Sue Parritt on Being a Migrant & Her Writing Inspiration @OdysseyBooks #AmReading #Dystopian #Goodreads

What inspired me to write my book?

Anger, abhorrence and disbelief motivated me to write Sannah and the Pilgrim. I was and remain appalled by past and present governments’ policy on refugees and asylum seekers. News bulletins and current affairs programmes helped fuel my deep concerns about the direction our country is heading. From a country that welcomed scores of displaced people after the Second World War, we are becoming xenophobic, rejecting those that have fled what for most of us are inconceivable terrors. As a migrant myself, I tried to imagine how I would have felt, if instead of paying my ten pounds and travelling here on an ocean liner, I had been forced to flee my homeland, hand over my life’s savings to greedy people smugglers and risk my life by boarding a leaky overcrowded boat.

My thoughts then turned to a different category of refugees, those we can expect in the not so distant future. Low-lying Pacific islands are already under threat from accelerating climate change, about which wealthy first-world countries have so far failed to act. Soon there will be a flood of environmental refugees seeking a safe haven in our sparsely populated and prosperous nation. How will our government react then, when turning back the boats won’t be an option?

I felt my option as a fiction writer was to draw on contemporary government policies regarding refugees and climate change to create a portrait of a future Australia that is, to my mind, entirely possible. The idea to divide the country into zones according to race of origin came from a thinly veiled proposal made by an ultra-conservative politician some years ago. Research into climate change led me to place my characters in the most inhospitable part of twenty-fourth century Australia, the extremely hot, humid and disease-ridden north. Confined to the Brown Zone (formerly Queensland) the people, descendants of Pacific environmental refugees, are forced to cultivate the remaining fertile coastal strip to produce food for White Southerners, whose zone, although more suitable for human habitation, is too arid to support agriculture.

I was inspired to create the role of storyteller for my protagonist, Sannah, by the manner in which information is often distorted by both the media and government in order to provoke certain reactions. For instance, fears of being swamped by refugees are intensified by using terms such as ‘illegals’ and concerns over rising utility costs assuaged by promises to repeal the Carbon Tax. Sannah’s people are kept in ignorance through a steady diet of Tales (a weird blend of historical fact and fiction) delivered by government-trained storytellers. In similar fashion, we are fed only what governments and multinational companies want us to hear and it takes a great deal of effort to uncover the truth. Lies ensure compliance in both twenty-first and twenty-fourth century Australia.

About the Author:

Sue Parritt is an Australian writer, originally from England. Her poetry and short stories have been published in magazines and anthologies in Australia, Britain and the USA. After graduating BA University of Queensland 1982 (majors: English Literature, Drama and French), Sue worked in university libraries until taking early retirement in 2008 to pursue her long-held dream of becoming a professional writer.  Since then she has written Sannah and the Pilgrim, numerous short stories and poems and‘Feed Thy Enemy’, a feature film script set in Naples in 1944 and 1974 and based on a true story (Sue is currently seeking a producer). She recently completed a second novel Safety Zone and is now writing a sequel to Sannah and the Pilgrim – the working title is Pia and the Skyman.

When Sannah the Storyteller, a descendant of environmental refugees from drowned Pacific islands, finds a White stranger on her domestep, she presumes he’s a political prisoner on the run seeking safe passage to egalitarian Aotearoa. However, Kaire’s unusual appearance, bizarre behaviour, and insistence he’s a pilgrim suggest otherwise.

Appalled by apartheid Australia, Kaire uses his White privileges to procure vital information for Sannah and her group of activists regarding new desert prisons that are to be built to house all political prisoners. The group plans sabotage but needs help, and Kaire is a willing accomplice. But when Sannah turns Truthteller and threatens to reveal the country’s true history, even Kaire’s White privilege and advanced technology cannot save Sannah and her daughter from retribution.

About Sannah and the Pilgrim:

Sannah and the Pilgrim is a tale of courage, defiance and deceit that asks the reader, ‘Would you risk death by telling the truth about your country, or would you play it safe and spend your life as a storyteller?’

