Marsha A. Moore

Saturday, June 15, 2019

Solstice Scavenger Hunt

Happy Solstice!

FSF Readers Lounge Presents its first ever Solstice Scavenger Hunt.

Running from June 16th to June 29th,19 authors joined forces to offer readers a chance at $75 cash via PayPal and 19 eBooks as a Grand Prize! 38 secondary prizes (an eBook from one of our participating authors) will be given to randomly chosen participants with the correct answer.

To Play:

To play for a chance to win you must go to each of the authors sites listed below, collect the "hidden" word(s), unscramble them to reveal the popular fantasy quote, and then enter to win! Enter the Rafflecopter Here

Entering does not enter you into anything! You have the option to choose who to subscribe to and who to follow - the only requirements are:

1) you must follow the Facebook page for the Readers Lounge in order to get the winners announcement and

2) use the link to enter the giveaway, but I hope you choose to follow the wonderful authors participating in this hunt!

Make sure to visit all the sites to gather all your words! Happy Hunting!

The Prizes:

$75 Cash via PayPal

eBooks up for prizes:

A Bit of Magic

Azimuth

Bonded

Curse Breaker: Enchanted

Dragon Blood

Elven Jewel

Forever People

Ian's Realm Saga

Schrodinger's Cat

Shadow's Hand

Sleepless Flame

Tattoos

The Fox and The Hunter

The Glass Gargoyle

The Hand of Atua

The Shikari

This Cursed Flame

Witch's Moonstone Locket

Wolves' Gambit

About my book prize, Witch's Moonstone Locket:

A local witch might have the griever’s moonstone locket, which allows the wearer to talk with the dead. Determined to find that locket, Jancie goes to the coven’s annual carnival. This opposes her father’s strict rule—STAY AWAY FROM WITCHES!

Twenty-three-year-old Jancie Sadler was out of the room when her mother died, and her heart still longs for their lost goodbye. Aching to ease her sorrow, Aunt Starla gives Jancie a diary that changes her entire life. In entries from the 1930s, her great grandmother revealed how she coped with her own painful loss by seeking out a witch from nearby Coon Hollow Coven. The witch wore the griever’s moonstone locket, which allowed whoever could unlock its enchantment to talk with the dead.

Determined to find that locket, Jancie goes to the coven’s annual carnival held in her small southern Indiana town of Bentbone. This opposes her father’s strict rule: stay away from witches. But she’s an adult now and can make her own decisions. She meets Rowe McCoy, the kind and handsome witch who wears the moonstone. He agrees to let her try to open the locket, but they’re opposed by High Priestess Adara and her jealous desire to possess him. Desperate for closure with her mother, Jancie persists and cannot turn away from a perilous path filled with magic, romance, and danger.

Witch’s Moonstone Locket is a stand-alone book in the Coon Hollow Coven Tales series. If you enjoy mystic adventures and have ever wanted to speak to the dead, then you’ll love Marsha A. Moore’s quest for the elusive gemstone.

Available for purchase at Amazon.

The mystery keyword from Marsha is:

Remember to visit all 19 author sites to collect all keywords. Once you unscramble the popular fantasy quote, enter it in the Rafflecopter here.

____________

Rafflecopter link: http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/3d87297f10/?

site links:

https://writerrsj.com/blog/

http://faeriesdragonsspaceships.blogspot.com/

https://sjeckert.wordpress.com/2019/06/16/solstice-scavenger-hunt-2019

https://linntesli.com/page/

https://marshaamoore.blogspot.com/2019/03/solstice-scavenger-hunt.html

www.huntersofreloria.weebly.com

http://www.pjmaclayne.com/mountain-musings/

https://diendrial.wordpress.com

https://www.facebook.com/KatieCherryFantasy/

www.dorablume.com

https://www.odinsmusings.com/

charitywrites.blogspot.com

http://eileenschuh.blogspot.com/

www.noellenichols.com

http://www.alisonlyke.com/blog

https://maebaum.com

https://melindakucsera.com/blog/

www.cheryllynndyess.com

www.thisisnothitchhikersguide.com

*** Marsha A. Moore is a writer of fantasy romance. The magic of art and nature spark life into her writing.

JOIN MARSHA'S MAILING LIST and receive a free copy of her paranormal romance story RULER OF THE NIGHT.

Read Marsha's COON HOLLOW TALES of paranormal romance and her ENCHANTED BOOKSTORE LEGENDS for adventurous epic fantasy romance. For a FREE ebook download, read her historic fantasy, LE CIRQUE DE MAGIE, available at Amazon and Smashwords.

