Cameron J Quinn

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Forming a Habit

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 In October I joined a 30 Day Writing Challenge,

run by two Story Grid editors, Valerie Francis and Rebecca Monterusso. To anyone out there who write, this might seem odd to do right before NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), and to those of you who don’t you might ask why I don’t already have a daily writing habit. I’ve been at this for a few years now, what’s the holdup?

The answer to the latter is life mostly. Having kids can put a serious kink in even the best-laid plans. I’m finally starting to feel better after having my third baby (a little over a year and a half ago). So it was time to get back into the meat and potatoes of this job and get my stories moving again.

I chose the 30 day challenge becuase there is some science behind it. There are a few books out there on studies that showed if you could stick with something for 22 days you’d successfully formed a habit. So 30 is a safe bet to make a change. It’s not easy, especially around day 15 when fatigue really settles in. But it’s worth it. Becuase I’m now 10x more likely to hit my NaNoWriMo goal. I’ve already gone through the fatigue and have written consistently. I’m excited to work on my story for 30 consecutive days. Who knows maybe I’ll end up with a workable draft instead of pile of poop I have to sort through later.

As of Tuesday the 30th, I will have written every day for 30-days

I haven’t written fiction every day and that’s an adjustment I’d like to make in the future but I’ve so much for my career this month that I’m very happy with myself. By writing every day I’ve made progress in leaps and bounds. Arrested is almost ready for rerelease (my deadline for the draft is 10-31-18). Bite Me Once (my werewolf PNR is well on its way. And I’ve written consistent blog posts and started working on guest blog content for other blogs to lead people back to my nonfiction site. This is all huge for my business. Both author wise and Book Launch Coach wise.

In November, I’m going to start a new daily habit

Now that my career is on the right track, I’m going to make a change for my health. I started running a while back and I was posting to Instagram every day when I got up at 5 am before the run and after the run, I was posting to a fitness group. After losing 15 lbs in a week (I still had and have a lot of weight from my pregnancy) I hurt my foot and could barely walk around let alone run. So I stopped and its been nagging at me ever since.

Trouble is, our elliptical is in the basement and with fall comes cold cold weather and I know myself well enough to know that I will not go down in the cold basement at 5 in the morning (or earlier) to run. So instead I found short yoga video’s on YouTube. I created a playlist of 30 videos and I’ll be adding a morning yoga habit to my routine. And I can do them in the livingroom. Next to the pellet stove (but not too close).

Setting myself up for success

Like I mentioned in my Discipline Equals Freedom post, discipline is like a muscle. You have to work it out to keep it strong. When you just start out though, its easy to give up. It’s easy to give in to that little voice in the back of your head that tells you it’s ok to just turn your alarm off and go back to sleep, its OK to skip your work out, or eat an entire box of donuts. Becuase you haven’t built up the strength to push through yet. And everytime you give in to that little voice you weaken your discipline.

I know myself well enough to anticipate that little fucker. So here are the things I’m doing to set myself up for success:

  1. Put my work out clothes right next to my bed:

    If I have to do anything like look for clothes or the video I won’t do it. I love to sleep and the idea of going back to sleep is always incredibly enticing to me. Way more so than being fit and successful (in the moment right after my alarm goes off). So I make sure I have no excuses to stay in bed.
    On the Sunday, I let myself sleep as late as I want. This might help or hurt you so test it out and do what works. But I need that one day to look forward too. And the important thing is that I set the day and don’t let that little voice decided for me in the moment when my alram goes off.

  2. Listen to motivational speeches daily:

    This helps me so much! For specifics check out my post Discipline Equals Freedom. The reason they work for me is I’m the type of person who needs someone to keep me on track but in a not making me do it kind of way. With these speeches, it’s like someone telling me why it’s stupid not to follow through with my goal. It’s hard but that doesn’t matter. That makes it worth it. And sometimes you need a Veteran Navy Seal to put all that in perspective for you. If Navy Seals are not your cup of tea, YouTube has these videos from all sorts of successful people.

  3. Daily affirmations:

    This is a physical way to retrain your brain towards positivity. And I probably wouldn’t have tried it if Tim Grahl hadn’t told us about how it changed his life. I used them to help my son get through a rough patch and I’ve used them to get myself off the couch and back to work. The way it worked for me and Tim was that I didn’t want to be lying to myself twice a day in the mirror. So I started getting my work done. That way at the end of the day when I looked myself in the eye and said “I am a hard worker” and “I am a writer” those statements were true.
    You can use these statements from Zig Ziggler or write up your own. I started out with a list from Tim Grahl’s Productive Writer course and then changed them to fit my needs and wants. Some people only start out with one statement. One thing twice a day that they say to themselves to make a positive change. To help me continue my writing and get this yoga habit cemented, mine for November will be “I am a writer who writes every day” and “I am a health conscious person who does yoga every day”. Simple yet effective. Leave yours in the comments!

