Tag Archives: romance

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READ AN #EBOOK WEEK AT #SMASHWORDS, 3/2-9/14!

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READ AN #EBOOK WEEK AT #SMASHWORDS, 3/2-9/14! Please consider including MORE #EBOOKS in your library!

RAEW 2 girlreading

KS67Q is the coupon code for 50% off through March 9, 2014, for my first ebook, a sci-fi/ romance/ paranormal/ multiverse/ utopian series, Volume I, This Changes Everything, usually $3.99. https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/376197

This Changes Everything cover

is from The Spanners Series, which is for adults, NA and YA,

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and prepares you for the more YA/NA Volume II, This Changes My Family and My Life Forever, coming out in June! Thanks!

Many other deals for free or very discounted ebooks all week. https://www.smashwords.com/ebookweek

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http://www.sallyember.com/spanners

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High Praise from Rebecca T for “#ThisChangesEverything”!

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Here are some excerpts from the latest glowing #review, written by Rebecca T, “The Literary Connoisseur,” for Sally Ember’s original, sci-fi, romance, paranormal, multiverse, utopian ebook, This Changes Everything, Volume I, The Spanners Series.

“If you’re a fan of Sci-Fi, this book was written for you!”

“If there’s one thing I can say for sure about Sally Ember’s writing, it’s that she knows what she’s writing about. She’s very, very intelligent, and so is her story. (With occasional witty humor that had me chuckling.)”

“Clara’s love life is not easy whatsoever, being the CC and all, but even though it killed me when she would pour out her emotions and heartbreak, that was my favorite part of the book. It gave a human touch to a book about aliens!”

This-Changes-Everything----web-and-ebooks

Link to full review here: http://theliteraryconnoisseur.blogspot.com/2014/02/this-changes-everything-by-sally-ember.html

All buy links, more reviews, Pinterest Board and other links: http://www.sallyember.com Look right and scroll! Available for $3.99 wherever ebooks are sold. Share!

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Author Interview on Tiffany Haisten’s TippyTree Blog

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Tiffany Haisten, author of the Red is the Color… children’s book, posts on her blog, “Tippy Tree.” On February 6, she published an Author Interview with me. Check it out!

http://tippytree.blogspot.com/2014/02/writers-window-thursday-sally-ember.html

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2nd #BookTrailer for #THISCHANGESEVERYTHING, Vol. I, #THESPANNERSSERIES

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This Changes Everything has a new book trailer, focusing on the multiverse, star-crossed romance between Clara Branon and Epifanio Dang. Check it out!

TCE Romance Trailer

http://youtu.be/QJDEt1O8yQ8

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4 Stars from “April” for “This Changes Everything” on Amazon and elsewhere

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“April,” an author who prefers to remain anonymous when posting online, reviewed This Changes Everything (The Spanners Series), calling it “An Intelligent, Funny, Multi-Generational, Multi-Timeline, Multi-Story.” Here is her review:

“Author, Dr. Sally Ember, Ed.D., has utilized every book formatting element recommended by successful authors. She includes: an attractive cover [cover art by Willowraven], a detailed TOC, and front flap reviewers’ remarks.

This-Changes-Everything----web-and-ebooks

“This Changes Everything is a science-fiction story about a woman who is chosen to be the main contact for ‘The Many Worlds Collective’ (MWC). The aliens she meets will provide information to her to give to Earthers in order for Earthers to become members of the MWC.

“Ember does grab my attention in the first pages with the opening scene where Clara, the protagonist, invites aliens, who have come into her home, to a late night tea.

“While I want to know more, as the story unfolds into a grand multi-story, multi-senses, multi-timeline story within a story, I get exhausted.

“As I age, I cannot read long fiction stories in one sitting, I have to read them in chunks. When I was younger, I could get lost in worlds created by others.

“Ember has a seamless writing style that flows as she goes from event to event, experience to experience, and interaction to interaction. She uses energetic, positive, imaginative, intelligent language and humor. The aliens are ‘cute,’ telepathic and funny.

“The main story is broken up by real time events and diary entries by the author covering the not just the author’s life but all of historic time.

“Ember introduces the concept of ‘simultaneous time.’ For lovers of time travel stories you will enjoy this multi-universe present time.

“I love learning new things, the author injects biological, psychological and Buddhism, technological and historical facts into the story. There is even a reference to marginalia and a discussion of the Sandwich Generation.

“Then there are the Spanners, who exist as one giant dysfunctional family. Spanners live in the best and worst of years of the modern era.

“Ember’s stories are like a brain dump of all her education, knowledge, experiences, philosophies, hopes and dreams, and observations.

“Ember is the Alice Walker of the Spanner Generation.”

Thank you, April! Glad you enjoyed TCE!

This ebook is available on Smashwords, Amazon, Kobo, iBooks and nook for $3.99. Buy links, more information and review links on http://www.sallyember.com

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Stellar Review by David ben Efraim for “This Changes Everything,” Volume I, “The Spanners Series”: The End of Humankind’s Loneliness

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Stellar Review by David ben Efraim for This Changes Everything, Volume I, The Spanners Series: “The End of Humankind’s Loneliness”

Excerpts and link to full review, below.

“From the moment I opened the book I felt that it was indeed a pure science-fiction novel; the author hits the nail on the head with the atmosphere she created, blending elements of comedy, mystery and surrealism together to give you, the reader, an unshakable desire to learn more about the aliens and the worlds they come from.”

“I found the story itself to be one of the most immersive and original ones I have read recently. Amongst the sea of science fiction novel clones, there is This Changes Everything, a book in which old ideas are taken in completely new directions (such as the whole intergalactic committee actually trying to help the humans), and new ideas are spawned by the dozens.”

“This Changes Everything is certainly much more than what I expected from it, presenting us an enthralling and original storyline set in a majestic and extremely-detailed world, populated by many characters that will stay with you once the last pages are closed. I wholeheartedly recommend the book to science-fiction fans, especially the ones who prefer their literature to explore ideas and concepts through words rather than actions.”

