Sunday 29 November 2015

MKSP Black Friday/Cyber Monday Crazy Fun Party! #prizes


Hi, I haven't been posting here for a while. I had two operations in October and I've been in the 'recovery' thing, which meant all my energy has been spent on getting myself to work and then zonking in front of the TV afterwards. Now that MUST change or I'll never write again!

Anyway, today, I'm still gonna be sitting on my butt, but hosting for an hour today at this event, organised by Kim of the MasterKoda FB group and MKSP, for Black Friday-Cyber Monday. It's a big giveaway of books, with various authors hosting every hour. 

I'm on at 6pm UK time - that's 10am PT / 1pm ET – and giving away some books... pop along if you like. 

The event link on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/1523164247975549/

There's also a big competition of grand prizes. The rafflecopter will explain all - http://ebookbargainstoday.com/rafflecopter-for-bfcm-event/


And, finally, to all you readers, if you’re looking for a bargain read, why not check out this website, where you’ll find many of the authors taking part this weekend -  http://ebookbargainstoday.com
 
Here's our line up of authors for today and Monday -

Sunday, Nov 29


Hosts:
10amPT: (6pm UK) me
11amPT: (7pm UK) Jennifer Loiske
NoonPT: Debra Shiveley Welch
1pm PT: Ey Wade


~Break~ (One hour)


3pmPT: Greta Burroughs
4pmPT: Steve Vernon
5pmPT: Candy Ann Little


Monday, Nov 30

Hosts:


2pmPT: CJ Peterson
3pmPT: Denise Ellyson
4pmPT: Wendy Siefken
5pmPT: Kimberly Hughes Smith
6pmPT: Tamy Burns

 

Wednesday 14 October 2015

Spooktacular Giveaway Hop - October 15-31 - win books!


Hi, I'm excited to be involved in the SPOOKTACULAR Giveaway Hop, hosted by I am a Reader, Not a Writer (www.iamareader.com). The hop is running from October 15-21, and there are so many blogs involved that you could gather an awesome armful of books!


 I'm giving away paperback copies of my fantasy novel The Sea Inside to 2 winners, 
and an ebook copy of Kiwi and the Living Nightmare to 10 runners-up :) 
Fellow author Greta Burroughs is giving away ebook copies of Gerald and the Wee People and  
House on Bo-Kay Lane to 2 winners. Good luck!

Winners' Prizes

The Sea Inside (paperback) by Vickie Johnstone
Book 1 in the Cerulean Songs series


"A young woman is struggling to adjust to life after a spinal cord injury when she is given a gift by a mysterious older woman. Rather than merely help Jayne adjust to her new reality, this gifts offers the potential of a completely alternate existence. Jayne finds her true love only to be dealt another cruel blow by fate. In her journey to get back her new life she must face the biggest hurdles any of us can – our own fears and doubts.  
The Sea Inside is a young adult fantasy adventure that, like the Kiwi series, takes the reader on a visit to a fantastic realm." (Review, Amazon) 
Amazon author page

Gerald and the Wee People (ebook) by Greta Burroughs
Book 1 in the Wee People series

 
Amazon book link
Amazon author page
 “A charming fantasy story, difficult to put down, and the pages and action quickly fly by.”
(Review, Amazon)

Gerald and his best friend, Vernon, literally fall into a new world when responding to a plea for help. A few years earlier, the boys discovered an unusual clearing in the woods where only Gerald had the ability to watch the daily activities taking place in a miniature village. When creatures attack it, Gerald becomes concerned about the little inhabitants he has become attached to. Inside the village, the boys face many dangers in trying to help the villagers fight the misshapen ones and fulfil a prophecy. An action-packed fantasy adventure that will keep you spellbound until the last page.


House on Bo-Kay Lane (ebook) by Greta Burroughs 
Book 2 in the Wee People series

Amazon book link
“Entertaining, imaginative, well written and lots of fun.” (Review, Amazon) 

 Gerald and Vernon believe their time with the wee people came to an end after they returned to their home world, but they have second thoughts when strange things start to happen at an abandoned house in their neighbourhood. When ghostly images of familiar faces from the wee people village are seen in the windows and echoes of voices from the past haunt the boys’ dreams, an undeniable curiosity draws them to investigate the mysterious haunted house. A special mirror and the telepathic skills of their former friends inevitably draw them back into the world of the wee people. 

