Anya Breton's Blog

My books, obsessions and other banal musings.

May
25

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Blog Tour – Little Nani Revisted

Category: Tours and Author Visits Leave a Comment

Today I have special visitors on the blog! The titular character from The Funny Adventures of Little Nani has stopped by for an interview. I can’t wait to see what she has to say. AND Little Nani’s creator, Cinta Garcia de la Rosa too! I hand the blog over to them:

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            Thank you for visiting this wonderful blog today so you can know a bit more about Little Nani, her stories, her world, and her author. OK, her author is not as interesting as Little Nani, but what can we do? They go hand in hand, so please bear with her.

Why are we here today? Because Little Nani is suffering a series of changes. “The Funny Adventures of Little Nani” was published for the first time last September 2012, both in print and in ebook form, on Amazon and Createspace. However, along the months, I started feeling less enthusiastic about my book, thinking that the cover was dull and boring, and also thinking that the stories could be improved, maybe going through some extra editing and proofing. So that’s what I did, and now I am much happier about the result and I trust that I will start getting many more sales. Why? Because I will make the books available not only on Amazon and Createspace, but also on Smashwords, Barnes and Noble, and Feed-A-Read.

There will be also many different options to buy the books. Do you want to buy the whole set of stories? You can do it. Do you want to buy just some stories, the ones you think you would like? You can do it too, since I will publish the stories individually on Smashwords. So you see, different options to match different customers, different readers.

Once all this is settled and the books are republished on all those retailers, I will start to do the same process with the second book in the Little Nani series, which will be available next Fall.

Follow the whole blog tour since I will be announcing all the news in the different blogs!

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Little Nani is a little girl who likes helping people. However, when she helps people the results can be a bit unexpected. Why is that? Little Nani is a witch! Or at least she wants to be a witch. With her magic wand, she will try to cast different spells to help her friends, but she won’t be successful all the time.

Follow Little Nani in her funny adventures and meet her extraordinary friends. Funny ostriches, horses that love reading, super-fast turtles, grumpy zombies… Little Nani has lots of friends! You can also draw your own characters!

Little Nani is willing to become a good witch. Will she manage to do it? Who knows? Read the stories and discover what happens next!

 

CintaAuthorAUTHOR BIO

Cinta Garcia de la Rosa is a Spanish writer who has loved the written word since he discovered she was able to read books at age 5. Since then, she has become a bookworm and reads around 100 books every year. She also writes, every day, compulsively, even in the middle of the night. You cannot control when inspiration hits you, can you? She writes in English because she is convinced that in a previous life she was British, so writing in English feels more natural to her than writing in her native language. Yes, she is crazy like that. Cinta Garcia is the author of “The Funny Adventures of Little Nani”, a collection of short stories for children, and “A Foreigner in London”, a short story published on Smashwords. She is a member of Independent Authors International (iAi).

 

Anya’s Interview with Little Nani

Anya: Hi, Little Nani! I’m so excited you’re here. I loved reading your stories. But for everyone who hasn’t, can you introduce yourself?

Little Nani: Hello, Anya! I am very happy to be here. Well, my name is Little Nani and I am 8. I have always wanted to become a witch, so I took an online course and now that I got my magic wand, I try to help my friends… but it seems that my spells can be a bit wrong sometimes. But my intentions are always good!

Anya: Can you describe where you live for the visitors?

Little Nani: I live in a very nice house in the middle of the country, quite close to a cornfield and the forest. There is also a river nearby, where we can have lovely picnics surrounded by lovely trees and flowers. If you want to visit us, just close your eyes, picture the house in your mind, and say “I believe in magic”. You will appear right there.

Anya: I understand you’re a witch! Wow, where did you learn magic?

Little Nani: As I said, I took an online course. Actually I haven’t finished the course, but I keep on working on it.

Anya: If you had to pick one animal to have as a pet, what would it be?

Little Nani: A turtle, because I’m not allergic to them and they are lovely.

Anya: Cookies or cake?

Little Nani: Cake!!! Where is it? Where is it?? Oh, there is no cake? *pouts*

Anya: How do you feel about R.O.U.S.?

Little Nani: I don’t like rodents of any size. But I know for sure that my creator loves “The Princess Bride”.

Anya: Do you like to read?

Little Nani: Ugh, no. Horse keeps on telling me that I should read to become smarter, but I prefer playing in the forest or casting spells.

Anya: What is your favorite book?

Little Nani: Any story by Beatrix Potter, because the adventures are lovely and I love the animals appearing in her books.

Anya: If I gave you a paint brush, what would you paint?

Little Nani: Rainbows, butterflies, and ladybugs.

