the love between a princess, and a commoner. I originally thought of the story as a standalone book. This progressed with time into an epic fantasy and historical romance series. This book was mainly inspired by the first love of my life, a girl who came from a prominent backgroumd, and fell in love with a boy from a lower-middle class family.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
No

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Mostly George R. R. Martin and his epic fantasy series of A Song of Ice and Fire. Also L. J Smith, Aola Vandergriff’s Daughters series, Stephen King, and J. K. Rowling.

What are you working on now?
I haven’t started working on my second book, but I plan on it soon.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Promoting on social media sites like twitter amd facebook.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Plan your marketing strategy before you finish the book and as efficiently as you would do when actually plotting your story.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Dream big, the sky is the limit.

What are you reading now?
A sci-fi and paranormal book called Open Skies,Closed Minds by Nick Pope.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Becoming a bestseller on amazon.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
A Game of Thrones
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
The Vampire Diaries
Daughters of the Misty Isles

Author Websites and Profiles
Nathan Marekera Website
Nathan Marekera Amazon Profile

Nathan Marekera’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account
Pinterest Account

Lin Lustig 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
As a life-long nerd, I selfishly write redeemable villains and subtle magic in plain sight to satisfy my own craving for wild adventures and epic loves. Enter GILDED LIES,my debut book that combines the best parts of X-Men and Sense8. I also have a small publication in an online anthology, and write content for a romantic branching narrative series (it’s under an NDA, but look for news next year!). You can often find me snuggled up with good stories, good tea, and desperately coaxing my bunnies to cuddle. They still refuse.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Gilded Lies was inspired by a lifelong love of nerdy media and a compulsion to tell stories. My degree in film studies gave me an addiction to pop-culture and I needed to share stories with my own spin. The superpowers in the book are often described as mellow X-Men-esque evolutionary abilities, thus the tagline of “Tantalize. Taste. Suck. Such misleading superpowers…” because truly, they aren’t what you’d expect.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
You mean other than obsessively? My process isn’t particularly unusual, but my expectations are. I’ve tossed eight different full manuscripts before even approaching Gilded Lies. Then I rewrote it four times and used two different editors. It’s so bad my friend said, “You’re not a half-assed queen, you’re a full-assed queen.” Little does she know how accurate that description is in multiple ways.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
I’ve had a huge author crush on Darynda Jones for a while now, as well as Rainbow Rowell—I mean she basically wrote a gay Harry Potter! Patrick Rothfuss is an inspiring delight whenever you can get him in a room, and I’ll follow Gail Carriger everywhere, and not just for her style! Basically when an author is willing to lift up others, I love them.

What are you working on now?
Currently I’m tacking book two and three in the Frequency Series. It will be a four book series in total (yes, I’m big on planning), but each book is in a very different stage. The multitude of ideas feel like popcorn popping in my head. I’m also contracted to write a script for a secret game project. It’s so freaking fun.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I LOVE Pinterest. Probably because I’m on there constantly. That, and my cover is gorgeous in my totally biased opinion. I selfishly love watching how many people save it to boards ranging from comic books to digital art. My artist, Robert Ball, has done cover art for a number of NYT bestselling books and I’m so grateful he was into the idea of taking on Gilded Lies. An amazing cover makes a huge difference! And mine is clearly amazing

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Don’t stop writing. Write a thing, toss it aside and write something else before you even look at it again. Study writing books, learn plot structure, gather a group of fellow writers close to your skill level and learn together. Whatever you do, keep creating. Keep pushing your limits. Keep learning.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Always be learning. There is no mastering this craft, and things will always change. Having flexibility and willingness to go with the flow is essential to sticking with it.

Follow your intuition. If you learn early how to listen to it, it will be a reliable guide through the dynamic landscape of writing and publishing. Watch and learn from others, digest the information, and spit it out in your own uniquely creative loogie.

Embrace your weird. Felicia Day has a whole book on this (which I highly recommend) and it’s a refreshing look at why you NEED to be a little (or a lot) weird in this world.

What are you reading now?
Several craft books by Chris Fox, David Gaughren, and some resources by Sarra Cannon (remember that always be learning tip? Yeah, that’s me). For fun I’m really into Hank Green’s An Absolutely Remarkable Thing—what a cool look into the intensity of being a high level influencer in the middle of a contemporary sci-fi adventure!

What’s next for you as a writer?
What isn’t? This is just the beginning. I have the rest of the Frequency Series to publish, a game script to complete, and a big dream of living off my income as a writer. Plus I really want to have a booth at a comic-com someday (spend all day talking to my people? YES PLEASE), but that’s not an option for a while, because pandemic.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Crap. I hope at least one would be a survival guide because otherwise I’d be doomed. Hmm. Perhaps Red White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston. Carry On by Rainbow Rowell. Aaand some kind of massive anthology of all the Sailor Moon manga—don’t judge. It’s awesome.

