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Amanda M. Blake

~ Of fairy tales and tentacles

Amanda M. Blake

Category Archives: Thorns

ROSE RED Playlist

24 Tuesday Dec 2019

Posted by amandamblake in Series, Soundtracks, Thorns

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inspiration, playlist, rose red, the thorns series

Rose Red E CoverOne of my personal little joys is moving music I love into playlists for the books I’m working on. It helps me focus my themes and feel all the feels that music can make a person feel more effortlessly than words on their own. My experience of books, mine and other people’s, is very cinematic, and soundtracks help supplement that experience for me, and I love sharing that playlist with anyone else, if they want to feel the feels with me.

There’s more metal in this than the pop/singer-songwriter vibe of the THORNS playlist (although we still have some of that), because things get darker and much more dramatic, hence the white-gothic aesthetic of the cover, which is my jam.

The rules: No more than two songs by each artist, and no song specially written or covered for a movie.

“Mad Girl” – Emilie Autumn
“Not a Virgin” – Poe
“I Can’t Make You Love Me” – Bonnie Raitt
“Swansong for a Raven” – Cradle of Filth
“Snow-White” – Xandria
“Out of my Cage” – UNSECRET feat. Alaina Cross
“Where is the Blood?” – Delain
“Promised Land” – Lily Kershaw
“Ravenlight” – Kamelot
“Madness” – Ruelle
“Control” – Poe
“Hate Me” – Eurielle
“Darkest White” – Tristania
“Vendetta” – UNSECRET feat. Krigare
“I Want My Innocence Back” – Emilie Autumn
“What Have You Done” – Within Temptation
“Nietzche’s Eyes” – Paula Cole
“Hate it When You See Me Cry” – Halestorm
“Manhattan” – Sara Bareilles
“Love and War” – Fleurie
“Let Her Go” – Passenger

ROSE RED now available

21 Saturday Dec 2019

Posted by amandamblake in Novels, Series, Thorns

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beauty and the beast, fairy tale, mash-up, nutcracker, pied piper, rose red, self-publishing, sleeping beauty, snow white, the thorns series

I’m very late, but everything is now available!

Hair as black as night, skin as white as bone, lips as red as blood… Just because the princess wakes up doesn’t mean she’s saved.
 
The second book in the modern fairy tale mash-up Thorns series is now available in ebook and print.
 
Amazon US ebook: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B082M9JBWY
Amazon US paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1674206011
Universal link to all other vendors: https://books2read.com/u/meBMBl
 
And start from the beginning with Thorns: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07KQFSNWP

Rose Red E Cover

ROSE RED blurb reveal

05 Tuesday Nov 2019

Posted by amandamblake in Novels, Series, Thorns

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fairy tale, mash-up, novel, olivia, rose red, snow white, the thorns series

Rose Red E CoverI don’t think I’ll ever like a blurb as much as I like the one for Thorns. I initially didn’t like the one I’d put together for Rose Red, but after some back-and-forth with my alpha reader, I sat on it for a while, then turned it into something that works.

Fortunately, it wasn’t as bad as the first few versions of Nocturne‘s blurb. I fixed that one seriously last minute. Rose Red‘s is last minute, too, but at least most of it was already  in place. Just had to rework the first main paragraph.

 

 

Hair as black as night, skin as white as bone, lips as red as blood…

Just because the princess wakes up doesn’t mean she’s saved.

After Sylvaine and the Sleeping Kingdom awaken from their enchantments, the Hunter Brotherhood struggles to help the cursed population adjust to life in the modern world.

But when Sylvaine turns up in New York City with no explanation, then goes missing, the search leads Olivia, Griffin, and companions old and new deeper into even darker stories, grim tales with more endings that haven’t gone as planned.

From giant rats to stolen hearts, it turns out saving princesses isn’t as simple as a kiss.

