Blog - StarDance Press

Moving Back to Move Forward

June 25, 2013 elouisebates

This weekend, we made a flying trip back to PA, where we lived for the first four years of our marriage. When we left, there were two weeks between finding out we had to leave, and pulling away from the house with our moving truck. It’s been almost five years, and we’d never made it back for any kind of closure. With Carl starting grad school this fall, and another huge move coming up in a month (EEK!), now seemed like a good time to finally go back, see our friends there again, show Joy the house where we lived when she was a baby, revisit some old haunts.

And go grocery shopping at Wegmans. Because we have MISSED it.

Bringing Joy home from the hospital. — Bringing Joy home from the hospital almost six years ago.

It was so, so good.

We had dinner Friday evening with some of our dearest friends. It was sheer chaos in parts, with ten kids running around and six adults trying desperately to cram five years of conversation into a few hours, but it was so good. It felt like we’d never left.

Saturday was a more leisurely lunch with more friends, these with two daughters close in age to our own girls. The four of them played so nicely together all afternoon, and Joy cried when we left – she felt like she’d finally found the Betsy to her Tacy, and then had to leave after just a few hours. We told her we would start praying, and KEEP praying, that God would send her a best friend at Gordon-Conwell, now that she has a taste of what it’s like.

Then we went back to where we used to live. NOTHING has changed. I don’t think anybody’s even painted their house a different color or bought a new vehicle. It was so weird, like stepping into a time warp. Milkshake (Carl and me) and chocolate milk (the girls) at the dairy bar down the street (and wasn’t THAT place dangerous to have within walking distance when I was in my third trimester during one of the hottest summers EVER), and then on to the cemetery where all the locals go to walk. It’s the closest thing to a neighborhood park around.

Posing just a few feet down from where the previous photo was taken

And THEN we did our grocery shopping. Then came home. Then crashed the next day (literally, for me – we got out our bikes on Sunday and mine decided it had had enough of my stumbling attempts to master it, and showed me who was boss. Hint: it wasn’t me).

The entire trip felt both like closure of the past AND reopening of old friendships. We were able to lay to rest some of the miseries that had chased us from PA, remember the good parts of living there, and reaffirm the friendships we made while there.

I also was able to remember that old tombstones are one of my best sources for finding awesome character names, and that ancient cemeteries are beautiful, peaceful, other-worldly places to stroll.

Despite our exhaustion, we came home energized, ready to tackle packing up this house, thankful for all God has done in our lives, and in my case, ready to dive back into writing now that I’ve gotten some more real-life filling.

How was your weekend?

"Rest in peace" feels a bit more tangible, here. — “Rest in peace” feels a bit more tangible, here.

Books, fantasy, fiction, publishing

Elle Strauss Cover Reveal

June 19, 2013 elouisebates

I was tremendously excited when I heard Elle Strauss was putting her “Love, Tink” serial together in one complete package, with a new cover and everything. I bought every one of the episodes as soon as it came out, and I’m happy to see them all together now. So naturally, I signed up to be part of the cover reveal!

Not familiar with Love, Tink? Here’s a brief synopsis:

Love, Tink: The Complete Set by Elle Strauss
Publication date: July 10th, 2013
Genre: YA Fantasy

Synopsis:

Originally published as six separate novella episodes, Love, Tink the complete series is all six stories together in one volume.

Tink is hopelessly smitten with Peter, the leader of the Lost Boys who’d mysteriously arrived at Neverland two years ago. Unfortunately, Peter is tired of the adventure and especially tired of dodging Captain Hook who is after his head. He just wants to go back to New York City and live his life as a normal fifteen year old

Tink is the only one who can help Peter return, but it breaks her heart to do it. She just wants to make him happy, so she does the unthinkable and betrays the fairy king. Now her heart is filled with remorse. Should she go after Peter? Should she follow him to his New York?

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18029050-love-tink

—-

ELLE STRAUSS AUTHOR BIO

I write fun, lower YA fiction (time-travel and fantasy). I’m fond of Lindt’s sea salt dark chocolate and hiking in good weather. I’m married with four children and divide my time between British Columbia, Canada, and Germany. I also write upper YA (historical and science fiction) as Lee Strauss.

