Tonight at 7:00 at the Athens Barnes and Noble, I will be leading a book club on Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.
If you’re in the area come join us! If not, there’s another way to participate. Post comments below with discussion prompts and your thoughts on the book.
The hero’s journey pops up in virtually every story ever told. So it’s important to get at least a basic familiarity with the major steps. I’ve compiled a list of blogs I’ve written on the topic.
The first thing established in the hero’s journey is the ordinary world. Sometimes called the slice of life, this sets up what the day to day life of the hero looks like before he or she receives their call to adventure. The call to adventure is the moment when everything changes. The known becomes unknown, and whether the hero accepts the call or not, this is the point where they enter the extraordinary world.
The hero then embarks on the road of trials, where their skills will manifest in surprising ways and they’ll slowly build confidence in their emerging abilities until they meet with utter failure at the moment they needed success most. Typically there’s a death here and we enter the darkest part of the journey, the belly of the whale.
This moment is what separates heroes from villains. See, a good bad guy had their own journey. But when they reached their low point, they didn’t find humility and a new determination to succeed. They missed the transformation into a hero. When all the skills, lessons, and red herrings along the way come together to matter in a big way. The journey ends with the road back, often fraught with its own perils to show just how much the hero has changed and how far they’ve come.
There are seventeen steps to the hero’s journey. I’ve only covered a handful, but there are tons of great resources out there for aspiring writers. Here’s a few of my favorites.
Hero with a Thousand Faces, by Joseph Campbell. This is THE source book about the hero’s journey. If you really want to learn all the intricacies of the journey, start here.
The Hero’s Journey in Game of Thrones: Jon Snow breaks down Snow’s journey. You can pretty much type in hero’s journey in insert any movie, book, show here and get the steps broken down. But this blog had some great visual resources as well.
The Writer’s Journey breaks down the steps and includes guidelines for writers to adapt the hero’s journey into novel form.
I know for many of my readers, school started weeks ago, and for many more school has not yet started. But today was my daughter’s first day back to school. She’s starting the first grade! I can’t believe how big she’s gotten.
Good luck to everyone this school year. I hope it’s a great one. Now I’m off to be all emotional about my baby growing up.
Aphrodite 3 has a name! As many of you know, I was struggling with this one for a long time. And I love all your suggestions! I feel terrible not using them, it’s not your fault. They were all great titles, but I gave the wrong parameters.
Originally, my naming pattern for the Aphrodite series was going to be based on which person she’s with the most for that book, because Aphrodite (my character, I can’t speak for the goddess) tends to define herself by who she’s with. So I was going to do Venus and Adonis, Love and War, and end with Aphrodite.
But, my publisher felt that broke the naming pattern I’d established with the Persephone series where all the names were titles that also fit the context of the book. Not just for the sake of the pattern, but because naming the first book of the trilogy Venus and Adonis sets up an expectation for 1. her name to be Venus, so instant confusion on page one paragraph one when she’s called something else (not because no one would instantly recognize that Aphrodite equals Venus, but because it makes it look like I’m going more into Roman territory for the series, like Rick Riordan did. It sets up a false expectation for the reader), and 2. that she and Adonis are end game. Those were all super valid points, so book one was renamed Aphrodite, Love and War was unaffected, and I’ve been struggling to name book 3 for years.
See, I was convinced I needed to have the word beauty in the title to fit the naming pattern I’d established. But nothing sounded right because the names have to do more than fit the pattern. They have to fit the book, and there’s nothing about the third book that relates to beauty. The fact that Aphrodite is the goddess of beauty matters less and less as her series goes on. And I thought anything to do with Venus was out the window because of the whole name confusion thing. But when I casually mentioned I wish it wasn’t because this name had been knocking around in my head (for years) they jumped on it. It’s enough into the series and not after a break in direction that it won’t establish any false promises, and it fits the book.
So super long story short, Aphrodite 3– Untitled is now named Venus Rising!
