Welcome to Day #2 of the WordCrafter Lingering Spirit Whispers Book Blog Tour, where we are celebrating the December 1st release of the Lingering Spirit Whispers paranormal anthology set. This unique collection of ghosties galore is a must read for all lovers of paranormal fiction. Available for pre-order now.
Lingering Spirit Whispers
We’re hanging out over at Un dawnted, where D.L. Mullen is interviewing contributing authors from the anthologies included in this set, and today’s author guest is… um… me! Kaye Lynne Booth. I have one story featured in each anthology. Un dawnted has no commenting capabilities, so please leave any comments you might have about the interview here, on Writing to be Read.
Kaye Lynne Booth lives, works, and plays in the mountains of Colorado. With a dual emphasis M.F.A. in Creative Writing, writing is more than a passion. It’s a way of life. She’s a multi-genre author, who finds inspiration from the nature around her, and her love of the old west, and other odd and quirky things which might surprise you.
She has short stories featured in the following anthologies: The Collapsar Directive (“If You’re Happy and You Know It”); Relationship Add Vice (“The Devil Made Her Do It”); Nightmareland (“The Haunting in Carol’s Woods”); Whispers of the Past (“The Woman in the Water”); Spirits of the West (“Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs”) and Where Spirits Linger (“The People Upstairs”). Her western, Delilah, her paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets, and her short story collection, Last Call, are all available in both digital and print editions.
In her spare time, she keeps up her author’s blog, Writing to be Read, where she posts reflections on her own writing, author interviews and book reviews, along with writing tips and inspirational posts from fellow writers. She’s also the founder of WordCrafterEnterprises. In addition to creating her own imprint in WordCrafter Press, she offers quality author services, such as editing, social media & book promotion.
In Whispers of the Past, my story is “The Woman in the Water”.
In Spirits of the West, my story is “Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs”.
In Where Spirits Linger, my story is “The People Upstairs”.
Thank you for joining us for Day #1 of the WordCrafter Lingering Spirit Whispers Book Blog Tour. This tour celebrates not one, but three different anthologies offered together in one anthology set. This unique paranormal set combines three paranormal anthologies into a single set for ghosties galore. A must have for lovers of paranormal fiction.
Whispers of the Past
As you may know, every year WordCrafter Press runs a short fiction contest, and each year there is a resulting anthology. For 2019, it was Whispers of the Past, with paranormal stories from contributing authors including myself, Roberta Eaton Cheadle, Stevie Turner, Laurel McHargue, Julie Goodswen and author of the winning story, Jeff Bowles.
Spirits of the West
For 2020, it was Spirits of the West, with western paranormal stories from contributing authors including myself, Roberta Eaton Cheadle, Jeff Bowles, Arthur Rosch, Tom Johnson, and author of the winning story, Enid Holden.
Where Spirits Linger
For 2021, it was Where Spirits Linger, with paranormal tales from contributing authors including myself, Roberta Eaton Cheadle, Stevie Turner, Enid Holden, S.L. Kretschmer, and author of the winning story, Christa Planko.
You can get all three in one anthology set, Linger Spirit Whispers, to be released on December 1 and available for pre-order now.
Lingering Spirit Whispers
And join us for the tour to learn more about the stories contained within these three paranormal anthologies and their authors. D.L. Mullen will be doing interviews on her Un dawnted blog site Monday through Thursday and we will finish up her with a guest post from 2021 contest winner, Christa Planko discussing the inspiration behind her winning story, “Olde-Tyme Village”, featured in Where Spirits Linger. Un dawnted does not have comments enabled, but feel free to post any comments you have on the interviews here. Interviews with authors Roberta Eaton Cheadle, Kaye Lynne Booth, Stevie Turner and Jeff Bowles will be featured. I hope you will join us today and follow us through the rest of the tour.
Today’s author guest is contributing author Stevie Turner, who has stories in two out of three anthologies included in this set.
Stevie Turner is a British author of suspense, paranormal, women’s fiction family dramas and darkly humorous novels, and likes to find subjects to write about that are not often covered. Stevie is married and lives in the wilds of East Anglia, England, and enjoys cycling about the countryside when she is not busy writing.
Her story “Partners in Time” is featured in Whispers of the Past – a paranormal romance where past and present cross.
And her story “David’s Revenge” is featured in Where Spirits Linger – a tale of revenge from the grave.
To wrap-up the WordCrafter Where Spirits Linger Book Blog Tour, we have a guest post by contributing author, S.L. Kretschmer about the inspiration behind her story, “The Final Portrait”. I hope you all have enjoyed following this tour with us. Don’t forget to leave a comment. Every comment at each stop earns an entry into a random drawing for a free digital copy of Where Spirits Linger.