Author Links:

Website / Goodreads / Facebook / Twitter

Ready for the cover? Here … we … go …!

Isn’t it lovely? Doesn’t it make you want to read the novellas? The complete series is coming out July 10th!

editing, goals, Life Talk, school, seasons, stories, writing

Scattered

June 11, 2013 elouisebates

-My copy-editor send back Magic Most Deadly this morning. This marks the last round of edits on it (whee!). Then I get to move on to formatting (not so whee). Still, overall way more exciting than not.

-On Saturday, Carl, the kids, and I went to the fabric store to pick up supplies for my sister’s baby quilt. Carl is, surprisingly enough, absolutely the best person to go quilt-fabric-shopping with. He has an unerring eye for colors and patterns that will work well together. Most of the prettiest quilts I’ve made have been ones he helped with.

-I’ve started packing up non-necessity items around the house. Pictures came down off the walls last week, and I’m starting to eye the bookcases, wondering what books we can live without for the next month and a half. (Answer: not many) Winter clothes are already packed away, and pretty soon I’ll be putting extra linens away in totes. Despite the many, many moves we’ve made in the almost-nine years we’ve been married, I still loathe packing.

-In related news, holy cow the end of July and our big move is coming up FAST. We’re going to be traveling three of the weekends between now and then, too. Yikes.

-As the work I need to do on MMD winds down, I’ve actually started writing, not just plotting and researching, my next book project (working title: Wings of Song). I’ve written, deleted, and re-written the first chapter already. Exciting! It’s odd but fun to be working on something without any magic in it at all. It’s also just sheer delight to be writing something set in the same era and general location of my grandfather’s childhood. I think this book will be dedicated to all my grandparents, in thanks for the stories and memories they’ve always shared.

-I’m backing off on the full load of school I’d been attempting with Joy. I think we’ll be fine doing that once the move is done and we’ve settled, but everything is too crazy right now. We’ll just keep doing a little bit here and there (working mostly on art lessons, because that is what she loves the best), but not try doing full weeks until sometime mid-August.

-I love all the fresh fruit starting to be available now. I’ve a big batch of rhubarb in my fridge waiting to be made into rhubarb crunch, and I made a strawberry cake for Grace’s birthday party that was amazingly good, and just to be able to open the fridge and indulge in fruit without worrying that it means we’ll run out before our next grocery trip is a treat. It’s so much easier to stay healthy this time of year!

Although this isn't technically health food, I suppose. — Although this isn’t technically health food, I suppose.

-It’s also pretty fun to be back browsing at the farmer’s market every Saturday (the ones where we aren’t traveling, that is). I came home this weekend with a pot of thyme and a tiny bottle of fresh cream. SO good.

-There’s not much else for news on this front! Posts are probably going to be scattered and/or non-existent from now until after we move (early August), so don’t get alarmed if a week or so passes without hearing from me. I will try to stay active on Twitter and Facebook just so you all know I’m alive!

-Have a fantastic week, all.

Books, fantasy, goals, heroines, publishing, stories, writing

Responsibilities and Inspirations

June 3, 2013 elouisebates

The thing about being an independently-published author (or at least journeying toward that goal – Magic Most Deadly, is so, so close to being ready!) is that you still have to be responsible about your writing.

By which I mean, if you have two books planned for this year, and two more planned for next, and you know that you are a slow enough writer it will take you all year to get those books written and ready for publication, you cannot, no matter how much you want to, hare off on a side trail and write something completely different. Because you have responsibilities just as surely as if you have a contract with an outside publishing house.

Which is why I am not writing that heavily female, POC, straight-up high fantasy quest-and-battle novel I want to write after seeing this, and reading this and this.

But I want to.

And so I am jotting down notes and character ideas and possible plots in my handy-dandy notebook here and there, as I think of it, and maybe, just maybe, once my self-imposed contracts are up, the spark will still be there and I will be able to write it. Or there’s even the possibility that I might be spurred to write these stories that much faster, so I can get to that one sooner.

In any case, it’s always nice to have inspiration bubbling, even if one can’t go chasing every will-o-the-wisp idea that floats across one’s path. Not, in any case, if one wishes to be that responsible writer one is trying so hard to achieve.

