Several months ago, one of my tattoo clients (the dear Paula Kolpien) approached me and asked if I’d be interested in doing a fundraiser for some organizations she’s a part of. Generally, I try to do one fundraiser a year by donating the proceeds from a day’s worth of tattooing, so this wasn’t particularly out of my normal realm of practice, but I’d been considering something … special … for a while. Let’s just say a few metaphorical marbles were rolling around in the ol’ brain hole.

I wanted to try connecting my two passions (tattooing and writing) in a positive way for a while, and when the lovely Paula said the money would go toward White Paws German Shepherd Rescue and Mit Leibe German Shepherd Dog Rescue respectively, I thought, “Those sound like organizations Granite would donate to if he weren’t a figment of my imagination.”

Naturally, as creative minds often do, this thought spiraled wildly out of control.

What organization would Umbriel donate to?
Or Mr. Addihein, the tireless humanitarian whose dream for a better world for all seems like an all-to-utopian impossibility?
Even Kazuaki, with his questionable moral compass, would surely find something he deemed worthy of supporting, right?

I believe they would.

As the general underlying theme of the Panagea Tales is ‘there is no good or evil, only people doing what they think is right’, I intend to do just that. Once a month. For an entire year.

Today, my tattooing career helped me raise $680 (or $340 for each organization) for Mit Liebe and White Paws.

Somewhere in the depths of my head, Granite is genuinely happy to see money going to help animals who really need it.

Here’s something directly from White Paws’ website:

Since 2004, we’ve saved approximately 150-175 dogs a year from being put to sleep in shelters, most stray or abandoned by owners.  We take in dogs found in dumping grounds, owner surrenders, shelters and many other bad circumstances from 22 states in the Continental U.S.  We rescue young, old, and medically needy dogs.

And the mission statement from Mit Liebe? I think that’s something we can all get behind:

We only adopt to those who will love the dog as much, or if possible, more than we do.

If you’d like to make your own donations to these fine organizations, you can find the information on their mission and more on the links provided.

We all know the cast of the Panagea Tales is extensive … so, as stated above, for every month of 2020, I’ll pick an organization I think one character would support today if they were tangible human beings. Since Granite was so late in the month of December, he’s taking place as my official ‘January’. I don’t know who will serve the February slot yet, but I’m sure when the timing strikes, I’ll feel it. (Unless, of course, you all have some suggestions on where you think the characters would like to lend an assist). I’d love to hear them and help however I can.

I’d also love to hear stories of how you made positive changes in your world or someone else’s. Maybe a signed copy of a book will fall into your mailbox from the literature fairy. They say fortune favors the bold, but I think it also favors those who favor others. Good karma and all that.

A happy New Year to you all, thank you to the lovely ladies who came out to get tattooed today, and cheers to eventual salvation for homeless animals everywhere.

-McK.

Ah, guilt. One of many emotions that are as inevitable as they are unpleasant. It makes us human, doesn’t it?

Guilt invades me more often than I care to admit when I think of the Incineration Saga. I’m not sure if you know to what I’m referring, since it never amassed the same following that the Panagea Tales did – but the Incineration Saga was my little slow-burn paranormal romance featuring the witch (Esven Greenbriar), the fire demon (Balvonak), and the priest (Elias Deverell). I worked on the series somewhere between writing The Serpent That Swallowed Its Tail and The Canary That Sang to the World … delaying the inevitable conclusion of the Panagea Tales, you see.

I wrote two books in the series and part of the third. The first two books went under my capable editor’s eyes, and then I hastily threw them up on Amazon thinking, “This will be great! A new series! Woo!”

As it turns out, our dear human/demon/human trio launched to crickets.

Now, I don’t write to make money. (No. Really.) I am fortunate enough to make enough coin with my tattoo artistry that I do not need to rely on funds from the books. I write because I enjoy the characters, and because I want to share their stories with others who may enjoy them as well. It didn’t bother me that Esven, Balvo, and Elias didn’t pay the bills … but I did find myself marinating in guilt that their ending remained up in the air.

Normally, when I write, I have a pretty good idea of when the book(s) will be available to the general public. With Incineration, I cannot see the immediate future. It irks me. Because of this, I’ve decided to temporarily unpublish the first two books in the Incineration Saga (Followed by Fire and Embraced by Embers) until I know precisely when the remaining books in the series (Swallowed by Smoke and Cell of Cinders) will be forthcoming.