Guest post by S.L. Kretschmer, author of The Final Portrait
The Final Portrait evolved from prompts I received in round 1 of the 2020 NYC Midnight Short Story Competition – Ghost story, a monument, deodorant. My mind immediately flew to the Western Front of World War I and the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme in Northern France. I was fortunate to have visited the memorial in 2011, boarding a bus in the French town of Lille, and travelling south towards the battlefields. Little could prepare me for the emotion I felt on the trip. The scars across the landscape, now lush and green, could be easily identified, and it was not difficult to imagine the horrific scenes of trench warfare.
Thiepval Memorial
I began to research World War I paintings and came across a particularly moving one by the Irish artist William Orpen. Orpen was an official World War I Artist, and his depiction of a soldier, bloodied and lying in an alien landscape, devoid of nature and pitted with craters and pools of fetid water, was confronting. Orpen struggled with the brutality and grisly sights he documented for those back home and claimed to have been struck by a phantom force while painting in an abandoned field.
William Orpen
These nuggets of information were gelling into a thought. What would those painted in death have thought of the depiction? Of family and friends who might recognize their loved one? Of who they were, compared to how they are remembered in this final rendering? The Final Portrait.
The Final Portrait, by S.L. Kretschmer
S. L. Kretschmer is a born and bred South Australian, recently embracing both a tree change and becoming an empty nester in the beautiful wine region of the Barossa Valley. She has a BA in Creative Writing, and Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies. Her stories have been featured in the anthologies A Flash of Brilliance and Tales from the Upper Room, and have also been published by Haunted Waters Press, Two Sisters Publishing, 101 Words,Beyond Words Literary Magazine, Bluing the Blade and inScribe Literary Journal.
Thanks for joining us today! And if you missed any of the blog stops along the way, you can find them at the links below. Drop by and catch the ones you missed, and leave a comment to let us know you were there and get a chance for the free didgital copy of Where Spirits Linger.
Sept. 20 – Intro./Enid’s promo – Writing to be Read/Review – Undawnted
For Day 5 of the WordCrafter Where Spirits Linger Book Blog Tour brings us a guest post by contributing author, Stevie Turner about her story, “David’s Revenge”, on Zigler’s News and a review by Victoria Zigler. Please join us to learn more about this author and her story. Leave a comment and earn a chance to win a free digital copy of Where Spirits Linger.
Day 3 of the WordCrafter Where Spirits Linger Book Blog Tour finds us over at Patty’s World with a guest post from me! Join us to learn about the inspiriation behind my story, “The People Upstairs”, which is included in the newly released paranormal anthology.
Exciting news! The 2021 WordCrafter Paranormal Anthology, Where Spirits Linger, was released today! And we’re launching a six-day blog tour to send this delightfully eerie anthology off to a great start. Each blog tour stop will feature a guest post by one of the authors about their story, and there will also be an interview of Christa Planko, author of the winning story in the 2021 WordCrafter Short Fiction Contest, “Olde-Tyme Village”. So, I hope you will stay with us and follow the tour this week to learn more about this wonderful anthology and its featured stories. Many thanks to the wonderful bloggers who have graciously agreed to host for this tour.
This is Day 1 of the WordCrafter Where Spirits Linger Book Blog Tour, so let me tell you just a little about the stories featured in this anthology and their authors. Since I published this wonderful anthology, I can’t really offer a review, but you can find a review by D.L. Mullen on her blog, Undawnted, here: http://www.undawnted.com/2021/09/wordcrafter-blog-tour-where-spirits.html
The winning story in the 2021 WordCrafter Paranormal Short Fiction Contest was Christa Planko with her story of ghostly encounters, “Olde-Tyme Village”. Robbie Cheadle will be interviewing Christa about her winning story on Thursday on her blog, Roberta Writes.
Where Spirits Linger Authors
In Roberta Eaton Cheadle’s story, “Listen to Instructions”, a greedy man misses the message a ghost is trying to convey. You can find out more about this story in Roberta’s guest post tomorrow on, The Showers of Blessings, along with a review by Miriam Hurdle.
In my story, “The People Upstairs”, when a young girl inherits her housekeeper and long time friend’s house, she finds out that her friend may not have been crazy after all, when strange things start happening to her. You will find my guest post about the inspiration behind this story on Patty Fletcher’s Patty’s World on Wednesday.
Stevie Turner’s spirit gets his takes out his revenge from the ethereal regions in “David’s Revenge”. Her guest post will be featured on Friday on Zigler’s News along with a review by Victoria Zigler.
