Happy Year and welcome to 2010 everyone.

I never know where my contest entries are going to come from and I am grateful to each of them for joining in the fun. But there is only one original piece of art and after making a list and cutting apart all the names from the entries and dropping them in a hat. My husband pulled the winner. I won’t give out their full names, but I will share with you their entry. They sent it in audio form. Listen closely and you will hear E and R give us a list of what they found hidden in the artwork.

It is so great that a brother and a sister, two kids, were so intent on picking out the images then recorded their entry because they can’t write yet!

Here is the entry!

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Also the runner up T! Won Celtic Jewelry!

I won’t be running any contests for a while as I am so not sure how to top this one!

Congrats to the winners thank you to the people who took the time to enter and have a prosperous new year to all my readers!

Artwork by Amie Perry-Reavis

You could win the original cover art!

Contest Time!

Rhonda R Carpenter, the author of The Mark of a Druid and co-host of Podioracket.com, has conducted an ongoing stream of contests. But this is it. This is the big one. This is the month where she awards the ultimate prize–the original oil on canvas artwork used as the cover for The Mark of the Druid. Painted by Amie Perry-Reavis this work was tittled Through The Void. Amie painted this astounding piece complete with hidden symbols and images from the book, the artwork will be awarded to one lucky contest participant.

The artist would not even tell Rhonda where all the hidden images were. So that is your job. Find and identify as many of the symbols, images people and places from the book in the art as you can. This is like gazing at clouds. I have found 10. How many will you find?

Then email info@themarkofadruid.com with your entry by Midnight Pst December 31, 2009. On January 1 2010 one lucky winner will be getting an email from me telling them they are the proud owner of an original Amie Perry-Reavis. You can find more and Amie’s works on her website Goddessprinst.com including a series of works she did for the book The Mark of a Druid. As a matter of fact, she is already working on a new piece for the next book When Ethers Decend. Please Support Amie buy buying her products from her Zazzle store.

See Rhonda’s website for more details.

See www.goddessprints.com for more work by the artist Amie Perry-Reavis.

Congratulation to darkestic and to jeanettemarsh for winning Contest #13 of the 2009 Contest Series your emails have been sent and the announcement has been made. There is only one contest left. Don’t let this win stop you from the biggest prize of all, the original oil on canvas that became the cover of The Mark of a Druid. It starts Dec 1 and ends Dec 31 at midnight. Find and Identify as many of the symbols and images from the book as you can in the artwork. Leave your guess as a comment on the contest 14 anything after Dec 1^st 2009. Take your time and find them all. There are more than 10.

Happy Hunting

Here it is one to go before the big give away! here is what you have to do. Between now and Nov 30th 2009 stop by this website and or the second life store located at 25 Gutenberg Alley on Book Island http://slurl.com/secondlife/Book%20Island/238/138/37 This is a direct link in SL to the store. While at the store create a note card and drop it on my profile. My user name is Insight Zadark. Tell me you were at the store and tell me what you think if you like. Have a look around the neighborhood. You will find many podcasters have taken up residence in the area. Some of those you might recognize are Emerian Rich, Mark Eller, Arlene Radasky, Free Audio Bookshelf, Lone Wolf Sage Ca, PodioRacket, Grizzly Smith and some new faces as well. Click on things there is lots of free reading and fun things for your inventory in almost all the booths.

If you are not into second life leave me a comment here and I will enter you in the drawing. It is just that easy!

There will be one winner from 1st life and one from 2nd life! Each will receive a autographed copy of The Mark of a druid and a singed poster!

And as a bonus this time around if you can guess who these two characters from the book are and their names to your note card or comment you will be added to an extra drawing!

You heard me right. Lone Wolf rented a space for me on Second Life. It has been a grand experience watching it build into something. The bottom floor is all about The Trilogy and the upper floor is all about Free Audio Bookshelf. We are located at 25 Gutenberg Alley at the corner of Lovejoy Square on Book Island. Just down the street from Quills.  Come and join us in SL.

Upstairs Free Audio Bookshelf will be providing a library environment where you can go her hear in a play and later live the readings of The Mark of a Druid and coming soon The Fox. Later Arlene Radasky and myself will be bringing you many other books. If you stop by and we are not there feel free to click on things and get free samples find out about SL contests and connect to other events.

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There are only 3 more days left to vote for your favorite Wicked Woman Writer in the Horror Addicts WWW Challenge. 

