Too Much Juice
April 25, 2023 by Kidd Wadsworth in category Infused with Meaning by Kidd Wadsworth tagged as flash Fiction, kidd wadsworth, short story, weird dreams, Witches
Too Much Juice
by
Kidd Wadsworth
I suppose there were opioids in my IV. I remember eating a three-foot-long, hot-pink centipede. I was a trifle worried. It was Lent. Does centipede count as meat?
While I chewed—centipedes are a might gristle-ly—there appeared by my bed three women. They “poofed” in; I thought them witches. Like a Hollywood wind machine was in the room blowing only on the three of them, their wild, flaming-orange hair and amethyst robes flowed out behind them.
They spoke, talking on top of each other, one starting before the other stopped.
My southern upbringing immediately identified them. Must be Yankees, I thought.
“Oy vey can you believe…,” said the first witch.
“Without her hair cut…,” said the second.
“She came to the hospital, and there’s people everywhere…,” said the third.
“…and her hair…,” said the second.
“You can’t cut your hair?” said the third.
“I know a place…,” said the first.
This started such a discussion about which place.
I picked up the small hand mirror Mom left for me on my bedside table.
I do need a haircut.
“My tante Zelda…,” said the first witch.
“What?” said the second witch. “Your tante? Why she’d be better off having her hair cut by monkeys at the Bronx Zoo.”
And the third witch nodded, her bangle bracelets clinking, her crystal earrings casting rainbows on the ceiling.
“Do you have any mustard for my centipede?” I asked.
“Why yes,” said the third witch, pulling a jar from her pocket. “Grey Poupon?”
As I spread spicy brown mustard on my centipede, the first witch called her tante Zelda on the phone, “How’s next Wednesday, Dear?” she asked me.
I hesitated, trying to remember when I was scheduled to be discharged. “I don’t know.”
“You’ve got to go,” said the first witch. “You have some gray, no offense…”
To which the second witch said, “But not to Zelda. Anyone but Zelda.”
I’m a Sci Fi fan—live long and prosper, dude. One of my favorite TV shows features evil aliens with glowing eyes. As I struggled to remember my upcoming calendar, I looked out the door of my hospital room. In the room across the hall, I saw my doctor. He turned toward me—and his eyes glowed.
“Oy vey, you don’t look so good…,” said the second witch.
I paused a bit of mustard covered centipede halfway to my mouth. As my doctor started walking across the hall to my room, the witches grabbed their light sabers. I dropped my fork and pressed the button on my IV.
Time for more juice.
Title Photo by Stephen Andrews on Unsplash
Kidd Wadsworth’s Books
Debut Author Barb DeLong–writing the magic of love and laughter and happily ever after!
February 2, 2023 by Jann Ryan in category Jann says . . . tagged as fantasy romance, romance, Witches
Barb loves reading, writing and animals, not necessarily in that order. She writes contemporary and paranormal stories of love, laughter and magic, and you’re going to know there’ll be a feature creature in there somewhere. Her short stories appear in several anthologies, including Secrets of Moonlight Cove, Love for Christmas, The Truth That Can’t Be Told, and The Truth That Can’t Be Told 2. She is currently working on a paranormal romance series called Keepers of Magic, about a society of witches desperate to keep their existence a secret. The first in the series, The Witch Whisperer, is currently under contract with The Wild Rose Press. A transplant from the Canadian cold, she enjoys sunny Mission Viejo, California, with her husband and a pampered, blue-eyed, ragdoll cat.
Today is a day I’ve been waiting for—to interview my close friend, author Barb DeLong, about her debut novel. So, let’s get started.
Jann: When did you decide that you wanted to be a writer? Barb: I loved creative writing classes in elementary and high school and won a few writing contests. I was in ninth grade when the writing bug really bit. My favorite TV shows were westerns, so I decided I’d write a historical western. It wasn’t until years later that I realized it was a romance. I still have those pages, typed on an old typewriter with a faulty ribbon that tinted the bottom of all the letters red. I’ve been writing one thing or another ever since (my letters are all black now).