Seriously, who hasn’t read LOTR and wanted to see Eowyn get her shot at adventure? She would be an amazing protagonist.

(I am also, in trying to be responsible, not taking up my Welsh language studies again. Though that has more to do with homeschooling/packing/moving/I have no time for a new time-consuming hobby than it does with writing!)

goals, philosophy, writing

Get Healthy Bloghop: Water

May 29, 2013 elouisebates

My number-one secret for getting/staying healthy isn’t really a secret at all.

Drink water.

When I was pregnant with my first child, the best advice my doctor gave me was to keep hydrated. I got a giant water bottle – one marked with easy-to-read measurements, and used that to keep track of my water intake each day. By the time I was finally done with pregnancy and nursing … well, by that time I was expecting again, so when I was finally done with all that, I had firmly established the habit of drinking water constantly throughout the day.

I’m not perfect with it anymore – my girls are four and five, long enough for me to occasionally slide back into bad habits. But oh boy, can I tell the difference when I get out of the habit. When I am drinking enough water, my mind is clearer; my body healthier; my hair and skin happier; my temptations to eat too much sugar far lessoned. When I’m even slightly dehydrated? I get slow, sluggish, and stupid. Cranky, too.

I don’t always like drinking it. Sometimes it’s too boring, sometimes it just tastes unpleasant. So often I add fruit to it to give a little more flavor, or squirt some lemon juice in, or even add just a tiny bit of juice. Anything to convince myself to keep drinking it.

And no, coffee, even decaffeinated, is NOT an acceptable substitute for water. So sorry! (Neither is black tea, which is sadder for me personally.)

Exercise is good (I’m still looking for something to fill the gap ice dance was for me this winter); healthy eating in general is hugely important; the simple act of moving throughout the day necessary; but for me, drinking enough water to stay properly hydrated is the single best thing I can do to stay healthy, body and mind.

How about you?

This post is part of the Staying Healthy Bloghop. Check out more posts at Alex J Cavanaugh, Stephen Tremp, L Diane Tremp, and Michael Di Gesu.

children, God, Life Talk

Grace

May 23, 2013 elouisebates

From this …

She smiled early, and hasn't stopped since — She smiled early, and hasn’t stopped since

… to this, in four short years

"best birthday present EVER" she said about her bike — “best birthday present EVER” she said about her bike

Hey kid, who told you you could grow up?

cookies and a fancy dress for Oma's graduation — cookies and a fancy dress for Oma’s graduation

Happy 4th birthday, darling Grace. You have brought so much sunshine and joy to our lives. You are full of drama, compassion, mischief, love, and delight, and you are way too smart for comfort.

You aren’t even close to being a baby anymore, but you’ll always be my baby, my sweet, lovable, darling Gracie. I’m so thankful God put you in our lives!

goals, Life Talk, school

Home Again

May 20, 2013 elouisebates

I woke up this morning with the strangest sense that I had left something undone. But what? I had even unpacked my suitcase before collapsing into bed last night! Then I remembered:

No blog post.

I almost always write these posts Sunday night, in order to have them up in good time Monday morning. Last night, though … well, it’s probably a good thing I did forget, because otherwise the post would look like this:

asfkjbarlsuhdflkgjbfkdjbgjskbg Graduated! sfkgjbnjlkjbjb..!

I was tired. It was an amazing weekend, watching my mom receive her Master’s hood (afterward, while I was helping Grace in the ladies’ room, a news photographer stopped by and took a picture of my gram, Mom, my sister, and Joy, to do a piece about the four generations in the paper. SO wish I hadn’t missed that!), bullying my pregnant sister into taking her vitamins every day and drink enough water, celebrating Grace’s birthday a little early, just enjoying being together with family.

But it was exhausting. Especially since my brother-in-law took out all four of Carl’s wisdom teeth on Thursday, leaving Carl pretty much non-functional for the rest of the weekend. Our trip to Ottawa on Sunday, intended to be the cap on a fantastic weekend, ended up being mostly a bust just because he was still having a hard time forming coherent thought and I was too tired by then to do the thinking for him. We wandered around Parliament, drove by the tulip beds, and came home with little more than a box of Timbits to show for it. Oh well. Another year.

