Flash Friday: Child’s Play

Posted on 18/07/2014 by Hannah Steenbock

“Come on!”

“You can do it!

I hated their cat calls. This was the first time they had allowed me to light the barbecue. I concentrated, any mistake would be dreadful.

“Go for it!”

“Nothing to it, Jenny!”

“Just do it!”

I concentrated fiercely. The barbecue grill stood seven feet away, the coals ready, piled on top of some crushed paper. Lighting it should have been child’s play.

It wasn’t.

I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and mentally went through the instructions once again. This time, I would do it. I breathed out. “Now.”

WOOOOOSH! BOOOOOOM!

My eyes flew open just in time to see a huge fireball reduce the barbecue grill to a twisted heap of charred metal.

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Some Dragon Eye Candy

Posted on 06/07/2014 by Hannah Steenbock

The cover is gorgeous, but there is even more beauty inside the book – yes, even the ebook. That’s why I work with Blue Harvest Creative, the formatting company I found last year. I think they make the prettiest ebooks I’ve ever seen. They look just like print versions.

Anyway, this is how the first page of every story looks – with a different title, of course, but with the same awesome picture on the page. Yes, even in the ebook.

Story title

Story Title

 

And when there are breaks in a story, there are also little pictures to indicate those. BHC chooses different pictures to fit each book. “Sequoia” has bear prints, “Pu-ukani’s Song” has a wavy, watery image and “Here Be Dragons” has this:

Divider

Divider

And if you look closely, you can see the same divider image just below the title on the cover itself.  I’ll repeat that here because it is so glorious. It looks totally stunning on the print book, especially in matte. So glad CreateSpace now offers that option.

Cover

Here Be Dragons Cover

And other than usual, you can click on these pictures to enlarge them – just to really enjoy that eye candy.

Big shoutout to Blue Harvest Creative for making my book so beautiful.

PS: Want to buy “Here Be Dragons”? Here you go:

Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
Amazon.de

If you prefer to order from your local bookstore, you can! Just use this
ISBN: 978-1500188023, and they will find it for you.

Want to say something? Feel free to comment.

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“Here be Dragons” – Release Day

Posted on 26/06/2014 by Hannah Steenbock
Cover

Here Be Dragons Cover

Today is the day!

I’m officially releasing my brand new short story collection. It contains my eight all-time best short stories. In fact, two of them have been published before, in online magazines. Another one has been published in its German incarnation – and I’m offering it in English for the first time here. (I do my own translations.)

And here’s what to expect:

Eight stories of classic fantasy. Eight adventures full of cunning and magic. Eight lovable heroes. Old and grumpy, young and eager, wary or daring, they come in all shapes – some are not even human. Eight worlds that will send your imagination soaring on fancy wings. Eight tales that will warm your heart. Eight stories that will leave a smile on your face.

What are you waiting for?

“Here be Dragons” is available both as ebook and as print edition, through Amazon. For your convenience, I’m adding links to the different Amazon stores – hope your country is among them. If not, go to the page anyway, and then exchange the amazon extension to the one your store uses.

“Here be Dragons” – ebook

Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
Amazon.de

“Here be Dragons” – Print

Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
Amazon.de

If you prefer to order from your local bookstore, you can! Just use this
ISBN: 978-1500188023, and they will find it for you.

Let me know in a comment what you think of the book!

And please consider writing a review when you have read the book. It helps others to find the stories, and enjoy them, too. Thanks!

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“Here be Dragons” Cover Reveal

Posted on 12/06/2014 by Hannah Steenbock

I’m very happy, and very pleased to be able to show you all the cover of my new book

Here be Dragons

Cover

Here Be Dragons Cover

Cudos to Blue Harvest Creative who do all the formatting and graphic work for my books. They have created another miracle.

What do you think? Leave a comment!

PS: Official release date is June 26th 2014.

 

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The Writer’s Process Blog Tour

Posted on 12/05/2014 by Hannah Steenbock
Writing

Writing

This is the equivalent of an old-fashioned chain letter – but in a really good way. You see, we writers get to show you some behind the scenes stuff that happens when we write. And you get to find out about more authors who may be unknown to you. Amazing authors. Funny authors. Young authors and old authors.

I was graciously invited by , one of the amazing authors. Her books are intense thrillers with a spiritual touch. You can find her blog over here: Ramblings of a Mad Southern Woman.

