The summer is over, the Labor Day Holiday barbecues are a recent memory, and a very sad 25th Anniversary of the 9/11 attacks has passed. What is next you ask?

HALLOWEEN!

Headstones are not scary, though. This photo is of me and the grave of my my great grandfather John Olaf Johnson. After leaving Sweden, he arrived in America as a seaman on a ship,

Without young children in our family in these parts, we decorate the house and sometimes hand out candy. It is a way to meet your neighbors or see how big the kids have grown. We have a lovely neighborhood with plenty of families of all ages. 

Have a SCARY good time!

Nancy Lee Badger

The Scots and Witches say SAMHAIN

 

It is the Halloween season and my neighbors have decorated their homes. Me? A sign in my yard and a pumpkin on the porch are my additions. 

In other parts of the world, the night of Halloween is called All Hallow's Eve. In the Celtic world, where many of my books are set, Halloween was called Samhain. (Check out these books: My Honorable Highlander, Dragon Bites, and Smoke). 

Samhain originated in ancient Europe as a Celtic holiday, but today, it is an event that is celebrated worldwide. It's a pagan holiday that acknowledges the end of the harvest and honors the changing of the seasons, with cold weather right around the corner.

Another reason I love the fall season are the colors...orange, pumpkin, amber, gold...colors that will decorate the house until we celebrate Thanksgiving Day (November 28th). 

Sorry...I went off-topic. While Halloween does have roots in Samhain, they are not the same thing. Samhain is still celebrated today by various groups including Wiccans and there are many ways in which the festival is celebrated. There are not only group rituals, but single rituals as well.

Whether you celebrate with kids in costumes that roam the neighborhood, or simply enjoy the changing of the leaves or your neighbors' spooky homes, enjoy the change of seasons (and a little bit of chocolate!)

Nancy Lee Badger 🎃

If I was a Kid This Halloween...

...I would dress up in an awesome costume and terrorize... I mean, visit my neighbors in Raleigh, North Carolina. When I was a little girl, I would beg my parents for one of these fabulous costumes I found on Amazon.com  

Roy Rogers, Sky King, and The Lone Ranger were big on our little black & white TVs so who wouldn't want to be a COWBOY?

The Wizard of Oz was my favorite movie and we kids watched it on Thanksgiving Day. The tornado was so scary, but the characters were great. My favorite was DOROTHY. 

Then I had kids and I was on the other end, but kids everywhere might love to be... 

Severus Snape from the Harry Potter series. Villains work well on Halloween, or what the Celtic families of Scotland called Samhain. What about a NINJA?

And...who doesn't love a PIRATE (which is why my hero in THE ROGUES RING is one). A little birdie told me my adult son is dressing up as one for an upcoming Halloween celebration. GO ERIC!

I will be giving out candy this year as our neighborhood is bursting with young children. (No chocolate, so I will not be sneaking pieces). Enjoy the holiday!

*this Blog uses Amazon Affiliate links

HAPPY HALLOWEEN & SAMHAIN!

Halloween is just a couple of days away. In the Celtic world, where my book A Gift from the Sea is set, Halloween was called Samhain. 

Samhain originated in ancient Europe as a Celtic holiday, but today, it is an event that is celebrated worldwide. It's a pagan holiday that acknowledges the end of the harvest and honors the changing of the seasons, with cold weather right around the corner.

While Halloween does have roots in Samhain, they are not the same thing. Samhain is still celebrated today by various groups including Wiccans and there are many ways in which the festival is celebrated. There are not only group rituals, but single rituals as well.

Whether you celebrate with kids in costumes, roaming the neighborhood, or simply enjoy the changing of the leaves (such as these in my front yard), take care and enjoy the change of seasons. 

Nancy Lee Badger

On the Road Again with Michele Drier and SNAP

On the Road Again

It’s closing in on Halloween and time I put on my costume.

That’s right, I dress up like an author.

What does an author look like? A bit frazzled, somewhat frantic, putting on a happy face while begging “please buy my book.”

Maybe it’s because of the long summer when much of California takes a vacation away from the heat, but every year September, October and into November is the travel season. The one where you load up the trunk of your car with books and hit the appearance road.