Wednesday, April 24, 2019

Seeking the Witch--a new course offered by the Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic

I am so excited about this upcoming online, 6-week course, "Seeking the Witch," offered by the Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic. The class will be taught by Dr. Sara Cleto and Dr. Brittany Warman who both earned PhDs in English and Folklore from The Ohio State University.

Over the past few years, I've had the pleasure of taking several courses with Sara and Brittany, the amazing "fairy-witch doctors." Each course has been spectacular. I didn't hesitate to enroll in this new offering. Didn't even stop to consider if my schedule would allow the time. They are that good!

Enrollment is open until the close of Walpurgis Nacht--midnight April 30th, 2019! And the very next day, with the energy of Beltaine, could not be a better time for them to begin our search for the many faces of the witch.

And as a special treat, they just this week announced a guest lecturer who will contribute and she is absolutely dazzling--Jenna Jorgensen! Yes, I'm even more excited!

Here's some info from the Carterhaugh School website:

"Jenna Jorgensen studied folklore at the University of California, Berkeley, and went on to earn her PhD in folklore from Indiana University. She researches gender and sexuality in fairy tales and fairy-tale retellings, folk narrative more generally, body art, dance, sex education, and feminist/queer theory. While most of her time goes to teaching college courses and publishing research on the above, she has recently returned to writing fiction and poetry. Her poetry has appeared at Strange Horizons, Liminality, Wyrd & Wyse, Glittership, Stone Telling, Enchanted Conversation, and Mirror Dance. She blogs at Patheos and is constantly on Twitter."

And about the upcoming course:

"Seeking the Witch: Traditional Tales and Everyday Magic." Blending traditional legends, fairy tales, historical materials, poetry, personal narratives, and prompts for your own creative projects, this course invites you to explore the beguiling figure of the witch.

She gathers lavender and thyme, hangs them in bundles in her windows. She wears shredded black silk or neat houndstooth suits or jeans with quiet confidence and a wicked smile. She lives on the margins, in cottages at the forest’s edge, in tiny apartments papered with Morris vines. She beguiles, she enchants, and she makes your life pulse and sparkle when you need her most.

The witch is a polarizing figure, inspiring fear, fascination, and curiosity with the invocation of her name. At the heart of these responses is the simple recognition of her power: she represents freedom from everyday rules and knowledge of the forbidden. She (or he or they!) is loved and hated, a shadowy presence on the margins of society, and yet she also possesses the ability to hold communities together, to speak to those of us who long for something more."

What you get during the course:

Video content for each lesson from Sara and Brittany (at least 45 minutes of material!) These will be pre-recorded and released each Wednesday of the course.
A ‘Further Reading’ PDF.
A PDF “grimoire page” summary of each lesson evoking pages torn from an old spell book (click here for more information about these!)
All supplementary reading for each lesson (in PDF or link form.)
Access to our private Facebook group for the course, where you can interact with fellow students, ask questions, share fun things, and generally get to know Sara, Brittany, and each other. You guys are our people and we want to get to know you! We will post discussion questions and other fun stuff here as well!
A Creative Quest to go with each lesson, which you can post in the group to get personal feedback on from both your teachers and your fellow fairy-tale loving classmates (if desired.)
Personal feedback on one completed final project (if desired.)
A special course completion certificate upon submission of your final project
A welcome letter and various course e-mails
A few surprises, including guest lectures, live videos, and more!

Plus ALL of the downloadable material will be yours to keep for personal use!

If this interests you, find out more at The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and Fantastic.

Monday, December 31, 2018

Featuring: The Young Adult Writer’s Journey by Elizabeth Fortin-Hinds and Janet Schrader-Post

The Young Adult Writer’s Journey
Elizabeth Fortin-Hinds and Janet Schrader-Post

Genre: Nonfiction Reference

Publisher: Tell-Tale Publishing Group

Date of Publication: November 23, 3018

ISBN: 978-1-944056-98-8

ASIN: B07K3VZ2ZK,

Number of pages: 232

Word Count: 60,000

Tagline: An Encyclopedia for YA Writers

Book Description:

Finally, an all-inclusive book on young adult fiction must-do, don’t do and how-to. If you want to write a young adult novel, you need to read this book first. Coauthored by an award-winning YA author and an acquisitions editor, both experts on kids and what they like to read, this encyclopedia contains all you need to start or improve a career as a YA fiction author.

From an examination of the market, genre and its sub-genres, to mechanics and the business, everything is at your fingertips. This amazing writer’s resource is written in a relaxed and interesting style, with plenty of contemporary references and examples for clear understanding and easier application.

