Writers

Author Feature — Nicole Hanson

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Today’s Author feature is Nicole Hanson from Rochester, Minnesota, author of 1 John: On Love, Obedience, and Side Effects of Salvation.

When I started writing, it was for fun and to make my sisters and cousins smile. Then, in High School, around 2010, I began writing devotional thoughts for others on my blog. Adults at church began asking when I would write a book, but I shrugged it off. I thought I needed to accomplish more before publishing, I thought I needed more experience under my belt and more candles on my birthday cakes. 

Over the years, I’ve realized those were excuses. But then I became busy with marriage, ministry, and work. In 2021, I knew it was time to write a book. It would be a devotional straight through my favorite book of the Bible (1 John), and it would include my paintings as visual cues. But between all the things vying for my attention, there wasn’t much room for research, study, and writing. I wrote whenever I could carve out time, and the book slowly began to form. 

In 2022, I was blessed to have the whole summer off. In a matter of a month, I finished the book, and the paintings, and figured out self-publishing!

My book, 1 John: On Love, Obedience, and Side Effects of Salvation, is a 23-day Christian devotional. Each day’s reading includes a scripture to read, my devotional thoughts, an application question, and one of my watercolor paintings that makes the concept from scripture more concrete and memorable. We journey through the whole letter of 1 John, exploring the themes of love, obedience, and “side effects” of our salvation. 

I am currently writing a book that will help Christians remember what God says He is faithful to do. This one will take more time, I believe, because I am reading every book of the Bible, looking for God’s promises of faithfulness. I have time set aside each week for study and writing. Those interested may sign up for book updates here: subscribepage.io/tehcMf 

The best writing advice I’ve ever received is to write the first draft and don’t expect it to be good, but to revise and edit until it’s great! This has been helpful for me because I tend to want the first draft to be publication-ready, and that’s simply not realistic.

Featured Author — Minda Gomez

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Today’s featured author is Minda Gomez, who writes bilingual children’s chapter books about the multi-cultural Martinez family! She lives with her husband and three kids in a suburb of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The Martinez Kids Adventures are a children’s chapter book series centered around a bicultural Mexican-American family. Rico, Diego, and Araceli Martinez are three spunky bilingual siblings who live in Minnesota with their Mami and Papi.

In The Secret Door, the family discovers that their next-door neighbor, Don Toño, has developed an invention that will transform them into animals through virtual reality, simply by walking through a secret door. They travel to the forest as squirrels, the coral reef as marine animals, and the Mexican rainforest as spider monkeys. In each adventure, they make new animal friends and learn lessons that can be applied to their lives. 

In The Arctic Quest, the Martinez family is driving to Mexico to visit family for Christmas. Along the way, the kids are transported to the Arctic and turned into animals through special virtual reality sunglasses that allow them to fly, swim, and communicate with other animals. Through new challenges and friendships, they learn important lessons through their adventures. Upon arriving in Mexico, they experience a rich, warm Navidad celebration that they will never forget.

The Martinez Kids Adventures are available online through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and many other online booksellers. Links to the books can be found at my website, www.mindagomez.com.

The Martinez family is modeled after my own cross-cultural family. My husband lived in Mexico until we got married, so Spanish language and culture are an integral part of our family’s dynamics. Over the years I have made it my goal to find quality bilingual and cross-cultural books. I have come across very few books about families that look similar to mine, so it has been a joy to represent them in exciting, wholesome stories.

In addition, I wanted to represent the code-switching and natural flow between Spanish and English that takes place in a bilingual family. Spanish words are incorporated into the dialogue in context in the English book, and a glossary is available for referencing meaning and pronunciation.

My husband and I worked together on the Spanish translation of the books. English words are also incorporated into the dialogue. 

These books are tributes to the beauty of language, culture, food, and family. Spanish words are scattered throughout the story in context, offering an opportunity for readers to learn.

I want these stories to draw families together with intriguing stories that activate the imagination and inspire meaningful conversations. It is also a goal that my readers will grow in their appreciation for their own traditions and those of their neighbors.

When I wrote my first book in the summer of 2021, I did not know anything about the world of publishing, and basically had to figure it out as I went along. I did not have any idea what this would grow into, or all of the areas in which I would have to learn new skills.

