Sunday Musings: Finding my Niche

(This is a duplicate of the post at
http://www.madison-woods.com/Wordpress/sunday-musings-finding-my-niche/
. I don’t post all of my posts here, so if you’d like to keep up with me, please go to the new blog and sign up to follow there – thanks!)

It’s 20*F outside this morning and the birds are tweeting like it’s spring already. The sun is shining and I love the way it creeps over the top of the mountains before it shines down into the valley.

Still a Social Hermit

While I haven’t been socializing as much, when I do get on I seem to be getting more accomplished both online and off. I’ve been doing a lot of editing and making good progress on Symbiosis. I’m starting to collect email addresses of people who are interested in reading it when it’s finally on the shelves. If you would like to sign that list it’s right here  at the bottom of every post. There’s a widget to put something at the bottom of every post, by the way, if you’re a WP user and want to try it out. It’s called “Bottom of Every Post“.

Announcement form

I’ll probably post this at the bottom of every post from now on. Or for as long as I’m building a readership, which will hopefully be from now on. My writer-friends who frequent my site will hopefully let it drift to the back of their consciousness so it seems less of an intrusion. But I want newcomers to my blog and potential readers of Symbiosis and future books and stories, to always have a no-hassle way to sign up easily for announcements without having to worry they’ll get swamped with blog posts or junk mail.

This list does two things

1. Notifies
2. Proves

It will let the readers who are waiting know when it is finally available to purchase. This will be more than a year from now even if I find an agent and publisher on the first attempt. It just takes that long for the publishing wheels to turn, from what I understand.

It will also show any agents or publishers that I am working on building a fan base and that there are readers who are waiting to read what I write. This could prove valuable, or it might not matter at all, depending on the agent or publisher. I’d rather have it and not need it, than not have it and try to scramble a list together in a week or two. It isn’t easy to convince people to drop their email address like that.

Submissions

I have two short stories out on submission still.

Website Housekeeping

Aside from the editing and list-building I’ve been working on optimizing my blog and website. I’m doing one thing in particular that I hope will improve my ranking in search engines. I’m trying to establish my niches. One of the ways Google ranks pages has to do with content and if a website author is an “expert” on a topic, it ranks better. To be considered and “expert” means the author has many posts on a particular topic.

A topic I can use to establish my expertise is the predator-prey relationship. So I did a search on my own site for that keyword and created an “index” to all the posts I’ve made that mention or have to do with the predator-prey relationship. This index is now a Page: Category- Predator vs Prey. As it turns out, this keyword phrase is the one that brings the most traffic from searches.

When I have more time, I’ll make category pages for the other search phrases that bring people to my site. I’m trying to capitalize on what I’m already doing, and do more of it.

On the Personal Front

My personal life has been hectic lately. At least one of the crisis were solved over the weekend last weekend when my son and future son-in-law retrieved my horse from THE NEIGHBORING COUNTY. Not only did he escape the field where he was being kept, but he got hooked up with a pair of wild, roving mules and I was afraid had reverted to being wild himself. Now he is home where he belongs.

My daughter is due to have a baby on or near April 20 (yeah, we laugh about the date too…) but she went into premature labor a couple of weeks ago. After a few days in the hospital they managed to stop the contractions but now she’s on complete bedrest. Not only is she going stir crazy by now, but the rest of us trying to keep her horizontal are also getting a bit stir crazy as well. Still, every week she can hold on to baby in the belly is another week of better odds for baby.

And my future husband sent me a picture of him at work standing by a sign that gives me a giggle. When he saw it while walking past it to a job, he must have thought it perfect too:

He has a collection of stories and pictures he calls “Kandahar WTF” because they’re either so stupid it’s hard to believe, or just plain unbelievable for other reasons. This one’s funny to me because of the singular ‘man’ at work, haha. So now you get to see what my man looks like We’ll be getting married in late September this year and he’ll be done with the gig in Kandahar in December. After that, we’ll both be working on our home businesses and our joint dream of becoming sustainable on our homestead. Our list of things to do is a mile long and from the look of it, we’ll never truly “retire”. Which is fine by me. It also means there’s never going to be a boring day for the rest of our lives.