Book Trailer: https://youtu.be/QVcMaGh7cng

Amazon

Review:

"I found The Young Adult Writer's Journey useful, building in meaningful ways upon the classic Hero's Journey to make it relatable for the world of YA fiction. This reference is brimming with examples that illustrate how both characters and plot should be fine-tuned to appeal to a younger audience. A great tool for writers." Marsha A. Moore

Praise:

"The Young Adult Writer's Journey is a 'Must Have' at your fingertip reference for anyone who writes (or wants to write) for or about kids. Engaging text with topical and thought-provoking insights leading from idea to submission . . . and beyond to populate a story with believable characters young readers can relate to."—Nancy Gideon, Award-Winning author of the By Moonlight series

“The trouble with “how to” books on creativity is that they usurp creativity. Not so with this very insightful guide for YA writing. If it doesn’t become a standard or even a classic among reference books, it will be an oversight. Janet Schrader-Post and Elizabeth Fortin-Hinds have all the marinated smarts and credentialed experience to pull this off, and they do! No dictated wisdom from on high here, no grafted creativity, THE YOUNG ADULT WRITER’S JOURNEY is accessible, motivational and a clear map that leaves plenty of room to discover for anyone wanting to explore their creative side.”-Thomas Sullivan, Pulitzer-nominated author of THE PHASES OF HARRY MOON

Excerpt:

When you talk about world-building, many writers think you’re talking about fantasy lands like Narnia, Westeros, Panam or Middle Earth. For most teens, school is their world. What kind of home life they have is their world and these worlds need to be just as complicated as Narnia. Well-developed teen worlds like Hogwarts, North Shore High School, home of the Mean Girls, Rydell High School of Grease, and Panem of Hunger Games are so well-developed they seem real, and you remember them as though they were a place you visited.

To create a real world for teens in our times, you really need to know them: what they do every day, what they like, what motivates them, the environment in high schools and many other details. Home life for kids is very different from twenty or even ten years ago. It takes two incomes now to support a growing family or to succeed, so both parents most likely work. This leaves kids as young as nine or ten at home alone for long periods of time (or even younger, unfortunately). The enemy of these parents is the school holiday, and it seem like there’s more than ever. These parents have no idea what to do with their children. Many can’t afford childcare, so the kids are home alone. It’s a thing you must think about when writing for them.

Children come from all levels of society. Poor kids will view the world through different eyes than kids who have well-off parents. Kids living with a single parent might have a different view of the world as well as different social structures. The kids with single parents or working parents might have to go hungry on weekends, on school holidays and especially during the summer. It’s hard to think about, but true. There are teenagers out there who eat breakfast and lunch at school and their families provide dinner. Sometimes all they get is their school meals some days. When school is out, they scavenge and fend for themselves or they don’t eat.

About the Authors:

Elizabeth Fortin-Hinds knows kids well. She spent decades teaching teens and adults to write and improve their reading skills. As a literacy expert and certified coach, she helped both teachers from elementary to secondary and preservice graduate students learn to improve reading and writing instruction. She has taught at both the secondary and graduate level, everything from rhetoric, essays, and thesis statements, to poetry, short stories, and how to write a novel. She has learned to use both sides of her brain simultaneously, but enjoys the creative side the most, learning to play piano, draw and paint, and find time for her own writing since retiring from her “day” jobs.

A “true believer” in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces, mythic structures, she uses that lens when considering manuscripts for Tell-Tale Publishing Group, a company she founded with some friends from her critique group a decade ago.

Daughter of a Colonel, Janet lived the military life until she got out of high school. She lived in Hawaii and worked as a polo groom for fifteen years, then moved to Florida where she became a reporter. For ten years she covered kids in high school and middle school. Kids as athletes, kids doing amazing things no matter how hard their circumstances. It impressed her, and it awed her. “How wonderful teens are. They have spirit and courage in the face of the roughest time of their lives. High school is a war zone. Between dodging bullies, school work and after school activities, teens nowadays have a lot on their plate. I wrote stories about them and I photographed them. My goal was to see every kid in their local newspaper before they graduated.”

Janet love kids and horses, and she paints and writes. Now she lives in the swampland of Florida with too many dogs and her fifteen-year-old granddaughter. She started to write young adult fiction with the help of her son, Gabe Thompson, who teaches middle school. Together they have written a number of award-winning YA novels in both science fiction and fantasy.

http://www.tell-talepublishing.com

blog http://www.tell-talepublishing.com/the-whimsical-herald

https://twitter.com/TellTalePub

https://www.facebook.com/doc.fortin

https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5882749-doc-fortin

newsletter http://bit.ly/2JOhlZk

http://www.jpostauthor.com/

https://www.facebook.com/vagrantchronicles/

https://www.facebook.com/jschrade52

https://wordpress.com/post/jpostauthorsimple.site/72

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tuesday, July 24, 2018

New release! Witch's Windsong, a new Coon Hollow Coven Tale

I'm so happy to say that Witch's Windsong is now available for purchase!