For the very few of you (less than sixty, I believe) who started the Incineration Saga and were looking forward to continuing it, I’m very sorry. I do promise that Esven, Balvo, and Elias will return. In the words of Elias Deverell …

There is no path on this land narrow enough that I would not walk beside you … even if I have to step in some poison ivy every now and then.

I still stand by the characters. I will still walk beside them and finish their story, regardless of the pitfalls. I just want to be sure that when they do, you won’t be waiting a year or more in between releases.

As always, thank you for reading!

October 21st is a wonderful day to curl up with a book (or four) and enjoy some delightful autumn reading.

It’s also the day the Panagea Tales comes to a bittersweet end.

I started this journey in January of 2018, and I made quite a few mistakes along the way. I’ve edited the original manuscript more times than I can count. I’ve gone through three different book covers for The Tree That Grew Through Iron. I didn’t have a newsletter, or beta readers, or advanced review copies to give out to people to make sure my book(s) had Amazon reviews on launch day.

I just knew I wanted to write a book. One book turned into two. The deeper the characters burrowed into my heart, the longer their stories became. Now, just shy of two years since I first put fingers to keyboard, their respective journeys are coming to completion.

Gods dammit, I hate goodbyes.

I’ll still be able to revisit them; I know that much. We still have to make the audiobooks for The Gods Who Harvested Men, The Serpent That Swallowed Its Tail, and The Canary That Sang to the World. I’ve been toying with the idea of a collection of short origin stories for Kazuaki’s crew. You know … little visits, here and there. But I know it won’t be the same. Half a million words is a long adventure to take, and unfortunately for Nicholai, Kazuaki, and the crew, there just aren’t half a million more.

I hope if you have stories in your heart, you write them. I hope if you have characters you want to show the world, you share them. And I hope you feel the same thrill, and fear, and triumph, and sadness that I have when you do. Goodbyes will always be hard, but I wouldn’t trade this one for the world.

I hope if you read the box set and enjoy the series, you consider leaving a review on Amazon and Goodreads. Thank you for taking this journey with me. Let me know if you ever start one of your own. I’m always down for an adventure.

 

-McK.

Hello and good morning, reading enthusiasts! I hope your week is going as well as mine. If I were Sisyphus, I might even think I could get the boulder all the way to the top of the hill with how pumped I’ve been lately.

It is my pleasure to report that The Tree That Grew Through Iron: Book One of the Panagea Tales, has been transformed into its latest edition. That’s right – we’ve entered the wonderful world of audiobooks. Can I get an enthusiastic “woo!” from anyone? Yes!

A little bird told me that audiobooks are the next best thing in the ever-evolving literary world, and I’m inclined to agree. In this generation of ‘go-go-go’ attitudes, time to sit down and read is a luxury no longer afforded to many. Audiobooks give us the ability to multitask while simultaneously entertaining ourselves– and if that doesn’t encapsulate the modern day desire, I don’t know what does.

In honor of the audio release of The Tree That Grew Through Iron, I’ll be giving away a code for a free download of the book from Audible. You can listen to narrator Gerard Marquez, in all his talented glory, tell the tale of Nicholai, Kazuaki, and the crew, as they weave their way through the continent of Panagea.

How do you win a free copy of the audiobook, you ask? Just share this post, and comment on the original Facebook post to let me know you’ve shared it! Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. I’ll choose a winner next Sunday (August 18th).

In the event that you want to dive into the series straight away, you can find the book on Amazon, Audible, or iTunes!

Thank you for sharing in this joy with me; I couldn’t imagine anyone else I’d rather spread this enthusiasm with.

Love and peace,

-McK.

Hello, all!

I hope I didn’t spoil the premise of this post; the title really does say it all. Yesterday, I woke up to an e-mail from The Wishing Shelf Independent Book Awards that stated ‘The Tree That Grew Through Iron’ was a GOLD medal winner in the Adult Fiction category of their contest! Ah!

After the wave of disbelief wore off, I was able to mutter a few incoherent words of appreciation. With a full day for the news to settle over me, I’m much more capable of highlighting my joy.

