I started blogging in October 2016 and my first blog was robbiesinpiration which I still use extensively. I had been writing poems and children’s stories for a while and published Michael and my first Sir Chocolate book in August 2016. I was looking for a way to engage with other writers, readers and authors and blogging was recommended to me.

My brother-in-law, Justin, helped me set up Robbie’s Inspiration. He knew a bit about blogs and blogging and recommended WordPress as a good platform. He helped me set it up and write and publish my first post. Over the next year or so, I learned more about blogging from other experienced bloggers like Sally Cronin of Smorgasbord Magazine blog, Sue Vincent from Sue Vincent’s Daily Echo blog, Chris from The Story Reading Ape blog and Hugh Roberts of Hugh’s Views & News blog. Each of these bloggers taught me different things about blogging successfully. Sally, Sue and Chris showed me that blogging was an interactive past time and I learned about the importance of commenting, guest posting and writing interesting content from them. Hugh’s blog also covers these points and he also writes informative posts about how to do a lot of things on WP. From him I learned how to insert the widgets which showcase my books along the side of my blog, how to include share buttons and many other things.

Through these four bloggers I met a whole community of wonderful people who all taught me more about writing, marketing and publishing. As time passed, I wrote more books for children and then, in 2018, I decided to take the leap into writing a longer novel for a young adult and adult market. In order to separate my children’s writing and baking posts from my adult writing and posts, I started this second blog, Roberta Writes, in September 2018. Through the Nethergate was published in October 2019 and I have also written adult horror and paranormal stories which are included in four anthologies, Dark Visions, Death Among Us, Nightmareland and Whispers of the Past.

On reflection, where I am going with this post is that for me, the most important tool for successful blogging is the comments section. That is where I engage with my readers on my blogs and engage with other bloggers on their blogs. I often comment on another blogger’s comment on someone else’s post if I liked their comment or want to add something. It is a friendship and a circle of support, encouragement and shared views. My blogs are not glamorous and I usually write a bit on the spur of the moment, so my thought pieces, like this one, are stream of consciousness writings, but it works for me and I am very happy in my lovely blogging community.

Have a lovely rest of the week and stay well.

What tools and templates do other blog-hoppers use?  Click on the link below to find out, or just add a comment:

Rules:

1. Link your blog to this hop.
2. Notify your following that you are participating in this blog hop.
3. Promise to visit/leave a comment on all participants’ blogs.
4. Tweet/or share each person’s blog post. Use #OpenBook when tweeting.
5. Put a banner on your blog that you are participating.

I am not doing a lot of active marketing of my books right now, but AllAuthor send me these amazing pictures so I have included a few here for you to admire.

I follow photographer, Wayne of Tofino Photography, and view and comment on his amazing wildlife photographs as often as I can. I usually do that form my Robbie’s Inspiration blog but today, I thought I would share some of his beautiful work here. I have matched two of his photographs with tanka poems. You can find Wayne’s site here: https://tofinophotography.wordpress.com/

Evolution

Only those who can

evolve quickly in the now

Will escape unscathed

Focus is necessary

To determine what matters

Irreversible change

Life’s background has changed

It will never revert back

I must adapt to

the different colour of dawn

Cut loose and embrace the now

These poems reflect some of my thinking about Coronavirus and its implications for my life.

Happy Easter.

April 9, 2020, prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story that declares, shield your face. It can be a knight of old, a doctor, or a senior citizen. What is the circumstance? Who makes the declaration? Go where the prompt leads!

Thank you, Charli, here is my piece:

Frustration washes over Cathy, and she concentrates on keeping her voice steady. A shaking voice will be misinterpreted as anxiety. Thank goodness this meeting is virtual, and she can hide behind her computer with the camera off. Nobody can see her face which is suffused with blood. She has never been good at disguising anger and strong emotion.

The facts are decisive, and she can’t understand this lengthily argument against the obvious answer. Then it strikes her. This discussion has nothing to do with logic or getting to the right answer. It has to do with pandering to fear.