  4. Write down my “Why” put it where I can read it every day:

    This is key to helping you get through the bad days of a new habit. Mine for October was because I want to turn pro with my writing and I can’t do that if I don’t write every day. I have a lot of books waiting in the queue and the only way to get to them is to write this one. My why for November will be similar but more personal. I’m creating a daily yoga habit so I can be healthy and a better mom for my kids. It will also help me get more writing done because when you feel good the words flow so much better. At least for me.

  5. Post to Instagram:

    And lastly, I’ve decided to help myself succeed by raising the stakes. If I fail now, all I have to do is not tell you. And then my failure would be minimal and all my own. So I’ve decided to post pictures to Instagram using the hashtag #30daystonewyou. If I don’t post all 30 days, everyone on my instgram and facebook will know I failed. Which gives me a lot of motivation. I hate public failure.  I chose the #30daystonewyou so A, you guys can join in and B, I can reuse it anytime I want to introduce a new habit (Also there are only 14 posts on this hastag right now). My pictures will be of both my word counts and my yoga mat or the video or selfies post workout. My instagram handle is @CamQuinnBooks. Come join me and make a change in your life! My pictures will also be shared on my Facebook page.

What habits do want to create? What changes could you make in your life by resolving to do that for 30 days?

 

Wolves and the Female Alpha

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paranormal romance

The Pack Begins to Form

As some of you may know I’m writing some werewolf books to go with my witch books. Salem Witch was supposed to come out first but I’d like to work with a Story Grid editor and I can’t afford that yet. So I put it on the back burner. As a result, I was working on Starsboro but my inspiration has been for these werewolf books. Well, the other day I gave into inspiration and now I’m well into the beginning hook of this book.

The Research

As with all my projects, I really enjoy the research portion. I wanted to bring something into this book that I haven’t seen before in werewolf books so I started in the obvious place. Wolves. Pack behavior. I’ve heard a lot that wolves are lead by a male alpha and that’s just the way it is. So imagine my surprise when I found a documentary about the wolves reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park where they were using the term female alpha. And Matriarch.

What they’ve observed in the park is that the females actually hold the pack together. Their mates are there to help. In one instance, the female was killed by a hunter (outside the park, sad but legal) and the male was forced out while the rest of the pack disbursed. This blew my mind. One wolf died and the pack ended. Joining a new pack is incredibly dangerous but they didn’t o couldn’t keep it together without her. I thought I knew enough about wolves to write this book but now, with this new information, my mind is racing with ideas.

What It All Means

The premise of my book was that there haven’t been any female werewolves in the last century and the packs were just without females which made it hard to carry on bloodlines (unless you essentially wanted to murder your wife and have a baby more about that in the book). Now though, Everything is going to be very desperate and chaotic. Making the first female in a century an even bigger deal than it was before.

Are you interested in this story? Signup for my email list here and you’ll be the first to know when it’s ready! Plus you’ll get a free book while you wait.

Discipline Equals Freedom

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health writer
Day 1 of my new routine

Writing is a really unhealthy occupation. Unless you make an effort to get a workout or hike in, you’re sitting in front of the computer. Whether you’re writing, editing, or marketing you’re sitting on your butt. And if you have a laptop, you probably have bad posture to boot. It’s not your fault, you’re laptop wasn’t designed with your back in mind. Ya know, or your neck and shoulders.

I wasn’t just missing exercise in my life either

I’ve been struggling to get my work done. Writing was not happening, I was easily discouraged in my book marketing business and I found myself worrying everytime I sat down to do a task that it wasn’t the right one and switching before it was complete. And everyone I talked to said, “You need a schedule” literally everyone. But I had a schedule. I have notifications that pop up on my phone for everything from making sure the kids have breakfast to reading before bed. and I had designated time for writing and other tasks I’m responsible for like doing the dishes and vacuuming. So that wasn’t enough.

How do you fix it? How do you add something to your schedule when you have no time?

New work out
Day 2. I was exhausted but feeling pretty good overall.

You get up earlier. For a while, I was getting up at 5 am and trying to write. I’d end up falling back asleep then feel like shit for not getting my work done. And then I’d be frustrated and grumpy all day because I feel like a failure.