Author Websites and Profiles
Lin Lustig Website
Lin Lustig Amazon Profile
Lin Lustig Author Profile on Smashwords

Lin Lustig’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account
Pinterest Account

Casey Bering 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I live in Western Colorado and work full-time in manufacturing. My day job keeps me on my toes and I’m usually exhausted when I get home, so I try to do most of my writing between 4 and 6am. I have written and published one novel and I’m hard at work on a second. I’m fortunate to share my life with my wonderful husband and our pack of rowdy rescue dogs.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Heroan, the first in The Hale Gunslinger series, was inspired by so many things. I adore Stephen King’s Dark Tower series and Joss Whedon’s Firefly, and I started imagining what life would have been like for a woman who was raised to be a gunslinger. The more I played with the idea, the bigger it grew, and the story of Cameron Hale took shape.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Every time I tried to write a novel in the past, I would get hung up on the first few chapters. I would read and edit, read and edit, and make zero progress beyond trying to make those first pages perfect. Now, I never write directly in my book file. I keep a notes file where I’ll write for a few days, then I’ll transfer all but the last 500 or so words into the novel file. I only open the novel file to paste the words into it

What authors, or books have influenced you?
I’ve been influenced by every author I’ve ever read. A few that come to mind (and in no particular order): Agatha Christie, C.S. Lewis, Stephen King, Kathy Reichs, Adrian J. Walker, Hugh Howey, Andy Weir, Erin A. Craig, Nnedi Okorafor, Gena Showalter, Nicholas Sparks, Nora Roberts, Dennis E. Taylor, and Rosamund Hodge.

What are you working on now?
I am currently writing Book 2 of The Hale Gunslinger Series.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
So far, Amazon ads have been the most beneficial, but I’m exploring other options as well.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
This is advice I heard/read, but I can’t remember where now: Treat your work-in-progress like Fight Club. What’s the first rule of Fight Club?

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
The very best – best of the best? You can’t edit a blank page. Whatever you do, keep writing. Dive in, don’t look back, and keep writing until that first draft is done. It’s okay if it’s akin to a trash fire. That’s what first drafts are for.

What are you reading now?
Project Dandelion by Heather Carson

What’s next for you as a writer?
Finishing The Hale Gunslinger Series and learning more about marketing and self-publishing as I go.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
This list changes from month to month:
Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King
The End of the World Running Club by Adrian J. Walker
We Are Legion (We Are Bob) by Dennis E. Taylor
Artemis by Andy Weir

Author Websites and Profiles
Casey Bering Website
Casey Bering Amazon Profile

Casey Bering’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Gerald Hogg 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am originally from Bedford in England but I grew up in Middlesbrough.
In the mid-1950s, when I was four years old, my parents took me to Jamaica to live which must have planted the seed to travel in me, as I have been travelling ever since. I have lived in ten different countries and worked in five-star hotels and restaurants around the world as a chef. I have also worked on cruise ships, Antarctic supply ships, a gold mine in Papua New Guinea and the Falkland Islands after the war with Argentina. I have now retired to Thailand where I live on the beautiful island of Koh Samui and travel extensively throughout South East Asia researching my travel books.
I have written eight books in total, five of them in my Retirees Travel Guide Series. The first book I wrote in the series was the”The Retire in Thailand Handbook (The First Six Months)” and was published by Austin Macauley in November 2019,
My other three books are a novel; “Thai Died…Murder in Paradise” my biography, “You will never amount to anything” and “The Deptford Mask Murders” which tells the story of how in 1905 during a bungled robbery Alfred and Albert Stratton murdered two people and were later tried, convicted and hung when fingerprint evidence was allowed to be entered as evidence for the first time in the UK in a capital murder trial.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
The book is called Thai Died…(Coronavirus has came to Koh Samui but so has another killer). I started to write this book in April 2020 when I was in self-isolation after I contracted the coronavirus. For me, the virus was just like a normal dose of the flu, but for millions of people around the world they were not so lucky. While I was in lockdown and seeing the effect the virus was having on the world I decided to write a suspense novel that was centred on Covid-19 that would highlight the difficulties and frustrations that any police force would face when trying to solve a major crime during the worse pandemic in over 100 years, when most of the population, except for essential services were told by their governments to stay home to stop the virus from spreading. The book is about a murder in Koh Samui here in Thailand with links back to the notorious Ronald and Reggie Kray the foremost perpetrators of organised crime in the East End of London during the 1950s and 1960s.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Being of a certain age I didn’t grow up with computers but I have certainly had to adapt to them since I started writing books. I do most of my writing thanks to a laptop and the wonders of Wifi sitting on a beach or around a swimming pool in Thailand or some other Southeast Asian country. Quite often when the sun is going down my inspiration is helped along with a cocktail or two.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
The first books I remember reading were the Just William series of books by Richmal Crompton. As I matured I read everything Charles Dickens wrote and all of The Hobbit series of books by J. R. R. Tolkien, I also loved Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. My daughter was born in 1974, and as she grew older I would read Watership Down by Richard Adams to her at bedtime. Looking back now it was probably a little scary for a little girl, but she loved the book as much as I did. Being at sea for much of my life, books were an important source of entertainment in the few leisure hours that you get working on a ship. I would read everything that I could get my hands on, from Agatha Christie to Ernest Hemingway, from Nevil Shute to Leslie Thomas. My favorite authors of today are James Lee Burke, Elmore Leonard, Dennis Lehane, Kate Atkinson, and Khaled Hosseini. I also like to read any travel-related books especially anything by Michael Palin and Bill Bryson. I don’t think any author actually influenced me; I just loved losing myself in a good book.