This Changes Everything cover

http://quick-book-review.blogspot.com/2014/01/this-changes-everything-volume-one-by-sally-ember.html

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Stellar Review by David ben Efraim for “This Changes Everything,” Volume I, “The Spanners Series”: The End of Humankind’s Loneliness

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Stellar Review by David ben Efraim for This Changes Everything, Volume I, The Spanners Series: “The End of Humankind’s Loneliness”

Excerpts and link to full review, below.

“From the moment I opened the book I felt that it was indeed a pure science-fiction novel; the author hits the nail on the head with the atmosphere she created, blending elements of comedy, mystery and surrealism together to give you, the reader, an unshakable desire to learn more about the aliens and the worlds they come from.”

“I found the story itself to be one of the most immersive and original ones I have read recently. Amongst the sea of science fiction novel clones, there is This Changes Everything, a book in which old ideas are taken in completely new directions (such as the whole intergalactic committee actually trying to help the humans), and new ideas are spawned by the dozens.”

“This Changes Everything is certainly much more than what I expected from it, presenting us an enthralling and original storyline set in a majestic and extremely-detailed world, populated by many characters that will stay with you once the last pages are closed. I wholeheartedly recommend the book to science-fiction fans, especially the ones who prefer their literature to explore ideas and concepts through words rather than actions.”

This Changes Everything cover

http://quick-book-review.blogspot.com/2014/01/this-changes-everything-volume-one-by-sally-ember.html

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My #Writing Process: Revealed!

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“Where do you get your ideas?” is the most-asked question of creative people. I’ve been paying attention to my own #writing process since people started asking me that more often. I now know I have three distinct phases for my creative process, but they are not entirely linear in sequence.

Without even consciously knowing I am in it, I am often in the incubation period, phase one for all creative endeavors. This assumes ground zero is pre-phase one, the part in which I determine I’m open to creating and what I want to create, in a general way.

For me, the incubation period is highly receptive. I am like a sponge; I am seemingly almost indiscriminate in my voracious appetite for information, as in Short Circuit‘s Johnny Five’s demands for “more input.”

Short Circuit need input

Phase one includes: getting cognitive but silent input from reading fiction and nonfiction books and magazine or ‘zine articles and blog posts; visual/emotional/audio content input from watching films/TV, TED talks and videos via Facebook, youtube, Google+, blogs and other sources; musical inspiration gleaned from radio, Spotify and other online music players, playing piano, singing; conversing with friends, family, strangers and acquaintances. All of this sparks thousands of ideas.

Next comes the internal percolating, still incubation, from all input and other connections being made. Percolating occurs while: dreaming, meditating, thinking, contemplating, swimming, walking, driving. I love this part: although most of it is invisible, it is palpable. I feel buzzed: re-routed, re-programmed, inspired, electrified. I often feel as if I am in a remembering or retrieval mode, recalling and almost hearing or seeing what I’m about to write as if it’s already written.

Inevitably, I get woken up from sleep or can’t fall asleep because these first gems of ideas are starting to surface and I MUST write them down. I hear them narrated or see them in paragraphs. I make lists, gather URLs and quotes, write down remembered dreams and conversations, make mini-outlines, generate summaries and plot intentions, describe characters and do many other cultivating things with the seeds already planted.

I have to move quickly; these deliveries are clear and sharp at first, but the longer I wait or the longer it takes to put them into form, the weaker the connection or recollection gets. This phase is very exciting but also quite frustrating. I feel as if I only get to write down or collect about half of what I receive.

I am now in phase two: full writing mode. I’m generating and composing my ideas into text. Organizing, whittling, deciding, creating connections are now dominant. Characters, plots, dialog, events, circumstances, facts and conflicts all converge in seemingly random and chaotic ways until I can sift through and wrest them into some order. It feels as if I’m gathering spiderwebs, tantalizing aromas and musical notes and transforming them into particular words, coherent paragraphs, comprehensible stories.

spiderweb fog

Once I start writing them down as lists or collect ideas into documents and folders for later use, I am compelled to follow clues, leads, research trails. These lead to more input and ideas, and those lead to further incubations, more percolating, etc.

These first two phases loop many times until the ideas erupt from me, birthed into existence as writing. I hate to be interrupted when I’m on a trail.

However, I love and crave, even make my own interruptions in the next part, the testing period of writing. I reach out to people to talk things out, hear ideas or dialogue aloud for the first time, getting first bounce-back reactions and more ideas from these interactions. I call certain people many times: my son, my mom, my sisters, a niece, some friends. I post questions and comments online and get responses from strangers/acquaintances. Suggestions, critiques, future-use ideas all welcomed, here.

social-sites

Eventually, the input receiving slows down and the output starts to take precedence. I spend more time writing than researching. This is the highest output part of the process, generating most of the writing. Much of what I generate may not get used, or not used for this immediate project, but I keep it all.

I have dozens of drafts, pieces, drafts of chapters and whole volumes for The Spanners Series in folders that may be mined for future Volumes if not used for the one I’m currently writing. I leave myself gifts and find them later. When I was ready to write Volume II, I was shocked to discover that I had already written large chunks of it while writing Volume I and didn’t even remember having done so much writing for that Volume!

Phase three involves combining, rewriting, generating, refining, selecting, drafting and completing the work. I spend more time revising than creating, which means I’m in the third phase. I do get new ideas and do more research during this final phase, in many of the same ways, but the proportions reverse from the earlier phases.

Some people call these three phases Prewriting, Writing, Revising. Works for me.

writing process three parts

Steven Johnson’s TED talk from 2010: Where good ideas come from, in which he ends with “Chance favors the connected mind,” describes a lot of what I experience. I love that quote.

http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_johnson_where_good_ideas_come_from.html

Good luck with your writing!

