Why Do You Blog?

Bloggers tend to be a unique group. Introverts or extroverts, we somehow manage to talk online with strangers on a variety of topics.

We write because we love to write.

We write because we have something to share.

We write because we think you'll be interested in what we've learned.

And we comment because we want others to know we appreciate their efforts, too.

I love knowing that I have blogging friends all over the world. Some, I may never meet in real life, but interacting with them has opened doors to other cultures, other traditions, new ideas, education, arts, and more.

My last three posts have been intense book recommendations, so I thought I'd open up today's blog post to you, and ask the burning question: Why do you blog?

I blog in two places: here, and over yonder at Wordpress (my personal blog's link is in my sidebar if you feel like visiting—Life As Only I Know It). The personal blog is mostly a "dear diary" for me. I write whatever's on my mind when I sit down with my laptop. Something timely, like a family birthday; something I've been learning in a class; observations on regular life, happy and sad.

Here at ERE, I write about things that interest my readers—and that usually involves reading, writing, or editing. I mean, hey, that's what I do, so that's what I write about.

Why I blog is a whole 'nother animal, as we say in the backwoods of Pennsylvania.

I started this blog when I started my editing business almost five years ago, in 2013. I thought it would be a good way to get my name out there to drum up some work, and to explore the blogging community. I read a few blogs here and there, but I never commented because I didn't think I had anything worthwhile to say. After all, bloggers were Somebody and I was just me.

Two people broke my fear of commenting. The first person was S.K. Anthony, an author I'd started working with very early in my editing career. She introduced me to a lot of terrific bloggers by sharing her favorites. She taught me good blog etiquette (e.g. no "thanks for sharing!" comments, which we can all relate to) and shared my blog with her followers to help me get a leg up.

The second person was author Raymond Esposito. I'd run into him on some Goodreads threads and thought he was hilarious and sarcastic, so I followed his blog. I tentatively commented on a couple of his posts, adding that I felt like a pest by commenting each time, and I'll never forget his response: "You're supposed to comment. Otherwise, I'm talking to myself."

Well, needless to say, I took that advice and ran with it. And now the two of them are award-winning authors who are some of my best friends. They own a business together, Writers After Dark, and they work hard to provide essential resources for writers. I’ve also discovered over the years that they each have genius-level IQ, which could be intimidating except that they don’t rub it in my face. But I digress . . .

I now follow a number of blogs and try to thoughtfully comment on all of them when there's a new post, and I don't hesitate to comment even when I'm reading a post written by a complete stranger. I know, you're all gasping with shock and perhaps admiration, but this was a serious thing for me to overcome. I had to get past the idea that I didn't have anything to contribute . . . that someone would point me out for a fraud if I said something stupid enough.

Fast forward to today, when I say plenty of stupid things and don't look back. I own my words, good or bad, but in general I try to not start internet fights with strangers. I enjoy the blogs I follow and try not to overextend myself by following so many that I can't keep up. Confession: I will give up on a blog with okay content but no interaction. On the other hand, I will stick with a blog that holds dubious interest for me, as long as the blogger interacts with followers. I see it all as a community, and I don't want to spend time with those who don't care to spend time with me. I'm not offended; it's a busy world and no one has time to waste on pointless things.

Funny thing about the "why" when I started this blog: I've almost never gotten a client through it. People have found me in other places and have come here to contact me, but I can only think of two people, ever, who said they found me through my blog alone. So I guess all that community stuff really does matter.

I ask again, then: why do YOU blog?

Come and Visit Me Somewhere Else Today!

Hi, everyone!

My friends at Writers After Dark asked me to do a guest spot this week, so you can find my real blog post over there today.

It's called "Parentheses in Fiction: Do They Break the Fourth Wall?"

Some pretty exciting stuff, eh? I live a wild life.

I'll be putting the post up here on Wednesday so I have it in my own archives, but for the first couple days, I'd like to give them the blog traffic. If you've never visited Writers After Dark, you're missing out on a great resource for authors. There are terrific how-tos, there's news, and there are videos from our two wonderful co-hosts, authors Raymond Esposito and S.K. Anthony.

Show them some love today, and then don't forget to come back here in a couple days to read the exact same article all over again, pretend you've never seen it before, and leave me comments so I don't feel lonely and ignored.

Thanks, everybody!

Holiday Break in Progress

I'm finding it more and more difficult to keep up with even reading other people's blogs lately, much less getting together a post or two for my own, so I'm going to do myself a favor and declare a holiday break . . . mostly since I'm already taking one by default.

Hey, I may as well make it look like it was planned.

My job is crazier than crazy in November and December, and I must have been delusional to think I could maintain the blog through those months.

I aim to be back by mid-January, and if I can find a moment here or there to read your blogs, I will certainly comment to let you know I've visited.