This new installment in my Coon Hollow Coven Tales series is about Shaman Keir. He's been hanging around as a fabulous secondary character in four previous books and steps into the spotlight here. It was a wonderful journey for me to explore his background and very special type of magic.

And there is a lot of amazing magic in this book! In addition to Keir's shamanism, which helps him explore the Otherworld, the heroine, Unole, is Native American and works wind magic, influenced by authentic Cherokee tradition and spellwork.

Book description:

When Keir’s coyote, his devoted witch’s familiar, is kidnapped, Keir’s unhealed grief over the recent deaths of loved ones he could have saved is rubbed raw. Hit with the reality that his coyote now faces heinous torture and possible death, Keir must find a way to rescue his familiar and defeat the self-blame confounding his focus as a shamanic healer. He searches the crime scene—a stream through one of the coven’s magical ravines—but is unable to find any solid clues. An enchanted willow reads his frustration and passes his despair to the wind coursing southward along the waterway.

Far from his Indiana hill country home, Unole, the talented daughter of a Native American wise man and Keir’s former teacher, reads that wind and hears his plea. Realizing the wronged man is Keir, her teenage crush, she’s eager to help—until thwarted by a past deal of black magic.

From what had before seemed only a harmless promise Unole made, along with a secret buried deep in Keir’s past, the kidnapper weaves a dangerous web of deception. Keir and Unole stand to lose everything—his coyote and career, the love they just discovered, and even her life.

Witch’s Windsong is a stand-alone book in the Coon Hollow Coven Talesseries. If you enjoy mystical adventures where hearts and spirits clash, then you’ll love Marsha A. Moore’s song of enchantment, love, and danger.

Buy Witch’s Windsong and listen to the magic!

Purchase Witch's Windsong on Amazon

Coon Hollow Coven Tales Series Description:

If you think you’re brave enough to venture deep into Coon Hollow Coven’s forest ravines, consider this—rumor has it the locals’ peculiar form of witchcraft is powered by souls of dead kin. Why else would the witches uphold a 1930s lifestyle from the time their founding families settled the southern Indiana hill country? Folks from the neighboring small town of Bentbone mostly don’t mind…or at least try their best to keep a safe distance from coven members. But for some townies, nothing will keep them from falling into those witches’ bliss and bane.

COON HOLLOW COVEN TALES series was inspired by the neck of the woods where Marsha A. Moore spent her favorite childhood years surrounded by the love of a big family. The tales are set in a fictitious community south of Bloomington, and the books are rich with a warm Hoosier, down-home feel.

If you like mysterious goings-on in secluded hill country villages & deep forest ravines, sprinkled with heaps of witchy magic, mysticism & adventure, then you’ll love Coon Hollow Coven Tales.

A note to readers: ALL THE COON HOLLOW COVEN TALES NOVELS CAN BE READ AS STAND ALONE BOOKS. The series is about one community—even though residents may pass in and out of various books. Each novel, however, has its own unique and special story to enjoy.

Learn more about Coon Hollow Coven Tales here on Amazon.

New to the Coven?

Witch's Moonstone Locket is on sale through August 30th for 99 cents.

Find it here on Amazon.

If you've already read and enjoyed it, pass this email along to a friend who might like the book. Thanks!

Wednesday, April 11, 2018

Tea Leaf Tales: Holey moley those cows are big! #FlashFiction

Last week while visiting our granddaughter in Texas, my husband and I took a road trip to Brenham looking for bluebonnets. Everywhere those flowers dusted fields with magic, but so did this pasture of longhorns which attracted plenty of sightseers. After the previous day spent unsuccessfully searching the South Texas State Fair for said cattle, with my only consolation a plate of tasty brisket nachos, I bolted from the car, hopped through knee-high weeds, camera in hand, and on a mission.

That mission started when I got married and my dear hubby labored for years to reintroduce beef into my diet and keep his from going cow-free. Not to be indelicate, but my system refused to process any degree of fattiness. Slowly, with extra lean and the best cuts, my metabolism accommodated. Now, almost two decades later, my path is set to seek and sample plenty of Texas barbecue, brisket, and beef ribs. A simple enough goal in that state, but I have to make up for lost time.

While snapping pics of these ponderous but delectable beasts, I proclaimed to that speckled black and white one, who stood no more than three feet away, a mere horn’s length from my bare legs, “I’m going to eat you.” The steer considered whether I was worth the bother, as I shivered just a little at my boldness and tossed my apple core to make peace with my future dinner long before he reached my tummy.

Tea Leaf Tales is a series of original ten-sentence short stories by Marsha A. Moore, relating to photos/scenes that resonate with her.

Read more episodes of Tea Leaf Tales archived at Marsha'sMercantile of Tea Leaf Tales.