Tag Archives: #MOTW

Books, personal, Promotion

DAY 7 #MarchoftheWriters

Leave a comment

Author Tribe

Gosh, there are so many people I should thank for helping me to get where I am today. 

I certainly wouldn’t have as many books published if it wasn’t for a group on Facebook, which at this time I can’t remember the name of, but I do remember it was run by Marjory. 
We would trade fake money to buy a service. Such as, say I would beta read someone’s short story and was given $1000 trading bucks by the author. I need a new cover but I don’t have enough trading bucks to pay for it so, I will trade a cover from a designer, in return for a book trailer. She gets the book trailer, I get my cover and we’re both happy. This went on for years. Huge shout out to Sharon Lipman from Fantasia Cover Designs. 
We traded, we swapped services, and we were able to get our books finished and ready for publication without it costing us anything. I know I didn’t have the money back then to afford an editor, let alone a book cover. 
Sadly as life moves on, so does your tribe. I can’t remember what the group was called as it was so long ago, but I know I still have around 140,000 trading bucks in my bank. lol

Next, I want to shout out to all the members of the Authors-Professionals Co-op on Facebook. The group has now almost come to a standstill, which is sad. But I know how much the regular, active members got from this group. I’ve made lifelong friends. I met my co-author, Karen J Mossman, with who, I wrote Toxic with. And an amazing man who helped get my daughter, Alexia’s, first illustrated book published. He’s the brains behind the EE branding Electric Eclectic, and he’s an amazing author, Paul White. There are more members, but I can’t remember names, so thank you for your support and for helping me along on my journey. 

You’ve heard me mention his name several times already in posts. He’s an advocate for indie artists, owning and running one of the biggest media platforms for indie artists such as authors, directors, actors, musicians and more, And he’s an author himself, with books you all need to check out called, Amongst The Killing and We The Moral Majority. So big thank you for all you’ve done for me Mr Joe Compton and on behalf of all indie artists that you have helped promote, with Go Indie Now, we salute you.

And, recently I met a wonderful lady who runs The Writer’s Tribe Facebook group. I haven’t been a member here long, but I’ve been welcomed into the tribe and then practically forced to write by Venessa Giunta and her sprints, lol. So, shout out to our cheerleader, who is inspiring, bubbly and always encouraging the tribe.

So many other people have played a part in helping me on my journey. Please forgive me if I haven’t singled you out that doesn’t mean I think any less of you, it just means my memory, which I have problems with, couldn’t remember you at the time I wrote this post.

I am just a little cog in the indie writing community but you are MY TRIBE.

Dark grey background. Two hands toasting with champagne glasses. Text in white underneath Cheers to my tribe

Books, personal, Promotion

Day 5 #MarchoftheWriters

Leave a comment

Sweet spot: writing session length

What is a sprint?

I’ve been an author for the last 28 years, and I’ve never taken part in a sprint before. The thought of everyone being on camera and just working didn’t make sense to me… until now!

On one of the panel shows by Go Indie Now, with Joe Compton. I met a very busy, talented lady author by the name of Venessa Giunta. And she runs an amazing group of writers on FaceBook called The Writing Tribe (TWT) and Nessie ( I call her that) organises sprints.
I went to the first one last month and I couldn’t believe how enjoyable it was to work in a group for twenty minutes, then we stop, talk about what we managed to get down, the words count and so fourth. We have a chat, sometimes and then back to work for another 20 minutes. She also does a Zoom sprint where we are on camera and don’t need to type our conversation. These last around 30 minutes and after a couple of them, everyone has a chance to share any good news they have. It’s such a supportive community of talented writers. I have been trying to attend the sprints regularly, and in the beginning, I used the sprints to get AuthorAssist work done, such as newsletters, promotions, and podcasts. I had a book I needed to write, but I was avoiding the damn thing. However, I started work on it last week, and every sprint I’m getting over 1k done, and Nessie has solved some dilemmas I’ve had with the book. I know without TWT and the sprints, I wouldn’t be writing as much or at all. So I am very thank full to the group and Nessie.