The worst part? I’d done just this, successfully not too long ago. So why couldn’t I do it now?

Fast forward a few months,

I’m driving down to visit my brother in Connecticut and the radio station starts to cut out. I’ve done this drive many times and as soon as Rock 101.1 fades, you’re in for a scanning nightmare. My husband was listening to podcasts in the passenger seat so I asked him to put some on the radio. He asked what I wanted to listen to (He had political stuff on and I can only take so much of that, even if they do make it funny) so I asked to listen to Jocko Willink. I’d heard a piece of an interview with him while I was doing other things and My husband seemed to like him and he’s an author I’d like to work for.

“Do you want to listen to Jocko motivation?”

At the time I groaned. Not really. But whatever. We ended up on an episode of the Joe Rogan Experience after Jocko’s motivation but that stuck with me. The video was Discipline Equals Freedom. People are motivated by one of three things, money, freedom, or fame. I am motivated by freedom. (I mean I want to live on a sailboat so I have the freedom to travel the world and bring my family and house with me).

We listened to Jocko’s bit again on the way home, then they played Joe Rogan’s motivation next and I think Echo’s and by the time we got home, it was decided. I’d start running at 5 am every morning and working until the kids got up.

Enter the resistance.

My husband asked me that night if I was going to get up and run in the morning. I said I didn’t have sneakers. I was tired. If I showered I’d wake up the kids and then I wouldn’t be able to get my work done anyway. Might as well sleep.

My husband wasn’t having any of it. So I found a pair of minimalist sneakers in my closet (I still need to get regular ones for the elliptical) set out my workout clothes and everything I’d need to shower, set my alarm and went to bed.

Good

That night I got no sleep. And I’m a person who needs sleep. But I kept hearing Jocko’s voice in my head.

just do it
Day 3. Literally fighting to keep my eyes open. Took me longer to get on the elliptical but I did it.

“You didn’t get any sleep? Good. When you do it’ll be easier and you’ll appreciate it more.”

“You’re exhausted? Good. Now you know exhaustion isn’t an excuse”

“You didn’t get the job? Good. Now you have time to better prepare.”

“Don’t believe the lies, that little voice in your head that says it’s ok to quit, it’s ok to roll over and go back to be, that’s a liar. Don’t listen to it.”

“Once you give in, you give that weaker part of you, power and then you can’t stop”

“Discipline. Equals. Freedom.”

Just Do It

I was exhausted when my alarm went off. I wanted to roll over and go back to sleep. I didn’t give myself that option. I got up. I put Jocko’s motivation on my phone and I got to work. I did it. And then I did it again at 7 pm. And I’ve run/lifted weights, every day for the last five days. That’s not very long in the grand scheme of things, but since I have been trying to get up at 5 am for about three months, I feel pretty good about it.

The exercise

Healthy writer
Day 4. The first and only morning of the five that was it was easy to get out of bed.

What you do doesn’t matter. Just start moving. Eventually, I’d like to find a yoga class I can go to once a week and maybe join a gym so I can keep up the momentum in the winter. I’m also hoping I can get someone to join me so I have an accountability partner. I know myself and old habits are too easy to fall into.

I decided to share this with you for a few reasons. One, I don’t think anyone wants to be lazy and unsuccessful. But we get stuck in that mode of eating junk (that tastes so good!) and binge-watching shows (that are so entertaining) and we end up letting life pass us by. Even when we want to get better sometimes we need a little boost, a little help along the way. And Jocko’s videos did that for me. So maybe, they can do it for you too.

 

Side Note

I’m a mostly healthy adult in my late 20’s. I have a history of DVT but other than that I’m pretty average. If you’re not, you can still do things to get healthy. Just make sure you ask your doctor and find out what’s best for you. Don’t let something you can’t control, control you. Don’t let that little voice say “That’s nice Cameron, but I’m different.” It’s a liar. Your path will just look different than mine. It’s out there, it just might be harder to find.

 

Witches and Beer?

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I love beer… oh and witch lorewitches and beer

Two of my favorite things in fact! I enjoy brewing ales, stouts, and shandies as well as drinking them so when I discovered a connection between alewives and accused witches of old, I had to delve deeper.

Turns out, there were a couple things at play here. One, people were afraid women with careers wouldn’t want children so some places even banned women between the ages of 14 and 40 from being alewives! Over time, men took over the biz while women with knowledge of how to mix herbs and brewing ales were accused of witchcraft.

Turns out, there were a couple things at play here. One, people were afraid women with careers wouldn’t want children so some places even banned women between the ages of 14 and 40 from being alewives! Over time, men took over the biz and women with knowledge of how to mix herbs and brewing, were suddenly accused of witchcraft.

