Another Healing Goodreads chat

Hi everybody, and welcome to my blog if you haven’t been here before!
Today, March 15th, everybody who signs up to follow my blog and leaves a comment on this post (so I’ll be sure not to miss you) will be entered into a drawing for a free copy of Another Healing. I will draw TWO winners late this afternoon. You can join my followers on the right sidebar — scroll down a ways.
Also, today I’m hosting a live Goodreads Chat today from eleven to one, EST, and if you pop over there, you’ll find a coupon code for 25% off Another Healing and “all other paranormal titles” at Dreamspinner Press, good for today and tomorrow! How’s that for a deal? You can get there by clicking HERE
You can also follow me on Facebook and now on Twitter!
And there is a link to my YouTube Channel, where you can watch my book trailers HERE
I am absolutely thrilled with the response that Another Healing is getting. It hasn’t even been out a week yet, and it’s getting good reviews. Overall, people agree that it’s an unusual book. I’m totally good with unusual. To me, it’s an important book, and  it says some things about people and life and love that I’ve learned and want to share. It’s taken me three years to write it.
I want to take this opportunity to thank some folks for their help: 
 My editor Liz at Dreamspinner (for untangling the plot) the artist Brooke Albrecht (who created the beautiful cover) and everyone else at Dreamspinner who has been so kind and patient. I also want to thank the one and only Kate (for trying to control my runaway imagination) the ELFS (my on-line writer’s group) Brian and Aaron (for being such wonderful example of love) Dogan in Turkey (for inspiring me with the way he’s not afraid to risk his life to stand up for love and peace) Deb (for always being there) my family and friends (for putting up with me always being on the computer and being distracted for no apparent reason) and Whisper and Pumpkin (who ALWAYS know when I need a furry kitty cuddle).

Goodreads Chat

Okay, quick reminder!

Tomorrow morning, eleven to one, EST, I’ll be hosting a Goodreads Chat HERE

It’s my first time. Very excited and hoping I do it right!

Dreamspinner Release Party Thank You!

I had a wonderful time yesterday hosting the release party on the Dreamspinner Press Blog. Since I knew I would be at school all day, I set my posts to go automatically every few hours. I checked the blog from my phone during lunch and was thrilled to see that I was getting comments. It’s always so hard to know what to make posts about, so when you realize that people are actually interested, it’s a wonderful feeling.

As soon as I got home, I jumped onto my computer and pretty much spent the evening there, responding. Some people were new to my writing, some had read me before. Believe me, writers really do care what people think about them. At least, I do.

Four years ago, I entered the publishing world with The Glass Man. Now I can’t imagine what my life was like before — it’s fundamentally life altering. Scary as hell, but worth every second.

Tomorrow’s the Big Day!

Another Healing, almost here!

People have already reserved copies of the novel! I’m so thrilled! Thank you!

The first twenty people to order a paperback will get an autographed copy. And you’ll have the good feeling of knowing you have a copy of M. Raiya’s first novel in print! How cool is that? I confess, I can’t wait to get mine! (Can you tell I’m a little excited? There really is something about a novel being released that just isn’t like anything else in the world.)

Tomorrow, Monday, I’ll be hosting a release party on the Dreamspinner Blog. Pop in, say hi, and read my babbling about why this story is deeply personal to me, a kind of healing in its own right. There will be a give-a-way drawing. I’ll be posting some photography and an excerpt and all kinds of good stuff.

Here’s a link that will take you there tomorrow (well, it will take you there today, too, but I won’t be there yet):

HERE

Here’s a link to where you can preorder your copy so it will be heading your way as soon as possible:

HERE

Can you tell I’m really, really excited?

Another Healing Getting Closer!

Next Monday is the big release day! This novel has been part of my life for so long that it’s really scary seeing it about to take wings. I keep comparing it to my daughters leaving for college. Subbing it a publisher was like sending them to Kindergarten. That was the point where other people who weren’t family really became part of their lives, which took us all some getting used to. But when they’re off to college, especially in another state, you know it’s never going to be the same again. Another Healing is truly out of my hands now, and that really freaks a writer out. I keep reminding myself that Another Healing has been very much fussed over by me and a lot of people, and I’m giving it a nurturing send off — on Monday, I’ll be hosting the Dreamspinner Blog all day, and on Saturday, March 15th I’ll be hosting a Goodread’s chat from eleven to two, EST. That’ll be a great chance to come and ask anything you want to know. More details soon.

And, I’m pleased to announce, I finished a rough draft of my next novella, Natural Instincts, last night. I wrote it in just over a week and had an absolutely wonderful time doing it. It’s a little of everything — canoeing, camping, nature, and BDSM. I couldn’t be more different from my main character (he’s actually good at math) but getting to know Kyle has been amazing. Looking for himself, he finds Jon, who is a whole lot more than he ever expected. If you like loons, this story is for you.

Notice — The Book Trailer!

Finally, after all these years, I got around to making a book trailer for Notice. I figured with all my new and improved trailers going up on my YouTube Channel, I’d probably better make one for Notice.

To watch it, click HERE
I think it’s really pretty.

And click HERE to see the trailer for A Sky Full of Wings

And HERE for Night of Ceremony.

It’s Another Healing Month!

Only ten days away! March 10 is the big day!

I’m celebrating by having a release day party on the  Dreamspinner Blog that day, and hosting a live Goodreads chat on the 18th. More details on both to come.

In the meantime, you can preorder your copy  HERE

Watch the book trailer on YouTube HERE

The first twenty folks who order print copies will get a special, autographed edition!

I’m doing a little happy dance right now!

