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I love these kinds of posts, just because they’re unique and they help to get my brain churning on different book ideas. Enjoy! If you were asked to think of the world’s most important and essential inventions, you would probably come up with things like the computer, antibiotics, anesthetics, electricity … things like that. But without the inventions listed below, many of those innovations would never have come to pass. Mankind has been inventing since the very dawn of man, and many of the things we take for granted today simply did not exist until some bright spark came up with an idea and made them into reality.   Coins Before the invention of coins, the only way you could exchange something you had for something you wanted was to barter it. Let’s say you had grain and wanted a pig. If you could not find someone with a pig who wanted grain, you would have to barter your grain for something they did want. Apart from the time this would take, you would also need to transport the grain and worry about it spoiling before you had made your deal. The invention of coins cut away all of this [...] read more

Shamballa ‘Sambhala’ or ‘Shamballa’ as it is sometimes referred to in the West today is a spiritual place, a place mentioned in Buddhist Kalachaklra Tantra texts and claimed to exist in the physical world. Many ideas about where Shamballa and its capital city ‘Kalapa’ were actually located exist but all are focussed around the central Asian area. From near Tibet to South Siberia, the accounts vary widely. Shamballa is or was ruled over by a King or ‘Kalki’ and its population is said to be made up of only enlightened individuals. Only people who have amassed the right amount of Karma can reach the place. It’s a pure land, a pure Buddhist land, but appears to have its roots in an earlier Hindu myth. It is said that it can be found in outer, inner and alternative states, outer being a physical place, inner being in the mind and one’s self and alternative being reached through meditation. There have been many attempts in the 20th century to find the physical place of Shamballa but none have been successful. A soviet expedition went to Tibet in 1924 and an expedition was sent on three occasions to Tibet during the 1930′s by [...] read more

When my manuscript for Dissension was in its early stages, I had a friend of mine read it so she could give me some feedback. She wasn’t adept at critiquing novels, but had a good amount of experience with copy editing essays and such. So when she finished reading it, she first told me how much she loved it. (Thank you!) Then she went on to tell me about all of my grammatical errors that needed fixing. When she said that I should never, ever begin a sentence with the words “and” or “but”, I had to disagree with her. I mean, sure – I went to school and I really do know all of those kinds of basics in the English language. However, when it comes to writing fiction, I feel like we authors have the right to word things in a more artistic manner. I have read plenty of novels that have a lot of sentences beginning with the words “and” or “but”. I also will have a sentence break with “then” instead of the proper “and then” every once in a while just because it sounds like the sentence will flow better that way. I believe this should especially apply to dialogue. [...] read more