So there’s the update on what’s up with me these days. Are you working on any new projects or making good progress on old ones?

***

If you give me your email address, I’ll let you know when Symbiosis and future books hit the shelves. You won’t get blog posts, or junk mail. The first announcement will be when Symbiosis has found an agent or publisher. You are not obligated to anything at all by signing up, but it shows potential publishers that there are people interested in reading it when it’s ready. Thanks in advance!

Click here to sign up for the announcement list:

http://forms.madison-woods.com/Symbiosis-Announcement/index.php

Marco Polo 100 x 100 Contest winners announced

Of the approximately 500 submissions, Darin Beasely of Marco Polo has made his calls. Check out #24 on that awesome list of 100

Prize:

Vincent Fino Mother’s Day Retreat

Honorable Mentions:

Ellen Azorin Dionisio
Mary Byrne Qa’id
Robbie Maakestad Seasick
Ellie Anglin Two Women
Anne Germanacos Language
Benjamin Zaban-Boylan You Are a Boat
Chris Sgro Ten Minutes Outside Kuriyama Hokkaido

100 X 100

1. Cameron Scott Un-drunk
2. Lindsay Garpestad The Gift of Silence
3. Patricia Richards She’s Stolen the Silver
4. Matthue Roth Adam
5. Goldie Kossow Leftovers
6. Susan Hodara Unwrapped Newspapers
7. Erika Pasquino Goodbye Means Hello Again
8. Dallas Woodburn Clink
9. Bobbi Owen A Valuable Lesson
10. James Sandham Living Small
11. Nedjo Rogers Long Story Short
12. Kyle Hemmings Not Far from a Very Small Town in Ohio
13. Allie Batts He Brought the Silver from Texas
14. Katherine Christensen The Greyhound Bus Depot
15. Len Kuntz Possessions
16. Benjamin Zaban-Boylan You Are a Boat
17. Lauri Maerov Church
18. Mishou De Champlain The Broken Song
19. Chris Sgro Ten Minutes outside Kuriyama, Hokkaido
20. Yorgo Douramarcos The Farm at Sunset
21. Zana Previti Husband
22. William Cordeiro Family Way
23. Rachel Turner Mr. Gurtle’s Roses
24. Madison Woods The Lover’s Return
25. Lea Menport Roots
26. Ellie Anglin Two Women
27. Anne Germanacos Language
28. Claude Clayton Smith The Great Water
29. Timothy Baker Hajji
30. Gabby Ercolani The Universal Hexagram
31. E. Louise Beach Post Modern
32. Alyx Johnson Sunday’s Walk
33. Howie Good Blind Man’s Bluff
34. Jonathan Divine A Doubter Amidst
35. Rob LaRocque The Gypsy and the Jester
36. Stefan Martin So, Like a Ship Past a Lighthouse, She Leaves Him Behind
37. Brett Davidson Gliding
38. Adele Annesi Falling Water
39. Oscar Rivera I Only Asked Him One Question
40. Katrina Pallop Elizabeth in the Desert
41. Robert Vaughan Forget It
42. Arlene Mandell Millenium + 20
43. Matthew Dexter Mango Deck
44. Ellen Azorin Dionisio
45. Emily K. Bright The Bunker
46. Zac Henderson His Two Weekends A Month
47. Marissa McNamara Unwrapped
48. Thom James Lips
49. Carol Smallwood How Things Really Are
50. Aaron Maltz Happy Hour
51. Adriana Fuentes Somewhere Between Arkansas and Oklahoma
52. Benjamin Norris Myth
53. Barbara Lovenheim On the Dock
54. Lydia Pyne A Fortune Not Fowl
55. David Bogdan Piquod
56. Amelia Hankins The Great Palace
57. Christina Murphy Bread
58. Mary Byrne Qa’id
59. Bobbi Lurie Je T’aime
60. Bonnie Ogle Souvenir
61. Nathan Alling Long My Father & I in Syria
62. Lynn Bey Not Both
63. Danielle Villano Predestine
64. Robert Wooten The Doe
65. Paul Hadella Pee
66. Jim O’Loughlin The Answer
67. Mieke Stoub When the Grass Grows Greener
68. Steve Kaminsky A Million Reasons
69. Gavin McCall Sap
70. Chris Wiewiora Again & Again & Again
71. Angela Hamilton The Simple Art of Pulling out One’s Own Hair
72. BH James Buckets
73. Gene Fairfield A Sunday to Remember
74. John Wilson Held Back
75. Gene Lempert Travels Abroad
76. Michael Walton In Honor of Dr. Strangelove
77. Lawrence Elliott The Man with the Photogenic Memory
78. Doug Bond Waiting and Half Asleep
79. Shellie Lempert A Future Complex
80. Nancy Boyce (J Boyce email) Anger
81. Marc Sheehan My Post-War Childhood
82. Erin Armstrong Backwards
83. Tara Masih The Red Door
84. Kenneth Pobo Spacker Railway
85. Jennifer Moffet On Not Saying Who Went to Paris
86. Thomas McColl S
87. Pedro Ponce The Rosary Killer
88. Deanna Morris Semi-Life
89. Michael K. Gause Hindsight
90. Robbie Maakestad Seasick
91. Lily Dodge Custom House Square
92. Joe L. Murr Process
93. Craig Calhoun What I Knew I’d Have to Do If Dogs Could Talk
94. Dawn Budge Darwinism, 9am
95. Vincent Fino Mother’s Day Retreat
96. Tendai Mwanaka You Must Also Run…Faster
97. Jaq Andrews Old Girlfriend
98. Eric Spears Flashback
99. Nate Worell The Open Box
100. Dorothee Lang Sometimes