You can join in here: https://carrotranch.com/2020/04/10/april-9-flash-fiction-challenge-2/

What Amazon says

Marcia Meara, author of Swamp Ghosts and Finding Hunter, has set Book One of her Wake-Robin Ridge series amid the haunting beauty of the North Carolina mountains, where ghosts walk, ancient legends abound, and things still go bump in the night.

“A PHONE RINGING AT 2:00 A.M. never means anything good. Calls at 2:00 A.M. are bad news. Someone has died. Someone is hurt. Or someone needs help.”

On a bitter cold January night in 1965, death came calling at an isolated little cabin on Wake-Robin Ridge. Now, nearly 50 years later, librarian Sarah Gray has quit her job and moved into the same cabin, hoping the peace and quiet of her woodland retreat will allow her to concentrate on writing her first novel. Instead she finds herself distracted by her only neighbor, the enigmatic and reclusive MacKenzie Cole, who lives on top of the mountain with his Irish wolfhound as his sole companion.

As their tentative friendship grows, Sarah learns the truth about the heartbreaking secret causing Mac to hide from the world. But before the two can sort out their feelings for each other, they find themselves plunged into a night of terror neither could have anticipated. Now they must unravel the horrifying events of a murder committed decades earlier. In doing so, they discover that the only thing stronger than a hatred that will not die is a heart willing to sacrifice everything for another.

My review

Sarah is a woman of some financial means who is tired and disillusioned with her life as a librarian and research assistant. Wake-Robin Ridge in the mountains of North Carolina is a fondly remembered holiday destination from her childhood and Sarah decides to take the plunge and purchase a remote cabin on Wake-Robin Ridge in order to pursue her dream of writing a book.

Sarah hasn’t been in her new cabin for long when she meets her neighbour, Mac, and his large half wolf half dog pet, called Rosheen. While Rosheen quickly takes to Sarah, her neighbour blows hot and cold and, despite being good looking and pleasant on the surface, manages to arouse a lot of tumultuous and conflicting emotion in Sarah who can’t understand his strange and contrary behavior.

The reader is introduced to second woman, Ruth Carter, who lives in an earlier time period [1962] and who is clearly the victim of an abusive husband. In the opening section of Ruth’s story, she commits a transgression in the eyes of her husband, Lloyd, who beats her nearly to death. Lloyd is arrested and imprisoned as a result and Ruth takes his hidden money, a substantial sum, and his car and flees. Lloyd comes to hear of Ruth’s actions and undertakes to get his revenge on her.

The story is a dual love story about both Sarah in 2011 and Ruth in 1962 with the injection of a murder and a frightening supernatural twist.

I enjoyed this story, but it was rather a slow burn initially for me with most of the action and revelations taking place in the second half of the book. I would describe this book as a romance with a paranormal sub-story rather than predominantly a paranormal book. The author’s beautiful writing and poignant emotional descriptions keep the story moving and maintain reader interest throughout the book.

I enjoyed the characters of both Sarah and Ruth, who came across as determined women who made the best of their opportunities and made some tough decisions to help and protect their menfolk. I particularly, like Ruth how showed unbelievable fortitude and resilience.

I would recommend this book to lovers of romance and deep and emotional writing with some mystery and an exciting paranormal twist.

Purchase Wake-Robin Ridge

I can remember, when I was a little girl of about eight years old, wanting to be a native American princess. In those days, I would have said an Indian princess. I was given an authentic Indian doll by an uncle who had traveled to the USA and brought this back as a gift for his doll loving niece. I remember that her clothing was all made of real leather and she had traditional beadwork decorations. I was totally fascinated by that doll and for weeks afterwards I forced encouraged my younger sister, Cath, to play Indian princesses with me. We had names; I was Princess Cherry Blossom and she was Princess Peach Blossom. We used to dress up as Indian girls and play outside in the sunshine for hours.

