Authors - Submit a Story and appear in eFiction Magazine!

Hey Authors! As most of you know I've been working over at eFiction Magazine for a while now, and things there are absolutely booming! Of course, we are always looking for new authors to submit stories for upcoming issues of the magazine.

Now that eFiction Magazine is being sold for the Kindle, we are reaching more readers than ever. Hopefully soon more issues will also be available on Smashwords and other online retailers so that those of you with other ereaders (like myself) can enjoy the mag each month. Of course, you can always visit the site on your browser to see what's new.

As new, upcoming indie authors, getting your name out there only helps you. I'll be honest, it can also help us. Submit a short story that you've written to the mag. If your story appears in the magazine your bio will also appear, so write a good one and be sure to include your previously published works, and perhaps a link to your page.

Sounds easy, right? It is. I did it, in fact I still do each month with all of the wonderful, expertly (ha) written book reviews that you guys see here.

October is paranormal month, November is un-themed, and December is a focus on family. So get your stories ready and start submitting. I look forward to reading them.

Indie Author Kia Heavey - Night Machines

Night Machines is another great indie novel. I received this book in the mail, and it came with a few other goodies which I got fairly excited about. First thing I noticed was an Anadreme pill bottle with little blue pills in it. Of course, they were blue sugar candies, but I will admit, I was caught off guard. There was also a CD and a Night Machines bookmark. Excellent attention grabber. The best way to grab my attention, however, is to write a good book that is well edited and proofed. Kia Heavey managed to get my attention on all fronts. I will admit, having the paper back in hand brought the book to the top of my to be read list, but if the story hadn’t been compelling and well written it would have been pushed back down to the bottom.

Night Machines tells a story about Maggie, a wife and mother of two small children. Her husband Rowan is a police detective who works long hours and, in the beginning of the book, becomes emotionally distant with the onset of a new, horrific case that he is working. His emotional distance increases until he is rarely home, and when he is home, he is also physically distant from his family.

Maggie begins a new job at the start of the book. When she goes to interview at a large pharmaceutical company, she feels completely out of place. Upon meeting founder and president, she is surprised to learn that she has a connection with him that she barely remembers.

As time goes on, Maggie’s relationship with her husband continues to deteriorate. While sleeping and dreaming vividly, Maggie conjures up a romantic scene with a man from the office. Upon awakening, Maggie decides that a little fantasy romance can’t hurt anyone or anything. Especially since no one needs to know the details of Maggie’s dreams…or do they?

As her fantasy world grows larger, Maggie’s life begins to spin completely out of control and she doesn’t see a way to stop it.

Night Machines had me hooked. I didn’t want to stop reading at night, and on more than one occasion I stayed up much too late reading only to pick it up again in the morning. When I came to the last 40 pages, I locked myself in my bedroom leaving my husband and children to fend for themselves for a while so I could read the conclusion.

The characters were all likeable and real. I was hard-pressed to dislike even the distant husband because the author showed inside his head, the reasons he was distant, and his true feelings toward his family.  Maggie was the most likeable character in the book. She always wanted to do what was best for her family, especially her children. She took her wedding vows very seriously; she just needed a little romantic outlet, and she chose to do so completely in her head. The man whom Maggie becomes secretly involved with is also likeable, and, despite my better judgment, I found myself cheering him on throughout most of the book. Of course, the author doesn’t always show his true colors.

The plot was well laid out and detailed. There were parts that I thought had been left to chance, such as some of the husband’s police work, but in the end, the author was able to logically and thoroughly explain how each piece of the puzzle fit into her story. The only hazy point in the plot that I can come up with was how Maggie’s future, secret-romantic interest was able to know that she was going to apply to work for the pharmaceutical company. Unless he put his plan into action after seeing that she had applied. If so, that was some amazing planning and follow-through in a short amount of time.

Without giving away the ending, I wished that it had happened a bit more dramatic. The selflessness that was seen was very uncharacteristic. It did provide the story with a neat, clean, completely final ending, but neat and clean isn’t always the best way to end a story. The finality of the ending could have been achieved a number of ways that aligned better with the character’s nature—selfish and crazy.

Kia Heavey didn’t disappoint. Excellent story, well written, and more than decently proofread. She will certainly be on my list of authors to look for in the future. 

Coming Soon!!!

So, I know I said I was going to start Author Interviews...and I plan to, truly I do, but life ended up getting in the way. Summer vacation, an unexpected (but appreciated) move, and more excellent submissions over at eFiction have slowed my blog progress, but enriched my life. Well, the move is over and things are settled, and summer vacation officially ends Monday when my daughter heads back to school. So, I'll have more time to read and write...theoretically...hopefully.

So, coming soon we will have that promised Author Interview. I have a few authors who have agreed to allow me to practice on them. Authors I trust, so I won't look too silly.

