Why I Write
By Amber Scott © 2010
Furiously typing away, caught up in a vampire versus seeker battle scene, I am interrupted by my beaming baby girl. “Momma, I poop!”
I look down and, sure enough, my darling has lost another battle with the mighty clench.
“I catch it!” (As evidenced by the large, brown tird teetering on her dainty palm.)
At four, my son wanted to be white balloon when he grew up, so he could fly high in the sky. Now he’s six and he thinks that’s silly. When I was four, I wanted to be a writer. I vividly remember telling my mother as much “Oh?” she’d said. “What will you write, Amber? Books? Poems?”
That pride still courses through me. I would write books, and just as those I read transported me, I would take others to another place and time to live vicariously. But, I rarely actually wrote. For school assignments, I scribbled away. For a few minor contests, I put pen to paper. For a Father’s Day gift, I penciled and stapled a little book on baseball, a topic I knew nothing about but thought my dad would love. I winged it.
When I was thirteen my dad died. I finished my first historical romance that year, beginning my lifelong affair with the genre. I wrote in my head and let it stay there.
In college, I excelled in my creative writing courses. Post graduation I contributed to my employer’s newsletter. I did not begin writing, though, really and truly writing, until my son was born. He nursed all day long. I had no job outside the home. I learned how to burn bacon. I mastered the quickest vacuum route. I grew a bit isolated and, forced to sit still and be present in my own life, my childhood dream began whispering.
I heard voices. I always had, I realized. Characters I’d thought up here and there during the course of my life had grown tired of sitting around my mental waiting room staring at a paper number in their hand.
During every nap, I wrote. At first, awful, passive-voiced, cliche-ridden novels I couldn’t let anyone read. But each time, I got a little better. I changed diapers and cleaned toilets and fell in love with an outcast knight. I stacked blocks and tended fevers and seduced my ex boyfriend’s best friend. I fell under a seeker’s spell and flirted with a dangerous bloodsucker.
Don’t worry. My husband knows all about them. He supports me throughout it all and, (surprise, surprise) did a dance when I finally kissed a girl. I am a happier wife, a more attentive and patient mother, when I am writing. Creating gives me purpose and escape. I better understand the people I love and better tolerate those I don’t. The deeper I delve into the human heart through these addictive characters, the clearer I see myself and the world around me.
I write for my dad who never got his baseball book, for my mom who always took my dream seriously. For my son and my daughter who still shout magic words to open the garage door. I write to control the voices and to face my fears.
“Oh, good girl,” I tell my cherubic girl. “Let’s take it to the toilet and tell it bye-bye.” And scrub your little hands and celebrate the day we proclaimed, we are potty trained! Hey, she was only two. What else could I do?
Maybe write about it.
Today, my latest release, “Fierce Dawn” is the IBC’s Bestseller For a Day, promotion priced at just 99 cents for your buying pleasure. Grab yours and get in on some amazing giveaways, including a Kindle and a signed ebook of “Fierce Dawn.” Just click HERE.
Now for a bit about Amber’s Book.
May 18th Bestseller for a Day: Fierce Dawn
Blurb of Fierce Dawn:
“X-MEN action meets True Blood heat.”
-Ann Charles
Nearly Departed In Deadwood, 2010 Daphne Winner
“Intensely satisfying!”
-Carolyn McCray
Kindle Bestselling author, 30 Pieces of Silver
Snarling teeth, glowing eyes. Someone–something–is after Sadie Graves.
Elijah Stokes, the man who haunts her dreams, enters her reality claiming she’s transforming into a changeling–not quite immortal but no longer human.
Battle lines are drawn and blood spills as the two fight not only for Sadie’s life, but for all of mankind’s as well.
Fierce Dawn excerpt:
He stepped closer, so close he could see thin gold flecks in her sky blue eyes. “Do you remember the night something chased you past the park?”
Her eyes widened. She perceptibly swallowed. “A werewolf?”
“No,” Elijah said, not wanting to correct the mortal term and create even more confusion. “I thought she was a shapeshifter, but she claimed to be a changeling. And that you are, too.”
“It doesn’t sound like you’re sure I am.”
“I wasn’t. Until now. The changeling has been following you. I can’t get a strong enough trace to hunt her again.”
“She wants me dead?”
“I don’t think so, but she wants something. She’s waiting, watching.”
Her hand went to her throat but her gaze hardened. “That’s why you want me to come with you?”
“Yes,” Elijah said. “There are immortals who would kill you just to keep the realms pure. Half-breeds aren’t tolerated in the immortal realm. They’re seen as inferior, tainted perfection by many. A changeling would be far worse. Right or wrong, your existence threatens both realms. The fact that I’m not the only one who knows you are transforming puts you in higher danger.”