By the time I was twelve, my vision of the future had changed and I wanted to be a poet, just like Emily in the book Emily of New Moon by L.M. Montgomery (also the author of Anne of Green Gables]. My poet and writing stage went on for a few years as I was still writing verses and bits of prose during my second year of high school. The year I turned fourteen, I had to select six subjects at high school to study to matric, my final year of school. This was serious stuff and I chose sensibly: English, Afrikaans (compulsory second language), Maths, Physical Science, Accountancy and History. The easiest subjects that required the least effort from me were English, Maths and Accountancy, but when I finished school I had no real idea about what I wanted to study.

I went to secretarial college for a year and learned short hand and typing as well as bookkeeping and Business English. These were all fairly easy for me and I passed all my courses with distinction. The course didn’t challenge me and I had a bit of a wild year with lots of partying.

I got a job as a junior bookkeeper and it was horrible. So boring and repetitive. After two years of working during which I changed my job eight times, I decided to go to university. I did a psychometric test and it came back that I should study to be a chartered accountant so that is what I did. I studied correspondence through a local part time university and worked as a manager at a local video shop for the three years of my undergrad degree in accountancy and auditing. After passing my degree with distinction, I applied to start my articles at KPMG Inc. in Johannesburg. I was accepted and the firm paid for me to study my honours degree part time. I passed that and then went on to study and pass my board examinations. It was during my first year of articles that I met my husband, Terence, who was completing his final year of articles.

That is my story of how I ended up becoming a chartered accountant. I did two years of articles and then I moved into corporate finance. At that time if you had all your core hours and competencies you could move after two years of auditing. I loved corporate finance and soon moved into stock exchange work. I gradually became an expert in this area and wrote a series of several publications on investing into Africa and the listing, debt and other requirements in the various countries. This work introduced me to the world of writing and publishing and from there I branched into writing for children. That, of course, is a whole other story so I shall stop here with the story of my paid job and work.

What did other blog-hoppers want to be when they grew up?  Click the link below to find out, or just add a comment:

Rules:

1. Link your blog to this hop.
2. Notify your following that you are participating in this blog hop.
3. Promise to visit/leave a comment on all participants’ blogs.
4. Tweet/or share each person’s blog post. Use #OpenBook when tweeting.
5. Put a banner on your blog that you are participating.

This is not my usual response to a write photo prompt. Usually, I write a story inspired by the word or picture or post an extract from my WIP that ties into the prompt. Today, however, I thought I would write a stream of consciousness piece about togetherness.

South Africa went into lock down at 12pm on Thursday, 26 March for 21 days until Thursday, 16 April. Our lock down is overwhelming as it prohibits walking your dog, jogging, purchasing cigarettes or alcohol or going out of your garden for any reason other than to purchase essential items such as medication or food or visit the doctor. We are now half way through the 21 days. Has it helped? I don’t know. Our numbers of infections are not high, just over 1 500 and we have had 9 deaths. Our minister of health is telling us not to think we are out of danger because of the relatively low new infection figures. He seems to think this may be the calm before the storm and I tend to agree.

With regards to togetherness, lock down has resulted in constant togetherness. I have my boys here at home, all day long, everyday. They need help with their home schooling work and they are continuously hungry or thirsty or bored. My husband is also at home with us which means that my dining room, where I always work when at home, is full with four of us all spread out over our 16-seater table. Everyone has at least one computer [I have two] and Terence and I have an additional large screen each. Everyone has an ipad and an iphone [I have two]. All of these devices require power so the floor is full of cables. The table is heaped with school books and my research as well as my work manuals and legal books. I find it quite cloying as everywhere I go, every time I turn around, I seem to trip over someone. First world problems I know, but I still find it difficult.

My parents are also here with us and they spend quite a bit of time in our house [they have their own cottage down the pathway] and have all their meals with us. If I want to film a video, someone will come in half way through and the interruption will have to be edited out. It feels like Park Lane Railway Station. If I make a cup of tea, everyone wants one, if I bake, someone wants to help; even cleaning the house has become an event that everyone becomes involved in. Everyone is trying to be helpful and it is wonderful, but I am finding it a bit overwhelming. To much togetherness. My husband and sons are taking turns at waking up early because they are not sleeping well. This means that even my peaceful early morning blogging and writing time is interrupted and I have to stop and listen to the overnight Corona virus statistics and everything else that relates to this virus while trying to kill my ghosts and save my main characters.

