An interview, or a plot

I recently did something a little…different.  I organized a meeting  between the characters in my books, Awaken the Demon (Draco and Missy) and The Naughty Angel (Ariel and Edison) because I felt they had a lot in common. Edison and Draco are both demons, and Missy and Ariel being very similar in personalities as in being more passive, yet being strong determined women. Because Edison and Ariel are wanted by heaven and hell for treason, this encounter had to be cloaked for their safety. The meeting took place at Draco and Missy’s mansion, which Draco equipped with plenty of guards for their protection.

Because I secretly recorded them, the discussions below are written down,  so you will have to use your imagination as to what they are doing as they speak. Here is a rundown of what occurred.





***************************************************************
Draco: Welcome to our home. I hope your travels were uneventful?
Edison: Thanks to your guards and the cloaking spell. Wow, this place is incredible.  Bet you hold some pretty awesome parties here.
Missy: We’re really not much of the partying type. I must say, I’ve never been in the presence of an angel before. I’m quite…uneasy.
Ariel: There’s no need. I’m no different than you, really.
Edison: Don’t let her sweetness fool you. She can be a nasty bitch when she wants to. Ouch!
Draco: I must say, when Shiela came to me with the idea of having us meet I was quite hesitant.
Missy: “Hesitant. You threatened to disembowel her.”
Draco: As well I should. Just the thought of me being in the same room with an angle is preposterous.
Missy: Please forgive my husband. He can be a bit of an ass at times.
Ariel: I understand the concern. When I heard she wanted us to meet with the two of you I was very nervous. You are, after all, Draco, a descendant from Satan himself.
Edison: I was thrilled and couldn’t wait to meet you. I’ve heard all the tales about you, good and bad. It’s an honor to finally meet you.
Ariel: You’re drooling, Edison.
Edison: You would drool too, if you were in the presence of Jesus. Aw, fuck, I don’t mean to compare you to Jesus. That was stupid.
Missy: Relax Edison. We understand. Can I offer the two of you a drink?
Edison: Hell yeah. Scotch, neat.
Ariel: Water will be fine for me, thank you.
*Feet shuffling. *Glasses clinking. *
Ariel: I must admit, I really don’t understand Shiela’s motivation in having us get together. Thank you.” *Sounds of sipping.*
Missy: She is a baffling woman. I found trying to get inside her head and figuring out her motivations frustrating. She put Draco and I through so much, twisting our stories about, changing what actually happened to her liking.
Draco: I told you long ago, my love, that I could control her mind and have her tell our story properly.
Missy: “And I told you to leave her be. She’s entitled to her creativity even if it is—“
Draco:  Wrong. She made me sound so…passive.
Missy: She put the event in which you killed Vincent in the book despite my pleading for her not to.
Draco: And she made it seem so tame.
Missy: She wanted readers to like you, not fear you.
Draco: I am to be feared.
Missy: Yes, dear.
Ariel: She left out some key points in my story as well. Deciding to do a one night stand took a great deal of deliberation for me. She made it seem like it was nothing for me to turn on my beliefs and my loyalties and take a man to my bed whom I would never see again. I struggled for months with my decision.
Edison: And I am forever grateful for your decision.
Missy: Was it hard for you both to turn on your beliefs and leave your families behind in order to be together?
Ariel: You would know better than anyone what love can do. No, it wasn't easy for me to step away from my kind, but at the same time, I couldn’t deny my needs any longer.
Edison: Boy does she have needs. Let me tell you, this woman is a hell of a lover. The things she does to me— Ouch! Why do you keep pinching me?
Ariel: Because you keep saying stupid things.  I felt Shiela made me a little too slutty—and if you open your mouth to that demon I will strike you down.
**Snickers**
Missy: I wonder what she has done with her other characters.
Draco: I heard she created a bunch of vampires who fight on the good and kill their own kind.
Edison: Get out! That is messed up. Tame vampires. *Snorts*
Ariel: I could search them out. It wouldn’t take much time for me to gather them.
Missy: That’s an interesting thought.
Ariel: Isn’t it though.
Edison: We could gather everyone together, get their take on her and then write a tell all book. Shit, if she can do it, we can do it.
Missy: But how could we do this without her knowledge?
Draco: Leave that to me, my love.
Missy: You have wanted to control her since the first edition she wrote of you.
Draco: Damn straight!
Ariel: We don’t want her harmed, though.
Draco: I won’t harm her. But it might be fun toying with her a little.”
Missy: Draco, behave.
Edison: Why do you think it is that she likes taking the bad and making it good?
Draco: Human nature. They always want things to have a happy ending.
Ariel: Well, she did give us all a happy ending didn’t she. I mean, sure, she changed us a little, altered some of the facts, but in the end, she gave us what we most desired.
Missy: Love.
Ariel: Exactly.
Draco: Fine, she brought love into our lives, but come on, she tamed us. She made demons and vampires friendly. That’s just not right
Edison: You got that right. I suppose these vampires don’t drink from humans, do they?
Draco: Only from their mates.
Edison: That is sick.
Draco: So are we all in agreement that we should gather the others and write Shiela’s story?
Missy: Ariel: Edison: Let’s do it.
Draco: Then it’s set.

