It's a Kind of Magic by Victoria Chatham

 

COMING IN SEPTEMBER 2025

Writers have a lot of words to play with, roughly one million of them in the English language. How we choose them and in what order we place them eventually becomes the stories we tell and the books we read.

Some books are long, others short, and others in between, but in all those words lies magic. The magic holds us spellbound, so as readers, our only option is to turn the page to discover what the author’s characters have in store for us. Read a romance or a fantasy and succumb to the enchantment of that author’s creativity. Savour the words on the page.

My words

So, where did all those words come from? Research has shown that our million or so words have developed over the last fifteen thousand years since the end of the last Ice Age, giving or taking a century or two here and there. Reputed to be the oldest words in our language are ‘thou’ and ‘mother.’ Currently, the longest word in English is forty-five letters long and is a medical term referring to a lung disease contracted from inhaling fine silica particles. Check any good English dictionary for pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.

It is not likely a reader would find that in a novel, but what about the shortest words? That good old stalwart indefinite article ‘a’ is the first that comes to mind, but don’t forget the pronoun ‘I’, which is always written in upper case. Numerous three-letter words exist, as any Scrabble player will appreciate, but not as many two-letter words. Of these, my favourite is the ubiquitous ‘up’.

At its most basic, its definition means moving to a higher position, but how many ways can it be applied? We wake up and get up. Topics come up. We call someone on the phone. We line up and can work up an appetite. A drain can be stopped up, so we open it up – or, more likely, the plumber does. We clean up the house, warm up leftovers, and respond to our teenager’s ‘Wassup?’ And then there is that universal, slightly risqué phrase referring to pregnancy, knocked up. 

Image from flashbak.com

There are several suggestions for its origin, but it likely dates from about 1760, when the Industrial Revolution developed in what was then Great Britain. The workforce needed to staff factories sprouting up like mushrooms was gleaned from the ever-increasing number of people moving from the country to towns and cities. Used to getting up as soon as it was light and going to bed when it was dark, these people radically adjusted their lives, as being late for work usually meant instant dismissal. 

The role of the knocker up was to tap on the bedroom window, making sure they were awake and preparing to go to whatever grimy hellhole employed them at low wages for twelve to sixteen hours a day, six days a week. The person doing the knocking, using a long pole with a knob or crown on its top, might be paid a small sum for the service. They might cover several miles in an area, walking up one side of the street and down the other. Once factory horns and reliable alarm clocks were invented, the practice of knocking up gradually died out, although, in one area in northeast England, it continued into the 1960s.

This post began with 'Writers have a lot of words to play with,' and the magic is I have only played with five hundred and fifty-six of them. There could have been so much more.

Victoria Chatham

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The day my computer crashed (and I how I survived the impact)

 The adventure started after a week of intensive editing and rewriting with D.L. Dixen, who is co-authoring the upcoming Pine County mystery, "Skidded and Skunked". Having set that manuscript aside to work on a more pressing task, my income taxes, I opened my computer and saw...the blue screen of death. Yep. That's a real thing. Digging a bit got me into a diagnostic that said. "No Hard Drive is Detected."

I was reasonably certain that not having a hard drive, where all of my files are saved, was a very bad thing. Some internet research on my smart phone confirmed that opinion. Bad. Worse than bad. Worse than really bad. Thoughts raced through my head.  Oh no! When did I last save my income tax worksheet? When did I last save the "S&S" manuscript?

I dug through my paperwork to find the computer's extended warranty information. Hmm. I bought the three-year extended warranty! Yay! The computer is...seven years old. Boo! 

The warranty information assured me that even past the end of the warranty, the provider (Geeks R Us) would be happy to evaluate the failure if I dropped the computer off and called back in a week. Minimum charge $149. (Additional $99-250+ if they actually repaired/recovered anything.)

Hoping to understand the problem, I went through a "root cause failure analysis." I determined the root cause was my mental imaging of smashing the computer on the sidewalk during the previous week's very slow Windows 10/11 conversion. Yes, the crash was my own fault. Karma got me for wishing the computer dead. Actually, my hatred may have been directed at the Microsoft engineer who decided it was to MY benefit to update from my functioning system to a new system that slowed my computer, frustrated me, and reformatted my files. I pulled out my thumb drive of backups and used my phone to verify that the most recent files had been saved. After a sigh of relief, I pulled the plug on the old computer, declared it officially dead, and went shopping.

