Category: - Mell Eight's Writing Blog

Out Now: The Oracle's Flame

11/20/2013

The Oracle's Flame is now available! Buy it today:

The Kingdom of Altnoia is on the cusp of civil war. The king and heir have been murdered, the throne taken by their uncle, and the kingdom's only hope lies with Prince Edan who has been missing for the past year. The Oracle appoints her new Dragon of Fire one task: Find Prince Edan and keep him alive.

It should have been a simple task, but Dragon did not anticipate that Prince Edan would hide away on a pirate ship, forcing Dragon not only to endure pirates, but sea-sickness and his fear of water. And nothing, not even the Oracle, could have prepared him for the twins and the complicated feelings they spark.

The Oracle's Flame: The Writing Process

11/11/2013

I was writing a short story for LT3's If You're Reading This anthology call. The theme was a message in a bottle. My immediate thought was, what if I sent a message from beyond? As the plot began to unfold in my head I had images of the prophetess at Delphi, breathing in toxic fumes that made her high and possibly able to predict the future. That idea became the basic premise for the story I was writing. An Oracle receives a message from beyond the Veil of Time about a prince besieged by treachery in need of a little help to regain his throne.

So I had a message received, which meant I had to figure out a way for the message to be answered. I turned again to Delphi, where heroes were given important quests to complete. Why couldn't I do the same? The Dragon of Fire was the perfect hero, a young man just coming of age with a thirst to prove himself. I added in a dash of magic, some pirates, and an evil king to give the story some depth, and voila The Oracle's Flame was born. I had written phrases like: "Message received" and "Message properly responded to" in order to fit with the theme and I submitted it to LT3.

To my surprise, a few weeks later LT3 sent me back a rejection letter. I'm paraphrasing, but the email basically said they liked the story, but it wasn't a good fit for the anthology and they saw potential in it for a series or at least a longer work. I reread the email and I realized they were probably correct and my surprise was unwarranted. The added, theme based, phrases weren't doing much for the story and I did have a possible idea for a second story set in that world. So I agreed with LT3 that The Oracle's Flame should be released on its own, with no anthology connections.

If The Oracle's Flame was supposed to be a series, then I thought I ought to start writing the second book, The Oracle's Hatchling. My fledgling idea began to take shape on the page--another quest dictated by the Oracle and another hero to bring justice to the world--but I realized that there wasn't any depth to the series as a whole. Flame and Hatchling were two disparate stories that just happened to be set in the same world, which doesn't really make a cohesive series. By that time I had an idea about book three, The Oracle's Golem, so I set aside Hatchling to start work on Golem while I thought about how to tie everything together. Then I got the first round of edits for The Oracle's Flame back from my editor.

The first things that had to go in the editing process were those awkward "message in a bottle" phrases, but with those gone I didn't have any reason for the Oracle to send out her hero on a quest. As I was trying to figure out how to fix that rather glaring plot issue, a light bulb went on. The Oracle sent her Dragon of Fire out to combat evil, but what if his battle was only one fight in an entire war? What if Hatchling and subsequently Golem were other battles in that war, the fighting of which could carry the series to the end? So I started writing again. I eventually added an entire prologue to The Oracle's Flame and little tidbits here and there to really start building the series. With the plot-hole gone, The Oracle's Flame was ready for publishing. It arrives in stores on November 20th and is available for preorder right now. I hope you enjoy it!

The Oracle's Flame will be released on November 20, 2013.
It is currently available for preorder at LT3 and at All Romance ebooks.

The Oracle's Hatchling will be released on March 5, 2014.

The Oracle's Golem is currently in the writing process.

Don't forget to check out The Oracle's Flame giveaway too!

News: Pre-Order, Editing, and voting

10/3/2013

10/3/13

Bloody Kiss is available for pre-order. You can get 15% off if you buy before October 9! Make sure to check out all the other great vampire books, including Bundle 2 which has six wonderful books, mine included.
The edits for Oracle's Flame are completed and back with LT3 for final formatting. It will also be ready for pre-order within the next month or so.
I am currently editing Wings of the Stars, my submission for LT3's Mecha anthology. I don't yet have any information on release dates (mostly because the anthology call just closed), but when I do I'll make sure to post it here.
Finding the Wolf is one of LGBT Fantasy's October books of the month! Yay! I hope they like it. Thank you to everyone who voted.
It doesn't look good for the Dragon's Hoard or Road to Revenge at the Rainbow Awards cover contest, but I think you can still vote if you want. (I don't see anything stating that the poll is closed.) Thanks to everyone for their support and thank you to the amazing cover artists who made it possible for both books to get into round two!
I haven't heard anything about Magnified, but I'm sure it's somewhere on LT3's submissions reading list. It's still early to hear back, but I'm hoping they like it.

