10 hours ago, kbois said:

I guess this means I have to add another question. 

@Wayne Gray in Tales From the Refuge, where do you get your inspiration for your characters from?

Thanks for the question, kbois.

I've met a lot of people over my life - lots of travel early on thanks to the Navy. My characters are largely based on memorable people I've met, but "memorable" to me likely isn't to most. I tend to notice the quiet ones. The ones trying to stay out of the way. But those folks often have the most interesting stories to tell. Some of my characters reflect that.

Now ... Mamma G from Broken was another matter entirely. I really don't know where she came from at all, but she was a good time. 🙂

12 hours ago, n8te said:

I’m working on submitting a couple of Ask the Authors. this next question was a sample question given to me.  I’ve been wondering a lot about it and figured this would be a good place to post it.

for @Mrsgnomie

"We all know who Jay Petermeyer is, at least according to the GIFs you use in the comment section, but who is Loren Patrick to you, the author?" 

This assumes that Loren is 100% created in my own head…

Ok, he wasn’t.

James Middleton.

Not Kate Middleton’s brother. 

He’s a is a fitness coach from the UK that does a lot of stuff on Instagram. Loren is definitely inspired by him. At least by James’ his body 🤤 

I like the new format for this blog.  It is much easier to use. Thanks Aaron.

My questions are for you, @astone2292.  What influences led you to write you great shifter stories like Cernunnos and the In the Shadows series?  How far along are  you with the Cernunnos sequel?  In the Shadows series, there is a long plot arc that I assume started as an outline.  How much deviation from that outline occurs as your write the individual stories?  If there is deviation, what are the sources of these changes?

Since I am currently reading three different authors writing shifter books, I also want to ask another question.  This time it is for @Grumpy Bear.

I love the Werebears in America stories.  These stories are cohesive and flow easily from story to story.  What advice do you have that would explain how you achieve this?  The second question is about your characters.  All the stories are set in the same universe and have many of the same characters.  The MCs are different in each story.  What's the criteria for selecting a new MC from all the characters already introduced before?  Finally, Arctic Roots was amazing read featuring several sub-genres.  How difficult was it to create with all those genres in play at the same time?

I said I am reading three authors in this genre, so now it is time to pick on @kbois. Your readers are sometimes so closely to your empathic characters that it borders on fanatic.  How do you do that?  The comments generated by your stories are abundant and range from playful to thoughtful and analytic. How do you handle these comments?  How important is it for an author to respond to these comments? 

13 minutes ago, raven1 said:

I said I am reading three authors in this genre, so now it is time to pick on @kbois. Your readers are sometimes so closely to your empathic characters that it borders on fanatic.  How do you do that?  The comments generated by your stories are abundant and range from playful to thoughtful and analytic. How do you handle these comments?  How important is it for an author to respond to these comments? 

This is what I get for popping in here one last time before I hit the hay! Lol. 

I think responding to reader's comments is crucial to building up one's following. I'm much more apt to follow an author whose stories I enjoy if that author responds to my comment/s. 

I thoroughly enjoying engaging with my readers. Honestly, there are some super savvy individuals on this site. I'm always amazed when things are mentioned that I never really gave any thought to. Feedback is important to me in doing final edits on future chapters that have already been written. 

I especially love all of the theories my readers put out there. While I will never confirm nor deny any plausibility, it's fun to see how close or how far-fetched they can be. 

I take comments one at a time. It's the only way I know how. 

Thanks for the questions raven!

32 minutes ago, raven1 said:

I like the new format for this blog.  It is much easier to use. Thanks Aaron.

My questions are for you, @astone2292.  What influences led you to write you great shifter stories like Cernunnos and the In the Shadows series?  How far along are  you with the Cernunnos sequel?  In the Shadows series, there is a long plot arc that I assume started as an outline.  How much deviation from that outline occurs as your write the individual stories?  If there is deviation, what are the sources of these changes?

Ooooooohh!! I wasn't expecting to answer questions. How exciting! Let's break down the questions...