Jann: Tell us about your journey to publication.
Barb: I’m self-published with short stories in a number of anthologies, but my dream was to sell or contract one of my books to a publisher. I’ve started and abandoned many stories, some of which I pitched to editors at conferences in years past but never submitted. Lost opportunities. Had a bite from Harlequin on an early completed novel. My stories have won or finaled in several contests. I decided in 2019 that it was now or never to fulfill my dream, so I knuckled down during NaNoWriMo that year and by May 2020, completed a rough draft of my first fantasy romance, The Witch Whisperer. Since one of my problems is letting go of my work, I took way too many months editing and revising. Finally, by early March 2022, I put a pin in it and sent out my first round of query letters with the first three chapters to publishers that didn’t need you to be agented. Within a week, The Wild Rose Press, a small but popular e-publisher, asked for the full manuscript. By April I had my first publishing contract. I was over the moon! My editor is anxious to see book 2 in my series, which I’m more than half way through.
Jann: Is Fantasy/Paranormal your preferred genre to write?
Barb: I’m romance through and through, whether it’s contemporary romance or fantasy/paranormal, I love to write both.
Jann: Why Witches?
Barb: Out of all the paranormal/fantasy beings, like vampires, shifters, fairies and the like, witches appealed to me more with their magical powers, and the fact that people who were believed to be witches were persecuted through the ages. Visit Salem, Massachusetts today to see the modern appeal of witches.
Jann: January 30th your first novel, The Witch Whisperer, book one in the Keepers of Magic series made its debut. How exciting for you! What inspired you to write this novel and series?
Barb: I’d been writing paranormal romance for a few years, witches in particular, trying to get a handle on the genre while reading extensively. Oddly enough, the title came to me after rewatching The Horse Whisperer. I thought, huh, The Witch Whisperer. Just the title. No plot. I usually let an idea (in this case, a title) roll around in my brain for weeks, even months before putting much down on paper. Then I started jotting copious notes while still editing a story that was proving difficult. Finally, the story of the Witch Whisperer became my focus. Difficult story went in the drawer. Soon into The WW, I recognized it was more fantasy than paranormal, and that I’d have to make it a series. Fantasy series sell better than standalones, I was told. Yikes! Three books. I named the series Keepers of Magic. Book two, The Keeper’s Code, is a work in progress.
Jann: What sort of research did you do for the book?
Barb: I read a lot of fantasy and paranormal romance. I researched conventional witch lore and covens and wiccans. I decided that my secret, pacifist witch society, having come from another realm to this modern world, would worship a goddess of nature and have their own form of governance and ritual. I did keep some conventions, like magical powers, elemental magic, herbs and potions, and other details. No magic wands. I took world building and fantasy workshops, read every blog I came across about writing fantasy and series writing. I have a giant book of spells that I refer to frequently. I went down so many rabbit holes. Ended up in Wonderland a few times.
Jann: Your main characters, Willow Gladstone and Never Ravenwood are fabulous. What challenges did you set for them to overcome? Will they achieve their HEA?
Barb: Willow seeks perfection in all things, especially herself. She already feels flawed because she has weak magical powers, so not in keeping with her magically Elite, over-achieving and judgmental family. When her already weak magic becomes glitchy, she must seek a cure or risk incarceration in the secret witch society’s dreaded Haven. The legendary Witch Whisperer, the one person she’d like to avoid, is her only other option. He’s messy, undisciplined, frustrating and way too sexy.
Never Ravenwood, The Witch Whisperer, likes his solitary existence. He’s happy to live out his sentence for past misdeeds on a secluded estate while treating witches with magic problems through his on-line forum. Then along comes beautiful Willow for a rehab residency to disrupt, beguile and baffle him. She forces him to confront his greatest fears, and to question a guilt so heavy that living without love seems an apt penance.
As for achieving their HEA? The Witch Whisperer is first and foremost, a romance, so…
Jann: Did anything about your characters surprise you when you were writing?
