In this fun series genre clichés endure. But amid the humor are some good ideas, if only that in avoiding all the empty clichés, we can create something good.

Costa has been a frequent guest contributor at TheReconnection.com and her short story, “Petrels and Terns,” was published in Wordsfest Franken Zine, Vol. 4.  Her health articles have appeared in Bowen Hands, the journal of The Bowen Therapy Academy of Australia. In her former career as secretary, she was a ghostwriter of countless business letters in which “Dear Sir” and “Yours truly” featured prominently, and she wrote “The Wellness Corner” column for an in-house corporate newsletter.

After leaving the steno chair, Costa maintained a private holistic health practice and wrote two health blogs before shifting to fiction writing where she often incorporates her previous experience into her stories.

At Sarah Selecky’s Writing School, Costa’s writing style was diagnosed as ‘Deeper Than You Think,’ a term coined by Selecky and defined as “deceptively straightforward and carefully crafted” and “more philosophical than you let on.”

Costa grew up on a farm in Perth County, southern Ontario, where she enjoyed the solitude of country living. She filled her hours reading books under the back yard maple tree while trying to ignore her pesky brothers. Attending her rural elementary school, she received solid instruction in grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure, some of which she still remembers. She now resides in London, Ontario.

“Breathing With Trees” is a coming-of-age story about a young teen raised in the world of holistic health. She is faced with making adult decisions around informed consent, while trying to discover the name of her father and the name of the classmate that has been calling her names. There is also first love and some magical elements.

He graduated from Medical School at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). He moved to London (Ontario-Canada) with his wife where he practiced Medicine for more than 40 years.

Today, in retirement he re-discovered his passion for writing. Due to his daily interaction with patients he learned a great deal about the complexities of mankind that he reflects in his first novel

“A new beginning “A second chance in life”. This book reflects his lifetime experience on the diversity of human behaviour.

Besides writing he is also an avid cyclist and enjoys carpentry using old reclaimed wood.

Website

Book

  •  Imagine that suddenly there is somebody living inside you who you who hasn’t been invited with a different personality that creates conflict in your life.

•  This is the story of a group of people that underwent this experience

  •  All of these people lived in a community and developed interesting interactions in spite of their differences causing scenes of humor, sadness, friendship and love that will keep you entertained and capture your imagination.

 •  Don’t be surprised if you feel identified with some of the characters, this might keep you reading until you find out what happened.

Facebook Author page:
Crime Writers of Canada page:

Books

A story of friendships forged in a time of crisis; of honour, and integrity.
Set against the backdrop of the D-Day invasion of France, an old man’s dying confession reveals an intriguing tale of theft, unflagging loyalty, murder and soul-searching redemption.
The unveiling of this family secret sparks a compelling quest as a dutiful son endeavors to complete his father’s final wish. The touching journeys of both father and son initiate a captivating series of unexpected life-changing events for everyone concerned; far greater than they ever imagined.

St. Patrick’s Day is generally a quiet affair in the conservative university town of London, Ontario. For Detective Tee Pepper and his partner, Rupert Wallace, the assignment to locate a missing coed takes a quick turn when the young girl’s murdered body is found–all signs pointing to the work of a serial killer. In a case like they’ve never had before, a series of clues that seem to be directed towards them lead the two detectives deeper into the twisted psyche of a clever opponent.

In the midst of a summer heat wave, London, Ontario is rocked by the senseless deaths of five teenage girls. A few weeks later, two suspicious deaths occur on the same night. Are the incidents related? Detective Tee Pepper, and his partner, Rupert Wallace, are assigned as primaries on the case. Pepper and Wallace must use all their ingenuity and deductive reasoning to try and wade through a complex array of suspects.
Can they shuffle the deck and pull out the guilty card?

Books

Angel, Jon-Erik, Tina, and Joey have fought to protect everything they have from the evils of the tyrannical businessman Richard Rasmussin, but a dangerous circle is quickly closing in on a deadly confrontation.

A chill wind is ripping through the streets of Toronto and it’s up to four fearless friends to upend a plot that could very well be the city’s downfall. And given the determination and martial arts skills of some of them, they may send the town’s corruptors literally flying. Meter of Deception, a nail-biting edgy debut novel, delivers a dynamic new twist on the Action/Thriller genre with unbridled fun, Ninja action and a scintillating story. Things are getting very dicey at the Foxy Fire Strip Club. At first, twenty-something Jon-Erik and his best buddy Joey are sure they have discovered a slice of heaven there in the form of super-hot, kick butt stripper Angel and her gorgeous friend Tina.