Books, Promotion

DAY FOUR – #MarchoftheWriters

Leave a comment

 For those about to WIP (work in progress)

So, what are you working on Karina? Oh if it was so simple to answer.

I have a four-book series called OUTLAW. Each book is a stand-alone read. Each book is about outcasts, outlaws, whether it’s an MC (motorcycle club) or a street gang. Each book is connected to this theme. The first book is called, In Times of Violence. If you read my 2nd-day blog post, you would know that In Times of Violence started as an 18-page short story. As I was young back then, I wrote it specifically to target my age group YA (young adult)
https://explosivewriter.com/2022/03/03/marchofthewriters/

The problem now is that it was many years later when I wrote Huntress the second book in the series, but not the second book to have been written, So now a mature writer, the mature themes come into play. By the time I got to Road Rage, there were no rules anymore. Can you see my dilemma?
Yep, that’s correct you can have one book a YA and the rest 18+ this was the first mistake I made. I kept them together, but marketed the YA differently and I could never do a box set with all four. The solution is easy, right? Yep, write another ITOV but an adult version. Unfortunately, life happened and shit happened and the book got lost in the shuffle. It would be 13 books and nearly 20 years later, I’m finally working on ITOV adult edition.

So, the second mistake. Over the years, my writing has matured along with me, and so my writing style and topics have been pretty graphic and intense. So that’s okay, you need to write a mature version of the first book ITOV. Yes, it could only be that easy. What I should have done was kept the original MS (manuscript) throw in some explicit sex and some graphic violence and bingo! – Nah.

I started writing out the first scenes and the only resemblance it had to the opening scene of the YA version, is the names of the characters. I had started a brand new book. A couple of chapters in, and I realise that Huntress which is a sequel to ITOV YA edition and will continue as book two to the YA and that if I carry on the way I’ve chosen to go, Huntress will need a re-write. I knew I had a decision to make, and I agonised over it, and there was no way I could bin the two new chapters I wrote, as they are GOLD. So to cut a long story short, my WIP is ITOV adult edition.

I’ve gone into new territories I’ve yet to delve into. I’m doing something I’ve never done before. I’m doing a year’s time jump just so I can stay on track to the genre and theme and not stray off the path. then I’m going to write a novella about that year. What happened to her and how much she suffered. The reader will have the choice to read it or not (I think most will.)

Would you like a sneek peek?

(Remember this is a first draft and not edited.)

The money lasted five days, even though I stayed in a cheap hotel in a rough part of the city.  I had no money, no food and no place to sleep. This wasn’t how my life was supposed to go. I wasn’t looking for fame, I never wanted fortune, so why couldn’t I get a break.

I hugged my rucksack as I fell asleep either on an empty bench or a shop doorway. It shocked me at the amount of homeless people on the streets. And they weren’t friendly to newcomers. Telling me to piss off and find somewhere else to sleep, that I was in their patch. I walked until my eyes couldn’t stay open and then took the first vacant sheltered sleeping space I could find.

As for looking for a job. I would change my clothes, tidy myself up and ask at every store, shop and kiosk, but as soon as I was asked my address, they became uninterested and used the excuse of being overqualified, or unqualified for the job.

***

I was sleeping on a green bench that I luckily found vacant in an open park. I soon understood why the bench was vacant when I woke to someone trying to pull the rucksack from me.
 I stood up and tried to keep my grip of the only possessions I had. I screamed at them to let go, but there was more than one person, and I soon found a fist in my face but I wasn’t going to give up that easily so I kicked one of the in the nuts, while he fell to the ground groaning, another two laid into me with punches and kicks. I dropped the rucksack. There was nothing in there to lose my life over, I thought, as I covered my head from being punched. But a kick to my stomach made me fall down to the ground. I heard a roaring of motorbikes and then shouting before a boot hit my head. My vision blurred as I saw a shade of black racing towards me. The shouting started to fade as did my consciousness. The last thing I remembered about that night was the smell of aftershave mixed with soap.

And here’s another exclusive.