Are you concerned about our governments’ (both past and present) failure to act on climate change and the detention and inhumane treatment of refugees? I am, so I have drawn on contemporary conservative attitudes to present a dystopian view of a future Australia in my speculative fiction novel Sannah and the Pilgrim. Read it and discover what could happen to our‘lucky’ country.

General Information - Sannah and the Pilgrim by Sue Parritt

ISBN: 978-1-922200-14-3

Genre: Speculative Fiction / Sci-fi / Dystopian

Release Date: 26 April 2014 (Paperback and ebook)

Publisher: Odyssey Books (http://www.odysseybooks.com.au/)

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1kBKqan

Kobo: http://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/sannah-and-the-pilgrim

B&N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/sannah-and-the-pilgrim-sue-parritt/1119209936?ean=9781922200143

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/sannah-and-the-pilgrim/id872478599?ls=1&mt=11

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21883471-sannah-and-the-pilgrim

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sue.parritt

LinkedIn: http://au.linkedin.com/pub/sue-parritt/60/622/301

What You Didn't Know About Saga of the Nine: #Area38 by Mikey DB @mikeydbii #Thriller #AmReading

Ten things you didn’t know about Saga of the Nine: Area 38

1) It was originally going to be a musical.  The album that inspired it, This is War by 30 Seconds to Mars, was intended not only as the frame work of the story, but the bulk of the songs as well.  I thought about seeking out Jared Leto’s help/permission to use his music and possibly add more, but things ended up turning a different direction.  It really came down to the fact that I didn’t think a musical would do the story justice.  I still listened to the album probably a couple hundred times while writing it, but the story is much different now than the original musical.

2) Mica and the USA Division were inspired by a date I took a girl on.  My date and I doubled with my roommate and his date, each got some masquerade masks, and then went to dinner at a fancy restaurant while we wore them.  Like I said, bizarre, but hey, something worked because my date that night is now my wife.

3) Area 38 is actually a reference to the 38^th state of the United States of America.

4) The opening setting was inspired by the cold winter mornings in Utah.  I’ve been working the six am shift for as long as I can remember, and one of the joys about having to wake up so early in order to get to work on time, is it’s around the time that the sun rises.  The fog that covered the fields outside the industrial park were some of the most beautiful mornings I’ve seen.

5) Benedict Cumberbatch, the actor who played Sherlock Holmes in BBC’s Sherlock, is the person I pictured as I wrote and fine tuned Christopher Stone, the sadistic Area Leader of Area 38.  If he reads this, I hope he doesn’t get offended.  The way he talks in Star Trek: Into Darkness as Kahn is exactly how I imagine Christopher saying his lines.

6) I wrote the entire novel on the floor of my 500 square foot apartment--right at the foot of my bed.  I could only right for a few hours at a time though.  Any longer than three and my butt and legs would begin to go numb.

7) Saga of the Nine: Area 38 is actually a hybrid.  The entire plot began as two different stories.  Both of them were going nowhere, and one day I had the epiphany to combine the two.

8) Most, if not all, of my research for Area 38 came from listening to history podcasts I would listen to at my day job in the warehouse.

9) The flag on the cover was the brain child of my cousin, the cover designer.  The entire premise is that anything that is evil and corrupt usually isn’t original.  Evil simply takes originality and tweaks it.  That’s what the Nine did with the U.S. flag.

10) The foreign language in the novel is based off of Tahitian, which I picked up on my LDS mission in French Polynesia.

Change affects everyone and it is no different for Jackson. Living in Area 38 for as long as he can remember, he knows of no better way to exist than under the tyrannical rule of Christopher Stone, son of Stewart Stone from The Nine of The United Governmental Areas, aka The UGA. This all takes a dramatic turn when Jackson finds a red, metal box buried in his yard, filled with illegal artifacts—journals, a Bible, CDs, etc.—that are from a man of whom he has no recollection of: Mica Rouge.

 The year is 2036 and Mica, unlike Jackson, does know of a better way of life but is torn apart as he sees his country, The United States of America, crumbling from within by group known as The Political Mafia. The Mafia has infiltrated levels upon levels of governmental resources and it is up to Mica and a vigilante group known as The USA Division to stop them and their dark Utopian vision. To their demise, and at the country's expense, The Division fails and has no choice but to watch The Constitution dissolve and transform into The UGA.