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Beta Readers Needed for Volume II, “The Spanners Series”

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Just sent to 2 beta readers! Vol II, This Changes My Family and My Life Forever, The Spanners Series. #TCMFandMLF #THESPANNERSSERIES

Need 2 more. Must read Vol I, This Changes Everything. Will send Smashwords coupon for free ebook of TCE if you want to be beta reader for TCMFandMLF.

http://www.sallyember.com for buy links for TCE, contact info, or message me here by Jan 31, 2014.

Cover art and logo by Willowraven.

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“Finishing the Hat” or, in my case, another #eBook

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Am I the only author who is reluctant to finish a book? In Stephen Sondheim’s depiction of Georges Seurat in Sunday in the Park with George, his song, Finishing the Hat, eloquently and poignantly describes this exact chiaroscuro-type emotional state.

http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/sundayintheparkwithgeorge/finishingthehat.htm

We artists, writers, creators enter and create “the world of the hat” “where there never was a hat” and then have to leave it (temporarily, and then, forever, in the case of a series of novels or works). I feel both proud and sad, both happy and relieved, both excited and frightened to go forward.

Going forward: beta readers, feedback, critiques, discussions, defenses, relinquishments. Then, editing, revising, altering my “hat” into its final formatted form for ebook publication on Smashwords. Next, reviews, rankings, more feedback, more critiques. Finally, publication/release. Endless marketing and attempts to increase readership/visibility, all along.

Writing is the best part. I hate to end it.

I am dragging my literary feet; I have had an unfinished near-the-end chapter of This Changes My Family and My Life Forever, Volume II of The Spanners Series, for two weeks. Well, I was away and “couldn’t write” for a week (really?). Home for two days and still couldn’t make myself finish it.

Until a few hours after I drafted this post, yesterday afternoon: finished and sent off my draft to two beta readers.

Writing this post helped make the finishing occur, somehow. I explained and confessed my hesitation to complete my work. Then, I had no more excuses or barriers.

The hat must be finished.

top-hat

I am already thinking frequently about Volume III (the next hat), This Is/Is Not the Way I Thought Things Would Change.

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iBooks, nook, Smashwords and other opps for gifting

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Still hoping to use ebook gift cards, give ebooks as gifts, get some more good reads for your own new device (nook or Apple brand compatible)? See below for opportunities!

Of course, I’m wanting you to include This Changes Everything, Volume I of The Spanners Series by me (Sally Ember, Ed.D.), in your gifting/reading plans! Buy links to TCE are below the link in this blog post for the gifting, so come back here or remember the title when you go cruising for ebooks in the sci-fi/ romance/ paranormal/ multiverse/ utopian great fiction sections!

If you start to follow my blog and/or already are a follower, leave a comment with your email address (or send it to me privately after following), I’ll send you a coupon for a FREE download of my ebook from Smashwords, which has all formats of ebooks available right there.

Click below to get to Her Ladyship’s Quest site for a chance to win a $15 nook gift card and an explanation of the iBooks’ gift card process, now available for the first time!

Thanks for being an ebook reader and supporter of indie and ebook authors! Happy New Year!

Her Ladyship’s Quest giveaways and info

TCE nook link

TCE ibooks link

TCE Amazon link

TCE Smashwords link

TCE KOBO link

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Author Interview Blog Talk Radio 12/27: Sally Ember, Ed.D.

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Maybe you’re able to be near an online source to listen to Sally Ember, Ed.D., sci-fi/romance ebook author, talk about her newly released ebook, series, writing, and more on Friday, 12/27, 11 AM EST. Spread the word! One-hour live call-in/comment online show.

Listen live or archived. Sally Ember, Ed.D. will be interviewed by Will Wilson on Indie Books, Blog Talk Radio’s weekly indie author spotlight.

Call in by phone, chat online with comments, questions, suggestions about The Spanners Series, This Changes Everything, Volume I, and Sally’s ideas, writing, and science-fiction/multiverse/romance/paranormal themes, Buddhism, Judaism, family: whatever you’re interested in talking with Sally about, this is YOUR hour!

Readers of this post who FOLLOW http://www.sallyember.com may email her to request a coupon for a FREE download of her ebook via Smashwords, good through 12/31/13.

Visit her site or https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/376197 to download free excerpts, read reviews/interviews, and more.

This Changes Everything cover

Go online (link below) to listen live and type in questions/comments via Chat, or call in to speak with the host, Will Wilson, 11 AM – noon, 12/27, EST, New York, USA, time, Friday: (646) 595-3951 in the USA

Or, if you miss it, it will be archived, same link, ever after:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/indiebooks/2013/12/27/indie-books-show-15

Blog Talk Radio

1/5/14: Today, Will Wilson, the host/interviewer emailed me that this show with his interview of me, Sally Ember, author of “The Spanners Series,” now has Indie Books’ 2nd-highest listener ranking, with over 350 listeners since the 12/27 broadcast! it’s archived, so listen any time and share! Thanks, Will, and thanks to all the listeners, past and future! 

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Last Day for Pre-Orders for “This Changes Everything”

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FINAL PUSH! last day for #pre-orders for my first ebook, original, unique #scifi/#romance/#paranormal novel with #Buddhist, #Jewish, #utopian themes, This Changes Everything, Vol. I of The Spanners Series, on iBooks, nook, KOBO thru 12/18; release date 12/19 will show great sales and ROCKET TCE to a high position on “best-seller” lists and get it more visibility IF pre-orders pour in.

Please help? Only $1.99. Starting 12/19 @ $2.99.

Give it as a #gift! Geared to older teens and adults.

This Changes Everything cover

Cover art by #Willowraven.

#Free excerpts here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/376197

Other links on http://www.sallyember.com (look to the right and scroll for the link you want: reviews, interviews, blog posts and buy links). THANKS! SHARE!

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Author Q & A on Goodreads and Google On Air Hangout on Release Date of “This Changes Everything” Register!

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Join ebook author, Sally Ember, Ed.D., for Q & A online chat on 12/19/13, Release Date of This Changes Everything, Volume I, The Spanners Series, on Goodreads, 9 AM – 12 PM PST, FREE.