To listen simply click on the link for each story listed below or go to horroraddicts.net. On the website Episode #31 is followed by each of the four stories:
#1 Tired by Arlene Radasky
#2 Organic Tomatoes by Michele Roger
#3 Enough is Enough by Rhonda R Carpenter
#4 Graveyard Shift (and Re-Shift) by H.E. Roulo

To vote, listen to each of the four stories then send an email to Emerian Rich (emzbox@sbcglobal.com) with WWW in the subject line. Include 1) The name, number, or author of the story you want to vote for 2) Your name or handle 3) Your mailing address (only used if you should win).

This week Contest Number 11 for The Mark of a Druid 2009 Contest Series Closed and there are 2 winners!

Congratulations to Iona_Da-Mystic and Cassiopia look for your email later today so we can snail mail your prize! Thank you all for singing up for the new site. I appreciate you all sticking with me during the site growing pains. And meny thanks for the nice comments on the new site.

Contests number 12 is Live and it is all about AWE

What is AWE? It is the Autumn Writers Event held annually on Cookie Island. This is a place in Second Life where you can find new authors and established authors from all over the Real World or First Life.
I even set up a booth along with Heather Roulo, Arlene Radasky, Emerian Rich and many many others. Come check it out and win a real book.

Join me on SL at this event before it ends on Nov 1, 2009 then come by the new store front located in SL at 25 Guttenberg Alley on Book Island currently under construction. We are planning some really exciting stuff there including book readings from www.blogtalkradio.com/FreeAudioBookshelf. If you leave me a note card in SL Or add me to your friends list I will put your name in a hat for a Print version of the book unless you prefer e-book formats it is the winners choice. The drawing for the winner will be held on Nov 30th Live in SL at the new store front.

Wicked Women Writers Rock!

Also, if you haven’t done it yet, listen to Sometimes Enough is Enough and all the WWW tails and then VOTE. Win that huge box of schwag from the www.Horroraddicts.net and The Wicked Woman Writer’s of www.Emxbox.ning.com. My story is extremely disturbing and should not be played at work or in front of your children. If you listen to Horror Addicts Episode 31 you will get some behind the scenes info from me about the story. Tons of thanks go out to Jack Hosley of www.WanderRadio.com for playing the part of Ken and running the mix for me. Send your vote to emzbox@sbcglobal.net in the subject line enter Wicked Women Writers Challenge then in the body of the email be sure you give your address so Emerian Rich can ship that big ol’ box of cool prizes. Including but not limited to Singed books (several of them) a mouse pad, cd’s, tee-shirts and so much more. It could all be yours. When this contest closes I will put this story out on my feed.

When a group of powerful women get together this is nothing they can’t do. And this is a Powerful group of Dark Goddesses!

Arlene Radasky, H.E. Roulo, Rhonda R Carpenter and Michele Roger have all done away with husbands for your entertainment. On October 7th at 7:30 pm pst we will be gathered in Second Life on Book Island in the Horror Addicts Shop, Quills at 22 Gutenberg Avenue. The Episode will go live on the Horroraddicts.net website Oct 11th.

Now I am not a huge Second Life fan but for this interview I have been playing in SL. I have learned to walk, talk and even got myself dressed and my hair stays on. I am inviting you to try something new. Come to SL and hang out with us. Hear our stories and vote for you favorite. You could win a huge box of cool stuff and show your favorite author that she has you support.

While I do hope that author will be me, but I will be happy for whoever gets the most votes. So, what do I look like in SL? Hot isn’t she! Her name is Insight Zadark.

What will you look like in your second life? My husband is a black wolf who walks next to me. He also growls at people if they get to close. It is a total riot. He even does tricks.

I hope you will all take a chance and join us for the interview and vote for your favorite author. My story is titled Sometimes Enough is Enough and I owe a big thank you to Jack Hosley of www.wanderradio.com for his portrayal of the male character in this psychological horror piece of flash fiction. He did an awesome job and said the story freaked him out for days after.

This is a graphic piece of fiction and not for children or work. I will share it on my feed after it airs on Horror Addicts.

Drum Roll Please…

I took the leap and dove head first into Smashwords.com, which now makes book 1 in The Mark of a Druid Trilogy available in all electronic print formats. A coupon that makes an E-book download only $3.99 until October 20, 2009!

This is a very exciting time to be an author as well as a reader. You can now consume books in anyway you want. Smashwords handles the E-book formats, Amazon and other online booksellers the paper and hardback versions and Podiobooks.com the serialized podcast and very soon the audio book version. So how do you want it? We got it!

Thank you for your comments and reviews and ratings!

