https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO4e4nCYBEo

Today's Daily Dragon is... the incredibly talented author, Heather Osborne

Heather Osborne is a talented and diverse author. She has written books in several genres, including historical romance, mystery, and even erotica. 

Bio: 

Heather Osborne was born and raised in California. She has a Bachelor of Science in Criminology and Victimology, as well as coursework in Early Childhood Education. In 2009, she met her husband and moved to Scotland, very much a dream of hers since she was a small child. Heather has been writing short stories for as long as she can remember. She also has written and directed several plays. In her spare time, Heather enjoys reading, writing (of course!), theatre, as well as caring for her young son.

She also reviews for Readers' Favorite.

Social Media links:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HAOsborne

Twitter: https://twitter.com/hosborneauthor

Google +: https://plus.google.com/u/1/+HeatherOsborne27

Blog: https://heatherosborneauthor.wordpress.com/

Her latest foray is into the realms of mystery, with her Rae Hatting series. Rae is the female main character, but the books are written in first person POV from the viewpoint of Rae and her partner, Luke. I'm not normally a huge fan of first person, but Heather has nailed it with these books.

Crushed Gardenias is the short intro to the series, and is a great set up that introduces us to Rae.

Special Agent Rae Hatting has been sent to a small town in Colorado to investigate the disappearance of young girls from several surrounding states. What she finds is not at all what she expected.

The Fairest of Them brings Luke Thompson into play for the first time.

Once upon a time, there was a murder...

Detective Luke Thompson is a hero cop, with a string of solved serial killer cases under his belt. He comes to California, thinking he can disappear quietly into the forests, isolated from the rest of the world. His expertise is called upon to help with a mysterious serial killer, dumping bodies dressed like fairy tale characters in the woods outside of Mendocino County. With the help of a profiler, Luke finally gets the break he needs, as well as finding romance for himself. Tragedy strikes, and Luke is left despondent, unable to carry on as a detective. Can a fiery redhead from the FBI help him out of the slump?

Determined to leave the life of solving unsolvable homicides behind, Special Agent Rae Hatting tries to settle into a normal life with her adopted daughter, Grace. However, her reputation precedes her, and Rae finds herself back in the fray, called upon to help solve a series of gruesome fairy tale style murders in California. Her only obstacle is Detective Luke Thompson. Broody, stubborn, and an all-around pain in the ass, the pair must work together before another victim ends up never finding their happily ever after. 

Book three, Misfortune, is Heather's upcoming novel in the Rae Hatting Mysteries.

Death is on the cards...

There’s a new serial killer on the loose, dumping bodies in sinister relation to tarot card meanings, preying on his victims’ vices. With roving psychics, all claiming to have knowledge of the killer, to a mysterious Cajun woman, who just so happens to be related to Dr. Sabine Lawson, will Luke and Rae solve the case before another person ends up tempting fate and succumbing to an unfortunate mishap?

The series so far has kept me on the edge of my seat the whole way through. I can't wait to read book three.

Imaginary dragons...a good thing or a bad?

Evening squishies.

As you may know, I'm an imaginary dragon.

There have been several famous members of my race over the recent years, notably in the works of authors like J.R. Tolkien.

I wonder, however, how many of you know that we've been around for eons.

As long as faer have walked in your dreams, we have played alongside.

I am Claude. I take many shapes. Do you know any dragons?

No?

Are you sure?

Today's Daily Dragon...ME!

Souls of the Never is #2

Come on, lets help the squishie to #1

The beauty of being an Indie Author.

Book updates, covers, blurbs etc

Let's say your book has been out for a while. Let's also say it's not selling as well as you'd hoped. 

Now, if you had gone down the traditional route, odds are you have a professional cover, but it's possibly not one you had any say in, and may not, in your opinion, be selling your book to the audience you intended.

Now I come to the subject matter. Independent, or Indie authors, have complete control over their work, so if the cover or blurb aren't working, it's a simple matter for them to change it. Well, maybe not simple, in that a new cover and blurb takes a lot of work. 

I know, because I've just gone through the whole process. Book two in my Tales of the Neverwar series has been out for a month or so. Sales have been okay, but I know myself the cover I made wasn't great, and wasn't 100% indicative of the genre and story. So, I sat down, talked to a few friends who have read it, and came up with a few ideas.

What we came up with is this image, which is now up on Kindle. It captures the genre and the plot perfectly. 

Free on KindleUnlimited

Today's Daily Dragon is...me!

I asked Colin for a part in his new book, but he has surpassed my wishes.

He has had his book two, Worlds of the Never, out for a while now, and though I liked the cover(it was a Dragon, do the math), the new one is amazing; and I'm on it!

Today's Daily Dragon...not really a dragon, but a great picture

I found this. I thought you might like it.

Digital libraries...the pitfalls.

Some of you may have read the recent articles about digitizing public libraries, doing away with print copy completely. Now, I'm all for technological progress, but I think this is wrong.

For me, libraries are all about books, paper ones. They are places we can go to take in the smell of the ink, and the touch of the pages under your fingers; but there is another reason, albeit a rather paranoid one.

What if there was some sort of disaster, either natural or man-made? How would we rebuild if all knowledge is lost to us?

A very good friend of mine, Zeecé Lugo, has written such a scenario into her series of books, set in what she has called ‘The Daniel’s Forks universe.’ The books are set in a future devastated by a global pandemic. Up until now, they have been a mixture of romance and mystery, with very little detail on what actually happened.

This has changed in her upcoming novel, which goes back to a time shortly after the event. I’ve been privileged enough to read the first few chapters, and the subject of digital libraries appears here.

Decades from now, print books have all but disappeared, but with the end of civilization, and electricity etc, so have all the digital copies. The task of rebuilding the world as we know it has been rendered impossible, due to even the simplest of jobs becoming an unknown art.

Print books are now the most precious commodity in this world, but the libraries that would normally have held these repositories of knowledge are now gone. Why shouldn’t they be, when ‘the Cloud’ held everything ever printed? But now the Cloud has blown away.

This is why I think the libraries are doomed if they digitize. They should remain a haven for bookworms everywhere.

One a slightly separate note, Zeecé has one of her books on special offer over the next few days. Strongheart’s Woman is a sexy romance, set in this future universe, decades after the event. It shows the way the lack of knowledge has affected the lives of the survivors. The world has become a simpler place, and Zeecé’s tagline, ‘Welcome to the future past,’ serves well. It’s frightening in its realism and probability.

Will this ever happen? I truly hope not, but they way the human race is going, we risk total technological breakdown.

The upcoming next installment in Tales of the Neverwar.

Here you are, humans. Due to popular(excuse me while I choke) demand, Colin has allowed me to preview this latest attempt at a cover and blurb for book three in the Tales of the Neverwar.

Now, normally I'd cringe at the though of him publishing another book. I've only just got the inside of his head back in order after the last release; but living inside his head has allowed me access to some of the ideas swirling around there. I of course, have given my own meager input, advising him that he needed more dragons. 

On this occasion, I'm happy to confirm he listened to me, and the last third of the book will feature my kind prominently. I'm trying to bag a cameo role. So far Colin isn't biting. I may just bite him.

Anyway, here you go. Enjoy, squishies.

The end of the end is near! Tenybris is free from his prison, and his hunt for the dragon eggs begins.  In the Glade, Gwenyth, the only human in the Lands, stands no chance against the power of the Darkness. With the fall of the Veil, the magic escapes to flood the universe, and the first stop is Earth. What can Katheryne and the others do to save her world and the rest of reality? How can the planet Sanctuary face the hunger of Tenybris? How will Gwyneth save the race she has come to love?