Cat Breeds in my Writing

Hi all!

I ran a poll on Twitter to see what you wanted me to blog about next. The winner of the poll was something cat related! So I thought I'd discuss the different breeds of cat I use in my writing.

Elemental Dragons.

Only one cat appears in this series, Normie. He is introduced as a siamese kitten. I went with Siamese as although the real Normie wasn't completely Siamese, he had the fur colour and everything. So I decided to make him pure Siamese for the books.

Mute.

Solaris and Lunaris are the two cats to appear in these books and they are both moggies. Neither of them are any particular breed. Solaris is a ginger tabby and Lunaris is a grey tabby. Neither have any specific breed in mind when I wrote them.

Street Rats.

A part-mechanical cat, Faraday, is the main cat that appears in this book. He has a little bit of Havana in him which shows thanks to his fur colour. But the rest of him is all moggie. He's not supposed to be a specific breed either, like Solaris and Lunaris.

Curse of Anubis.

Bastet, the cat goddess, is one of the main characters in this book. She is almost always in her cat forms, ranging from a silver to black Egyptian Mau. I went with an Egyptian cat breed that I thought looked cute and had a wide range of fur colours that I could use. She could theoretically change into any type of cat she wanted, but I thought I would stick to one breed for the books.

Original Elementals.

Aspen appears in this book and she is a white and grey fluff monster! Again, I didn't write her with a specific breed in mind so she is just a moggie as well. All of the cats that I've owned are moggies so that might be swaying my opinion a little bit!

Below are some of the cats that I plan on writing in future novels, though they aren't set in stone yet:

Unnamed game-lit fantasy.

Mishka is finally turned into a book character for this one! She will portray herself in her moggie glory! The only thing we know about her is that she is a quarter Bengal, but the rest of her is unknown.

Unnamed supernatural horror.

The cat in this story is unnamed, but belongs to the main character's sister and is able to communicate with her due to her power. This cat will be a Turkish Angora, though I haven't decided what the fur colour or gender will be.

Parasitic Aliens.

This will be a trilogy. I've only planned one cat so far although there will be one for each book. One will be a Devon Rex. Again, no fur colour or gender as of yet, nor which book it will appear in,

That's it for this week, I hope you enjoyed reading. Which cat is your favourite? Let me know in the comments. See you next week!

The Children of Purgatory

Hi all!

This week I have decided to talk about the Children of Purgatory, the mysterious group in Mute who have a vast knowledge of wendigos and are able to catch them and release them into the world. I did release a few facts in the Mute Advent Calendar, but I thought I would expand on them a bit more for those who are curious!

As stated in one of my daily facts, they were created in 1908. Several small towns across the United Kingdom were suffering from animal attacks. First it was livestock and general wildlife that would be found in forests torn to shreds. Then, people started going missing. Their bodies never showed up however, and although those still alive took more precautions the amount of people that disappeared without a trace increased each day. Hunters flocked to these areas in an attempt to hunt whatever beast was causing all the destruction, but they too would disappear after a few days.

One man, Hubert Ward, was a prolific hunter in his youth but had to lessen his hunting trips due to ill health. However, he had been reading about the incidents with great interest. Every disappearance made him more interested in the hunt, especially when townspeople started calling out for 'monster hunters' to help with their issue. He eventually persuaded his two sons, Jack and Robert, to go with him to the nearest town. He told them he only wanted to inspect the tracks and talk to the townspeople and not participate in the hunt itself.

So, they travelled and were met with solemn faces and distraught townspeople. That night three men and two women had gone missing, seemingly snatched right out of their beds. Each house was left a mess, with possessions being upturned and blood all over the floors and walls. Many had heard the screams during the night, but they were too afraid to offer any assistance. Hubert visited each house and made notes of what he found in each one. They all had the same pattern: claw marks all over the walls and floors, a blood trailing leading towards the door and to the trees not far off. But no bodies. He assumed that whatever was attacking the townspeople was dragging the bodies back to its lair, but the tracks didn't match this.

Both him and his sons decided to spend the night in the town, and set a trap outside the inn they were staying at. That night a couple went missing and their trap was untouched. Robert was starting to lose his nerve at this point and tried to convince his father and brother to return home, but they dismissed him. They were both fascinated by the mystery at this point and wanted to join the hunt.