One of the most challenging skills was learning to illustrate digitally on an iPad. I have always loved art but did not have experience with this medium. It has been very rewarding to develop in this area, and I find the illustration process to be incredibly engrossing. Hours can go by as I am working on one project, and it may feel like it’s only been a short time. 

The marketing process has been challenging for me as well, as I do not have any formal training in this area. I have been thankful for the way people so generously share their knowledge online. 

Currently I am working on my third chapter book, which is in the editing process. I am also working on a spin-off picture book based on one of the animal characters from my current work in progress. I work during the chances I can find between the responsibilities of parenting and my full-time teacher job. It is my goal to release these books by this summer, but that time is flexible. That is the beauty of self-publishing; my deadlines can adapt to my life.

The best writing advice I’ve ever been given is do it because you love it. I want to keep doing this because it is something I enjoy. If it starts to feel like a chore, I need to take a break. That’s the benefit of doing this for myself and not as my full-time job. Currently it brings me so much joy that I can’t imagine stopping.

You can connect with Minda here:

Author Feature–Vallean Jackson

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If you’re looking for something new to read, check out today’s author feature, the lovely Vallean Jackson from Birmingham, AL. 

I am a children’s book and urban fiction Author. If I had to choose, I couldn’t. I am equally passionate about both genres. I also have a little romance and borderline education (my children’s workbook) under my belt. I am working on introducing other genres that I am more than excited about.

I would say that my biggest challenge to overcome as an Author was getting back into writing. For a minute, I gave up because of a past experience, but a great part of me just felt like something was missing. I had this build-up and stories continuously dancing in my head that, in a sense, frustrated me just as before when I first started. So once I started back writing, I got the relief I was looking for and have been back at it in every sense, and I couldn’t be more content.

My writing goal(s)…..are plenty, honestly. It’s almost like every day I add on something else. I literally have a folder on my phone entitled “book ideas” because something is always hitting me. I just wish sometimes I could write as fast as I thought of these stories. But on a more intentional level of goals, there’s me releasing another children’s book this year, releasing a new genre from me, and maybe some other projects I have in mind. To achieve these goals, the idea is to not give up. Be persistent! As well as keep in mind what I want to see come to fruition.

The best writing advice I’ve ever been given was to not give up honestly because I truly was a good writer and had so much to offer. I didn’t feel like that at the time and was just going to focus on journalism. But hearing those words came as a shock yet as a wake up call. That I was being hard on myself as well as letting a situation have control over my purpose, and that wasn’t right.

As for a book that I would like to focus on at the moment is my latest release Love On Thin Ice 3- Healing. It was released at the end of 2022 and is the last book of the “Love On Thin Ice” trilogy. The last book in the trilogy was bananas, if you ask me! The twist and turns that developed even shocked me. That might sound crazy, but for a minute, it took me a while to see what direction I really wanted to go. I was honestly struggling a bit, then one day it just hit me and everything started to unravel. It was like my characters took me over. I think the best part of the trilogy for me is how my characters each realized healing isn’t the same for everybody. It might carry one definition, but how it’s interpreted is to each’s own. 

Love On Thin Ice 3- Healing can be purchased on Amazon, Kindle, Google Books, and www.valleanj.com

They say that time heals all wounds, but for the dynamic couple Keiontay and Nova, the flames of the love between them have fanned out.

Nova’s battle of standing her ground has her embracing the role of a single mother while trying to heal from a failed relationship and conflicted with still believing that love for her is not dead.

With the feeling of rejection that cuts as deep as a sword, the question for Keiontay becomes if he can maneuver out of his own way to get back the love he holds dear.

But the wrath of rejection doesn’t stop there as Tarven thinks he finally has the woman he has always fought for, and Ginger refuses to let go of her heart’s desire. Her take no attitude in this trilogy reveals many anticipated consequences.

And Omar works through some childhood trauma that leads to experiencing the love that he has always craved.
In the fight for love, healing, and a healthy relationship…..who will finally get their happy ending?

The INFJ Writer: Cracking the Creative Genius of the World’s Rarest Type by Lauren Sapala

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First, I need to preface that according to the Meyer-Briggs assessment, I’m an INFP-A so I’m not exactly the target audience this book was aiming at. However, it was a recommendation from the Introvert Writer Summit I enjoyed at the beginning of March and being introverted, I hoped that there would be something useful for me in it.