A nice gentleman at Costco showed me a wonderful new computer, on sale for only slightly more than Geeks R US charge for evaluating and recovering the files from that hard drive. The new computer is lightning fast. It has more capabilities than I'll ever use and, as the salesman pointed out, has enough memory to record every movie that's ever been made! (Who would do that???)

 I took it home, plugged it in, inserted the thumb drive, and found all of my files. Yay!

Adding insult to the computer crash injury, the following week, my printer died. I feel like I'm in electronics purgatory! My mother, a pessimistic Swede, said bad things always happen in threes. Yes, my cell phone died the following week. With three, now functioning replacements, life moves on.

Hopefully, the computer change enhanced "Skidded and Skunked", the May release of the next Pine County mystery.

Check out the BWL website for D.L. Dixen's bio and links to all of my/our books.

Books We Love Home Page - BWL Publishing Inc.

Dixen, D.L. - BWL Publishing Inc.

Award winning series about the French Revolution, by Diane Scott Lewis

 

To purchase Escape the Revolution, click HERE

To purchase the sequel, Hostage to the Revolution, HERE

A writer goes through many drafts of their manuscript. This one I worked on the longest, being my first completed novel.

A novel that grew so big I had to cut it in half. Who knew publishers shied away from large novels, though it didn't stop Diana Gabaldon.

I even visited Cornwall and Paris, where my main character lived, struggling to solve her situation.

Settle back, and enjoy this journey through a determined young lady's experience.

The northern coast of Cornwall, England where Bettina works in a tavern

I researched the French Revolution to add flavor to the story of a young countess who is tricked by a trusted servant into fleeing to England to deliver important papers. When she arrives she discovers the paper are blank and she's left penniless and adrift. She must find a way to reconnect with her mother. And uncover the truth of her father's death. She finds herself embroiled in a murderous plot. Escape the Revolution takes place in England, where Bettina must find work to pay her way. With no real skills, she ends up in a bawdy tavern on the Cornish coast where she meets a man who is rumored to have killed his unfaithful wife. Will an attraction happen between them?

The Luxembourg Palace in Paris where Bettina must go to ask a favor of Napoleon

The second novel, Hostage to the Revolution, takes place in New Orleans and France. Bettina discovers the truth of her father's death, and kidnapped by rebels, she escapes into war-torn France to save the man she loves. Through it all, she grows in courage and shrewdness, ready to face any difficulty that comes her way. 

Read an excerpt, the first meeting of the main characters:

“Affreux!” Bettina recoiled from Stephen. “You are … a rutting pig, and have no reason to say that to me!”

He grabbed her upper arms as she tried to shove past him. His bared teeth turned him wolfish, wiping any attractiveness from his features. “A pig, am I? I’ll show you a pig, froggie!”

“Let go of me!” She struck and pushed at him with her fists. But the harder she struggled, the more he laughed. Stephen hauled her to his chest, then brushed his damp lips on her jaw when she whipped back her head. Bettina wrenched up a hand to scratch his cheek.

A horse clopped up. Someone dismounted, jerked Stephen around and punched him in the face.

The young man sprawled on the ground, kicking furiously at the dirt. “Damme! Who the hell—oh!” He staggered to his feet and sped off into the twilight, his footfalls echoing across the cottages.

Bettina froze, her hand at her throat, heaving for breath. Facing the person who came to her aid, she took in a tall figure in cape and hat silhouetted against the darkening sky.

“Are you all right, young woman?” The man spoke in a deep, resonant voice. The clean, faint scent of spice floated around him.

“Yes … merci,” she uttered through tight lips. "Who are--"

“Then if you don’t live far, you had better proceed home.”

Bettina didn't wait for more and hurried up the road. Once she reached the inn porch, she looked back to see the man mount his horse and ride away. With a ragged sigh, she brushed tears from her cheeks. She’d little doubt she just came face to face with the nefarious Everett Camborne.