Have a wonderful Christmas, Hanukkah, or winter solstice, if that's what you celebrate. And I'll see you for sure in a month or so! And in the meantime, please enjoy the handmade Christmas card I received last year from our very own Raymond Esposito. Still one of my all-time favorites: Santa and Baby Jesus fight the zombies. Warms my heart.

Special Edition with the Writers After Dark Crew!

I need to preface this post by saying that just a few years ago, I would have bragged that all my friends were "real"—in the sense that I had spent face-to-face time with every single one of them at some point in my life, whether we currently lived anywhere near each other or not. I couldn't understand how anyone could become friends—true friends—over the internet.

And then I met SK Anthony . . . online, when she hired me to edit her first novel, Kinetic. Much like the insta-love in the awful romance novels we despise, our friendship was solidified within the first conversation. We pretty much went from strangers to BFFs within an hour, it seems, and it's a friendship that's only grown stronger over the few short years we've known each other. In fact, this week we celebrated three years of friendship, and true to form, we celebrated the one-year anniversary of our two-year anniversary (go with it . . . it makes sense to us) when we finally got to meet in person last summer.

SK and me, on our "date" where we laughed for 12 hours straight. #truestory

So I suppose it should have been no surprise to me that my friendship with Raymond Esposito turned out much the same. We met on Goodreads while harassing conversing with a bunch of whiny people on one of the discussion boards and decided we had way too much fun being logical with people who were . . . well, they were kind of uptight, for the most part. Our combined superpower there was that we never took ourselves too seriously, and it drove the uptight people crazy. We did meet some pretty fun people there, too, but our own friendship extended to outside of Goodreads and eventually to a working relationship when Raymond asked me to re-edit the first two books of his Creepers series. 

I ended up introducing him to SK, and a magical three-way friendship was cemented and just kept getting better and better. A few short years later, here we are: we've done a lot of book work together, we've chatted countless hours online, we've exchanged some of the strangest Christmas gifts ever, and we finally all met up in person this spring when Raymond had the crazy idea in January that he was going to throw himself a 50th birthday party and house us for five days. His thought was that either we'd emerge the best of friends, or we'd never want to speak to each other again.

It's hard to imagine how this works, but the entire five days had the feel of people who had known each other our entire lives, and who could live quite comfortably together indefinitely. Amazing. And because I happened to be in the right place at the right time, I got to be their first real, live, in-person guest on Writers After Dark. We could not pass up the opportunity to film while we were all in the same house, and I'm so glad we made the time to do it, though I will say that most of the footage does not make us look nearly as happy as we were. I think SK and Raymond figured twelve minutes of us just laughing over each other wasn't what most people would bother to watch, so here's what's left after the edits. 

Enjoy their interview, ignore that we were squished together and couldn't move, and pretend we all actually know what we're talking about in Episode 6 of Writers After Dark: Me Can Self-Edit.

What You May Have Missed . . . the Good Stuff

All right, so I've been gone for quite a while. Part of what kept me too busy to blog was my day job, but a good portion of my time outside that job was devoted to editing and more editing, and that's what I'm going to talk about today, since that's kind of the purpose of this blog.

When I edit a book, I'll often promote it here once it's published. Not always, but when I have time and it fits in my schedule. Or maybe I play favorites . . . who knows? It's my blog and I can do what I want. Not only that, I typically enjoy most of the stuff I work on, so it's more along the lines of recommending a book to a friend.

Anyway, here are the more recent things I wasn't around to shove in your face promote when I worked on them, but that you should check out anyway (direct links to these books on Amazon can be found in my "links" tab):

Keepers of Arden: The Brothers (book 2) by L.K. Evans—Dark fantasy, superbly written saga involving war, mages, evil, gods, the abuse of power, and destiny of two brothers. Part of a series, so make sure you check out Book 1 first.

The Forest of Windellyn by Andrew Marr—Juvenile fiction, fun and thoughtful, in which children are being kidnapped and replaced by elves intent on stealing their souls. The rescue involves a forest which has been created out of cyberspace by the elves, and all the complications that arise from the mesh of reality and cyber.

Bloodwinter: Immortalibus Bella 3 by S.L. Figuhr—Dystopian dark fantasy, incredibly detailed and intricately woven. There are royals and peasants, corruption and greed, mortals and immortals. What more could you ask for?

Beneath the Gathering Storm (The Creepers Saga Book 3) by Raymond Esposito—Post-apocalyptic dark fiction/horror filled with all the great stuff I'm always telling you about Raymond's writing. He thought this would be the final book of the series until he sat down to write it, and is sincerely hoping there's only one more to tie things up. If you haven't picked up the previous two Creepers books, you really need to get with the program. You'll never look back. I had the privilege of flying to Raymond's home in Florida in April to celebrate his birthday with his family (and S.K.!!), and I got to see his beautiful and interestingly designed office where all the magic happens. I'm sure you'll be hearing more about that in future blog posts here.