And there was! I felt validated as both an introvert and writer as I read it. Some of the weird stuff that I thought just made me nuts was addressed. For example, the children’s book series that I’m currently working on–well, the main character Lupita is a fully formed, slightly awkward, 5-year old clamoring in my head for me to tell her story. She just appeared to me one day and here we are, taking dictation for book 3. This phenomenon was addressed in Chapter 4, INFJ Psychic Ability and Character Development. Apparently, this happens to other writers too! WHOOP!

The book also talked about how introverts prefer to work intensely for large blocks of time, don’t like meetings, and lead interesting lives which will make fabulous memoirs. (So me!) In addition, there are discussions about what it means to be a Sensitive Intuitive writer and how hangups with financial success hold them back from making a killing with writing. (Certainly true!) And why INFJs, INFPs, and Sensitive Intuitives might not find it in their best interests to try and become a full-time writer. Fascinating stuff!

So I highly recommend The INFJ Writer: Cracking the Creative Genius of the World’s Rarest Type by Lauren Sapala if you are an INFJ writer. You’ll also find it helpful if you are an INFP or Sensitive Intuitive. After all, knowing ourselves is the first step in truthful writing. 

If you’d like to get an idea of what type of writer personality you have, here’s a link to a free online personality test.

Interview with the Author — ME

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Well, who knew that having a pen name would make identification so difficult? This week Leigh Thelmadatter wrote about me for Mexico News Daily and I barely recognized myself even though there was a picture of ME in the article.

Anyway, if you’d like to read more about C.E. Flores AKA La Gringa de La Yacata AKA Camille Torok AKA Torok AKA La Maestra AKA Camille E. Torok de Flores AKA Millie Flores (author of soon to be released children’s books) then here’s the link to that article. Enjoy!

Author Interview with The Bangura Institute

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Last week Roxana Bangura from The Bangura Institute features little ol’ me on her YouTube channel. What was intended to be a 30 minute chat lasted more than an hour! I shared some personal things that I hadn’t meant to, and talked about my books some, revealing the fact I’m working on a series for children that hopefully will be available in the near future. 

So if you’d like to watch the episode about yours truly, here it is!

My First Radio Interview

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I did a short promotional piece for the Self-Publishing 101 webinar on the Canadian radio last week. It went well, I think. Feel free to listen and let me know what you think! You can find the link here.

April 2021 Virtual Book Tour — Lynda Lock

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Hello, I’m Lynda Lock. I’m originally from British Columbia, Canada, and now live in Isla Mujeres, Quintana Roo, Mexico. It’s an island about seven kilometers long and a kilometer wide 15 minutes by boat from Cancun. It has all the peace and quiet of island life combined with all the big city amenities, including a large international airport just a few minutes away.

I came to Mexico with my husband. We are both from British Columbia Canada, having lived in a variety of small communities and large cities. My original hometown, located in the coastal mountains of British Columbia, is now a deserted ghost town. It was a thriving gold mining town that shut down when the mining company ran out of easily accessible gold. My husband, on the other hand, grew up in the city of West Vancouver, located directly across the harbour from the much larger metropolis of Vancouver BC. We met on a similarly sized island in BC Canada called Bowen Island in 1975. We have been together since 1980. We married in 1987. My husband and I are currently retired. For the most part of our working lives, we were self-employed entrepreneurs with a wide variety of businesses that included an antique store, a freight boat business, a solid waste disposal company, an award winning bed and breakfast, and a micro-brewery, to name just a few. He was also the Fire Chief and I was a volunteer firefighter for many years in another small island community in BC Canada. I’ve also been an ambulance driver, a control centre supervisor for a high-tech computer-driven train, a park attendant, and have written a safety magazine.

My husband and I frequently say that we have Adult Attention Deficient Syndrome. As soon as a business was running well, we got bored and sold it, only to immediately start a different type of business. In the later years of our working careers, we switched to managing businesses for other companies. He managed a large winery and restaurant complex and I managed a mid-sized hotel.

We had enjoyed short vacations on the western side of Mexico for many years and then we discovered the Caribbean side in 2002. Wow! The turquoise water, good food, friendly islanders; we were hooked. After four visits to the island, we purchased an oceanfront lot in 2006 on Isla Mujeres with the idea of building a home. Since we were still working at that time we had planned to live part-time on the island and the balance of the year in Canada.

