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The Stories of Scott D. Southard

  • In Jerry’s Corner
  • A Jane Austen Daydream
  • Permanent Spring Showers
  • Megan
  • Maximilian Standforth and the Case of the Dangerous Dare
  • The Dante 3
  • Me Stuff
  • Man Behind the Curtain
  • December 18, 2013

    Only a little longer to win a signed copy of A Jane Austen Daydream!

    A Jane Austen DaydreamThere are only a few hours left to try and win an autographed copy of my latest novel A Jane Austen Daydream!

    At 12:00 AM (PST) on December 19 the giveaway shuts down. (That’s only hours away!) You can enter and learn more about the giveaway via this link.

    My novel is being showcased as part of the Best of 2013 Blog Hop Giveaway. On the site (besides the contest), blogger and author Kathryn Treat interviews me about the creation and inspiration behind the book.  I hope you will check it out and enter the contest soon… or now… now is good.

    If you want to learn more about my book as well, there are excerpts, reviews, interviews, and more fun goodies on my page for the book here. A Jane Austen Daydream was published by Madison Street Publishing in 2013.

     

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  • December 16, 2013

    Celebrating Jane Austen’s birthday with My Jane Austen Book Club

    Austen_vert_compl02I was thrilled to be asked to contribute to My Jane Austen Book Club‘s celebration of Jane Austen’s birthday! For those that are fans of Jane Austen and don’t know it, it is a great site and has been a good friend and supporter to my novel A Jane Austen Daydream since its publication.

    Over the course of the day, authors and fans have been sharing their insights and feelings towards Ms. Austen with a new post each hour. And for those interested in inspiration, regency, or simply the power of the written word, these entries are a great read. Some are fun, some are very serious, and some are  quite moving. You should check them out by scrolling through the site. Truly, there is something for everyone there.

    For me, my entry can be read via this direct link… and it includes a flying DeLorean.

    A Jane Austen DaydreamMy own tribute novel to Ms. Austen, A Jane Austen Daydream, can be purchased in print ($13.46) or as an eBook for the outrageously low price of $3.99 for Kindle. You can find it on Amazon here (http://amzn.com/B00CH3HQUU).

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  • December 12, 2013

    New WKAR Book Review: We Are Water by Wally Lamb

    Current StateToday, on WKAR’s Current State I reviewed the new novel by popular writer Wally Lamb. It is called We Are Water. You can listen to my review online here:

    http://wkar.org/post/book-review-wally-lambs-we-are-water

    If you would rather read my book review, you can do so below.

    We Are Water can be found on Amazon.com here. If you would like to hear/read more of my book reviews you can do so via my page for my Current State reviews here.

    I hope you enjoy my new book review!

    (more…)

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  • December 11, 2013

    Charging the Melancholy Dragon: The Down Bits in Writing Today

    Bugs Bunny in CasablancaBeing a writer can be… depressing.

    This is really not surprising and most that work in the arts feel this to a certain degree, because you are putting a piece of your soul out there for the world to see and judge.

    And everyone judges.

    Yet, for an author there is something about writing that makes it seem so, so much more personal.

    It’s probably because a story begins in one’s mind and resides there for months to years, until that fateful moment when a writer finally hits “print” on their keyboard or “send” in that first e-mail. And when you consider that most authors are introverts to a certain degree to being with.… Well, it just spells depressing doom, doesn’t it?  Yes, this all seems completely explainable, so why does it affect all of us so much?

    Because creativity is all illogical! It’s on a completely different side of the brain from logic! Creativity resides with emotion and once I am ready myself to show or talk about a book, I usually expect to be disappointed and a little down. This is not me being a glass-half empty kind of guy; it’s just the nature of being a writer, especially in today’s overly-congested market of authors peddling their wares.

    Yes, we writers when we are young to the field all dream of accolades and awards and long lines of readers desiring autographs at the local bookstore, but that doesn’t always happen. The chance of that happening to any of us is the equivalent of winning the lottery. Maybe three lotteries… back to back… in one day… and then getting hit by lightning while picking up the winnings.

    These are the two most important lessons that get me through the rough authoring patches… (more…)

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  • December 10, 2013

    A Jane Austen Daydream in the Best of 2013 Blog Hop Giveaway! Win a Signed Copy!

    A Jane Austen DaydreamI was recently honored to have author and blogger Kathryn Chastain Treat pick my novel A Jane Austen Daydream as her selection for the Best of 2013 Blog Hop Giveaway!

    So very cool!

    Because of this selection, on her site she has shared an interview with me about the book and is giving away a signed copy of it to one lucky reader. You can read the interview and enter the contest here.