Runners-up Prize
Kiwi and the Living Nightmare (ebook)
Book 3 in the Kiwi Series

Amazon book link
"Living Nightmare has just the right amount of scary bits along with humour to make it a very enjoyable read for kids of all ages." (Review, Amazon) 

 Amy, James and Kiwi embark on their spookiest adventure yet – on Halloween. What begins with an eerie dream about a three-legged cat will take the budding detectives on a quest to find an old house in the middle of the woods, meeting some perky squirrels along the way. Little do they know that there awaits an angry, restless ghost that will do anything to stop them leaving. Meanwhile, Inspector Furrball and Siam discover the human world, and that Ames and Jimster are not what they seem. 

For a chance to win, just do the Rafflecopter. Good luck! 
Click on the links below the Rafflecopter to hop to the other blogs offering fantastic prizes :)

Saturday 10 October 2015

Flash fiction 14: Forever in time #2minutesgo

Well, yesterday it was Friday and write with JD Mader over at his website, Unemployed Imagination - www.jdmader.com/2015/06/2-minutes-go. The idea is to write for 2 minutes - some people write longer - and you just go for it, without looking back and editing. Have a great weekend! :)


Forever in time

How they loved to dance. Shocking in the raw splendor of it. Bereft of shame. Watched, idolised even. Nothing punctured the air encircling them as they stepped, drifting, innocent as children on the air. You could not spy their feet; they shifted so quickly, hungry for the beat carrying them, passionate for the music to never end. It would not – forever it would wind, the notes crushing the bodies to one another, in vain trying to penetrate the flesh, to be one, as one, only one. Yet they were fated to be two, lost in time, woven together as the seconds spun. Around. In the end only a flicker remained on unraveling film before the dying light lost them to the silent screen.

copyright Vickie Johnstone, October 9, 2015
 

Thursday 8 October 2015

#NationalPoetryDay - These twisted paths we tread

A poem for National Poetry Day...

These twisted paths we tread

She slides between these walls
one foot, two feet, a hand and two
this is the space in which she lives
breathes, empties all that she is

she knows, where the eye seeks to spy
through circles drilled into the walls
the hidden, they watch, scratching idly
starving for love, the thing she lost

the ones she forgot were left behind
they hide now like ghosts in the leaves
rustling they leap upon the breeze
echoes of the past haunting mirrors

the scribe knows, he laughs sometimes
knowing all the things he does
it only makes him fail, too self-absorbed
to comprehend what she really is

the ghosts they circle inside these walls
pushing their fingers through the paper
seeking to caress the curls of her hair
twisting, she knows they linger

inside, watching where the beetle runs
trailing all his miniscule unlived lives
between the pages of a book unseen
she lived it, breathed it, all that ripples

thus she dances here alone, casting
rainbow dust upon the bleakest grey
the steel that rusts in crusts of red
rosebud offerings to the elements

laughter so raw covers an ache so deep
like a monster it yearns to spring
inside, where the waiting ends
inside, where the spiral grows

there’s a twist in the passage that eels
a malevolent darkness screams
opening the chasm that yawns awake
stealing tomorrow for its own sake

it twists, but nothing can touch her,
lost as she is in the echoes of her past.


copyright Vickie Johnstone

Sunday 6 September 2015

A Poem a Day (53): Sing


Sing



Some people sing –

It’s a sentiment I crave

Like the desolate moon

Drip-dry of felt.



These waves run to black

As I weave this rolling pattern

Shimmering to the fore

Where we forget this,

The rhythm of the day

The luster of the sky,

Blazing.



A purse lined with nothing,

Scabbed knees praying low

While the blackbird sings

To waken the dead silence

Seeping in a spiral of stars,

Edging into the mind

Where everyone forgot

How to.

copyright Vickie Johnstone

Friday 28 August 2015

A Poem a Day (52): Smoke

Well, it's been a while... and I'm rusty, but JD Mader's Unemployed Imagination site got me off my butt and writing today. Head over to his place for some inspiration :) A happy Friday to ya, whatever you're up to. 



Smoke

Grey smoke lists
Twists in the echoes
Of an endless night

Moments of indecision
Breaking under pressure
Until life pauses
Offering itself alive
To be savoured

He sees her as she is
In tunnel vision
Soft as the sea’s roar
Penetrating his shell

She seeks and finds him
Here in the dawn
A blanketed man
Raw in his openness
Hopeful of high heart
Aching to know it all

He senses
A reflection drawn
And set apart
Yet completing him
As she lifts her head
To utter a kiss

She saves his smile
A treasured thing
So fragile and fleeting
To keep her warm
On the journey back
To herself.