ROSE RED Cover Reveal

20 Sunday Oct 2019

Posted by amandamblake in Novels, Series, Thorns

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cover reveal, covers by combs, fairy tale, mash-up, rose red, snow white, the thorns series

I know it’s been a while since I last updated. I had computer troubles and needed to send it out for repairs. It took a lot longer than I thought it was going to, because I just told myself I’d wait until I got it back before doing any blogging. Joke’s on me, I guess.

So we can start with the soft reveal of ROSE RED. I think it’ll be a bit late coming out–mid to late November instead of end of October. I’m just starting on the proofreading, and then it’s got to be formatted and I need to get a proof sent to me before I publish.

Until then, whet your appetite on the gorgeous, white-gothic cover of ROSE RED, the second book in the Thorns series, a custom by Covers by Combs. The fairy/folk tale inspirations for this one are Beauty and the Beast (of course), Snow White (but oddly enough, not Snow White and Rose Red, which is a Bearskin tale–just borrowed the name), and the Nutcracker.

Rose Red E Cover

THORNS Playlist

19 Saturday Jan 2019

Posted by amandamblake in Music, Series, Soundtracks, Thorns

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fan soundtrack, inspiration, Music, the thorns series, Thorns

Thorns E CoverOne of the things that I need when writing is the perfect background music. I actually end up using a cultivated playlist more during edits and to psych myself up for those edits between projects. I’m an all-five-senses kind of girl. Music inspires feelings and memories; I associate feelings and character thoughts and scenes with different songs, be it from lyrics, the singers, or whole package songs.

I shared my NOCTURNE playlist two Halloweens ago. I definitely have a gothic and metal side to my music collection, but THORNS lends itself more to pop sounds, so I hope it’s a bit of an eclectic collection. If you want to know what kind of sounds introduce the Thorns series to the world and make me experience all the THORNS feels, check out the playlist below.

The rules: No more than two songs by each artist, and no song specially written or covered for a movie. My personal playlist has these things, of course, but that’s for my own edification.

“Fairytale” – Sara Bareilles
“Loverman” – Nick Cave
“Whyyawannabringmedown” – Kelly Clarkson
“Dance in the Dark” – Lady Gaga
“Wish I Had an Angel” – Nightwish
“A Girl Like You” – Edwyn Collins
“Jar of Hearts” – Christina Perri
“(Are You) The One That I’ve Been Waiting For?” – Nick Cave
“Lil’ Red Riding Hood” – Laura Gibson
“Chandelier” – Sia
“Kevlar Skin” – Kamelot
“One Night” – Christina Perri
“Covered by Roses” – Within Temptation
“Dark Horse” – Katy Perry
“Black & Silver” – Xandria
“Save Me” – Queen
“Don’t Know How to Stop” – Halestorm
“1000 Times” – Sara Bareilles
“Stay with Me” – Sam Smith
“Save You” – Kelly Clarkson

THORNS now available!

20 Tuesday Nov 2018

Posted by amandamblake in Novels, Series, Thorns, Writing

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beauty and the beast, bluebeard, book, griffin, mash-up, novel, olivia, remix, self-publishing, sleeping beauty, snow white, the thorns series, Thorns, urban fantasy

Thorns E CoverIt’s finally here! The first book in the series, THORNS, has been made available across the board.

To love a rose, you must also love its thorns. THORNS invites you down the twisted paths of classic fairy tales, myths, and legends into dark forests, urban jungles, otherworlds, underworlds, and your very own rose-red hearts.

Kindle e-book
Trade paperback
Universal link to all other vendors

When eccentric artist Olivia Rowe returns to the Castle to fulfill a childhood promise to its mysterious owner, Griffin, an assassination attempt against him catapults her into a world of hunters, witches, and enchantments—where fairy tales are real but happily-ever-afters are far from guaranteed.

With a rogue hunter hot on their heels, they must journey between the modern world and the last remaining magical enclaves to rescue Snow White, the Sleeping Kingdom, and Griffin himself from Bluebeard, a powerful sorcerer on a life-stealing spree to achieve immortality.