In a final stand, having not given up hope, Mica and what is left of The Division, give one final fight in Colorado, or better known as Area 38. However, all is lost as The Division is betrayed by one of their own, Stewart Stone. Mica is left with no choice but to hide in exile, leaving what little history he can of himself and the great United States of America, with his wife, long time friends, and newly born son in hopes that they will one day finish what he could not.

Jackson, having found this legacy twenty-seven years later, decides to start the war that will end The Nine, and he with an outcast group known as The Raiders, begins his fight with Christopher Stone in Area 38. Filled with betrayal, unity, despair, hope, hate and love Area 38 follows both Mica and Jackson in their attempts to restore what they believe to be true freedom, and where one fails, the other rises to the seemingly impossible challenge.

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Genre – Dystopian Thriller

Rating – PG13

More details about the author

Connect with Mikey D. B. on Facebook & Twitter

Website www.mikeydb.com

@Vanna_Smythe on Believable Fictional Characters #AmWriting #YA #WriteTip

How to Make Your Characters Believable

I believe the number one thing that will make fictional characters believable and enable them to come alive on the page is the ability to picture them as real, living human beings. This means you should be able to imagine what they look like and how they dress, but that’s not nearly enough. To truly see them and know them, you should also be able to imagine their facial expressions, for example, how their lips curl into a smile, how they frown and whether dimples form in their cheeks when they laugh. Yet that’s still only the tip of the iceberg, since it only covers their external side.

Internally, I think the most important thing when it comes to writing believable characters is their nature, namely are they loving, aggressive, driven or passive. This ties directly into their goal in the story, as the ways they choose to achieve their goal will inevitably make their traits come to the surface. This is why it is important to know all their traits, even the ones they choose to keep secret.

Ideally, you should know at least some of these traits before beginning to write. Though if you’re more of a seat of the pants writer, you probably prefer to let the characters reveal themselves during the course of the story without you forcing any characteristic on them. But when you do the final revision, you should take care to bring all of their various traits into a logical whole.

One neat trick I recently discovered for matching up mannerisms with emotions or situations is observing actors in movies. Since you know what emotion they are going through (which may not always be the case when simply people watching) it is easier to come up with ideas of how to describe a character that is nervous, in love, sad, angry or happy.

The advice “Show Don’t Tell” applies to characters as well, and to make them as life-like as you can, it is always better to show their emotions, thoughts or actions, rather than just explaining how they feel.

For my latest book, The Grower’s Gift, I had a good grasp of the main male character Ty before I started writing, but my main heroine Maya developed more gradually during the course of the story. Although, by the time I finished the book, I got to know both of them as well as I know some of my oldest friends.

The future is bleak in the year 2102. The planet is in chaos and the weather patterns have completely shifted, turning most of the world into an uninhabited wasteland.

The rich and powerful of North America have pulled back into the six remaining megacities, erasing all trace of a central government and leaving millions displaced by the environmental crisis to fend for themselves in the dying world.

Sixteen-year-old Maya has a gift, a power she thinks can heal the earth and make it habitable again. A gift that she must learn to harness. The school for the gifted in Neo York is the only place where she can learn to control her power and reach her potential.

Yet the school is not what it seems. Ran by the ruthless head of the city of Neo York, the school’s only objective is to extract the powers of the gifted and then discard them. Only Ty, heir to the city, can keep Maya from being destroyed there. But Ty has a secret, and his loyalty to his family has never wavered.

Will his growing love for Maya be strong enough to save them both?

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Genre - YA Dystopian

Rating – PG-13

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Connect with Vanna Smythe through Facebook & Twitter

Website www.vannasmythe.com

Roland Hughes on Success in Writing #AmWriting #Dystopian #BookClub

How do you write – lap top, pen, paper, in bed, at a desk?

If it were not for OpenOffice and its spell checking I could never be a writer.  That said, I seem to go through a lot of scratch paper.  Perhaps it is because I grew up before computers existed.  Notes in a text or other file tend to get lost but when I'm writing something I intend to complete my desk is littered with things written down on paper in my nearly illegible handwriting.

How much sleep do you need to be your best?