Static (The Luminaries Book 2) by S.K. Anthony—Fiction that falls under everything from "superheroes" to "coming of age," it seems. All I know is that it's great. S.K. and I have had a lot of adventures, so my opinion could be biased. However, it's not. She's just a terrific writer and her books speak for themselves. They're full of characters you want to be friends with (or beat up), superpowers you wish you had, and plots that are "curiouser and curiouser," as Alice would say. The third book in this series is in the works and I can't wait to see where it all goes. S.K. and I were able to meet in person for the first time last summer on our two-year anniversary of knowing each other and decided one of our husbands has to pack us up and move to where the other one lives, because we were seriously meant to be next-door neighbors. Or roommates. Living at Raymond's house for four days in the spring only cemented our decision.

Star Trek: The Four Years War; Star Trek: The Romulan War; Star Trek: The Four Years War and Romulan War Technical Manual; and Star Trek, the Next Generation: Pirate's Cove by Stephen Fender—Military space science fiction at its best. The reason I mention these last is because if you missed out on the Kickstarters for these, you missed out on something special and you, unlike me, will not be the proud owners of limited edition Star Trek books. The eight novels and one technical manual account for probably 60% of what has kept me busy over the past two years, with over 500 editing hours logged. I don't get a whole lot of rest when we're working on a project, and I'm pretty sure Stephen is glad to live on the opposite side of the country from me, well out of choking range, when things are busy.

So . . . yep, things have been active on my end of things, to say the least. And that's just the editing portion, which, by its order in the balance of my life, comes after the 40-hour job. But I love both jobs because even though they're work, they're satisfying and enjoyable and I can't imagine giving up either one completely.

Have you read anything over the past few months you simply couldn't put down? Something that had a plot twist that surprised you? I'd love to hear about it as I continue to catch up with what I've missed.

Editor's Notes #17: Does Personality Matter?

When it comes to hiring an editor, does a compatible personality really matter all that much? Do you care whether he or she can relate to you as a person? After all, you're just hiring them to do a job. In many cases, you may never meet them face to face, so you don't have to deal with them in the traditional way. Though I respect those who are interested in a "just business" transaction—and I do accommodate them—I think being compatible does matter.

I surround myself with people who are generally pleasant. I don't care for mean people (really, who does?) and it makes me uncomfortable to be around people who talk down to others.

I need to have people pour into my life as I pour into theirs, and this applies on a professional level as much as it does on a personal level. Even though the personal level is . . . well, personal, and therefore maybe a little deeper, I believe it's important to encourage while doing the job well and not skirting around the truth.

I don't think most writers appreciate those who take and don't give. Everyone appreciates encouragement and a kind word, as long as it's not false flattery. I do "take" in the sense that I take compensation. That's business, plain and simple. But there's no need for me to take their self-esteem by implying that they're not smart enough to know all "the rules." If that's the case, then I have to face the truth that I'm not smart enough to write an original story myself. We all have our gifts. A good mesh of personalities should enhance those gifts and encourage them.

When you develop a relationship with a coworker (in any job), helping each other is part of the deal. Whether you work directly together or on individual aspects of a project, all components must match up and make the final product shine. Normally you see this person every day and you know if she appreciates constructive criticism or if he has a hard time accepting he’s not perfect. You know if they can “take it” straight up or if you have to dance around how you communicate a mistake. And vice versa: they understand our personalities and how we work as well. 

The author-editor relationship isn’t all that different. If my authors know me, they’ll be able to differentiate between whether I’m offering a helpful critique or criticizing them in a condescending way.

If our sense of humor matches up (I like sarcasm), we can laugh about mistakes found in the manuscripts. Because let’s be honest, some are pretty funny. Things I'm allowed to share (yes, I asked): S.K. Anthony had one of her characters "flowering the plants" and in another area couldn't figure out why the word "payed" looked so odd; Raymond Esposito wrote that "deaf people hear things others might miss" when referring to a blind character's uncanny hearing, and in the same book had a character throw a boilermaker in a fistfight, rather than a haymaker (all I could picture was the guy throwing whiskey at the other guy, followed by a splash of beer); I'm forever telling another author to stop naming people he's going to kill, because I'm tired of writing down their information on my style sheet, only to add "dead" beside them ten minutes later. My margin notes hopefully show that I'm laughing along with them rather than laughing at their expense.

Don't get me wrong: I get it back as often as I give it. It's no secret, I think, that S.K. and I share the same brain (sometimes we take turns and one of us gives it up entirely), so when I ramble, she tells me. In fact, I was having trouble organizing my thoughts for this post, and when I sent it off to her for help, she sent it back with the document labeled "Lynda's Disjointed Blog Post." She's also been known to preread my posts and tell me to "cut this part out, because you're whining." 

