Author Dr. Randy Overbeck Brings You the Genius of Sir Ridley Scott via Podcast Magic

You’ll thank me for this quick tip. It’s Author/Podcaster’s regular interviews with literary and artistic geniuses of our time--as a resource and for inspiration.  This month he gave me goose bumps with Sir Ridley Scott, cinematic storyteller on call!  I care enough about the entertainment value in addition to what my fellow authors can learn from this to sponsor it!  Here’s more on the series that comes to you from author/podcaster Dr. Randy Overbeck! 

Author of the Bestselling Series
The Haunted Shores Mysteries 

Randy  Overbeck

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ShoresIn this episode, you'll discover--

• how Sir Ridley Scott went from advertising mogul to major movie director
• how even though he ranks among the top grossing directors of all time, he had to wait half his life for his chance to direct a his first major motion picture
• how so many of his films, which were not appreciated initially, became cult and fan favorites
• how. like so many great storytellers, he had to overcome dramatic challenges to accomplish success

Check out the backstories you never knew about the storytellers you love.

Learn More About Randy:

Media

More About the Podcaster

Speaking

Contact

Books & Reviews

About Randy

MORE ABOUT THE BLOGGER

 Carolyn Howard-Johnson is the multi award-winning author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning #HowToDoItFrugally Series (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BTXQL27T/ ) of books for writers including "The Frugal Book Promoter" (https://bit.ly/FrugalBookPromoIII), and "The Frugal Editor" both offered in their third editions by Modern History Press. Others in that series are "How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically," and two booklets, both in their second editions also from Modern History Press. The booklets, "Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers" (https://bit.ly/LastMinuteEditsII) and "Great First Impression Book Proposals" (https://bit.ly/BookProposalsII) are career boosters in mini doses and both make ideal thank you gifts for authors. The one on writing book proposals is also available as an Audio Book. "The Frugal Editor "(https://tinyurl.com/TheFrugalEditor), was recently released in its third edition. It is the winningest book in this series for writers. 

Carolyn also has three frugal books for retailers including one she encourages authors to read because it helps them understand what is needed to convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is "A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques" (https://bit.ly/RetailersGuide). 

In addition to this blog, Carolyn helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at https://TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com. She also blogs all things editing--grammar, formatting and more--at "The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor" (https://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com). Learn more and follow it to get news on her new releases directly from Amazon at https://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile.

On Effort and Surrender and Writing

 

Effort and Surrender and Writing

 

A personal yoga lesson, writing lesson, and review
by Carolyn Howard-Johnson

 

 

Yoga simply is. Like life. Like love. Like Writing. When we do it we may also connect. Eric Dinyer’s ethereal photographs in his Effort and Surrender published by Andrews McMeel, are aged like a Sienna landscape. They could easily be the route a beginner or a yoga sage might take to the next step. Or a writer takes to get creative juices started or to keep the I’m Not Good Enough Syndrome at bay. 

Way back in 2004 Eric asked me to write the foreword for this little treasure. 
An author-illustrator-photographer Dinyer has worked in the entertainment, music, and publishing industries with creative giants like Time-Warner Books, Columbia Records, Viking Penguin, St. Martin's Press, Doubleday, and Scholastic, as well as in publications such as Harper's, Newsweek, and the New York Times Book Review. He created cover images for Bruce Springsteen and Sting and illustrated The Breathing Field: Meditations on Yoga. And his request forced me to revisit my early experiences with yoga and I’m retelling a bit of it from the foreword for you so my writing fellows will understand why I think writers should give it a try, if they aren’t already in love with it..

I have been doing yoga since by brother directed me in a few poses.  I lay on a delicate patterned Oriental carpet before a fire in my mother’s home; he pointed my limbs in the proper directions.

            “Hatha Yoga” my brother said, “just poses…” He knew my atheistic tendencies.

            So, I did “poses only” until I saw light and knew.

            That was my only lesson.   

My yoga instructor did not believe that yoga should be uncomfortable or difficult but joyful. “Ignore those who say ‘No pain, no gain,’” he said.  “Stretch until it feels good.  Breathe until it feels better.”