She threw her hands up and started yanking drawers open, tossing clothes aside. Impatient but not angry.
He took in her every move, listened to the even keel of her vibration. She sounded resolved. Elijah’s worries subsided. She was far sturdier than he’d first assumed.
She paused but didn’t face him. “And?”
“And there is a faction—The Illeautians—who consider humankind parasitic. They want the human realm destroyed. If humans start evolving….”
She pulled off her tee. The smooth bare skin on her back, two crescent shaped scars at her shoulders, filled his vision. Elijah couldn’t look away as she strapped a bra around her slender ribcage and put her arms through the straps. His gaze caressed the slope of her back. Two hollows above her ass peaked out from her bottoms. His imagination filled in what he could not see.
His body tightened against his will. He had no business wanting a mortal.
Even a changeling one. Because a part of her might always be human.
Humans died. Immortals lived.
“If you’re right and I’m not going to be human anymore, why would anyone care what I am?” She brought a snug blue shirt over her head then glanced meaningfully over her shoulder.
He should turn around, give her privacy. “Because, what are realm lines for if humans are evolving? Mortals live, they die, they do not become immortal. In human terms, it could be seen as the first stages of Armageddon. Only this wouldn’t be a war between Heaven and Hell.”
Amber Scott bio:
In between naptimes and dishes, Amber Scott escapes into her characters’ addictive lives. She often burns dinner, is a sucker for chocolate and still believes in happily ever after. She makes her home in hot Arizona with her two children, husband, and one day, two cats.
Contact info:
amberscottbooks@gmail.com (for readers)
amberromances@yahoo.com (for main contact)
Twitter: @amberscottbooks
Weblog: http://amberscottbooks.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/AmberScottBooks”
Blurb of Stolen Dreams by Stacey Kennedy:
Tess Jennings has the ability to see and talk to spirits. On a daily basis, they harass and annoy her to save their souls. Sometimes she helps, other times she ignores them, but one ghost will give her no choice. Kipp McGowan, a cop with the Memphis Police Department, uses his ghostly charms to gain her attention and forces her to expose herself to his partner.
As she’s pulled into the five year old cold case of Hannah Reid she wants no part of, she finds herself in more than one precarious situation. But that’s the least of her worries―Tess begins to have a serious problem on her hands. Kipp might be dead, but he’s drop-dead gorgeous and she’s beginning to forget that he’s a ghost.
Murder and corruption has brought Tess and Kipp together. But as her feelings for Kipp deepen, she suspects she just signed herself up for a one-way ticket to the nut house, and can only hope, straitjackets come in a size four.
Blurb of Fated by Carolyn McCray:
Lovers torn apart by history
Bound for eternity
Blurb of Cattitude by Edie Ramer:
It’s all in the Cattitude…
After Belle the cat switches bodies with a psychic on the run from a murderer, she wants her perfect cat body back instead of this furless human one. But she doesn’t count on falling in love with her former owner. Or that a CEO and a beauty queen want to use up her nine lives. Now is her chance to prove anything a human can do, a cat can do better.
“Cattitude is a magical tale that you won’t soon forget. Edie Ramer has a writing voice that charms, and she pulls the reader right into Belle’s amazing world.” -Cynthia Eden, author of Deadly Fear and I’ll be Slaying You
About Bestseller For a Day:
Making authors dreams come true one promotion at a time.
Each month, for one day, readers, friends, family and peers rally together to drive an ebook up the Amazon Kindle rankings with a goal to pierce the top 100. The aim of the program is to help indie authors get a foothold in the traditionally published dominated market. Authors coordinate with book review sponsors to show readers that the 99 cent promotional price is worth every penny.
As thanks, each author creates giveaways for participants and drives traffic to participating review sites. Additionally, readers are offered Bonus Buy reads discounted to 99 cents for the event with that price offered to be rebated back by the participating authors when readers fill out the relevant form.
Fierce Dawn Giveaways:
Amber Scott will be giving away an Amazon Kindle to one lucky winner who purchases Fierce Dawn during the promotion on May 18th and fills out the form located on the http://bestsellerforaday.com site. Signing up the for event newsletter earns readers extra entries toward the Kindle, too!
Additionally, any reader who purchases Fierce Dawn through May 18th can request a signed ebook copy of it after submitting proof of purchase in the form of a five word phrase from the middle of the book sent by email to amberscottbooks@gmail.com!
Thank you Amber and Bookseller for a Day for stopping by Lisa’s World of Books today. Now everyone head out there and check out the books!