This summer, I finally dipped my toe into the wonderful world of author appearances. I spoke on a panel at Jordan Con, went to a local author event at my local library, and participated in B-Fest at Barnes and Noble. I’ve got to say, it’s kind of addictive. I’ve been on the lookout for author events ever since. Here’s a brief summary of each one.
I didn’t plan for this to be an author appearance. I went for Brandon Sanderson and a pitch panel. But while I was there I noticed a local author panel on the agenda, and asked the coordinator how I might get involved in the future. To my surprise, she invited me to participate that day. Fortunately, I had my books on hand (I’ve learned to always keep a box in my trunk, you’d really be surprised how often it’s come in handy).
It was a small gathering of people, but they had great questions (mostly about the publishing process), and I met a fantastic author named Michael J Allen (check out his books here) and a few other people from my hometown, Columbus Georgia, which was a nice surprise (Jordan Con was in Atlanta).
All in all, this was the perfect panel to break the ice with this whole in person thing. I didn’t have time to get nervous, there weren’t a lot of people so it was really more conversational than speechish, and I met some great people. I’ve already talked to them about going back next year.
My library held an ice cream social meet and greet for people to meet local authors. This was a bit more crowded. There were four authors, counting myself, so people would go table to table, eating ice cream and talking. Again, most of the questions were on writing in general, but that’s fine. I can talk about writing all day. Plus I sold a few books, met some great local authors (Grady Thrasher, an amazing children’s writer who really hit it off with my daughter, Erica Jantzen, a super friendly writer of women’s fiction, and the amazing Phyl Campbell, an incredibly prolific writer who I convinced to join my writers’ group.) I sold a few books and got my books into more library branches here, made some author friends, and met some teenaged writers who are seriously going places.
I’m glad I had some events under my belt before I went to this, because I had a better idea of what to expect. This was my first official signing, but mostly it was an author talk. I didn’t have the safety net of other authors this time, it was just me, the amazing staff at Barnes and Noble, and ten teenage girls all dressed up for the Selection Prom (the event prior to mine). I’d met one of the girls before. She was a fan who’d reached out to me via my daughter’s gymnastics coach, so we’d grabbed coffee and I signed her books. I was so glad she was there because she always has great questions and great book recommendations. But I shouldn’t have been nervous, because the other girls were all just as excited about reading. This time instead of talking about the publishing and writing process, we just talked about books. My books, other books on Greek mythology, and then YA books and trends in general. I can talk about books all day.
I sold and signed a ton of books, and I got my books on the shelf in Barnes and Noble, so that was pretty awesome.
In person events are great. I really enjoyed meeting readers and writers, no matter what side of the table they were on. The biggest benefit I got out of these events was having done the events, if that makes sense. Author signings and appearances were this kind of nebulous thing always floating around inside my head. I worried about what would happen if no one came, if I didn’t have anything to talk about, or just being in front of a crowd in general. But those concerns were ill-founded. My audience is young adults. I’ve taught in a classroom full of teenagers held against their will until the bell rang. In comparison, chatting with teens who are willingly hanging out because they’re excited about reading is a cake walk (not to mention a thousand times more fun). I learned that a small turn out isn’t a bad thing, it gives you the opportunity to really get to know the people who did come. As for being nervous about running out of stuff to talk about, my books, books in general, and writing are endless sources of conversation for me, so that was a silly concern.
I can’t wait to find more events.
The love story of Psyche and Cupid is perhaps one of my favorite myths outside of the Persephone story. There are echoes of it all over the fairy tales and modern literature. I wrote a blog series on it a while back, and now I’m putting the posts together all in one place.
I began with Psyche’s backstory before she met Cupid (or Eros). Then I talked about the strange marriage, which lasted right up until Psyche looked upon Cupid’s face. Doing so broke all kinds of divine rules, and if Psyche wanted to be reunited with her husband ever again, she needed to complete a series of trials (post 1, post 2, post 3).
