News from the Dynasty

What's up in the Dynasty of Naturion? What's up? What's up in Naturion? What's up with the book? What's up with the Publisher? What's up?What's up with Cheryl Zemke? What's up with the website? and What's new, too?

Page Table of Contents:

Click on Faces to take you to that section or scroll down.

Recent events- Past and Present

What's Up! What's New?

Interviews, Articles and Reviews

Important Dates to Remember

Updates!

What is Operation Desert Swap?

Recent Events Past and Present

I am working on a few more local book signings. Information will be listed on the

site, and all Defenders/Members will receive a NEWS BLAST. If you have not yet

signed up......we invite you to Join.

What is Operation Desert Swap?

As of, September 12th, 2009, I am proud to announce that on I joined 'Operation Desert Swap'. We "are a group of authors dedicated to actively showing our support for the troops".

Each author "adopts" a soldier, then sends them a copy of their book along with a letter. At least once a month, we send "our" soldier a letter and at least one care package during their deployment. In addition we will be sending them a Christmas and birthday card.

This is a great opportunity to help our community get involved in the project too. If possible I would like to get others in my church, my son's school and my family/friends to help out.

I believe that this is a GREAT CAUSE. I am very excited to be apart of it.

If you are an author please consider joining.

Currently we are supporting C company 3/25 Aviation Regiment. These soldiers are a medevac unit also known as "Dust off"

If you would like to donate to this cause please contact me through the Guest Book.

Thank you for your support!

Whats up? What's New?

New Video- Check out Book Videos Page for:

"Memoirs of Authors and Fairies"

New- Authors.Books 2 Read Page Revised

The page was revised, eliminating the graph format and changing to pics of authors books. Click on them to Link to their site and find out more.

New- "Inside the story" for September is complete.

It features, the Trumpfuss (AKA:grass men).

It will be exciting to see who your favorite character is on the poll, next month. So don't forget to vote before you log off. Poll available on sidebar.

Interviews, Articles and Reviews

Online Interview Posting:

Nature Inspires Art and a Novel

Cheryl Zemke Combines Her Two Passions and

Writes Book© Carmen Thomas Jul 13, 2009

During a family vacation, artist Cheryl Zemke and her son are inspired by everything around them and she writes her first novel.

Cheryl Zemke was six months old when her parents started taking her on family camping trips to William Hayes State Park in Irish Hills, Michigan once a year. As she grew up, the camping trips became an opportunity for her to do what most teenagers want to do, get some space from her parents. She’d take those moments away from the tents and explore the area which eventually led her to grow a love of nature.

Along with her love of nature, Zemke loved art. She won art awards as early in her youth as first grade and always tried to work in creative fields. Growing up she admired the artwork of Pablo Picasso and still considers Andy Warhol an influence and artist who was ahead of his time.

Zemke found a way to marry both her passions when she wrote her first book, Defenders of Naturion, published by Publish America on April 6, 2009.

Camping Trip Inspires Book

Naturally Zemke’s love of camping and nature led her to start her own family tradition of camping. She lives close enough to the state park to go more than once a year and it was one of those camping trips with her son that led to the creation of her book.

She brought a sketch book for her son to draw what he saw and it didn’t take them long before they started drawing characters from twigs, rocks and leaves. The creatures are the nature inhabitants and they started thinking of stories to put them in.

It’s like if you went to the woods and everything came to life and not everyone can see them,” Zemke said.

Zemke wasn’t someone who dreamed of being a writer, so the fact that an entire novel poured out of her was surprising. She did the cover art and 22 character drawings. Only 15 made it into the book. She hopes that her book might inspire others to see the beauty in nature.

“It’s incredible what God has provided us,” Zemke said. “You can look at something in nature and see how incredible it is.”

Zemke’s Community Involvement

While Zemke was getting her hair done and talking about her book to her hairstylist, a teacher overheard her talking about her book and invited her to speak at Maybury School for Career Day.

“When I asked if any of the students wanted to be writers not one of them raised their hands,” Zemke said. “By the end of my discussion, some of the students wanted to be writers.”

The incident had an impact on Zemke and a realization that she is unique as a published author in that it wasn’t her life long dream. But she understands she serves as an inspiration to others and she and her family have always been involved in thier community.

“We’re green people,” Zemke said.

They recycle, try to be earth friendly and use the canvas bags provided by stores. Her son, who helped her edit the book and who the book is dedicated too has started an environmental club at his school and volunteers at the Toledo Zoo.

