You may have come across A. L. Butcher on her blog, Library of Erana. Alexandra is one of the most prolific Indies I know, so I was looking forward to finding out more about her and her work.

The Usual

Hello Alex, good to have you here. What inspired you to write your books?

The first novel – The Light Beyond the Storm Chronicles? It was born from a gaming character, something I’d been working on for a while and a lot of encouragement. I decided to flesh out the character, adapt her to my fantasy world and that was that. The later novels and the short stories have come from the lore of the world. It is a world where magic is forbidden, people are segregated and many enslaved. A tyrannical martial law is imposed, lies and half-truths abound and good and bad are not easily defined. There is a…

© 2014  Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM.  World Rights Reserved.

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Are you a nonfiction author? Or would you like to be? Would you like to build the community of people who are interested in you and buy your books? Then this article is for you.

Do you have one book already? Great! So, what is your mission, your calling, your “job in the Universe”, of which this book is a part? What are you trying to achieve? Who are you trying to affect? Take a couple of minutes to write out your cause, your motivation for writing this book and others. This is your mission statement.

“My ideas usually come not at my desk writing

but in the midst of living.”

~Anais Nin

Can you see a multiyear plan that includes other books you may write? What would those books cover? How can you tie together the…

In the spirit of the season, I’ll share a story of generosity. The true story of my mother, who’s an incredibly giving and generous person. Especially with other people’s stuff.

You see, my mom has been working with various charities through the years. She’s always found painting, sewing and preparing things for sale in countless bazaars, when she’s not teaching orphans. Sadly, she tends to get carried away.

Growing up, I never knew whether I’d find my clothes in my closet, or if she would have given them away to a passerby, or to be sold off at a bazaar. Nor was I alone in my predicament; my father suffered the same fate. To illustrate my point, consider the case of the disappearing pair of jeans.

My dad had this pair of jeans that he loved. He’s a rotund fellow (albeit less so, nowadays) and that one pair of trousers fit…

Getting children to read classic books, even hilarious ones like Pinocchio, is not always easy but the stakes couldn’t be higher. They’re our best bet for ever achieving our dreams for self-realization, rebirth, peace, redemption and goodwill to all mankind. A good boy was what Geppetto was trying to carve out of his outrageously impossible, willful puppet. What classic books come to tell us is that the paradise-on-earth we dream of is never easy but can always happen.

With more than ever readers, available books, gift-giving grandparents, creative teachers, informed parents and technological tools, we should be able to progress:
– the Gutenberg Project offers free e-book versions of all books in print
– you can download excerpts from movies of classics on devices; e.g. a mother I know used  Frozen (from a Hans Christen Andersen story) to organize a birthday party
– a variety of audiovisual resources can be used in classrooms…