So there is a lot of togetherness at the moment. Quite difficult for an introvert like me who needs time out to recharge. It is better to be together than to be alone I am sure and I love having time with my family, it is just adding to this general feeling of weirdness I have. The knowledge that everything in the world is not right.

How are your dealing with lock down? Are you enjoying the togetherness or are you alone? Tell me in the comments.

This post was inspired by Sue Vincent’s weekly write photo challenge. You can join in here: https://scvincent.com/2020/04/02/thursday-photo-prompt-together-writephoto/

Into the Past Prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story about people who tell the truth in the face of many lies. Don’t feel constricted to coronavirus or the 1918 flu pandemic, but feel free to use any of the information presented here.

Here is my piece with is about the Second Anglo Boer war which is the focus of my WIP:

A silence fell, and Robert thought again about the Boer from the trench. The man was no different from many of Robert’s counterparts in Mafeking. He was probably more educated than many of the British troops. Robert thought about the pro-war propaganda he had seen in England during his recent trip home and the demonization of the Boers who had gone from being “Brother Boer” to “Dirty Boer” due to the imminent war.

The anti-Boer campaign was part of a campaign by government to dehumanise the Boers in the eyes of the British public. Most of it was lies.

You can join in here: https://carrotranch.com/2020/03/31/into-the-past-the-not-so-spanish-spanish-flu/

I have signed up for the Back to the Classics Challenge 2020, hosted by Karen from Books and Chocolate blog.

https://karensbooksandchocolate.blogspot.com/2020/01/back-to-classics-challenge-2020.html.

The Great Gatsby is my fourth book for this challenge.

What Amazon says

This carefully crafted ebook: “The Great Gatsby – The Original 1925 Edition” is formatted for your eReader with a functional and detailed table of contents. The Great Gatsby is a novel written by American author F. Scott Fitzgerald and first published in 1925. It follows a cast of characters living in the fictional town of West Egg on prosperous Long Island in the summer of 1922. The story primarily concerns the young and mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby and his quixotic passion for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan. Considered to be Fitzgerald’s magnum opus, The Great Gatsby explores themes of decadence, idealism, resistance to change, social upheaval, and excess, creating a portrait of the Jazz Age or the Roaring Twenties that has been described as a cautionary tale regarding the American Dream. Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (1896 – 1940) was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigmatic writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century

My review

The Great Gatsby is a novel that questions the reality of the American dream. I am not American, but my understanding of the American dream is that anybody, regardless of their background or social standing can achieve financial success and upward social mobility through hard work in a society that has few barriers to entry. The author, F. Scott Fitzgerald, questions the reality of this believe and the fact that the wealthy classes are snooty and unaccepting of difference is one of the themes of this book. One of the other major themes is that the rich don’t take any responsibility for their actions and don’t feel any remorse or concern when their actions result in negative consequences for others.
The story is narrated by Nick Carroway, a Yale University graduate from the Midwest, a World War I veteran, and, at the start of the plot, a newly arrived resident of West Egg. Nick moves into the bungalow next door to a mysterious and young millionaire called Jay Gatsby. Gatsby lives in a huge estate on Long Island and throws large and decadent parties for multitudes of young and wealthy people looking for a good time.
Nick doesn’t know anyone in the area and so he visits the family of his second cousin once removed, Daisy Buchanan, and her millionaire husband, Tom. During his initial visit he meets a close friend of Daisy’s, Jordan Baker, who is an amateur golfer and who becomes his girlfriend. All three of them live a life of idle decadence which revolves around extra marital affairs, drinking, parties and pursuing all sorts of entertainment.
Early in the book, it becomes known that Tom is having an affair with the lively and exciting wife of the man who owns the local service station.
Despite his wealth and good looks, Jay Gatsby operates on the peripheral of society and has not become one of the boys. The numerous attendees of his house parties are just there for the free food and drink and have not interest in, or respect for, Gatsby, who is the subject of their gossip and speculation. It becomes apparent as the story unfolds that Gatsby is regarded with suspicion because of his unknow background which is believed to be unsavoury and his wealth attained through shady business connections. Bootlegging is alluded to later in the story.
Nick becomes friendly with Gatsby, at Gatsby’s initiation, and it gradually becomes known that Gatsby is obsessed with Daisy, with whom he had a short relationship prior to his leaving for Europe during WWI. Gatsby wishes to use Nick’s relationship with Jordan to arrange a meeting with Daisy.
Gatsby is an interesting character who, while initially coming across as aloof and distant, and then as being vulgar and having unorthodox and dishonest business practices, has a decent side and takes care of his aging father. He is a focused man who achieved financial success through sheer determination, hard work and an ability to turn a blind eye to questionable practices on his path to the wealth he believes is necessary to win Daisy’s affections.
This book is slow moving in the beginning but has a punchy and surprising end.