copyright Vickie Johnstone

Friday 7 August 2015

A Poem a Day (51): This sea

Well, it's Friday again. Been out for pizza with a lovely friend, gained some calories and lost a jacket (luckily they have it, so fingers crossed it's there tomorrow), and now it's time to write with JD Mader over at his home, Unemployed Imagination - www.jdmader.com/2015/06/2-minutes-go. The idea is to write for 2 minutes - some people write longer - and you just go for it, without looking back and editing. Head over to play or just read. Have a great weekend! :) 


This sea

It sweeps over
This sea
Drowning everything
It sees
The motion
The being
The feeling
In the in between
Secreting inside
This skin

Patience defies
It all
Gasping to be free
To be itself
In the moon tide
Restless in transit
Enlightened, fading
And rising again

The potion
Of the wisest man
Seeks to dispel
This almost knowing
Wishing for clarity
While walking
In grey
In signs still blurred
In lines in twists
Within

Scurrying forth
Beneath this sea
Washing all over
The hands beneath
We dance in circles
Sing in rhyme
Travel in the mind
To find our own kind
In the waters
Secreting our soul.

copyright Vickie Johnstone, August 7, 2015

Friday 24 July 2015

Flash fiction 13: Strokes


Well, it's Friday again, so it's time to write with JD Mader over at his home, Unemployed Imagination - www.jdmader.com/2015/06/2-minutes-go. The idea is to write for 2 minutes - some people write longer - and you just go for it, without looking back and editing. Head over to play or just read. Have a great weekend! :) This is the third piece I wrote.


Strokes

Colour. I race through colours, all of them – a dipping stream of dizzying brushstrokes zipping the majestic. Me. Just me. I am not you and neither are you me. I used to be an extension, an extra limb, a twin almost to your individuality. The echo of your words, the agreement of your thoughts, dressing in your gawky style. Looking up to you in mind and height. My idea of happiness, for you brought me this.

Skipping on the chalk lines, calling out the purple numbers drawn in curls of magic. Our feet crossing, uncrossing, jumping, stasis. Giggles. And buttercups. Those curved buckets of lemon lips and we did kiss them, but only when the daisies couldn’t see. Our first four-leaved clover, seemingly left by the whitest, brightest unicorn in the land.

Only from the other; the other world. The lies of our dreams. Fantasies worn too tightly, falling loose as we found ourselves in our growing pains. A curtsey to the future while we ran wild, chasing time itself, even as we sensed the curtain must fall one day, when the roses would cease to flood our stage with the perfume of delight.

When once upon a time faded, decay stole into this place, clouding everything in its breath. Including you, my beloved sister, wrenched from my arms before your time. I paint you here with daisies playing in your auburn hair, your elfin eyes creasing at the edges and your lips turned up in a perfect bow. Love racing through its colours. 

copyright Vickie Johnstone, July 24, 2015

Thursday 2 July 2015

Poem: Kid Summer

We're having a heatwave here in Old Blighty with temperatures up to 34C! I think I might have only felt that in Britain in my dreams! So here's a poem about summer. You can find it in my poetry book, Mind-spinning Rainbows. Cheers. Enjoy the sun! 



Kid summer


Lost in days
Strewn in sand
Feet twitch
Caressed by water
Flooding in
The in between
Lost on a horizon
Pinkly lit

Seagulls swirl
Streaks of white
A dance in time
With the tide
Beating a rhythm
Playing to none
Lost in the rays of
An egg-yolk yellow
Summer, we played
Yodelling with glee
Skipping puddles

Grey crab wakes
Shakes a claw
Laughter cracks
A dizzying spray
Salty to taste
Lips cracking
In the heat
Scrubbed by sand

Like lobsters
So red we are
Smelling of the sea
And salted earth
Trying to fly
This blood-red kite
It swoops and churns
Scaring the gulls
Squawking dismay
The wind carries
Us forwards
Jumping, leaping
Before diving
Into the blue
Lost and found
As we emerge
Currents drift
Ebb and flow

A courtesy call
This fish swimming
An orangey speck
Wiggling our feet
Swooping our legs
Circling our arms
We float
In the place
We cannot live
Like flying almost
Where the gulls dare
Losing us
To the here below
Earth bound
Sea legged
Spitting salt water
Only to gulp again
The same
Laughter spreads
Driftwood catches
Giving a rest
To weary limbs

It carries us in
Back to the voices
Of the sunned shore
A line of colourful
Stripy towels
Blowing windcheaters
Our mothers wave
Licking ice creams
The chocolate gone
As the first delight
Waving and swimming
We laugh and play
The day fading out
In the summer’s way
An echo of pink
On the horizon’s back
Towards the end
Of the earth
Flows the sea
Til it fades to black. 

Copyright Vickie Johnstone - Mind-spinning Rainbows, April 2015