    Here is a selection from the interview where I discuss my research into the writing of my little daydream:

    I knew that if I was to do this book right, I couldn’t only dip my toe in. I had to do this fully, live in the deep end of the pool, underwater. Her books, a few biographies, her letters, her unpublished works, I even visited some locations back before I began the book looking for inspiration. Everything I could get my hands on plays a part in the work.

    My goal was not just to write about her, but to have her be a part of it. So references and quotes from her classic works are sprinkled throughout it. The trick for me was though writing a book that could work for the casual fan as well as the obsessed reader. Again, it all comes down to planning, which means I had to find a narrator voice that was between Jane and my own. If I did this right, there is something for everyone in this book and it is readable even for those not used to reading regency novels.

    A Jane Austen DaydreamYou can read the rest of the interview and enter the contest by visiting Kathryn Chastain Treat’s website here.  Good luck!

    A Jane Austen Daydream can be purchased in print ($13.46) or as an eBook for the outrageously low price of $3.99 for Kindle. You can find it on Amazon here (http://amzn.com/B00CH3HQUU).

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  • December 5, 2013

    Book Sale on Kindle! The gothic MAXIMILIAN STANDFORTH… is only 99 cents! Check out an excerpt!

    Maximilian Standforth and the Case of the Dangerous Dare, Cover

    “For now, let me warn you of the morbid and sad tale ahead of you. This is a
    tale filled with horror, dark passages, ghostly apparitions, and deaths I would
    give my last shilling to forget.”

    For a limited time (and just in time for holiday shopping and holiday travels), my novel MAXIMILIAN STANDFORTH AND THE CASE OF THE DANGEROUS DARE is on sale on Amazon!

    The eBook version is only 99 cents and the print version is only $9.89! If you enjoyed my other books (like A JANE AUSTEN DAYDREAM) or are curious about my fiction or simply want to read something new, different, and unlike anything you will find… well… anywhere, this is for you!

    Honestly, this is not a book for everyone and I adore it for all of its madness. It is the kind of book as a reader I would love to discover lost and dusty on a library shelf. My goal in it was to break down the idea of storytelling and see what remains in the ruins of it… with a lot of humor, romance, horror and mystery roped in as well.

    You can find the novel on amazon here (http://amzn.com/B00CXSDEBE).

    If you would be interested in kicking the tires first, there is an excerpt below and more via the page for the book on this site here. (more…)

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  • December 4, 2013

    If I was…

    My Audience1 of 4

    If I was a rock star I would’ve started the band because I thought it’d be fun.  Also, it was a way to meet girls, or at least that is how my friends and I would’ve imagined it as we sat around with our guitars trying to figure out chords in my parents’ living room. In time there would be gigs. College parties, the occasional music festival. We would want to play our own songs, but the audience wouldn’t care. They were there for a good time and we were unknowns then. So we learned the classics and I would attempt to mimic other singers at every show. Then one day, while opening for a much better band, I would try out a new song. It would be a cynical piece but people would latch on to it as a love song. Before we knew it, we’d have a record contract and to our shock the song would jump up the charts.  While the attention and money is nice I would become frustrated by all of it.  Everyone (everyone!) wants us to do a song similar to the hit, but that just doesn’t interest me. That song was a fluke, it isn’t me! I would want to try new things, experiment, break ground in my music. It’d be probably at this point that some of my friends would begin to quit the band. But the rest of us would go on, because it had gone from fun to important to a job. Just a job. And later on, sometime during the middle of some random set at a casino, I’d look out over the audience (noticing again that the size is dwindling) and wonder when did this change? When? This was supposed to be fun, right? Fine, I’ll play that song again. Fine. (more…)

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  • November 28, 2013

    Jane Austen! Demonic Castles! Time Travel! Dragons! This Black Friday Consider a Southard Novel…

    When I sit down to write a book, my first goal is always to give my readers something new. So much of what you find on bookstore shelves can feel like a cookie-cutter recipe for a tale. Add a twist here, build to a love story here, sprinkle some comedy… That is not what you will find in one of my novels.

    This Black Friday, and in your holiday shopping, consider one of my novels for your readers. You can find excerpts, reviews, interviews, and more information on each of the books via their pages on this site.

    A JANE AUSTEN DAYDREAM
    Available in print ($13.46) and eBook ($3.99) from Madison Street Publishing via Amazon.com here.

    A Jane Austen DaydreamAll her heroines find love in the end–but is there love waiting for Jane?

    Jane Austen spends her days writing and matchmaking in the small countryside village of Steventon, until a ball at Godmersham Park propels her into a new world where she yearns for a romance of her own. But whether her heart will settle on a young lawyer, a clever Reverend, a wealthy childhood friend, or a mysterious stranger is anyone’s guess.

    Written in the style of Jane herself, this novel ponders the question faced by many devoted readers over the years–did she ever find love? Weaving fact with fiction, it re-imagines her life, using her own stories to fill in the gaps left by history and showing that all of us–to a greater or lesser degree–are head over heels for Jane.