I want the authors who hire me to feel comfortable—confident in the knowledge that I have the ability to do a good job for them, and secure enough to know that I won't talk in a patronizing way when I make suggestions. Besides, getting to know an author a little better gives me a deeper understanding of how his mind works. By having that extra insight on his individual communication and expression style, I’m able to grasp the written word in his manuscripts on a whole new level. 

Getting along encourages a smooth and fun transaction all around.

Coffee Chat 4.2 with S.K. Anthony: Our Facebook Issues

Hey, everyone! Amazingly enough, I'm waiting for S.K. to arrive instead of finding her in my kitchen already (or my bedroom, or at the door, or any number of places). I thought I'd look through some of our old Coffee Chats to see what we've covered, and realized we never finished our coverage of the Social Media monster. I've been wanting to talk more about it anyway, since I'm having some Facebook issues.

SK: Oh hey, Lynda! Goodness . . . how many bath towels do you own? I've been stuck in your laundry room all morning washing them for you. I got here extra early and didn't want to disturb you, since, umm . . . you didn't seem too happy about me waking you up last Thursday. Hang on; let me get us some coffee while you tell me what's bothering you this week. I know it isn't me. I've been a good girl . . . so far.

ER: Whatwhatwhatwhat . . . do you EVER sleep? [Sees a pile of fluffy towels.] Hmm, this may not be so bad. Thanks for washing the towels, man. I owe you . . . something . . . unless you’ve already come in and taken it.

SK: No, no . . . I took nothing. I even brought you some bacon to make up for eating all your goodies last time. Look out the window!

ER: [Makes the mistake of looking.] Is that—?

SK: You’re welcome.

ER: There is a live pig in my yard. A pig that is walking around. A pig. Walking. I . . . I just . . . uh . . . [Sighs.] Thank you.

SK: [Nodding vigorously.] Yep! You’re welcome.

ER: I’m not really sure I want to know where that pig came from. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t legal. Maybe we should just talk about something else, and deal with my bacon gift later.

Okay, here’s what’s bugging me today. You and I both have Facebook pages, right? I've gotta ask: Do you have much success with using it as a promotional platform? Because I have a moderate amount of "likes" on my Easy Reader Editing FB page, but it doesn't seem like a whole lot of people actually see my posts on there. I have better luck when I share my ERE posts as myself on my personal page.

SK: Define success. If by that you mean I get likes on my FB posts from my editor regularly, then yes. I'm very successful. If not then well . . . sadly no. I've had a range of 30 out of my 1,121 "likes" on my FB page "seeing" my post to over 5,000 . . . it depends on how many shares I get.

Recently Facebook made about thirty-hundred changes on its "page" features. And that's in the past year alone. Do not look up the real number, I'm exaggerating by like two numbers—otherwise I'm pretty sure I'm close. Anyway, since they went public, pages have suffered because the FB peeps are more business-oriented and are in for the money. If you and I want to make sure our "fans" see most of our posts then we have to pay up . . . umm, NO.

ER: I’m not into paying for advertising on a free social media site, especially one such as Facebook. I am one of those people who completely ignores the column with ads while skimming the page for posts of friends or family members, and I’m going to assume most people filter that type of thing without thinking about it consciously.

SK: In past years it used to be free, and I think everyone saw everything, which made it one of the best ways of keeping fans in the loop and helped with promotions. Now we have to pay and keep our fingers crossed it’s not fake "sees" we're getting. This last change (which I'm sure will change by midnight again) says: "A person has to be 'active' on your page a minimum of three times within any calendar month period. This means clicking 'like' on one of our pictures and/or posts, or just leaving a short comment. If a person is not active on your page, as listed above, after a month of no activity, their 'like' will be removed from your page. FB has decided they are not interested in your page!" (This I'm quoting from a message going around FB; I have no idea who the originator was.)

ER: That almost sounds like something I’d find on Snopes. We should have asked Raymond about that, since he’s faster than Google. I just don’t see why a person has to prove he’s active on a liked page to see that page’s posts. Really, if I liked it, doesn’t that imply I wish to see the posts? This is why I don’t do the “I’ll like yours if you like mine” swaps—I only click “like” on the pages I genuinely LIKE. And if people “like” a whole lot of pages, how are they supposed to remember to go looking for posts that aren’t showing up on their feed? It makes me want to bang my head against the wall.

AND . . . AND . . . I need more coffee. I use up all my caffeine intake at a faster rate when I get worked up like this.

SK: Okay let me get you some more coffee while I scream: EXACTLY!

I don't want FB to guess what it thinks I'm interested in. I want it to show me what I told it I'm interested in. Ugh. Anyway, and since I'm not paying nor is hardly anyone else, groups have become popular. Authors, readers, anyone who has some kind of following are creating groups and keeping their fans up to date that way . . . except now the word on the street is that FB has caught on to that. Now, they're also not showing the feed and group members have to go in the group, much like into pages, to see what is going on.