Hubert noticed that the creature mostly attacked at night and decided to conduct his hunt then. Visibility would be poor, but he hoped that setting a trap might enable him to catch the beast once and for all. He and his sons dug out a pit in the forest and covered it with a net which was then hidden by leaves. Not wanting either of his sons to come to harm, he decided to use a dead cow as bait for the creature. All three of them crouched in the bushes and waited for hours. They shivered in the cold but didn't dare move too much just in case it alerted the creature.

Once the sun started to peak over the horizon, they gave up. Jack was the first to move to dismantle the trap, when the creature struck. Hubert described the creature in his notes as being: "a hideously disfigured man with unnaturally pale skin" with "sharp talons on each finger that could slice through bone with ease". Hubert doesn't elaborate on his son's attack, but they are able to get him back to the town with grave injuries. The townspeople had never seen a survivor of the beast before and crowded around all three of them as they tried to find help. Eventually they find a doctor who is willing to take a look at Jack.

As the day goes on his son's condition worsens and Robert again tries to convince his father to abandon the hunt. Hubert refuses, blinded by rage. Jack doesn't succumb to his injuries and instead starts to change, which Hubert notes as if: "a demon had entered him and changed him beyond recognition". What happens next is not documented well, as many of the pages are torn or damaged. From what the Children of Purgatory pieced together Jack transformed and attacked the townspeople. The missing townspeople, most of whom were transformed into wendigos, also descend on the town in a massacre. Hubert, Robert and the surviving townspeople, including the doctor who treated Jack, burned the town to the ground. This was successful, as he noted: "so many charred remains" of the wendigos.

He, Robert and the doctor, William, returned to Hubert's home and started writing up their findings. With the events in town and his poor health, Hubert's health declined quickly. However, his surviving son continued to read about the beast in other areas across the country. William suggested capturing the creatures and keeping them hidden somewhere so they could not terrorise people again. But Hubert argued: "these souls cannot pass on, if we stop them they will be suffering for all eternity" and "what happened to those we killed? Do they get to see the gates of Heaven or are they forever trapped in a grotesque form?". Instead, he elected to capture them and release them on those who "committed grave sins".

The three of them created the Children of Purgatory but Hubert unfortunately passed a few months later due to his ill health. Robert and William kept to their word and discovered ways of catching the wendigo. By this point however word had spread that the creatures could be killed with fire. So, they only managed to capture five from the remaining towns. As they travelled they recruited more members and studied the wendigos where they discovered their weakness to silver. So, each member always kept a piece of silver on them in case of an attack. Over the decades the Children of Purgatory kept to Hubert's word of only releasing wendigo on those who committed sin. But in Mute, that has all changed thanks to new leadership...

That's it for this week, I hope you enjoyed reading! See you next week!

PS; looking for some new books to read in 2022? Check out the ones in these bundles:

New Year, New Worlds SF/F Giveaway

New Year, New Monsters 2: From the Ashes

Unlimited Reading

Years Cover Design

Hi all!

This cover reveal is a bit later than I normally announce it, but I hope the cover is worth the wait! Below is the cover for Years! I’ve already updated my website and banners to reflect the colour scheme of the book.

This cover, like all my other ones, has been designed by the lovely people at Deranged Doctor Design! As I have done with the previous covers, I’ll explain the design choices:

• The girl on the cover is Cheyenne, the main character of Years.

• The colour scheme for this book is red and orange.

• The background is an area of dead land. There is no vegetation as this cannot be supported until someone goes into the Gaia Machine to sacrifice their years to the Earth.

• There is a gap in the clouds to show that a solar flare is coming through.

• Although the solar flare is wrapped around Cheyenne’s body, she can’t control them.

• Anyone who touches a solar flare in the book dies instantly. The flare around Cheyenne is a cool design choice from DDD.

• The font is bold and also fits the genre of Sci-Fi perfectly.

• My name is back on top cover of the book, like with the Elemental Dragons series.

• In the book, Cheyenne has a small tattoo on her wrist, this isn’t shown anywhere on the cover has neither of her wrists are visible.

Once again I’m very happy with this cover! DDD always deliver perfect covers and I will continue to go to them for more covers in the future.

Years will be out in April 2022. Pre-order available next month.