Enjoy.
A few weeks ago, I posted my favorite litograph shirts, which are shirts made up of the words of different books. This week, I thought I’d share my favorite writing t-shirts. So here they are in no particular order. One day I hope to own them all.
These shirts came from two different websites. Tee-Spring and SunFrog. Check them out.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve been writing about each step of the Snowflake Method, with examples of how I’ve used it in my own work. I’m really excited about drafting this way, and it’s been very helpful with Aphrodite book 3.
Here’s all the posts I’ve written on the topic. But first…
Check out The Snowflake Method Website. Read about the method from the man who created it, Randy Ingermanson, himself. A much more concise guide.
And if you have Scrivener, check out these templates built with the snowflake method in mind.
Here’s a few great articles on the snowflake method as well.
Now for my blogs on each step.
Step 1– Write a one sentence summary of your book.
Step 2– Expand that sentence to a paragraph
Step 3– Write a one page summary of each character
Step 4– Expand each sentence in your one paragraph summary to one page
Step 5– Write the synopsis from the POV of each character.
Step 6– Expand each paragraph from your one page summary to a page
Step 7– Create full fledged character charts detailing each character’s arc over the story.
Step 8– Make a spreadsheet outline of each scene based on your four page summary
Step 9– Write a narrative summary of each scene
Step 10– Write that good book.
I’m going through all my series posts and rounding them up into master posts. When I’m done, I’ll put links in at the bottom of my page so it’s easy to find the whole series on a topic.
Here’s what I’ve written on Hercules.
The birth of a hero— In this post I talk about the politics of Olympus when Hercules was born.
Young Hercules— In this post I talk about Hercules’s adventures as a youth.
The legendary labors of Hercules (the stuff he was really famous for) are outlined in these four posts. One. Two. Three. Four.
Hercules also went on a few miscellaneous adventures as an adult, not related to the famous labors. I talk about those here.
In this last post about Hercules, I talk about his ascension, love life, and death.
There are a lot of Persephone and Hades retellings out there. Believe it or not, that wasn’t the case back when I wrote Persephone. In the year I worked on Persephone, so did several other completely unconnected authors. I’ve been told this is a common phenomenon in publishing. An idea gets in the air, and several different people catch it.
My version is a bit different than most of these in that it’s a truly modern day retelling of the myth. My Persephone is THE Persephone. Not Persephone reincarnated. Not a girl living through a similar story. Some of the myths have already happened in my world, but the majority are still unfolding in new and interesting ways.
Here are some of my favorite retellings out there. If I miss any, go ahead and add them to the list in the comments below.
The Abandon Series by Meg Cabot
A modern day retelling that reincarnates the Persephone myth in a new generation.
The Goddess Test series by Aimee Carter
In this series, the Persephone myth happened in the past, and now Hades is searching for a new bride.
The Everneath Series by Brodi Ashton
Aren’t those covers amazing? Ashton weaves in several myths in a modern day almost retelling. Like many of the other series, this protagonist isn’t THE Persephone, but a person from modern times thrust into a similar role.
The Blooming Goddess Series by Tellulah Darling
A hysterical take on the Persephone myth. This book is so much fun, give it a try.
Radiant Darkness by Emily Whitman
This book predates mine, and it’s amazing. It’s a retelling of the original Persephone myth set in ancient times.
The Crysomelia Series by Molly Ringle
More of a new adult novel, but still a faithful retelling of the Persephone myth. This version features a Persephone and Hades who are frequently reincarnated and find each other over multiple lifetimes. Check out my review here.
The Forbidden Games Series by L.J Smith
An oldie but goody. Definitely captures the spirit of the Persephone myth in Jenny and Julian.
If I’ve forgotten any YA versions of Persephone, add them to the list in the comments OR on the Goodreads list I’ve created for Young adult Persephone retellings here.
Kaitlin Bevis 