I would like to thank ALLi (The Alliance of Independent Authors) for all the work they do in vetting the book award contests that are NOT out to jilt an eager writer out of his or her hard-earned money by charging them entry fees for nothing more than greed. Winning an award is an incredible honor, but winning an award that has been thoroughly analyzed by a group of experts in the field is even better.

In other news: I have finally decided to pursue a voice actor for an audio book version of The Tree That Grew Through Iron! I’m excited to say that I’ve had several great auditions, and will be narrowing it down very soon.

Thank you to everyone, the readers, for making this series as powerful as it has become. I hope to have the same luck with my new paranormal romance series: The Incineration Saga!

Hello, friends and readers!

As you may have already discovered, I only update my blog posts once every month/every other month. I hate to offer up excuses, but I’m going to do it anyway, as I have a few. Here’s a list of things I’m probably doing when I’m not concocting a blog post:

• Raising a four-year-old.
• Making time to be a good wife.
• Writing books.
• Tattooing people (my full-time job)
• Overseeing the cleanliness of my home. (Currently in a  war with Sears Home Services while I wait for them to fix the dishwasher I paid for six weeks ago. Hard work, hard work.)
• Trying not to trip into a downward spiral of madness.
• People stuff.

Jeepers, now that I’m looking at it, it’s only seven things. Still…

You guys don’t want to get spammed with blog posts, do you? Of course not! You’re too busy reading!

My rambling does come with a point, I swear. What I’m trying to say, in my own long-winded way, is that the third book in The Panagea Tales tetralogy is available for pre-order! If you’d like to snag a copy (set to be delivered to your Kindle on January 10th, 2019) click here!

Thanks again for sticking with the characters and for all the kind messages and reviews I’ve received on both Amazon.com and Goodreads.com. You guys are phenomenal!

Have a stellar day, friends. Thank you and goodnight, it’s time to go start the next book!

You’ve felt it before.

The hollow pit forming in your stomach. The hole in your brain that leaks a constant supply of negative thoughts into your bloodstream. The heaviness. The crushing weight of your own self doubt. The thousand and one irrelevant ‘what if’ questions that fly through your skull, clogging every path that any redeeming feelings might flow into, suffocating you, until you are a victim to the inner demons. Demons birthed from your own imagination. Demons who remain invisible to others, but to you, they are as tangible as any human being.

If any of that sounds familiar, then you have my sincerest pity. Functioning with anxiety is nearly a Herculean feat.

I’m here to share my experience. You know, when the call to write inevitably means your mental problems will weave through each word you type. When choosing to publish your work, to put it out there for everyone to silently (and sometimes, not-so-silently) judge, becomes a choice you have to make.When your anxiety amplifies the nervousness tenfold, crippling you some days, and still trying to destroy you, even on the days it fails to succeed.

Simply put, writing with anxiety sucks ass.

I’m embarrassed to admit how often I’ve hovered over reviews and shuddered at the idea that someone I’d never met disliked a character, or a scene, or spotted a grammatical error, or found any fault at all with the story at all. I don’t think there’s an answer for it. I don’t even think awareness of it will keep me from doing it again.

But if anybody is reading this, anyone at all, who has written a story and fears the repercussions of exposing yourself so much, that you have yet to pursue publishing… please, heed my advice: take the plunge.

I cannot promise you won’t have bad days.

I cannot promise you won’t constantly second-guess whether or not those who have read your book think any less of you, for whatever made up lie your anxiety tells you is true.

I cannot even promise that the book will sell well, or at all.

But I will say that your book is unequivocally, 100%, without a doubt, better than all the unwritten books hiding in the backs of peoples’ minds. You made something. You poured effort into it. You spent hours looming over a notebook, or a computer, churning words in your head and spilling them onto the pages. That, my friend, is more than most people can lay claim to.

You gave the world art.

While many years have since separated artists from public reverence, there was once a time when the creative people of Earth were venerated. Take a small slice of that past worship for yourself. Tuck it away, into a pocket or an easy-to-find corner in your brain. Keep it accessible, that you can reach for it on the bad days.

Take a cue from your characters. If you can write the bravery that gives them life, than it’s already inside of you. And even if, at the end of a long day, nobody else gives you a pat on the back for what you have achieved… please know, that somewhere in the world, I’m giving you the biggest feckin’ thumbs up I can muster.

You wrote something. You created. Share your work. Slay the beast that dares to shackle you. I know you can, because you’re a gods-damned hero.