Dragons Don't understand Come-Ons

This is an article I wrote for a blog when Live and Let Fly came out in e-book in 2011.  I love this book, I really do.  Vern is witty and fun, the plot is a roller-coaster of close scrapes and touching scenes, and the characters gave me their best.  Sadly, it has not sold well, and won't be going into print.  I've gotten back the print rights and may self-pub it, because I like having hard copies of my books.  In the meantime, I thought I'd share some of the fun, and if you enjoy this and like e-books, please check it out at http://tinyurl.com/LiveAndLetFly or http://tinyurl.com/amazonllf.

My latest book, Live and Let Fly, is a super-spy spoof starring my dragon detective, Vern.  I’ve written a lot of Vern’s cases over the years, but this time, Vern’s going to have to travel to places in the Mundane world working as an undercover agent.

There’s a problem being an undercover agent in our world, however.  Dragons just don’t blend in with the population.  So I had to turn Vern human.

Vern has been human once before, thanks to a demon’s curse, but it was a harrowing and confusing experience that he’d mostly forgotten.  (You can only imagine what it takes to make a dragon forget an experience.)  This time, however, holy magic transforms him for a good cause.  Nonetheless, it’s kind of a harrowing experience for him, especially when he discovers that he looks the same as when he was cursed—a rather gorgeous man with dark, Irish looks.  He panics and whines until an exasperated Sister Grace suggests they stuff him full of sweets until he gets fat and develops acne.

     “Will that work?”

     “No, you silly dragon, and that’s the point!  You have this form because if you were human, that’s the form God would have given you.  It’s a trustworthy face.  Just be careful around the ladies.”

So, not only does he have to deal with uncomfortable shoes, intercontinental plane flights in coach, and the moniker “Drake Muldoon,” he’s got to watch out for women.  Only problem is, he’s a dragon—androgynous and sexless.  What’s he know?

Poolside at the luxurious island resort, Vern manages to fend off one interested lady by telling her he’s “devoted” to someone.  Later, he and his partner, Charlie, have to meet their contact at a big hotel party.  They pass by a couple necking behind a potted plant, but it doesn’t phase him.  As a dragon, he’s seen plenty of humans mating.  He can handle the dancing part, too.  Dragons love to dance, although their dancing is aerial, aggressive, and thoroughly enjoyable, but also completely without sexual overtones.  Thus, when he and one of the beautiful women he’d been dancing with head off the floor and to the bar for a drink, he’s thinking they’re going to cool off.

Not quite what she had in mind.

"Better," I sighed. She started to order us some margaritas, but I stopped her and ordered an iced coffee. "If I have anything alcoholic now, I'll be asleep before I hit my bed," I told her.

"Can't have that," she murmured. "So, do you have plans for Festival? I hear it's a fascinating ceremony." She dragged the word "fascinating" out in a way I probably should have recognized but didn't. Hey, I was tired.

I shrugged. "My friend Nigel's not much for parties. We'll probably just hang around the hotel."

"Doing what? The power's going to be off, you know. For the whole weekend, we're going to live like the primitives."

"Kirsti should like that," I murmured. Yeah, I was tired, and my legs felt like lead. If I'd been a dragon, I would have flexed my claws to work out some of the kinks; instead, I pointed and flexed my toes just to keep them from stiffening up.

The bartender gave us our drinks, and we clicked glasses. The cold coffee felt wonderful going down my throat. I took three big swallows before I realized I was being careless. After all, what's the cliché in these cases? I rolled my next sip around my tongue, testing for any trace of drugs. Aliciya watched me, a shy smile on her lips, fingers twisting her hair. I grinned back.

She leaned forward and started rubbing my knee. That felt good.

I purred. Dragon brain, dragon reaction. I shut my eyes and relaxed.

"Hey, you, don’t fall asleep here. I've got to ask you something."

Oops. I sat up and leaned on my elbows. I looked straight into her eyes so she'd know I was paying attention. "What's that?"

"Well, Kirsti's sweet, so she just sort of takes things at face value, but I want to know. You're not married?"

Huh? "No."

"Engaged?" She leaned a little closer.

I shook my head.

"So, just how...devoted...are you?" She licked her lips.

That's when I realized, she wanted to drag me behind the potted plant!

Oh, oh.

Dragon brain plus human body equals vocal cord short circuit. All that came out of my mouth as she leaned closer was, "uhhhh..."