Barb: Yes. I began to realize during the editing stage how much I identified with Willow and her need for perfection, to never feeling good enough. I became quite attached to her. Never Ravenwood’s love for his blood brother Blaise became much deeper than I’d first imagined. Nev demanded I add emphasis to their relationship throughout the story.
Jann: When starting this series, did you think of character, plot or theme first?
Barb: As I mentioned above, the title came to me first, then the character Never Ravenwood as the WW himself. I did extensive character analyses in One Stop for Writers’ Character Builder on the main characters and major secondary characters. Once I had an idea of their goals, motivations, and conflicts, I could work on an outline to achieve their character arcs and story ending. Theme is almost always something I discover after a first draft.
Jann: How many books do you have planned for this series? Are you working on Book Two? Can you tell us about the characters and their story?
Barb: I mentioned that I’ve planned three books in the Keepers of Magic series. I’m working on the first draft of book two, The Keeper’s Code. I took a secondary character from the WW, powerful witch Ash Hunter, and made him the protagonist of book two. He’s a Keeper of magic in their secret witch society that is desperate to remain secret, an ever-more difficult task in this contemporary world of cameras on every corner, cell phones, and social media. He’s adept at lying, can mesmerize with a touch, and wipe memories. Who to pair him with? Why not a beautiful Reg (a person with no magic—think Muggle), who’s an award-winning investigative journalist with major trust issues and a killer witch stalking her.
Jann: What do you hope readers will take away from this series?
Barb: I hope they will be entertained, chuckle here and there, and wonder if that weird next-door neighbor is actually a witch. Seriously, books one and two have underlying themes, like perfection is unattainable (accept yourself for who you are), and something like learning to trust and trust in love. Still working on that one for book two.
Jann: Do you plan to stay with fantasy/paranormal genre?
Barb: For the foreseeable future. I need to finish the Keepers of Magic series in some kind of timely manner because I have so many other witchy stories I want to write.
Jann: The Great Leaving is an origin short story you wrote for the Keepers of Magic series. What is it about? Is it available to purchase?
Barb: I wanted to tell the emotional tale of the witch society’s forced abandonment of their homeland, the fantasy realm of Tae-wen, back in our time of 1690. For this snapshot in time, I chose the point of view of immortal witch Aris, whose adopted name in our world is Elizabeth Trowbridge. In The Witch Whisperer, she’s still alive, living in the society’s Haven and the owner of Trowbridge House, the secluded estate where The Witch Whisperer is incarcerated, and where Willow comes to have her broken magic fixed. She plays a much bigger role in book 2. I plan to use the short story The Great Leaving, a small e-booklet that is available through BookFunnel, as a free promo item at various events and for an eventual sign-up bonus when I start my newsletter.
Jann: I see that you have also written several short stories that are published in several anthologies. Would you share a bit about those stories?
Barb: I like writing short stories in between longer novels. Secrets of Moonlight Cove anthology was a fun one because all the authors got together and mapped out a fictional coastal town and set up a Google doc so we could share the details of our stories. In our own stories, we referenced characters in other stories and their businesses. Mine was a contemporary romance called Maggie’s Mystery Man.
Love for Christmas anthology was a labor of love with my critique group. I wrote a paranormal romance called Love for Christmas, about a cursed witch with a Christmas deadline.
In both volumes of The Truth That Can’t Be Told anthologies, I wrote a darker fantasy in two parts about cursed witches, plus a couple of contemporary pieces. All are available on Amazon.
Jann: Barb—Wishing you all the best on your debut novel, The Witch Whisperer and the Keepers of Magic series.
Barb’s Books
(Hover over the cover for buy links. Click on the cover for more information.)
Did They Really Fly?
October 20, 2019 by Meriam Wilhelm in category A Bit of Magic by Meriam Wilhelm, Writing tagged as brooms, magic, Witches
Fall is my favorite time of the year and an opportunity for me to share three unusual witch facts with you. Why? Well, of course, because I write about witches. But since my witches live primarily at the beach, and since that might seem peculiar to you, I thought I’d share a few other things you might find different, unusual or just plain funky about my favorite subject—witches!
