DC Free Today Only

Hello all, Natasha here... once again. I just have a short and sweet announcement. Darwin's Children is free today for an Amazon Prime promotion. Get it while its zip!

Sure, a blurb...

Life can get pretty complicated for any seventeen-year-old girl, but for a home-schooled telepathic black girl trying to survive in a prestigious private school in small-town Jonesborough, Tennessee, it can be maddening – especially when her telepathic father keeps eavesdropping on her thoughts!

Jaycie Lerner’s family isn’t the usual mom-dad-kid setup. Her family's special – in more ways that one. Her mom’s MIA, but Allison, her personal live-in ‘trainer,’ is more than a mom, with her own special abilities, like being able to lift cars and run incredibly fast. And her godfather John can literally convince anyone to do anything.

But, as far as the rest of the world’s concerned, Jaycie’s on the outside looking in. The townsfolk love her pediatrician father, but she doesn’t fit in with ‘normal’ kids, and she doesn’t really want to. Most of her free time is spent training to keep her telekinetic and telepathic powers under control. But there’s one thing she can’t control – her feelings, especially when her best friend Matt is nearby. If only he knew what she was truly capable of...

Everything seems to be status quo for Jaycie and her family, until she receives a cryptic message from a stranger and meets a very unusual girl new to Jonesborough. Then all hell breaks loose! 

 

 

The Linky 

Get It Here on Amazon 

 

 

Another Unnatural Law Review

Hi lovelies. I forgot to post this review for Unnatural Law and wanted to take this opportunity to share it. You can read the review by visiting this link ---) A Book Vacation

Check Out My Latest Book Review

Yay! Thank you, Hannah! 

My Book Journey: REVIEW: DARWIN'S CHILDREN: Darwin's Children Author: Natasha Larry Series: Yes, #1 Publisher: Penumbra Publishing Release date: June 2011 Genre: YA Kindly given...

Casting Call for Darwin's Children: The Dey-Vah Guard and a Minor

Yay! It's that time again. What time? Time for me to keep picking my dream cast for the characters in Darwin's Children. As I disclaimed last week, I only do this for fun. =) Today I want to cast two members of the Dey-Vah Guard, actually, the only two  important ones.

This one was hard to do... 

Lucy of the Dey-Vah Guard. Okay, I only picked Megan Fox because she has that crazy look in her eyes and she's wearing red in this photo. =) Well, Lucy is nuts, and often wears red. Picture her with wings, and pointed ears. Yes? No?

Michael of the Dey-Vah Guard! I figure if Allison's going to be running around with a fairy, he better be really hot. ;) For the ladies.

Alright, those are the only two fairies important enough to cast. This week, as an added bonus, I want to cast another of my supers, Steven Fowler from Unnatural Law.

Steven Fowler! The adorable and geeky technopath. I've always loved Glee, and think Daniel Criss would be great.

Next week I will cast some more characters from Unnatural Law and maybe even a new character from the next installment, Common Descent. 

My Neurotic Book Affair: Favorite Books of 2011- Unnatural Law Made It

I'm going to start this blog post off with a woo hoo. Why? Well, because I feel honored to have made Shari's favorite Books of 2011 with my YA title, Unnatural Law. You can check out her list, and what other books made it by clicking the link below.


My Neurotic Book Affair: Favorite Books of 2011: Today's the last day of 2011! I can't believe how fast it has gone by. Tonight my plans to ring in the New Year are simple. I'll be hanging...

Thank you Shari! I'll end this with another Wooo Hooo!

Check Out My Latest Interview and Giveaway

I was recently interviewed by the lovely Jaidis Shaw. You can read the interview Here at Juniper Grove. There is also a chance to win a copy of Darwin's Children and Unnatural Law!

If you could read my mind: What a tale my vampire's would tell

Hi all! :) I know you've missed me but I have been busy on vacation, (sounds like an oxymoron huh? ;) with editing and on a cruise (where I had to pay for internet time by the minute) so my absense wasn't without it's reasons. As you may have guess this time I'll be spaking about telepathy and mind control (with a nodd to the great Canadian singer Gordon Lightfoot) First off though (as always)

Shameless plug: My book The Newfoundland Vampire will be on in April 2012 (with Pat's very skilled and gracious help) and Tasha’s books (I've read both and highly recommend) are out now.

When a lot of people think of vampires a power that often comes to mind is hypnotisim, mind control or some kind of telepathy. A vampire's gaze is often used in novels and movies as a way to control a human, even if it's just long enough to take a nibble on their neck ;) I didn't bother with the gaze part and I don't mean crushing someone's will but just the ability to make people act just a little different than they may have otherwise would be an incredibly usefull tool. For my book I took it a few steps further but first a few questions. What would you do if you could read someone's mind? What behaviours would incourage or discourage in others?