Influences: My three influences are actually GA authors! @Cia's Carthera Tales, @Rob Colton's Timber Pack Chronicles, and @WolfM's Running with the Pack are some of my favorite were-creature/paranormal stories, and I wanted to create something akin to them all. Throughout my life, I've always had a habit of daydreaming, and it wasn't until recently I decided to put them into action. Err, well... pen and paper. 

Cernunnos sequel: I'm two chapters in, but sadly, it's going on the back-burner for a bit. I'm a little bogged down with current projects (Death in the Shadows, beta-reading for Shadow Effect, writing an anthology, and editing Love in the Shadows). Once I get a few of those things knocked out, I'll be picking up where I left off. 

In the Shadows: It is a long plot! Jeezums, I didn't mean for it to be this long! I had a vision of being one book when I started, but characters kept begging to be created, subplots occurred without negotiating with the ultimate end-goal, and aaaaauuuughhhh!! I do know how I'll be ending it... I just need to fill in the gap between now and then. 

Outline: What's an outline? Honestly, when I started Love in the Shadows and Cernunnos, I was such a newb when it came to writing. I just wrote the stuff spewing from my head, then worked on tying up the strings to ensure the plot to make [some] sense. There was no organization. No character sheets. No plot line. I was such a deranged and chaotic author back then... 

Deviations: Most of my story plots are a deviation. I get bored very easily, so I think of a tangent plot. Before I can rationalize whether it's a good idea, it's already three chapters later. There's only been one instance of comment section-related deviance, and that was in Cernunnos. 

26 minutes ago, kbois said:

This is what I get for popping in here one last time before I hit the hay! Lol. 

I think responding to reader's comments is crucial to building up one's following. I'm much more apt to follow an author whose stories I enjoy if that author responds to my comment/s. 

I thoroughly enjoying engaging with my readers. Honestly, there are some super savvy individuals on this site. I'm always amazed when things are mentioned that I never really gave any thought to. Feedback is important to me in doing final edits on future chapters that have already been written. 

I especially love all of the theories my readers put out there. While I will never confirm nor deny any plausibility, it's fun to see how close or how far-fetched they can be. 

I take comments one at a time. It's the only way I know how. 

Thanks for the questions raven!

Thanks for taking the time to answer kbois.  You and Mrsgnomie have the most engaged and interesting readers on GA.  At times it feels like a Paris Salon from a century agon, but online.

Terry

Thanks for answering my questions Aaron!  I enjoyed reading your answers.  I especially liked this part.

23 minutes ago, astone2292 said:

Influences: My three influences are actually GA authors! @Cia's Carthera Tales, @Rob Colton's Timber Pack Chronicles, and @WolfM's Running with the Pack are some of my favorite were-creature/paranormal stories, and I wanted to create something akin to them all.

I believe these authors would appreciate your comment.  I have read Timber Pack Chronicles and Running with the Pack and believe you have achieved your goals.  Cia is a great author, but I didn't know about Carthera Tales and will start to read them next! Thank you for your wonderful response to my questions.

Terry

Hi @raven1,

I'm very pleased that you've been enjoying my series!  It seems that I've always been writing, in one form or another for most of my life.  Whether it was a research thesis in college, writing/editing newsletters for various organizations, or technical training manuals for work.  My fiction was one thing that I couldn't/wouldn't share with others for a very long time.  One day, I grew tired of reading my hundredth werewolf gay shifter fiction story online and thought to myself "somebody needs to write more shifter fiction featuring bears, dammit."  I soon realized that if no one else was going to do it, I might as well try it myself, and thought that this site could be a good place to let others read the ideas rolling around in my head.  If I got through the first story and nobody was impressed, then I could at least say that I tried, and be satisfied writing training manuals.  However, if I wrote a story, and people actually liked it, and talked about it with something other than scorn or derision, them maybe I might have a second or even a third story in me.

So, that brings us to today, when I'm nearly finished with book 5.  I admit that I had quite a bump when I lost faith that people were enjoying what I was writing, and I logged off this site for just a week at first, which turned into a month, which stretched to eight months.  The longer I stayed away, the harder it was to return.  But, the characters from my stories are so real to me, at least inside my head, that they refused to be shut away in the dark.  They wanted their tales finished and new ones begun again.  So I returned, and was pleasantly surprised to find that not only did people continue to read and love the things that I'd already written, but there was genuine concern that I had "disappeared" and they wished for me to come back and finish what I'd started.