That’s it for this week, I hope you enjoyed reading! See you next week!

PS; looking for some new books to read this year? Check out the ones in these bundles:

New Year, New Monsters 2: From the Ashes

New Year, New Worlds SF/F Giveaway

My 2022 Writing Goals

Hi all,

As promised - here are my writing goals for 2022!

Write four books.

By the end of the year I want to have written the first drafts for the following books:

Original Elementals #2: Maelstrom

Original Elementals #3: Shadowhunter

One of the standalone books that I have planned

Original Elementals #4: Devouring

Publish two books.

I want to publish Years in April and Celestial Plague #1: Nirvana in October.

Get three covers designed.

Celestial Plague #1: Nirvana and Celestial Plague #2: Heaven will have covers by the end of the year. These have been booked through my usual cover designer, Deranged Doctor Design. I also want to get a cover done for the Years reader magnet to match the Elemental Dragons Short Story Collection and Famished.

Self-edit all of the Celestial Plague series.

I want all of the books in the trilogy to be self-edited by the end of the year. They will then go to my editor before coming back to me for the final edit. I'm planning on getting the first two edited by my editor this year and the third one in early 2023.

Write the Years reader magnet.

I've attempted to do this so many times before but found that none of my ideas were working well. I've scrapped this reader magnet so many times and I would like to get it done by about February.

Make two reader magnets available to my newsletter subscribers.

The Years reader magnet will be available first and then Celestial Plague: Seashine. Both of these will be free to download for my newsletter subscribers, as well as my other two reader magnets.

Submit more short stories.

Although I wrote a lot more short stories this year, I only submitted three of them. I would like to submit more to anthologies to expand my publishing portfolio.

The image that will be used for the Years book poster - illustration by chlmerrahh on Fiverr: https://www.fiverr.com/chimerahh?source=order_page_user_message_inner_link

Read 100 books.

I read 200 last year so I think 100 will be doable. I've got loads of books currently sitting around waiting to be read, so I don't think I'll struggle for reading material!

Grow my mailing list.

I would like to have at least 500 subscribers by the end of 2022. I'm already doing plenty of newsletter swaps and group promotions on StoryOrigin, and would like to grow this further.

Focus on Amazon ads more.

I've really struggled with this in the past as my automatic ads never seem to spit out many targets for me. I'd like to give this another try in 2022, especially since I have more books in my backlist now.

Get my books into more libraries.

My books are currently in a few libraries and I would like to get them into more. I would like to send out emails to libraries that are willing to stock indie books and see if they will take any copies of mine.

Make all of my books available in hardcover.

Now that Amazon are giving authors the choice to publish a hardcover book, I'm making sure that all of my future books will be in hardcover! It's my favourite kind of book, and they look gorgeous on my shelves.

Participate in Camp NaNoWriMo and NaNoWriMo.

I like participating in these events as I like seeing my word count go up each day. I'll be participating in all three of these events this year!

I think that's everything that I have planned for 2022! Mentally I'm doing much better than I was last year, so I hope some of these goals will be more achievable! What are your plans for 2022? Let me know in the comments. See you next week!

PS; looking for some new books to start off the New Year? Check out the ones in these bundles:

New Year, New Monsters 2: From the Ashes

New Year, New Worlds SF/F Giveaway

2021 Year in Review

Hi all,

As with last year, I’m going to give you the run down of 2021! Some goals I hit, while others I didn’t get anywhere near. My mental health has suffered a lot this past year and I’m hoping that 2022 will be better for me.

Write three books.

If I manage to finish Street Rats by the end of the year, I would have written five! The ones that I have written are:

Curse of Anubis #2: Limbo.

Curse of Anubis #3: Middle.

Curse of Anubis #4: Dual.

Street Rats.

Original Elementals #1: Frostbite.

Plan nine more Elemental Dragons books.

I’ve managed to plot out all of the books in the series, and I’ve written the first book! In a few weeks time I will start writing Elemental Dragons #2: Marine and I’m hoping to get it finished before April 2022 Camp NaNoWriMo.

Publish two books.

As promised, Elemental Dragons #4: Cinder and Fire was published in April and Mute was published in October.

Create and publish the Elemental Dragons boxset.

This was published in July, and I didn’t realise how tricky it was going to be! Combining four books into one took a lot of work and formatting to make sure everything was in the right place.