With her art, her book, her family, and her other creative projects, she’s very busy but has still made time to sell items related to her book and has three writing projects she’s working on.

For more information on Cheryl or her artwork, her website also features a new character every month.

Source: Cheryl Zemke was interviewed for this article via telephone on July 7, 2009.

The copyright of the article Nature Inspires Art and a Novel in Backpacking, Hiking & Camping is owned by Carmen Thomas. Permission to republish Nature Inspires Art and a Novel in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

http://www.suite101.com/profile.cfm/carmenthomas http://hikingbackpacking.suite101.com/

Interview by author Monica Gray:

Go to http://www.monicagrayauthor.webs.com/ for more info.

Author Name: Cheryl L. Zemke

Book Title: Defenders of Naturion

1. When did you decide you wanted to become a writer? When I finished writing the book. I am more of an artist and have let the artwork dictate what was going to be in the story.

2. How long did it take you to finish your book? It took me 1 1/2yrs. to write the story.

3. How did it feel when it was finally finished? I felt really excited to have accomplished something so completely, and believe in it so much.

4. How has your publishing process been? The publishing process has been unbelievably quick and full of a wide arrange of emotions.

5. When you pick up a book to read what are you looking for in the story? I look for something that is exciting, adventurous and definitely not bloody and gruesome.

6. What do you think is the most important marketing tool for your book? Word of mouth.

7. What advice would you give someone that comes up to you and says they want to write a book? To just start writing things down, not being concerned of the order of events and linking the parts of the story together. I think that many writers give up because they think that they have to create a story the way it is read. When writing Defenders of Naturion, I actually wrote the last chapter first and worked backwards.

8. Do you have any other projects in the works? I am working on book #2 for Defenders of Naturion, and two other children's books but for different age categories. Additionally I am working on possibly doing artwork for another authors book.

9. Is your book available for purchase? www.publishamerica.com, www.amazon.com and about 25 other online bookstores. To get a listing go to www.bookfinder4u.com.

10. Where can people go to learn more about you and your book? The Official Website for Naturion at http://www.defendersofnaturion.com/

What? Important Dates to Remember

1/20/2009 Submitted manuscript to Publish America (aka PA)

1/22/2009 Publisher said YES to Defenders of Naturion

1/22/2009 Almost fainted from shock of news!

1/29/2009 Signed and sent in contract to PA

2/12/2009 Recieved Author Questionaire have 14 days to send everything back to PA including manuscript, email list, cover proposal and all finished artwork for inside

3/02/2009 Finally everything is off to PA

3/04/2009 Book went to text production department

3/12/2009 Received letter in mail from PA with $1.00 symbolic check.

3/23/2009 Received text file for review. Have 48 hrs. to respond to PA with corrections

3/23/2009 Excited about receiving news, Defenders of Naturion issued the ISBN # 1-60836-937-4

2/25/2009 12:30a.m. Early morning sent in changes

3/25/2009 Received final review before book goes to cover design- another 48 hr review

3/26/2009 PA working on correcting artwork for inside of book

4/03/2009 Received Cover Design back from PA. They did a great job! Very H-A-P-P-Y!

4/07/2009 Surprise! The book is on sale at Publish America website. Placed my first order of books.

5/29/2009 Got a book signing with Border's Express for Aug. 8th.

5/20/2009- Spoke at Career Day for Maybury School In Detroit, Mi.

5/5/2009- Seitz Jr. High Book Club invited to speak at their club.

6/6/2009- Official release date for book

8/8/2009- First Book Signing event at Border's Express

8/9/2009- Book signing went very well!

.... check back for more things to come!

Find me on a number of different websites including www.goodreads.com see Favorite Webs

Updates!

9-09 Joined www.countrykidsmagazine, loaded info and pics on the site, new link on favorite webs page.

9-09 Uploaded articles and info. on my page, at authorsden.com .

9-06-09 Added a Table of Contents to the News from the Dynasty Page. Click on the face next to the item to directly scroll to what you want.

9-07-09 Updates the Glossery of Characters, listed on the Inside the Story pg. (If you see a character missing- please send me a message and I will be glad to add it.)

9-07-09 Updated Fairy Realm Page, adding a Table of Contents. Now you are able to see a listing of what is on the page and click on the star next to the item to get directly to it.

09-07-09 New Inside the Story posted.

09-12-09 New Fairy of the week. Featured are the Fairies of Neopets.

09-13-09 Joined 'Operation Desert Swap'. For more information click on link.

Visited by all 50 States- as of Sept. 08, 2009