That said, let me answer your actual questions   Caution: Mild spoilers exist in some of the answers for those who haven't yet read any of the stories.

1) How do I achieve the cohesive flow from one story to the next?  The answer is hard to explain, but it is mostly because I have created a vast "room" within my mind in which the universe of these werebears exist.  I can very easily close my eyes, and transport myself into this universe and dwell among these characters.  In fan-speak, people refer to "canon" whereby the actions and history of the characters are carried forth as the truth from one story to the next.  Within my mind, I don't think of these things as canon as much as memories.  This summer, I was having dinner with some friends that I only get to see a couple times a year at most, and I was describing my world of were-creatures and explaining the concept of kindred DNA which allows the bears to reproduce after a fashion and create new werebears.  One of my friends was listening intently, and finally asked, "You don't actually believe any of that is real do you?"  I smiled and told her no, of course not, but the truth is that I only have to go to that place in my mind where the werebears live, and that world is real to me.

That was a long and roundabout way of saying that I achieve cohesion by completely immersing myself in the world of my imagination while I write.  I am the omnipotent observer in all that they do, and I remember all.  So, when Axel tells Gunnar in the backroom of the Silver Bullet in Trophy Cub that he taught his professional wrestler friends how to do a sleeper hold eighty years prior, I knew that when he revisited his past in Arctic Roots that at some point in his tale he was going to become a professional wrestler.  

Make your world your own.  Make each book you write merely a chapter in the lives of your characters and the actions of the previous books their memories, and you will find cohesion.

2) How do I select new MCs from the ones introduced in the story before?  That answer is two-fold.

The first answer is that I make sure even though each character is involved in the plot/crisis/drama at hand, they each also have their own life to live, and when one story ends, that character still has more to tell.  When Axel adopts his first cub at the end of Savage Beasts the tale of what happens next was waiting to be told.  When Gary tells Bill that he can rescue him from a life of injury and disfigurement by changing him into a near immortal werebear, I knew that a future tale would have to include that Papa and Cub pair and the academy that they dreamed of creating together.  And, when Siku the polar bear felt the pangs of loneliness and longing for a Mate or Cub of his own in Serpent Mound, the next tale was going to feature everyone's favorite gentle-giant polar bear striking out on his own to find the mate that Fate had destined for him.

Which brings me to the second answer to the question... It also depends on which characters the readers are responding to the most.  As each tale progresses, the readers develop favorites, and they express concern in the comments for that character's future.  So, while I may read some of the comments loaded with theories and predictions after each chapter is posted, pleased when I'm leading the readers down a false path just before I reveal a plot twist that changes everything, I do recognize when those same readers are becoming almost as immersed in my world as I am and I allow them to tell me when a character has loose ends at the conclusion of one tale that is begging to be told in the next.

3) How difficult was it to create Arctic Roots blending many different sub-genres into one tale?  I consider Arctic Roots to be the best story of the series so far, and I'll tell you that at times it was extremely difficult to write.  In the first two tales, I was able to create the world, characters and scenarios that I wished, and allowed my mind to conjure the history that tied it all together.  When I began Arctic Roots, I realized that I had created a character so complex in Axel that his actions and behavior in the first two tales required explanation.  I could have written it as a straightforward road-trip adventure story to find his Ancient Papa, but it wouldn't be enough to reveal the core of who Axel is, and why he was so broken by his earlier life.