********************************************************************

Quite something, isn’t it? Here I thought getting a few of my characters together, ones I thought might benefit from each other was a good idea. Little did I know they would plot against me.  Sigh…If anyone knows of some good protection spells, please give me a call. I’m going to need them.

Check out Awaken the Demon, book 1 in the Demon series and The Naughty Angel, a 1 night stand book.

Website: www.shielastewartsbooks.com
Purchase: www.champagnebooks.com
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Naughty-Angel-Night-Stand-Story-ebook/dp/B008P2NT8K/ref=sr_1_5?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1516305742&sr=1-5

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Awaken-Demon-Book-1-ebook/dp/B0051PDUG0/ref=sr_1_7?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1516306098&sr=1-7

The Holidays When You Aren't Quite Into It

It's that time of year again. The time of peace, happiness, Christmas carols, and egg nog. However, it's also that time of year for crowded stores, endless sweets, and empty bank accounts.

Normally I'm not a scrooge. In fact I'm quite the opposite. I usually love Christmas! Everything about Christmas would make me happy. It's always been my favorite time of year. Unfortunately this year I'm just not feeling it.

My girls are now teenagers so the beautiful fantasy of Santa Clause has now disappeared which means a lot of the "magic" of this time of year has dissipated as well. I miss the lists for Santa, the kids writing letters to him, and yes I even miss that damn Elf on a Shelf. It makes my heart sad to see all the pictures of everyone's Elf and ours is tucked away somewhere. Poor Nicky.

As many mothers of teenagers know that the gift requests have also gone from easy toy lists with tons of items to requests of game systems that cost a whopping $300 and that's before the game to actually play! And when you have three teenagers all requesting big ticket items it definitely hurts the wallet. I know they don't have to have everything they ask for but I've always been one to go big or go home on Christmas so that's what we try to do but now instead of seeing tons of gifts under the tree there's only 4 or 5 per teen since everything they want is so pricey. Just takes away the illusion a bit for me.

My husband and I did manage to go take a 'just us' trip up to Opryland Hotel for an evening. It was beautiful BUT also crowded with most people not knowing where they were trying to walk to but all in all it was a nice getaway.

I'm trying to get more in the mood for Christmas as it gets closer but at the same time each day there's something new that I forgot or need to make along with keeping up the house and keeping the teenagers alive. Combine all of that with the day job and I'm just drained of all holiday spirit. Although I'm trying to hide that from my kids.

However, I did manage to add a couple new books to my TBR list. Like I need anymore. But I'm really looking forward to these. Links below....

The Woman in the Window  by A. Finn -- Really looking forward to some down time so I can actually read this. It doesn't release until January 2nd but it's available for pre-order.

The Wife Between Us by Greer Hendricks & Sarah Pekkanen -- Releasing on January 9th but is available for pre-order. 

The English Wife by Lauren Willig -- I haven't read a historical story in quite some time but this one I'm going to have to. It seems to interesting to pass up.  -- Releasing on January 9th but is available for pre-order.

I know I'm sure I'm driving you nuts since the books mentioned above are all pre-orders so here ya go...

The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty -- I can't pass up a book with that title. Just can't. Plus, love her! Available now!


I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season!! Send some cheer and joy my way while you're at it. ;-)

Hugs,
Amber

Never write while sleep deprived

**Yawns** forgive me if I ramble a bit today. I’m going on day three of having very little sleep. No, I have not been up all night writing. That would be nice.  I’ve had a few rough days and nights dealing with some personal issues. Enough said. Anywho…back to what I was talking about. Writing with very little sleep. Have you ever done it? Did you actually accomplish anything? Were you able to read it?

