“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”
Maya Angelou
“Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.”
Albert Einstein
“Creativity is an act of defiance.”
Twyla Tharp
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nonfiction
Happy Valentine’s Day to Writers
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Happy Valentine’s Day to writers! Keep writing, enjoy the journey, embrace your creativity, and get your drafts done!
Why Do You Write?
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I have a question for all you out there who write, and that includes writers of books, poetry, plays, nonfiction, and blogs. If I left out any kind of writing, you are included also.
Why do you write?
I write because I love telling stories, because I see characters and want to know their stories, and because I feel compelled to.
So for everyone else, I am curious: Why do you write?
Gallows Hill can be found here in ebook.
Gallows Hill in paperback can be found here.
An interview about Gallows Hill can be found here.
Please follow the following links to find my novel:
Thank you!
The book trailer:
Maledicus:Investigative Paranormal Society Book I
My radio interview:
What Is The Opening Paragraph of One of Your Books? A Book Promotion Party!
StandardI thought it would be interesting to do a book promotion party by giving not only the name of your book and what it is about but also the opening paragraph.
I offer the following from Maledicus: The Investigative Paranormal Society Book 1 by Charles F. French:
“Lucius Antony Caius exalted in his good fortune. He was in complete control of his destiny, of his place in the world. Not for him was the belief in the three sisters of fate–they would not measure and cut his string of life. Caius, also known as Maledicus, as he was called because of his odd lisping voice coupled with the grating sound of sandpaper grinding on coarse wood and with his personality, believed he controlled the world. And his evil persona caused others to fear him. He didn’t look like the image of a strong Roman–he was short and fat, with little hair, but he was as dangerous as the most powerful general.”
So, if you would like to join the party and promote your book, please offer a quotation!
Have fun, promote your book, and please share this post.
Gallows Hill can be found here in ebook.
Gallows Hill in paperback can be found here.
An interview about Gallows Hill can be found here.
Please follow the following links to find my novel:
Thank you!
The book trailer:
Maledicus:Investigative Paranormal Society Book I
My radio interview:
January Promote Your Book Party!
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With 2019 well underway, I thought it was a good time to have the next Promote Your Book Party!
I thought it would be a good time to share what you have been writing and what you have written. I want once again to offer an opportunity for all writers who follow this blog to share information on their books. It can be very difficult to generate publicity for our writing, so I thought this little effort might help. All books may be mentioned, and there is no restriction on genre. This includes poetry and non-fiction.
To participate, simply give your name, your book, information about it, and where to purchase it in the comments section. Then please be willing to reblog and/or tweet this post. The more people that see it, the more publicity we can generate for everyone’s books.
Thank you for participating!
Keep on writing, and have a wonderful year of writing!
Celebrate and promote your writing! Shout it out to the world! Let everyone know about your work!
Feel free to promote a new or an older book!
I hope this idea is successful, and I hope many people share information on their books!
I will continue to have this party every few weeks.
Gallows Hill can be found here in ebook.
Gallows Hill in paperback can be found here.
An interview about Gallows Hill can be found here.
Please follow the following links to find my novel:
Thank you!
The book trailer:
Maledicus:Investigative Paranormal Society Book I
My radio interview:
An Invitation To Join The U.L.S. The Underground Library Society
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I am again asking for those who would like to join the U.L.S.,the Underground Library Society, to join and write a guest post.
In an earlier First Year Class at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, PA, The U.L.S. — The Underground Library Society — was created. It is in the spirit of the Book People from Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. In that novel, all books have been banned, and a few people “become” books by memorizing them, in the hope that, one day, books will be permitted to exist again.
In that spirit, I am putting out the call once more for like-minded people to join The U.L.S. All that is needed is to choose a book you would memorize if the need ever arose. You do not actually have to memorize the book now. If you wish to join, simply write a guest post in which you say what book you would “become” and why.
I hope many of you choose to join.
If you do wish to do a post, please email me at frenchc1955@yahoo.com and write a guest post as a Word doc. Thank you.
Charles F. French
Magic in Stories: Revisited
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There is magic in stories; there is magic in writing. Magic is the transmutation of objects or the manipulation of the world in ways that move outside the realm of science. Whether or not magic is real in the sense of the here and now world is not the point; magic is a metaphor for fiction. Stephen King says, “books are a uniquely portable magic” (104). This magic is in the words, in their transmitting from the writer to the reader other worlds and ideas. In writing fiction, writers create a world that was not there; even so-called realistic, literary writers create an alternate world that readers inhabit when they read the book. The writers and the readers, in a mystical incantation, create another reality, one that can be so strong sometimes that readers can be moved to tears or laughter or sadness or joy or grief or sorrow or despair or hope. Readers come to care about the characters and feel empathy as if they were real. That is a kind of magic.
Neil Gaiman, in his introduction to Ray Bradbury’s 60th Anniversary Edition Fahrenheit 451, speaks to the power of the written word and stories: “Ideas—written ideas—are special. They are the way we our stories and our thoughts from one generation to the next. If we lose them, we lose our shared history. We lose much of what makes us human. And fiction gives us empathy: it puts us inside the minds of other people, gives us the gift of seeing the world through their eyes. Fiction is a lie that tells us true things, over and over” (xvi). It is through the creation of artificial worlds, no matter how speculative or fantastic, that we experience our world in more intensity and with deeper clarity than we had before. This act of magic is what we share as writers and readers. I am honored to be a mere apprentice in the magic of writing novels.
Works Cited
Gaiman, Neil. “Introduction.” Ray Bradbury. 60th Anniversary Edition Fahrenheit 451. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013.
King, Stephen. On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. New York: Scribner, 2000.