I'm a poker player (very much an amatuer sadly) and I can only dream of how this would help at the table (especially since I pretty much lost steady for 4 nights on a cruise). Just the ability to see someone's card or make them fold at just the right moment could make you a fortune and eventually piss a lot of people off :-) Just imagine though the simple things like waiting in line, getting into a sold out show, getting away without a parking ticket, life sure would be easier with a little mind influencing action.

But I'm way off topic. What I saw for vampires is that they could not only influence people's action but also animals. How useful would be to quiet an annoying barking dog? Or stop a cat from spraying the furtniture? For a more extreme situation nothing would be better (or more surprising) than having a crocodile or other large animal show up to fight for you when the going got tough. Furthermore I thought that one vampire who creates another would have a special bond and could communicate telepathically over any distance and could read weak-willed or young vampires minds. Vampires though would also have the ability to shield their thoughts from anyone, it would just take time and skill to do so. (hey you can never be too careful right? :)

The temptation to control human behavior would always be present (and could also be a ton of fun at parties ;) and the ability to communicate without words to another vampire would be incredibly convienent and useful. Well I'd go on but I've got this funny feeling in my head, kind of like a sexy female voice almost whispering for me to finish putting away the dishes ;-) Until next time dear readers I am...

A Wayward Interview+Sneak Peak at Common Descent!

Hi all, Natasha here. I just wanted to share an interview I did with one of my favorite bloggers and supporters, William Green. You can read the hilarious interview here at Wayward Things. 

There is also a brief and sneaky peak at the third book in the Darwin's Children series , Common Descent.

Casting Call For Darwin's Children: The Kiddies

Because I'm a huge geek, I had a lot of fun doing this last week. So, I'm back this week posting pictures of my dream cast for the younger characters of Darwin's Children: Haylee, Matt and Jaycie. Enjoy!

Meet Miss Omega herself. I've been a huge fan of Keke Palmer ever since I saw her in Akeelah and the Bee. I think she would be a fantastic Jaycie Lerner. 

I've loved Katelyn Pippy from Army Wives. I think she's a great choice for Haylee Mitchell. 

Okay, so I'm not a fan of the Justin Bieber haircut, but picture this guy with shorter, spiky hair. Well, hello Matt Carter! Rarw. I hope you can act Austin Victoria.

I hope you like my picks. Next week I'll be back casting a few of the vampires and members of the Dey-Vah. Plus, I'll be posting some of the new supers from Unnatural Law.

Check Out My Latest Review

Check out the latest review for Darwin's Children over at Books, Crafts and Pretty Things!


♥ Books, Crafts & Pretty Things Blog: Darwin's Children by Natasha Larry: It's funny how things happen. I have seen Natasha online for quite some time. You know how you seem to interact with authors and book b...

Get Me Free Today!

What's better than Natasha Larry for free? Darwin's Children by Natasha Larry for free! Cheesy? Totally, but the book is still free in the Amazon store, and that happens to be awesome! Go download it =)

The Blurb!

Life can get pretty complicated for any seventeen-year-old girl, but for a home-schooled telepathic  girl trying to survive in a prestigious private school in small-town Jonesborough, Tennessee, it can be maddening - especially when her telepathic father keeps eavesdropping on her thoughts!

Jaycie Lerner's family isn't the usual mom-dad-kid setup. Jaycie's mom's MIA, but Allison, her personal live-in 'trainer,' is more than a mom, with her own special abilities, like being able to lift cars and run incredibly fast. And Jaycie's godfather John is more than persuasive - he can literally convince anyone to do anything.

As far as the rest of the world's concerned, Jaycie's on the outside looking in. The townsfolk love Jaycie's pediatrician father, but she doesn't fit in with 'normal' kids, and she doesn't really want to. Most of her free time is spent training to keep her telekinetic and telepathic powers under control. But there's one thing she can't control - and that's her feelings, especially when her best friend Matt is nearby. If only he knew what she was truly capable of...

Everything seems to be status quo for Jaycie until she receives a cryptic message from a stranger and meets a very unusual girl new to Jonesborough. Then all hell breaks loose!

What are others saying?

