I’ll be getting back to it really soon, though I’ll have to set a schedule for a change, rather than the way I used to get this done.

The other day I started reading the rough draft of the sequel, which I have written 10 chapters of, simply because I’ve forgotten what I wrote. It’s almost like reading someone else’s work. The good news is I outlined every chapter months and months ago, so I can easily pick up where I left off.

Wish me success.

J.

It’s a treat to be able to enter into ABNA, not just because of the slim possibility of winning a publishing contract with Penguin Press, but because they’ve made the process so easy and free of charge.

Now I just have to wait and hope for the best. I’d be happy to be a quarterfinalist, thrilled to be a semi-finalist, floored to be a finalist and joyously numb to win one of the two grand prizes.

Meanwhile, the sequel says: “Get back to work.”

1/2 of the sequel is done. The other half may require an evening of cheese pizza and coca-cola. It’s just a possibility.

Wish me luck and success!

J. Parrish Lewis

P.S. You might notice the page design has changed. This is now primarily an author site, with jparrishlewis.com as an added URL. The original TGR site is still all there. Click the “The Goblin Road” in the menu to go to the section focusing on the book.

I hope you’re all living well and enjoying December! I want to thank all of you for your support in the last few months regarding my first book, The Goblin Road, and my ongoing work on the sequel (which here will not be named, lest any mischievous fauns are listening in).

I would like to ask for a few minutes of your time, if you’re willing and able, to help me with promoting the book. What I truly want for Christmas is more people reading the story I wrote.

All I ask is that you pass on this post to everyone you know, with the following links:

THE GOBLIN ROAD EXCERPT (FREE 2 chapters of the book):
Http://www.thegoblinroad.com Click on the download at the corner.

WHERE TO ORDER A PRINTED COPY: ($12 plus shipping costs)
https://www.createspace.com/3384564

WHERE TO ORDER AN ELECTRONIC COPY FOR KINDLE USERS (ONLY $5!)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0030BFX6W

There are also blog posts here on www.thegoblinroad.com that I think you’d enjoy reading.

Thank you for helping me promote The Goblin Road. Most of you know that my dream of being a published author has been floating around in my mind for a very long time. I hope to one day get this book in bookstores, published by a bigger company. Any promotion I do now with your support will increase my chances of someday getting a publishing contract.

If you have not yet read The Goblin Road yourself, check out the free excerpt mentioned above. I’m convinced that the majority of you will enjoy it. The others, who I would normally subject to the dark-hearted pixies of the caves, I’ll still appreciate anyway for taking the time to read the excerpt.

With warm and fuzzy regards,

J. Parrish Lewis
The Goblin Road author
Defender of adventurous Brownies
Arm-Wrestling Buddy of wise, friendly Trolls

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE KINDLE PAGE TO BUY THIS BOOK

Only $5. For those of you on a budget, this is a lot cheaper than buying the paperback. If you want me to sign the book, I suggest the paperback. I could use a Sharpie on the Kindle, but I’m not sure if you want that.

With Trollish Regards,

J. Parrish Lewis

I want to share some little baubles of thoughts with you on a subject that’s only an inchworm’s width away from my heart: Troll Keeping.

If you’ve spent even a few minutes reading J. Parrish Lewis’ The Goblin Road, a true-to-life depiction of my adventure so many years ago (though disguised as a story about my good friend of those days, Ruarc, and his brother) then you know that trolls usually hang around tree gates. Yes, they make them too, and they’re quite good at it–so good, in fact, that they have a monopoly on the job. Usually. I think a few of us brownies can do a decent job, except when I make a gate they’re more fit for anything smaller than a squirrel. But I can put my arm through it, so if I make it a portal to somewhere else, say, the top of a nice apple tree, I can grab a few tasty treats.

But I’m getting off the point here! Which is this, the point I’m getting at: trolls are gatekeepers, but who keeps the trolls?

It’s a well-known fact, or at least it was when I was a young brownie, that any troll worthy of the name is a dreadful housekeeper and cannot prepare a meal worth consuming. Just because they’re super-strong trolls with tough skin and dubious looks (aside from the half-troll Sasja, my lovely friend who is blessed with sprite genes) doesn’t mean they don’t get hungry.

As a result: we brownies and other creatures can be quite helpful at keeping trolls healthy and happy. I like to think now of those cute rhinos and the birds who live on them. Though I’d rather not perch upon a troll’s shoulder, we have a good friendship with these creatures. (Usually, that is: there was one such exception in J. Parrish Lewis’s The Goblin Road, that described a particularly odorous troll that I had hoped would turn out for the better)

I myself spent a fair number of years, a century or two before Ruarc ever stepped his little toes onto the Goblin Road, keeping one particularly quiet troll quite well-fed with apple milk and apple pie, my specialties. It’s not a lot of work, but the reward is immense: have you ever seen a contented troll smile? It’s darling!