This highly anticipated sequel to author Wolf Schimanski’s debut novel Meter of Deception finds the fearless foursome comfortably settled into a domestic paradise. Jon-Erik and Angel as well as Joey and Tina have settled down and are engaged to be married, and the men are working together as partners in Joey’s family furniture business.

But corporate shark Richard Rasmussin has his sights set on their business, and he’s determined to swallow it whole. A ruthless, underhanded, crooked man, he’ll stop at nothing until he takes hold of the business, and he’ll do whatever it takes to make sure that no one interferes with his larger, wide-sweeping wicked schemes.

Cultural differences and the challenging environment ignited in him fresh perspectives, inspired a new way of being and fueled his soul searching. The experience changed the direction of his life and is at the core of his autobiography: “Awakening in the Northwest Territories.”

When he left the north two years later, motivated and passionate about helping others less fortunate, he went to Bangladesh for two years as a Cuso International Development volunteer, followed by a placement in Nigeria.

Candas grew up in Toronto where she raised her family and worked extensively in the social service sector.  Her career covered numerous private and public services including early childhood education, employment management for persons with disabilities, environmental advocacy, and community development.  Her journey eventually took her to London, Ontario where she continued to follow her passions to serve her community.

Alastair met Candas one day by chance, fell in love, and with a shared passion to improve the lives of others, they set off together on a new path of adventure in volunteering and travel. They went to Jamaica and Guyana on one year Cuso assignments, and in between placements, backpacked Central America and S. E. Asia for 8 months. These experiences were so personally rewarding that they felt compelled to write two memoirs: “Go For It – Volunteering Adventures on Roads Less Traveled” and “Go For It – Budget Backpacking for Boomers”, to share their adventures  with fellow “Boomers” to inspire and motivate them to “Go For It.”  

Just when they thought their volunteering and writing days were over, they found themselves deeply embedded in a First Nations culture (the ‘Namgis) in Alert Bay B.C. on another 4 month Cuso assignment and with lots to write about. What they learned about the social injustices inflicted on First Nations people by the governments of the day so impacted them on a deep personal level that they felt obliged to share their enlightenment with other non-aboriginal people. “Tides of Change –Volunteering Adventures in Alert Bay, B.C” is the fourth memoir in their “Boomers’ Adventures” series.

To sell their books, they present an entertaining audio/visual story-telling show (readings accompanied by music and Power Point) to audiences throughout S. W. Ontario.

Books

Book One:  Awakening in the Northwest Territories

Book web Site: http:///www.awakeninginthenorth.com

Ordering information:

Indigo.ca:http://tinyurl.com/AWNTChapters

Amazon.ca:http://tinyurl.com/awakeningintheNWT-amazon

Amazon .com:http://tinyurl.com/kjmrq5t

Barnes and Noble:http://tinyurl.com/ANWT-BandN

Friesen Press: http://tinyurl.com/anwt-friesen

Book Two:  Go For It – Volunteering Adventures on Roads Less Travelled

Book web Site: http://www.goforitvolunteeringadventures.com

Ordering information:

Amazon.ca:  http://tinyurl.com/GFI-Vol-AmazonMAZON

Chapters.indigo.ca: http://tinyurl.com/GFI-Vol-Chapters

Book Three:  Tides of Change – Volunteering Adventures in Alert Bay B.C.

No book web site yet.

Ordering information:

Amazon.ca: http://tinyurl.com/jzxc95s

Book Four:  Budget Backpacking for Boomers

To be published in December 2016

ALL BOOKS ARE AVAILABLE TO PURCHASE DIRECTLY FROM THE AUTHORS

Alastair Henry  226 700-7305

Candas Whitlock 226 224-1834

I always wanted to be a storyteller. At recess time I would gather some of my schoolmates and entertain them with stories—some of my own, others just summaries of books I read. My life, however, took a different turn, and I ended up following a career in information technology (as Professor Irene Gargantini). This over, I reverted to my old passion: plotting intrigues and mysteries and creating romantic or passionate encounters. I took several e-courses on fiction writing and began jotting down my tales. So far I have written ten novels, several short stories and co-authored a novella. The genre varies from romantic suspense to thriller. See www.vermeil.biz and renenatanblog.wordpress.com.
As an author, my goal is threefold: having fun in writing, entertaining the readers and offering them an uplifting vision at life.