What do you have in store for us next?

Little Nani: I will star in a new set of ten stories which will be titled “Little Nani and Her Friends”. I will also live some great adventures in a set of stories of the choose your own adventure type. I think it is going to be fun.

Anya: That sounds great! I can’t wait :)

Little Nani: Thank you, Anya, for hosting me today on your blog! I have loved being here!

GIVEAWAY! Don’t forget to leave a comment, so you can enter the giveaway for the opportunity to win a signed copy of “The Funny Adventures of Little Nani”. If you leave comments in several blogs during the tour, you will get an entry for each comment. So don’t hesitate to comment!

LINKS TO THE BOOKS.

 

MEDIA LINKS:

 

May
23

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Trauma Llama – C L Raven teach the young. No really.

Category: Trauma Llama 4 Comments

Today Cat and Lynx Raven topple the Queen of Trauma Llama, Ms. Bronwyn Green off her throne with their FOURTH entry into the Trauma Llama series. All hail the awesome gothic queens! Here’s their contact info: blog | Twitter | facebook
Here is their blog.

Before we get to the trauma, check out their book Soul Asylum. It’s FREE this week! So you have NO reason not to grab it. Here’s the blurb:

The blood wanted to prick a conscience that couldn’t bleed.

Poe could keep his telltale heart.

I couldn’t hear it beating.

Ravens Retreat harbours a sinister secret. Inside its blackened heart lurk the ghosts of patients and staff who died when the asylum was burned down in 1904. Over a hundred years later, the West wing survives and now the patients want revenge.

Their eternal repose is disturbed by a malevolent poltergeist and the ghost tours led by the asylum’s resident, Phineas Soul, which attract the attention of journalist Mason Strider. His attempts to expose Phineas as a fraud have catastrophic consequences when it is Ravens Retreat’s dark heart that’s exposed as it awakens to claim the lives of those who dare to enter its brutal past.

Some things should never be disturbed.

Grab it here.

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C L Raven are identical twins from Cardiff, Wales. When they’re not spending their days looking after their animal army, they’re exploring castles, ghost hunting in spooky locations and drinking more Red Bull than the recommended government guidelines. Along with Ryan Ashcroft, they make up the ghost hunting trio, Cardiff’s Answer to Supernatural and have their own show on YouTube – Calamityville Horror.

Here is the lovely ladies’ fourth Trauma Llama tale:

As Soul Asylum is heavily linked to the past, we thought we’d share part of our past. It may surprise some people to know that we were once voluntary teaching assistants. What is even more surprising was that we weren’t banished forever.

We’d been helping in our mum’s school on inset days since we were 6. We spent the first few years hiding in storage cupboards, avoiding the children. When we started working there, we spent a lot of time hiding in storage cupboards, avoiding the children :D The art storeroom was our favourite bolthole. The area of the school was incredibly Welshy so it took us years to understand the kids. Cardiff isn’t a Welshy town. We got by with nods, ‘uh-huh’ and ‘ask the teacher.’

When we were in sixth form, if we only had morning classes, we’d spend the afternoon at our mum’s school, until we left school at 18 and worked there full time for two years unpaid. Did we abide by school rules and tone down our Gothic look? No. The kids loved it.

Our time there will always be marked with the many disasters we caused. The first one happened when we were kids. We dropped a 2Kg tub of red power paint and it went everywhere. Even we were plastered in it. Red powder paint over black trainers wasn’t a great look. Worse, it was in full view of the class.

One of the most memorable (cringeworthy) times was during Assembly with the entire infant school. For non-UK readers, that’s ages 3-8. The nursery teacher, Jan, was playing the piano, and any naughty kids had to stand by her. One boy managed to shut the piano lid on her fingers. She tried freeing her fingers whilst not showing how much pain she was in. The hall was deathly silent, apart from some insensitive people’s hysterical laughter. Our hysterical laughter. The worst thing was, we couldn’t stop and had to leave. All the kids were staring at us. So much for setting good examples. But we didn’t discriminate – we secretly laughed at the children when they fell over. We are terrible people.

Most of our memorable moments in life involve our animals and their unfailing attempts to embarrass us. This part is no exception. We own a duck, Peking, who’s the last one from 9. Her parents and aunts were hatched in the school for them to see life cycle differences between chickens and ducks. We kept the 4 ducks. And the 7 chickens. No, we don’t live on a farm. The ducks imprinted on us and thought we were their parents. Not many people become mothers to ducks at 15. Even less become grandmothers at 17. The ducks used to go into the school with our mum so the kids could see them changing (the chickens didn’t go back as they couldn’t be trusted. Chickens are evil geniuses). We built the ducks a pen in the foyer and kept the radio on so they wouldn’t get lonely (we did this at night when they slept in our room). One day the radio wasn’t on and they got lonely so they escaped from their pen and came looking for us. Just as the school inspectors turned up. Anyone in the teaching profession knows how stressful inspection time is. Luckily these inspectors had a sense of humour.