1. Witches were not originally thought to be bad, evil or even scary.
Many practitioners of witchcraft were originally respected as healers, providing helpful healing aids to their villages. Using plant based remedies they created tinctures, oils and healing potions which they shared freely throughout their communities for the purpose of curing everyday maladies. Many were known for having vast gardens, where they harvested plants and flowers for medicinal uses. The popularity of using natural plants and flowers as healing tools is on the rise again today. Herbal Medicine, Natural Remedies by Anne Kennedy is a great resource for info on this.
(My book, The Witch of Bergen shares a witch who is one hunky healer)
2. Witches didn’t really fly on brooms… or did they?
People who practiced witchcraft experimented with herbs and potions in rituals that may have used the Mandrake plant. Mandrake contains scopolamine and atropine, two alkaloids that cause feelings of euphoria in low doses and hallucinations in higher doses. The rituals—performed in the nude—called for the participants to rub an herbal ointment containing the mandrake on their foreheads, wrists, hands, and feet as well as on a broomstick that they would ride. The ointment would be absorbed into their system, causing a floating sensation—and their description of that feeling is what perpetuated the image of a witch flying on a broomstick. Adapted from an article in https://mentalfloss.com
Others believed that brooms were never “flown”, but rather used to sweep rooms clean to allow for a sterile environment for creating powerful potions.
3. Did you know that there is a Witch Capitol?
There is and it’s not Salem, Massachusetts! It is Vardo, Norway. It’s dark, cold and hard to get to, but what else would you expect from a place that honors witches? Called the Steilneset Memorial it recognizes the ninety one victims of the witch persecution that started in Norway in the early 1600’s and ended in 1692. 135 people were prosecuted for the crime of being a witch with 91 of them actually dying at the stake for their crime. The structure itself is a bit haunting, but none the less memorable. When I was in Bergen, Norway, I attempted to go there. But the train trip required was far too long and I had to put my trip off for the next time I’m in Bergen. I hear visiting there at midnight will set your teeth to chatter!
Just a few thoughts on witches to warm a cold October day.
Happy Halloween!
1 0 Read moreMy Kingdom for the Right Home
January 20, 2019 by Meriam Wilhelm in category A Bit of Magic by Meriam Wilhelm tagged as magic, Something new, The Witches of New Moon Beach, Witches
If you’ve read any of my books, you know that I write about witches—nice witches thrown into every day dilemmas where their magic sometimes is and sometimes is not very helpful. Recently, I’ve had a new story buzzing around in my head, just ready to pop out. I can see my characters and yes, they have paranormal powers, in fact they’re all witches. I may throw in a warlock or two, although I’m not yet sold on that inclusion. I have a sense of where I want to take my characters, what conflicts they’ll meet along the way and even who my villains might be.
But I thought I’d try something different this time, something I’ve never done before. I thought I’d start with a house. Not just any house, but a place with its own personality. A house capable of hosting all sorts of exciting, mystically challenging; paranormal activity. The exact house to function as the hub of my story.
With this in mind, I went in search of the perfect abode for my witches to call home and that’s where I ran into my own dilemma . . . which house to choose? I combed various neighborhoods, searched the internet, looked through real estate sites and visited a historical site or two on a quest to find the right domicile. Once committed to a place, I think the rest of my story will naturally unfold itself.
I’m down to four houses scattered throughout Europe and the U.S.A. and I would love your input. Not only which house would you choose, but why? I chose each house for a different reason and I’ll be curious to learn which house captures your imagination.
One more thing, if you are curious about the stories I’ve written, you can find The Witches Of New Moon Beach in a new boxed set right now on Amazon and Smashwords. Take a look and let me know what you think.
Oh, and those of you who have been following my travels/struggles towards my sixty-fifth birthday – I’ve managed to complete every goal but one. I sadly have not lost my twenty pounds. However, not one to give up, I’m still working on it, including walking 45 minutes a day!