Sunday Musings

Flash Collection

Many of you have signed on to be included in the flash collection I’m planning to do at the end of this year. (I’m getting ready to send out the first update so if you’re not on my mailing list, send me an email if you want to be included).

Writerly Goals

I’m still working on editing. But now there are a few other things lining up to be done, and I’ll have to leave many of them on the back-burner until the editing is finished.

• continue to edit Symbiosis
• 100×100 collection
• short story for contest (1000 words at least)
• article for InDTales magazine (and flash contest I’m co-sponsoring) done
• short story for Cthulhurotica II

Pitch Slaughters

So this week we will have reached the end of our first round of pitch dissection. There are still new ones coming in and I’m adding them to the calendar, but my turn comes around again this Thursday.

It must be a significant indicator that I’m finally growing some thick skin because I’m actually looking forward to it. I’ve been shredded once by the canaries and again by y’all, picked apart by the canaries again, and now once more I’m putting my 25 words on the altar here. I think I’ve bled out already because I’m not concerned about pain or threat of death anymore, ha.

Others of you have decided to go it again, too, and so we’ll have Rainy Kay and Denton Gay again in the following weeks along with new ones by others.

Something new

We’ll start the addition of a 30-second audio pitch. When you send in your 25 words, if you want to also post your spoken pitch (up to 30 seconds) send that to me in an mp3 or mp4 format. I’ll go first with that this week. If you’ve already sent in your 25 words and want to add the audio to it, just send it in. I used my iPhone to record mine and then emailed it to myself. So you can do that if you have one and email it to me from your phone. I don’t know how else to do it, but surely there are other ways.

Sunday Musings

I have a lot to share with you today. So much, in fact, it feels like I’ve neglected to say much for too long – but that’s not true because I did do my musings last week.

A lot has happened in a week, I guess.