So during those years, I came up with a few simple rules for Troll Keeping: The practice of supporting our hard-working gatekeepers (though we never could quite figure out why there were gates in the first place, a mystery solved later on):

Rule 1: An apple will do the trick in any meal. Hot or cold, food or drink, an apple is the ingredient you don’t want to skip, for it pleases a troll to no end.

Rule 2: Larger meals are better than smaller meals. A troll does not diet. In fact, I’m not sure they need to digest. Maybe their magic just keeps them fit?

Rule 3: Watch your fingers. Cousin Bark lost a thumb once, accompanying me. Sure, we eventually managed to re-grow the thumb with some nice little magic, but she was decidedly anti-troll after that.

Rule 4, and the most important: If it’s a cold time of the year, warm foot-covers can be knit for your troll friend. Why let them be uncomfortable? It’s an inexplicable job to be a gatekeeper, but being a troll keeper makes plenty of sense.

Do you part today. Find a troll and see if he needs a keeper. The rewards are heartwarming, my friends!

With sweet regards,

Lichen the Brownie, former Troll Keeper

I’ve been writing short updates there on life, language, random things, and about my progress with writing the sequel to The Goblin Road. The story and the title are under wraps. If you ask, you won’t get any real details. This is mainly because I’ll be tweaking the story as I go. The editing process is going to take a few months after the rough draft’s done. I am currently writing Chapter 7 of the sequel, with an estimate of 24 chapters total for this book.

Friends, Goblins, Country Biscuits- Halloween isn’t too far off. Consider purchasing a copy of The Goblin Road for an unusual Halloween Gift. Who says you can’t give a gift on Halloween? Perhaps one of the trick-or-treaters would enjoy the nice surprise? Also, if anyone decides to dress up as any of my characters, send me a picture, and I just might post it here on the site!

Thanks for your support. Please share the link to this site with others. I could use all the traffic I can get here!

J. Parrish Lewis

You know I, Lichen the Brownie, am not one to blab on and on and on at the mouth about all sorts of things–even if you don’t want to hear it, so much that you have to fold your ears in half and wrap some twine on them–but today I MUST tell you this: pixies are being treated horribly, every day! This isn’t fair!

Pixy-tossing has become a popular sport among the magic-born peoples, in particularly the oh-so-grumpy goblins, who have no problems fending off the Pixy Protectors, equally grumpy fauns who just care about their little pixy friends. These goblins make special trips to the caves just to snatch pixies from their cozy little resting places and stuff them into large burlap sacks. These sacks chafe your skin! It’s horrible! I know, from experience, having spent an night or two testing out a burlap sack hammock and thereafter deciding against it. Brownies need to protect our skin, you know, and keep ourselves looking splendid.

And so do pixies. Ok, I admit. They aren’t the most pretty little things you ever did see, but they are so full of laughs and they’re always trying to hug you. I’d hug them back, but they’re so clumsy with their sharp claws that I keep getting scratched! I know they don’t mean to do this. Pixies are always up for fun games, like playing tag. They’re always IT, trying to catch me, but I’m LICHEN! I’m a BROWNIE! (Sorry Cuzzie Moss) Brownies, especially ones as nimble as I am, are fast!

Pixies have tried all kinds of things to catch me when playing tag, including setting silly little traps. They even look like they have real wooden spikes that snap shut! Really, they do! I think they must love me a lot to go to so much effort, but I’m too good, and I don’t believe in pretending to be caught. That would be a lie! And you know lying would just make my knees quake, and then I couldn’t do somersaults, which is just sad.

But. Back to the point, lovelies! Pixy-tossing is wrong! The competitors grab a wriggling pixy from the scruffy burlap sack, getting a tight grip around both feet, then they all line up–usually on a nice green meadow if there’s a nice green meadow around. Then there’s usually a line of trees a ways off, probably 235 brownie leaps ahead, with some really gnarly branches that stick out every whichway. Leaves are sparse. I’ll say this much in the goblins’ favor–they do pick a lovely scene for a game, even if it’s immoral! Even if it’s just so SO SO WRONG!

Then they bring the largest horse, usually led by the judge. He’s usually a really short goblin, but I don’t know why. Nearly shorter than me! So anydeehoo … the judge will reach up at some point and flick the horse’s ear, and at that point the horse gets pretty annoyed–probably because games are too frequent and therefore his ear gets flicked so often that that ear is starting to get all bent out of shape compared to the other ear–and the horse stomps just once, loudly.