The Making of the Silver Pearl Book Trailer

The new and improved book trailer for Silver Pearl is now up on YouTube! (Okay, it’s just slightly tweaked, but whatever.)

You can go to my YouTube Channel HERE

I thought I’d share a little behind the scenes look at how I made this one.

My first step when I make a trailer is to write the script — in other words, the words. It looks like a poem when I’ve finished, just scribbles in a notebook. Then next to each line, I jot down what photos I want to use with it. I decided when I first started making trailers that I would only use my own photos because I didn’t want to have to deal with buying other people’s and worrying about copyright laws. This isn’t really a problem for me, because I have hundreds of photos on my computer — my own personal stock photo collection. For years, I’ve never gone anywhere without a camera, and the things I like to photograph lend themselves to the things I like to write, so it’s surprisingly easy to find photos that evoke the feelings I want to show in the trailer. None of my trailers have any real people in them. I think in some ways, it’s more powerful to evoke a mood and let the viewers’ imaginations fill the rest in.

Once I have my script, I make a list of photos I need to take for this particular project and then do a photo shoot. For Silver Pearl, I only needed three new images.

One was easy — I needed photos of a pearl. I used one of my earrings and a red washcloth for a nice background and to hide the post. The next was easy, too. I needed a photo of a van. We have one in our garage, and it was already dirty and scary looking. I shot a close up of the sliding door, which is unique to vans, and fit with the line about Joel being dragged inside

The last image was a lot harder. I wanted some photos of arrows. I didn’t have any arrows lying around, but my father-in-law is a hunter, and he lent me a couple. He wanted to loan me a bow, too, but I explained that didn’t need one. Fortunately, he knows me well enough not to think I’d completely lost my mind. I picked a couple serious looking arrows meant for deer hunting, which was close enough to unicorn hunting for me, and headed home.

My next problem was how to photograph them. My first thought was to stick them in the ground, but that wouldn’t really be dramatic enough since you wouldn’t see the arrowhead. Not only that, but there was snow on the ground, and my story doesn’t take place in the winter. So I decided to photograph them in the air. I got my camera ready and threw an arrow into the sky. Obvious problem — it was going away from me, and I wanted it coming it at me. Second problem — it fell faster than I could focus.

So I got my teenage daughter to help. She’s used to her mother doing some pretty strange things in the name of art, but this took the cake.

“You want me to throw arrows at you?”

“Well, not at me, kind of over me.”

“You do know the wind’s blowing, right?”

I nodded.

“And if you go in the emergency room with a arrow sticking out of you, I’m going to end up in jail and you’re going to end up in a psychiatric ward, right?”

I envisioned calling my publisher to explain and bail us out. For a moment, I hesitated, then I told her to go ahead and throw the arrows.

It was a little scary, considering I was using a telephoto lens and it made the arrows look a lot bigger and closer. But I got half a dozen good shots and did not have to do the final edits for the story from a padded cell.

Once I had all my shots, I put them together in a file and worked on each one — cropping and adjusting the color balance and that kind of thing. My father had a dark room when I was a kid, so I learned how to do all that a long time ago. Doing it on a computer is so much easier. I really changed up some of the photos a lot to give them the mood I wanted, especially the shots of the “hidden meadow,” which were taken in normal daylight that didn’t show any mystery.

Then, finally, I uploaded them all into Windows Movie Maker and dragged them onto the timeline in the right order. Then I typed in the text, deciding whether to go on the image, or before it. Then I put in transitions — in this case, all fades — between each photo. Then I added effects — in this case, all zooms. I wanted to keep this video very clean and simple and not flashy. This part takes hours of tiny tweaking to get everything to happen at the right time and not have titles coming in on top of each other.

Finally, the music. Again, I have to be really careful to find music that is free and available to be used for commercial purposes as long as I give proper credit. I go into the process with just a general idea of what I want, and a pretty clear idea of what I don’t want. I simply listen to a lot of selections. When I hear the right one, I know it. I heard this piece by Tom Fahy and didn’t have to listen to any others. I downloaded it, added it to the timeline, and that was pretty much it.

Some trivia: the shot of the moon through the dead tree limbs I took one day hiking in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom — a wild, rugged part of the state. I also got the photo of the path later that same day. The shot of the moon in the dark over the water is a place where my husband and I stopped to eat some subs we’d just bought near the Lamoille River on our way to visit his parents for the evening. The two waterfall shots came from a hike I did in the White Mountains of New Hampshire a few years ago. The shot of the pretty green mountain is interesting. It’s called Camel’s Hump, and it is one of the Green Mountains here in Vermont. I originally took this shot as a possibility for the cover of my novel Notice. It didn’t get used, but I really like it, so I slipped it in here. I had a hard time not getting any power lines in the photo. I was pulled off on the side of a very busy road when I took it. See what a dangerous business writing can be?

The shot looking down on a lake is actually in Acadia National Park in Maine. The barn is on our family farm, as is the shot of my mother’s irises. The apple blossom buds are from the trees on my front yard. The “hidden meadow” is also my front yard. The starbursts are from a day I was fooling around with a new filter. The close up of the pine needles is in front of my neighbor’s barn — the nice out of focus dark background is the wall. And the owl is a Barred Owl, which I took through my kitchen window a few years ago.

So all these photos were taken over the course of probably five years and in three different states, and some of them at grave personal risk to the author. In a lot of ways, they are much harder than writing the story. But I love making book trailers — they combine writing and photography and music, all of which are really important to me. In some ways, they feel like little mini works of art in themselves. Do they help sell my stories? I hope so. In any case, they are loads of fun to make.

For purchase information about Silver Pearl, click HERE