Join Goodreads (also free), then use the link, below, to post question/comments and register in advance or on the day of the event. SHARE!

ALSO, simultaneously, on Google On Air Hangout via youtube: https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/cqk9o94v7ovcdbdbq8q6mn26dns

Links to reviews, interviews, blog posts and buy links as well as excerpts on author’s website http://www.sallyember.com

This Changes Everything cover

Cover art by Willowraven.

SHARE! Thanks!

SYNOPSIS: Dr. Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., 58, is having the first of many home visits from holographic representations of five beings from the Many Worlds Collective (MWC), a consortium of planet and star systems all around the multiverse, over a thirty-year, increasingly Utopian period. Earth is being invited to join, formally, and the December, 2012, visit is the first one allowed to be made public. Making the existence of the MWC public means many Earthers have to adjust our beliefs and ideas about life, religion, culture, identity and, well, everything we think and are. Clara becomes the liaison for Earth, the Chief Communicator, between Earth and the MWC. This Changes Everything relates the events partly from her point of view, partly from records of meetings of varying groups of the MWC governing bodies, and partly from her Media Contact, Esperanza Enlaces, employing humor, poignancy, a love story, family issues, MWC’s mistakes and blunders, history, politics, paranormalcy and hope.

https://www.goodreads.com/event/show/911803-chat-with-the-author-of-this-changes-everything-on-release-date

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Last 8 days for #pre-orders!

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BIG PUSH! last 8 days for #pre-orders for my first ebook, original, unique #scifi/#romance/#paranormal novel with #Buddhist, #Jewish, #utopian themes, This Changes Everything, Vol. I of The Spanners Series, on iBooks, nook, KOBO thru 12/18; release date 12/19 will show great sales and ROCKET TCE to a high position on “best-seller” lists and get it more visibility IF pre-orders pour in.

Please help? Only $1.99. Give it as a #gift! Geared to older teens and adults.

This Changes Everything cover

Cover art by #Willowraven.

#Free excerpts here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/376197

Other links on http://www.sallyember.com (look to the right and scroll for the link you want: reviews, interviews, blog posts and buy links). THANKS! SHARE!

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Pre-orders and Release Date for “This Changes Everything” free coupon!

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Please share: Now in Pre-orders @ 50% $1.99 on Kobo, iBooks and nook, Sally Ember, Ed.D.’s first sci-fi/romance/paranormal novel, is getting 4- and 5-Star Reviews in pre-pub: see snippets from Reviews, below and full reviews on Goodreads. This Changes Everything, Volume I of <em>The Spanners Series release date is 12/19/13 via Smashwords to Amazon and all ebook retailers. Book club members, teachers and readers of THIS press release, contact Sally for coupon for free download from Smashwords to use after 12/19 – 12/31/13, sallyember@yahoo.com.
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/376197

What others are saying about This Changes Everything,
Volume I, “The Spanners Series” by Sally Ember, Ed.D.

“[This Changes Everything] is highly-imaginative, but for so many different reasons, and outside of the normal scope. There are times when I felt that I was reading an actual research report of true to life events. Honestly, I’m sitting at my laptop, questioning if Clara has provided this work to Ember, or if the two are one in the same. The experience is mind-altering, and would challenge readers to think beyond the bubble that we live in. I would surely recommend ‘This Changes Everything’ to anyone that enjoys a a well-written and researched Sci-Fi series. I will point out that it pushes the envelope, and toys with one’s perception. Well done! 5 Stars.”
–Janice G. Ross, author, 11/11/13
http://jgrwriter.wordpress.com/2013/11/11/review-this-changes-everything-by-sally-ember-3/

“This Changes Everything by Sally Ember is a well-written, complex work that is going to add a strong title to a genre that can sometimes become bogged down with the same old, same old. ‘This Changes Everything’ is a book that I am very happy to have had the chance to read and I would recommend it to any sci-fi/fantasy fan.”
–Zach Tyo, Indie Reviews, 10/4/13
http://indiebookreviewer.blogspot.com/

“You have created your characters very well. I feel for Clara, I imagine her alienating a lot of people because her enthusiasm and drive and ability to push herself makes her someone who doesn’t suffer fools gladly. I would have liked more of the reporter’s life and I didn’t like Epifanio at all. He sounded arrogant and selfish. I loved that the aliens were chosen by lottery. You had so many good touches like that, which made the book a continuing surprise. I…have to say it is one of the most challenging, exciting and original books I’ve read.”
–(Mary) Josephine O’Brien, author, ‘Sharing Skies,’ 9/14/13

“You have written a wonderfully imaginative and original story with plenty of twists and turns. I really like your multiuniverse setting with different timelines and the concept of the ‘Many Worlds Collective.'”
–Sophekles, author, ‘The Serotonin Transfer,’ 10/8/13

“I love your sense of humor. I literally laughed out loud when Clara said that she had given him the name ‘Led.’ I also like that this is an alien story where the aliens are helping, rather than trying to take over the world. It’s a refreshing angle.”
–S.M. Koz, author, ‘Pangalax,’ 9/4/13

[after reading 1st 20 pages only] “…In a lot of ways I’m at a loss to critique this because it’s quite different than what I’m used to encountering. It’s a more immediate version of ‘Stranger in Strange Land’ by Heinlein. Now, what I say next is strictly speaking off the cuff at 11 PM after a couple of rum and cokes, but as it stands I’d probably rate this either three or four stars, depending on how it develops. Once I got into the ideas behind it all, I found it personally fascinating. I’m not sure how that would translate to a broader readership, but it’s nifty stuff. I like alternate timelines and the like…”
–Alexander Crommich, reviewer @ Crommich Industries