Twitter on the other hand . . . I guess its great. I don't utilize it to my advantage as much as I should. I love that you can add hashtags and anyone looking for something specific can find your tweets that way. If I was more active with readers and friends I might benefit better. Sigh. I'm just going to give up on FB and create my own community and whatnot on Google plus. It seems to be the next big thing . . . unless they start making us pay too. I’m feeling sad now. I feel like I’ll have to break up with FB soon. What do you think you’ll do?

ER: I really like FB for my personal stuff, but it’s not doing me any favors for my editing. As long as they don’t start charging me to have a business page, I’ll just keep it. I ignore the sad statistics they send me each week anyway—the ones that tell me how many people are NOT engaged with my posts.

SK: Mind if I finish off this coffee? [Sees the look on Lynda’s face.] Oh, okay, we’ll share the last of the coffee. Relax! Here eat this in the meantime. [Throws chocolate at Lynda.] By the way, I think your piggy is hungry. [Throws more chocolate at Lynda.] Thank goodness I found some chocolate in one of your socks. Pheww.

Now that we’re both calmed again, I’d like to rant one more time: And it’s not like we can come up with a plan on what to do with FB since they keep changing things. Also, what’s up with the new look? I guess I’m getting used to it but there was nothing wrong with it before. NOTHING. Well, except maybe fewer ads from them. Ugh. Social Media! Love to hate it and hate to love it.

ER: I think the ad column is wider, and the design is ticking me off because I just finished adapting to the other change they made a year ago. I’m slow like that.

I’m pretty happy for now, sticking with Coffee Chat and my Monday blog posts (which I should probably apologize for completely forgetting about this past Monday). I would like to ask our readers, though, which of the social media platforms works for them and why. I don’t have enough time in the day to put effort into something that’s not making me happy.

As always:

You can find S.K. Anthony in a number of places. She's on Twitter @SKathAnthony, her website is www.skanthony.com, her Facebook page is S Katherine Anthony, and on occasional occasions, she'll be right here with me, drinking coffee and laughing it up over our latest plans and schemes. And possibly even talking about books and writing. 

You can find me here. I'm always here.

Coffee Chat 13.0 with S.K. Anthony: We’re Back!

Hey, everyone, S.K. here. I’m back from my Jamaica trip, woot! I’m trippin’ while troopin’ and sneakin’ around. Yes, I said sneakin’ around. I’m back to my shenanigans because, well, I can’t help myself. No problem, mon! [Opens Lynda’s door.] It’s a good thing I made myself a copy of Lynda’s house keys. Keep it quiet and follow me . . .

ER: [Startles awake.] Holy cannoli! You scared me! [Realizes it's really S.K. beside the bed.] YOU'RE BACK!

SK: Shhh! You're going to wake up your husband! Come on, let’s get started. I took the liberty of warming up the banana nut muffins I found in your kitchen and made a fresh pot of coffee, mon.

ER: [Yawning.] You seem to have taken a lot of liberties, as far as I can tell . . . mon. [Looks over at Tim, miraculously still sleeping.] Um . . . give me a minute and I'll be right down.

. . . Five minutes later . . .

SK: [Sitting in the kitchen, wiping crumbs off face.] There you are, LynLyn, it took you long enough. I can’t wait to catch up! The A to Z challenge left me tired and my vacation left me relaxed. What did you do while I was gone?

ER: I'm pretty sure I just cried. I don't really remember much after you texted me to say goodbye. [Looks around.] Didn't you say there were muffins?

SK: Oh, well there were only three . . . and you took forever to get ready. One thing led to another and I finished it all, but don't worry about it, you can make more if you want.

So did you get a chance to rest after the big A to Z challenge ended?

ER: Well, I did a little thing I like to call “Finally Getting Something Else Done.” On Thursday, I tried to do Coffee Chat without you but I gave up after I couldn't think of any questions that didn't end with "why am I not in Jamaica?" I wrapped up the first rounds of a book edit on Friday, and Saturday and Sunday were busy with things that didn't go in A to Z order, didn't need my Red Pen of Doom, and didn't require a comment.

Did you think of me every day you were gone? I bought some of those little umbrellas for your coffee like one of the Coffee Chat commenters suggested. I thought maybe they would make the transition back to reality a nice one.

SK: “Finally Getting Something Else Done!” This I have yet to achieve. I just got back, unpacked, and now the laundry is sitting there mocking me, but hey, at least I had some yummy muffins to help me feel better, and those little umbrellas will sure help even more. Did I think of you every day I was gone? Definitely. Except not really. A little bit? Ahem, I mean . . . of course! I thought I was suffering from Internet withdrawals, but it must have been you I was missing.