Natasha Larry is a funny and witty writer who knows exactly how to make her readers laugh out loud and also knows how to make a story so suspenseful that you're biting your nails as the pages turn. This book has the perfect balance of comedy and drama. We all know I love books with as many surprise and expected elements as possible, and Darwin's Children is one of those books! It's an amazing story filled with super powers, supernatural beings, humor, love, family, and plenty of drama- Carole from The Life of Fiction  

Where Can I Get It?
On Amazon Today for FREE 

 

Creating a Mythology for your world

Hi all :) A little over a week I know but ideas take time to form in my head. So this week I'd like to talk about vampire myths, powers and the fun/struggle of creating creatures for story but first these messages.

Shameless plug: My book The Newfoundland Vampire will be on in April 2012 (Pat is hard at working editing now :) and Tasha’s books (I've read book and highly recommend them) are out now.

I think one of the things authors who write in the fantasy/paranormal/science-fiction/horror/YA genre (among others) enjoy the most is creating powers for their creatures/heroes. Most geeky people imagine what it would be like to have super-powers and write you write characters you get a chance to live out that thrill vicariously :)

For me I wanted to develop the powers of my characters (who are vampires of course :) with detail, consistency and still have some fun along the way. For me the challenge was that vampires have such a long history in book/films/history (myths rather..or are they? ;) that it was tricky at time to not muddle the powers I thought of with those already done.

For example as my esteemed editor Pat and Penumbra Publishing pointed out, if vampires are unholy why would they only be affected by Catholic symbols such as crosses and holy water? If vampires existed thousands of years ago (as mine do) they would have to be affected by other holy symbols that the Romans would have used. As usual she was right and I decided that my vampires (since they don't "die" to be made a vampire) were not strictly unholy at all and therefore symbols and devices of faith did nothing to them.

Then you get into other details like how does sunlight affect them, how exactly does their telepathy work, can they sense others of their kind and so on. The fun part was taking a very well know creature like a vampire and adding some twists to it (some of which I've already discussed in a previous post). One of my ideas was to have vampires be able to control any animal (not just rats or wolves as in Bram Stoker's Dracula) to a much stronger degree than they could a human.

The other challenge was to establish a set of guidelines that the reader can learn and then stick with them throughout the novel. That doesn't mean there can't be some freak/super-vampire that defies a few of the rules but he/she/it certainly still needs to abide by most of them.

Finally it's funny how little details matter so much, initially I wrote that my vampires front teeth became fangs. This would have made them very comical bunny-rabbit type monsters =) What I meant of course was the traditional cuspid or canine teeth.

What challenges/fun aspects do other people face when they create a world? I'll admit I took it a little easy with just one supernatural creature. How do authors handle create many different types of powers/creatures? I'll leave you with these questions, I've got some packing to do. My next post will be from sunny Florida. Now that I've made some of jealous ;) until next time dear readers I am..

Casting Call for Darwin's Children: The Big Three

I'd like to start this post by saying I totally stole this idea from the wonderfully talented author of the YA adventure Excelsior, George Sirois. You can read my review of his debut title Here. Its worth checking out.

Now on to that age old question, if my books were ever turned into a movie or  TV series, who do I see playing them? I'd like to start with the big three in the Darwin's Children series, or rather, the adults because they were the easiest to "cast." Here are my picks for John Gramm, Mason Lerner and Allison Young.

I'm pretty sure Bradley Cooper was born to play the super powered master of the human will. I decided this after seeing him in the A-team. He has John Gramm's sense of humor and big, blue eyes. 

 

 

 

I've always loved Terrance Howard and think he would be a great Mason Lerner.

I've always loved Thirteen from House, and can totally see her leveling planets and juggling tanks. She's my pick to play Jaycie's mommy, Allison Young. 

Next week I'll do the kiddies, or Matt, Jaycie and Haylee. Feel free to chime in with your thoughts about my picks. Authors, who is your dream cast for your own work? 

Happy Sunday!

Check out my Latest Review

 Yay! Here is my latest review for Unnatural Law. I was impressed that it was written in such detail, without giving anything away. Never easy to do, enjoy!


Inside the Mind of Wenona: #Review ~Unnatural Law Book 2 by Natasha Larry: Published on: October 26, 2011 Add it on Goodreads Buy it on Amazon or B&N First Thoughts: It was a fun read ov...

You'll be the death of me

Hi all :) I know I'm late this week (or nearly for next week, depending on how you look at it) but here I am with another post. As Monty Python once said "and now for something completely different!". Today I'd like to talk about role-playing games and in particular how my characters seem to keep getting killed but first these messages.

Shameless plug: My book The Newfoundland Vampire will be on in April 2012 (Pat is hard at working editing now :) and Tasha’s books (the second one I’ve read and highly recommend) are out now.