Also upcoming I'll be hosting my first giveaway. I have a signed copy of Jane Was Here. I'm still undecided on how to conduct the giveaway, and I really don't want to go the route of gaining more entries by following me on twitter (although I'd appreciate a twitter follow @EssieHolton), facebook, and commenting on the blog (but I love comments, too). So if anyone has an idea for a giveaway contest, leave a comment or send me an email.

Look for my next review in a few days. I've recently finished Night Machines by Kia Heavey. I'm working on the review now, and I'm trying to do it without giving away too much about the book. I can't wait to pass this one along. 

Indie Author Jack Blaine - Helper12

When an author asks me to review his or her book, generally I get a description of the story. By the time I sit down to read the book, I usually have no idea what the premise is, unless the title gives it away. Sometimes this adds a little more excitement to my story reading and sometimes this confuses me. In the case of Helper12, I was confused. I thought I was fairly certain what this book was about, and in part, I was, but there was a bigger picture that changed the genre of the book in my eyes.

Helper12 is set in a world where only the rich have control of their own lives. All others are tracked as infants into the jobs that they will do for the rest of their lives. The Helpers, as they are called, have no names, only numbers. They have no families, only the Breeder who gives birth to them, the Baby Helpers who care for them, and the Trainers who teach them. Helpers aren’t allowed to ever start families of their own and aren’t allowed to live outside of the complexes where their every move is digitally monitored.

In the beginning of the book, a baby helper, Helper12, is introduced. She cares for the babies from the time they are born until they are tracked at 6 months old. It is a sad description of how babies are cared for. No one loves them except for the baby helpers, and after they leave for tracking, the baby helpers never see them again. There are some babies who don’t make it that far. Some are deemed as unuseful to society and are euthanized.

Helper12 is getting ready for the end of her shift at the hospital when the director comes into the ward with a woman and her son. Helper12 is amazed and horrified all at once. She has never seen a family unit before. The woman hasn’t been sanitized and wants to hold a baby. One baby in particular, baby Jobee, as Helper12 calls him. The director allows this, and Helper12 is left helpless.

Through their conversation, Helper12 discovers that this woman’s intention is to buy the baby boy whom she is holding. To her horror, Helper12 finds herself being sold to this woman and her husband as a nanny. She has no choice but to go.

Helper12 is distraught and doesn’t trust Mr. and Mrs. Sloan or their older son Thomas. She sees no way out. After arriving, she tries to get to know the other Helper in the house but is met with distrust and aggression at every turn.

Finally, the Sloans go away on a three week anniversary vacation, and Helper12 feels like she can breathe. Complications arise when Thomas returns home and demands that she and the baby spend time with him so that he can get to know his little brother.

Helper12 doesn’t know what to do about this situation, and when she leaves the house with Thomas the first time, she is certain that he is going to sell her and the baby. Thomas, on the other hand, simply wants to spend time with her and the baby and soon finds himself on the edge of a forbidden love.

I was not expecting romance when I sat down with Helper12. Although surprised, I was not disappointed. I rather enjoy a good romance story and enjoyed the novel more than some that I’ve recently read.

I felt like I got to know the characters in the short time that I was “with” them. I found myself cheering for them and their love even when I wasn’t sitting down reading the book. Long after the story concluded, I thought about the characters and what they would be doing after the story’s end.

The book’s ending was somewhat unexpected. I could see where it was going, but as it got there, I was surprised by a few of the details. I love being surprised by endings. There is nothing worse than an overly predictable ending to a story.

Sometimes, endings are rushed, thrown together to close a story, and incomplete in their urgency. Helper12 was none of these things. It was a continuation of the story that led to an ending that concluded the story. It wasn’t a separate piece the author attached because it was time to end the story. A good ending is seemly hard to come by. Jack Blaine worked hard to give us that ending.

There are few discrepancies in the novel that were a minor irritation during reading, but if you could get past them, then the book worked well enough. In one instance, Baby Helpers are said to care for babies until they are tracked at six months old. Later in the story, Helper12 explains that she is only trained to take care of an infant to age 4 months. I didn’t get the feeling that she was being deceptive to simply get out of the house to gather more information, and the author didn’t suggest as much. It appears to simply be an oversight by the author.

The author also left a minor plotline completely open and feeling a little empty. Helper12 broke the rules. She loved to draw. She would save paper from dressing gowns at work and bring them home to draw on. She even had to go through illegal channels to obtain pencils to draw with. When Helper12 goes to live with the Sloans, she brings her last 3 drawings with her. Thomas later discovers her passion and Helper12 is terrified that he will turn her in. I wanted to see some real danger come from this plot line, but it didn’t develop into anything sinister. Of course, I didn’t want Thomas to betray Helper12, but the author went to great lengths to describe the severity of continuing with this activity, yet, the reader never got to feel the terror that Helper12 felt.

Overall, a good read, especially for those of you who like romance novels with a twist. This one won’t disappoint.