Reading Challenge & Book Club
Part Two of the Qurilixen Book Club and Reading Challenge Series (Find Part One HERE)
Book Club Discussion series for Qurilixen World series collection.
*Comments might have spoilers*
- Discuss the books below
- Ask questions
- Please leave reviews for the books you love. They don’t have to be long. Reviews rankings and numbers do matter. They mean more books in a series, more sales for the author, more exposure on the vendor sites.
The Books:
Secrets from Writing the Books:
Barbarian Prince was my second book ever published back in 2004. I think I’ve grown a lot as a writer since that time, but it was what really started the Qurilixen World collection of series.
These first four books were written at the same time, over a 2 mth period. I was on a new book signing high and words just flowed out me. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
I had just sold the Regency Paranormal The Mists of Midnight (now called Forget Me Not). The publisher really needed books for their science fiction romance line and asked me if I would do it. In my mind I was a historical romance author, and that was where my passion would always remain.
Insert present day me laughing at my younger self. Laughing hard. So hard. So very hard.
At the time though I told myself, OK, just these four and that will get me in good with the publisher so I can do what I want later. I based the futuristic societies of the Draig and Var off of history. You’ll find those parallels a lot in my futuristic/sci fi books. Because of my love and study of history.
Today, you see a ton of dragon-shifter stories (which is awesome). At the time, not many people were doing dragon-shifters (I can’t recall any offhand if they were, and I can’t remember having seen any on another planet or in space) or this kind of romance book in general, so it really was a strange new market.
You might not remember but in 2004 there was no Amazon Kindle or Nook or Kobo, etc, ebook markets. Amazon didn’t open up indie until Nov 2007. We were pioneers of the current age. I can’t tell you how many times I had to explain that an ebook was “just like a physical book” and why they needed a book cover if they weren’t in print. There were PDF, HTML, & LIT files. They did go into print, but ebook is mainly how the books were sold. Also, on floppy disk.
Barbarian Prince was supposed to be a short sci fi sexy story for this line that consisted of the marriage tent scene. And then my author brain kicked in with the what-ifs. Then it became 4 books about the prince brothers. Then it became a simultaneous time line because the marriage ceremony could only be one night a year. Two months later… 4 books.
What would I have done differently?
Not much. They are what they are. I was a new writer, and maybe some of the character development I would have changed. I did go in and expand the Anniversary editions from the original, but it’s a fine line between doing what I think the story needs, and messing with books that readers have really come to love over the years. So at this point, they are what they are. The characters are a representation of the kind of writer I was at the time, which is not to say I was bad LOL. As you progress through these Qurilixen World series and the 30+ books currently out, you will hopefully see my growth as a writer as the world expands.
Now I want to hear your thoughts about the world and characters!
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This is a Summer 2020 Series – Part 3 Coming Soon!