    “I consider this novel one of the best not only in regency era literature, but also in mainstream fiction.” -NovelTravelist.com

    MAXIMILIAN STANDFORTH AND THE CASE OF THE DANGEROUS DARE
    Available in print ($9.71) and as an eBook ($3.99) via Amazon.com here.

    Maximilian Standforth and the Case of the Dangerous Dare, CoverThe cursed and foreboding McGregor Castle is the most terrifying and haunted location in all of the British Empire. Only a brave (or foolish) soul would consider visiting it, let alone staying within its walls for five days. In other words, a perfect dare for a man like Maximilian Standforth!

    Maximilian Standforth, famed playboy aristocrat and private detective, is a genius with dangerous tastes. With Bob (his trusty carriage driver, biographer, and body guard) and Maggie Collins (actress, spy, and maid) by his side, Maximilian will experience horrors and madness unlike any seen before. For it is at McGregor Castle that the team will discover more than they ever could imagine in this very experimental and genre-breaking thriller.

    “Playing with traditional style and plot ingredients but introducing enough surprises and originality this book was great fun to read.” -Christoph  Fischer Books

    MY PROBLEM WITH DOORS
    Available in print ($15.38) on Amazon.com here and as an eBook via Google Play ($9.99) here.

    My Problem With DoorsJacob’s life changed in a single moment when, as a toddler, he walked through his bedroom door only to find himself in the office of a British officer in Capetown, 1870. This would begin a thirty-year journey which would take him from ancient to future civilizations, and innumerable places and times in between. Through all of his travels, Jacob seeks for the purpose of his predicament, the significance of his life with all of its joys and suffering, loneliness and impermanence.

    “This is a most compelling book. It pulls you in to a fascinating concept from the beginning…. I give this book 5 stars.” -The Voracious Reader

    MEGAN
    Available in print ($15.51) on Amazon.com here and as an eBook via Google Play ($9.99) here.

    MeganMegan Wane is caught in a life of dull dreariness. She goes to work in a dead end job with a boss she can’t stand, and comes home to a silent apartment with only a standoffish cat for company. She can only get away through her imagination. And there, in her thoughts, there exists a fairy-tale kingdom with wizards and dragons. A place called Prosperity, where she is both a princess and a hero. On this day, both Megan’s external reality and her interior world will suffer tragedy that will turn her life upsidedown and shake her to the foundation. Can Megan turn disaster into deliverance?

    “I am very impressed with how Mr. Southard has interwoven the two world’s of Megan. It is very artfully crafted with vivid descriptions. ” -S. M. Nystoriak, Writer’s Block

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  • November 27, 2013

    New WKAR Book Review: Mitch Albom’s The First Phone Call From Heaven

    Current StateI am back on WKAR’s Current State today with a new book review! This time it is for the new novel by Mitch Albom, The First Phone Call From Heaven.

    You can listen to my latest book review here: http://wkar.org/post/book-review-mitch-alboms-first-phone-call-heaven

    If you would rather read my review, you can do so below.

    Mitch Albom’s book can be found on amazon here. If you would like to learn more about my book reviews or hear/read past installments you can do so via my site (here) or via this page on Current State’s official website.

    I hope you enjoy the review! (more…)

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  • November 18, 2013

    Twitter-Free: My 24 Hours Without Twitter

    The Fail WhaleI have over 30,000 Twitter followers. When I began this post I had tweeted exactly 10,400 times. No more, no less. Tweet #10,401 will be the first notice that I have written this post.

    I am an author on Twitter and, honestly, I don’t think Twitter has led to many book sales really from the traffic. It does generate blog views, but never more than a third of what I get on a daily basis. The rest comes from subscribers and those who just seem to check me out from time to time. So what is this hold Twitter has on me that I keep returning and why do so many follow me?

    For me, personally, Twitter is an ego trip. I admit that. Beyond the amount of followers, I get a huge kick out of sharing, retweets, and likes around my articles and books. And I especially love it when someone writes to me about my books usually to say they are reading one of them or enjoy it.

    The fact is though I can’t imagine having a real friendship or relationship over Twitter. There almost needs to be a new word for the relationships built on this social network; somewhere below “acquaintance” but above “name recognition.” Yeah, it’s not like Facebook where a majority of my “friends” I have actually spoken to at one point. This is more like epic literary crowdsurfing for a writer. Like I am thrown to the sea of Twitter, riding my book like a boat. And there are thousands and thousands of other writers and readers like me on the rough sea in similar boats… and now and then we will see a Fail Whale. Making us at that moment the internet equivalent of Ahab.

    Well, not this day.  For on this day, for the first time in two years, I have decided to take a break and document my withdraw… (more…)

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