Get two covers designed.

Both Mute and Years got their covers designed. The cover for Years will be revealed in a few weeks. I also got a cover designed for Mute’s prequel, Famished.

Edit three books.

I only edited one book, Years. As I said before my mental health has been pretty low, especially towards the end of the year. And getting Years back from my editor took several blows out of my self-esteem, to the point where I still haven’t gone back through all of the edits now. It will be ready by April, but for a few weeks I wondered if continuing to publish books was the right thing.

Hire a sensitivity reader.

As I have only just started editing Celestial Plague #1: Nirvana myself, I haven’t had the chance to look through sensitivity readers. I’m hoping to get this done next year.

Write more short stories.

I have written a lot more short stories this year, one of which has been accepted into an anthology! This should be released next year, and I’ll keep you posted.

Write Curse of Anubis short story/novella.

I tried writing a few ideas I had but none of them seemed right so I’ve scrapped them. For now I’m focusing on the reader magnet for Years.

Read 30 books.

I’m not entirely sure how I did it, but I read 200 books! Due to the way I was feeling I dove into books to escape a lot more than I have in previous years. Hopefully I can continue to read more next year!

Participate in both Camp NaNoWriMo and NaNoWriMo.

I joined both the April and July Camp NaNoWriMos and NaNoWriMo. I managed to get the first drafts finished for:

Curse of Anubis #3: Middle.

Curse of Anubis #4: Dual.

Original Elementals #1: Frostbite.

That’s it for this week! Next week I’ll talk about my goals for 2022! See you then.

PS; looking for some new books to read in the new year? Check out the ones in these bundles:

New Year, New Monsters 2: From the Ashes

New Year, New Worlds SF/F Giveaway

How I Named the Dragon Characters in Original Elementals

Hi all,

This will be my last blog post of 2021 before my 'year in review' post! Last year I talked about gifts for writers, but I thought I would do something different this time. I made a post in the past about naming the dragon characters in Elemental Dragons. So, I'm doing the same for the main dragon characters in Original Elementals! Without further ado, let's get started!

Frostbite.

Frostbite's name was revealed in my 2020 Christmas calendar on the final day. I wanted to give her a name that was similar to that of her companion, Frost. At the time, Frostfall was the one I wanted to go for, but I thought that sounded too much like a Warrior Cats name than a dragon name. So I went with Frostbite instead.

Maelstrom.

Maelstrom was a bit harder to come up with than the others, just because there are several names that could fit her. Whirlpool was one, along with Reef. Eventually I settled on Maelstrom after reading an article about severe whirlpools in the ocean. I thought it fit her personality.

Shadowhunter.

This name came to me pretty easily. I didn't just want the dragon to be called Shadow as that seems like such a generic name, especially for a Dark Elemental. My boyfriend and I were discussing how Mishka likes to hunt down spiders in our flat and the name clicked!

Devouring.

This name was a really fun one to come up with. In the books, Devouring is a bouncy, excitable dragon who constantly gets under everyone's feet and just wants to play. I wanted to give them a tough name that completely contradicts their personality. This is also a sore point for their companion, Benjamin, who wants them to live up to their name rather than play with everything they come across.

Tempest.

Tempest had several names before I decided on hers. Hurricane, Storm and Sirocco to name a few. But I couldn't find one that fit her until I Googled 'names for wind' and came across it. Even after looking through a bunch of words associated with wind, I couldn't get Tempest out of my head.

Sunrise.

I picked this one as it fit the element of light perfectly. The sun rises and spreads light to the land. While I did think of Sunset, I thought that it would fit better for a Dark Elemental than a Light one.

Stormburst.

While I was looking for names for Tempest I thought of Stormburst. I thought it would suit an electric dragon better so I gave it to Logan's companion, Stormburst.

Turf.

This one was actually the easiest and one of the first I came up with! Other words that I Googled associated with Earth didn't seem to fit so I struck with Turf, it's simple and easy to remember.

Arcturus.

For Stellar's companion, I wanted to give them a star name. I looked up a lot of names until I came across Arcturus; and I knew that it would fit the powerful dragon that I wanted to write about. This one probably took the longest to come across, just because I was looking through so many stars to find the perfect name!

That's it for this week! I hope to see you next when I discuss my year in review. See you next week!