The story is about coping, survival, passion and heartbreak.
Then victory under dire circumstances. A rousing adventure.

"...wonderfully researched and the reader is taken right into the drawing rooms, kitchens and taverns of the dark days of late eighteenth century England."
- Historical Novels Reviews blog

Diane lives in Western Pennsylvania with one naughty dachshund.

To Good to be True...by Sheila Claydon

You know that saying...

If it seems too good to be true, it probably is!

Well recently I had it proven and it is something that all writers should beware.

Over the years I have written quite a number of books. Books We Love has published most of them, mainly as their primary publisher, but on several occasions when copyright from older titles has reverted to me, it has republished them, for which I am extremely grateful. I have one book, however, that is published by Amazon and this is the book that comes with a red flag.

When I checked my emails the other day, one popped up from an unknown sender. Although I am usually cautious it looked harmless so I opened it. Immediately my blood pressure went up and my heart started beating fast because it was from a Literary and Talent Agent who was asking if I would be open to pitching my book for a possible film adaptation. He explained the growing demand for book-to-film projects, gave details of the submission specialist partners and studio managers who wanted to work with me, and suggested a Zoom meeting to explore next steps. 

Have any of you daydreamed about turning your novels into a film? I certainly have, and coincidentally this particular book has always been at the top of that list. For all of five minutes I saw my book up in lights. I wondered who would play my sparky heroine and my moody hero. Would the location be the one I wrote about in the book? While I was in this state of euphoria I dashed off a reply. Not an effusive, excited one though because, in case you are wondering, I am not that green!!  I merely sent a note asking for more details.  Then, while I was waiting for his reply, I googled 'book-to-film' scams. And wow!

I not only discovered a great deal about the various scams that are out there but, more importantly, the huge sums of money some writers have been persuaded to part with in an attempt to get their story onto the big screen. When I made it very clear to the agent that I wasn't that person we parted on friendly terms, with him thanking me for my candid reply. He also said the door was always open if I changed my mind and wanted to invest. Not prepared to part with a single cent I went back to thinking about what I might write next, not for film, just for me and my readers. 

I did feel sad though, learning about all those writers who have been duped. As we all know, writing a book is not the path to fortune except for a fortunate few. It is more a labour of love, something that however time consuming and frustrating it can be, we just have to do. We are thrilled when readers get in touch, so of course we would be even more thrilled to see our stories up on the big screen and the scammers know this. So they search out the gullible and take their money not once, but again and again while they purportedly take the newly drafted script from studio to studio, so please fellow writers, remember...

If it seems too good to be true, it probably is!

And if you decide to read any of my books, the vision of the protagonists and the settings that you see in your mind's eye are the next best thing to them being up there on the big screen anyway. My 3 Mapleby Memories books, which are written in the past and the present would be a good start and a challenge to any film maker:)

Find my books here

St. Patrick's Day - Irish Memories by Janet Lane Walters #BWLAuthor #MFRWAuthor #St. Patrick's Day #Memories #Books "Choices #Medical romance

 

This story has an Irish hero -

Johanna Gordon devotes her time and energy to her job as Director of Nursing at Hudson Community Hospital. With budget cuts hanging over her head, Johanna suspects the CEO of scheming a plan that threatens her job as well as the hospital, and she’s determined to find out why.

The choices she’s made for herself and her career leave her with no social life until she meets Dylan Connelly. He’s everything she’s always wanted, loving, devoted to his kids and everything she’s never had. Just when she finds love with the new man, an old flame returns with promises of a life together. Johanna has to decide between security and companionship, while trying to recapture the past, or moving forward with her new life.

A fun book to write but my Irish memories are ones of a years ago trip to Ireland when I was able to visit the town where one of my relatives came from. I also remember Ireland for the greens. Seemed as though there were hundreds shades of greens.

Another memory was during our exploring trip of watching a black and white collie performing herding tricks. The shepherd of the flock gave us  a look at how the dog obeyed commands and how it herded the sheep. Was a wonderful stop beside the roam just to rest our legs but also to watch the dog and the shepherd. No words were taken, just hand signals to the dog.

Weaving memories is what I do these days. mostly along with weaving stories.