Happy New Year to you all and I can’t wait to hear from you!
3 0 Read more
I Put a Spell on You by @MeriamWilhelm
November 20, 2017 by Meriam Wilhelm in category A Bit of Magic by Meriam Wilhelm tagged as Fan Letters, magic, Spells, Witches
I love writing books about modern-day witches.
My favorite part is the research; learning more about magic, spells, historical witches and current practices. Healing crystals and common rituals intrigue me and I love visiting stores, books and websites that focus on the use of crystals and gemstones to improve life for us mere mortals. I’ve met some of the most interesting people while scouring through New Age shops from Carlsbad to Solvang and often model my characters after those I’ve met. I fill my stories with light-hearted spells, mystical facts and quirky characters intended to make each book not only engaging and believable but also colored with unique, factual details.
But lately I’ve received some rather interesting e-mails, Facebook, Twitter and website contacts from readers—that have me wondering. I’ve paraphrased a couple and cleaned up one in particular.
I just finished your book – Have you cast a spell on me? I think I’m in love. (So, okay, that one was actually kind of cute.)
Can you cast a spell on me? My life sucks!
Can you cast a spell for me? I want to be rid of him…or her…or them…for good! (Heavy!)
Are you bewitched…are you sure? How can you be certain?
[tweetshare tweet=”Have you cast a spell on me? I think I’m in love. @MeriamWilhelm” username=”A_SliceofOrange”]
I’ve even been asked if I use frogs when creating my home-grown spells, prefer to wear the color black or know any single, available witches. (I cleaned up that last request!) My favorite comment dealt with the fact that the witches in all of my stories live at the beach—New Moon Beach. “I understand you live in Southern California and I have visited many of the beaches there. Unfortunately, I am very disappointed to tell you that I have not had even one witch sighting yet. Can you please direct me to the correct beach?” Hmm…
Sure, I write about the supernatural and I always try to include interesting magically accurate tidbits – not only in my books but also in my monthly newsletters. (If you’d like to receive my newsletter just sign up at my website www.meriamwilhelm.com – You can also find all of my books there!
However, although I’m tempted to say otherwise, and I hope I don’t disappoint you too badly – I am not a practicing witch. Yes, I love to dress in black – who doesn’t? I wear healing crystals all of the time and really do believe in their powers. I’ve met several attractive witches over the last couple of years – but I have no idea if any of them are single or available. And no frog has ever been injured during the conjuring of any of my literary spells.
I will continue to quench my curiosity by searching out new and entertaining bits of info about the supernatural world of magic. And I hope that you’ll consider jumping into one or more of my stories. Oh, if you have anything magically interesting that you’d like to share with me just send me an email at meriamwilhelm@hotmail.com It just might end up in one of my books!
If you share my passion for the mystical world and you’re looking for a few good books to learn more about witches, magic spells or crystals – here are a couple of my favorites.
WICCA A GUIDE FOR THE SOLITARY PRACTIONER by Scott Cunningham
Crystal Muse Everyday Rituals To Tune In To The Real You by Heather Askinosie & Timmi Jandro
Healing Crystals by Cassandra Eason
Everyday Witchcraft Making Time for Spirit in a Too-Busy World by Deborah Blake
OH, AND PLEASE CHECK OUT MY LATEST BOOK MURDER BY MAGIC
Meriam
The one thing I know, after all my years as an elementary school principal, is that there is magic everywhere and in everyone. While I miss those enchanting moments with kids, I have always wanted to let my imagination run wild as I seek out my own magic and write about it. When I retired, I started to write my first books, a series called The Witches of New Moon Beach and inspiration wasn’t hard to find.
I have lived in Redondo Beach all my life, and New Moon might have more than a passing resemblance to my hometown. Every day I walk on the path that runs along the beach, sometimes with my sisters, but most often with my thoughts as I plot my next book.
I am long married and mom to three great grown kids. When I’m not writing or walking on the beach, you’ll find me sewing, reading or traveling and taking pictures.
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