Friday 29 November 2013

"Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World (Expanded Edition)" is available in print!



The Expanded Edition is available now! "Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World (Expanded Edition)" is available in print! The expanded edition has five additional Christmas illustrations inside the book, towards the end, to make your reading experience just a little bit more fun. Both books are fabulous, and these anthologies make wonderful gifts for the holidays, so if your trying to save money, you can buy the regular edition of Jingle Bells, but if you want to add a bit of oomph to your gift-giving while not spending too much more, then I highly recommend the Expanded Edition!

These stories are all family-friendly and children will love them as much, if not more than, adults. You can buy them as gifts, buy them for your won reading pleasure, or buy a copy to read a story each night to your child throughout the holidays. It's a great way to get them (and yourself) into the holiday spirit.

All proceeds from sales of the books go towards supporting the Chapter Book Challenge.

US: Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World (Expanded Edition)

UK: Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World (Expanded Edition)

Tuesday 26 November 2013

Teapot Tales: Take 2 - Guidelines for "Teapot Tales: Pirates, Mermaids and Monsters of the Sea"


I have mentioned the theme for the next Teapot Tales, the one that will come out in Summer 2014, to some of the members of the Chapter Book Challenge, and some of the newer members are asking questions about formatting and submission guidlelines, so I thought it might be good to make everything clear in a post here.

I am taking submission early this time, because I am hoping it will help with the editing so that, when I finally get to the formatting, the editing will be mostly complete.

The theme for the 2014 Teapot Tales anthology will be " Pirates, Mermaids and Monsters of the Sea." In fact, the full title of the next Teapot Tales anthology will be: "Teapot Tales: Pirates, Mermaids and Monsters of the Sea," or something very similar.

1. Your stories must be about pirates, mermaids or other monsters of the sea. But "monsters of the sea" can be loosely interpreted and basically, your story should have the sea or the ocean somewhere in it.

2. Stories do not have to be FOR children, but they do need to be child-friendly in that there should be no bad language, no sex and, although kids love gore and violence, please keep it PG.

3. Stories can not be less than 300 words and cannot be over 800 words. Last time, the limit was 700 words, but several went over. This time, I am hoping everyone can keep it concise enough to stay within the allotted word count. The point of the title "Teapot Tales" is that each story is a short piece of flash fiction - a story short enough that a person can sit and enjoy a cup of tea while enjoying a story or two. People should be confident that they can sit and read a story in a short span of time, easily fitting story-reading into those briefly-snatched, relaxing moments throughout the day.

4. You MUST be an officially signed-up member of the Chapter Book Challenge in order to submit a story to the Teapot Tales anthology. You can sign up here. (You can read more about the Chapter Book Challenge by browsing this site or clicking on the "about" section at the top of the blog.)

5. Please follow the formatting guidelines as stated on Melusine Muse Press's page. Go here to read the formatting guidelines.

6. Proceeds from sales of the anthology go towards supporting the Chapter Book Challenge. Right now, the proceeds help pay for the prizes (we do a lot of prizes during the challenge) and the posting of those prizes. In the future, if proceeds increase, they will also help towards advertising ChaBooCha to bring in more members, advertising of the Teapot Tales anthologies (and other ChaBooCha anthologies) to help get them to a wider audience, donating our anthologies to libraries, setting up a more professional website and more. The goal is to grow membership of the Chapter Book Challenge, so we can better help each other towards our publishing goals. The Chapter Book Challenge is FREE to join and will remain so.

7. Illustrations (line art - black on white) will also be accepted.

8. Author bios must be sent in - around a paragraph each, links may be included, and must be written in 3rd person. These will be included in the book.

9. The deadline for the Teapot Tales submissions is April 30th, 2014.

10. E-mail submissions as a file attachment to Rebecca (at) Fyfe (dot) net.

Anthologies will be made available in both kindle and print formats.

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For those of you who do not wish to join the Chapter Book Challenge, but would still like to participate in writing a story for an anthology, we do one other anthology during the year which is open to everyone. This year, we published "Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World." In 2014, we will be doing a Halloween themed anthology. I will create a separate post to explain the guidelines for the Halloween anthology. but,m the basics are that the maximum word count for stories for this anthology will be 1,200 words, and the stories will be written FOR children.