PS; looking for something to read before Christmas? Check out the books in this bundle, all free to download with Kindle Unlimited!

Magical Winter - Fantasy in Kindle Unlimited

My Favourite Author Resources

Hi all!

This week I thought I'd share with you some of my favourite resources for writing, marketing and publishing books. I've used all of the below and they've all worked out really well for me! Some are free, while others have subscription plans or a fee for lifetime access. You can click on each of the names to be taken to their website, so be sure to check them out!

Reedsy BookEditor.

I use this tool to format all of my books. I find their tool clean, easy to use and it formats the book beautifully. They have templates for the front and back matter for copyright, dedications and about pages. It's completely free to use and I was so ecstatic to find it after hearing about how hard formatting can be. All my books and reader magnets have been formatted through Reedsy, so if you want to have a look at the end result just take a look at my books!

Book Brush.

I use Book Brush to design Facebook ads and graphics for Twitter. My favourite use for them however is making advent calendar facts! Once I found a template I liked it was super easy for me to just use that template and change the text and graphics. They have loads of images to choose from and plenty of book templates. I especially like their cover reveal templates, which I really want to use in the future. Another thing I want to try out is their Amazon A+ templates, as I would like to add them to my book pages!

StoryOrigin.

The thought of swapping newsletters with other authors terrified me before I signed up with StoryOrigin. I signed up while it was still free and had no hesitation in paying for it. I find it invaluable to swap with other authors and join promotions. My mailing list has grown a lot and I've found new fans of my work. I also really like creating promotions, and creating the headers using Book Brush. It's easy to use and you don't have to contact other authors directly if you don't want to. You can also see how many clicks authors get from each campaign they do, so you can reject anyone if they are joining campaigns and swaps without holding up their end of the bargain.

A header I made in Book Brush for a future promotion on Story Origin

Infostack.

I purchased Write Publish Profit 3.0 in June and absolutely love it. Everything they use in their deals has a massive discount. From courses, to books, to writing tools and marketing opportunities. I've only used half of the stuff that was in the deal, and I've found it all great! I found out about it through a Facebook group and quickly snapped it up. Their deals are only available for a limited time, so if you want it you need to get it quick!

AppSumo.

This is another website where you can pick up courses, ebooks or apps for a reduced price. I've bought quite a few of their deals and I'm really impressed with them. The first one I bought was the Depositphotos deal, 100 credits to download 100 photos that will not run out. So I bought another one when that deal popped up again! I'd recommend them if there are any apps or plug-ins you want added to your website or just to keep track of various things.

Depositphotos.

I've currently got 168 images left to download from my AppSumo deals and I love it! They have a wide variety of photos, vectors and illustrations for various subjects. If I'm ever struggling to find photos for a book cover, this will be the first place that I'll look.

Author Shout.

Not only did I enter Blood and Water in their Reader Ready Awards in 2020, but I participate in Cover Wars will all of my books if I can. Entering Cover Wars is completely free and it's free advertising. None of my books have won unfortunately, though I'm hoping one will one day!

That's it for this week! I hope you found this blog post helpful and will check out some of the great resources above. See you next week!

PS; looking for something new to read this week? Check out the books in this bundle:

Magical Winter - Fantasy in Kindle Unlimited

Mute Virtual Advent Calendar

Hi all!

If you weren’t here last year, I made an Elemental Dragons Virtual Advent Calendar on my Facebook page. 24 facts - all about different dragon species in the Elemental Dragons universe, This year I thought I’d do the same thing for Mute! Each day I’ll be posting a fact about the following:

Wendigo

Guardians

Children of Purgatory

Each topic will get eight days each.

As with last year - I’m doing another giveaway for day 25, Christmas Day! One of the following ebook versions will be won:

Blood and Water

Venom and Earth

Glass and Ice

Cinder and Fire

Mute

Years - eligible to claim on release day in April 2022

If you would like a chance at winning one of my ebooks, please read the rules below and go to my Facebook page: Jessica Turnbull Author.

If you’re unsure what to look out for, here is yesterday’s post:

The giveaway closes December 24th - when the last fact has been posted. Make sure to keep an eye out December 25th for the winner! Here is my Facebook page again: Jessica Turnbull Author.

That’s it for this week, if you decide to enter - good luck! See you next week!

