I feel like there are flickers of beauty, so bright and unreal I can't fully capture them before they're gone. It's like watching children grow into adulthood. I can't forget to watch, can't close my eyes for a moment or I'll miss the luminescent flash.
I'm so excited to have you on my blog today! I loved your book. I'm wondering what brought you to this place in your life, why do you write fantasy? Take it away H.L.!
Why Fantasy?
“Mom, are mermaids real?”
I have the hardest time answering questions like this. I don't like to give my daughter a hard no but I also don't like to deceive her. I wish she'd just accept fantasy at face value for a bit longer, let her imagination win, but Coryn is one of those kids who wants to know the truth.
But dang it, I haven't explored every inch of the ocean! For all I know there COULD be mermaids. What if there are mermaids?
So I usually end up with, “Well, I've never seen a mermaid . . .”
I think that's why I love fantasy. It's about the impossible or in the very least the improbable, but by taking away the hard and fast lines of reality, it opens up a far bigger world of possibilities. Anything could happen.
It's easy in the modern world to assume we know everything, that everything has been explored, that there is nothing left to find. However, the truth is, our human knowledge is finite. What lies at the bottom of the ocean? In the furthest reaches of caves? In the deepest jungles? And that's just our earth. What about space? What exactly is out there?
Fantasy provides a world that is bigger, braver, and more beautiful. It sparks that desire for “something more” that I think was left in us for a reason. Fantasy feeds our natural curiosity. Good fantasy allows us to think about possibilities without straining us into “that's just ridiculous” territory. It makes the improbable seem completely natural.
So while I don't want my child to be so gullible that she believes in anything, I want her to stay open to the possibility that she doesn't know everything. Also to the reality that she can't possibly know everything. That even if she read every book and discerned every truth known to man, there would just be more questions, more doors to open.
And perhaps some of those doors lead to other worlds. Why not?
Perhaps some of those caves have a sleeping dragon.
Perhaps . . .
And that's why I write fantasy, and why I always keep one eye open for mermaids. Thanks so much for stopping by H.L. I'll be on the lookout for mermaids from you in the future. I believe I heard a rumor that you were submerged in something along those lines. My review is as follows from H.L.'s book, Lands of Ash. Check it out here!
I came into this book not sure what kind of book I was getting. I'm not sure what I expected, but it surpassed my expectations. The writing flowed beautifully, the world building was dynamic without being too over the top confusing, and the characters were individual and wonderfully complicated. Elements about it reminded me of the Mistborn trilogy by Sanderson.
The plot begins with the end of the world and then shows what happens after that to the people who saved it. Is that a spoiler? H.L. Burke built a rich tapestry that had wonderful layers of development.
My favorite character, Smoke. I LOVE him. He's wise and witty and good but relatable. I love the name.
I love the different abilities the different types of people have, the empaths (Those who can sense and soothe the emotions of those around them) and the sypaths (which are like emotional/energetic vampires). I loved the fight scenes against the fire monster people where the sympath sucked the energy out of the fire monsters and gave it to the good guys making them superhuman with their ice blade weapons. That was super awesome and very well written. I was never left scratching my head uncertain what was going on.
All in all, I'm left on the edge of my seat, looking forward to the next in the series. This prolific writer cannot write fast enough.
I have done so much work on what I thought would be a quick edit. I rewrote a good third of the thing. I hope that it's an improvement and helps my readers connect better with my characters and the story. I ended it a little less cliff hangery (I am ignoring the red underline). Ah. Now I want to sit back and sew a softie, or two.
Here's an excerpt that I'm pretty silly happy about.
I reached a hand towards
the shadows, tentatively pushing through the warm dampness that swallowed my
hand in shadows. I felt nothing as I moved my hand down, although there should
have been a car seat somewhere halfway up my wrist. It was as though shadows
and other stuff didn’t really take up the same space, somehow they switched
places. I scooted closer towards him, until with a start he wrapped his hand
around my wrist and gave me a sharp tug.
“What are you doing?” he
asked in a voice that sounded almost amused, still firmly holding my wrist. He
wasn’t made out of mists anyway.
“I thought if I had more
mists, closer, then I wouldn’t be able to smell the monster and throw up. Your
mists are really potent. I don’t see how you can smell or sense anything else
with so much wrapped around you.”
“You get used to it,” he
said shortly, then after a moment’s pause. “You actually want to get closer to
me? I don’t recommend it, but it wouldn’t bother me.”
I found myself pulled
into the darkness, falling forward as gravity ceased having any kind of meaning,
swallowed up in the warm, damp world until I found myself touching a shoulder
with the hand that wasn’t still held by his. The smell of the mists was so
encompassing, so rich, dark, and sweet, that I forgot about the other scent,
the other world that had so recently occupied so much of my mind. I felt my
heart slow as I relaxed, lost for a long moment in a relief so heavy I felt
buoyed by it.
