Why I Love Pinterest!

I'm not very good at social media. I usually have flurries of activity where I'm tweeting and posting things on my Facebook page everyday, then I drop off the grid. Sometimes it's because I'm knee deep in a writing project, sometimes it's because I'm busy with real life stuff but the rest of the time I'm not sure what happens. Do I forget? Do I have nothing interesting to say? Have I been abducted by aliens? Possibly. But when conventional methods fail there is always another shiny new social media outlet to tempt me and this week, it's Pinterest.

"But Claire," I hear you telling me. "Pinterest isn't new. It's been around for ages."

"I know," I say, hanging my head. "But I thought it was just a bunch of people posting recipes and wedding dresses."

So yes, that was the extend of my interest in Pinterest. It was non existent. After all, I have no need for recipes since I don't cook and I'm not exactly a dress kind of girl. But one day last week I read a blog post (sorry but I don't remember whose blog it was) about how great Pinterest was for authors and decided to check it out.

What I found was an endless parade of pictures, great pictures, awesome pictures. So I created a board for my book My Deliberate Mistake and I started pinning things. Photos of lakes, drowning girls, pills. It was so cool! I was able to pin gorgeously haunting pictures of the Olsen twins. Even though they don't really act any more because they are busy being brilliant business moguls, I still think they would be perfect to play Ana and Julia in the movie adaptation. It was like creating a story board for my book and I loved every minute of it. (I also wasted a couple of hours in which I should have been writing but never mind!)

I love Pinterest! I think it may turn out to be a great tool for writers block. I can pin things for my work in progress and get ideas for where the story is going. It also lets me show you what's going on in my head when I write the book. Things I visualize about the story. But the cool thing is that the things I visualize may not be the same things you do and that is what makes reading so great.

So I encourage you to make your own My Deliberate Mistake boards. Pin things that you thought of while you read the story. Maybe we'll even pin some of the same things. Two minds momentarily joined through reading and writing!

I have a new board for my soon to be released crime thriller but right now it's secret. Don't worry though, I'll be revealing it soon. I can't wait to share it with you!

Check out my Pinterest page here

Why Genre Hopping Is Bad (and I don't care!)

Writing has rules and we all know rules are stupid. Don't head hop, get rid of those pesky adverbs, always end a sentence with a period. Okay, those are all pretty good rules but you know what they say. Rules are meant to be broken. Except genre hopping. They say it's bad. The worst. Career suicide. I don't know who they are but I do know that they're pretty opinionated about it.

What is genre hopping you ask? Well let's say you want to buy a book. You go into your favorite bookstore, or at least you did before they all closed down, and you walk to the section where all your favorite books are. Now that might be science fiction or thrillers or romance. There they sit on the shelves all shiny and new with the authors names on the spines and flashy covers. The books you want to buy. But what if your favorite author of space opera just wrote a historical romance. Would you read it? Probably not. But how about an action adventure novel? An apocalypse novel with aliens? What if someone recommended it to you? I like to think you'd take a chance. I know I would.

As a reader, I like to read a lot of different genres. As a writer, I never even think about what genre I'm writing in until the book is almost finished. You see the story comes to me one piece at a time, like a jigsaw puzzle I'm putting together in my head. Now all my books are dark and twisted. You won't find me writing a straight romance or a comedy. That's just the way the words come out. But you may find my books straddling the lines between thrillers/suspense/horror and who knows what else. I hope you'll take the leap and follow me down the path of words I leave behind.

In a couple of weeks I'm hoping to release a book I wrote last year. This is a crime thriller with a plucky, damaged private investigator and a serial killer who wants her dead. It's not new adult. It is what it is. I have an awesomely scary cover for it which I'll be revealing in a few days. Honestly, it's really creepy. I think you're going to love it. And I'm also still working on my dark fantasy. I hope when that book is finished, you'll follow me there too!

Beneath Paper Cranes is free!

I have a new short story up on Amazon and to celebrate it's free today and tomorrow (April 12th and 13th). So download away because it's free and what's better than free? Nothing, that's what! And if you like it, please leave a review. Indie authors don't have the backing of a big publishing house so we rely on you, the readers, to spread the word. Which is kind of awesome!

Another cover reveal - Passion Potion by Mary Beth Daniels!

Another cover reveal! This time we have Passion Potion by Mary Beth Daniels! It's on my to read list. Make sure you add it to yours!