PS; looking for a good book to snuggle up with in the cold? Check out the ones in this bundle:

Magical Winter - Fantasy in Kindle Unlimited

The Warriors Short Story Competition

Hi all!

If you're not a fan of the Warriors, or Warriors Cats, series, you may not have any idea of what I'm going to talk about today. Warriors is a book series written by Erin Hunter, a penname for multiple authors. The Warriors series focuses on groups of cats, called Clans, that live around a forest and later on a lake. There are hundreds of characters from the series and the authors have written 60+ books. If you haven't seen my other blog posts on Warriors, you can check them out here and here.

The latest Warriors book to be published

So, when it was announced that Warriors would be holding their first ever short story collection, I could feel the younger version of me getting excited. Despite all of the fanfiction that has been written on the series, the website has never held a competition for all the authors out there. This competition has been split to under 13s and over 13s. 500 words have to be written, following on from the prompt that they have provided.

Although I wish they would have given us a higher word count and more freedom to write what we wanted, I still think it's an interesting prompt. We are introduced to a few cats from ThunderClan and also given a few hints as to what we can write about. I have decided that I will continue to write from Brightpaw's perspective, and pick the story up from when they leave camp. I'm not sure about what characters to include yet, as the word count is so low that you can't introduce that many. But I do have an idea of where I want the story to go.

Some tips for if you do want to enter:

Don’t include too many characters - you’ll run out of words more quickly.

Don’t focus too much on description - you don’t have enough words.

You don’t need to follow the prompt to the letter - if you want Brightpaw to head to RiverClan or twolegplace, go with that instead! Don’t feel pressured to make her interact with her siblings or Swiftpaw.

StarClan does not need to appear - you can just write an ordinary day if you want to.

Want to switch POV? - Don’t be afraid to do this if you don’t want to write about Brightpaw or ThunderClan.

Foreshadow if you want to - You can foreshadow any future event you want.

If this competition is successful, I hope they do more. Perhaps they could give us the freedom to write about any events from the books, or even for people to use their own characters. I'm hoping that they will expand on this in the future, as it could lead to some amazing stories from fans. I would also love to write more about my original character, Russetheart, as it's been years since I've revisited her story.

The competition entry page

I still read every Warriors book that comes out now, and I can't wait to start writing my entry. The deadline is the 10th December, so I'm hoping to finish NaNoWriMo and then start working on my entry. Perhaps after the winners have been announced I'll share what I wrote about in a separate blog post!

If you're a fan of the series and want to enter, I'd advise you do it. After all, you haven't got anything to lose! If you want to check it out, you can here: Competition Page.

And the entry page is here, with the prompt and rules: Prompt and Rules.

Good luck to anyone who enters!

That's it for this week, see you next week!

81 Words Flash Fiction Anthology

Hi all!

This week I wanted to inform you all of a new anthology that I have been published in: the 81 Words Flash Fiction Anthology. This anthology includes 1000 stories by 1000 authors, all 81 words long each. This anthology has been years in the making, but was published yesterday!

81 Words Flash Fiction Anthology
1,000 Stories by 1,000 Authors – A World Record Breaking Book

Profits from sales of this book go to the Arkbound Foundation…

…a charity that aims to widen access to literature and improve diversity within publishing by running projects that empower people from disadvantaged backgrounds and deprived communities to get their voices heard.

The 81 Words Flash Fiction Anthology contains 1,000 stories written by 1,000 authors who submitted their work to the 81 Words Writing Challenge run on Chris Fielden’s website. Each story is exactly 81 words in length.

The 81 Words Writing Challenge was created to raise awareness of the importance of careful editing, support authors, celebrate diversity and raise money for charity. Every story submitted to the challenge has been published so that writers can gain the experience of having their work edited and then see their stories distributed in print and eBook formats all over the planet.

The publication of this book has also set an unofficial world record for the most contributing authors published in an anthology. You can learn why it’s an ‘unofficial’ world record by reading the book’s introduction.  Profits generated by sales of this book are donated to the Arkbound Foundation.

This book was brought together thanks to Christopher Fielden, who has put together and published many anthologies. All of them raise money for various charities, and you can take a look here: Writing Challenges.

That’s it for this week, I hope you check out this anthology and support Chris! See you next week!