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There is also a charity anthology project that will be hosted in 2014 by Melusine Muse Press, funny, true stories about cats - the cat anthology proceeds will go towards the Cat's Protection League.

Melusine Muse Press will also be accepting submissions for a much larger anthology project, in which a limited number of submissions will make it into the anthology. It is a four volume anthology with a fairy theme, with stories written for adults. Each volume focuses on stories of fairies from the different courts: Winter, Autumn, Spring and Summer. There will be prizes for winning entries in each volume.

Both the cat anthology and the fairy anthology are still having the details put together, but you can look for information on submissions for them later. Sometime in the future, the details will be posted on Melusine Muse's anthology submissions page.

Thursday 21 November 2013

"Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World" is available in both print and kindle!

 


"Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from around the World" is a collection of holiday stories created by Chapter Book Challenge members and their friends. It is full of wonderful short stories featuring stories from Hanukkah to Christmas. There are 23 authors and with 38 different chapters altogether, the anthology has 33 short stories and 5 poems. The stories range from magical to emotional and all of them are suitable for reading with the family.

Read about a clumsy dragon, a super dog who helps save Christmas, and a Christmas fairy, along with several different stories to warm your heart.

You can buy your copy of Jingle Bells at any Amazon store. The print edition will be out this week too and will make a fabulous Christmas gift for your loved ones!

The Kindle edition is on sale until after Christmas. You can get your copy for only 99 cents!

In the US: Jingle Bells:
Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World

In the UK: Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit from Around the World

Proceeds help to fund the Chapter Book Challenge (ChaBooCha)

(An extended version, with more pictures, will be available at a slightly higher cost, later this week.)

Friday 8 November 2013

Jingle Bells cover reveal and list of stories and authors

Here's a sneak peek at the cover for the Jingle Bells anthology which will be available for purchase in a few short weeks!
"Jingle Bells: Tales of Holiday Spirit From Around the World"

And just for another sneak peek into the anthology, here's a look at the table of contents, complete with the story titles and names of the authors who have contributed.

1. Hope by Cecilia Clark
2. Christmas Is Coming by Emily Morgan
3. Kristel the Christmas Mouse by Kelly Vavala
4. Zeyde's Hannukah by Nancy Churnin
5. Thomas' New Coat by Marissa Ames
6. Spying a Saint by Angelica Fyfe
7. Saving Silver Square by Ashley Bohmer
8. Dirkus's Christmas by Jackie Castle
9. The Spirit of Christmas by Rebecca Fyfe
10. A Very Merry Birthday and a Happy Christmas by Kelly McDonald
11. Where Are the Bells by Melissa Gijsbers
12. Coal by Abbi Knight
13. Christmas Spirit by Alayne Kay Christian
14. The Ragdoll Under the Christmas Tree by Beth Avery
15. The Day of the Wren by Deirdre Sheridan Englehart
16. White Fairyland by C. S. Frye
17. Christmas Blessings by Theresa Nielsen
18. Olivia the Terrible Singer by Nicole Zoltack
19. Make My Christmas by Satori Cmaylo
20. The Button Box by Melanie E. Lancaster
21. The Naughty or Nice List by Ashley Howland
22. Dashing Through the School by Jo Hart
23. The Perfect Gifts by Robert Fyfe
24. Daddy's Home by Abbi Knight
25. Aussie Jingle Bells by Melissa Gijsbers
26. Duncan's Gift by Rebecca Fyfe
27. A Perpetual Gift by Cecilia Clark
28. Christmas In June by Alayne Kay Christian
29. The Holiday by Emily Morgan
30. Jack's Frosty Christmas by Jackie Castle
31. Holiday Hustle by C.S. Frye
32. Assunto's Presepi by Kelly Vavala
33. Lightning Lilly, Princess Seea and the Foggy Night by Ashley Howland
34. Dragon Magic For Christmas by Rebecca Fyfe
35. A Little Bit of Peace by Melissa Gijsbers
36. Xmas Means by Abbi Knight
37. The Mermaid's Gift by Cecilia Clark
38. The Ice Queen by Robert Fyfe

I can't begin to tell you how much you are going to love the stories within this anthology - heart-warming holiday stories written by a variety of talented authors.