J.D. Sawyer is Turning the Tables on the Gals of Podioracket.com

Heather Roulo and Rhonda Carpenter are going to let you snag some cool schwag!

J.D. Sawyer Author of Antithesis and Down From Ten will host a special Podioracket.com Blog Talk Radio Extension where he leads the Interview, handles the questions and callers with guests Rhonda R. Carpenter and Heather E. Roulo. Have questions for the ladies about Podioracket.com, BTR, WWW, or either of their books The Mark of a Druid and Fractured Horizon then be there LIVE at 6pm Pacific/9pm Eastern on Thursday, September 17th. Set a reminder! That is tomorrow!

How do you win?

Show up and enter the chat room or call 347-996-3319 and ask a question or comment to the authors and you could just Snag the Schwag. There will be more than three winners! Book excerpts and what ever else J.D. comes up with. Here is a hint to a secret schwag award, Ding Ding Ding, But you will have to come to the show to find out what that means! See you there Blog Talk Radio Podioracket 6:00 pm PST. Don’t be late!

August 30th, 2009

Totally a Success!

Yesterday was my first book signing and it was so much fun. When I got home after celebrating with Sushi and a fellow author, Arlene Radasky and the cover artist Amie Perry-Reavis and My husband, I got a message from Emerain Rich and she ask if she could interview me about the book signing. So instead of writing a blog about it I thought I would share a snippet from the interview that will air in full at a later date on Horror Addicts.

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It was so cool to have the staff put the sticker on my book as the Staff Pick! They also talked about doing another signing and a book club event. Very exciting to be able to be involved at a community books store. Many thanks to McCabes & Company Booksellers of Crestline, CA.

Thank you to everyone to turned out and purchased the book, came to meet me and support me. You are the reason this author will do another event like this.

My self, the cover artist and the banner out side of McCabes and Co Booksellers in Crestline in Southern California. Amie Perry-Reavis is a dear friend and an wonderful artist. You can see more of her work and buy product with her signature artistic style on her website. www.goddessprints.com. She has a fabulous series of greeting cards, reproductions and original works for sale in many forms.

Arlene Radasky the author of The Fox and my partner in BTR-Authors Read came out to show her support and I was so grateful to have her there, but what was really cool was the bookstore picked up some of her books and she sold one and I got to see her sign it.

I can’t thank everyone enough especially McCabes for supporting this local author and asking for me to come back and do it again! Must of done something right.

 
Keep writing I know I will.

Book Signing August 29th 12:00 pm to 2:00 pm

I am so excited to be doing my first book signing right here on the mountain.

Mc Cabe & CO Booksellers

•               (909) 338-1088         (909) 338-1088

Mc Cabes and Co are some of the nicest people. They truly support local authors and in this case a local artist as well, Amie Perry-Reavis. There will be a book reading and paper backs for sale. If you already have a copy bring it I will be happy to sign it. If you live in Southern California then you can enjoy a day in the mountains beating the heat. We are always 20 degrees cooler up here. Our community is nestled in the San Bernardino National Forest. After the book signing spend an hour at Lake Greggory about a quarter mile from the book store or take a short drive to Lake Arrowhead Village and make a day of it. Bring your hiking boots or off road vehicle and hit the trails it is free! Silverwood lake is less than 30 minutes from the book store. So how did this happen? Simple, I have a friend who went to the book store and said, “Do you carry The Mark of a Druid?” They said, “It is not in stock but, we can order it for you.” She then said, “She is a local author will she be having a signing here?” She kept asking when I was going to set it up. There is nothing like your friends and fans pushing for you. I was busy when we first released with my online efforts and didn’t want to invite people up when it was snowing. Hence, the end of the summer Book Signing. Escape the So Cal heat at 5000 ft while you support a local author. It is actually pretty funny how nervous I was when I went in to set it up. I took some bookmarks in to the store and asked to talk with the owner. I didn’t realize until after I walked out, with the booking in my PDA, that I couldn’t find my keys. I thought, oh great, I’m so nervous I left them inside. Then realized I didn’t need to go back in because my car was running windows down, car unlock, in the parking lot. I must have been so nervous when I parked I didn’t even turn off my car. I remember telling myself just do it all they can say is no and I jumped out of the car. I hope to see friends, colleagues, neighbors, mountain folks and of course all of the great people from down the hill, as we say up here above the clouds. Email me if you want directions or suggestions of how to spend the day in paradise. Rhonda Carpenter P.S. Contest 10 is now open come on over and join in!