Vern gets out of it, though not quite in the way he expected.  I hope you’ll read about it and all his other close calls as a human and a dragon in Live and Let Fly.

A Dragon Goes to Confession

Rob is home from Baghdad for two weeks, so some of my blogs are re-runs right now. This is one of my favorites from the Live and Let Fly tour of April 2012.  It's also appropriate since we're in Lent, and all good Catholics should go to Confession during this season.  If Vern can do it, you can!  

If you've not read it, it's available on e-book.http://www.amazon.com/Live-Case-Files-DragonEye-ebook/dp/B007Y5TCHG/
 

A Dragon goes to Confession

By Karina Fabian

One of the things I like about working with smaller press is that they aren’t as worried if something has religious overtones.  Neither of my publishers for my DragonEye books are Catholic, yet they loved the incorporation of the faith in the world and character building.  I like to think that it’s because it is part of the world and character, rather than for preaching; and certainly, if I had started preaching, they would have caught me.

Still, it’s been fun to be able to put in scenes like this one in Live and Let Fly.  Vern, my dragon who has been “drafted” into serving the Catholic Church, goes to Confession with a priest from Idaho who has never even seen a Faerie creature, much less a Magical.  However, Vern and his group have just come out of a very dicey situation and are wounded in more ways than one, and Sister Grace has fetched a priest knowing the Sacraments will help:

"Well," Sister Grace said with false brightness, "why don't we leave these two alone to talk? Gene, perhaps you can explain to me why you're not practicing your faith?" She grabbed him by the ear and led the crouching, staggering and protesting federal agent out. Heather swallowed a giggle, made an awkward curtsy toward Father Jacob (like she had learned to do for Bishop Aiden of Peebles-on-Tweed) and followed.

Which left me with a tongue-tied priest.

We stood there a moment like two kids being told to make friends while the moms went off to have coffee and gossip. He toyed with the strap of his bag. Some of the numbness in my wing and arm was wearing off, and my front paw had prickles. I lifted it some and splayed the fingers, stretching them out.

"Well!" He mimicked Grace in word and tone, then fell silent.

I decided to give us both a break. I jerked my head, gingerly, toward the tarp-covered hay bale. "Would you like to sit down, Father?"

"I—Yes! Yes, I think I would."

I followed in his wake, doing my best not to reveal what each step cost me.

Once he'd settled, he reached into his book bag, pulled out his stole and blessed it. It seemed to give him confidence, because he managed a couple of sentences this time. "You'll have to be patient with me, I'm afraid. This is the first time I've done something like this."

"Heard Confession in a barn?"

He smiled. "Yes, yes. That, too."

"Well, it's new for us both. Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It's been four days since my last Confession."

"Really?" He sounded surprised, though that might not have had anything to do with my species. He spoke his greeting, and I began listing my sins. I decided to go easy on him and work up to the big ones, so I catalogued the usual things he'd heard a thousand times before: moments of greed, resentful thoughts about my pre-George predicament, my nastiness toward Kitty McGrue. Once I saw his neck and shoulders relax, I moved into the more serious ones. I started with my threatening behavior toward Phil A. Minion—sans the jokes, though I confessed that I still found it funny—then confessed to pouncing on Sally and scaring her out of ten years of life. Finally came the big one:

"I'm not quite sure what Grace told you about the rescue, but it got pretty dicey, and talking and making threatening pounces weren't going to cut it. In the chaos, I...bit off a guy's hand." I waited for his reaction.

I didn't get what I expected. "I'm sorry. I'm really quite new at this. Is eating another sentient being considered a sin for dragons?"

My lip curled in a smile. Good question. Points for the newbie. "For dragons under normal circumstances, no. But my case is...special."

He nodded. "Go on."

You know, this could be the beginning of a beautiful spiritual friendship. And he'd made it easier for me to say what I had to say next. "For a moment, I enjoyed it, Father. I really enjoyed it. Like I haven't enjoyed something in nearly a millennium. And humans are not my first choice for a meal." I shivered with the memory of how good it had felt.

"Grace did tell me a little more of what happened. You were not yourself then, were you?"

"Injured, poisoned, imprisoned, my friends threatened. And I was hungry. So, no."

"You've been given a great temptation in a time of extreme physical weakness and mental distress. But you did pull back from the brink of greater sin. Having tasted that temptation—" He winced when he realized his words, but continued. "—you must redouble your efforts to resist it. I hope that makes sense?'