Then the competitors start swinging the pixies around. They get to do three swings before they release in the direction of the trees.

Have you ever heard a flying pixy? It’s a sad thing. They whine, each of them, without fail as they hurtle through the air toward the trees at a speed fast enough to make you want to cup your eyes, but you don’t anyway because it’s morbidly fascinating and the whine is such a weird little drone from these little guys.

Whoever gets his or her pixy to land on the highest branch wins. Ties are broken by throwing a second set of pixies and seeing who can land their second pixy on top of their first pixy. That’s pretty much it. They land with thuds and go quiet for a little while. Goblins usually let them go home after, but I think this is just so they can recover before the next game!

Lovelies! Let’s not allow the pixies to be treated this way any longer! Just make a stand for pixy rights today!

How you can help: We will have a march through the goblin village at midday on this coming Sunday! Bring your colorful clothes to draw attention, bring your singing voices, bring your best goat milk, bring your good cheer to support these misunderstood little creatures.

Meanwhile, study The Goblin Road to learn more about pixies, fauns, and other interesting creatures such as brownies like me. I’m the star, after all, in a very subtle way…

Ta!

Lichen The Brownie, Grand Commentator of BrownieTalk.

In a recent email exchange with Ocean of Deaf Pagan Crossroads, J. Parrish answers questions and shares some of his thoughts about The Goblin Road…

What is your novel all about?

Here’s the synopsis:

“Ruarc and his little brother Aidan are playing knockstones on the floor long after they both should have been in bed when a curious creature of light and flame appears and violently steals Aidan away. His parents injured in the attack, young Ruarc must strike out on a path to retrieve his brother. Armed only with the fantastical stories of his grandfather, he chooses The Goblin Road.

Ruarc’s choice leads him to newfound friends but also through dangerous obstacles and as the Goblin Road snakes through the territory of long-forgotten magical creatures: from loyal brùnaidhs and gatekeeper trolls, to menacing goblins, black-hearted pixies, and worse. As this unlikely hero struggles onward, he will be troubled by doubt. Does he have the strength to meet this road’s challenges? Can he trust in its mysterious architects? Will he live up to Grandfather Uilliam’s expectations? Are the fortitude of friendship and the bond of brotherhood enough to see him through?

This story frightens with its hardships, surprises with its revelations, and entertains with its imaginative universe, but ultimately it tells the tale of the lengths that one stouthearted boy is willing to go to for his friends, for his brother, and for himself.”

How did you come up with the concept for your novel?

Excessive pizza and soda. I went to bed one night after too much pizza and soda and predictably my dreams were bizarre. Just before I woke up, I had a dream with The Goblin Road in it. I decided it’d make a fun background to a story and I came up with the characters that day.

What inspired you to write this novel?

At first, it was just me wanting to turn my interesting dream into a short story. By the end of the first chapter I knew it was going to be a book. At that point, I gave myself a deadline of one month to write the entire rough draft of the book. On the 30^th day alone, I wrote the final 3 chapters.

Who or what would you say influenced this book and/or your writing style for this book (other than that pizza and soda?)

I cannot think of any author’s work that my writing style would resemble. As far as influence, in some ways I’d actually say there are some authors that I enjoyed their work so much that I wanted to avoid writing anything too similar to theirs. I had to challenge myself to not write a story or write characters that felt like I was borrowing from them. In the fantasy genre, Tolkein and J.K Rowling are such excellent storytellers, but I did not want to feel like a copycat. As a result, I had to reinvent new ideas of some popular creatures, twisting them around until they felt original.

What do you consider to be the primary theme or lesson of your novel?

There are several, but if I had to narrow it down, I would say it is that the challenges we face in life are a big part of what makes us who we are. We must embrace those challenges. When things happen to us, even the bad things we are unhappy about, we change in ways that sometimes benefit us by making us stronger or wiser.

What do you want the reader to come away having learned or to feel from reading your novel?

The message I stated above. But aside from that, I would add that sometimes it’s better for us to purposefully choose the harder option, knowing that the easy options don’t help us grow as human beings.

Do you feel this book has a spiritual theme?

To me, life is spiritual. As a result, there are a lot of spiritual issues touched upon, including the afterlife. However, I wrote this in such a way that it doesn’t necessary match my own beliefs or anyone else’s. I reinvented this as well. I don’t believe you can find an afterlife that matches the way I describe it, though I did draw inspiration from various mythologies. Yet this is a story and not intended to suggest any particular truth.

Did your own spiritual beliefs play a role in this book? If so, how?

Yes, in that my spiritual beliefs are important to me and trigger me to want to write about such ideas like the meaning of life and death. Yet like I say, what is told in the story isn’t a reflection of those beliefs or anyone else’s. I let the story guide me, not the reverse.