Most of our time was spent moving stuff. One day, we were moving a bench –one of those long ones with no sides- and backed up. Smash!  We’d hit the fish tank. The foyer was covered in water and fish. We saved the fish then Cat sliced her hand when we taped the tank back up. The fish lived in buckets until a replacement tank was bought. It wasn’t one of our finest moments.

Our main job was doing art displays in the classrooms and corridors. That’s the only part about the job we miss. Our mum liked having big 3D displays so there were times when we had to hang displays from the ceilings. The school was an old TB hospital, with long corridors, huge classrooms and high ceilings. There was only one way to reach them – put a 9 step stepladder on the tables and climb to the top. Except we hate heights. Yes the children witnessed us doing these dangerous stunts. No we didn’t use any safety methods, apart from one of us standing at the bottom to attempt a catch. Often, some of the displays would fall down in the night, triggering the alarms, so the caretaker would have to go to the school to make sure nobody was robbing the place. In the end we learned to position the displays out of the sensor’s vision, so if they fell down, the caretaker didn’t lose any sleep.

A male teacher joined the staff and was the prime target for practical jokes. Our best one was a combined effort with our mum and her teaching partner. The children had a fruit tasting day with a wide variety of fruits-some we’d never heard of. One of these was a cherimoya. We watched the interesting faces the children were pulling and had the wonderful idea of giving some to this teacher. He also pulled an interesting face –before running off to be sick. One of the other teachers (the only one who knew what it was) informed us it wasn’t ripe. It had to be eaten when the inside was soft. Cherimoya meant ‘custard apple’. No wonder it smelled so vile!

Despite all this, we weren’t fired. However, after working there for so many years unpaid, the school came in to some money. Did the headmaster reward us for our years of dedicated service?

No.

He employed someone else. The teachers we worked with were gutted. We left the school in disgust and never returned.

But from that moment on we’ve been full time writers for no pay. Someone out there is laughing very hard.

*shakes her fist at the headmaster* What a tool. In other news, evil genius chickens? I’m intrigued lol

Do you have a Trauma Llama story you’d like to share? Prod me on Twitter (@AnyaBreton) or e-mail me anya at anyabreton.com :)

Apr
25

By

Trauma Llama – Red Tash Karaokes

Category: Trauma Llama 2 Comments

trauma-llama-featureFellow Hoosier author Red Tash stopped today to tell us a story of her college days and the importance of “always go for the funny”. But first let’s look at her book TROLL OR DERBY.

 

Here’s the blurb:

Troll Or DerbyIn TROLL OR DERBY, fifteen year old Roller Deb is singled out by town bullies for both her skates, and for being different.  When her popular homecoming queen of a sister is kidnapped by a scuzzy drug dealer, Deb must flee the trailer park in which she’s grown up, and rescue her.  Along the way, Deb becomes enmeshed in the magical realm of trolls and fairies, and the blood-thirsty version of roller derby at which these beings excel.  But spending too much time among the fairies comes with a price.  Will Deb choose to save her sister, with the aid of a mysterious troll?  Or will she be lost to the lures of roller derby, and the blonde temptress April, forever?

Purchase on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, iTunes, Kobo or check out her page for more ways to get the book (and a SWEET photo of this bonafide roller derby gal)

Here is Red’s Trauma Llama tale:

It was the early 90s, and I was a student at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. Like many other collegians, I had to sing for my supper, so to speak. I did my performances as part of the “lunch lady” glove-wearing crew of Kroger J-928′s Salad Bar team. One of my best friends from my IU days was a girl who, like me, was way too cool to cut up fruit at a salad bar. This could be observed by the way she taught a goofy 19-year-old such as myself to rap along with TLC’s “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” or House of Pain’s “Jump Around.” I grew up on Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd. This personal introduction to what would eventually become “hip hop” was changing my life, yo. Not that I could actually sing—but it was fun to sing with her.

Another thing my friend taught me was to “always go for the funny.” I’d always been witty–at least in my own mind–but I didn’t always have the courage to make the jokes aloud. She assured me that when I saw the window for making a joke, I had to take it—that it was okay to fail at being funny, but since I had a good sense of humor, I should trust my instincts. It was great advice and it changed my life, most definitely. I think “always go for the funny” would have been one of my marriage vows, had my husband and I stopped to write any down. It’s right up there with “always be my friend,” and “always tell me I look beautiful/handsome, no matter what fresh hell I’ve been through.”