Now I’m back to the grind and I'm slowly catching up with blogs. I missed the last two days of A to Z and it almost seems like everything else piled up right along with the challenge. It's a shame really. There are so many awesome bloggers and I don't want to miss their creative posts. Speaking of the challenge, of all the new blogs you discovered, give me one of your favorite A to Z bloggers. Yes, only one. Otherwise we will never finish this chat.

ER: Ava Quinn at Tongue in Cheek had me laughing every single day.

And I won a book on TheWriteGame, C. Lee McKenzie’s blog! All because I didn't know who anyone in her posts was, but kept trying anyway. Her cat loves me. Loves. Me.

SK: I didn't know anyone either and yet you won it? You bullied that cat! I'm sure of it . . . nicely played, Lynda. Nicely played.

My top favorite was Michelle over at Writer-in-Transit with her interactive posts. I loved the different book illustrations she provided for us to caption.

ER: Me too! That was a great one. Did you have any blogs you "found" that surprised you? I tracked down all my new commenters; I enjoyed a lot of flash fiction, random stuff, and my "surprise like" blog was Sue McPeak's CollectinTexas Gal. Sue took old forgotten photos and created short fiction around them. So creative and intriguing!

SK: Yes! I never really gave quilting much thought until I "met" Fanny Barnes Thornton. I found myself fascinated by her work; they're all a piece of art. One of my favorite lines of hers was: "Some quilts are like novels - they're never finished or have to be re-worked, and you can spend about the same amount of time on them." I can see how this is true, even if I've never done a quilt myself. It's just amazing how all types of artists—as different as we all are—can share the same experiences.

Did you have any favorite post or comments from your own challenge? I really enjoyed all of YOUR replies on “Cliché” day. So hilarious! And your commenters were by far the best and most fun, they were all interacting with each other and it almost seemed like an all day party over here, especially on “X” day. Well, a party that lasted the whole month with nightly breaks, that is.

ER: My cliché comments were the cat’s meow. The bee’s knees. And a pain in the butt, but well worth the effort. “X” day’s comment’s? Ohhh . . . My commenters in general made the challenge great for me.

SK: I’m not sure about mine. I did enjoy reading about my fellow twitchilators a.k.a. OCD peeps. It’s always nice to know you’re not the only weirdo around, ya know?

ER: There’s great comfort in that. Then again, you’re talking to the weirdo who came up with a dumb A to Z haiku every day for Raymond Esposito’s Writing in a Dead World. And you purple prose-d him almost to death with your comments on his blog. It’s nice to have friends we can abuse.

SK: I did and boy, I had fun with that! Since time was the most challenging aspect of the whole A to Z thing, I didn’t get a chance to visit as many bloggers as I’d hoped. I plan on still checking out participants in the future . . . after I catch my breath a little bit. How about you? Wanna do some stalking with me?

ER: I’m with you, stalking buddy! That’s the great thing about the A to Z: those posts will still be around, and better late than never, I say, when it comes to blog visits.

SK: It sure was fun! A to Z Challenge 2015, get ready for us! We might even do a joint series to kick things up a notch. What do you guys think? A Coffee Chat A to Z Theme—yes, no, maybe? Hmm . . . ideas are swirling!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Before you go share with us: Who were some of your favorite A to Z bloggers?

As our blogging challenge did end, a few great bloggers had us in joy, kneeling from the laughter many new and old posters quietly and randomly shared. To us very brave wonderful xantax-free yet zesty A to Z challengers, Cheers!

As always:

You can find S.K. Anthony in a number of places. She's on Twitter @SKathAnthony, her website is www.skanthony.com, her Facebook page is S Katherine Anthony, and on occasional occasions, she'll be right here with me, drinking coffee and laughing it up over our latest plans and schemes. And possibly even talking about books and writing. 

You can find me here. I'm always here.

Coffee Chat 0.0: S.K. is GONE!

Today is Thursday. 

Thursday is Coffee Chat day.

BUT . . .

My Coffee Chat buddy is not in my kitchen.

No one has snuck in my window.

No one has picked up a guest . . .

. . . or two . . .

No one has shown up stinking drunk at my back door,

or even called me to cancel our weekly date.

Why, you ask?

Somebody whose name I won't mention decided to go on a vacation with her husband. To Jamaica. Since I'm typing this post, I think you can all guess I'm not typing it from a beach chair. So I may as well just say it.

S.K. has deserted me.

Thankfully, this is only temporary, and we'll be back next week with brand-new coffee and a brand-new bunch of rambling conversation—unlike those reruns linked above.

For this week, though? This is S.K.'s happy place:

And this . . . sigh . . . is me:

No worries. I need the recovery time from A to Z anyway. 

Rest up, everyone, and enjoy some down time! See you next week!