When it was time to return to work we happened to arrive in the middle of a late spring snow storm. A meter of snow! That was it for us. We told our employers that we would be leaving permanently in October of 2008, and worked until it was time to move to Mexico. In the meantime, we sold our home, furniture, paintings, decorations, books – everything. The only possessions that we kept were some articles of clothing and a few tools or special mementos. Our rule was; if it won’t fit in the car it isn’t going.

We drove from the Okanagan Valley to Isla Mujeres in our Nissan Hybrid car, taking twenty-three days to sightsee across the south-western USA and central Mexico. Our then nine-year-old cat, Thomas, had to wait until we arrived on Isla Mujeres before he could fly with my sister to his new home in Mexico. Thomas starred as the hero in my children’s book The Adventures of Thomas the Cat: Las Aventuras de Tomás el Gato. He thrived in Mexico, living until his seventeenth birthday.

Since moving to Mexico, my relationship with my family hasn’t changed. I still see everyone almost as frequently as before. We have an adult son and two grandchildren. They love that we live in Mexico. They visit as often as possible. As for friends, some I see less, others more and I’ve made many more new friends. As I was already retirement age when I moved here, learning a second language has been a big challenge. I miss the easy, silly conversations with the locals, things like chatting about the weather, what’s happening in their lives, and how they are doing. I should have learned Spanish about 30 years ago when my brain was younger and I was smarter. It’s a daily struggle, but I keep trying to pick up new words and phrases. I don’t take lessons because I don’t have the patience for classroom learning. Like all things in my life, I learn as I go. My Spanish is limited, but I keep trying.

I love Mexican culture. It is like being transported back in time to the 1950s. There are large and close-knit families who look out for each other and easy freedom for the kids, not so many organized and scheduled activities, just outdoor fun with friends. I especially love the climate by the ocean in the tropics.

Living in Mexico has helped me to discover the ability to just live and not worry about the silly stuff that we have no control over. I have learned to be patient, when to give up and when to move on. For example, having a guarantee doesn’t mean much. You have to be calmly persistent to get service for any appliance or piece of equipment that is theoretically under guarantee. After seven weeks of polite and daily phone calls with the help of one of our Mexican friends, we finally got our new refrigerator fixed by the manufacturer. My friend’s words of wisdom regarding guarantees were “It’s a game of Survivor. You have to outlast, outwit and outplay your opponent to win.” That really made me laugh.tomas The accomplishment that makes me the proudest was self-publishing my first book in hardcover “The Adventures of Thomas the Cat: Las Aventuras de Tomás el Gato.” It involved figuring out how to get it printed in China as the printing costs in Mexico, the USA and Canada were too much for my budget, arranging the shipping to Mexico, clearing the shipment through customs, and arranging for trucking to our city. It was a great learning experience.

In my free time, I write for my own pleasure, walk on the beach with our low-to-the-ground rescue mutt, socialize with friends, enjoy the sunset and a glass of wine with my husband, who is my best friend, and take pictures.

I have self-published four books and two more are in the process.
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Books in progress:
Named by the Enemy, historical fiction set in Canada.
The Adventures of Thomas and Sparky, the bilingual sequel to The Adventures of Thomas the Cat: Las Aventuras de Tomás el Gato.

I write a weekly blog called Notes from Paradise–Isla Mujeres with my husband. Whoever has the bright idea for the week, writes the articles. I take 90% of the photographs because I habitually have a camera attached to my hand. Since we began in September of 2011, we have had over 434,000 page views with the weekly average now hitting around 10,000 page views. The response is astounding!

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I don’t specifically volunteer for any one charity, just help out where I can with student scholarships, donations to helping animals, and entertaining the island’s youngsters during the Christmas Golf Cart Parade and the Day of the Kings, with our Mickey and Minnie Mouse costumes.

 

April 2021 Virtual Book Tour — Beverly Wood

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Beverly Wood co-authored The Move to Mexico Bible. Here’s a little more information about her life.

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OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI was born in Toronto but spent two decades on the west coast of Canada (Vancouver and then Vancouver Island) before moving to Mexico in 2012. We work from home (we are writers, editors, producers) so we could live anywhere in the world that had internet. We briefly considered Europe as I have due Canadian/Irish citizenship but it rains in the winter like it does in BC. We were done with Canadian winters – even though the west coast is much kinder than Ontario.