The reason I ask is that I have written while on little sleep. And trust me, it was not readable. But at the time, I had a great idea and it couldn’t wait. I had to write it now. Since I couldn’t sleep, I sat in my living room, laptop ready and began to type like a mad woman. The ideas rolled out of me in a flow I’ve never felt before. I couldn’t type fast enough, my fingers flew across the keyboard like lightning.  As I wrote I told myself this was the one that was going to take me to the top. Three hours later I had several chapters done and sleep was calling. I saved the document, then staggered off to bed. Despite being dog tired, I was hyped up about the epic novel I had just started. For the first time in days, I slept like a baby.

I should have stayed asleep.

Excited, I woke, ran to my laptop even before having breakfast and opened the document. I stared at the screen, blinking as if that would change what I saw before me. Nope, nothing changed. It was still crap.  There wasn’t a single sentence in the five chapters that made sense. I kid you not. Picture yourself, eyes closed, typing away. Now open your eyes. How well did you do? Probably better than I did while sleep deprived. My sentences looked similar to this.

Asdjoiefn gruhlasd ueoihas sa[ksdnkcfpos

Seriously! Yet in my mind, and in my sleep deprived vision I saw sentences of great writing. Paragraphs that were off the charts.

And do you think I could remember any of the idea when I woke? Nope, not a trickle came to me. How is that possible? People do strange things while sleep deprived. I wrote the greatest crap story ever written. I’ve learned my lesson. If I’m too tired to think, or I’ve gone days with little sleep, I don’t write.

When a Writer Stops Writing

I've been writing for a very long time. I believe it started in middle school with short stories and poems. Then I got married, popped out a couple babies, moved out, got divorced, graduated college, then decided to write again.

I've spent the last six years writing off and on. I've even published a few books, then unpublished a few books, then finally left my two favorite novels published on Amazon. It's true what they say, "No one is more critical of you than you."

People ask me why I unpublished some stories and frankly it's because I didn't feel as they were up to par. My heart wasn't in those stories, not really. To really pour my heart and soul into a story it needs my undivided attention. Sure I've written before while having a day job but my day job then was a lot less demanding than it is now. I used to eat, sleep, and breathe my stories but now it's become harder and harder to dive back into that world.

So what's a writer to do when there's nothing to write? Study? Figure out the answers to life's biggest questions? Learn how to paint? Become a conspiracy theorist? Cook? Who knows?

What I do though is blog. Blogging has saved me a few times. Every time I feel that spark begin to light back up again but I don't have the time to dedicate to writing a full blown story I'll blog or write a little and move on. Life has wrapped it's hands around my throat and has taken control between the day job, the family, the house, and studying for my real estate license I'm spread completely thin. So blogging gives me that outlet I so desperately need.

Do I always know what to blog about? Hell no! As I'm typing right now every single word is finding it's way to the screen without much thought put behind it. What you see is what you get. But that's what I like about blogging. It doesn't have to be perfect, it doesn't have to be edited, it just has to be real. (Some editing may not be a bad idea but nevertheless you get the point.)

I also read. Again, when I can. I try to focus more on the shorter stories or novellas because as bad as it sounds I just don't have the time to dedicate to a full blown novel. Maybe one day I will or maybe during the holidays I'll cram in some reading time but right now I just don't have it unfortunately. I've been desperately wanting to read Colleen Hoover's new book 'Without Merit' but I haven't had a chance to crack open the first page. I've downloaded it though. ;-)

I've fallen in love with the Misadventure series. If you haven't heard of it please go here and look it up --->   Misadventures FB Page

The latest book in this series is Misadventures of a Valedictorian. I haven't read this one yet but the others are fantastic! They have a new book released every week and these stories are full of hotness!!

Misadventures of a Valedictorian

This is what I believe most writers do who find themselves unable to write. We blog, we read, we spend time on Facebook jealous of those who can still write, we find ourselves at book signings and events soaking in the sweet air of creativity, and we promote the authors that we love. Because that's what this community does for each other. 

Thanks for reading! If you are looking for me I'll be over here eating cake, drinking wine, and attempting to study for this damn real estate exam.

Hugs,

Amber

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