Luke: The Angel of Healing

The Angel of Healing, Luke, was actually born a human, long after the rest of the races had been created. He showed tremendous compassion, and worked alongside the Goddess Lumise to eradicate the plague, before he knew her true identity. They grew fond of each other, and she saw his stubborn, unrelenting way of healing those infected, the way he refused to give up hope. As such, Lumise worked with the other Gods and Angels to elevate Luke from a human to an Angel, whereupon he joined them in the Garden of Luas.

Though Luke was once human, his appearance is something of a mystery. There are no records of anyone seeing him in person, which may have something to do with his lowly upbringing.

The Angel of Healing is known best for his ferrying of souls to the Garden of Luas, and his healing of those souls in mourning. He watches over those transitioning to the Garden of Luas, having done something very similar himself, and cares for those that have lost loved ones, as he did for his own family when he joined the Gods and Angels.

He is closely associated with springtime and renewal, and his direct descendants are the Knowledgists. Like him, they constantly seek to understand what they didn’t before, looking to elevate themselves as he did. As such, many libraries and monasteries dedicated to knowledgists are built for Luke.

Not much is known of his demeanor, though he is suspected of being the same driven, compassionate man he was when he met Lumise.

Publisher Interview: Andy Lee

After reaching out for author interviews and guest blogs in a women's writing group on Facebook, I met Andy Lee, one of the founding members of Pub518, an all-female tiny press in New York. We decided to exchange interviews, and got to know a lot about each other along the way!

You started Pub518 back in 2016. What was the turning point for your group that finally made you decide to go into publishing?

The four of us met during NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) in 2014. I’d done it seven or eight times before, finished it three times. Shannon Kauderer, one of our co-founders, is the Area Leader for Albany NY, she does an amazing job setting up neighborhood write-ins and other events. We kept up our friendship, and our write-ins! At one point, we were moaning about how hard it is to get published. One of the prizes for completing NaNoWriMo is the opportunity to send in work to publishers and editors, but even those folks rarely get published. We decided we wanted to open up opportunities for local writers, many of them are really good! It really has taken off, in terms of submissions, the hard work now is selling enough books to pay for the next one.

What hardships did you face when building Pub518 versus the difficulties or issues you may face now?

Our first year was full of potholes! None of us had ever started up an LLC before, so it was a sharp learning curve getting our business and tax status squared away with New York State and the Federal Government. We also spent a lot of time figuring out what we wanted to do, or start doing, with Pub 518. Obviously we wanted to give local and other writers a chance to get in print, but we also wanted to create a quality product, and we didn’t want to go ‘boutique’, charging writers to publish their work. We decided to initiate a Kickstarter campaign to get the money for our first anthology, Dark and Bitter (https://smile.amazon.com/Dark-Bitter-518-Publishing-ebook/dp/B077QNV838/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1548269800&sr=8-2&keywords=Dark+and+Bitter). That was a pretty intense time. There was a lot of excitement generated around the anthology, and people were amazingly supportive. Even Neil Gaman tweeted a link for us!

Now things seem a little calmer, we know what we’re doing a little better, but there are always ripples we are dealing with. We switched to a new web server recently, and have to make more time for conferences, workshops, readings, and other events. Trying to sell books to make enough for the next publication is a challenge. We’re thinking about taking on individual novels, which is a lot to add, since none of us are able to dedicate ourselves full time to this. So far, all our profits have gone right back into more publishing, paying for advertising and recouping expenditures for conference and other expenses. Our second book is Exploits in the Adirondacks ( https://www.amazon.com/Exploits-Adirondacks-Shannon-Yseult/dp/1720619905/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1548272830&sr=8-1&keywords=exploits+in+the+adirondacks ), it came out last year.  Our third is already in production, we’ve been reading submissions and will be out later this year.

As publishing is a full-time endeavor, how do you manage to balance work and writing creatively?

None of us work full time at this, none of us could, yet! We divide up the work, and most weeks all we have to take care of are our marketing commitments. Obviously we get busy when it’s time to decide which submissions get into the next anthology, sending emails, marketing, and so on, We can only give the time we have. We make time to attend conferences and fairs, as well, to sell our books and to network. There are a lot of little details that we divide and conquer. Finding writing time for all of us is a challenge. We still meet weekly, not just the four of us, all the NaNoWriMo folks! It’s a super supportive community of people. I go when I can, and it’s always very satisfying when I can make progress on my own work.

You have a degree in Creative Writing and Anthropology, as well as an MFS in Forrest Science. How did having knowledge in such different fields help with your career and/or personal works?

I’m not sure it’s helped much with my career, but having a diverse background has been a real blessing in many ways. Mostly, it’s fed my curiosity about things, from human culture to ecosystems. How things work, especially interactions, interdependencies. I love when I write about something, delve in and mine a gem, bringing up a little nugget of understanding that I can share with others. It’s so satisfying!