This year it began in New Orleans with two panels at Bouchercon, the world’s oldest and largest mystery fan and author convention. As the co-chair for Bouchercon 2020, here in Sacramento, I spent six days taking notes, shadowing people, being on panels, talking, talking talking. I was reacquainted with old friends, met some new ones and came home exhausted.

The Great Valley Book Fest

with (left to right)

Catriona McPherson

Cindy Sample

Cherie O'Boyle

Michele Drier

moderator Danna Wilberg

Packed up the car and took off for a presentation in Fresno, 170 miles south. Home again, I reloaded the car and drove to Manteca (50 miles south) for the Great Valley Book Fest, a one-day fair of all thing bookish. Talked to a lot of people, met William Kent Kruger, award-winning author of Ordinary Grace.

Then closer to home, I drove to Face in a Book, an independent book store in El Dorado Hills to take part in a Sisters in Crime mystery panel. I’m the president of the local Sisters chapter, Capitol Crimes, and with four other members, regaled the audience with tales of being a writer. How do you come up with your plots? Do you have a regular writing schedule? Are you like your characters?

Odd, no one asked what we wear to write in. They probably knew that a writer’s uniform is jammies…or in my case either a t-shirt or sweatshirt, depending on the temperature. One author confessed to writing every morning in her recliner and another said she stands at her kitchen counter. Me? I sit in my office and stare, waiting for inspiration to leap out from the walls.

I‘m winding up this sprint on Nov. 5 when I teach a writing class at a local Adult Ed program.

At the bookstore, I fell into conversation with a young woman who’s just finished her first novel, a YA coming-of-age set in the supernatural. I gave her some resources, encouraged her to polish her book and to see it through to be published. Having the passion to write, to finish a novel, or short story or essay is a wonderful thing. And to sell it, to share your stories with others, to amuse, challenge, scare, teach others through the persuasion of your own words is heady stuff.

But being a writer is scary, also. Putting your thoughts, ideas and words out there for perfect strangers. Letting people you don’t know into your world. And then hoping they’ll pay to hear and read that story, those words.

And what’s even more scary? I still have a trunk full of books in my car.

I tell myself that John Grisham and Stephenie Meyer started out this way.

Book Blurb

In book nine of the Kandesdky Vampire Chronicles, Maxie Gwenoch, LA-based media star, VP for International Planning for the multi-national gossip conglomerate, SNAP, has finally agreed to marry Jean-Louis Kandesky, a 500-year-old Hungarian vampire a leader of the family that owns SNAP.

Is marriage a big change? Not as big as the fact that Maxie is now a vampire, as well. When munitions from the Kandesky Enterprises weapons plant in Slovakia turn up at the bombing of a Royal's house in England, Jean-Louis and his "brother," Nik, are hot on the trail of shadowy terrorist groups dealing in international weapons sales. Are the Kandesky arms being sold to terrorists groups? Should Maxie use her new-found vampire strengths to ferret out the scum?

More About the Author

Michele Drier was born in Santa Cruz and is a fifth generation Californian. She’s lived and worked all over the state, calling both Southern and Northern California home.  During her career in journalism—as a reporter and editor at daily newspapers—she won awards for producing investigative series.

She is the president of Capitol Crimes, the Sacramento chapter of Sisters in Crime, and the co-chair of Bouchercon 2020.

Her Amy Hobbes Newspaper Mysteries are Edited for Death, (called “Riveting and much recommended” by the Midwest Book Review), Labeled for Death and Delta for Death.

Her paranormal romance series, The Kandesky Vampire Chronicles, was the best paranormal vampire series of 2014 from the Paranormal Romance Guild. The series is SNAP: The World Unfolds, SNAP: New Talent, Plague: A Love Story, Danube: A Tale of Murder, SNAP: Love for Blood, SNAP: Happily Ever After?, SNAP: White Nights,  SNAP: All That Jazz, and SNAP: I, Vampire.

Visit her facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/AuthorMicheleDrier, her website www.micheledrier.com or her Amazon author page, http://www.amazon.com/Michele-Drier/e/B005D2YC8G/