But back to college. One night after work I joined my friend and her roommates at their apartment to have a few drinks and hang out. At the time, it wasn’t common for people to own karaoke machines, but my friend’s roommate had one. Enchanted by the novelty and bolstered by the booze, I grabbed the microphone and launched into the next song: “The Greatest Love of All” by Whitney Houston.

Always go for the funny, I told myself, and when it got to the chorus, I inserted a lyric. “The greatest love…of all…is my ‘GINA!” What followed were a series of lewd gestures that I would be mortified to ever repeat, but at the time, they really slew my drunken college girl audience!

A few moments later, as the entire apartment complex beat down the girls’ door, doubled over in laughter and bringing their own booze, the party was on. For the rest of the night, quiet mousy me was red-faced, trying to avoid the question “So which one of you was the one who sang “My ‘GINA!” on the karaoke machine?” Evidently my drunken caterwaul about masturbation was interpreted as an invitation to party, and about 30 strangers showed up for an encore performance.

I don’t think I ever hung out at their apartment again.

LOL! I think this calls for comments on what other songs could use ‘GINA in the lyrics!

Do you have a Trauma Llama story you’d like to share? Prod me on Twitter (@AnyaBreton) or e-mail me anya at anyabreton.com :)

Apr
22

By

New Release – “Fire and Flame”

Category: New Releases Leave a Comment

FireandFlame_w7304_750-340x510My publisher The Wild Rose Press has put my newest paranormal romance Fire and Flame up EARLY on the Kindle store! Every other retailer will get it in August (8/3/13 to be exact).

Why the early date? Because they wanted it to be a part of the Kindle Select program (hint: there may be free days coming in the next few months). This means if you’re an Amazon Prime member you can borrow it for free!

 

 

 

 

Here’s the blurb:

Sara McKenna longs for a career in television–far away from the violence of her Fire witch heritage. But when her father is struck down through a typically savage stroke of fate, Sara is summoned home by her father’s second-in-command–her childhood rival, Fire witch Brent Conley.

Brent failed to protect the only man he’s ever respected. He refuses to fail his former priest’s haughty daughter. Sara must produce a pure-blooded child to continue their coven’s line, and Brent intends to personally see to that duty.

Although Sara will fulfill her duty, she has every intention of returning to her media career, without letting Brent steal her heart. But when Brent sees Sara again, he realizes just how much he’s missed her–and how much he wants her to stay. Will Brent be forced to free the one thing he’s always wanted to possess?

Read the Excerpt. Buy from: Amazon, Amazon UK (all other retailers 8/2/13).

Apr
19

By

Guest post! – Richard Flores IV – Don’t Judge a Book by its Cover. Wait…

Category: Writing 4 Comments

Today I’ve got the awesome Richard Flores IV visiting as part of his book tour for “Dissolution of Peace” Check out his post below!

Don’t Judge a Book by its Cover. Wait… –

by Richard Flores IV

We all know that saying “Don’t judge a book by its cover.”  We hear it all the time.  But, we rarely hear it applied to actual books.  That is because we all judge our books by the cover.

In a Disney’s Phineas and Ferb episode, “The Chronicles of Meap”, there comes a very funny scene (at least to me the author).  In which Candace is with her Mom (Linda):

Phineas: Yeah, it looked way outside, but then it was right in the zone. There’s a lesson, baseball fans: never judge a book by its cover.

(scene flips to Candace, looking at a row of books)
Candace: Boring, dull, stupid, lame— heavy-handed and derivative.
Linda: Oh, thank you for those insightful reviews of books you haven’t read.
Candace: Mom, that’s why books have covers: to judge them. I mean, why did you choose these books from the library?
Linda: They looked interesting.
Candace: So…

Linda: Point taken.

Every time I see that scene (and I watch a lot of Phineas and Ferb) it makes me smile.  Because it is so true.  Books have covers to entice us to buy them.  When I am in the book store (yes they still have those,) I browse the rows of books until I see a cover that jumps out at me.  I pick it up, look it over (including the back) and I decide if I am going to buy it based solely on the cover.

This is why cover art is so important.  Once you get them to pick up the book, you need to get them to turn it over and read that all important “sales pitch” printed on the back.  Only after you get past that will you be able to get them to buy the book.  Even if the person thumbs through the first few pages, they have to pick it up off the shelf first.

