Inspiration

I’m pretty lucky to live in such a beautiful area. We have a lake, mountains and the most striking desert scenery.
I find inspiration all around, in the breathtaking sunsets, sun-painted cloud formations and mysterious moon phases I can see right outside my house.
These inspiring natural sights often find their way into my stories, especially the moon which plays an important role in tales of myth and magic.
Open your eyes. Inspiration is all around you. All you have to do is take the time to notice.

Excerpt from The Bear Goddess:

Moonlight spilled into the cave in an ethereal glow. She padded barefoot across the cold stone floor of the cave. Maggie stirred from her perch on a tall thin rock formation. Callisto searched through her supply of herbs and potions in the clay jars sitting on the natural ledge. She grabbed the jar containing a nightshade potion and hurried back to her warm bed. After draping the blanket around her shoulders, she opened the jar. A strong odor tickled her nose. She was careful to drink a small amount of the poison, just enough to help deepen her trance state.

After sealing the jar, she settled into a sleeping position and focused her thoughts on Pan. Closing her eyes, she sensed the cave spinning around her. The sensation tickled her stomach. The moonlight grew brighter against her closed eyes. Then only the pitch-black darkness of a tunnel filled her vision. A nightingale singing rang inside the passageway. In her vision, she felt herself step through the tunnel, following the birdsong as if she had no control over her motions. As if she were under an enchantment.

She walked down steps into a familiar-looking cave. Pan’s sanctuary. The god sat on a stool, playing his reed flute that sounded just like a nightingale. The song filled her head, each note weaving a spell into her mind like the tiny silver threads of a magical cobweb.

The dream changed and Callisto was in the forest where she had faced the boar, but she stood in a different spot hidden in the trees. Peering out of the trees, she saw herself facing the boar. It was an odd feeling to be outside her body and see herself. The boar charged her. She winced at the sight of herself being struck by the boar, feeling again the painful effects of the silver. She tried to move, but her feet stuck to the ground. When she looked down, a scream caught in her throat. Instead of human legs and feet, her lower half was the body of a goat.

She awoke from her trance, her throat raw from screaming.

Kelley Heckart, Historical fantasy romance author
Captivating...Sensual...Otherworldly
http://www.kelleyheckart.com
http://kelleysrealm.blogspot.com/
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From the old bat's belfry

In this Holiday Season, all is about celebration and lights. Yet the darkness is still there waiting. Do we all carry a pre-civilization memory of the days when our ancient ancestors may have lived in caves and feared the night? Many dangerous beasts roamed the darkness in those ancient times, so there was cause for fear.

Today light is only as far away as the flick of a finger, yet we still fear darkness. With some cause, because danger still stalks the night, some humans being more dangerous than any beast.

If you happpen to believe in paranormal creatures--are they out there waiting in the dark?

Even if you don't believe such creatures ever existed, if you're like me, you still enjoy scaring yourself by reading about them. And in my case, also creating them to try to scare readers,

I've written about both kinds of dark predators--human and paranormal. And ones who are sometimes human, such as were-creatures. Do I believe in these paranormal beings? Yes and no. In real life, no. But while I'm writing about them, yes, they exist for me in all their complexity and unhuman ways, just as all my characters are real to me when I write about them. They have to be, so I can feel what they feel and care about the outcome. Which often makes it hard to leave them behind when I'm through with the story.

I've written about weres: Wolves--Racing With The Moon, The Volan Curse and a number of short stories and novellas. Dragons--Moondark and Darkness of Dragons Trilogy, plus a novella. Beasts--The Moonrunner Trilogy.

A more complicated one was Fire Griffin where meteorite "eggs" hatched into huge ravenous worms that morphed into griffins. These beasts then merged , literally, into whatever human who found the "egg" as symbiotes, enchancing the abilities of humans without harming them.

Others were magic dolls--Hugger Doll. Or vengeful ghosts-The Woman In White.

My preference is to write about were creatures not as evil monsters, but simply a shifter who may or may not be able to control his or her changes. Mine never run in packs, they're individuals who carry the shifter trait for better or worse.

I won't discuss vampires because mine are always evil. I have never been able to view a vampire as anything but dead. Not a living creature. So none of mine have yet been heroes. I use "yet" because I really do never know for sure what I'm going to come up with in the future. Keeps life interesting.

My December book is Ten Past Midnight and dark indeed. Stories in it include madness, a ghoul, an ancient Egyptian monster, and horny aliens. But two of the dark tales do end sort of happy for now.

All my monsters reside at my website: http://www.janetoombs.com/