News: End of Summer Writing Plans

9/3/2013

9/03/13

Happy September everyone! I hope the end of summer treats you well. It's certainly treating me well so far! Here's all my good news:
First and foremost, yesterday was the very last day of my crazy summer job. I will suddenly have so much more time for writing that I don't know what might happen. Hopefully I'll be able to get a lot of books written in my Oracle series. I'm also planning on getting my Trickster's Eye series off the ground, I need to keep working on Road to Home, the sequel to Road to Revenge, and I've started a new story called Kelpie Blue that is going to require a ton of research but will be totally awesome!
Wings of the Stars has been unofficially accepted. Yay!
The edits for The Oracle's Flame are sitting on my desktop, staring at me. I've had to set them aside for a while until I get more of the series as a whole fleshed out. The first book is such an important stepping stone that if I don't wait on the final edits I'm worried I'll mess up something crucial for book three. I think I'm finally getting to a point where I'm comfortable letting the edits go, so I'll be working on those again soon!
My final bit of news is that while Road to Revenge did not come in first in the July cover contest at the Rainbow Awards, it did pass on to round two! I'll keep an eye out for the start of round two when we can all vote for The Dragon's Hoard and Road to Revenge again!

News:

5/15/2013

I have succumbed to the masses and have created a twitter account. I was avoiding twitter for as long as possible, yet LT3 was writing such lovely things about my books that I wanted to share. I couldn't stay away any longer. If anyone would like to follow me on twitter, where I will be a bit more explicit on what I'm working on at the moment, please feel free. @MellEight

Melting the Ice Witch is still available for preorder at LT3. Click HERE to reserve your copy for a 15% off discounted price. Only three more weeks until official publication!
The Dragon's Hoard is now up on Goodreads! Expected publication is this June. Check it out.
I've started talking covers with LT3 about The Oracle's Flame, Paint Guns Money & Love, and Bloody Kiss. I'm expecting great things for these three great stories! I'll keep you updated whenever the covers come out.

News:

5/2/2013

News:

There's been a lot of fun things happening recently. Number one is I finished and submitted my story for LT3's Proud to be a Vampire anthology. My story is called Bloody Kiss and it's cute. I think you'll enjoy it! I will post when I know whether it's been accepted and when any release dates are made available.
I now have an official summary for Road to Revenge. Check it out! I worked very hard on this story, so even though the edits are fighting me every step of the way it's definitely one of my favorites. It's quite a bit different from The Dragon's Hoard series, but that's what sets it apart.
Stealing the Dragon missed being on M/M Romance's May Book of the Month list by just one vote. I'm honored that Stealing was being considered next to so many other great books. Thanks to everyone who participated.
I've started talking about covers for The Oracle's Flame and for Paint, Guns, Money, & Love. I can't wait to see what the artists come up with! I'll add them here when they're done.

News

3/8/2013

3/08/13

Was my story, The Oracle's Flame, accepted by LT3? Sort of. They told me they loved it, but it wasn't quite right for the If You're Reading This Anthology. They still want to publish it, which is awesome and exciting. I'm looking forward to fleshing the story out a bit more now that it's to be a full ebook!

Melting the Ice Witch is back with my editor. This is the hardest editing job of all four books because it's the last one and I want to do it right. I think it will turn out to be excellent!

Have you seen the new cover for Road to Revenge?

Have a look! Do you see how shiny it is!

I'm writing a lot right now, but not for the projects I need to be working on. Isn't it funny how that works? I have an excellent idea for LT3's Vampire Anthology and I haven't even put a single word on a page because I've been working on Paint, Guns, Money, & Love instead. PGML is an old story I've had kicking around on my computer for years. I've added a little here and there every so often, but this time when I popped it open a couple thousand words erupted. If I finish writing it within the next week, yay, but if not it'll have to be forced into hiding for a while longer so I can work on things with a time limit first.

News

3/1/2013

3/01/13

I have a new website! I finally got fed up enough with google sites that I dumped them and moved to weebly. Check it out!
The Oracle's Flame has been submitted to LT3's If You're Reading This Anthology. I'll let you know if they accept it or not, but I'm not worried. The story has pirates and twins! How could they not love it?!?
I'm working hard on the edits for Melting the Ice Witch. It's the final story in the series so I really want it to go well. Keep an eye out for it in June!

News

2/20/2013

2/20/13

My blog tour and giveaway was a huge success! I really enjoyed visiting other blogs and the giveaway had a great response. Thank you to everyone who participated!
I am so close to finishing my submission to LT3's If You're Reading This anthology, The Oracle's Flame. I have a final scene to write and the editing to do. Can I finish it by the deadline in eight days? Well, I'm certainly going to try really hard!
The edits for Me lting the Ice Witch are sitting in my inbox right now! I've made an executive decision to finish The Oracle's Flame first before I tackle this next big project, but they're sitting there taunting me.
You can now follow me on Facebook! Please stop by!