N.O.A. Rawle: Through the Eyes of a Stranger

Do you like stories with pirates? If the answer is no, then you can leave and go do something else other than read the rest of this.   Have the strange people gone? Yes? Good. Well here we are then. I wrote a book. It’s an action/adventure/mystery/romance in the theme of fantasy steampunk. Quite a mouthful right? Really it’s just a rollicking good story about our heroine Larissa, her counterpart - a reticent yet highly skilled fighter named Holt - her genius engineer friend Cid, and a cat. The first book The Machine is where the story starts and really you need to read that before you can read book two, The Pirate . It’s available now for only .99 (or equivalent currency in your location). You go read that now and come back to me here, I’ll wait…   Now that’s out of the way, you want to find out what happens next don’t you? Well lucky you. Book 2, The Pirate is out on 29th February. The same team are off on yet another adventure. Poor Larissa has a bit to...

If you were asked to list ten women who write horror, could you? It wasn't until I was looking at the listings of authors in the last two anthologies I had work published in,   Hides the Dark Tower   and   Once Bitten , that I really began to think about how few female authors of horror are well-known. By well-known, I mean recognisable to people who don't usually read this genre. Most would probably know  Mary Shelley  or   Daphne du Maurier , some might get as far as   Anne Rice , or even, to stretch the horror genre description to extreme limits,   Stephanie Meyer . But why so few? So why are there not more well-know women horror authors? Hides the Dark Tower was edited by two highly respected female editors and writers, Kelly A. Harmon and Vonnie Winslow Crist. Once Bitten is published by Knightwatch Press, then under the auspices of Theresa Derwin, and these are just the tip...

Today my guest blogger is Julie Burns, whose new novel The Purse has been released this month. Born in Marshalltown, Iowa, Julie has a love of mountains and dedicates her life to working with  mentally challenged and/or mentally ill adults. In this post, she shares her perspective on sexuality in novels and challenges the reader to think differently.   Stereotypical or Not   Stereotypes are everywhere. The reason they exist is because there is some element of truth in them. The LGBT community knows this fact well. After all, it is often how we find each other and how others seek us out. This is never more true than in the literary world. I have read many books geared toward an LGBT audience and there were a few that I really enjoyed. I realize now more than ever, that sex sells and it always will. Many lesbian-centered stories play the stereotypical “butch” versus “femme” setup. The “butch” girl wears flannel and works on cars and has a h...