Prior to the accusations and witch trials that killed thousands of innocent women, it fell on women to produce beer. There’s evidence that beer is one of the only things that got people through the dark ages. I know what you’re thinking. Beer, really? But drinking water was often polluted by waste when it was common to dump.

In the documentary, How Beer Saved the World, they even tested the theory by brewing beer with water from a duck pond. They tested the water before and after the brewing process and found that the process destroyed the micro-organisms and nasty stuff you can imagine is in duck poop.

AND, our whole image of a typical witch, all came from real life alewives. Cats kept the rodents

Witches and Beer

out of the wheat and barley and the cauldrons brewed beer. Naturally, I had to find a way to use this in my Tales from the Salem Grimoire series. You can find Raven, and alewife and Millicent’s descendant in LA Witch. Due to release in 2019.

What I found most interesting was the blatant use of the public’s hysteria to take over a position of power. Strong women were pushed out and even killed for wanting a career instead of babies. I think it’s important to look at current events through a calm and understanding eye. Assume people are good and trying to do what’s best. And allow them to make mistakes but we also need to pay attention. We need to make sure we aren’t starting a new witch hunt.

And for women out there looking at the career of their dreams and worrying you’ll have to choose between work and family. Or that you’ll be judged for not having kids. It doesn’t matter what other people think. This is your only life, do what you want with it.

As a little girl, I always wanted to be a mom. For a while, I thought that meant I couldn’t have a career. But I was wrong. I have an amazing career while being home for my kids. I found a way to have the best of both worlds. You can too. You just have to look for it. And now if you’ll excuse me, there’s an unfiltered lemonade shandy with my name on it.

Salem Witch Trials: Is there Fungus Among Us?

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The Witch Trials in Salem Witch:

For the sake of my story, I decided the witch trials themselves would be the result of my character’s actions. That’s why the beginning of the story has Millicent trying to save the innocent men and women from the angry mob of Puritans:

Millicent stood hunched over towards the back of the crowd. The cheers for death that rose from the those around her filled her heart with sorrow. Her disguise was incomplete without her own voice calling for innocent lives. Still, she couldn’t make herself join the chant. The words caught in the guilt that filled her chest and throat.
She missed her family but she’d be with them soon enough. The people of Salem Village couldn’t be so bloodthirsty as to never come to their senses. Millicent moved through the crowd unnoticed as she approached the hanging tree. The woman looked terrified as she fought to keep a brave face, tears fell from her eyes.

The executioner kicked the stool out from under her feet and as her eyes widened with terror and her legs kicked in search of the ground, Millicent bowed her head and went to work. Making an entire crowd believe they’d seen someone die was no easy feat, even for the most powerful witch in the New World.

The following scenes jump back almost a year before the trials and accusations of witchcraft.

While Salem is most famous for its witch hunt, 12 women had already died as witches in Massachusetts and Connecticut in the 17th century. And the witch hunts overseas in Europe were just starting to die down.

The Actual Witch Trials Were Caused By Something Much less Ominus

I’ve always been fascinated by the darkness in human hearts. From the witch trials to mass genocide and serial murder, there’s something about how far people are willing to go to hurt others that keeps me watching documentaries and turning pages. How could they possibly justify their own actions? With serial killers it’s a whole other ball game of abnormal psychology and a serious lack of Jiminy Cricket’s but what about these girls made them continue acting out even after people started losing their lives?

When I was a teen I was channel surfing, like one did before DVR, and found a documentary about the witch trials. This one claimed a kind of fungus, ergot, may have been the initial cause. Ergot is a fungus that can grow on rye in the right conditions. Conditions like those in 1692 Massachusetts. Dr. Linda Caporael came up the theory and studied the growing conditions prior to the hysteria of the trials giving this theory a lot of validity.

The idea appeals to me for two reasons:

  1. The idea that a bunch of teenaged girls would purposely kill 20 people for attention is incredibly sad yet totally believable. I’d rather blame fungus.
  2. The way they were acting fits with the effects of ergot poisoning. The fungus contains LSD as well as alkaloids which when consumed can cause convulsions, vomiting, muscle spasms, crawling sensations on the skin, and more. All of which were recorded as afflicting the accusers.

The Actual Witch Trials

For those of you who don’t know, the Salem Witch Trials kicked off when two girls, Elizabeth Paris and Abigal Williams began suffering from hallucinations and muscle convulsions (likely caused by ergot in their bread) in 1962. The town doctor concluded witchcraft was to blame. More girls came forward with symptoms and accusations to match. Anne Putnam jr was the most vocal. Eleven of the nineteen people she accused were found guilty.