So, I decided to tell his life story, as told by Axel himself to his new, curious Cub, and intersperse his backstory with the present-day dealings with the Lycan Council and the adventure of the expedition to the Arctic Circle in Alaska.  However, if I was going to write his history, I had the choice to either base it entirely in fiction, or I could base it on actual history, and place Axel within actual historical events.  The migration of the Russian Cossacks to Siberia in search of wealth, the fated expedition searching for a fabled river that accidentally discovered the Bering Strait when all ships but one were lost, the Russian colonization of Alaska and the revolt by the native peoples leading to the burning of the settlement of New Russia... those are all actual historical events.  When Axel joined the gold rush in the Yukon, the mining methods and practices he employed are period correct to the best of my research and abilities.  When he ran off with the traveling carnival, the practice of having an "athletic show" featuring professional wresting was also period correct.  All of that took a great deal of time to research, and integrate those historical events into the world within my mind so that Axel could be a part of it.  I probably spent twice the time writing each chapter of Arctic Roots that contained  a part of Axel's backstory than any other chapter of the other four stories.

When it came to blending the genres, that simply came easy to me.  Since I was dealing with so many different historical time periods, I wrote each segment in the style befitting the time period in which it existed, with the road-trip adventure as the framing device for all.  Was the character of Lenny in the traveling carnival a bit of an homage to Lennie Small in Of Mice and Men?  Of course!  Which explains the chapter title "The Best Laid Plans". 

I was almost afraid when the necessary progression of the story took me to Calgary for a week of long and boring Council meetings that there was the danger of becoming a bit dull, like the Star Wars prequels when they got way too bogged down in Senators and Ambassadors and Republic politics, but lucky for Axel and Adam, there was a frisky and friendly Beta wolf around to keep things interesting!

I hope this answers all your question and more!  If you want to know any more of the insights into how the world inside my mind flows from my fingers and through the keyboard, you just have to ask!

--Grumpy 💙

39 minutes ago, Grumpy Bear said:

Hi @raven1,

I'm very pleased that you've been enjoying my series!  It seems that I've always been writing, in one form or another for most of my life.  Whether it was a research thesis in college, writing/editing newsletters for various organizations, or technical training manuals for work.  My fiction was one thing that I couldn't/wouldn't share with others for a very long time.  One day, I grew tired of reading my hundredth werewolf gay shifter fiction story online and thought to myself "somebody needs to write more shifter fiction featuring bears, dammit."  I soon realized that if no one else was going to do it, I might as well try it myself, and thought that this site could be a good place to let others read the ideas rolling around in my head.  If I got through the first story and nobody was impressed, then I could at least say that I tried, and be satisfied writing training manuals.  However, if I wrote a story, and people actually liked it, and talked about it with something other than scorn or derision, them maybe I might have a second or even a third story in me.

So, that brings us to today, when I'm nearly finished with book 5.  I admit that I had quite a bump when I lost faith that people were enjoying what I was writing, and I logged off this site for just a week at first, which turned into a month, which stretched to eight months.  The longer I stayed away, the harder it was to return.  But, the characters from my stories are so real to me, at least inside my head, that they refused to be shut away in the dark.  They wanted their tales finished and new ones begun again.  So I returned, and was pleasantly surprised to find that not only did people continue to read and love the things that I'd already written, but there was genuine concern that I had "disappeared" and they wished for me to come back and finish what I'd started.

That said, let me answer your actual questions   Caution: Mild spoilers exist in some of the answers for those who haven't yet read any of the stories.

1) How do I achieve the cohesive flow from one story to the next?  The answer is hard to explain, but it is mostly because I have created a vast "room" within my mind in which the universe of these werebears exist.  I can very easily close my eyes, and transport myself into this universe and dwell among these characters.  In fan-speak, people refer to "canon" whereby the actions and history of the characters are carried forth as the truth from one story to the next.  Within my mind, I don't think of these things as canon as much as memories.  This summer, I was having dinner with some friends that I only get to see a couple times a year at most, and I was describing my world of were-creatures and explaining the concept of kindred DNA which allows the bears to reproduce after a fashion and create new werebears.  One of my friends was listening intently, and finally asked, "You don't actually believe any of that is real do you?"  I smiled and told her no, of course not, but the truth is that I only have to go to that place in my mind where the werebears live, and that world is real to me.