Books, Music, YouTube

Day three of #MarchoftheWriters

Leave a comment

Writing Muzak

You all know that I dabble in lots of different fiction genres, one would think every genre would come with a different genre of music. Well, you couldn’t be more wrong!

No matter, if I was writing my YA fantasy duology, Illusional Reality, or one of the OUTLAW dark romances series, or even some poetry ( rarely ) I would always have music on in the background, or coming through headphones, as it helps me get lost in the world I’ve created.

And the genre of music? Those that know me well. \m/

I’ve never done a playlist in my books. I probably never will. I doubt my readers would care what I listen to when I write. But here’s a few, so you get the idea. Each song tells its own story, Epic shit!

This last one is very special to me. It’s the song that I used to sing when I sang lead in a rock band… back in the day. Yep, I could hit those F-ing notes!

Books, Poetry, Promotion

#MarchOfTheWriters

1 Comment

Day Two

Show and tell your books.

Agh… my favourite pastime. Where to begin. At the start, where else!

The first book I had published was In Times of Violence YA edition (currently working on the adult edition)

1) In Times of Violence started as an 18 A4 page typed
(yes, I said typed) story. 

2) S.E.Hinton and her book, The Outsiders, was the reason I wrote ITOV. 

3) A woman was reading the book by a pool and was so caught in the story, she didn’t see or hear her boyfriend calling to her as he got cramp, and was going under. Oops.

Then came Huntress Dark MC romance 18+ due to explicit scenes and graphic violence.

  1. I had no plans to write a sequel to ITOV, but the fans demanded it, and you have to give them what they want.
  2. Readers have said Huntress is like reading a script from, the SOA TV series, created and written by Kurt Sutter. Who has a warped mind and awesome acting abilities. (My book was out way before their MS hit the table.)

After two male-oriented MC novels, I wanted the women to have their turn. Book three is a vigilante thriller MC novel called Lawless Justice.

  1. I got the idea for this bad ass biker MC, from the film Death Proof, staring Kurt Russel and written and directed by Quentin Tarantino.
  2. There is a message in the front of the book, to the awesome actor, film critiqe and oscar winning director, Quentin Tarantino.
  3. Lawless Justice is the book that the fans want to see turned into a movie! Guess who I would have as my director? ….. Yep, you got it. Quentin Taratnino. ( Are you seeing a pattern here?)

The last book in the series is Road Rage it’s a stand-alone read. 18+ because of the graphic violent scenes and the explicit sexual scenes.

  1. One of the smaller characters in Lawless Justice is the main character in Road Rage. I needed to tell her story.
  2. Road Rage is the second most popular book in my collection.
  3. It was the film Biker Boyz, that inspire me to write the storyline about another MC. The clean-cut public superbike racing team, Rage.

Moving on- this was my first (and won’t be the last) Dark Mafia Romance, Broken Chains. I enjoyed writing this book so much, and I had loads of fun with it. 18+ due to explicit content and graphic violence.

  1. Broken Chains became my number one bestseller.
  2. Broken Chains won the Top Pick Award from Author Shout and was nominated in the top indie books of 2021 by Joe Compton, owner of the indie media platform, Go Indie Now.
  3. Broken Chains book trailer which I created, won an award at an International Film Festival for Best Female Director for thriller short.

Moving on to my collections. Heads & Tales is a collection of flash fiction in a mixture of fiction genres.

  1. Head and Tales was inspired by the song titles of Iron Maiden’s album Best of the Beast.

    2) At least 18 of these 28 flash fiction stories, were previously published in magazines and newspapers.

    3) I won a t-shirt from a magazine for my horror story Crossed for being so bad and cliche, then the following month the same short story won first prize in an international horror short story contest. ( oh, yeah, I made sure the magazine knew about that win.)

Undressed, is my second collection, It has poetry, prose, short fiction and writing prompts.

  1. I held a cover contest. This cover was painted ( I have the original), it was everything I was looking for.
  2. Amazon ( groan) continues to keep putting Undressed in the erotica categories when there is no mention of sex in the book.
  3. I had many of the poems in the book, originally published in magazines and ezines.