The Canary Review

A while back I sent a revised version of the pitch I’d made here earlier to get some feedback from the canaries over at The Canary Review.

They handle pitches with a different sort of eye and I wanted to offer my own up as example and suggest that you might be interested in getting more in-depth crit from them one day:

http://thecanaryreview.com/2012/06/01/pitch-slapped-you-only-get-three-seconds-to-make-a-first-impression/

What we get on my blog is reader perception. What they give is editorial perception. They’ll be talking more about what agents and editors look for in pitches (I believe) this week on Friday.

If you follow me on FB or Twitter, I’ll post the link whenever I see the post or you can keep checking their blog too so you don’t miss it.

Tuesday Spotlight

This week Mitch Haynes will be in the spotlight to talk about a writer’s conference taking place in Denton, TX next month.

The LEXICON WRITERS CONFERENCEwill be held on July 21 – 22, 2012 in Denton, Texas but we have special events set up for the 19th and 20th as well.

Publicity

I know it’s just a little paper.li deal, but still. Publicity is publicity, ha. My awesome spot on the Science Fiction Daily: http://paper.li/AmyJoywriter/1333728136 (well darn. I’ll leave the link up in case you want to look at the paper, but content is different daily and I was only there on Sunday.)

Frontier Tales Anthology

Last evening I attended the standing-room-only release party for Duke Pennell’s Frontier Tales Anthology. Several of my local writerly friends were there to give readings or insight on the stories behind their stories. My role there also sort of morphed into being the ‘event photographer’ which I rather enjoyed.

The lovely Kim Pennell

Future topics

I want to start sharing some of the background to Symbiosis. Not sure yet which day of the week I’ll use to do this, but probably Tuesdays when I have no guest lined up.

When anyone writes a novel they’re drawing on things that they find interesting, topics that for whatever reason they enjoy. Mine run the gamut from philosophy, Jungian psychology, ancient history, ancient to modern religion, origin of myth, sociology (especially patriarchy vs matriarchy – is it indicative of anything that the word ‘matriarchy’ isn’t even in WP’s spell-check database, but ‘patriarchy’ is? – and pecking orders), balance of nature, herbalism (which bleeds into religion and fear of witchcraft), how fears drive societies (which bleeds into or really underlies many of the topics that interest me) and kundalini, karma, sexuality. Oh. I forgot to add that I love twisting the concept of thermodynamic’s first law…the one about conservation of energy. Some physicists might be appalled at the liberties I’ve taken with that one in Symbiosis.

Even fiction writers need a platform, things to talk about if invited to be a speaker or to present. Since all these things underly my passion for writing, any one of them could potentially become topics that segue with talking about my books. And not just Symbiosis, because my interest in these things influence everything I write in some way.

Me in cowgirl getup for the Frontier Tales release party.

Monday Musings (and writerly goal check)

Usually on Mondays I do goal checks. And I’m still going to do that, but from now on the post will also include other things I want to talk about.

Musings

Today I’d like to pass on an announcement from my friend Duke Pennell of Pen-L Publishing. If any of you are readers or writers of western stories, I encourage you to look into his online zine. I don’t write westerns, but these folks are my writerly friends so I’ll be at the celebration.

You’re invited! The Best of Frontier Tales celebration is this Saturday, June 2, at 7 pm at Nightbird Books in Fayetteville. Five local writers of winning stories from my ezine at www.FrontierTales.com will be there to fascinate and inform.

Hope YOU can make it! Western Heritage Museum Hall of Famer Dusty Richards, JB Hogan, Pamela Foster, Nancy Hartney, and Greg Camp join writers from across the US in this 1st volume. Enjoy selected readings from the Tales, tips on how to write Westerns, book signings by the authors, and a cowboy trivia contest.

Be sure to grab your cowboy hat, boots, or a bandana to help us honor the Old West and the men and women whose strength and spirit made this country what it is.