Interesting question.  I've seen it asked in many different ways.  People talk about Earnest Hemingway “at his best in the morning.”  Others talk about his drinking.  Few connect the two and say he was at his best hung over.  It is kind of a straight line.  If you drink a lot then you are either just sobering up or hung over in the morning.

Oddly enough I find I'm at my best when physically tired.  I don't mean exhausted after a day's work, but the kind of tired you get the next day or the day after many days of exhausting work.  Where you have slept all you can sleep but don't seem to have enough energy to go outside and do something.  That kind of physical fatigue keeps me parked in the chair at the keyboard.  The writing part of my mind is in complete control pretty much because the rest of it is still checked out.

Every writer has their own idea of what a successful career in writing is, what does success in writing look like to you?

The definition of success changes over the years.  Early on you want to have that run away hit so you can “live the life”.  A bit later your focus starts to move towards writing that one book which will last.  Once you approach the big 5-0 you tend to focus on writing something you really feel needs to be written and hope there will be one other person at some point in the future who discovers it and claims it made their life better.

Occasionally I visit a writing forum or two.  I'm always amused at the fledgling writers striving to make their first work a break out commercial success.  When they ask why I'm amused I tell them they should focus on writing really good books early on then strive for that big commercial success with their last book.  Why?  Because it wags the long tail of their catalog.  Many get offended when they here that, but it weeds out writers from lottery players.  Far too many people putting work out there think they can write a single story then live on easy street.  They don't want to hear that easy street doesn't have a zip code.

How did you develop your writing?

As a child I wrote a lot of letters communicating with family members.  The Post Office was all we had back then.  I guess that resurfaced later in life.

Where do you get your inspiration from?

When it comes to my “geek” book series “The Minimum You Need to Know” inspiration comes from identifying things developers need to know which aren't widely documented or, as in the case of the logic book in that series, are simply no longer taught.  My novels come from various places.  In the case of “John Smith” those characters simply refused to leave me alone until I told their story.

When you are not writing, how do you like to relax?

A glass of Chardonnay by the fire place with some good DVDs.

How often do you write? And when do you write?

I write when I have both the time and the need.  I self publish these days.  I have no deadlines or release commitments.  This gives me the freedom to do it right.

"John Smith: Last Known Survivor of the Microsoft Wars" is one big interview. It is a transcript of a dialogue between "John Smith" (who, as the title of the book implies is the last known survivor of the Microsoft wars) and the interviewer for a prominent news organization.

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Genre – Dystopian Fiction

Rating – PG

More details about the author

Website http://johnsmith-book.com/

S.M. McEachern on What Inspired Her to Write "Sunset Rising" @smmceachern #YA #Dystopian #TBR

Tell us about your new book? What’s it about and why did you write it?

Worlds Collide is the second book of the Sunset Rising series.  Sunset Rising ended in a bit of a cliffhanger and Worlds Collide picks up exactly where it left off.  I’ve done a lot world-building in this second novel and introduced new characters. Some mysteries from the first book are solved in WC, but new ones are added in preparation for the third book. The first three books will establish a series that could go on for infinity (kinda like Star Trek).

When did you first know you could be a writer?

I always knew I wanted to be a writer, so it’s kind of weird that it took me so long to write my first novel. I did a lot of academic writing throughout my studies and career, so I guess that helped satiate my desire to knit words together.  However, when I had my first child, I made the decision to be a stay-at-home mom (and that was a tough thing to do!), so that writing outlet was gone. Now both my kids are in school and I have more time to myself.

What inspired you to write your first book?

My teenage daughter and I do buddies reads all the time, mostly young adult contemporary fiction.  Before we started reading together, I hadn’t really read any young adult novels. I fell in love with the genre! And I already had an idea for a novel, based on academic research I had done years ago, so everything just came together and I started writing.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?

If you could hit a “reset” button on the world, what would you change about it? Would you try to rebuild what we already have or go in a completely different direction? I hope the Sunset Rising series will get readers thinking about what kind of future lays before us and what they can do now to shape it.

How much of the book is realistic?