So I have had a love of role-playing games (RPG) for over 20 years now. I think Vin Diesel said it best when he called them "the training ground for imagination" (and no I don't think much of him as an actor but I have to admire his choice of hobbies :-) I won't go into a long discussion of how RPG's work. I'll just reccomend this book or you can look it up on Wikipedia.

In my look role-playing career I've played many different types of characters. Wizards, gladiators, gamblers, cops, Tarzan, Zorro, professors, bug-men, zombies, vampires and many other kinds. When you play a character it means that you build up skills, powers, get tougher, stronger but most importantly you start to feel a connection with a particular character, for me the longer I play one the stronger this connection gets.

For me role-playing is a chance to act out and explore behaviours and actions that I never would (or even possibly could) in real life. As a consequence I tend to play people who are often morally gray or sometimes just downright evil bastards :) Just the other day I had a nice chat with my friend about a character I played for over 3 years who died in a session on Feburary 18th (yes this is the session I promised to talk about =) He was a huckster (a type of sorcerer that uses playing cards and binds a demon to his will to gain powers) and he was pretty well insane and evil to the core. With that said he was usually an immense amount of fun to play and since he never acted any of his friends (i.e. the party or group) he somehow always managed to make it out alive. Huck had been near death so many times that he had picked up a number of phobias including, dismemberment, dead bodies, inclosed spaces and trains (when you get runover by one it's understandable ;).

Deadlands is a brutal world where the U.S. civil war never ended, law is non-existent in many places, magic ghost rock is mined and used to power all sorts of things, strange science makes robots and other gadets and monsters like vampires, zombies and dragons are all too real.
So Huck (original name I know ;) got in a huge bar fight this particular session, got beaten to a bloody pulp, blew off a ship and almost drown and then was finally killed by a massive water dragon (it didn't help he was tied onto the ship at this point either :)

I always feel sad when a character dies, the connection I have is gone. All the time building up skills and getting new powers seem wasted and I have to come up with a new name :) Seriously though because of the type of characters I usually play it happens to me quiet often, I've also been know to have a few drinks while playing and this can lead to some poor game choices. It's all in good fun though and I do enjoy making up new characters as well.

In conclusion perhaps you've heard of Dungeons and Dragons, if you've never tried it I would highly reccomend it. It's a great way to make friends and have fun and I believe many comic book stores offer D&D night once a week. Well that sums up in for me, until next time dear readers I am . . . .

Yay for Matty!

This was pretty cool so I just wanted to share the original link. Matt Carter made about 4 book boyfriends list. One list came from one of my favorite readers/bloggers, Diana. Enjoy and Happy Friday.


Little Miss Drama Queen: Top 5 Book Boyfriends: Looking at all the books I read this year I'm just realizing that I can not make it to 10. Wow this was a bad year in romances for me. The...

The Bookish Babes: Book Review ~ Unnatural Law (Darwin's Children, #2...

Check out my latest review for Unnatural Law, thank you Andrea! 



The Bookish Babes: Book Review ~ Unnatural Law (Darwin's Children, #2...: Seventeen-year-old Jaycie Lerner’s psychokinetic power surge is over, and her astounding powers are under control for the time being – sort

Another stake in Buffy: The Vampire Slayer Comics

Hi all. Well I decided to take a break from more serious writing concepts and ideas to get back to my love of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. In particular the next 3 volumes of Season 8 I read, 5-7 but first these messages.

Shameless plug: My book The Newfoundland Vampire will be on in April 2012 and Tasha’s books (the second one I’ve read and highly recommend) are out now.

Ok so as you know I loved Buffy when it was on TV and I enjoyed the ending. The comics pick up where the show left off and these three finally reveal who the big baddie is this season, mysterious "Twilight".

Volume 5: Predators and Prey, this was a fun volume. A clever idea (and one that would probably happen if vampires were real) for vampires to become popular and slayers to become hated. I love the "Andrew" character, used to be evil, now works for Buffy and super Geeky. It was also fun to have Harmony back, for an evil vampire she is always good for a few laughs :)

Volume 6: Retreat, another excellent entry in the series. Buffy and the gang decide they have to use less magic (which is tough when your powered by demon energy ;) and go to hide out in Tibet with Oz (the Seth Green werewolf character). One of the best parts of this comic for me has been that Joss can bring back all the characters, Faith, Giles, Andrew, Spike, Oz, Dawn, Willow they all make appearances. So Oz has found a way to give his power to the earth and Buffy and the slayers (along with Williow and the magic users) do the same. Twilight finds them anyway and with no magic they fight a traditional war with tanks, guns and torpedoes! (you'll have to read it). Also Dawn and Xander finally get together and Buffy gets superpowered.

