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Ronel Janse van Vuuren

Sept books

IWSG Book Club: September 23rd, 2021 Reads!

IWSG Book Club Upgrade!
The IWSG is getting an overhaul. We’re so excited about the changes, so let me just stop here and turn the explaining over to the fabulous Toi! (Toi’s msg taken from club newsletter.)

How to join IWSG and participate in the book club and the blog hop, and the many things for author’s sponsored and hosted through Insecure Writer’s Support Group. Find out here!

A MESSAGE FROM TOI

Hi there, I’m Toi.

Perhaps you’ve seen me around the IWSG community. I’m number 36 on the blogging list, and I’m kind of a ghost in the Facebook group, but I do pop in and out from time to time. I’ve been very active in the IWSG Book Club on Goodreads and have recently been asked to take it over. Fortunately, my wonderful co-mods (Juneta Key and Ronel Janse van Vurren) will be there for support the whole way.

We are so excited to announce the new direction the book club will be taking and hope that you will join us. Before we kick off our new traditions, we’ll have our final discussions about the craft of writing, featuring the titles: Writing Magic: Creating Stories that Fly by Gail Carson Levine and They Called Us Enemy by George Takei and Justin Eisinger. These final discussions, on August 25, 2021, are simply fun poll questions you can answer and then, if you so choose, share your thoughts and or review of the last books we read. Click here and here to join in.  

Starting in September, the book club will now serve as a spotlight of member talent. That’s right. We will be reading, sharing, and supporting the works of IWSG members and hope you will join in the fun. While spotlighting writers, we hope to take the book club in a direction that appeals to readers as well. Even if you don’t have time to read the books we choose to spotlight, you can still participate and spread the love. And just remember, your turn will eventually come around.

We have decided to honor the IWSG and its members in the month of September by featuring two of the group’s anthologies: Tick Tock: A Stitch in Crime and Parallels: Felix Was Here. These anthologies are themselves a showcase of the talent present within the IWSG community. Since many members of the community are only published in the anthologies, this gives those members a chance to be featured.

Each month, we will feature two books from IWSG members, and whether a long-time veteran or a newcomer, your time to shine will come. The co-mods and I will be picking titles from members based on the blogging list. We’ve divided the list into three parts: 1-50, 51-100, and 100+. We will alternate each month which part we choose from, that way we’re not just showing attention to members in one portion of the list.

As the new admin of the book club, each month I will share tips on ways for members to help their books become more searchable, increasing their odds of being featured. The co-mods and I have also come up with some fun ways for the IWSG community to get involved, even if they are not ready to join the Goodreads book club. After the spotlighted books are announced in the IWSG newsletter, we encourage interested members to share which of the books they are excited to try out, the first Wednesday of the month, in their IWSG day post.

The second Thursday of the month will be when we post our group polls. We are even taking suggestions from members about poll topics to feature. The third Thursday of the month will be our #iwsgbookclub check-in, where we head to social media to share which book(s) we are reading and our thoughts at the moment. Finally, the fourth Thursday of the month will be our discussion day. We’ve decided to help connect readers with the IWSG authors by hosting micro discussions- 3 questions dedicated to each book featured; plus, I’ll be sharing additional questions on social media to indulge the avid readers. Even if you don’t have a chance to read the books, we encourage you to join the discussions. We all know how much writers thrive on feedback.

Wow. There are so many new and exciting things coming your way from the book club and I hope you’ll join the current book club members on this new journey. Personally, I am excited to be part of a community that provides so much support and so many opportunities. I can’t wait to see the IWSG Book Club on Goodreads thrive even more as we continue in the spirit of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group.

See you on post day.
Here on September 23, 2021!!

Thanks, Toi Thomas
Author at #thetoiboxofwords etoithomas.com
Founder of Lit Carnivale. For more info, click here.

pegasus

Magic at Midnight by Ronel Janse van Vuuren Magical Pegasi

Magic at Midnight by Ronel Janse van Vuuren Magical Pegasi

Magical Pegasi
Ronel Janse van Vuuren

The idea of the winged horse has captured the imagination since Ancient times.

