Author Wednesday!

Thank you for stopping by on our first ever! Author Wednesdays!  

These days we will be hosting authors! 

 They will get to choose their own questions and share with us their thoughts on any subject!  

This week we have non other than Megan Thomason author of Daynight!  

Book Description

Publication Date: November 12, 2012
Print Length: 320 pages

BlueInk Review * (starred review): "gripping young adult dystopian novel; compelling conflicts; high stakes; powerful narrative; surprises keep coming; strong writing; page-turner; engaging characters; Readers will be hungry for the sequels.”

“Sure to win over YA readers looking for a dangerous, dystopian adventure story... A sci-fi adventure with a sweet YA love story at its center… richly imagined alternate world… distinctive voices and conflicting motivations” —Kirkus Reviews

Meet The Second Chance Institute (SCI): Earth’s benevolent non-profit by day, Thera’s totalitarian regime by night. Their motto: Because Everyone Deserves a Second Chance at Life(TM). Reality: the SCI subjects Second Chancers to strict controls and politically motivated science experiments like Cleaving—forced lifetime union between two people who have sex.

Meet Kira Donovan. Fiercely loyal, overly optimistic, and ensnared by the promise of a full-ride college scholarship, Kira signs the SCI Recruit contract to escape memories of a tragedy that left her boyfriend and friends dead.

Meet Blake Sundry. Bitter about being raised in Exile and his mother’s death, Blake’s been trained to infiltrate and destroy the SCI. Current barrier to success? His Recruit partner—Miss Goody Two Shoes Kira Donovan.

Meet Ethan Darcton. Born with a defective heart and resulting inferiority complex, Ethan’s forced to do his SCI elite family’s bidding. Cleave-worthy Kira Donovan catches his eye, but the presiding powers give defect-free Blake Sundry first dibs.

Full of competing agendas, romantic entanglements, twists and turns, daynight is Megan Thomason’s debut young adult dystopian novel and first in the daynight series.

   

About The Author

› Visit Amazon's Megan Thomason Page

Biography

Megan Thomason lives in paradise aka San Diego, CA with her husband and five children. A former software manager, Megan vastly prefers writing twisted tales to business, product, and marketing plans. When she isn't typing away on her laptop, she's reading books on her phone--over 600 in the last year--or attending to the needs of her family. Megan's fluent in sarcasm, could potentially benefit from a 12-step program for road rage, struggles with a Hot Tamales addiction, loves world travel & fast cars and hates paperwork & being an insomniac. Daynight is Megan's first published novel, but fourth written one.

Why should we read daynight?

Highly rated by professional, Amazon and Goodreads reviewers, daynight will grip you from the first page and take you on a wild ride: “a dangerous, dystopian adventure story”-Kirkus Reviews. “A must read for Hunger Games and Divergent lovers”-Amazon reviewer. “Delicious humor, intelligence, and sparkling dialogue”-Amazon reviewer. Full of competing agendas, romantic entanglements, twists and turns, daynight transpires in a modern-day society that fully intends on extending its dominion to Earth.

Read a sample and/or buy daynight 

Where did you get the inspiration for daynight?

As I was hiking in one of the many canyons during San Diego on a particularly hot day, I pondered what it would be like if things were so hot that there would be no choice but to switch days and nights. This was the impetus for Thera, the setting for most of daynight. I had fun researching all the various ways this would impact the Theran people--from differing lingo 'daymares,' 'daygowns,' 'Monnight, Tuesnight, etc.', to environmental (landscape, weather shifts).

The Second Chance Institute, benevolent non-profit on Earth by day, and totalitarian ruler on Thera by night, and their messed up agendas and methods, are purely a figment of my twisted imagination.

Tell us about the characters in daynight. Who is your favorite character in daynight? Least favorite?

daynight rotates between three main characters’ point of views—Kira, Ethan and Blake. I assigned physical and character attributes much like I’d do a job description:

Kira-pretty; athletic; willing to put up with a whole lot of crap; naïve; loyal; great poker face; always asking questions; internal strength and resiliency

Blake-rebellious; loyal to the Exilers he grew up with, yet resentful for having to take on their cause; doesn’t trust anyone or want to have to depend on anyone; judgmental; rough around the edges

Ethan-gorgeous; self-esteem damaged from having been born with a heart defect and continually told he isn’t worthy of his birthright; protects those he cares about; funny; listens well; very close-lipped about his past

Physically, I started with pictures to inspire me for each character. You can see some of these pictures here

Favorite character: Jax. Ethan’s best friend, excellent comic relief in a dark story, communicates in double speak, and more important to the story than many may realize.