Volume 7: Twilight. Okay I can see what people were talking about when they said the story starts to go downhill. This has some strange stuff in it. I didn't mind the fact that Twilight was Angel, he's done some bad stuff as Angel (not Angelus) before but it's not explained how he became "invulernable" and having a whole issue focusing on Angel & Buffy having sex was odd (though stimulating of course :) Making Buffy & Angel "gods" of some sort and Adam and Eve, well it's something that never would have been shown on cable TV and is not one of Joss' best ideas. Despite that I still enjoyed this volume and was glad to see Spike come back, I'm looking forward to reading the end of Season 8.

On a technical note I have to praise all of the artwork, these volumes looked fantastic and overall I would certainly reccomend it for any Buffy fans. So until next week dear readers I am . . .

Make it real

Hi all :) Well it's time for another weekly installement of ...well whatever I come up with :) So far it's been vampire/writing related. This week I'd like to talk about characters and how to a writer they become almost like real people that demand to be heard.

First though a message from our sponsors (namely me and Tasha): My book The Newfoundland Vampire will be on in April 2012 (exact date to be determined) and Tasha’s books (the second one I’ve read and highly recommend) are out now.

So this is something I thought of a while ago, last September when I was on vacation in Cuba but only came to the fore front of my mind tonight. As a writer (well technically aspiring but that will soon change) I think that one of the greatest pleasures is creating characters that feel real to you. Characters that almost take on a life of their own and speak to you in quiet whispers and needle your subconscious.

For me when I wrote my book the main characters are Cassandra and Joseph, for the second one in particular as I said before he is really a chance for me to imagine myself having a totally different path in life and he gave me the chance to speak on issues that mattered to me. I idenitifed with a lot of the emotional events he goes through in the book (obviously not all of them) and ultimately I tried to imagine what Joseph would do in a situation rather than exclusively what I would do.

With Cassandra, well she is a woman of fantasy certainly. I don't know any actual woman like but that didn't make her any less real to me. It might sound strange but when I write her it felt like she would sort of tell me what to say. A female character is a little harder for me to do but still her personality always seemed very strong to me.

To followup on what I said before, like most people when you're on vacation you have a lot of time to think (and drink, and read and do whatever :-). When I was sitting on a chair by the pool (Cuba was hot!) I thought that there has a be a book 2, my characters have more to say and hopefully next year (or late this year possibly) there will be another. I think one of the joys of writing is creating characters you love and following their journey down the twisted, sometimes dangerous path your imagination will take.

Until next week my fair readers I am...

The dangers of putting too much of yourself in a story

Hi all :) Taking a little break from editing to write this. Another busy week for me at work and lots of shoveling, winter sucks :( (at least here way up north in Newfoundland) but I digress. Tonight I thought I'd speak about a writing issue/subject I've thought on a fair bit lately, namely writing what you know and in particular putting yourself in your stories.

First though a message from our sponsors (namely me and Tasha): My book The Newfoundland Vampire will be on in April 2012 (still working hard on editing) and Tasha’s books (the second one I’ve read and highly recommend) are out now.

So when I started writing my book seriously about two years ago (I actually started it way back in 2002) I decided to base the main character, Joseph, largely on myself. I know it's been done but I couldn't resist. You're supposed to write what you know and what better do I know than myself? From the time I was thirteen I imagined what it would be like to be a vampire, so naturally when I wrote a vampire book the easiest way to write the main character was to imagine how he/me would act as a vampire.

I wrote the book initially as a sort of wish fullfillment/diary of what I had done in my life and how I imagined things could have turned out differently. The biggest problem with this idea (that I discovered much later on) is that like most people I don't have a very exciting life. So when you write a vampire's story and not much happens to him for the first 13 chapters or so, well it's not the most exciting read.

I see that now but for a long time I didn't. It's a strange phenomennon that when you write something so personal it feels good (I guess a little therapeutic even) but it takes the perspective of an objective reader to make you realize this does not make an engaging story. (Thanks Pat, I know you're reading this :-)

I became very personally invested in Joseph because so much of him was me that I lost objectivity, this was a mistake I can see now. I wish I had an exciting life like Hemmingway or William Shanter (give the guy credit, he's over 80 and still acting! :) or even Oscar Wilde.
("Picture of Dorian Gray" is amazing) but I'm not like those people (well maybe Shanter a little ;) and I had to make Joseph's adventures exciting and thus gave him some adventures I wish I had (and others I'd never want anyone to experience.)

But hopefully my life will get a little more exciting (I did have a car catch on fire last month) and in the meantime Joseph and my other vampire creations can be vicarious thrills for me and hopefully bring excitinment to those who read them. Until next time dear readers, I am . . .