ALL A-QUIVER: WALKING THE STRAIGHT ’N ARROW

Word of the week: ebullience - \i-ˈbu̇l-yən(t)s, -ˈbəl-\ - noun - (hear it!) - the quality of lively or enthusiastic expression of thoughts or feelings

Indie Author of the Month: Please Come Meet . . . Lisa M. Green

(From my Amazon review of The First.)

For several months, I’d waited for The First to be released, truly tempted to read the sample chapters from Lisa’s website, but knew I’d much rather wait for the full version on my Kindle so I could take in the story as a whole . . . and the wait was very worth it.

Lisa takes her readers on an fantastic journey straight from the inside out, fairly turning the main character (Rinni) on her head with startling revelations about herself, her people, and the lifestyle and world she once took for granted and thought she understood, with a wholly unexpected ending that’s sure to make readers think. It sparked my want to read the story again, not only because it’s a well-written book, but also to see with more clarity and foresight how connections are made from start to finish.

Certainly Lisa has taken great pains to polish the prose in The First to a near-perfect shine, and has created a world with characters so very much alive, they practically grab you by the hand and immerse you into the unfolding tale—everything a great book should be and should do for a reader.

Did I have a couple of niggles? Sure I did. But even though the main character voiced her direct thoughts immediately after (which, to my editor’s mind, lent itself to repetition), and Rinni’s reaction to a handful of situations bordered slightly on melodramatic, neither of these detracted from my overall enjoyment of the story.

The First is a solid, well-written novel, all round. Truth be told, and in my humble opinion, it’s a sumptuous blend of some familiar books—it has the feel of The Giver, plus a bit of Wool, all tied up with a very slight smidgen of the Hunger Games—yet in the end, Lisa’s debut novel is an entity all its own, and a book I highly recommend for those looking to read a truly entertaining tale.

And so, without further ado, here’s Lisa to tell you a little about herself. Come, read, enjoy . . . and please, always support indie authors.

* * *

Greetings and salutations, friends! My name is Lisa M. Green, though, in truth, it isn’t. Not yet. It will be soon, once I’ve said my vows and slipped on the Ring of Binding (+1 patience, +2 loyalty). I’m a high school teacher with a teenage daughter (+50 patience). Oh, and I write. Fantasy, of the mythic and paranormal variety, with a bit of might and magic to come.

You could call me a teacher who loves to write. You could call me a writer who loves to teach. But the truth is that I am both, separately and together. I teach literature and writing to high school students. I’ve been writing since I was a very young child, even having my young ego stroked with writing awards and accolades through school competitions. Perhaps that fueled my desire to continue. Perhaps writing is just a part of who I am.

The goal I was working toward was a career in writing, but somehow I talked myself into believing that I could never make a living out of such an uncertain path. Maybe that was true at the time. Either way, I turned to another career I had always considered—teaching—in part because my mother is a teacher. I love teaching literature, as well as writing. Writing has always come naturally to me, but I stopped believing in my ability to actually get published a long time ago. I was scared. And complacent.

But then the muse struck me. To be more specific, she smacked me across the face with a metal baseball bat. And so I began to write what would become my first full-length novel. My college courses in grammar and linguistics, as well as creative writing and editing, helped tremendously in shaping my path through such an enormous endeavor. Yes, I had always been naturally adept at writing and revising, but those experiences pushed me to a completely different level.

Without the current atmosphere within the self-publishing industry, I might never have accomplished my dream of publishing a novel. I will never know if a publisher would have scooped up my manuscript because I made a gut-churning, nausea-inducing decision to avoid the publishing houses altogether. Some may say that it was a big mistake not to try. Some may think that my work must be sub-par since I wouldn’t let a professional take a look at it. Some may have no clue how subjective and time-consuming that process actually is.

The First is a story of truth, trust, and sacrifice. A young woman, determined not to fall prey to the consequences of inaction, must brave the nightmares beyond her known world in order to fight back against the nightmare within that is slowly killing her village and her people. As a mythic and paranormal fantasy novel, it may not be for everyone, but the professionalism involved should be apparent. With the insurmountable mass of self-published work out there, it is very difficult for those with a professional background to stand out amongst what I like to call “hobbyists.” There is nothing wrong with writing as a hobby, or writing because you love it, but for those who wish to go further and develop a career in the field, the task is a bit overwhelming.

But I will not lose hope. I will not give up. In fact, I am currently writing my second novel—most likely a series—in the fantasy genre. It’s full of magic and time travel and all sorts of other goodies, and I’m quite enjoying the experience. I honestly love to write. I’m overwhelmed with a feeling of euphoric ebullience whenever the muse hits me, despite her sometimes malevolent nature :-P

Being in the earlier stages of my writing process, more research than writing has occurred so far. Names and meanings are very important to me, so I tend to spend a good deal of time finding just the right word or name for many aspects. This wasn’t the case for everything in my debut novel (the character names were straight out of my head, but place and object names were often significant). However, this new series involves some very in-depth research on name meanings.

If I’ve piqued your interest, you can check out the first eleven chapters of The First on my website or via a PDF download. My website’s main page is located at lisamgreen.com. You can also download samples from Amazon or Goodreads. The book was released on February 25, 2014, and it’s available at the following locations: my website (print and all digital formats), Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, Apple iBooks, Kobo, as well as many others. You can also order it from your local independent bookstore.