Purchase The Great Gatsby

This week’s blog hop topic is How do you feel about killing off one of your major characters?

I have only written one novel and ninety two percent of one (based on my current word count estimation) so I don’t have vast experience of killing off a main character in a novel. My adult writing is mainly in the paranormal, supernatural fantasy and horror genres so death is likely and expected in my books and stories. You can’t have a ghost unless there is a death, can you?

In Through the Nethergate, the main character, sixteen year old Margaret, does not die, but many of the supporting characters are already dead as they are reincarnated ghosts. This book provides details about a number of their deaths, which are unpleasant or they wouldn’t be ghosts. People who die naturally in their beds one night don’t usually take to haunting an inn, mansion or castle.

I didn’t mind writing about their deaths at all; I have always enjoyed paranormal, supernatural and horror so I am used to reading about deaths so it isn’t that difficult for me to write it. I don’t believe my death scenes are overly gory as I am not a fan of deaths by ax murderers and the like, I am more into deaths by starvation or drowning.

My WIP, A ghost and his gold, also includes ghosts and their deaths, but my main character in this book is also probably going to survive, although I’m not finished writing yet so I can’t say for sure. I think readers prefer a book to end on a positive note so I doubt Michelle will die.

I have written a number of short stories and these have all included deaths. Dark Visions, a horror anthology edited by Dan Alatorre, includes my stories, The Haunting of William and The Willow Tree. Both of these stories have murders in them and The Haunting of William also has a suicide.

My three stories in Death Among Us all include deaths of various types and are all based on real historical events and people. Amelia Dyer is a well know British baby murderer from the 19th century and my story, Justice is never served, is a fictionalised account of her arrest, trial and death by hanging. The murder of the monk is a fictionalised account of the last attempt by the Abbot of Glastonbury to stave off the destruction of Glastonbury Monastery in the 16th century. My final story, an eye for an eye is about the murder of a female master chimney sweep who abuses her indentured climbing boys (child chimney sweeps). I really enjoyed writing these stories and doing the necessary historical research. The deaths in the stories were necessary and did not bother me.

My two fictional stories in my latest anthology, Whispers of the Past, include murder and death from unusual medical conditions. I enjoyed research bee allergies and rabies in humans for these two stories, The Last of the Lavender and Missed Signs.

How do you feel about killing off your main characters? Find out what other authors think about this here:

Rules:
1. Link your blog to this hop.
2. Notify your following that you are participating in this blog hop.
3. Promise to visit/leave a comment on all participants’ blogs.
4. Tweet/or share each person’s blog post. Use #OpenBook when tweeting.
5. Put a banner on your blog that you are participating.

Award winning fantasy and children’s story author, Wendy J Scott, is hosting day 7 of the Whispers of the Past blog tour which features a post by Kaye Lynne Booth. Thank you, Wendy, for hosting us.

Inspiration by Kaye Lynne Booth ​