That was a long and roundabout way of saying that I achieve cohesion by completely immersing myself in the world of my imagination while I write.  I am the omnipotent observer in all that they do, and I remember all.  So, when Axel tells Gunnar in the backroom of the Silver Bullet in Trophy Cub that he taught his professional wrestler friends how to do a sleeper hold eighty years prior, I knew that when he revisited his past in Arctic Roots that at some point in his tale he was going to become a professional wrestler.  

Make your world your own.  Make each book you write merely a chapter in the lives of your characters and the actions of the previous books their memories, and you will find cohesion.

2) How do I select new MCs from the ones introduced in the story before?  That answer is two-fold.

The first answer is that I make sure even though each character is involved in the plot/crisis/drama at hand, they each also have their own life to live, and when one story ends, that character still has more to tell.  When Axel adopts his first cub at the end of Savage Beasts the tale of what happens next was waiting to be told.  When Gary tells Bill that he can rescue him from a life of injury and disfigurement by changing him into a near immortal werebear, I knew that a future tale would have to include that Papa and Cub pair and the academy that they dreamed of creating together.  And, when Siku the polar bear felt the pangs of loneliness and longing for a Mate or Cub of his own in Serpent Mound, the next tale was going to feature everyone's favorite gentle-giant polar bear striking out on his own to find the mate that Fate had destined for him.

Which brings me to the second answer to the question... It also depends on which characters the readers are responding to the most.  As each tale progresses, the readers develop favorites, and they express concern in the comments for that character's future.  So, while I may read some of the comments loaded with theories and predictions after each chapter is posted, pleased when I'm leading the readers down a false path just before I reveal a plot twist that changes everything, I do recognize when those same readers are becoming almost as immersed in my world as I am and I allow them to tell me when a character has loose ends at the conclusion of one tale that is begging to be told in the next.

3) How difficult was it to create Arctic Roots blending many different sub-genres into one tale?  I consider Arctic Roots to be the best story of the series so far, and I'll tell you that at times it was extremely difficult to write.  In the first two tales, I was able to create the world, characters and scenarios that I wished, and allowed my mind to conjure the history that tied it all together.  When I began Arctic Roots, I realized that I had created a character so complex in Axel that his actions and behavior in the first two tales required explanation.  I could have written it as a straightforward road-trip adventure story to find his Ancient Papa, but it wouldn't be enough to reveal the core of who Axel is, and why he was so broken by his earlier life.

So, I decided to tell his life story, as told by Axel himself to his new, curious Cub, and intersperse his backstory with the present-day dealings with the Lycan Council and the adventure of the expedition to the Arctic Circle in Alaska.  However, if I was going to write his history, I had the choice to either base it entirely in fiction, or I could base it on actual history, and place Axel within actual historical events.  The migration of the Russian Cossacks to Siberia in search of wealth, the fated expedition searching for a fabled river that accidentally discovered the Bering Strait when all ships but one were lost, the Russian colonization of Alaska and the revolt by the native peoples leading to the burning of the settlement of New Russia... those are all actual historical events.  When Axel joined the gold rush in the Yukon, the mining methods and practices he employed are period correct to the best of my research and abilities.  When he ran off with the traveling carnival, the practice of having an "athletic show" featuring professional wresting was also period correct.  All of that took a great deal of time to research, and integrate those historical events into the world within my mind so that Axel could be a part of it.  I probably spent twice the time writing each chapter of Arctic Roots that contained  a part of Axel's backstory than any other chapter of the other four stories.

When it came to blending the genres, that simply came easy to me.  Since I was dealing with so many different historical time periods, I wrote each segment in the style befitting the time period in which it existed, with the road-trip adventure as the framing device for all.  Was the character of Lenny in the traveling carnival a bit of an homage to Lennie Small in Of Mice and Men?  Of course!  Which explains the chapter title "The Best Laid Plans". 

I was almost afraid when the necessary progression of the story took me to Calgary for a week of long and boring Council meetings that there was the danger of becoming a bit dull, like the Star Wars prequels when they got way too bogged down in Senators and Ambassadors and Republic politics, but lucky for Axel and Adam, there was a frisky and friendly Beta wolf around to keep things interesting!

 

I hope this answers all your question and more!  If you want to know any more of the insights into how the world inside my mind flows from my fingers and through the keyboard, you just have to ask!