Some poses came naturally. I have long muscles with little structure. Working them is like stretching warm Play-Doh. Dinyer’s photos of poses like The Plow are difficult for some but were easy for me. At 63 I was still doing that extension with variations, knees touching the floor above my head. Some poses like The Airplane he illustrates impart balance. My ability to do them improved as I practiced, mostly without my perceiving the changes because yoga benefits deliberately, leisurely.Some, like the Crane Posture require strength. I do not expect ever to achieve them.

Having said that, it does not matter to me. Yoga is not a contest with others nor with myself. I’m like that with writing, too. If practiced, it will progress. I eventually—perhaps after ten or twelve years—read (nay digested) Paramahansa Yogananda’s teachings but only when I was ready. His book materialized in the reading pile next to my bed. I still don’t know how that small volume came to be there.

I did not take expensive lessons, use special equipment, buy a Zen wardrobe or even set goals. All one needs for Yoga is willingness. I admit I ended up spending more money on things like writing classes, writers’ conferences, and reading, reading, reading on anything one needed for that like marketing. But I worked in breathing to increase the joy factor. I think it worked. I even wrote a poem about it:

 

Yoga is life.

                                    We see its splendor if we look

                                    Know its challenges when we choose to know

                                    Its comforts when we acknowledge them

                                    Recognize pain as a companion

                                    From whom we can learn or turn away

                                    It can quiet like the curve

                                    Of an egg in a bowl.

                                    It can be personal as a pulse

Or connect like a current.

                                    Life.  We select its ecstasies.

 

Such inspiration will surely move reader whether they choose Effort or Surrender or Writing—or all three. Yoga and writing is in the doing. Yoga and writing are very simply, life. 

MORE ABOUT THE BLOGGER

 Carolyn Howard-Johnson is the multi award-winning author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning #HowToDoItFrugally Series (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BTXQL27T/ ) of books for writers including "The Frugal Book Promoter" (https://bit.ly/FrugalBookPromoIII), and "The Frugal Editor" both offered in their third editions by Modern History Press. Others in that series are "How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically," and two booklets, both in their second editions also from Modern History Press. The booklets, "Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers" (https://bit.ly/LastMinuteEditsII) and "Great First Impression Book Proposals" (https://bit.ly/BookProposalsII) are career boosters in mini doses and both make ideal thank you gifts for authors. The one on writing book proposals is also available as an Audio Book. "The Frugal Editor "(https://tinyurl.com/TheFrugalEditor), was recently released in its third edition. It is the winningest book in this series for writers.  

Carolyn also has three frugal books for retailers including one she encourages authors to read because it helps them understand what is needed to convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is "A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques" (https://bit.ly/RetailersGuide). In addition to this blog, Carolyn helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at https://TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com. She also blogs all things editing--grammar, formatting and more--at "The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor" (https://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com). Learn more and follow it to get news on her new releases directly from Amazon at https://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile.

Winning Writers Celebrates Its 2024 #NorthStreetBookPrize Winners

As you my visitors and subscribers might know, I love to pass along resources that benefit  authors in ways beyond what the usual services and opportunities offer. As a writer with a retail background (writing books entails retailing/selling, too!), I tend to call these “extras” value-added benefits and given the scams out there that plague authors,  I can only hope that they come to rely on these #TheFrugalBookPromoterTips. 

WinningWriters.com’s #NorthStreetBookPrize is one of those.  That might seem unnecessary, but early on I followed the newsletter Jendi Reiter put out for this organization. It was (and is) primarily a list ov vetted contests and by that I mean contests judge on the prizes they offer, their prestige, the reasonable price they “charge”--even some free ones--and more! Winning Writers has built such a reliable network and they are likely to come cross anything that doesn’t fit their standards for “ethical” early in the game. 

As a poet myself, I am featuring their winning poetry book for 2024 in this post announcing the winners for 2024, a veritable launch full of books for your 2025 reading list.  Something to suit everyone in genres across the spectrum. Find the celebration on WinningWriters.com today, Feb 15.  and start your plans to enter the 2025 competition right now with your Work-in-Progress. You’ll be amazed at those “value-added benefit” the contest authors as well as a friendly, knowledgeable support system that comes to you when you subscribe to their newsletter and will also keep you informed so you don’t miss the deadlines.  Oh! and Jendi’s newsletter, too. You’ll find enough places to let your work be seen without having to worry about scams.  Read on for information on a lovely poetry book from Stephen Pollock to start the year with!  

