Mariposa's Musings

What is one of your favorite resources for research? Cate Masters:  I’d love to be able to visit every setting in my stories! Unfortunately I can’t, so I mainly rely on either the library or the Internet, but I love to come across books specific to my needs that I’ll keep on my shelf for reference. For instance, I’ve relied on The Dictionary of Angels to supply not only names but background information for the angels in my Christmas fantasy, Ground Rules, and my dark paranormal, Dancing With the Devil. When I was lucky enough to visit Key West, Florida, I bought about six books about the local area because the history intrigued me so much, and I spent a few days in the library there while my family went parasailing and snorkeling. They had a fun time, but I felt like I found a lost treasure chest! For more about Cate visit her blog: Cate Masters: http://catemasters.blogspot.com Regina Duke:    I love Google and Wikipedia. This sounds simplistic, but as...

About Christine: Originally a journalist, I've been working as a writer/editor ever since (about 25 years), from tech to marketing to exec communications to entertainment. So I have an extremely varied background, which has informed my writing style and my tactical editing approach. Currently, I'm focused on writing fiction, though teaching is my other love (" The Editor Devil's Guide to CHARACTERS " and " The Editor Devil's Guide to DIALOGUE "). I'm indie publishing my debut novel, "An Eye For Danger", to Amazon for Kindle July 30th, 2012. What inspired you to become a writer? All my manuscripts originated in dreams. So that's another major influencer. But the roots of my author side have been there a very long time. Honestly, I grew up psychic and was the kid of a psychic. (I used to give life-path/archetype readings.) So I knew 2 things about my own future from a very young age: that I would be a published author and t...

Tell me about yourself.  How long have you been writing? My mother first encouraged me to start writing stories as a way to express my feelings after my parents divorced when I was seven years old.  I wrote a story about a haunted house. Later I made up stories about creatures that lived behind the tattered tiles of the first apartment my mother and I shared alone by the beach. My imagination provided me an escape. As life evened out and as writing instructors all told me to “write what you know” I fell off the fantasy path. My early 20s were full of angst and poetry, some of which were published.  After I was married and life evened out I focused on my career and my infertility. My pen ran dry. Six years ago, after my son was born, my mother told me about NaNoWriMo, the challenge to write a 50,000 word novel in one month. I had never stopped writing stories in my head. I wanted to be an inspiration to my son to always follow your dreams and also to live the last word...