Sunset Rising is science fiction/fantasy with roots firmly planted in reality.  I think anyone who keeps abreast of world events (politics, climate change, dwindling resources) accepts there’s a possibility of a third world war. In chapter seven, my main character flips through some old, preserved magazines and scans the news headlines leading up to the nuclear war.  Three out of four of the headlines were taken directly from the news on the day I wrote that page.  I wrote a trivia question about it on Goodreads if anyone wants to check it out: https://www.goodreads.com/trivia/show/168358-in-chapter-seven-of-sunset-rising-book

Can you tell us about your main character? 

Sunny O’Donnell is a seventeen-year-old slave born in the Pit.  At heart, she’s very stubborn and extremely resourceful.  When her life starts to fall apart, and every one she loves is threatened, she looks for a way out. The “way out” means teaming up with someone she considers the enemy, but she’s willing to make that sacrifice in order to save everyone she loves.  She just doesn’t count on her enemy being a good guy. So begins an unexpected romance that seems destined to fail.

How did you develop your plot and characters?

My plot was pretty much developed when I started writing Sunset Rising. My characters always develop as I write them, which means even though I have a plot worked-out, my characters sometimes take it in a different direction.  In writing circles, I’m what you call a pantser—I write by the seat of my pants.  I have a rough outline in my head, but no direct path from point A to point B.

What do you consider the most challenging about writing a novel, or about writing in general? 

There are two sides to everything I write: what I meant and what the reader perceives.  These two things don’t always agree.  Beta readers are the best people to let me know when I’ve missed the mark.  Then comes the hard part of rewriting what I said in order to clarify it for the reader.

Why did you choose to write this particular book? 

Sunset Rising is a cautionary tale. I’ve woven a lot of current real world problems into my story, such as: bonded slavery, human rights, poverty, nuclear arms, and corruption in the government.  It’s my sincere hope that young adults who enjoyed reading Sunset Rising might visit my blog and see the links for UN Slavery Today and United Nations News Centre.  You can find my blog here: http://smmceachern.wordpress.com/category/my-posts/

What are some of the best tools available today for writers, especially those just starting out?

The absolute most beneficial “tool” an author can have: Readers.   Readers have, and always will, determine the worth of a book.  Charles Dickens, J.R.R. Tolkien, Edgar Allan Poe and Mark Twain were all authors that didn’t have support when they started out, other than readers. They wrote their stories and sent them out to the masses and the masses gave them feedback.  Sounds a lot like self-publishing, doesn’t it?  Charles Dickens actually did try to go the traditional publishing route, but “A Christmas Carol” was rejected, so he self-published.

How much research goes into your stories?

As a reader, nothing takes me out of story faster than bad science.  So I’ve put a lot of research into the Sunset Rising series.  The first book of the series was inspired by my academic research on the Biodome experiment in Arizona. My background in International Development (aiding developing worlds) allowed me to create the political system between the Dome and the Pit.  And in my second book, Worlds Collide, I’ve researched nanotechnology with the help of a scientist from the National Institute for Nanaotechnology (NINT) in Canada.

February 2024: Desperate to find refuge from the nuclear storm, a group of civilians discover a secret government bio-dome. Greeted by a hail of bullets and told to turn back, the frantic refugees stand their ground and are eventually permitted entry.  But the price of admission is high.

283 years later...  Sunny O'Donnell is a seventeen-year-old slave who has never seen the sun.  She was born in the Pit, a subterranean extension of the bio-dome. Though life had never been easy, the last couple of months had become a nightmare. Her mom was killed in the annual Cull, and her dad thought it was a good time to give up on life.  Reyes Crowe, her long-time boyfriend, was pressuring her to get married, even though it would mean abandoning her father.

She didn't think things could get any worse until she was forced upstairs to the Dome to be a servant-girl at a bachelor party.  That's when she met Leisel Holt, the president's daughter, and her fiancé, Jack Kenner.

Now Sunny is wanted for treason.  If they catch her, she'll be executed.

She thought Leisel's betrayal was the end.  But it was just the beginning.

"Sunset Rising" is Book One of a series.

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Genre - YA Science Fiction, Dystopian

Rating – PG-16

More details about the author

Connect with S.M. McEachern through Facebook & Twitter

Website http://smmceachern.wordpress.com