That is why covers are important in the store, but what about online.  Do people still browse the virtual aisles of Amazon.com?  I think they might.  Even if they know exactly what they are looking for, they may browse more.  For example, go to Amazon.com and search Richard Flores IV… no wait that sounds vain, searchRobert S. Wilson instead.  If you were specifically looking for his book Shining in Crimson because you saw my post about it (vanity again).  How would you recognize it instantly in the scrolling list of results?  THE COVER.

Now, if you click on the link to his novel.  You will see Amazon puts that “People who viewed this also viewed:” on the bottom.  Now all you see there is the cover, the title, and the author.  Now, you may not ever use that (I have), but people do that.  Otherwise, Amazon wouldn’t use it.  Again, they will make the choice to click on the novel, based on the cover.

So the cover is important in store or online.  If you go with a big publisher, chances are they will have someone take care of the cover art for you.  But, if you decide to self publish you will need to deal with cover art on your own.  Perhaps you hire somebody, or you can do it yourself if you choose.  But be prepared to spend some time on it.

A good cover needs:

  1. To have the title on it.  That seems obvious enough, but the title should be the dominate text on the cover.  I have seen books where you could easily mistake the Authors name as the Title.  Or even a tag line.  You don’t need to place the Title on top, but you do need to make it the most eye catching text on there.  Use easy to read, stand out fonts are best.  Make sure the title contrasts with the rest of the cover art, you don’t want it getting lost in the artwork.
  2. To have the Author’s name on it.  Believe it or not, I have seen covers with no Author’s name on it.  If I want to find a book by Robert S. Wilson, Lee Gimenez, or even a blockbuster like Orson Scott Card; you need to have the name on it.  I am not going to spend time looking to see who the book is written by.  You may not think you are worth looking for, but if you are marketing your book, someone is looking.  Even me, the twice published author of two short stories, gets a hit to my website based on a search for my name at least once a week. Again, stand out font that contrasts with the artwork.
  3. The artwork itself.  Many would argue this should have been number 1 on this list.  Sure the art may be what catches the eye first, but title is what always hooks me in to reading more.  So as far as importance goes, you decide.  There are several ways to get artwork for your cover.  There are plenty of stock photo/artwork sites.  You can buy the artwork per piece or you can pay a monthly fee and get all the artwork you want.  Some are even free.  Always check the terms and conditions carefully.  You may not be able to use the stock art commercially.  The other down side to stock is that your image could be used by someone else not giving you exclusive rights to the art.  If that is the case, you may want to commission an artist to do your cover art.  It will likely cost you (unless you are connected) and it will likely be more than the stock art sites.
  4. Relevant artwork.  Artwork is important enough to get two bullet points (that and I didn’t want to turn off my bullet point format).  Make sure you get artwork it is relevant to the story in some way.  It should be eye catching as well.  The artwork should not be overwhelming either.  It is not an art gallery exhibit.  Just enough to entice the readers to pick it up off the shelf.  The bottom line, you want art work that promises the story you’re telling inside.
  5. Tagline.  The tagline is a good thing to add on most cover art.  Though I know some great books without one.  But if you have a good strong tagline that will work, add that on there.  This should be the smallest text on the front cover, though still large enough to read.  A tagline is a one liner that hooks that sells the book.  You see these a lot on movie posters to.  “In a world…”
  6. The sales-pitch.  Typically this is on the back cover.  Not seen right away.  But you got the book off the shelf (or they clicked on the link).  Now you need to get them to buy it.  If you buy paper books like I do, the first thing I do after looking at the front cover, is turn the book over.  This is where the author now has a chance to tell me why I should buy the story.  Online they have a section for the book description or synopsis.  There are whole blogs on how to write that.  The main issue is you want to have a quick sales pitch about what your story is going to offer.  And then, if you have them, some quotes for fairly well known (or just known) reviewers.  This is your chance to get them to check out with your book.  A poorly written sales-pitch will result in them putting the book down.  Of course, they may also put the book down because the story isn’t what they like to read.  That’s okay though.  You’d rather have them not buy it than get it thinking it was something else and hate it (and possible tell a lot of people they hate it).

While I am no expert in Book Covers, I do understand that we judge books by their covers.  If you want to sell some books, cover art helps a lot.  Your cover art will become that books brand.  And we all know how powerful branding is.  Just think about golden arches.  So consider your cover art carefully.  You should work together with the artist to get exactly what you envision while utilizing the experience of the cover artist.

When it comes to books, it is okay to judge them by their covers.

Buy Now @ Amazon

Genre – Science Fiction

Rating – PG13 to R (Language)

More details about the author & the book

Connect with Richard Flores IV on Facebook & Twitter

As Richard says below, you can claim 5 entries in his Blog Tour Giveaway just for reading this blog post. The link is here: http://bit.ly/Y4krNr

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