On to my YA fantasy romance, duology, Illusional Reality. Book one.

  1. The first book Illusional Reality was inspired by The Fellowship of the Ring from LOTR.
  2. Illusional Reality has the most reviews, out of all my books and has won three awards so far.
  3. Although, fantasy, there is no stereotype characters. There are no elves, dwarfs, wizards, goblins, trolls, etc and yet Illusional Reality is full of new characters and lots of magic.
  4. There is an audiobook out for Book 1 of Illsuonal Reality.

Book two of the duology, The Quest

  1. The duology is a duology in itself. The main character has two sides to her in each book.
  2. The second book is inspired by The Two Towers, LOTR
  3. No, there’s no third book like there was in LOTR
  4. A publisher contacted me and asked if I would like to sign up with them.
  5. The Illusional Reality has a colouring book out as well.

Stone Cold is a YA supernatural thriller.

  1. Stone Cold is the most biographical book out of all my stories.
  2. I did more research for this book than any of my other books.
  3. The book is based in Scotland even though my experiences happen in Wales.
  4. There is an audiobook for Stone Cold
  5. The book trailer for Stone Cold has won 3 International Film Festivals awards. ( you can check the trailers up on the main menu bar)

Toxic is a sci-fi dystopian erotica (yes I like making up my own genres.)

  1. Toxic is a collaboration with another author, Karen J Mossman. We got together on camera and spent 2 hours plotting, scheming and coming up with a fascinating dystopian world.

    2) There are two versions of the same book, one naughty (mine) and one nice (Karen’s)

    3) Toxic will soon be removed and republished with a new cover and a publisher. They have taken on all the books and are keeping the naughty and nice theme.

    4) Toxic is a trilogy. The first draft of book 2 is ready and we’ll be working on book 3 later this year.

A Flash of Horror – A collection of flash fiction from the horror genre. (in case that wasn’t obvious)

  1. A Flash of Horror is flash fiction taken from Heads & Tales, Undressed and a couple of original flash, that I wrote for the collection.
  2. The paperback version of the book is pocket sized. Yes, you can actualy keep it in your handbag, or pocket.

The other two fiction books are In Times of Violence, adult edition (to go with the original OUTLAW series.)
And the box set of Illusional Reality.

And that’s not all. I’ve been working on a small project with my youngest daughter. Take a look.

Notebooks, journals, colouring book

All books are available on Amazon published under the imprint, JadeMarcus

Links to all my books will be on the right-hand side of the page. Thanks for your support and feel free to share.

Art, Books, Narrations, personal, podcast, Promotion, Radio, YouTube

New Challenge

Leave a comment

You know me I love a good challenge and when I take on something, I don’t back down.
This one is called March of The Writers and every day, we are given a prompt and it could be to write about a book, introduce myself, write flash fiction and so forth. I will be given a prompt and see if I can do one every day through March. This will be fun.

From the crazy mind of Author and YouTube addict, JD.Estrada. You can follow his blog and journey on https://jdestradawriter.blogspot.com

DAY ONE.

 New month, who dis?

Well, hello world. I’m Karina Kantas award-winning author and filmmaker. I have 15 books published, some independently, some under publishing contacts. I write in most fiction genres and I go through binges. Right now it’s Dark Romance.
I’m from the UK but I live on the Island of Corfu.

I’m a BookTuber, YouTuber, Podcaster and Radio Host and I also run Author Assist which offers affordable assistance to writers, authors and those in the publishing business. I’m a VA , Author Manager, Publicist, Book Trailer Creator, Designer of Graphics, Social Media Consultant, Marketing and Promotion Manager and Narrator… plus a few more I haven’t mentioned.

I’m the host of the Author Assist Radio Show. Which has just celebrated five years on the air. My YouTube and audio podcast is called Behind The Pen and I get to chat and have a laugh with many in a business where they use a pen such as Illustrators, writers, musicians, and so forth.

For all links for my social media ( I’m everywhere) and for the podcasts and my YouTube channel go to

https://linktr.ee/karinakantas