"A lot of sense." See? I said to the Holy Spirit. How come you never do that for me when I ask for inspiration?

Story time! Reading aloud from Live and Let Fly

I even made pictures and some snarky comments. That way you don't have to look at my face for the next six minutes. 

Enjoyed that?  You can buy Live and Let Fly at http://tinyurl.com/LiveAndLetFly or Amazon.

The Inside Scoop from a Cover Artist, Lex Valentine

Today, I have a guest blog from the cover artist of Live and Let Fly--Lex Valentine.  Lex did a terrific cover and was very receptive to my feedback.  She was great to work with and I've gotten a lot of comments on the results.  She's going to give you the inside scoop on cover art from the artist's POV.

I’m Lex Valentine and I’m an author. I’m also a cover artist for MuseItUp, Pink Petal Books, Passion in Print and MLR Press as well as for authors who self-publish. Karina asked me to guest blog here today because I created the cover for her new release, Live and Let Fly. I thought it would be a good opportunity to show readers and authors alike what goes into the creation of a cover.

The creation of a cover starts with the information the author provides to the artist. The artist uses the information to either draw an image or find an image or images that fit. They create the cover based on their interpretation of the information. When the author looks at it, they let the artist know what works and what doesn’t work. The artist then goes back and makes changes to bring the cover more in line with what the author envisions.

Most publishers that allow author input (some houses do not allow input unless the cover really misrepresents the book) up to a point, one or two passes of changes and that’s all. The reason they can’t allow more is because it’s cost prohibitive (time is money!) and it can build ill will between artist and author and publisher. The fastest way for a publisher to see an author as a Diva who may not be worth their time in the future is for the author to keep asking for more and more changes to the cover art. And believe me, if an author is Diva-ish when it comes to their cover and their book doesn’t sell well, the publisher may pass on future manuscripts from that author. Trust me. I’ve seen it happen.

The best thing an author can do when it comes to cover art is to realize there are limitations to everything. First, there are limitations when it comes to communication. If the author doesn’t articulate their vision very well, the artist is more likely to return a mockup that doesn’t match that vision. Artists don’t have crystal balls! They can’t read author minds! You need to be very concise about your descriptions and you also need to articulate what you are willing to bend on.

Second, there are limitations based on the artist. Some artists can actually draw. Others use photo manipulation. Those that can draw rely totally on the descriptions provided by the author. Those that use photo manipulation are limited by the images that are available to use. The more wild and diverse the characters and setting the less likely a photo manipulation artist is to find images that will work for the cover.

Third, there are almost always limitations based on cost. If a photo manipulation artist finds only one image that correctly portrays a character, the author may insist on that image. If the publisher pays the cost of the images and the image is expensive they may say no. If the artist pays the cost of the image and it comes out of their commission, they may say no. There are a lot of images that are cost prohibitive out there. And for artists who receive their fee based on the sales of the book, paying out of their pocket for images means they are fronting the cost of that cover in the hope that they will recoup what they have spent. They are in a sense, paying the author for the right to do their cover…at least until the sales start rolling in. No sales means the artist has given away that cover for free and the money spent on it becomes a loss.

Fourth, there are limitations based on time. If the cover art is needed quickly because a release date is very close, there may be very little time to make changes to the first draft of a cover. Also, when the artist is paid a flat fee for a cover, the longer it takes to create a cover, the less money an artist makes on it. At some point continuing to make changes becomes cost prohibitive. If an artist’s flat fee is $100 based on $25 an hour, that’s 4 hours the artist has to find images, create the cover and make the changes. If the work goes beyond 4 hours, the artist is no longer making any money on that cover.

Luckily for me, Karina’s cover required only two passes of changes. She wanted a very James Bond looking cover which immediately brought the gun barrel image to mind. Finding the inside of a gun barrel at the stock agencies turned out to be a piece of cake. I then decided to use the Mobsters font because it turned some of the letters into guns. Some of you may remember the font as the one used on the Sopranos TV show.

Next, I needed a red dragon. Since I write dragonshifters myself I did have a few dragons in my light box and they led me to the dragon I eventually chose for Vern. Finding a human Vern turned out to be fairly easy too. The man with the glasses seemed very James Bond-ish while still giving the reader the ability to see him as Vern’s human form.