All the women that are on the executive board for Pub518 have such different collegiate and career backgrounds. How does that influence the jobs you do at Pub518?

Not sure how we decided who does what, it’s more about what we were good at, how much time we each have, and what we want to learn how to do (because we all had to learn a LOT). We all have a lot of respect for each other, we’re different in a lot of ways but it’s brought a vastness to our interests and skills. I think Pub518 has seen some terrific success so far because we each bring a fresh and deep perspective, and commitment, to our work.

How does your work differ from that of a larger press? What are the pros and cons?

Pub518 is a Tiny Press. Our intention is to give unpublished writers a chance to build their resume. We don’t charge (we try to compensate at least a little), and we provide final editing (we do an initial read and recommend edits that the author has to do) and a cover as part of our service. It’s really satisfying to get to know these wonderful writers who haven’t yet been ‘discovered’. Authors may not get much money from us, not right now anyway, but we do try to get out in public, market the books, and give folks a chance to start writing more professionally.

Book Spotlight: The Shady Side: Shortcut to Uneasy Street

In an attempt to broaden my reading horizons, as well as connect with other authors, I reached out to people in writing Facebook groups I belong to, asking if anyone wanted to guest blog on my website. That was how I was introduced to this book and I have to say, I was not disappointed.

Noble does a fantastic job of weaving the supernatural and macabre into a suburban-esque setting. Her characters are compelling, and each story (this is a collection of six short stories) is as interesting as the last.

I want to spotlight my two favorite stories here. The first is "Defensive Driving." It follows the story of a man who cannot, for the life of him, stay calm behind the wheel of a car. It certainly doesn't help that his truck is named The Beast, either. When he's gifted a hula dancer to put on his dash, things seem to look up. But, of course, the peace doesn't last for long. Noble manages to create an interesting story in just a few short pages, keeping the readers guessing as to what the insidious factor of the story will be.

My second favorite is "Wrath," simply because it's told from the point of view of a crow, and there's a hippie woman who reminds me a lot of Cosima from Orphan Black. It's seriously one of the more interesting stories to unpack, but I won't give any of it away.

Noble has 160 published works ranging from poetry to nonfiction. And I bet each story is as artfully crafted as the last. I thoroughly enjoyed reading these stories; they reminded me of the ghost stories I used to read in summer camp as a kid, the ones where you'd put a flashlight under your chin and try to frighten all your friends.

Do yourself a favor, if you're into horror and suspense, grab yourself a copy of this book. The nostalgia, alone, should be enough to compel you. And if not, Noble's artful writing surely will be.

You can get a copy of the book on Amazon, grab the eBook, or visit her online at www.shannonraenoble.com.

World Building

I recently drafted a blog post about world building. As I was putting my thoughts down on paper, I realized it was a bit difficult to put everything down about world building that I knew. It’s such a person-specific topic that it’s hard to give general advice. So, rather than post that jumbled mess, I figured I’d break down how I do world building and try to give some advice along the way.

First, I want to preface this by saying I got a minor in history when I was in school. I focused on holocaust studies and histories pre-American Civil War. All of this plays into my novels.

Most of my books have historical settings, likely as a result of my love for history. But also, because it’s much easier to modify a setting/time period that already exists. Let me explain.

When you write an alien civilization or create a world that doesn’t currently exist, you MUST ground your new world in something human. If your world, your characters, even your names are too alien, your readers cannot connect and will therefore lose interest. Think of it like you’re a scientist trying to explain your new discovery to a room full of high schoolers. Some will understand the complexities you’re talking about, but the majority wont.

It’s great to have things that are otherworldly, and alien, and manifestations of your incredible imagination. But at the same time, there must be something recognizable embedded in there. Which is why I like to use historical settings in my novels.

You can take something that already exists and change it to suit your needs. For example, in my standalone novel I’m working on, I have an alien civilization that lives on a watery moon in a made-up solar system, but their town is inspired by Colonial Williamsburg. That way, the world isn’t too overwhelming to understand for my readers. (Plus, I really LOVE Colonial Williamsburg.)

Another thing to remember when building a world is to let your imagination run wild. The best example I have of this is the short-run TV show Defiance. It took three humanoid races (the grounding aspect for watchers) and added incredible intricacies. Sometimes, the best world building is rooted in culture.

I do this in my Anastasia Series. There are 10 races, each one with their own dimensional world. And each race is based on a culture that exists/once existed. There’s Hinduism, Victorian England, ancient Scottish and Irish, Native American, Renaissance… They form the basis for my characters, upon which I can build and create and give them all intricacies. That way, they’re just recognizable enough for my readers, and yet different enough to cause intrigue.

The best thing to take away from this is to simply have fun. World building might seem overwhelming, but it’s most often the best part of novel writing. Do what you love and the rest will follow.