We’re all doing much better after sleeping in our own beds. (and those Timbits were not scorned for breakfast today, let me tell you.) I’m even hoping to start first grade with Joy today.

(We’re starting right after finishing kindergarten, because we know we’ll be having to take time off during the year and I would rather start early than have to go late next spring, and also I’m a little concerned she’ll forget half of what she knows if we go a few months in between right now. Also I’m still really bad at sticking to a schedule, so the more time I have to form good habits, the better.)

Other exciting things will be happing soon. Magic Most Deadly is with my proofreader. The cover designer and I are trying to restrain ourselves from going overboard with shinies. I’m currently debating between finishing up a new Sophie short story, putting in more work on Magic Most Deadly’s prequel (this one set in Regency times!), or going over to the Louise Bates side and starting work on the 1930s historical fiction. I’m really strongly leaning toward the 1930s story, but … I would love to do some physical research on that first, going over to the area in which it is set and getting a real feel for it, but that’s not likely to happen until next summer. So I’m still dithering.

In the meantime, laundry, school, meal planning, and grocery shopping beckon. It was a great weekend, but it’s good to be home!

families, heroines, influences, Life Talk

My Strong Heritage

May 13, 2013 elouisebates

I have a love/hate relationship with Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Valentine’s Day, and the like. I don’t like how exclusive they are. For Mother’s Day especially, I don’t like how a culture that usually treats women, mothers in particular, as “less than,” takes one day to say “Oh yeah, moms are great,” and then goes back to sneering at them.

On the other hand, I also like any opportunity I get to show the people I love how thankful I am for them. So I’m usually torn, these sorts of holidays.

But today, I’m not torn at all. I want to sing praise not just to my mother, but to all the women in my family who have contributed to make me the person I am today. It’s the day after Mother’s Day, and the day I choose to celebrate these amazing women.

My mom. She’s getting her Master’s degree on Saturday. Her granddaughters get to watch their Oma get a degree, how amazing is that? She taught me everything I know about sewing, cooking, teaching, and more importantly, how to use my brain (OK, Dad contributed to that part as well. Don’t worry, Dad, your post will come after Father’s Day!). She taught me about sacrifice and hard work, and the importance of having dreams while keeping your practicality. She’s the best mom I could imagine.

Gram, Mom’s mother. Just as my girls get to watch their grandmother earn her degree, I can still remember going to Grammie’s college graduation. She’s tackled every challenge that comes her way with zest and determination, and her energy puts me to shame. She’d do anything for her family, except let them get away with doing less than they are capable of.

Grandma, Dad’s mom. Raised eight children and had a hand in the raising of many of her grandchildren. Kept a sense of humor up to the very end. Faced a hard life with laughter and courage. Also went to college, to become a teacher. Instilled a love for reading and love for music in all her family.

My great-grandmothers. Some of them I only really know through stories. Some of them I knew well. One of them got to meet my Joy right after she was born. One of them had a name I am proud to now carry as my own. All of them strong, independent, courageous women.

My sister. My best friend, one of the smartest people I know, with the kindest heart to match her keen wits. She’s going to get to hold her first baby this fall, and I am so excited to see her become a mom. She’s going to be as spectacular at that as she is at everything else, I know.

My aunts, great-aunts, cousins … really, the list is too long to go on. And if I get started on the women who aren’t in my family who have influenced me and contributed to the person I am today, we’d be here all day. I am so thankful for all of them. I rejoice that my daughters have such a strong heritage – and one of equally brave, smart, loving women from their dad’s side – behind them.

Not just Mother’s Day, but every day I thank God for them!

Gram meeting our Joy for the first time.

Books, fiction

More Good Books

May 6, 2013 elouisebates

I’m at an in-between place with writing at this moment – not quite ready to make the final edits to my current MS, but also not wanting to dive wholly into my new one for fear I’ll get carried away and have a hard time coming back when the time is right for said current edits. I have a short story I’m working on, but the plot keeps getting stuck, so I’m working on plotting right now rather than actual writing.

Instead, I’ve been reading. Voraciously. Coming home from the library every week with stacks of books, and exchanging every one for fresh fodder the next. It’s like I’m a kid again.