Over two hundred people were accused of Witchcraft during the frenzy that ensued. Including a four-year-old girl and the oldest was an 81-year-old man (Giles Corey). Over fifty people confessed to witchcraft to stay alive. During the time leading up to the trials, there were a lot of land disputes between families.  While it’s not proven, historians suggest that some of the accusers were using the trials to get the land they saw as rightfully theirs.

24 people were killed

Four people died in prison without being convicted. Two dogs were also accused and put to death. The last to be killed, a man named Giles Corey, refused to confess to witchcraft so he was crushed under rocks. The idea was to place large rocks on his chest until he gave a plea. The crushing took two days and ended with him asking for more weight. The gruesome events of his death shocked the town out of their bloodlust. A suspension of the trials was issued after the crushing.

After the trials and executions, the town people regretted everything. Because everyone was so busy accusing their neighbors of witchcraft, fewer people were taking care of the harvest. Resulting in less food and Salem’s economy took a hit. As a result, the people thought God was punishing them for the murders of twenty people.

In January 1697, the Massachusetts General Court ordered a day of fasting and twelve jurors signed a declaration of regret. It wasn’t until 1706 that Anne Putnam confessed to lying. Historians believe her family told her who to accuse because of a family feud.

If you want to read more about the specific events this page is really helpful with names of victims and accusers as well as a clear timeline.

American History-Making sure Salem Witch Makes Sense

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Researching the 1600’s

Ship, colonies
Photo from Pexel.com

For Salem Witch, because it is essentially a prequel to 9 other books all based on the descendants of it’s four main witches I need to make sure I get the facts straight. I’ve done a lot of research on Kanti (who’s name might change) she’s a Wampanoag woman who’s daughter is sick in the beginning. I found a museum I’m dying to go to, here’s the link, if you’re in the Massachusetts area do it!

But I also have an escaped African slave and I need these people to be able to escape Massachusetts. So I started looking into who else was there and when.

Now to get to the part where I’m annoyed at my education. I was told and over and over and over again about the Pilgrims. And yeah, they were important. I knew the first settlement was James town and I thought it was probably a year or so before the Pilgrims got there. So as I read everything that happened between and around Jamestown and the Pilgrims, I got a little irritated.

The Settlements on the East Coast of North America

So here’s what I found about the order in which North America was settled by the English and the Dutch. And this is just the East coast.

1607: Jamestown is a thing. Settled in the Chesapeake Bay area by the Virginia Company. A lot of these people were indentured servants. They traded a few years of hard work in exchange for passage to the New World and a small piece of land once they’d served there time. There were also African slaves brought over at this point so my African character is completely plausible. (This is both good news and also pretty sad. I realize slavery was and still is a global issue but the first settlement?) Also, this is where Pocahantus lived and the story of the first of the John Smith’s in her life happened.

1609: The Dutch East India company sends Henry Hudson to explore what we know as present-day New York. He founded a colony for the Netherlands, the capital is New Amsterdam. With the Dutch came Dutch ways of building houses and towns. This is where New York’s winding streets and brick homes originated. Brick is still a prominent choice for New England homes.

1611: William Penn, a wealthy Quaker, receives a large tract of land (it pays to be buddy buddy with King Charles II) west of the Deleware River. With Penn’s promises of religious freedom, the Quackers, Baptists, Mennonites and the Amish followed his lead and settled along the river. This will become Pennsylvania.

1620: The Pilgrims finally arrive in Plymouth on the Mayflower, escaping religious persecution in England. There were about 40 of them, Protestant separatists, who sailed with about 62 other people looking to make a new life in the New World.

 1630: John Winthrop arrived with 900 Puritans. The Massachusetts Bay Colony, Boston, was self-governed unlike James Town and New Amsterdam.

So, basically, my history lesson was about 40 people who got here 20 years after people started settling here. Not to mention aside from the weirdly inaccurate retelling of thanksgiving, the native people weren’t mentioned much at all. This was a lot of fun to research and I’m looking forward to investigating that museum and talking to the Mashpee Wampanoag people about their history.
As for my research, my characters are all safe as in it’s plausible for them to exist and I haven’t even gotten to the witch trials yet (1692-93).

Thanks for stopping by! What was the most surprising gap in your education that you discovered later? History has been mine over and over again which is sad because we can learn so much about humanity by studying our past.

If you want to read more about the early 1600’s in American these were the two sites that helped me the most: Met Museum and The History Channel.