What are you working on now?
Now that the coronavirus travel restrictions have been lifted in Thailand, I am driving around the country doing research for my next book that will be about Thai women who work in the lady-bars and massage shops in Thailand, Its a tough job but someone has to do it.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I have recently published a website as it seems a necessity in this day and age. Apart from that, being a retiree and of that certain age I am not very knowledgeable about computers and social media, so I rely on word of mouth and hopefully my publisher getting my name out there. I know I must be missing out on many selling opportunities but I find the whole social media thing rather boring and time-consuming.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
As I am a new author myself there is not much advice that I can offer. Just keep doing what you’re doing; even if you don’t get published you’re still improving your mind, enjoying what you’re doing and fulfilling an ambition. My brother John, who was a much better writer than I will ever be, tried most of his life to get his books published and never succeeded. I wrote my second book in 2017 (the first book I wrote was never meant for publication) and I was offered a publishing contract for it within a few months of releasing it on Amazon. What I discovered since becoming an author is that getting a book published is quite often down to luck, being in the right place at the right time and of course writing a great book.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
“Travel whenever you can. The greatest experiences are seeing other cultures and getting a real perspective on life and the lives that other people lead”. Which is the way I have always tried to live my life. Many people live in a bubble and are not aware of what is happening in the world around them.
When I was in Cambodia recently researching my book, I spoke with a lady who was just forty-two years old the same age as my daughter. Her father was arrested, imprisoned and later killed by Pol Pot’s henchmen for the crime of being a teacher. When she was one year old, with her mother, older brother, and sister, they were forced marched 330 kilometres from their home in Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville to work on a communal farm. Her mother died along the way of sickness and malnutrition and she was separated from her brother and sister, and she would never to see them again. She was taken in and raised in impoverished conditions by another family who had befriended her mother on the long march south. Being born in Cambodia during those murderous days she had not had the opportunities in her life that my children or grandchildren have had. She had no education, no real family, and had been working as a prostitute since she was fourteen years old to survive. It certainly put everything in perspective for me. You don’t see the real world by watching it on the television.

What are you reading now?
I am going back to some of the books that I read when in my teens. I have just finished To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and I have just started Catch 22 by Joseph Heller.

What’s next for you as a writer?
I normally write my books in the wet season here in Koh Samui (October until December) but because of the travel restrictions laid down by the Thai government and having to stay home over the last six months due to Covid-19 I have been unable to travel to do research. I am going to take a few months off to do some travelling and hopefully get inspiration for my next book about Thai working ladies.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Blah Story by Nigel Tomm. It’s reputed to be the longest book ever written. I am not sure if I would enjoy it but it has 7312 pages so it would last a while whilst waiting to be rescued. It’s probably cheating but I would take the boxed set of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. How to Survive on a Deserted Island by Tim O’Sheid would be invaluable and for a little light entertainment Adolf Hitler; My Part in His Downfall by Spike Milligan.

Author Websites and Profiles
Gerald Hogg Website
Gerald Hogg Amazon Profile

Gerald Hogg’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile

Danielle Martinette Briers 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a South African author. Although I have always loved reading, I did not always envision myself as an author. I obtained my honors degree in biochemistry and pursued several years in teaching science to high school learners, before allowing myself to dream about being an author.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My book’s name is : She’s as good as dead. I had the idea for my first book form over several years before I realized that it is a story that should be told. Before that, I mostly just wished that someone would write a story like the one in my head, because I wanted to read it!

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I write best when I am in my pajamas.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
My ultimate favorite author is Mary Higgins Clark. I have devoured every one of her books.

What are you working on now?
I am busy with the next book in the Lara Jones series (the sequel to She’s as good as dead).