The Rose Less Taken

16 Friday Nov 2018

Posted by amandamblake in Music, Poetry, Series, Thorns

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lyrics, not a poet, poem, roses, seduction, songwriting, temptation, the thorns series, Thorns

nature red love romantic

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

I’ve been very busy with NaNoWriMo and the publication of Thorns was delayed, but it looks like it should be a go here within a week at most. I have a collection of Christmas songs that got this whole lyric-writing thing started, but I don’t want to start those until after Thanksgiving.

With Thorns coming out soon, I thought I’d share a song I wrote that was (very loosely) inspired by it. It’s got some themes connected to the series, but it’s not spoilerific, because it’s inspired by rather than based on.

It’s definitely got a darker rock edge to what was originally meant to be a pop sound. I’d put it in a pretty little minor key.

THE ROSE LESS TAKEN

She illuminates the room with crimson blue light
Fills up the spaces in everyone’s sight
For every step she takes, they all walk a mile
Velvet on her lips and thorns in her smile.

She is the eye in the center of the storm
The thickest of hides always gets torn
Making them wonder if she is the one
Love potion on her skin and poison in her tongue.

Chorus:
A rainbow in the gray
A slither out of sight
Woman by day
Temptation by night
I know that I shouldn’t
But I never say no
Wherever she takes me
I know that I’ll go
All she does is smile
And she leaves me broken
I’ll sink in her thorns
She’s the rose less taken.

Heaven knows she sends to me to hell
She was the very last angel who fell
She seems like honey, but you suffer her sting
And worship her for the pain that she brings.

Bridge:
She’s the vampire they cling to
The doll they desire
They pour gasoline
She sets them on fire
I’m only one of the beasts that she tames
She does what she does
And I’m the only one to blame.

Chorus

Cover Reveal

06 Saturday Oct 2018

Posted by amandamblake in Novels, Series, Thorns

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cover by combs, olivia, peacock, roses, the thorns series, Thorns

I just can’t keep a lid on it anymore, especially since I set up the Thorns series page and bought the domain name.

After working with Covers by Combs, she came up with an amazing custom cover for THORNS, the first book in the series. It’s just so gorgeous, I can’t stand it. Sometimes, when I’m nervous or lacking confidence or wondering what the point of this is, I just open the cover file and stare at it for a while.

THORNS will be available at the end of the month!

Thorns E Cover

Writing Through the Apocalypse

14 Friday Sep 2018

Posted by amandamblake in Series, Thorns, Writing

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2012, apocalypse, fairy tale, mental illness, Series, thanatophobia, Thorns, Writing

aerial photography of pine trees

Photo by eberhard grossgasteiger on Pexels.com

The year 2012 was a rough one for me. If I remember correctly, I was taking online courses and no longer working at the time, which was amazing, and going forward, I will ever pursue a similar state. But I was also dealing with a level of anxiety and fear that has only been matched post-2016 election, and for much the same reason.

I’m what’s called a thanatophobe. Roughly translated, it means afraid of death. Now, that would describe most people, right? Fear of death is normal and part of the survival instinct. There’s something fundamentally disturbing about being snuffed out, of the world continuing on without you, even though you accept perfectly well that the world got along fine before you were born, too. Your consciousness just can’t comprehend not being a consciousness. That’s why you wake up from dreams when you die–or that’s the theory, anyway. It’s all very mirror-in-a-mirror.

I do have what I consider a higher level of normal death anxiety. Hypochondria is a side effect of that, as is the mysophobia that’s been slowly but steadily increasing for a while. Uncertainty and control freakishness play a big part.

But I also have an occasionally paralyzing fear of apocalypse. All kinds of apocalypses. If there’s been a disaster movie about it, I’m afraid of it–although, strangely, I love disaster movies. Natural apocalypses. Alien apocalypses. Supernatural apocalypses. The Rapture. The Yellowstone caldera eruption. Asteroid hurtling toward Earth. Nuclear war. Rapid climate change. Epidemic. (Honestly, every time I read THE STAND, I get a cold. I think the publisher puts something in the pages.)

And yes, the 2012 Mayan calendar ending that marked the end of the world as we know it.

Did I know that, while natural and nuclear apocalypses are quite possible (as my brain reminds me all the time), this one was complete bunk, and nothing was going to happen in 2012 just because it was 2012, and the world was definitely not going to end on exactly December 21, 2012? Absolutely. I knew this for a fact. Just like I knew that the Rapture wasn’t going to happen according to Harold Camping’s predictions. Did that stop me from being afraid of it? No. That’s why they call it a phobia, Carl. It’s utterly irrational. And it was the entire freaking year. December 21 was at the end of it, after all.

So to distract myself, I wrote THORNS, which ended up about 195K words in its first draft. (I write long, then cut. That’s my very frustrating process.)

Of course, it helped that I was pretty much the only one freaking out and everyone was else was basically chill, so there were a lot of ports in the storm. Post-2016, not so much, which is why creativity has been such a hard thing for a lot of artists of late, although I’m noticing an upswing. Fear fatigue, maybe?

THORNS actually arose from a short story I’d wanted to write during college four years earlier. The opportunity came up in my fairy tales class–yes, I had a literature class on fairy tales. Envy me. Among a few other options, our final assignment could be a retold fairy tale, so I sat down and put to paper the idea I’d had for this BEAUTY AND THE BEAST retelling I was dying to write.

First thing I realized upon writing it was that it was too long for a short story–around 11K. The second thing I realized was that the story was still much too short and didn’t work at all as it was. It needed to become a novel to do the concept justice, so I shelved it until I thought I could handle a more elaborate plot. I wrote a much shorter BEAUTY AND THE BEAST retelling for the purpose of the assignment and moved on with my life, working on other projects. Most of which I also shelved, because that was the period in my life that I was really Learning How to Write by writing well-conceived crap. I’ll probably rework some of it someday.

Enter the apocalypse.

I’d say I just needed some escapist fiction, but THORNS isn’t really escapist. What it offered me, however, was a full, rich, detailed world in which I could hide among plot complexities (I’m a logistics person, so the problem-solving aspect of plotting is my wheelhouse) as well as hang out with people who were much more interesting to be around than my anxiety-ridden head. As long as my mind was racing, I thought I might as well put it to better use.

About halfway through this monster of a novel, I realized one book wasn’t going to cut it. Because of course.

But that’s the beauty of it (seriously, I’m not trying to be fairy tale puntastic). I can always come back to the THORNS series. When I do, I know it’s going to take up time and brainpower and spoons. But it’s going to do so in a way that I very much need, so it’s a good thing I’ve planned at least seven books in advance, and in my spare moments at work, I try to think beyond that. I told myself I couldn’t publish the second book, ROSE RED, until I’d written the fourth, PUPPETEER. Now that I’ve more or less figured out a work/writing balance, I’m thrilled next year will finally see me tackle it. (If we’re still here. Just saying.)

Haven’t figured out a work/writing/life balance, but you can’t have everything. And if you can’t have everything and the world is going to hell in a sound bite, I plan to do it writing.

The line in HAMILTON that sticks with me daily is “Why do you write like you’re running out of time?”

Because I fucking am. And I’ve got shit to finish before then. I guess death is a great motivator.

Would rather not work in a constant state of low-level panic, but I’ll take what I can get.

P.S. Editing through the apocalypse works, too.

Written in Stone

06 Monday Feb 2017

Posted by amandamblake in Novels, Series, Thorns, Writing

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nocturne, novel, self-publishing, standalone

1183643_75152080

It’s on the internet now, so it must be true.

I intend to self-publish Nocturne—my first novel and a YA horror standalone—somewhere in the realm of late September or early October of this year.

I also plan on self-publishing Thorns—the first book in my fairy tale remix series—in November or December, but that will ultimately depend on how soon I can get my cover commissioned and on what editor in his or her right mind will tackle a very long novel. It may need to be in January or February instead.

Suffice it to say, no more waffling. These books have had multiple edits, multiple eyes. It’s time.

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