I had a feeling that finding a Grace would be trouble. And she was. I looked at a lot of nun photos before I found one that might work. Lucky for me, Karina liked the one I chose.

We had some tweaking to do in terms of colorizing but all in all, this wasn’t a difficult cover to make and Karina’s requests didn’t outdo or match the Diva authors I’ve worked with. It ended up being a fun cover I think readers will be drawn to. The James Bond ties are obvious as is the fact that the book is humorous.

As an author myself, I always strive to give authors a cover that fits their vision. Sometimes I can’t do that. When that happens, I try to at least give them something representative of the book, something beautiful that catches the reader’s eye and makes them want to know more about what’s inside. I know that when I, as an author, have no input on a cover and the cover isn’t pleasing to me, I find myself trying extra hard to sell the book to people. And I’ve sometimes found myself trying to justify the cover even though I don’t like it either. As an artist, it can be really uncomfortable to sit in the author chair and not be given any say over my cover. And believe me, I have been in that position several times.

So there you have it, thoughts from a cover artist on what it takes to create covers. If you’re interested in my work, my portfolio can be seen at http://winterheart.com. Many thanks to Karina for having me today and I wish her many sales with Vern and Grace!

Lex Valentine

Winterheart Design

Behind the Scenes with Editor Penny Ehrenkranz

Penny Ehrenkranz is a line editor for MuseItUp and a dear lady.  I thought for the book tour, it'd be fun to ask her about her experiences editing and especially about editing Live and Let Fly.  She's also an author in her own right, so check out her books!

1.  What is your job at MuseItUp?  What kind of editing do you do?

I am a line editor at MuseItUp.  As such, it’s my job to look for spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors.  I also try to help the authors weed out extra words like “that” which tend to creep into everyone’s manuscripts.  I will also keep a lookout for inconsistencies that might have slipped by the content error.  I will also offer a second opinion if the author and content editor might not agree on how something should be written.

2.  What do you like about it?

There are a couple of things I like about my job.  First, I am an avid reader.  What could be better than a job where I get paid to read all day long?  It’s an almost perfect job.  Second, I have always enjoyed the English language and all its nuances.  Even when I’m reading a book for pleasure, I’ll notice errors that an editor didn’t catch, even from some of the big houses.  It happens, but it also proves to me that line editing comes natural to me.  

3.  You were already a fan of Vern and Sister Grace.  How did that help or hinder you in your editing?

I am indeed a fan of Vern and Sister Grace.  I think it probably helped my editing, knowing the characters. I could better tell if something fit or seemed out of character.  It always helps in editing if the editor enjoys the story she is working on.  Vern and Grace are such delightful characters; I look forward to both reading and working on the stories to tighten them up for publication.

4.  What was the best part of editing Live and Let Fly?

I enjoy working on books where the author has a sense of humor.  That’s not to say I don’t like reading dark and mysterious books, but it’s a nice change.  Live and Let Fly didn’t disappoint me.  Karina’s writing style always gives me a chuckle as I’m reading.  Vern just cracks me up sometimes with what comes out of his mouth.

5.  What was the most challenging part?

That’s hard to answer.  Karina is cooperative and open to suggestions.  By the time it got to me, the manuscript was in pretty darn good shape. Chris, as content editor, might have had more of a challenge than I did.

6.  Tell us a little about your own works.

I have three very different romance stories publis

hed this past year by MuseItUp: Love Delivery, a contemporary romance, Lady in Waiting, an historical romance, and Mirror, Mirror, a time-travel romance.  Sam’s Dot Publishing released a collection of my short stories in January of 2011, A Past and A Future.  My children’s books are all under contract with 4RV Publishing and will be released the end of this year and through 2015: Ghost for Rent and Ghost for Lunch are middle grade paranormal mysteries, and Boo’s Bad Day and Many Colored Coats are both picture books.  Here are links:

Love Delivery

http://tinyurl.com/4ajo9wz

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005GPRQEC

Lady in Waiting

http://tinyurl.com/6u4keh5

http://tinyurl.com/82rjtj8

Mirror, Mirror

http://t.co/quFSgqOv

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006R0A3KY

A Past and A Future

http://sdpbookstore.com/anthologies.htm

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/62608

Ghost for Rent, coming 2012-2013

Ghost for Lunch, coming September, 2013

Many Colored Coats, coming October, 2014

Boo's Bad Day, coming June, 2015

http://4rvpublishingcatalog.yolasite.com/