Elijah David

Fairy Tale Central is doing some daily challenges on Instagram featuring OTPs (One True Pairings) as part of their celebration of all things fairy tale this month. For those of us who wind up doing these things in blog form, Arielle had kindly shared the full listing on her own blog here . Fairy Tale OTP Challenge: 1. The first fairy tale OTP you shipped      Probably Beauty and the Beast or Aladdin and Jasmine. These are the earliest fairy tales I can remember getting deeply involved in. 2. The cliché fairy tale OTP that everyone ships but you still love      I think I'll probably go with Snow and Charming from Once Upon a Time. Do I sometimes feel like they get too much of the spotlight in later seasons? Yes, but their relationship is wonderful in the first few seasons as we see them fight for each other. 3. Your favorite hate-to-love fairy tale OTP      I'm assuming this is an enemies to lovers trope rather than an ex...

Hello, again! I have been plugging away on some projects (and crocheting away, as I'm due to have a new baby nephew this summer!) -- one of which is to finish a round of edits on Paper and Thorns . I hope to have some exciting news on that front in the next month or two, but for now we'll have to be satisfied talking about other  fairy tales. Today I'm participating in Fairy Tale Central 's blog link-up. Fairy Tale Central is a website dedicated to fairy tales, including their origins, history, and retellings. Every month they feature a new tale, but in February they pull out all the stops and celebrate fairy tales of all kinds. FTC: What’s an obscure fairy tale you love? I always feel like "The Wild Swans" is a bit obscure since it's not one of the "big" tales that everyone knows thanks to Disney and the multitude of illustrated picture books that abound in the children's sections of bookstores. FTC: If you got to choose Disney’s nex...

I've seen this tag show up in a few places, but Kate over at Seek Him First was the first I saw put an authorial twist on it and answer based on her own stories. I liked the idea so much I had to try it myself. ON THE FIRST DAY OF CHRISTMAS, MY TRUE LOVE SENT TO ME: A PARTRIDGE IN A PEAR TREE. The partridge stood alone in the pear tree. What is your favorite standalone novel? Definitely There's No Place Like Home? because I think it's probably the strongest of the few standalone books I've written. I can't wait to dive into editing it later next year. ON THE SECOND DAY OF CHRISTMAS, MY TRUE LOVE SENT TO ME: TWO TURTLE DOVES. Love is in the air! Who is your one true pairing? So, this is a tricky question because the Albion series has its fair share of pairings, but with only the first book released, none of them are exactly "canonical" yet. But the one pairing that's fairly set up (or at least implied to be in the early stages) in Albion Acade...

I'm picking this tag up from Paper Fury , who picked it up from other blogs. Chocolate Chip: Classic Book That You Love Dracula, Treasure Island, Pride and Prejudice, The Hunchback of Notre Dame Thin Mints: A Hyped-Up Book You Want To Read The Return of the Thief by Megan Whalen Turner, Bridge of Clay by Markus Zusak, the Temeraire series by Naomi Novik Shortbread: An Author You Can’t Get Enough Of C. S. Lewis, Jim Butcher, J. R. R. Tolkien, Naomi Novik, Megan Whalen Turner  Samoas: An Emotional Rollercoaster A Monster Calls  by Patrick Ness, Changes by Jim Butcher, I Don't Want to Kill You by Dan Wells Oreos: A Book Whose Cover Was Better Than The Story The Golden Compass  by Phillip Pullman Gingerbread Cookies: Where The Story Was Better Than Its Cover Till We Have Faces  by C. S. Lewis, The Secret of NIMH/Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH  by Robert C. O'Brien (I have the movie tie-in edition and it's not...

In the words of the indomitable Samwise Gamgee, "Well, I'm back." Sorry for the unexpected absence of the last couple months. I experienced an unexpected career change earlier this year and while the transition has been fairly smooth, I haven't had a lot of blogging in me. I've told myself to just take the plunge and get back to it, but it took Mirriam's awesome autumn tag to finally get me back here. So without further ado, the Autumn Tag: Favorite Autumn Activity Walking. I love walking in the autumn when the air is crisp and smells of woodsmoke and dead leaves and the promise of adventure. There's a certain kind of wanderlust that appears in autumn that isn't always about reaching faraway lands but sometimes just about getting 'round the corner. Favorite Autumn Music The Harry Potter soundtracks, the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack, the Lord of the Rings  film soundtracks Spooky or Cozy Autumn Both? Probably more cozy than...