If I remember correctly, you did mention to me that there is magick in this book. Can you talk a little bit about that – how you define it, and how it is incorporated?

Magic is probably in almost every chapter and is an important aspect in the lives of most creatures you will read about in the book. Without revealing too much of the story here, I will say that in my story there are those who are without magical power of any kind (like most humans) and those who are “magic-born.” I don’t define it clearly in the book, intentionally, in part because that will be an aspect of the sequel that I am currently working on.

Being that you are deaf yourself, are there any aspects of deafness incorporated into your novel?

Yes, but not in the usual way. Although there IS one minor (but important) character in the novel who is deaf and uses sign language, I leave it up to the readers to notice that, without me needing to explain very much. I actually include a lot of descriptions of sounds in the book, which comes from my imagining what I don’t hear.

How did you go about getting your novel published?

This first edition is self-published, which does take discipline and organization to make it happen. Since I am self-publishing until I find a larger publisher, I had to make sure the book got edited, proofread, and that the cover got a design. It’s a juggling act, where I had to learn a lot about what it takes to get a book ready for publication. It would be easy for someone to quickly throw something together and upload it to the printing company’s web site, but I spent 7 months working on this daily to get the quality as good as anything you would find in a store. My wife edited the book, my brother and sister-in-law designed the cover and formatted the interior. We all proofread it several times, including another friend. I wrote chapters and I destroyed chapters, rewriting them until they worked. It was one of my goals to produce a book that I felt would be worthy of sitting on a shelf at the bookstore, ready to be purchased.

What kind of readers do you think (and hope!) will be attracted to your book?

I can tell you right now: all kinds of people. I have already been selling to young and old, fantasy fans and non-fantasy fans, and more. Which is great, because that’s what I was hoping for-a diverse audience. I knew I had to have a focus, so I choose to have my target group be middle school through early high school ages, but I did not want to limit it. It was definitely a challenge.

How successful has this book been so far?

I actually ordered the first 100 copies recently. 52 sold within a few days. Of course, in order for it to be successful in the long run, I will need to promote it any way I can and get bookstores to carry it. For now, most copies will sell through my web site at www.thegoblinroad.com.

What were the biggest challenges in writing/publishing this book?

Accepting my wife’s honest feedback when she felt some elements in the rough draft did not work. I learned to let go and pay attention. In the end, she was absolutely right, and all the revisions I came up with were so much better than my first ideas. Sometimes we have to really just be willing to accept that for the best ideas to emerge, the good ones may need to disappear.

How would you sum up your experience of writing and publishing this book?

It has been one of the best experiences of my life to write the book, from beginning to end. Publishing it is a blessing and something I feel very good about. Promoting the book and selling it is a bigger challenge for me since I have to put aside my hesitation. I have spent most of my adult life trying to become as humble as I can be, and when I talk about my book, I feel like it’s a little bit of ego showing its face. Truth be told, I’d rather see the book sell itself—which means getting it in bookstores.

What advise would you give to someone wanting to write/publish a book?

Just write it. Give yourself a short deadline of one or two months to write the whole book without worrying about anything. Forget grammar, spelling, whatever else concerns you. The key is to get the rough draft finished. Once that’s done, the rewriting is where you polish it into something you feel is presentable. I’m fortunate to have a background in Journalism, so I feel confident with my writing skills and my love for the English language. At the same time, for those who just feel they have a great story to tell, they can write the story and let someone work with them to polish up the language. We can’t let our fears or doubts stop us before we even begin.

Time to wrap up this interview! Anything else you’d like to share, or would like the readers to know about you?

Just that it’s more important to me that people enjoy the book I’ve written and cherish the effort I put into it—I like to keep the focus on the work, not on me as a person.

Autographed copies can be ordered for a short time only by e-mailing jpl@thegoblinroad.com. $12 plus $3 shipping. Paypal or checks accepted.

If anyone would like a non-autographed copy sooner, go to the CreateSpace store:

https://www.createspace.com/3384564

If anyone would like to read a free excerpt of the first two chapters, visit www.thegoblinroad.com.

-Written by Ocean. Please visit deafpagancrossroads.com to view the original post.

Months of waiting to get this book released- a definite test of my patience.

Once it’s ready, I could use everyone’s support to get the word out. YOU can make a difference. Advance thanks for all of you who support me and this project. I can use that to keep me going through the process of writing Book 2. I’m keeping the title under wraps for now!

Let me know how you like TGR once you’ve read it. I’m off to teach Lichen about Facebook. We can only hope this isn’t a mistake.

Thanks,

J. Parrish Lewis