MORE ABOUT STEPHEN POLLOCK AND HIS “EXITS"

Stephen C. Pollock is a poet, essayist, physician, academician, business executive, and inventor.  He is the author of the poetry collection Exits, which was awarded First Prize for poetry in the 2024 #NorthStreetBookPrize.  The twenty poems in Exits were written and edited over a period of twenty years.  The poems in Stephen C. Pollock’s poetry collection Exits explore the beauty and frailty of life, the cycles of nature, and the promise of renewal and formatting the book required an additional two years.

In addition the the North Street Book Prize, Exits has been honored with the Gold Medal for poetry in the 2023 Readers’ Favorite International Book Awards, the Silver Medal for poetry in the 2024 Feathered Quill Book Awards, and the Bronze Medal for poetry in the 2024 EVVY Book Awards, all to accolades like this:

                 “Exits has profoundly impacted the literary world.”

                  ---Midwest Book Review

"Pollock's poetry is brilliant"
— Kristiana Reed, editor-in-chief, Free Verse Revolution

"Exits exemplifies the musicality of language"
— Camille-Yvette Welsch, Foreword-Clarion Reviews

"Full of wit, insight and provocative imagery, Exits is a masterful collection.  The formal poems are the best.  Some are sonnets as artful as any by Shakespeare or Ben Jonson."

                — Anthony Aycock, IndieReader,  

Steve’s professional career was a play in two acts.

 

Trained as a physician, eye surgeon, and neuro-ophthalmologist, he was recruited to Duke University as Chief of Neuro-Ophthalmology in 1987.  He ultimately achieved a rank of Associate Professor with tenure.  He has published 30 peer-reviewed papers and book chapters in medical literature.

 

After seventeen years in academic medicine, Steve left Duke to become chief executive of CEC, a nationwide company that provides vision benefits to individuals and their family members.  He retired from the company in 2019.

 

Though not an engineer, Steve has always had a penchant for designing novel devices.  As a medical student, he collaborated with another student in the development of a unique variable-focus lens.  Steve drafted the patent and the associated illustrations.  In 1984, the Patent Office granted U.S. Patent 4,477,158, Lens System for Variable Refraction.  

Learn more about the poet and his other act at:

 

Website:  exitspoetry.net

 

Universal Book Link:  https://books2read.com/u/b5qK6O

 

Buy His Book on Amazon:  https://www.amazon.com/Exits-Stephen-Pollock/dp/1957638680/ref=sr_1_1?crid=59QO7F4Q1KWQ&keywords=exits+stephen+pollock&qid=1688221554&s=books&sprefix=exits+step%2Cstripbooks%2C75&sr=1-1

 

MORE ABOUT THE BLOGGER 

 Carolyn Howard-Johnson is the multi award-winning author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning #HowToDoItFrugally Series (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BTXQL27T/ ) of books for writers including "The Frugal Book Promoter" (https://bit.ly/FrugalBookPromoIII), and "The Frugal Editor" both offered in their third editions by Modern History Press. Others in that series are "How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically," and two booklets, both in their second editions also from Modern History Press. The booklets, "Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers" (https://bit.ly/LastMinuteEditsII) and "Great First Impression Book Proposals" (https://bit.ly/BookProposalsII) are career boosters in mini doses and both make ideal thank you gifts for authors. The one on writing book proposals is also available as an Audio Book. "The Frugal Editor "(https://tinyurl.com/TheFrugalEditor), was recently released in its third edition. It is the winningest book in this series for writers. 

 Carolyn also has three frugal books for retailers including one she encourages authors to read because it helps them understand what is needed to convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is "A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques" (https://bit.ly/RetailersGuide). 

In addition to this blog, Carolyn helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at https://TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com. She also blogs all things editing--grammar, formatting and more--at "The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor" (https://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com). Learn more and follow it to get news on her new releases directly from Amazon at https://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile.