Blog Hop Continues with Elaine Schmitz

First a word about my blog hop sponsor: Julaina Kleist-Corwin:

Julaina Kleist-Corwin is editor for her anthology, Written Across the Genres. She teaches creative writing for the City of Dublin, California. She has won several first place awards in short story contests. Her work has been published in The California Writers Club Literary Review and Harlequin’s 2012 and 2013 Christmas anthologies and other collections. Find her at her blog at www.timetowritenow.com, on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JulainaC, or on Pinterest at http://www.pinterest.com/jkleistc.

 In Julaina’s multidimensional novel, Norman in the Painting, the protagonist, Jill, has a long time friend named Evelyn who owns an antique store. Jill freaked when Norman appeared out of the painting at the back of her shop. She wanted Evelyn to see the phenomenon, but Norman had disappeared again. Since then, Evelyn’s tone of voice sounds placating, as if Jill is mentally fragile regardless of the topic Jill initiates. Ed, the knife sharpener at Evelyn’s, often gives Jill a look of total confusion and annoyance. He has seen her fainting, shouting, arguing, and causing chaos, which Evelyn says he doesn’t like. Jill wants to have conversations with him but he ignores her attempts. The antagonist plays on Jill’s fears to control her but as she grows in the character arc, the limited assumption about Jill will prove wrong.

About My Novel – Price of Independence:  Photo is Eugenia in a Turkish Harem, circa 1824 (right side of photo)

Let me introduce you to  Eugenia Yannopappas. She is fifteen at the beginning of her story, living on the Greek island of Chios, seven miles off the coast of Turkey. It is 1822, just before the infamous Chios Massacre.  We follow Eugenia as she survives capture and kidnapping during this horrendous epoch of Greek history. Her world is rocked, torn asunder, and somehow made whole again.

After Eugenia was captured and kidnapped by Turkish marauders, she was taken from the hold of a Turkish warship by her captor to face unknown dangers as a slave in Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire.

Eugenia was sold as a concubine to Pasha Rifat Polat, in his haremlik in Istanbul. There she met the love of her life, a fellow Greek slave, Dimitri.  How did they hide their love when the Pasha returned from a long sea voyage on official business for the Sultan? When and how would she escape? Do Eugenia and Dimitri live happily ever after?

Here are a few of Eugenia’s fellow characters and what they have to say:

What does her Mama think of Eugenia? “She’s my youngest child and the apple of her father’s eye. She is beautiful and independent, sometimes too much so. Though she tries hard to obey, her free spirit will get her into trouble one day.”

What does her Turkish keeper, Fatma say? “My son kidnapped her to sell her and make our fortune. She is indeed beautiful and desirable. But she might be the death of me or my son. He can barely keep his eyes from her. Though she is quick to pick up Turkish, she knows so little of our world and customs. I can’t trust that she will act like a proper concubine.”

What does her master, Pasha Rifat Polat think? “I think too much about her. She lives in my dreams and drives me crazy with desire when I am awake. I cannot bear to leave her, but the Sultan insists on my services. I long for the day she will replace my only son, who recently died, with several more to continue my name and dynasty.”

And what does Dimitri, her forbidden lover, say? “I would do anything, even risk my life, to see her free of the Pasha and returned to her family. She is heart of my heart, my soul reawakened, my reason for living.

Stay tuned for next week’s featured blog hop authors:

In order to take part, I solicited for other authors/bloggers to join me in this ongoing chain. Here are two of my talented friends who responded and plan to post about their books next week:

Author, healer, all-around kook, Jenna Newell Hiott boasts of having a limitless imagination, unless it’s nap time. While many of us had an imaginary friend as children, Jenna had an entire imaginary family—complete with a second set of parents and three siblings and all of whom lived in a make-believe world of Jenna’s own creation. One could say she’s been writing fantasy fiction since she was old enough to use words. And she never outgrew it.

Out of this hyperactive imagination, Jenna created the land of Todor: a world of magic, intrigue, and power plays. The first book, Revelation, was published in December 2013 and the second book is in production now. Follow her at:http://www.jennanewellhiott.com/blog.html

After years of writing poetry, books, nonfiction, and legal documents, it was author Ray Bradbury’s friendship and encouragement that inspired Dale E. Manolakas to pursue writing as a career. He taught her the characters wrote the book–she didn’t. But she also had to make a living, therefore:

Dale earned a BA from UCLA, and MA, MS, PhD and JD from USC. Member of the California Bar, she has clerked for The Honorable Arthur L. Alarcón, US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and been a Court of Appeals senior appellate attorney and an Administrative Law Judge.

She has also taught at high school and university levels, and  acted on stage, in films, and television. Dale lives with her husband, a retired attorney, in an otherwise animal-free environment in California.

Look up Dale’s two books on Amazon: Lethal Lawyers and and Hollywood Plays for Keeps.  Find out more about Dale and her writing at http://www.dalemanolakas.com/home.html