“The writing is complex and done extremely well….There were times when I almost forgot I was reading a work of fiction and not a news account of real events, and I would consider that to be skilled writing indeed….[D]id I enjoy more of it than not? Yes. Four stars. Did I like the overall content? Most of the time. Three stars. Was the writing of good quality? Oh, definitely yes. Five stars. My overall rating: four of five stars.”
–Lynda Dietz, Easy Reader, ilovetoreadyourbooks.blogspot.com, 11/4/13

About the Author
Sally Ember, Ed.D., is a published, nonfiction author and produced playwright (children’s theatre, Crystal Dreams; Grading System for adults) whose sci-fi romance/speculative fiction, YA, New Adult and adult series, The Spanners, starts with Volume I, The Changes Everything, uploaded in e-book format by Smashwords and for sale December 20, 2013. Volumes II – X are planned (see Appendix A, below). Volume II, This Changes My Family and My Life Forever, is coming out in Spring, 2014, and the others are in various draft stages. Sally also has some short stories and articles published in ‘Out of the Kitchen,’ a journal available in the 1980s in print format only. She has co-written, edited, and proofread many nonfiction books and worked for a some magazines in the early 2000’s.

Sally was raised Jewish and is a practicing Buddhist meditator. She is also an almost-daily swimmer, a mediocre singer/pianist, avid feminist, dreamer, and devoted mother/ sister/ aunt/ daughter/ cousin/ friend.
Her website includes a blog: visit and comment, follow, “like,” and share! sallyember dot com.

In her “other” professional life, Sally has worked as an educator and upper-level, nonprofit manager in colleges, universities and private nonprofits for over thirty-five years in New England (every state), New Mexico and the San Francisco Bay Area (where she now lives). Sally has a BA, a Master’s (M.Ed.) and a doctorate in education (Ed.D.).

Interacting With and Finding Sally Online
Please write a review and give This Changes Everything a rating on SMASHWORDS, iBooks, Kobo, nook, whatever retailer you use for ebooks, as well as many other sites that bring readers to this book: Authonomy, Wattpad, Indiebooks, https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7237845.Sally_Ember, her blog, http://www.sallyember.com. Help bring people to ‘The Spanners Series’ via any other website that invites readers to post comments and reviews of Sci Fi novels, especially if you LOVE it!

Sally would be delighted to visit your Book Club or class in person or via SKYPE to talk about ‘The Spanners Series.’ Ask her to co-develop curricula, projects and activities for your group/class members!

You will want to check on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheSpannersSeriesbySallyEmber or her website to find out when the next Volume will be available.

Follow Sally on Twitter @sallyemberedd and please Tweet about this book and series! She will be posting excerpts of the upcoming Volumes on the Series’ FB page. Notices of those postings will be on Twitter.

For photos, images, music, bios and other memes relevant to Sally as an author and directly to ‘The Spanner Series,’ please visit her ten boards on Pinterest: “‘The Spanners Series’ includes…”; “Inspirations for the Earth locations in The Spanners Series”; “Music of ‘The Spanners Series'”; “Space Shots I like”; “Books that changed my life”; “TV shows and movies I actually like”; “Writers I Love”;”Resonating Pins” (from others’ boards); “Blog Posts”; and, “Flora and Fauna that amaze me.” She also puts up promos for her own and other authors’ books on occasion via “Book Billboards.” Please follow her Boards on http://www.Pinterest.com/sallyember gets you to her boards.

Cover Art by Willowraven: willowraven-illustration.blogspot.com

This Changes Everything cover

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Author Interview at Amethyst Eyes’ site!

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Thanks, “Amethyst Eyes” site author, Debbie Brown, for hosting an Author’s Interview that went live today, 11/22/13! Please visit and comment!

http://amethysteyesauthor.blogspot.ca/2013/11/sally-sue-embers-and-this-changes.html

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#Free #ebook if you have class or Book Club and want to co-develop a #curriculum using Volume I, “This Changes Everything,” “The Spanners Series” (or any future Vol.)

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Volume I, This Changes Everything, The Spanners Series
could be free to participants in your class or Book Club!

Are you a teacher or curriculum developer? I have worked in those fields a lot! Do you belong to or moderate a Book Club?

Let’s co-develop discussion questions, activities and projects for your classes/group to inspire your students/participants to read parts or or all of my ebooks, starting with Volume I, This Changes Everything, The Spanners Series.

Middle/high school and college teachers of English or science fiction literature, world history, ancient art and artifacts, physics, astronomy, social science, communication, art, psychology, sociology and writing could use this Volume and the others in the Series as jumping-off points for great projects, further research and discussions. Volume II, This Changes My Family and My Life Forever, is due out in spring, 2014.

Appendix D in each Volume provides the actual individuals, by category, that are referred to in the Series. In several chapters, there are also specific political, artistic, geographic and historical references and descriptions related to the themes and topics in the Series.

The novels are in the science/speculative fiction/romance genres for a mixed audience of adults, new adults, and young adults. The Series’ themes, characters and plot points incorporate Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, physics, astronomy, multiverse/multiple timelines, social speculation, sexual orientation and gender identity, psi/paranormal skills, aliens/life on other planets and orbs, politics and government, Nazca lines, pyramids Roswell and Area 51, and much more. (Synopsis and Table of Contents for TCE at the end of this post.)

Volumes II – X coming in 2014 and soon after. Alternating (even-numbered) Volumes utilize narrators and points of view from young adults, teens and children.

I will provide Volume I or any of the Series’ ebooks free to students using my ebook in a class and to Book Club members as long as one copy is purchased (usually by the leader/teacher).

Also, I live in northern California and am willing to travel if you’d like the “author visit” or “author reading” or “author Q & A” session for your group. Since I used to teach middle and high school as well as college and graduate school and have been a reader since I was 3 years old, I would be delighted to speak with students and readers anywhere, any time, about my books, about writing, and about the themes in The Spanners Series.

Pre-order at half-price or purchase after 12/20 (see below). Then, if you are interested, email me to discuss! sallyember@yahoo.com

Pre-orders at $1.99 11/5-12/19 on iBooks, B & N nook and Kobo via Smashwords; release date via Smashwords and on Kindle and other sites starting 12/20/13, @ $3.99.