The anthology will be available online on June 1st. Don’t miss out! Support your Western authors!
www.Pen-L.com/books.html

Goal Check

Since I have quit trying to get up at red-eye hours, I’m getting more editing done. Now I just stay up too late and get up too late to make myself look presentable to go to work. So I am beginning to appear like an insomniac more and more. Dark circles, grumpy, etc. I need to get this book finished. On p. 92 now of a 350 page ms. Not quite 1/3 there yet.

But I’m pleased with the results so far.

I’ve been changing it over from first-person to third. Someone once told me that was easy, all you have to do is find the “I’s” and change them to “she’s”. If that’s all that was wrong with the ms I guess that might be easy. I apparently am not good at getting it right even on draft four, so it’s a little more involved than a quick ‘ctrl-F’ seek and destroy mission.

This will hopefully be my last pass, though. After that, I’m going to turn it loose and begin work on the next one that’s becoming very impatient.

What else?

Hmmm. There was something else I wanted to talk about today. Can’t recall – oh!

I’ve found an author who writes material I can call ‘comparable’ when I’m drawing up my queries. One of you suggested I look at Laurell K. Hamilton. Thank you! The subject matter of her books is much different from mine, but our style is very similar. I am really enjoying the first book I bought (Guilty Pleasures), and I intend to read everything of hers I can. These are ‘urban fantasy’, and the mc is called ‘The Executioner’ because she kills rogue vampires. She also raises the dead to question them for the police. The stories are a hilarious mix of humans, vampires, weres, zombies…

It feels good to have found something I enjoy reading. I’ve become way too critical to find it fun anymore and I’d only been reading for research or to review and rarely read for pleasure.

***

If you’re off work today, I hope you’re enjoying your time. I am. I’m writing and editing

Sunday Musings

Short Pitches

If you follow my blog, you’ll notice every Thursday we critique someone’s pitch. To write a 25-word summary of a novel sounds deceptively easy.

It isn’t.

But it is important to be able to do it, even if the only reason is because it forces the writer to find the kernel of their story.

Another reason is because sometimes pitch opportunities come in small spaces. Here’s one such opportunity, on Dorothy Dryer’s blog. She’s hosting a contest and an agent will pick a winner of a 3-sentence pitch: 
http://we-do-write.blogspot.de/2012/05/three-two-one-pitch-contest.html

Run-on sentences are not allowed and the agent is a stickler about that and the grammar. So three sentences might amount to a few more words than 25, but not by much if you stick to the ‘no run-on’ rule.

Memorial Day

I hope everyone enjoys their long holiday weekend. I saw a photo going around FB the other day that had a caption that made a lot of sense.

Photo is linked to the Facebook source.

***

This weekend I’ll get some yard work and house work done. Lots of editing on the “to-do” list too.

Have a great weekend!

I said I wasn’t going to do this…

But I’m posting today anyway.

So yesterday I shared a link I’d found about the differences between magical realism and fantasy. The author of the post gave a spread of titles to span from far left (surreal fantasy = *I’m assuming* magical realism) to far right (pure fantasy).

I’m trying to find books both recent and older that are comparable to the book I have written. This is called a ‘comp title’ and I’ll want to know a few to reference in my queries and pitches for Symbiosis.

I picked two titles, one from the left,  (One Hundred Years of Solitude) and one from somewhere near the middle right,  (Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell).

Only Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell was available as Kindle, so I ordered it and began to read right away. And I don’t like it. This is nothing like what I write, so it won’t work as a comp title. The other one won’t be in for a few weeks (print version).

I hope the other book is a better comparison. I’m not going to read the one I started just for the sake of reading because I have a TBR-list of books my friends have written and I’d like to begin working on that.

Commenters on my post from yesterday gave me lots of other suggestions to try, too. So I think I’m going to start going through them, reading until I’ve either decided I don’t like them or they aren’t a comp title. If either I’m enjoying the read or I think it’s a comp title, I’ll keep reading.