Honors
Second place, the 2015 Five Star Dragonfly Book Awards for The Woman in Black
Silver Medal, the 2015 Global Ebook Awards for The Loves and Tribulations of Detective Stephen Carlton 
Honorable Mention, 2014 San Francisco Book Festival, for Fleeting Visions
First place, 2012 Five Star Dragonfly Award for the Blackpox Threat
Finalist in the 2011 National Indie Excellence Award for the Blackpox Threat
Honorary Mention, 2012 San Francisco Book Competition for the Bricklayer

Books

Lemoncella Cocktail is the story of a young man who, by saving a teenager from drowning is drawn out of his comfort zone and into the fight against arms dealers working in Canada. Action, 2016, 

Fleeing Visions is a thriller centered on underage prostitution (nothing graphic, though). Louis Saura, orphan at the age of two and raised by an old uncle, becomes prey to a vicious criminal. 2013, http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HNG53LU (ebook and softcover)

The Loves and Tribulations of Detective Stephen Carlton (ebook, romance) is centered on the life and misfortunes of a man of the law who falls in love with the wrong woman: a female athlete on the run. 2015.

The Woman in Black, dedicated to all parents of handicapped children aims at entertaining the reader while portraying the hardship of coping with a mentally retarded girl who becomes a mother. 2014, 

The Bricklayer is a thriller. Everything is going well for Frederick Dalton, until he hires a female engineer in his construction company. Thriller, 2012, http://www.amazon.com/Bricklayer-Rene-Natan/dp/1466404019 (eBook and paperback)

The Blackpox Threat is a spy story. Her country threatened by a deadly epidemic, Tamara Smith moves from her comfort zone to a world filled with deception, treachery and life-threatening danger. 2010, 

The Jungfrau Watch is a political thriller. A young man is raised to believe that communism is the panacea for all the problems of the world. Then the Soviet Union collapses, exposing all its crimes. What chances has a person like that to redeem himself? Available from the author.

The Red Manor (Omnia vincit amor) is about family bonds that stretch over two continents; here love overcomes both greed and cleverly engineered criminal plots. Romance, 2008, http://www.publishamerica.com (softcover)

Fire Underneath the Ice (a novella coauthored by Sharon Crawford under the pen name Natanevin) is a love story. Revenge is supposed to be sweet, but when Michael Hamming decides to take it out on the daughter of his nemesis, he finds love instead. 2010

The Collage (romantic suspense) describes the anguish of a young woman accused of a murder she hardly remembers of having committed. Creative Guy Publishing, 2004

Mountains of Dawn is about an orphan who wanders from foster home to foster home with no place she can call home. Suddenly she comes into money—but the people who killed her parents are now after her. www.smashwords.com/books/view/205088 (ebook)

Books

“From the Bottom of My Heart” — Amazon Canada

“From the Bottom of My Heart” — Amazon US

Recently, we here at LitWorldInterviews.com conducted a survey,“Why do you put a book down?” and through the assistance of the writing community we had a very nice response. Now it’s time to share what we found.

First, I want to say why the survey was conducted. We wanted to help writers by giving them the information they most need. If a reader takes the time to check out your book and don’t like it, they are unlikely to give you a second chance with your next work. First impressions mean a lot.

86.30% of those responding were Female, thus leaving the remaining 13.70% Male. Considering the majority of those reading novels are Female, although not quite this extreme, I’m comfortable with sharing what we found.

There were 34 sub-categories as a result of the survey. Those results were then placed into 5 main categories: Writing, Editing, Proofreading, Taste, and Other, with Writing providing the largest number of sub-categories and results.

68.49% of those responding noted some form of dissatisfaction with Writing as a reason for putting a book down.

26.03% gave Editing.
23.29% gave Proofreading.
17.81% was Taste.
2.74% was Other.

Let’s take a look at the Writing sub-categories first.

The above pie chart shows the concerns in descending order of greatest number of mentions. The story being Dull was the most frequently mentioned problem with 25.29% of the mentions of the Category. Followed by actual Bad Writing, then Dull or Unbelievable Characters, Info Dump, and uses  of Profanity.

Let me speak about Profanity for a moment, this along with Gore, Violence, and Sex were all mentioned in the context of being included in the story for no apparent reason. Most of those who noted it as a concern stated they know these things occur in books, and even have a place, but the problem arose when the author was using them as obvious crutches in an attempt to hide poor writing and plot.

The subcategories of Writing Concerns as identified by readers are as follows in descending order: Dull, Bad Writing, Unbelievable Characters, Info Dump, Profanity, Over Describing, Violence, Weak Narrative, Confusing Beginning, Unexpected Sex, Gore, Weak Story, Bad Dialogue, Dashes, Racism, Poor Relationships, Head Hopping, Repetition, and Writing with Dialect Accents.