(The warm streak we’ve been having contributes to this. The girls and I have been spending every moment we can outside, soaking in the sunshine. This winter was long and miserable and sickly, and so we are forgetting about school and housework and everything inside related, and for me, that includes writing. Laptop doesn’t like the sun. Books love it.)

(The mosquitoes are starting to emerge, though, so we’ll probably start spending more time inside this week. Gracie is mildly allergic, so every bite balloons up and itches like mad, and since we live right by a wetlands, we get swarmed with mosquitoes all summer long. Poor kid.)

Anyway. Not all of the books have been winners. Some I read, finish, and think “Ugh, why did I waste my time?” Some I read, finish, and think “Wait, what was the point of that story again?” Some I read and don’t finish. Some I don’t even read, just skim and decide to skip.

But most of them have been good, and a few have been truly wonderful. Two in particular from last week’s load.

The Grass-Widow’s Tale, by Ellis Peters. I love Peters’ Cadfael books, but Inspector Felse is almost as good. This book features Bunty, Felse’s wife, and it entered my life at just the right time. In it, Bunty is turning 41 and wondering who she is apart from Wife and Mother, and what her purpose is on the earth aside from those two roles – does she matter her, alone, aside from how she affects Husband and Son? I’m not quite at that age yet, but oh, haven’t I asked myself those questions?

The adventure Bunty gets entangled with as she struggles with these questions is both exciting and enlightening, and I love how she is both gentle and fierce, loving and ferocious, exactly when she needs to be. It’s a great, great read, and another one of those books that deals with serious matters as only supposedly light fiction can do.

The other book was Eva Ibbotson’s The Dragonfly Pool. This is only the second Ibbotson I’ve ever read, and sometimes I feel kind of cheated that I didn’t get to discover her as a kid, when her books and characters would have had a hand in shaping my world. But there’s something special about reading them for the first time as an adult, too, though not of the same sort. This time it’s more of a reminder of the magic of my youth, and I need that, these days when I feel old and cranky and worn-out way, way before my time.

(I am learning, these days, when those moods come on me, to shout “Carl! We’re being too boring again! We need an adventure!”, and he is learning not to fetch me a nice soothing cup of tea when I do that. We’re getting there. By the time we’re old we’ll have remembered how to be young.)

The Dragonfly Pool, despite not being fantasy, is really quite fantastic, and thoroughly delightful. I love Tally, with her quiet and steadfast determination to help others, and how in doing so she helps herself along the way. I love all the side characters, so richly drawn. The villains are satisfyingly villainous, and the overall setting is truly magical.

So. Those are two of my excellent reads from last week. We’ll see what gems pop out of this week’s library haul.

What good books have you been reading lately?

1920s, Books, critiquing, fantasy, publishing, writing

Title Reveal!

April 29, 2013 elouisebates

I teased on my FB page last week that I had finally settled on a title for my novel … and then said you would all have to wait until Monday, on the blog, to find out what it is. Wonder no more!

I’ve been calling this book Magic & Mayhem almost since the conception, but I never intended for it to be the official title – it was just holding it together in my mind, better than just calling it “Maia’s story” or “The Book.” When the time came to settle on a real title, though, I had the worst time. Nothing I thought of seemed quite right. I would bounce ideas off my husband with even more intensity than we used to discuss baby names (seriously, those were easy compared to this), and then email a list to my critique partner to get her opinion. I scoured the manuscript itself for clues, hunted through my Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, searched poems and verses and the Bible, stared at my row of Agatha Christie’s in vain hope of inspiration, and racked my own brain for ideas.

Finally, finally I found one that not only I liked, my two long-suffering partners in crime agreed sounded good, as well. Success at last!

(Seriously, who would have thought picking a title would be almost harder than writing the book itself?)

So, without further ado, I introduce …

Magic Most Deadly

Ever since the War, Maia Whitney’s life has been one long straight path of drudgery and boredom, with no room for the adventures she secretly craves. If only there was a chance to do some work that really mattered, but what would that be?

Lennox Davies, minor magician and master Intelligence agent, has no time for independent and opinionated women. Lives depend on his ability to remain undistracted and keep his own counsel.

But when the two of them witness a murder, and Maia discovers her own blossoming magical talent, they must put aside their differences in order to work together. If they don’t, England itself could fall.

And even if they do, it still might not be enough.