Coffee Chat 10.0 with S.K. Anthony: Into the Nightmirrors with Raymond Esposito

Hi, everyone! I’m really excited about today’s Coffee Chat, because Raymond Esposito is going to be joining us to discuss his newest book, The Devil’s Hour. I sent S.K. to pick him up—oh, shoot! I forgot to tell him she was coming—but no matter, they should be here any minute. Actually, they should have been here a while ago . . .

Here’s the thing: I never know what kinds of adventures S.K. is going to get herself into, so this time, I took the small precaution of putting a return sticker on her. That might sound strange, and a bit degrading to some, but I think it’s just plain practical. It would have been easier to meet at Raymond’s house, but he wouldn’t tell us where he lived. I don’t know why. Thank goodness for Google.

[Hears a knock at the kitchen door.] Yay! I’ll bet they’re here!

[Opens door to find Raymond, holding a dripping wet S.K. by the hood of her sweatshirt. The look on his face is quite indescribable.]

Um . . . well. Hi, Raymond. Welcome to my house. I’m sure there’s a story behind this, but it’s probably best told over coffee. Come on in and we’ll get a towel or two for S.K. [Sighs.]

SKA: Or a blanket . . . err, thanks for returning me, Raymond.

RE: Hi, Lynda. Sorry we are a bit late. First I had to figure out why a strange woman was running around on my front lawn getting soaked by the sprinkler system . . . then I had to explain it to my wife before she dialed 9-1-1. I can attest that S.K.'s superpowers do not extend to being waterproof . . . or staying on the walkway.

ER: I guess the important part is that you're here now. [To S.K.] Why didn't you just go in the garage when the sprinklers started? You could have stayed dry.

SKA: Are you insane, Lynda? I’m not going in there! Didn’t you read what happens in The Devil’s Hour in the garage? I don’t trust it . . . or you, Raymond. I’m pretty sure at any moment you’re going to open that bag and throw diabolical bugs at me or something.

[Trembling.] I . . . I’ve been having nightmares. I can’t even look you in the eye.

ER: Let's reassure you: Raymond, how about showing S.K. what's in the bag. Did you bring us chocolate?

RE: S.K., of course I didn't bring diabolical bugs. I gave those to the demonic clown that is hiding under your bed. What I did bring is chocolate-flavored coffee because I think comfort foods . . . well, in this case, beverages . . .  go so well with Horror. I know that sounds crazy, but for me some of my fondest childhood memories are of watching horror movies and reading horror novels.

SKA: Demonic clown under my bed? O_O At least it’s not spiders, but umm . . . I’ll take that chocolate-flavored coffee while I set up my new bedroom in Lynda’s house.

ER: Great. Now I have a permanent houseguest. And thank you, Raymond, for reminding me of the demonic clown . . . because I had FINALLY gotten that out of my head for five whole minutes.

What got you hooked on horror? Can you trace it back to a certain time or event?

RE: It's interesting that as a kid I hated roller coasters, but loved being frightened. My mom was a big horror fan. She took me to see The Omega Man at the drive-in when I was, like, five. Together we consumed every creature feature program on television. I think horror is my drug. In fourth grade I did a shadow box on "The Tell-Tale Heart." In middle school I did book reports on John Saul's Suffer the Children, The Amityville Horror, and Peter Straub's Julia. When I discovered Stephen King's ’Salem's Lot, though, that's when I realized I wanted to write horror novels.

[Looks around.] Umm . . . is S.K. going to be okay with the coffee? She had a hard time operating the door bell, and coffee makers are a little more complex.

ER: I'd better check on her . . . she's usually okay with coffee (I think she can make it in her sleep) but this whole clown/bug thing has her pretty wigged out. I thought she was going to tackle you to the floor when she realized you had a bag in your hand.

SKA: I’m okay, I’m okay! I’ve been hiding by the door trying to keep an eye on Raymond. [Looks at him.] You don’t look all that dangerous, and this is awesome coffee, so I forgive you. Don’t give me that look. Your book petrified me, and you should be a little sorry. And now you’re laughing? Fantastic! 

ER: Okay, so let's talk about The Devil's Hour. People always say, "Write what you know." This makes me wonder about you just a little bit. Did you write this book in the bathroom while your friends and family tried to break in and kill you? 'Cause that would leave me with a permanent twitch, and I have to say, you look pretty serene for a horror writer.

RE: I think I do write what I know. Horror is just actual experiences ramped up with imagination. Fictional demons to exercise the real ones from the past . . . in my opinion. As a kid I often barricaded myself in a room while a real-life demon tried to get in to kill me . . . figuratively kill me, of course.

ER: Ahh, yes, the brother who ate the cereal full of ants . . .

RE: My childhood was a great world of imagination and fun, but it was also filled, like many people's, with my fair share of not-so-great experiences. There are as many psychological aspects to my story writing as there are "scary" things because I've always thought that horror is the celebration of human character and strength . . . even when it doesn't end well, it's about standing up.