We explored destinations like Costa Rica and Galveston, TX (where we spent a number of winters). CR did not have the culture, the vibrancy or the food of Mexico and while the weather was spectacular, we found the environment lacking in something. Galveston was comfortable – we had previously lived in Dallas for a year on assignment – but that was in the Ann Richards time period. We witnessed a shift in the US over the years we spent wintering in Galveston and as Canadians, weren’t happy with the direction. So we started checking out more locations in Mexico. It was all research.

To be honest, it’s our environment that has changed – our lives are pretty much the same as they were! We still work at home, so get up, make coffee, go to the office. I do have a housekeeper once a week and a gardener once a week,  which was a luxury I didn’t have up north. More sun instead of winter rain, and a longer gardening season, We really don’t eat processed food as much as we did, I suppose.

I actually have a stronger appreciation for Canada, as I watch the news from Mexico (being writers and editors, we are news junkies). And I realize how incredible the health care system is in Canada. I appreciate my home country more than I ever did before. But I do think some of that is the global situation and gaining perspective from distance.

I have been trying to learn the language for six years off and on and finally, my latest instructor says I would be considered ‘intermediate’ now, were I to head for a Spanish classroom (I do one on one Skype lessons with a local teacher – much easier to make that happen than a physical class for me).

Emergency medical care in Spanish (my husband has had both a gallbladder attack and an emergency appendectomy) is a gong show for me. I can’t communicate on any medical level, and I am sure they run every test in the book (private hospitals) because we are gringos and have insurance – never mind that we have to pay on our credit card and wait three months for reimbursement, My heart jumps into my throat every time anything happens that might result in a hospital visit, If anything will drive me out of Mexico it will be my own inability to manage the language well enough to deal with medical issues. And the medical system itself. Again, I was raised in Canada where one’s health care is almost taken for granted.beverly3 How does anyone persevere? I stick my head in the sand and pretend we aren’t hitting an age where things start to break. And when it happens, you deal with it. I think it’s probably true that the anxiety worrying about anything is more painful than the event. When anything happens, so far we have dealt with it. We’ll see how it goes in the future. I am very grateful that we have a country we feel is worth going home to, should we decide to leave. We don’t plan to live in Mexico for the rest of our lives  – maybe another five to 10 years. But who knows? Maybe we will. We love the way Mexico deals with death spiritually (the Day of the Dead).

The things that have always been important remain important – friends & family, being honest, not doing harm, trying to do good. We were never very material people and the typical middle-class aspirations have never been important to us. This is an interesting exercise. I hadn’t realized before articulating this but we’ve always been kind of nomads so having things wasn’t really practical. We have a 5 x 10 storage locker in Canada. We moved the important stuff to Mexico, even a couple of pieces of furniture. One is an antique Chinese cabinet that was the first item I ever shipped and imported into Canada on my own and we like it, but if it disappears tomorrow we don’t really care. I’ve gone off a bit here, sorry – but I really don’t have answers for some things. When we came to Mexico – we’d already figured out who we were. I know it can be a complete change for some – but we started freelancing 30 years ago so haven’t participated much in the rat race, lucky for us.

A defining moment for me was looking around at a social gathering in the first town we landed in, where every guest (big catered party) was gringo and speaking English. Incredible home, worth $1 million+. Half a block away, I had noticed a small house with the door open – the floor was dirt and the roof was a blue tarpaulin. I looked around and thought, “This isn’t what we came here for, I could be in any gated community in Arizona”.beverly1We have two dogs, we have a pond, a pool, a large garden. Lots of chores. Paying bills, grocery shopping in the markets – it all takes time.

We are both writers and consultants. We write books and also do ghostwriting of memoirs for select clients.  I am currently working on two ghost jobs for clients – one is a Canadian story – a successful businessman who has run airlines and pubs and the other is a tragic (true) love story that happened in Mexico. move to mexico bible

I was a real estate agent in Toronto and know Mexico well. We have bought and sold several homes in different areas and I have working relationships in assorted cities and have been consulting on possible moves to Mexico for clients. I conduct a series of interviews that helps them determine the area they would like to explore and I will find potential rentals or potential purchases for them to check out when they arrive. I can arrange any facet of their arrival and pre-planning and my co-author of The Move to Mexico Bible – Sonia Diaz – can assist with visas and other legal requirements/options once they arrive.

I can be contacted at:

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