Least favorite character: Blake’s father, Hank. Terrible dad. Not only does he steal Blake’s childhood to further his own agenda, he’s too bull-headed to see his own stupidity.

Why did you decide to self publish?

I had originally planned to go the traditional publishing route with daynight. But without any contacts in the publishing industry, I didn’t like the odds of sending a one paragraph description in a one page letter to the dozen young adult agents in the country… who each get up to 20,000 letters a year and can only take on a couple new authors. And even if an agent did pick me up, it would take a couple years to get published. The process seemed rather antiquated and slow and I wanted to begin writing the next book. So, I decided to self publish and focus on getting a) great professional reviews (so far, so good here) and b) success as an indie author (working on it… it’s only been 6 weeks). Making it as an indie author takes a ton of work. But I don’t shy away from hard work. In my last career, I often worked 80-100 hour weeks. I can live on very little sleep for long periods of time and am extremely productive.

How do you go about the writing and editing process?

I plot, plain and simple. Given daynight has 3 main characters who tell their story in the present and by flashback; a dystopian entity with a presence on both Earth and Earth’s sister planet, Thera; multiple ‘bad guys’; a band of Exilers split into two factions; and several other more minor, but highly important characters, each with a rich backstory… I had to plot it. That said, to me a book is like a living entity that continually evolves. I revise said plot as often as I have better ideas—which is all the time!

Tell us your most rewarding experience since being published.

Having thousands download daynight during two days of ‘free’ promotion and positive reviews start to pour in!

Any other books in the works? 

Book two of the daynight series, arbitrate is fully plotted and well under way. I’m targeting to have it out the summer of 2013.

I also have another book, B*Lies, in the works, the story of a girl who makes the decision to run from her abusive father.

Any advice for other authors?

1) Read! If every author read every book in their genre (or at least the highly rated ones), there would be a lot less rehashed stories, better writing, and fresh concepts. I read 600 books in the last year. You can find my top 50+ favorites here

2) Plot! Certainly, there have been some successful books written off the cuff, but to have good pacing, story development, character development, building of tension, etc. it typically takes good plotting.

3) Flexibility! Revise, revise, revise. Rewrite, rewrite, rewrite. Don’t get so stuck on your initial concept that you reject an even better idea.

4) Edit! Editing is hard. I typically go through my book over a hundred times, looking for something different each pass.

5) Proofread! Yes, I list this separately from editing. Have someone (or even better, many someones)—other than you—someone with a sharp eye and very keen grasp of the English language, proofread your book. The brain compensates for missing words, extra words, etc. and they are very hard to find. If problems are found after publishing, fix and update.

6) Work hard! If you thought the writing was time-consuming and hard, promoting your book takes as much, if not more time. Put in the hours.
7) Thicken your skin! It is unlikely you like every book you read, so you can’t expect everyone to like your book. I’ve adopted the saying: "If you're trying to please everyone, then you're not going to make anything that is honestly yours, I don't think, in the long run."--Viggo Mortensen.

8) Start writing the next book. Your chances increase exponentially of having a ‘hit’, the more offerings you have.

     What experiences have you had that inspire your writing?

My oldest daughter told me not to elaborate; that my back-story is “too dark”. Suffice it to say that I have a wide array of emotions and experiences to draw from—from humorous, to heart-breaking. Not everyone can say their (violent) dad left their family to go to Peru to get picked up by a spaceship, had to watch their 9 year-old daughter go through cancer treatments with less than a 25% chance of making it (thankfully, she defied the odds), or has a teenage son who has gone off the rails in a spectacular way.

What’s the weirdest book you have ever read?

I got put on bed rest with child #4, and a friend brought me the strangest trilogy of books—one was about a conjoined set of twins and the issues they had having relationships (disturbing); one was about bondage (even more disturbing); and the last was about an elephant tribe and their 'relations' (intriguing, but again, disturbing). I don’t remember the names, but the themes have stuck with (haunted?) me to this day.

LINKS

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