This is a book tag that I'm nabbing (and modifying) from Cait at Paper Fury (who nabbed and modified it from #bookstagram). I'll try to go with more recent books in cases where there are many answers I could give. 1. Chocolate Cake: A dark book you absolutely love Hmm . . . I don't usually "love" dark books. But V.E. Schwab's Shades of Magic series is one of the darker I've read recently, and I did love those. (Note: They feature vulgarity, violence, and the occasional mostly tasteful scene of human love-making, so if those aren't your cup of tea, or you're like me and appreciate knowing beforehand, this is your warning.) 2. Vanilla Cake: A light read I just poked through my reading challenge for this year on Goodreads and . . . I've not read many books this year I'd deem "light" (and truth to tell, a lot more of them are dark than I'd have given myself credit for. I still put SoM as my answer for dark books.) ...

I've had a number of friends do this tag in the last couple weeks, so I figured I'd jump in. 1. WHAT GENRES, STYLES, AND TOPICS DO YOU WRITE ABOUT? Genres: Fantasy (high, urban, contemporary, epic), magical realism (or something that's not quite full-blown fantasy), and I've got ideas for sci-fi and horror stories/novels that haven't been written yet Styles: Well, I only wrote in third person omniscient for a long while, but I've tended to use more first person in my writing in the last ten years or so. I almost always write in the past tense in my fiction. Topics: I haven't really written topically, but I have touched on some issues like infidelity, homosexuality, personal identity, and religion in my short stories and novels. One novel-in-planning will deal very heavily with child abuse and its effects on both the victims and their friends and families. 2. HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN WRITING? I've been coming up with stories and writing them down sinc...

Cait over at Paper Fury listed 10 Bookworm Questions  she posed for herself to answer and invited others to post their own answers. They looked like fun (especially the last one) so I thought I'd give it a go. 1. What are your top 5 reads of 2017 so far? This one was fairly easy to answer. I've got 26 books on my Goodreads Challenge so far this year (including several short stories I listened to via Audible and the last few volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist). These five titles rose to the top of the list: Goldenhand by Garth Nix The Heart of What was Lost by Tad Williams The Glass Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg The Dispatcher by John Scalzi I Don't Want to Kill You by Dan Wells (As a side note, the last two titles on this list are not  for the faint of heart. The Scalzi title is an Audible-exclusive novella that, while otherwise solidly written, has some intense use of vulgarity, heavy on the f-bombs. For that reason, I don't recommend it carte bl...

I got this from Amanda , who got it from someone, who got it from someone, who got it from the original poster . The idea is to list a book or character who fits the associations listed with each month's birthstone. This should be fun. 1. January (Garnet): Associated with warding off negative forces and dark energies. Name a book with the darkest/evilest character you can think of. Seven Princes by John R. Fultz: The main villain of this book made me sick to my stomach. If I'd had the physical book for this, I'd have thrown it across the room. 2. February (Amethyst): Purple is associated with royalty. Name a book with regal qualities. You can base this off of characters or choose the King of all books. The Lord of the Rings : It's regal. It has kings. It is the king of fantasy. 3. March (Aquamarine): Washed out. Name a 'wishy washy' character, a character who is not strong or a follower. Georgiana from A School for Unusual Girls : She has very little dri...

Arielle tagged me in the Book Sacrifice Tag, and it looked like fun, so here we go. #1: An Over-Hyped Book Situation: You are in a bookstore when the zombies attack. Over the loudspeakers you hear the military announce that over-hyped books are the zombies' only weakness. What over-hyped book will you chuck at the zombies? Go Set a Watchman should not have been published. It's based on (or is) an early draft of what eventually became To Kill a Mockingbird and it should have been left to rot wherever it was dug up from. Harper Lee thought it had vanished and never said she wished it hadn't. It isn't a good novel, and it is a tarnish on Harper Lee's legacy. #2: A Sequel Situation: You are caught in a torrential downpour and you're probably the type who melts when you get wet. What sequel are you willing to use as an umbrella to protect yourself. Clariel by Garth Nix. It's technically a prequel, but it was the first *new* book in the Old Kingdom serie...