Contact me here any time after December 20, 2013, to download the free ebooks (I will give you a code).

Meanwhile, review this TOC, below, and check out excepts via this website or on The Spanners Series by Sally Ember Facebook page (which has more!), and let me know what you think of using this book for your Club or class.

This Changes Everything, Volume I, The Spanners Series
Synopsis
After several millennia of mostly secret visits and contact with Earthers, members of the Many Worlds Collective (MWC) Council decide that a Liaison, dubbed the Chief Communicator (CC) must be contacted and that this contact must be made public in order to avert multiple types of disasters on Earth. The visiting members of the MWC come in hologram form to the selected CC (Clara Branon, 58, living in northern California) for the first time on December 21, 2012.

As a “Spanner,” Branon is one of millions of “Baby Boomers” who survive across two centuries and bridge the divide (hence, “Spanners”) between nonpublic and public contact with the MWC and many other major changes that occur during these decades.

Because most Earthers are not prepared to accept this type of reporting or storytelling as nonfiction, this first and some other volumes of the series are of the realistic fiction/science fiction/fantasy genres. Many of the characters, events and locations are actual; some are not, or haven’t happened (yet) at the time of first publication.

In This Changes Everything are: a love story, spanning about 40 years; dialogue and scenes of the relationships among the CC and her mother and siblings; communications between the CC and her adult son; dialogue between the CC and some friends; info about the selection and identity of the chosen media contact for the CC, with excerpts from her journal; news stories about the CC and the MWC events from Earth media as well as MWC media; background about the CC and the reasons for her being selected; excepts from minutes of meetings of the InterGalactic Council of the MWC; and much more.

After the MWC educational resources and information become widely available, in 2013, all time is now known to be simultaneous. Writing from any point in time and timeline is means that the love story and other aspects are depicted in multiple versions. Will Branon and her Future or Fictional Husband be together? Which “re-set” of the Transition After Public Contact prevails?

Tone is humorous/serious; mode is utopian. Narrative includes history, poetry, literature, music/lyrics, science and technological advances, paranormal skills, law and government, Buddhism and other religions, meditation, social-emotional intelligence, time and space travel, interspecies communication, and social/futuristic depictions of the Earth, post-MWC public contact.

This Changes Everything is the first of The Spanners Series, which chronicles the public contact between the CC and the MWC and the impact of these contacts on Earthers and the MWC over the 30 years that Branon is the CC. Chapters are written from several perspectives. Some Volumes in series purport to be nonfiction or have nonfiction sections.

Genres and Audience: Sci-Fi/Speculative Fiction/Romance, Adult/ New Adult/YA novel

Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE First Contact between the Many Worlds Collective
(MWC) and Clara Branon, Ph.D., in northern California, December, 2012
INTERLUDE I Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log What is Fiction?
CHAPTER TWO Minutes from the Fission Subcommittee, MWC Intergalactic Council Earth Date: August 5, 1945 Page 6 of 9
INTERLUDE II Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Clara Freaks Out
CHAPTER THREE “‘They’ Never Leave: the MWC and Earthers; or, Crop Circles, Alien ‘Abductions,’ Whitley Streiber, Roswell/Area 51 and other MWC Blunders” Opening Remarks given by Dr. Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., Chief Communicator and Liaison between Earth and the Many Worlds Collective Global Unity Leaders Council #1, 6/8/15, The Hague, The Netherlands
INTERLUDE III Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Who are “The Spanners”?
CHAPTER FOUR Many Worlds Collective Intergalactic Travel Authority Accident Report Earth Location and Date: Roswell, NM, USA, July 8, 1947
INTERLUDE IV Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Ackerman Family’s Adventures in Psychokinesis
CHAPTER FIVE The Mayan and Current Calendars; or, Why First Publishable MWC Contact Occurs on December 21, 2012 Vid Interview given by Dr. Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., Chief Communicator and Liaison between Earth and the Many Worlds Collective January 6, 2014, with Media Contact, Esperanza Enlaces, Interviewer
INTERLUDE V Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Clara Develops Trust in The Band
CHAPTER SIX Epifanio’s Version Epifanio Dang Tells His Story
CHAPTER SEVEN MWC Collective Artists’ Guild’s Philosophy and Policy on Off-Planet Installations Approximate Earth Locations and Date: Teotihuacan (Mexico) and Sudan (Africa) Pyramids, 250 BCE
INTERLUDE VI Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Clara Describes Her Earlier Timulting Experiences
CHAPTER EIGHT Second Public Contact between the MWC and Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., or, This Is Not a Dream
CHAPTER NINE From Esperanza Enlaces’ private journal entries, February 13 – December 23, 2012
INTERLUDE VII Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Confessions of a Bad Poet: How I Become a Writer
CHAPTER TEN How Our Contacts Become Public (thanks to my son, Zephyr Branon, and the 2013 world-wide web [www])
INTERLUDE VIII Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log “Clara: the Outsider Who Becomes the Ultimate Insider” rehearsal for interview with Espe for May 2, 2013
CHAPTER ELEVEN First Internet News Stories, posted simultaneously on The San Francisco Chronicle’s website as well as salon.com, Reuters.com, slate.com
and hundreds of other sites January 5, 2013 and the Changes Publicizing the MWC Contact Bring
CHAPTER TWELVE Individuals from the Many Worlds Collective: Their Names and Their Worlds (as Earthers know them)
INTERLUDE IX A Compilation from Clara Branon’s Personal Journals All the Epifanios
CHAPTER THIRTEEN Do Solar Storms Make Us Do It? Conflict, Wars, Violence and Other Human Flaws Are Not Our Fault?
CHAPTER FOURTEEN Exploding and Imploding Earthers; or, What the Buddha Taught That Made His Followers’ Heads Explode Public Talk give by Dr. Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., Chief Communicator, new Nobel Laureate Nobel Peace Prize Recipients Ceremony, 12/12/16, Oslo, Norway
CHAPTER FIFTEEN Generated by Events of January, 2013 – March, 2013 Contact-Induced Injuries Report made to MWC Intergalactic Council April 27, 2013 Earth Date
CHAPTER SIXTEEN Whom I Saved and How It Happened; or, “I Told You So, Part I” (for my brother, Dr. Thomas Ackerman)
INTERLUDE X Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Being Changed “For Good”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN MWC Lottery Winners Determine First Public Delegation to Earth Story posted on mwcw.lottery.verse December 8, 2012 Earth date
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN How Ongoing Contacts and My Role as Chief Communicator Change(d) Me
CHAPTER NINETEEN IGC MWC Musicians and Artists Festival, first-ever held on Earth Sydney, Australia, August 15-22, 2022 Earth dates
INTERLUDE XI Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Even Social Media Have “Previews”
CHAPTER TWENTY Who Survives and How We All Change: Learning about Re-set
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE From Esperanza Enlaces’ private journal entries, April 18 – May 20, 2013
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“Imagine: The Elimination of Nations, Boundaries, Citizenship, Race, Religions, Politics, Hunger, Poverty and War; or, What John Lennon Knows” Public Talk given by Dr. Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., Chief Communicator, Templeton Prize Recipient for 2014 5/12/14, London, England
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE Minutes from the Jesus Subcommittee MWC Planning Committee Meeting Capernaum, Galilee (Israel, Africa), November 13, 32 A.D. Earth Date Page 2
INTERLUDE XII Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Explanations, Appendices and Acknowledgements
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR The Love Story Embedded in This Story; or,
“I Told You So, Part II” (that’s for My Future Husband, Epifanio Dang)
INTERLUDE XIII Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log When Trouble is not Trouble
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Interspecies/Interplanetary Marriagebond Laws stories posted on mwcw.laws.verse May 30, 2023 and February 10, 2035 Earth Dates
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX Other versions of Clara and Epifanio’s Love Story (either/ors and both/ands)
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN Sono-Pictorial Languages of Cetaceans, Sign Language and Vocalizations of Primates and Other Species’ Communication Modalities on Earth and Afar
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT There’s No Time Like the Present; or, (as Zephyr Branon coined) Timultaneity: Can’t Live With It, Can’t Live Outside It
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE The Media and Clara POPULAR MEDIA
“Lost and Found: How My Time with the Aliens Helped Me Lose 130 lbs. and Find Love” (interview with Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., by Esperanza Enlaces O Magazine [Oprah Winfrey’s periodical], September, 2014 Earth Date)
CHAPTER THIRTY “The Future of Earth and the Many Worlds Collective,” Panel Discussion at the Ceremony for the Retirement of the Chief Communicator Part I San Francisco, California, USA, Link MediaVerse Studios December 22, 2040 Earth Date
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE What Happens When we Die? Clara Learns About Return and ReInvolvement
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO “The Future of Earth and the Many Worlds Collective,” Panel Discussion at the Ceremony for the Retirement of the Chief Communicator Part II San Francisco, California, USA, Link MediaVerse Studios December 22, 2040 Earth Date
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE Clara Explains Human Relationships to The Band: The Romantic Paradox
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR Photos and Captions
INTERLUDE XIV Excerpts from the Chief Communicator’s Occasional Log Clara’s Apology Letter to Epifanio
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE Even the Chief Communicator Disappoints Her Mother
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX “It’s Not Over ‘Till It’s Over”

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#SFRBP Snippet from “This Changes Everything”

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http://www.sfrcontests.blogspot.com

From Chapter One, This Changes Everything, Volume I, The Spanners Series,in which Dr. Clara Ackerman Branon, Ph.D., first meets the visitors from the Many World Collective:

…my mind is racing through possibilities. They are aliens! I am feeling excited and intensely interested. I assume that if they meant to harm me, I’d be harmed, already, so I am rapidly becoming less scared. Brimming with questions and curiosity, I go right over to them.

My upbringing kicks in, maybe because they are around my dining table, and I ask them kind of automatically, “Would you like some tea or something cold to drink? Are you hungry?” Then, I laugh, and they make some noises that must be their ways of showing amusement; they aren’t here; they are holograms. They can’t eat or drink anything. Duh.

I sit down in my chair which they seem to know is mine because it isn’t blocked or occupied. I look towards them, expectantly, and realize I don’t know where to look. Only one of them has anything resembling “eyes,” and the other four do not even really have anything I would call a “face.” Still, reflexively, I guess, I keep my focus on their upper bodies’ uppermost sections and on the zeppelin’s middle.

I ask, “How may I be of service? Why have you come to see me?”

Unknown's avatar

More about living in a “God Realm”

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Yesterday my at-home #Buddhist #meditation #retreat, week one, contemplating living in a “God Realm,” took some interesting turns due to “regular life.” That’s the beauty and the challenge of having a home retreat: life keeps on happening, and not very far away or able to be ignored. Need to deal with my car, keep connecting with some people, job-hunt and apply, have a job interview (when invited), shop for essentials, tend to chores.

As a writer who is finishing Volume II, This Changes My Family and my Life Forever, and marketing (release date, December 20) Volume I, This Changes Everything of The Spanners Series, I am also writing, marketing, learning about ebook publishing, indie pub networking and methods, editing/revising, weighing in on cover art for Volume I (thanks, #Willowraven!) and learning about this whole ebook process for the first time from Mark Coker of #Smashwords (thanks, Mark). My days and some of my nights are quite full, already. Adding in 3 – 6 hours of meditation each day (sometimes more) is quite a feat. I’m not bragging; just explaining. Something’s gotta give.

So, yesterday, the meditation time “gave” to the car repair and friend times. However, I did walk and meditate/contemplate while my car was being assessed (one hour). During that hour, I walked around downtown Hayward to do errands (bank, library) and then sat in an rarely-used chess-players’ seat at a small city park.