--Grumpy 💙

Grumpy,  You did a outstanding job of answering my questions with some brilliant insights to how you think about and create the characters and the universe in which they exist.  

Having read your stories recently, I am sure I know when that bump occurred and want you to know I had to fight the urge to use the angry face reaction on some of the comments.  I didn't because I only use that reaction for a chapter's evil character doing something horrendous and not comments.  (Think Bridget in Circumnavigation.) But I was sorely tempted, but didn't.  The chapter involved must have been very difficult for you to write, but I appreciate the hurt and pain you experienced. Chapters like this are a necessary evil that make the story more relevant and real.

Your description of how you are able to write cohesive chapters and books reminds me of how JKR organized her writing of the HP series.  This strategy is quite a bit different than many of the authors I have read, but works so well for you in this series.  

Your answer about MC shows a great deal of respect and trust in your readers.  Many of the authors I have read talk about how the characters determine what they want and who they become.  I like your different approach and the characters  you choose.  I have a few in mind, no make that many of your characters, that I would like to know more about.  Susie is on the top of that list.  That lady and the She-Wolves are special to me.

Finally, Arctic Roots is my favorite tale.  It is like written jazz song with all the many rhythms, complex chords and free flowing melody. You did give me one surprise, and that was your explanation of Lenny and the homage you gave to "Of Mice and Men".  I hadn't caught that when I read that part, but when you mentioned that in your explanation it hit me hard.  It was a beautiful homage and helped me understand both Axel and Lenny on a new level.  Again, Thanks for your stories and these answers to my questions.

Terry

6 hours ago, raven1 said:

Susie is on the top of that list.  That lady and the She-Wolves are special to me.

Therein is my conundrum when it comes to MCs in this series.  I realize that I've unique and vibrant character in Susie Banshee.  A transgender female wolf-lycan who has risen to not only become pack Beta, and Colonel in the Lycan Council army, but also the mate of her Alpha?  Who's sharp tongue and quick wit can usually take down her opponent without even lifting a paw against them?  She is a goldmine of possibilities.

However, I have to remember that the series is Werebears in America, and I started writing it as a counter to the vast array of wolf-shifter fiction already out there.  So, for now, Susie will remain the most popular of the supporting characters, and will frequently show up to pull the bears' asses out of the fire, so to speak.  That's part of the reason why Susie and Apollo are tied up taking care of the side-story in Worlds Apart instead of San Francisco with Gunnar and the rest of the Sturgeon Bay bears.  The bears needed a story where they finally handled their problems on their own, instead of needing Susie to come to their rescue!

Perhaps, when the werebear series has run its course, I could shift my attention to Susie and her she-wolves as MCs.  I'm sure that would make a great series all its own!

2 hours ago, Grumpy Bear said:

Therein is my conundrum when it comes to MCs in this series.  I realize that I've unique and vibrant character in Susie Banshee.  A transgender female wolf-lycan who has risen to not only become pack Beta, and Colonel in the Lycan Council army, but also the mate of her Alpha?  Who's sharp tongue and quick wit can usually take down her opponent without even lifting a paw against them?  She is a goldmine of possibilities.

However, I have to remember that the series is Werebears in America, and I started writing it as a counter to the vast array of wolf-shifter fiction already out there.  So, for now, Susie will remain the most popular of the supporting characters, and will frequently show up to pull the bears' asses out of the fire, so to speak.  That's part of the reason why Susie and Apollo are tied up taking care of the side-story in Worlds Apart instead of San Francisco with Gunnar and the rest of the Sturgeon Bay bears.  The bears needed a story where they finally handled their problems on their own, instead of needing Susie to come to their rescue!

Perhaps, when the werebear series has run its course, I could shift my attention to Susie and her she-wolves as MCs.  I'm sure that would make a great series all its own!

Your reasoning is perfectly understandable. I wouldn't worry about catering to readers' wishes, especially if they go counter to the series.  However, count me in when Susie and her She-Wolves get their own series.  I am content with their frequent appearances as Best Supporting Characters.