***

update: Thanks to Scott’s comment on yesterday’s post today, which I copied to the comments of this post, I’ve suddenly made a lot of progress in finding comp titles. At least old ones. Now to find some recent ones. Older references will include Roger Zelazny’s Amber Chronicles and Carlos Castenada’s Teachings of Don Juan.

Writerly Goal Check – Throwing in the towel

There comes a point when it’s time to throw in the towel and re-evaluate the goals.

I am at that point on two of my struggles.

First, I am having no success at all consistently getting up earlier than 0500. So my new goal is to get up consistently at 0500. Ha. If I *happen* to wake up earlier than that I will get myself out of bed and consider it a treat. I’ll stay up as late as I feel like staying up in the evenings if I’m working on my writing. If I’m just goofing off on the internet, I’ll go to bed by 2130. There is no television (well, there’s the unit, but no service) in my house, so  no worries there.

As for finishing my manuscript before August. I don’t see it happening. There just aren’t enough hours in the day for my rate of editing. I’ll continue at the pace I’m currently going, and barring unforeseen circumstances, it should be done in time for the Plan B date in October. I’ll use my Chicon experience to network and make contacts and learn from the workshops. Originally I’d wanted my ms to be ready for spontaneous pitching opportunity at the conference.

***

Taking Reading Recommendations

One new thing I’m adding to my goal list is to read more. I need to find some comparable titles in my genre because I’ll need that info when I’m pitching.

Do you have any favorite books (traditionally published, that would be known to agents/editors) to recommend in the genres I write? A blend of urban fantasy and magical realism I think is closest to what Symbiosis will likely be categorized.

***

Update 1545: Just found this excellent post at Tor.com about the differences between Fantasy and Magical Realism:  
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2008/10/magicrealism

Sunday Musings – Google alerts

Google Alerts

This morning’s report of Google Alerts (keyword: Madison Woods) was interesting. Most of the time it’s hardly interesting or relevant, but it’s one of the potentially useful marketing chores I continue for a few reasons.

I don’t know whether I should tell you the reasons I use it first, or explain why today’s was so interesting first…

Okay, this morning’s was a little unusual.

The story it pulled had to do with the county where I currently live. There are a lot of counties across this country named ‘Madison’ so it doesn’t always tag my particular county. My keywords are set up to ping on either word in the phrase, not necessarily both, so I get a lot of flotsam to sift through sometimes.

So here’s the story it hit on:

http://www.daytondailynews.com/lifestyle/new-writer-discovery-meet-frank-wheeler-jr–1378260.html

• The book premise itself was interesting because the setting is where I live and I recognize these characters even if the author has changed the names.
• I didn’t realize there were news columns for finding new authors and this opens up a great potential when it comes to finding reviews for my book when it’s ready.
• There was a third reason, but I’ve forgotten what it was now after focusing on these other two. (It’s not old age. I swear.)

So do you use Google Alerts?

Mostly I like using them because it lets me know when one of my stories has received a review somewhere. When the Cthulhurotica anthology came out, not all reviewers reviewed all the stories, but I collected the links to the ones who mentioned my story. I found those reviews because of the alerts.

I’ve often not been pinged when my blog has been linked to in someone else’s posts and the alerts let me know so I can go check it out.

Plus, I find out useful things I didn’t think of, like the column this week’s story came from. Now I will do a search for all the public news channels that have such a column and add them to my list of contacts when my book is ready for reviews. Many of them are probably swamped, but some might be trolling for material when my request comes through.

Tuesday’s Guest: Celestine Nudanu, Ghanaian living in West Africa who loves books and reading

Celestine Nudanu is one of our newer Friday Fictioneers. She’s from Ghana, now living in West Africa. She has a strong interest in African women writers.

I asked her to be my guest here today because she’s very passionate about her interests and I wanted her to share some of that with us. She preferred that I come up with questions for her, rather than her blog a post blindly.