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Finding helpful websites such as AWESOME GANG.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
There will be many moments that you doubt that your novel is worth reading. Just make sure that it is something that you wish you could have read!

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
The line between impossible and the possible is never drawn for you.

What are you reading now?
I dug up some of Mary Higgins Clark’s books from before I was born, and I am currently reading them.

What’s next for you as a writer?
I hope to add several books to the Lara Jones series before figuring out which stories also needs to be told.

Author Websites and Profiles
Danielle Martinette Briers Amazon Profile

Elizabeth Andrews 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
After attending Art college I worked in advertising then set up a small business producing art cards for various retailers. I became interested in local folklore and began compiling tales from around the country, adding illustrations as I went. This was published as ‘Faeries and Folklore of the British Isles, a follow up to this was ‘Faerie Flora.’ I then expanded the legends of the country and turned them in to works of fiction; this started the Psychic Sisters series. I have also written a small collection of children’s illustrated books.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is called ‘The Doll’ it is the latest installment of The Psychic sisters series; it was inspired by a visit to an antique shop where I found an old creepy doll.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I write in longhand first before transferring it to my laptop.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
First book that I ever read that scared me to death was The Devil Rides Out by Dennis Wheatley so I try to achieve that feeling when I am writing myself.

What are you working on now?
The fifth in the Psychic Sisters series, From The Ashes.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I use Facebook mostly to promote my books.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Keep going, have faith in yourself and proof read a lot.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Don’t be afraid to ask a question

What are you reading now?
The White Raven by Diana L Paxson

What’s next for you as a writer?
I fancied writing a romance novel

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
The Lord of The Rings by Tolkein, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and the SAS Survival Handbook!

Author Websites and Profiles
Elizabeth Andrews Website
Elizabeth Andrews Amazon Profile

Elizabeth Andrews’s Social Media Links
Goodreads Profile
Facebook Profile
Twitter Account

Susan Guinn 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I have written four books, but this is the first I have published on Amazon. It’s been an interesting journey trying to do internet research on how to indie publish this book. Its title is WHEN HEAVEN SIGHS, and it has taken me about 18 years to finish it! I was working and raising a daughter then came up with so many health problems. I’ve just retired and finally got it finished. I hope everyone enjoys reading it.

The other three books are a murder mystery set in Middle Tennessee, a science fiction book and a sequel to WHEN HEAVEN SIGHS.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My debut novel’s name is WHEN HEAVEN SIGHS and is a murder mystery set with the eclectic spiritual atmosphere of Nashville, Tennessee, Music City USA. I was searching for a closer relationship for myself to God, and during that process, I got to experience and get to see a wider segment of my Christian community. I love Nashville and grew up there. In this book, I have tried to give a feel for what it is like to live there in a city with such a creative atmosphere.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Yes, inspiration always seems to hit me early, like 3:30 or 4:00 am in the morning. It seems like that is when my mind is clearest, but it can get a little tiring. Afternoon naps can help!

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Lee Strobel’s book The Case for a Creator is fantastic. Eric Metaxis’ book on Bonhoeffer was good. I enjoyed Dee Henderson’s murder mystery titled When I Sleep.

What are you working on now?
The sequel to WHEN HEAVEN SIGHS which ties up some loose ends from that novel and presents another major plot development. I also am working on hopefully publishing right before Christmas a children’s book called The Christmas Tree Angel. Plus I have a blog site where I love to leave some of the poems I write.

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I’m so new at this I don’t have an answer to this question yet.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Work at your craft diligently, and see if you can find some helpful books on novel writing which is what I did. Use research on the internet for any problems you have.

What’s next for you as a writer?
Keep on developing the books I have already started until I can get them published.

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Bible, Lee Strobel’s book The Case for A Creator

Author Websites and Profiles
Susan Guinn Website

Wally Wu 

Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am an aspiring writer and a happy Doggie Daddie. I have written six novels so far and working on another right now called Tats.

What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book is called Almost-A-Ghost and what inspired me was the paranormal and the world out there we cannot expericence with our five senses but maybe sometimes we can.

Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I love writing at night and with lots of activity and noise around me.

What authors, or books have influenced you?
Burroughs, Grey, and the like.

What are you working on now?
I am working on a Chinese fantasy book called Tats and man is it a doosey!

What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I am pretty new in the game so, it would be your website primarily.

Do you have any advice for new authors?
Just keep writing no matter what life throws your way.

What is the best advice you have ever heard?
NEVER GIVE UP ON YOUR DREAMS. Just write your way out of your problems, no matter what they are.

What are you reading now?
I am a tales of Narnia guy and I am back to square one with the first novel in the series.

What’s next for you as a writer?
A website!

If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Robinson Caruso, Survivalist guide, how to cook and make stuff in the woods, especailly how to make coffee. And my Bible of course!