In Greek Mythology, Pegasus is the only known winged horse. His story is a little tragic, though.

In one version, Poseidon and Medusa got together, she got pregnant and Athena cursed her to be unable to give birth. Perseus cut off Medusa’s head and Pegasus got born – fully grown. Pegasus spent some time on Mount Olympus as Zeus’s bolt carrier and then had some fun on earth with various heroes from Greek Mythology. It’s not clear if he had anything to do with his father the sea god Poseidon, his mother’s Gorgon relatives or the woman who cursed her (Athena, goddess of wisdom). It is clear, though, that he is a winged horse, typically depicted as being pure white.

In another version, he is the offspring of the sea god Poseidon and the Gorgon Medusa but was born of the blood that spurted from Medusa’s neck when Perseus decapitated her. He then stayed in servitude to Perseus until the hero’s death and then went to live with the Muses. Then Athena somehow captured and tamed Pegasus and gave him to Bellerophon so the two could slay chimaeras and other magical monsters together. Until, of course, Bellerophon decided to join the gods on Mount Olympus – Zeus sent a fly to sting Pegasus, Bellerophon got thrown down to earth and Pegasus became a constellation and carried Zeus’s thunderbolts.

Tragic or not, it is still the thing of fancy. So when I read in Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson series that he used “pegasi” as the offspring of Pegasus, I loved the idea of more winged horses surviving since Ancient times. I’ve wanted to use them in my writing ever since, but nothing magical tied me to them. Yet.

Then I got my girls. Libi is half Pinto, half Friesian. Calto is half Boerperd, half Friesian. They have the same father, different mothers, and are the same age.

Magic at Midnight by Ronel Janse van Vuuren Magical Pegasi

Honestly, they do intimidate and frighten me from time-to-time. But so do my chickens. Anyone who says that chickens are meek, never had a flock of the wild things.

Magic at Midnight by Ronel Janse van Vuuren Magical Pegasi

One morning while cleaning the chicken coops, Oliver watching me like I’m messing with his belongings, I realised that my chickens and horses are quite similar: Libi and Calto have to go into a separate camp from the one I’m cleaning or we have a turf war. As I emptied the wheelbarrow on the compost heap, next to what had come from the horse enclosure, something clicked. This is what it smells like when you have pegasi.

And the premise for “Magic at Midnight” was born. I based my winged horses on my own horses and chickens, and also on Caitlin’s actions (she’s the inspiration for Idil in “Magic at Midnight” even though she is a Rottweiler).

I wanted there to be a big change, physical and magical, and that’s why Idil has a unicorn horn on the cover… Though it isn’t strictly folklore, more a figment of the imagination, even WB Yeats wrote about the winged unicorn in his “The Unicorn of the Stars”. Mine is still a pegasus, though.

I’m not going to go into all the magical qualities of the pegasi here (I’m releasing a full folklore and writing post about them on my blog on the 24th of July, if you’re interested in more), but the fact that Idil physically changed means a lot more than is explained in the story itself. I’m sure, though, that my readers have already inferred the deeper meaning.

Do you like horses? And chickens? What about the legend of winged horses? Do you have a favourite story involving any of the above?

My Review of Magic at Midnight on Amazon

Live Book Launch of Magic at Midnight. Take a look!

Magic at Midnight by Ronel Janse van Vuuren Magical Pegasi

About Ronel

Award-winning author Ronel Janse van Vuuren mainly writes for teens and tweens, though she is known to write mythology-filled short stories for anthologies aimed at older readers. Her dark fantasy works, usually full of folklore, can be viewed on her website and on Goodreads.

Ronel can be found tweeting about writing and other things that interest her, arguing with her characters, researching folklore for her newest story or playing with her Rottweilers when she’s not actually writing.

All of her books are available for purchase from major online retailers. Sign up to be notified of new releases, giveaways and pre-release specials – plus get a free eBook – when you join Ronel’s newsletter.

Connect with Ronel online

Twitter: Pinterest: Goodreads: Instagram: Amazon author page:

Ronel the Mythmaker, Website

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