There was nothing to
see, so I let my eyes close, not trying to see or make sense of a world inside
of my world, a world where there was the Nether, dark and dangerous inside the
steaming mist that soothed every ache I had. There was a distinct lack of pain
before something shifted inside of my mind or intention, and I realized then
that the skin under my hand was bare, wet and slick. My hand slid over the
shoulder, down a chest, a stomach with rippling muscles until his other hand
came firmly over mine, stopping my progression any lower.
I opened my eyes,
startled, but there was nothing to see, although the darkness seemed to caress
my eyes, soothing the strain I’d had trying to see in the dim light. I pulled
back, suddenly.
He didn’t resist,
letting me slip out of his grasp like a fish in a stream until with a choked
cry and a disoriented lurch, where I ended half off the seat, I was back in
Satan’s car, staring horrified at the shadow across from me while a monster
breathed through the glass behind my head with an awful smell that was almost
comforting.
“Are you naked?” I
shrieked. Hope you had a great 4th weekend and a productive catch up Monday.
I love my birthday. I love it! No matter what happens, it is always the best birthday ever. Always. Life gets sweeter and lovelier, and I am surrounded by the most wonderful people in the world. I'm so blessed. I have no idea why I'm so lucky, but I am not complaining!
Don't judge a muffin by its cover.
I forgot her name. Maybe Gypsy Cyanide.
Books. Hugs. Happiness.
Copper Pot! Day lilies! Cattails!
This is not my book. But I'm destined to be a cunning bird watcher. In Missouri.
Fish in the pond, although we haven't caught any, wild bees making honey, but I'm staying far away from those hives, wild mushrooms in the woods, although I have no idea which ones are poisonous, but the black raspberries! All of us go out every day and pick berries until our fingers and faces are stained. I have two baggies frozen, but no jam. I've never made black raspberry jam, or any berry jam for that matter. I like the idea of it, spreading it on my fresh from the oven bread, a smear of purple that tastes like summer. Maybe I'll have courage when the blackberries come on.
Um, I'm having a little bit of trouble 'seeing' how this room will turn out. I'm starting to get cold feet. Do I paint? Blue? What if it's too cold? It's on the North Side. What if it's too dark? What if... I need to push back the doubts and go for it! It's paint! If it's dreadful, I can paint it something else. I am a good painter. I've had lots of practice by now, so long as I don't have to hold a baby in one arm, because that messes up my wrists.
I love Posie Gets Cozy softie animal kits. I want to make all of them. I'm getting one (maybe two) for my birthday. I'm so excited! I'm going to be sooo old. And wise. Although I still don't know how to shave my legs without getting nicks.
I love the picture from Venus A. Dodge's book, 'Dolls' House Needlecrafts'. It's a fantastic book. She's one of my favorite doll book writers. I want to make a rag rug for the boy's room after I rip up their carpet and hope that the floor underneath isn't a very big mess. If it is, I'm going to paint it. My husband isn't certain this is a good step, but I think it'll be wonderful. I think. Anyway, it's a small room for three boys. My darling is making a triple bunk bed. Now that will be fun! Any ideas for how to store legos and other boy stuff in a small space?
I met Franky online at Clean Indie Reads when I was asking about whether my books looked particularly clean or not. I love Pride and Prejudice type stories, so I got the sample to see how it would go. And you know what? I had to finish reading it, so there you go. It's a sweet like one of Emily Loring's old ones. I can recommend it with a completely clear conscience.
This book, first off, does not have a lot of description and frankly, I always have a hard time with first person present tense, so when I downloaded the sample, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to finish it, but before I knew it, I was laughing out loud at this hilarious story!
Caralyn is just lovely and ridiculous and human. We're in her head the whole time, a rambling, stream of consciousness that is so over-the-top, I just loved it and her. She's a mess and has to figure out what to do about it as her precariously built world topples over on her.
The dream guy was a bit dull, honestly, but very nice. The kissing was sweet and fun! It's exactly like a sweet should be.
Throughout the story I found myself laughing out loud, and sometimes gasping in shock as some new atrocity happened. Some favorite scenes: The ghost scene, the butterfly garden, the airport scene, and the shoe scene.
Well done Franky A Brown. I know a new author I can go to for an uplifting lighthearted romance.
I had the most fun putting this together. The fabric bundle is my 10 year olds coveted assortment. She really wants a whole outfit and wardrobe out of it, and the room, gold and gorgeous, is the room the girls share in the house we're moving into. I had an eureka moment as I realized how great the gold would look with the pink. The beautiful doe doll is an inspiration of how gold goes with pink as well. I am probably buying the pattern, although the kit is simply marvelous.
I'm a little bit trepidatious (is that a misspell?)
Although I'm sure everything will be wonderfully exciting and convenient, no 30 minute drive to buy bananas, it will be weird to have a million neighbors. How will I wave to them all without getting arthritic wrists? It will be an adventure for sure.
All my sewing, crafting supplies are packed up. It's nice not to have so much stuff, but also not nice to not have any stuff. Ah well. This is an excellent opportunity to focus on writing, wrapping up my House of Slide series!
I've been working on the house one room at a time, and we finally got the boy's room done. That means that we don't have two twi...