And on Saturday, we will finish off the tour right here, on Writing to be Read with a guest post by S.L. Kretschmer about her story, “The Final Portrait”, in which her character releases a spirit with a phantom image.
Unfortunately, Enid Holden was not able to participate in the tour and tell you about her story, “The Chosen Few”. But, I can tell you that it is a delightful paranormal charactered by some very colorful spirits whose co-existance with their home’s living inhabitants will surprise and delight you. This light and humorous story is sure to evoke a chuckle or two. I will include the excerpt from her story here.
The Chosen Few, by Enid Holden
I’m pleased with the selection of stories we eneded up with in Where Spirits Linger. We have some great contributing authors and some wonderful short stories. I hope you will stay with us and follow the tour to each blog stop to learn more about the stories within to picque your interest. Of course, I hope you buy the book, but each comment you make along the way earns an entry into a random drawing for a free digital copy of Where Spirits Linger, so you could be our next lucky winner!
You can purchase your copy of Where Spirits Linger here:
We’re wrapping up the WordCrafter Behind Closed Doors Book Blog Tour over at Zigler’s News with a guest post by poet and author Robbie Cheadle and a review by Victoria Zigler. Please join us to learn a bit more about the author and her book.
Day 4 of the WordCrafter Behind Closed Doors Book Blog Tour finds us over at Miriam Hurdle’s Showers of Blessings blog site with a guest post by author and poet Robbie Cheadle and a lovely review of Robbie’s latest book, Behind Closed Doors, a collection of unusual poetry. Drop in and learn more about this fascinating poetry collection and its author.
For Day 3 of the WordCrafter Behind Closed Doors Book Blog Tour we’re over at This is My Truth Now with James Cudney and a guest post from author and poet, Robbie Cheadle and a wonderful review of Behind Closed Doors. Please join us to learn more about this author and her wonderful poetry collection.
Day 2 of the WordCrafter Behind Closed Doors Book Blog Tour brings us another wonderful guest post by author and poet Robbie Cheadle and a review by DL Mullen. After you enjoy the guest post below, please pop on over to DL Mullen’s Undawnted blog site to check out her review:
Behind Closed Doors, a collection of unusual poems blog tour – Day 2
Do you want it enough? is a freestyle poem I wrote while contemplating why it is that some people and/or poets are prolific and manage to get a number of books, short stories and/or poems published while others don’t. It is not a question of talent generally, as many writers and poets who don’t publish their work are incredibly talented.
So what holds some writers and poets back?
This poem captured my ultimate view that it depends on the determination, resilience, and drive of the person in question. Publishing a book or any other work is a massive effort and requires numerous re-writes and edits. Once that process is complete, there is still the typesetting and final proofing phase to undergo before you can hit the publish button.
I also believe that there must be an acceptance that a piece of work will never be completely perfect. I have realised that I must accept a 96% perfection level in order to get a book finalised for printing and publishing. No matter how hard I try or how many times I read my work and get other people to read it and edit it for me, I always find a few typos and punctuations after the book has gone live. That is that nature of writing and is almost impossible to avoid. The fact that I detect typos and errors in traditionally published books gives me some comfort in this respect.
These ideas of mine resulted in the following poem.
What are your thoughts on perfection in publishing and the road to publication? Let me know in the comments.
Book blurb
Behind Closed Doors
What goes on behind closed doors: in the boardroom, after death, in the home, during lockdown, and in nature? This collection of poems, ranging from rhyming verse to twisted nursery rhymes, captures the emotions and thoughts people hide behind the masks they present to the world.
What thoughts are hidden
Behind her immobile face
Quite expressionless
Eyes cold and indifferent
Scrutinising me – hawk like
This book includes some of Robbie Cheadle’s spectacular fondant art and cakes.
Robbie Cheadle author bio
Robbie Cheadle is a South African children’s author and poet with 9 children’s books and 1 poetry book.
The 7 Sir Chocolate children’s picture books, co-authored by Robbie and Michael Cheadle, are written in sweet, short rhymes which are easy for young children to follow and are illustrated with pictures of delicious cakes and cake decorations. Each book also includes simple recipes or biscuit art directions which children can make under adult supervision.
Robbie has also published 2 books for older children which incorporate recipes that are relevant to the storylines.
Robbie has 2 adult novels in the paranormal historical and supernatural fantasy genres published under the name Roberta Eaton Cheadle. She also has short stories in the horror and paranormal genre and poems included in several anthologies.
Robbie writes a monthly series for https://writingtoberead.com called Growing Bookworms. This series discusses different topics relating to the benefits of reading to children.