We all answer the same four questions. And then we’re supposed to show you three more authors – sadly, I could only connect to one. But one is better than none, right? So read all the way through, and find a great author who created a wonderful and magical world for her tales.

Oh, and feel free to link to this post and others in The Writer’s Process Blog Tour. Share it on Facebook, Twitter, G+ and where else you meet your friends. Thanks!

Anyway, here’s my behind the scenes stuff:

1) What am I working on? Continue reading →

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The Bad Guys

Posted on 28/04/2014 by Hannah Steenbock
Bad Guy

Bad Guy

Everyone knows the Bad Guys. They wear a black hat or helmet. Or gory make-up. Or masks. Or they are ugly. And of course, they are mad, or sadistic, or aliens, or ruthless killers or all of the above. It’s easy, isn’t it?

Actually, it’s not.

Because those bad guys drive your story, at least for a while. They are the ones pushing the hero, setting things in motion and finally, forcing the hero to transform. They are important. They matter.

Makes sense? Not really? Okay, let’s look at some of them. (And cut me some slack. I’m not that much of movie gal, so if you have better examples, please share them in the comments.) Continue reading →

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A New Dragon Tale – Some Rambles

Posted on 24/04/2014 by Hannah Steenbock
Dragon

Dragon

Quietly, I’ve been working on a short story to usher in a full novel featuring dragons.

I’ve been partial to dragons for a long time, admittedly. It all started when I was an exchange student in California, in the senior year of Senior High. (Rowland High School in Rowland Heights, for those who are interested. And no, my fellow students didn’t know me as Hannah Steenbock.) The school library drew me magically, since my afternoons and evenings in a family with children clearly younger than me were not very eventful. And there, I found the Pern novels. I was an instant fan. In fact, I spent quite a bunch of my time translating “Dragonflight” into German. Nothing ever came out of that, however.

Anyway, I started a dragon novel about a year ago when an Idea hit me. Girl meets dragon, then some other characters appeared and started to weave into three story lines. And stalled. Continue reading →

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The Future Book Store

Posted on 09/04/2014 by Hannah Steenbock

Bookstores are doomed, they say. They are disappearing at an alarming rate, they say. All over the world, big book seller chains are in trouble.

They blame Amazon.

And it’s true that a lot of book buying has shifted online. Ebooks are only part of that phenomenon, even physical books are bought online more and more.

It makes sense to me. It’s so much easier to find books online, to find recommendations – and last but not least, ebooks take almost no time for delivery. It’s also a rather comfortable way of getting new reading fodder.

In fact, I have to admit that I have stayed away from big bookstores in the last years or so. I have walked through some small ones and left without buying. These days, I feel overwhelmed by looking at thousands of books that don’t interest me while those fields that do interest me are not stocked. So I go online.

And yet, for some reason, I kept thinking about a weird question:

What would a bookstore have to look like so I would enjoy going there? Continue reading →

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Two Things Happened

Posted on 23/02/2014 by Hannah Steenbock
Writer

Writer

They say to never apologize after a long break in blogging. They say to just pick up the pieces and continue as if nothing ever went wrong… lah di dah.

Well, that doesn’t feel right. You deserve to know what really happened:

The afternoon after I published the post with swords (in October), the school horse I usually ride decided to play rodeo, right at the end of the lesson. He pitched me off right over his neck and head, after bucking several times first.

I managed to turn the fall slightly and slammed down on my right shoulder. My right collar bone took the full brunt of the impact. In fact, it splintered quite impressively. I ended up in ER, got some painkillers, was sent home with a special clavicle bandage and an appointment for surgery a few days later. Continue reading →

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The Trick with Short Stories

Posted on 18/11/2013 by Hannah Steenbock
Manuscript

Manuskript *

The other day, a friend called me and asked for help. She had been given an assignment: Write a short story.

If you ask me, that’s a pretty tall assignment – and it was given in a foreign language class, on top. But then, I was often asked in school to write a tale, without getting guidelines. Teachers rarely write stories, so maybe they assume that creating a little short story is a snap, precisely because they are short.

Well, it isn’t.

And here’s what I told my friend – she needed simple guidelines:

A short story is about an extraordinary experience of the Main Character.

That’s the foundation. And yet what exactly that extraordinary experience is completely depends on the character and on what kind of story you want to tell. Continue reading →

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