Cast Off! It’s Pirate Week and I Am Writing About Pirates

Tags

fiction, pirates Pirates Week, the blue butterfly, the red finch

I am in the process of writing the second book in my time travel trilogy, The Red Finch, which picks up where The Blue Butterfly left off. As I paused to write this blot post I left Jack Donovan on board the Queen Anne’s Revenge about to come face to face with Blackbeard. I didn’t really plan to write that chapter the same week as the famous week in the Caymans, but here it is.

As it happens, I know a little about the festival that annually brings in scores of would be pirates, including Johnny Depp in full Jack Sparrow regalia, to the Caribbean. One of my closest friend, Val Kegel, knows everything about it- she is the ‘tourism ambassador’for the Caymans. View her site at http://www.passengerpicks.com. Apparently there are scores of people who want to hoist Jolly Roger flags, dress up in pirate attire, stage sword fights and drink up me hearties yo ho. (I know this because Val has been posting pics on Instagram and Facebook with the tag line AARRR…)

I will insert here that I am descended from piracy, having traced my family tree on my mother’s side back to Sir Francis Drake. I will also admit to enjoying a pirate movie every now and then, most recently of course the Pirates Of The  Caribbean series.

I am, however, doing research to present Jack’s time travel experience so that it is historically based and not a copy of Hollywood’s interpretation. Blackbeard ruled the open seas and terrorized the Caribbean and the coast of North Carolina during the 1720’s, with flaming braids of rope woven into his famous beard. I am not sure exactly how Jack’s adventure is going. More than any of my other books this series has been character driven. While I go back to 1725 and check on Jack, and figure out where Mollie is going, you can read The Blue Butterfly  and check out my other books at http://www.booksbylynnmurphy.com.

Advertisements

When Blue Butterflies Make Way For Red Finches

Tags

Amazon, author, books, fiction, indie publishing, the blue butterfly, the red finch, time travel

“The rain has stopped and I wake from dreaming of blue butterflies swirling past me. The dream is so real that I think I can feel that now familiar sensation of falling and being pulled  down into a narrowing vortex, that trip across time circles of which which I am never certain how long it will take and where I will end up. At first I think that I am time traveling again….

That is the opening line from the first chapter of The Red Finch, which is the second book in my Time Travel Trilogy. When the main characters’ stash of blue morpho butterflies- the object that has until the book begins made time travel possible, is compromised, they have to find another time travel mechanism. And, at least in the story, it seems that the feathers of red finches have the same capability. (That doesn’t mean that I am giving up the blue butterflies all together. They will still feature in this book and the next.)

As the book begins, three of the time travelers are still lost in the past. I have mapped out where they will visit over the course of this book and have written about fifty pages. My plan is to have it out in time for the Thanksgiving holidays, with a goal to finish the trilogy by early spring.  I still find the concept of time travel interesting and making it seem plausible is a challenge.

I like history, which the students I teach typically claim they do not. One of the things I hope to accomplish with this trilogy is to give the readers a taste of historical facts- just enough about a few events of the past in a way that will encourage them to explore history on their own.  Mollie and Jack will find their way to several more venues as the trilogy progresses, some even more perilous than the ones they have already experienced.

Here’s the cover:

While I follow Jack and Mollie through time, go ahead and check out The Blue Butterfly at http://www.booksbylynnmurphy