What does this tell us? The first thing that jumps out to me is that we as authors aren’t putting out books with stories that are capturing the attention of the reader. With a book done with professional intent behind it, a dull story should be the reason our books are not read. That’s right, we are not read because we just didn’t do a good job of telling our story. Maybe we didn’t have the right beta readers. Maybe they were too nice. Maybe they just went through the motions. Maybe they just aren’t that good at the task. Or maybe we should recognize our work isn’t that good. How about all of the above?

Let’s look at Editing Concerns

There were four subcategories for Editing Concerns: Actual Bad Editing, Plot Holes, Sentence Structure, and No Scene Breaks for Time Lapses.

The bad thing about writing a novel is the author knows everything that is happening, even behind the scenes, the back story the reader never sees, and the in between scenes that happen. The problem this creates is hopefully caught during editing. A good editor can save a book from disaster. Fresh eyes see old mistakes that the author overlooks each time they’ve gone through each of the five drafts they’ve done.

An Editor is not responsible for rewriting a novel. I want to make that clear. They take what a writer gives them, looks for plot holes, sentence structure, weak story development, and things of that nature. They are not a Proofreader. I think people confuse the two, but having been associated with a professional Proofreader who has guest hosted here on the site, I know the difference.

If you pay an Editor they are to give you the tightest and most entertaining story they can from what you’ve given them. Of course you, as the author, can disregard everything, but that would be a foolish thing to do. I have a writing mentor who edits some things I give her at times. I take some of what she offers and disregard others because of the importance of what that means to the overall story, a story she isn’t fully aware of yet.
Notice I didn’t throw everything away, and I took into consideration what she said about the part I disregarded. I changed things to make that part seem more relevant to the story at that point, without giving anything away.

But what we get from this part of the survey is that readers notice editing of a book. The idea of not editing a book crosses the minds of Indie Authors. We’ve been through the book a dozen times. We know it’s just fine the way it is. Note the sarcasm I said those last couple of sentences with. I’m not saying it’s impossible to edit your own work, but you would have to be able to step away from the work long enough to see it with fresh eyes, several times. At least that’s my opinion. You also have to become slightly detached from this labor of love, in some cases.

Proofreading Concerns

There isn’t a need for a chart here. There were two sub-categories: Proofreading (66.66%), and Grammar (33.33%).

I have to say, this is an area I notice a lot in books. If there are proofreading problems in a book, they take me out of the story, out of the world created by the writer. Every book has a proofreading error, or perhaps a printing error, not so much on the printing these days with the modern printing methods, but back in the old days of typesetting, errors happened.

I’ve read several books for the purpose of reviews and I have put some down because of the proofreading problems. I honestly don’t think there was any proofreading conducted. You might get past the dull story, even some bad editing, but when you are constantly tripped up by spelling errors, punctuation, and all of that, you eventually become tired of it all.

Taste Concerns of the Reader

There were 7 different sub-categories placed under taste: Slow Beginning (30.77%), Tragic Ending (15.38%), Difficult Vocabulary (15.38%), Too Much Detail (15.38%), Back Story (7.69%), Genre (7.69%), and Cliffhanger Ending (7.69%).

You won’t find two readers with exactly the same taste. They may have a discussion and it sounds like they are the same, but put five books in front of them and have them read them, I would be willing to bet you would get different opinions.

Some books, due to the nature of the story and world, may require a slow beginning. The trend is to jump right into action to capture the reader’s interest, but perhaps your story doesn’t fit that type of trend. Difficult vocabulary may be part of how a certain character speaks.

But I understand what the readers are saying. Sometimes the way things are done, they are not necessary. I think when it all makes sense, a reader is fine with it, but just as when people throw profanity or gore into a story, sometimes these tastes, other than perhaps genre, are signs of weak storytelling and plot.

Other

There were only two that fell into the Other category: Having the book available for Screen Readers, and Having a Misleading Book Description.

I think these are two very valid reasons to not read a book. As my eyesight fails I know it becomes more difficult to read. Some will say just get glasses, but this is due to medications I must take. Eventually, I will likely not be able to see at all. But I love books. It would be a shame to not buy a book because it didn’t work with my screen reader.
As for a misleading book description? It may be the opinion of the reader as to the misleading nature or not. If it truly is misleading, I think the book needs removing or at least the description updated.

Conclusion

What all did we learn from the survey? Good writing and story, with good editing and proofreading will make for a page turner

Revising Old Books