Passion Potion 

by Mary Beth Daniels Publication date: May 1st, 2013 Genre: New Adult Paranormal Romance

Jet is a Nix, the daughter of an Enchantress who went outside her bloodlines. No one helps a Nix, and even though her father is in deep trouble with Dei Lucrii, a dark Enchanter who paid her family an extraordinary sum to make a passion potion, Jet has no way to fix the powerful spell that killed her mother. But someone is watching her. A very handsome someone whose face appears in a pewter bowl her mother always kept close by. Could the boy be the secret to avoiding the curse of the Nix? Or is he the sort of distraction Jet REALLY can’t afford at a time like this? Passion Potion is a paranormal new adult romance from the author of the romantic comedy hit Heteroflexibility.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mary Beth Daniels is a writer and photographer in Texas. She is a huge fan of Ellen Degeneres, a rabid stalker of Nathan Fillion, and she can't mention how she feels about Chris Hemsworth without risking a restraining order. Mary Beth is also the author of the hit romantic comedy Heteroflexibility and cites Strawberry Shortcake & Friends as an inspiration for her hair colors.

Cover Reveal for V.J. Chambers new book!

Check out this cover reveal for the awesome new book by V.J. Chambers! I don't know about you but I can't wait to read it! Sign up below if you want to be on her mailing list and get notified when the book is out.

Like your torrid professor-student affairs with a side of gothic magic?
Crimson, by V. J. Chambers, author of the Jason and Azazel series and Slow Burn Professor Carter Alexander may have a sharp tongue and a reputation for reducing freshman acting students to tears, but he's gorgeous. He's the man of Teagan Moss' dreams. Literally. She's been having dreams about him since she was thirteen years old. Yes, those kind of dreams.
Teagan's been sheltered, hidden away by her crazy aunts and her even crazier mother, all of whom have cautioned her that the man in her dreams wants to hurt her. But Teagan doesn't believe in their stories of power and evil.
All she wants is to be normal for once.
One night, she's compelled out of her bed by a force she doesn't understand. She finds herself across town on Professor Alexander's porch.
And he's kissing her.
New Adult Paranormal: Intended for mature audiences due to explicit sexual content
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Goodreads Giveaway!

I'm giving away a signed copy of my book on Goodreads. Click below to enter. Good luck!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

My Deliberate Mistake

by Claire Svendsen

Giveaway ends May 06, 2013.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

The Next Big Thing Blog Hop

I've been tagged in a blog hop. Imagining bunnies with paint ball splats, hopping across your screen? Yeah, me too but apparently that's nothing to do with a blog hop at all.

Last week I was tagged by Catriona Crehan. You can check out her blog here http://www.catrionacrehan.blogspot.com/ She has a new book coming out on May 1st called The Color Keepers.

So on to the questions.

1. What is the working title of your book? 

Limbo. But I'm sure it will change or at least morph itself into something else along the way.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

Usually the ideas just pop into my head. I think they come from the great big story bank in the sky.

3. What genre does your book come under?

Good question. Because I start with an idea and run with it, I never really know what genre the book will fit in until it's finished. But if I had to guess, at this point I'd say New Adult Dark Fantasy.

4. What actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

I'm really bad at imagining people playing my characters, probably because I'm still learning about them as I write. However, if I had to choose I'd say that Robert Downy Jr should play all the characters because he's awesome and has clearly shown us he knows how to rock a dress so the female parts shouldn't be a problem!

5. What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

Ash expects to jump to her death but when she ends up in Limbo she's forced to make a choice; become the leader they've been waiting for or save herself. 

6. Is your book self published, independently published or represented by an agency?

Self published 

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

It's not finished yet. I'm about half way through and I'd say I've spent about two weeks on it. 

8. What other books would you compare this story to in your genre?

As I don't like to read books similar to mine when I'm writing, I couldn't say. But if Hugh Howey's Wool and the movie Constantine had a baby, this would be it. 

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I don't question the how or why. I just let it unfold naturally!

10. What else about the book might pique a readers interest?

Well they'll be sex and death and weird mutant Limbo creatures. Plus a pretty and/or gross looking cover! But basically anyone who's ever wondered what might happen when you die should read this book. And if you've never wondered something as macabre as that, then you probably shouldn't be reading my books anyway!

So that's a wrap. This was just as painful as I thought it would be and I hope I never get tagged again but now that I've said that I'm sure I'll be tagged about a million more times! I'm supposed to tag five new victims ... I mean volunteers but since everyone who's ever written a blog has been tagged already I only have one person. Check out their blog next Thursday to read all about their next big thing!

http://amsterdamassassin.wordpress.com/