SKA: Standing up? Sure, I can see that. But I’d rather run to my new bedroom, curl up and hide under my blanket. Speaking of running, originally I would have been all for going after the SUV to get away like they did in the book, but after what happened in the garage . . . I don’t know that I would still try to get the car out; I still have goosebumps.

RE: Well, I think courage is a situational thing. That's what I love about horror—take the worst situation and see which characters rise and which fall. It's a great world for the reader to ask, "What would I do?"

SKA: What was your favorite scene to write, Raymond? Or one of your favorite lines?

RE: I'm going to cheat a bit and say there wasn't one particular scene, but TDH is one part mystery and I really enjoyed weaving in the clues. I'm hoping when the reader gets to the end they go "a-ha."

But the demon under the bed was one of my personal childhood nightmares.

ER: The under-the-bed stuff was the same for me. No matter how hot it was, I couldn't allow my hands or feet to hang off the side of the bed because I knew something would grab me. I also had a fear of the killer bees after I'd read a National Geographic article. I was convinced they were coming up from South America to kill me. I was so happy you didn't have a swarm of killer bees in your book! I would have needed therapy.

Since I got the manuscript in parts, I had a lot of "a-ha" moments because of your excellent clue-weaving abilities. I couldn't wait to reread it for the final proof so I could look at those moments more purposefully.

Speaking of your abilities, I think you have the creep factor down pretty well. No need to work on that. Something you and I talked about during the editing process was the horror aspect of this book and how it was a little different than your other works. Can you elaborate on that?

RE: I remember the "killer bee" scare and the made-for-television movie. It gave me nightmares. And to answer your question, that's what TDH was about: nightmares. I've written a lot of short stories, but to date my novels are zombie/infected related. I really wanted to write a straight-out horror story. Something that would let me talk about all the nightmare stuff that scares me. I wanted it to be one of those books that fits the classic description of horror without relying on blood or guts or slasher-type elements. I'm hoping readers will find at least one thing in it that visits them when they lie in the dark and sleep won't come . . . but I guess that's every horror author's goal.

SKA: Let me assure you, your goal was achieved. I love everything zombies, so I’m probably okay with blood and guts. But the creepiness you have in TDH? That was not expected and I’m pretty sure most readers will agree with me. My skin is still crawling. And the fact that I finished reading at 3:00 a.m. didn’t help matters with me staying awake after reading The Devil’s Hour. What are the odds? Needless to say, I lay in the dark and sleep did not come when I was done . . .

RE: I think the odds are about right—maybe it was a warning. [Laughs.]

ER: Did it end up being therapeutic, or creating more nightmares for you? I'll bet you don't have any happy clown nightlights in your house.

RE: Unfortunately, no, it wasn't therapeutic, because the more I've seen of this country and the more I've learned, the closer I come to believing that maybe these fictional "fears" have some truth. It does seem everything we imagine comes true—like flying, magic potions that cure disease, space travel. So perhaps the monsters are real. Maybe they're just good at hiding . . . until that one time they grow tired of waiting . . . that time you forget to look under the bed or you chance not turning on the light and you reach into the darkness. Maybe I don't have a good imagination, but instead, maybe I just know something that's hard to explain any other way but in stories . . .  Okay, I just creeped myself out. See? Horror is an itch but it’s like poison ivy: the more I scratch, the worse it gets.

ER: You're creeping me out, too, and making me want to run, screaming, into S.K.'s new room. You said you were going to bring a movie for us to watch. Pleasepleaseplease let it be something like The Sound of Music or The Princess Bride.

RE: Sure. It's just like those movies. Nothing to fear at all . . . just turn off the lights and have a look.

It begins with a car accident and a mysterious wall of smoke. Something horrific has arrived in Sam Drake's neighborhood—something that will unleash their every nightmare and test the limits of sanity. Sam and his friends must find a way out . . . a way to survive the terrors in the darkness. But every neighborhood has its dark secrets and some nightmares are inescapable . . . when the hour comes.

ER: Not . . . The Princess Bride . . .

You can get your own copy of The Devil's Hour on Smashwords or Amazon. In fact, Raymond has provided a coupon code (WS98R) to get it FREE on Smashwords if you're one of the first 25 people to get there and grab one. 

You can find Raymond Esposito on his own blogs, Writing in a Dead World and Nightmirrors. You can also find him on Twitter @Nightmirrors666.

As always:

You can find S.K. Anthony in a number of places. She's on Twitter @SKathAnthony, her website is www.skanthony.com, her Facebook page is S Katherine Anthony, and on occasional occasions, she'll be right here with me, drinking coffee and laughing it up over our latest plans and schemes. And possibly even talking about books and writing. 

You can find me here. I'm always here.