Lynne North Blog

Fantasy Author

  • Lynne North
     
    Children's Author
    Caution: Witch in Progress
     
    Humorous fantasy
    novel
    Gertie Grimthorpe comes from a long line of witches. Unfortunately, she hasn’t really got the hang of it. Being blonde haired, blue eyed and free of warts isn’t much of an advantage.
  • Zac's Destiny
     
    Sword
    And Sorcery
    Fantasy
    Zac is a fifteen year old stable boy whose life is turned upside down when he finds himself in the midst of demons, magic and a perilous quest. The land around Albemerle castle is under attack ...
  • Emily and the Enchanted Wood
     
    A short Children's fantasy tale
    Emily and her woodland friends find their wood overtaken by marauding goblins. They seem determined to stay, but not if Emily can help it ...
  • Be Careful What You Wish For
     
    A Children's humorous fantasy tale
    Finn is a bored young leprechaun. He wants something exciting to happen, but never having been blessed by the Good Luck Fairy, he soon gets far more than he bargained for. This is no fairy tale…
  • Unlucky For Some
     
    compilation of 13 macabre
    Twist in the Tale stories
    to chill your soul (NOT for children!)
    Thirteen tales of fear, murder and mayhem. They will remain in your mind long after you have turned the last page ...
  • The Chalice of Jupiter
     
    A challenging Role Play Gamebook
    Enter the ancient Roman city of Veradum, at your own risk. Can you find the fabled Chalice of Jupiter? Indeed, can you even survive?
  • Pirate's Peril
     
    A challenging Role Play Gamebook
    Sail the seas on a pirate ship to Bone Island, at your own risk. Can you find Evil Eye Bart's treasure? Indeed, can you even survive?
  • Gertie's Guide to Nature's Cures
     
    A fun and educational Guide to Nature.
    Meet Gertie Grimthorpe, a trainee witch who’s interested in natural cures and remedies. This guide contains what she's learning, in her own words...

Coming soon…

I’m really pleased to see that people are enjoying my blogs about the humble beginnings of our customs, traditions and days of celebration. There is probably more folk lore associated with December than with any other month of the year, and most of this is very old. I will soon begin, therefore, to present blogs about some of these many Christmas traditions; including sending cards, Santa Claus, Mistletoe, the Yule log…and much more!

Welcome

Hello and welcome to those of you who have begun to register with my Blog site. I hope you will find it interesting. Please leave comments if you wish, and let me know what I can do to make my blog appealing to you.  Glad to have you aboard!

Book dedications

Does anyone read dedications in books, I wonder? I always do, because it took me some time to try to get mine right in just a few words. How can you sum up the importance of the person you are dedicating your book to in so few lines?

            Both my published books so far are dedicated to my mother, who I lost to a stroke very suddenly in 1997. I wish she could have seen them published, as she always believed it would happen. In my way, the dedication keeps her memory alive forever.

            So, when you skip by our dedication page, maybe give it a moment’s read, and wonder what those few lines meant to us as we wrote them!

Book Promotion

So, you’ve written your book, and actually had it published. Now you can sit back and wait for the money to roll in. Do you think so? No, you soon find out that your work actually begins here. No matter how good your book, how do you get people to know about it, to read it, to tell others about it? It’s not easy, but the key word is Promotion. There are lots of places out there, especially on the internet, where you can try to promote your life’s work. Some are good, some are not. Some make you pay, others just want to help. One such site is:

http://www.authordirectory.co.uk/

Check it out. This is a genuine promotional site that gets a lot of hits. Contact the site to have your book featured. Believe me, any promotion is good promotion. Best of luck to all you new writer’s out there! We can’t all be Terry Pratchett, but we can do our best to get our books noticed!

A light-hearted history of Bonfire Night

The historic origins of Bonfire Night date to the conflict between virtually outlawed Catholics and the Protestant establishment of the 16th and early 17th century. On November 5, 1605, Guy Fawkes (the real one, not the stuffed variety) and a group of Catholic conspirators who felt badly treated by the King put 36 barrels of gunpowder in a cellar underneath the Houses of Parliament. (Not a bad idea, do I hear you say?) Some of those involved in the plot however, realised that innocent people would be killed in the explosion. One plotter wrote a letter warning his friend to stay away from Parliament on November 5, and this letter got to King James I. Guy Fawkes was in the cellar with the gunpowder when the king’s men arrived. His guilt was a bit of a give-away. He was taken away, tortured and sentenced to a very unpleasant death (not that it is ever fun…).

The date of the Gunpowder Plot coincided with the end of the English harvest season, traditionally marked with festivals. The fireworks that are now a firm part of Bonfire Night are, no doubt, a reminder of the barrels of gunpowder, but the huge bonfires are more likely to reflect ancient seasonal traditions once part of the Celtic Fire Festival of Samhain.

            Enjoy the fun, treacle toffee, parkin, and of course the fireworks!

Halloween

Happy Halloween weekend everyone. I’m sure my character ‘Gertie’ will be enjoying this important day in all witches calendars on Sunday!

            Though we celebrate Halloween on 31st October each year, do you know why?

            Well, here is a brief explanation!

            Halloween seems to have its roots in the Celtic celebration of Samhain, the last day of the Celtic calendar. Samhain was a Pagan harvest festival celebrated by huge sacred bonfires in honour of the dead, marking the end of the Celtic year and the beginning of a new one. Fire often symbolised the power of the sun, or served as a defence against trick-bent spirits. Many of the practices involved in the celebration were fed on superstition. The Celts believed the souls of the dead roamed the villages on this night. Spirits were thought to assume grotesque appearances, and the tradition of dressing up like these spirits developed in the hope it would prevent the ghostly beings from causing harm. Some believed the spirits could be warded off by carving a grotesque face into a gourd or root vegetable and setting a candle inside it. Family spirits were welcomed home, but gifts and treats were left out to pacify less friendly ones, and to ensure the success of next year’s crops.

            The word Halloween was first noted in the16th century and represented a Scottish variant of the fuller All-Hallows-Even (“evening”), that is, the night before All Hallows Day (now known as All Saints Day). This was a time when the boundaries between this world and the next were said to be at their thinnest, allowing the dead to once again walk amongst the living.

            Today, many people who celebrate Halloween have no conception of its Pagan heritage. They see this day simply as a time to dress up in frightening costumes and host Halloween parties, while small children enjoy playing ‘Trick or Treat.’

However you celebrate Halloween, stay safe, and have a good one!

Facebook links

Hello again, I hope you’re all having good weekends. I will be spending more time on my blog page just as soon as I manage to link my blogs to a Facebook update. So far it isn’t working…Watch this space. More to come soon.

Updates

Well, I have chosen my background-which I love, added some links and included my first pages. I think I might be ready to release this now. I can add other sections as I go along. Many thanks to Karl Powis for the initial set-up, and for his patience in teaching a web-design illiterate geek like myself to change and update the rest. What do you think of it so far? Any suggestions for improvement appreciated!

Hi all

Welcome to Lynne North’s blog. I am the author of two published children’s novels, ‘Gertie Gets it Right (eventually)’, a humorous fantasy; and ‘Zac’s Destiny’, a sword & sorcery fantasy. I hope you will want to join me in discussing my books, your favourite authors, and what you look for in your chosen reading. Writing is a learning curve, and who better to help authors learn than the readers we are trying to introduce our books to.

Please check out my website at:

www.lynnenorth.co.uk

And feel free to get back to me with comments or questions about any of my books. I look forward to hearing from you!

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