MW: Thank you for joining me today, Celestine.

CN: Thank you, Madison, I’m priviledged to be a guest on your wonderful blog; considering that I’ve been blogging for barely three months, this is really a feather in my cap. I take this opportunity to say that the Friday Fictioneers is an amazing concept and super way of unearthing talents and boosting one’s creativity towards the development of fine full length stories. I am deeply grateful.

MW: You’re welcome and I’m glad you’re enjoying the Fictioneers!

It seems no matter where we are from, regardless of how urban or rural our abodes, there are still common themes that run through our fiction.

What would you say is your common theme?

Have you identified one, or is more than one theme that calls for you to explore it through your writing? If not in your own writing, perhaps you have noticed what it is about other writing that calls you to it.

CN: I would say that themes for writers vary as a result of our peculiar history as a country. Post-colonial Ghana saw writers like Aye Kwei Armah, exploring the filth and corruption and the disappointment of the Ghanaian with the government of the day which had only carried on neo-colonialist tendencies under the guise of freedom, in his book Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born.

The theme of love/romance is not particularly alien, but this is culturally relative. We in Ghana see romance in a cultural perspective. Kissing in public is frowned upon and so is nudity; and even with the infiltration of western culture via the media, Ghanaians are squeamish to see nudity displaced on our screens. For us, as is elsewhere, marriage is sacrosanct and romance/love, is squarely placed there. In the olden days when marriages were arranged we believed that love would grow in the marriage and so a couple not being in love was neither here nor there. Again, how do you explain the concept of love in a polygamous marriage where a man has multiple wives as opposed to one wife in Western culture? Could he love all wives equally? But such marriages were known to have worked very well. I am not advocating polygamy, I must add, but these are some of the issues that come up in discussing the concept of love in the African context.

Iconic female writer, Ama Ata Aidoo who set the tone and pace for female writers in Ghana explored love in her novel Changes; where an educated career woman is unhappy with her marriage because she has no ‘space’ and her husband demands too much of her time, so that when he ‘rapes’ her she divorces him. Does having sex with your wife, albeit against her wishes constitute rape in the traditional African setting? She finds love but as a second wife and even then, happiness eludes her. A review of Changes is on my blog
http://readinpleasure.wordpress.com
for your perusal.

Now, contemporary writers like Empi Baryeh have come out with pure romance novels Most Eligible Bachelor, and Chancing Faith, based on the western concept but with an African flavour and I think that the myth is being shattered.

Amma Darko is another contemporary female Ghanaian writer who explores Streetism, (children who live on the streets) poverty, child labour and the house-help in her novels, Faceless, The House help and Not Without Flowers. Streetism and Child labour are issues facing the governments with little or no solution is sight and Darko does poignant justice to these in her novels.

For me as a writer, I love romance mixed with a dose of haunting sadness, a recurrent theme in my writings and poems. I am yet to publish a full novel and when I do the genre will be mainly eclectic, though with underlying romance. I have a lot stories in draft form and some in the writing process dealing with themes like incest and poverty.

MW: When you seek to publish your novels or stories, will your audience be at-large, or do you think your stories are going to appeal also to the women of Ghana?

CN: I do believe my audience will cut across cultures, at-large, because the themes are universal. However, Ghanaians are not comfortable with an issue like incest, though it is taboo in our culture. Until recently, It had been a topic with little or no media attention. Families where incest occurs also were reluctant to come out because of stigmatisation. Poverty also played a part where even when cases of incest come out in the open, victims are made to keep quiet because the perpetrator is the bread winner. Incest is indeed dicey in Ghana, and has been an issue that I am very passionate about. Now I dare say, that media reportage is improving.

MW:Are you considering the method of publishing you’ll take – indendent or traditonal?

CN: I would like to go traditional; for financial reasons, I would like to get a publisher so we can come to some sort of arrangements.

MW:Thanks! These are great and interesting answers and I’m so glad you were game to do it