No one else was in the park. In fact, it was officially “closed,” but the walkways were open. I and a dog-walker were the only park users when I was there. I could picture the park on busier days, ghost figures filling the space: the traditional-old-men-playing-chess images, some teens hanging out on the benches, a stroller-pusher or two, a dog-walker or two. But, since it held no other appeals, with no playground, no fountain or pond, no climbing structures, no other places to sit, I ran out of ideas. Besides the two chess stations and two park benches, there were a few patches of grass (well-trimmed), some flowering shrubs, one tree: that was the corner park.

Meditating/contemplating living in a God Realm caused me to look around more closely as I walked and then, sat. I discovered several aspects of this downtown that struck me as relevant. First, there are a lot of abandoned or empty, unmarked buildings and vacant lots among some seemingly open ones or those not due to be opened, yet (it was before 11:30, so many places weren’t open, yet). In this particular moment, one day in 2013 in Hayward, California, I could see evidence of better days.

One large, brick building had odd-shaped and oddly placed spaces high on one wall facing the busiest intersection. I puzzled out that these were vacancies left by large, individual letters which must have been adhering to the brickwork to display the owner’s or business’ name. Gone. But, before that era ended, those people must have been very wealthy to have owned such a large, prominent downtown structure. Most owners live in a God Realm, until they don’t.

They would have had servants and workers under them, surplus income to spend on themselves. They would have indulged themselves and their family members in luxuries and vacations, had most every whim fulfilled. Fancy clothes, fast and expensive cars, jewels, lavish parties, food and beverages, entertainment, sex, exotic pets, travel to beautiful locales, music and art would have filled their lives. Let’s give them good health, love and intelligence, too. A perfect human existence, probably in the latter part of the last century or earlier.

Where are those owners now, if any of them are still even in those human forms? Assisted living or nursing homes? Scattered from Hayward, younger family members out of touch or estranged? Dead already? Where are their money, those luxuries, that business? What happened to their residences, cars, clothes and other possessions, friends and colleagues? Gone to others or just completely gone. Empty. Abandoned, like this building.

Even when “everything is perfect,” it can’t last. Even if the outer pleasures continue, the enjoyers do not. These “Gods” age, get infirm, die; or, die suddenly. But, die they must, taking none of that gilded life with them.

I returned to retrieve my car (can’t be fixed until part arrives. I chose Halloween for my next foray into town, since I have a medical appointment that day, anyway). Driving the short distance home, I contemplated the ephemeral nature of all life and the futility of accumulating wealth, possessions, pleasures and such.

We may be living in a God Realm or not, but what we all share is impermanence. Whatever ways we are enjoying or suffering through our existences, our pleasure or pain is just a moment in the great span of time. Whatever we have, whatever we want: Feel it, live it, then go on to the next moment. That is the merry-go-round of samsara.

Prayers for all beings to recognize the illusory, temporary nature of samsaric existence and to buckle down (or ratchet up) to be on the path to individual liberation. Bodhicitta and gratitude for my path filled my heart as I re-entered my home, my retreat space.

Unknown's avatar

“The Right Timeline”

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I am submitting this story, “The Right Timeline,” to be published in an online new journal, Sci-Fi Romance Quarterly, by October 31. Wish me luck! And, good luck to Heather Massey, K.S. Augustin, Diane Dooley and others involved in launching this zine!
Venue: SFR Quarterly
Editor-in-Chief: K.S. Augustin
Co-ordinating Editor: Heather Massey
Fiction Editor: Diane Dooley
Launch Date: November 15, 2013
http://www.scifiromancequarterly.org/

Unknown's avatar

“The Right Timeline”

by

I am submitting this story, “The Right Timeline,” to be published in an online new journal, Sci-Fi Romance Quarterly, by October 31. Wish me luck! And, good luck to Heather Massey, K.S. Augustin, Diane Dooley and others involved in launching this zine!
Venue: SFR Quarterly
Editor-in-Chief: K.S. Augustin
Co-ordinating Editor: Heather Massey
Fiction Editor: Diane Dooley
Launch Date: November 15, 2013
http://www.scifiromancequarterly.org/

Unknown's avatar

Another reviewer comments on 1st 20 pps., This Changes Everything

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“…In a lot of ways I’m at a loss to critique this because it’s quite different than what I’m used to encountering. It’s a more immediate version of Stranger in Strange Land by Heinlein. Now, what I say next is strictly speaking off the cuff at 11 PM after a couple of rum and cokes, but as it stands I’d probably rate this either three or four stars, depending on how it develops. Once I got into the ideas behind it all, I found it personally fascinating. I’m not sure how that would translate to a broader readership, but it’s nifty stuff. I like alternate timelines and the like…”

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another reader comments

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on authonomy.com: “Wow. I think this [This Changes Everything] is in a tie with one other book for the most creatively confusing book on authonomy! In case you can’t tell, I mean that as a compliment…. I love your sense of humor. I literally laughed out loud when Clara said that she had given him the name Led. I also like that this is an alien story where the aliens are helping, rather than trying to take over the world. It’s a refreshing angle.”

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one reader comments

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On authonomy.com, for This Changes Everything: “You have quite a unique and interesting story! Not like anything else on here….Overall, I applaud your creativity and novel approach.”

Unknown's avatar

“The Right Timeline”

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Just spent a wonderful day conceiving (from meditations, dreams, and visions) a short story, “The Right Timeline,” based on the same main characters and multiverse foundations as in my sci-fi series, The Spanners, to submit to a newly starting sci-fi/romance online quarterly. If it is not accepted, I’ll just include it a future volume of the series. It if is, whoopee! Stay tuned! Decisions later this fall (it launches in November; deadline for submissions is October 1). Want to meet these characters? Read the first 13 chapters of Volume I, This Changes Everything, right here! Then, please post a comment here, on Twitter, on your own blog, on authonomy. com, on wattpad.com, on Goodreads, and anywhere else you roam. Thanks.